Point Blank

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POINT BLANK
    A Jove Book / published by arrangement with the author
    Copyright © 2005 by Catherine Coulter.
    All rights reserved.
    No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.
    For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,375
    Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
    ISBN: 0-7865-8044-5
    JOVE®
    Jove Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,375
    Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.JOVE is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.The “J” design is a trademark belonging to Penguin Group (USA) Inc. To Anton We’ve got a winner here. Thank you for being who and what you are, and thank you for being mine.
    POINT BLANK

CHAPTER 1
    WINKEL’S CAVE MAESTRO, VIRGINIAFRIDAY AFTERNOON
    RUTH WARNECKI PAUSED to consult her map, even though she’d read it so many times it was worn and stained from use, with a smear of strawberry jam on one corner. Okay, she’d walked and crawled down this twisting passage exactly the 46.2 feet indicated on the map. She’d measured it carefully, just as she’d measured all the distances since she climbed down into that first offshoot passage at the end of the cavern’s entrance. A narrow and twisty passage, smelling strongly of bat guano, some lengths of it so low she’d had to crab-walk, it had finally flattened out. So far the distances had matched those on her map to the centimeter.
    At this point, there should have been a small arched opening directly to her right. She focused her head lamp some eight feet up to the top of the cave wall then slowly scanned downward. She didn’t see an arch or any sign there’d ever been one. She went over the directions again to this point, rechecked the distances, but no, she hadn’t screwed that up. Again, she shone her head lamp on the cave wall, moved back and forth at least three feet in both directions. Nothing. She was in the right spot, she knew it. Ruth rarely cursed when she was frustrated. She hummed instead. And so she hummed as she began to glide the palms of her hands slowly over the wall, pushing inward here and there. The wall was limestone, dry to the touch, eons of sand filming over it. Nothing but a solid cave wall. She was disappointed, but she knew that was a fact of life for a treasure hunter. Her old uncle, Tobin Jones, a treasure hunter for fifty years, and something of a mentor to her, had told her that for every authentic treasure map, there are more fraudulent ones than illegal aliens in California. Of course that was because every fraudulent map was a treasure in itself if it sucked in the right mark. Problem is, Tobin had said with a shake of his head, we’re all suckers. But that, he’d always believed, was better than those idiots traipsing over an empty ballpark or a beach with their metal detectors, looking for nickels. Actually, she used metal detectors, had a portable one attached to her belt along with two more flashlights. Yes, she understood all about fake treasure maps, but she’d really been excited about this one. All her research had led her to believe it could be the real deal. Even the age of the paper, the ink, and the manner of writing tested out—about 150 years old.
    But there was no arch. She felt the crash of disappointment again and kicked the cave wall. There was always frustration, and it wasn’t as if she hadn’t been taken before. There were the two fraudulent maps that had sent her after the guys who’d sold them to her; they’d known she was a cop, the morons. Then there was the Scotsman who sold her a map of a cave not a quarter of a mile west of Loch Ness. She should have known better, but he was so charming she’d believed him for one delicious moment. She shook her head. Pay attention. This map wasn’t a fraud, she felt it in her gut. If there was gold here, she intended to find it. If there wasn’t an arch, maybe it had crumbled and filled in over the long years. Yeah, right. She laughed at herself, an odd, creepy sound in the dense silence. What an