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It was Rusty. “Cameron! Are you there?”
“Yes!”
“The feds are here,” she shouted.
“Tell them to hang on a bit. We’re getting ready to bring up the remains.”
“Will do,” she shouted, and then the voices from above faded.
Church was surprised. “What are the feds doing here? What’s going on?”
“They came to get that box,” Cameron said.
Ken swung his light toward the corner where it was sitting. “I saw that. What is it?” he asked.
“It’s what got her killed,” Cameron said.
Now all three of them were staring at the box.
“What’s in it?” Trudy asked.
“Confederate money, which amounts to so much trash now. A boy was shot up here recently becausesome damn treasure hunter got wind of a treasure and assumed it was gold.”
“Oh my God,” Church muttered. “No wonder all of this is so personal. One tragedy repeating itself for another. Okay, team, let’s get their girl out of this hole and into the light, so they can bring an end to this nightmare.”
So up they went, one by one, leaving Cameron to be the one to secure each container into their lifts. Once the last one was out, Cameron climbed out, too.
Rusty was waiting.
“Hey, honey. My guys have been helping them carry the containers to their van. Some guy named Church said to tell you he’d be in touch tonight to let you know she’d been delivered. I assume you know what that means?”
Cameron hugged her. “That I do. Thanks for bringing out the feds, and unless you want to hang around in this heat, feel free to head back to the house. I need to help them get the box out and then send Woodley’s officer home.”
“What are you going to do about that cellar? It’s going to be a liability nightmare for Ray and Betty now that its location is known. I can see kids prowling around down there just for the thrill of being scared.”
“Already on that,” Cameron said. “I have a construction crew on call. We’ll cut up the old flooring, drop it in the cellar, and then fill it in. It was a grave, and now it needs not to exist.”
“Agreed, and as soon as the rest of the men get back, I’m going to take your advice and go home.”
“There they come,” Cameron said, pointing behind her. “Be careful with yourself and baby Pope.”
“Always,” Rusty said, then turned and walked away.
As Cameron stood watching the red curls bouncing on her head and the sunlight catching fire in their color, he wondered if Brendan Pope had been watching when Meg walked away with her berry basket. Something she’d probably done every berry season for as long as they’d been together.
He would have had no reason to fear for her safety. He couldn’t have predicted or prepared for such an atrocity. And yet it had happened.
All of a sudden, he had an urgent need to get that damn box off this property and be done with all of it. The feds were here. They wanted it. They could go down and get it.
And then a couple of federal agents approached him, smiling. “So, you’re Cameron, Rusty’s husband. We’ve heard good things about you.”
“Not all good, I hope. That would be lies,” Cameron said.
They laughed. “Rusty said you were a pistol. But you’d have to be to catch her eye. She’s one of a kind.”
“Yes, that she is,” Cameron said. “What you came for is down in that hole. There are enough ropes here to tie it off and pull it up from above. But you’re going to have to go down there first to do that.”
One of them shuddered. “Oh hell, I hate caves.”
