The Secret Sister by Elizabeth Lowell

Author:Elizabeth Lowell [Lowell, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Romantic Suspense, Thriller
ISBN: 9780060511104
Google: Pmjr6ytkCikC
Amazon: B001A80KGA
Barnesnoble: B001A80KGA
Goodreads: 36197
Publisher: Avon
Published: 2005-11-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 28

Cain ducked back underneath the lintel and into the alcove. Moving quickly, no longer worried about accidentally damaging something, he strode along the low wall at the front of the room block. He stopped at each doorway to stare into the dark recesses.

Only once did he step into the darkness. When he came out a moment later, there were potsherds in his hand.

“They cherry-picked the entire site,” he said harshly. “I guess they didn’t think this was worth taking out.”

The sherds joined perfectly, becoming the painted bowl of a ladle. Even with the handle missing, it was a handsome piece.

He tipped his palm and let the pieces slide to the floor. She started to object, but when she saw him wipe his palms on his jeans as though he’d touched something unclean, she bit back her words. He had a bone-deep contempt for Jo-Jo and all she stood for. Everything she touched.

Looking at the wreckage of beauty, so did Christy. A child’s selfishness was one thing. This was adult.

This was criminal.

Jo-Jo, why?

But the cry was only in Christy’s mind, echo of a past when anything had been possible, even an unselfish Jo-Jo.

I never really knew her.

Now I never want to.

And that hurts me more than it does her. Nothing has changed. Except one thing. I’m through letting her hurt me.

It’s finished.

With tears burning the back of her eyes, Christy watched Cain climb up a short, irregular stairway of rubble to the second story of the building. The rooms were even smaller there. Some of the walls were smoke-blackened. Every space was bare. Except for a broken clay mug and a few rough, tiny corncobs preserved perfectly in the dry air, the rooms had been looted to their floors.

Operating from instinct and experience gained in the exploration of a hundred ruins, he picked his way to a block of rooms that formed a right angle to the line of the original building. He stood there, staring down at the remnants of a small plaza in the crook of the L-shaped structure.

She paced him on the ground level. As she stepped over a low wall onto the floor of the plaza, there was a low, hollow groan, as though she had stepped on a ghost. She jumped back, more in surprise than fear.

“Stay put,” he said quickly. “There’s probably a kiva under that debris. Don’t trust the roof to hold your weight.”

She skirted the little plaza, peering into gloomy corners. When a metallic glint caught her eye, she eased a little closer.

If he hadn’t already told her about Anasazi underworld myths, she might not have recognized the square black hole in the plaza floor as an entrance. A few inches of aluminum ladder stuck up out of the hole.

“There’s a ladder here,” she said.

“Wait where you are.”

Using one of the thick vigas, he swung down off the roof of the room and walked toward her, skirting the level area that was a kiva roof of uncertain strength.

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