I was remiss...I meant to share an excerpt from
JUNGLE OF DECEIT
Chuck had gone ahead to check the trail one last time. It was almost a relief to have him out of her hair. Between him and Wes, their disapproval of her intended destination was stifling. It wasn’t as if she was crossing that barrier—that unseen line where people had gone missing over the past few years. No, they would be a good forty miles from the sector labeled
No Man’s Land on Chuck’s map.
Alex would never jeopardize the safety of her crew, particularly considering most were college students, too young to know any better on their own. Maybe she was barely ten years older than most of them, but it might as well have been a lifetime. Youth was something that fascinated her, but she felt a strange disassociation with it.
Again Alex’s gaze returned to the photographer. He swiped a hand through hair made darker by perspiration. The hair was nice to look at, but her focus was on that hand. Big and scarred with nicks. A man’s hand.
That rogue thought spurred Alex to slam down the trunk of the Jeep. The sound drew the photographer’s attention her way and she met his eyes.
Midnight blue.
They reminded her of the ponds that provided sanctuary from the rigors of this dig. Cloistered by palm fronds, those small bodies of stagnant water discharged curls of steam on sultry mornings. Each pond was a temple to her. Each a retreat.
And Mitch Hasslet’s eyes looked exactly like the dark shadows at their depths.
Alex jerked her glance away. Maybe the move of their camp would improve her sudden treacherous thoughts. Yes, of course it would. A new challenge in an uncharted jungle. Land that no archeologist had covered.
Well, she couldn’t say that was true.
If an archeologist had—they never returned to tell about it.
JUNGLE OF DECEIT