Page 75 of Just My Luck

Of course. They were taking Rory to a boat.

His mind raced. If they leaned hard enough on Rory, they might find out about the Crystal Collective. If that happened, every single person in that forum would be at risk. Tanaka would hunt them down, one by one.

But Rory wasn’t on that boat yet.

He turned to Robert, who he deemed the most physically capable among this crew of nerdy scientists. Robert also would know the most about navigating these cliffs. “Can you get me down to the shore in one piece?”

“Yeah bruddah. You need the right shoes, either that or go barefoot.”

“Hiking boots okay?”

“Better off without. Too clumsy. It’ll be hard on your soles, but you’ll have better grip.”

Without hesitation, he toed off his boots, which he hadn’t bothered to lace up. “Then let’s do it.”

“Wait!” cried Zara. “What are you doing?”

“Rescuing Rory. He did the same for me enough times. All this is my fault. I’m not going to let him suffer for it.”

“But—” She looked around the group desperately. “Just you? Shouldn’t we all go? You don’t even have a gun. We should wait for your security team, hike back to camp and contact them⁠—”

“No time. We can’t let Rory get on that boat. This is on me.” He handed her his boots. The ground under his feet was cool and slightly damp from the morning dew. He tried not to think about the centipedes. “And I don’t need a gun.”

“Why not? They’re probably armed to the teeth!”

“I’m not going for a shootout here. That would be idiotic. I have a plan. I promise.” He held her gaze. Her honey eyes swam with tears. He turned to Mathilda. “Do you trust me to handle this?”

Looking numb from fear, she nodded.

“Okay then. Let’s go, Robert.” Robert had already taken off his own boots. His brown feet were wide as a hobbit’s, and Lincoln guessed that his soles were much more callused than his own. He’d grown up on an island made from lava, while Lincoln was more used to grassy lawns.

Didn’t matter. He owed Rory this.

He wished he had time for more of a goodbye with Zara, but a sound from the shore sent adrenaline rocketing through him. He recognized it as an outboard motor. Were they deploying a Zodiac to pick up Rory from the shore? If so, he needed to get down there fast.

He shared a quick, burning glance with Zara. She’d have to fill in the blanks, but that wouldn’t be hard. He’d told her everything last night. Her silence had told him plenty too.

Then he followed Robert across the scrubby grass and over the cliff.

37

“This is a shortcut,” Robert grunted, as he lowered himself onto the first tilted slab of black rock on the other side of the edge. “Those guys probably took the long way around because it’s easier, and they had a prisoner to wrangle. I’ve climbed down this cliff before. There’s a pool halfway down that fills up from the waves. Makes a nice bathtub. Just step exactly where I step, and don’t fall off.”

Easier said than done. The lava made for a rough surface, and it was hard to determine what would be a good handhold and what might crumble away to the touch. He watched how Robert moved and tried to imitate the way he tested each step before he committed the weight of his body to it.

Robert was a big guy, both taller and heavier than Lincoln, but he moved with a smooth grace and control that Lincoln couldn’t begin to attempt. He was happy just to stay on his feet, or at least not tumble willy-nilly down the cliff.

“Forgot to mention, better say a quick prayer to TūTū Pele,” Robert said after they’d made it a few yards down. “This is her realm.”

“The volcano goddess?”

“The goddess of fire, volcanos, lightning, wind. She created all this. It was molten lava a thousand years ago. Show some respect.”

“Gotcha.” Maybe in his old life he would have scoffed at the idea of taking a volcano goddess seriously. But now, as he trusted his life to the support of the hardened magma, he muttered, “If you please, TūTū Pele, please allow us to reach the bottom without killing ourselves. My purpose is worthy.”

Robert grunted as he made a crouching leap onto a piece of pahoehoe lava, the smooth kind, the size of a banquet table. He turned and waited for Lincoln. “This is the hardest part right here. There’s a crevice you gotta jump over. Don’t miss or you might end up in a lava tunnel. Ain’t no getting you out of that.”

Great. A lava tunnel. Lincoln glanced down to the shore and saw the Zodiac zooming toward the beach. It looked like a raiding party, it had so many gun-wielding military types onboard.