“See? Not broken.”
Cat’s EMT helped her to stand. The other woman reached for Nevada and clung to her.
“I can’t believe we went through that today,” Cat murmured. “We could have been killed.” She gazed at Nevada. “We should go back to my hotel and rest.”
Nevada slowly disentangled herself. “I don’t think so. Tucker, could you find someone to take Cat back to her hotel?”
“Sure.”
He waved Jerry over and told him to drive Cat back to her hotel. Cat protested, but eventually allowed herself to be led away. The EMTs went back to their truck.
Charlie walked over to Tucker and glared at him. “You should know better. She was standing too close.”
Nevada shook her head. “Don’t yell at him. It was my fault. I got distracted.”
“Is that what you’re calling it?” he muttered.
Nevada glared at him. “Don’t start with me.”
“You were kissing her.”
He hadn’t meant to say it, but the words came out before he could stop them.
Charlie blinked at them both. “Excuse me.”
Nevada sighed. “It’s a long story.”
“I have time.” She looked from Nevada to him and back. “But I thought…”
“Me, too,” Tucker growled, not liking anything about this. In theory, the girl-on-girl thing was appealing. But not so much when one of the girls in question was his girl.
“Oh, really?” Charlie grinned. “How was it?”
“Different.”
“Different good or different bad?”
“Are you asking for yourself?” Nevada raised her eyebrows. “Cat’s entering her feminine stage.”
“She’s not my type and I’m not interested. Just curious.”
Will hurried over to them. “Boss, you gotta come see this. When they blew the side of the mountain, a whole bunch of caves were exposed. There’s gold in them. Statues and art and stuff. It looks old. Indian, maybe.”
“Mayan,” Nevada and Charlie said at the same time.
“The Máa-zib tribe,” Tucker said, wondering what had been unearthed and how much it was going to delay construction. Surprises like this were rarely good news for the contractor.
“Can you take her to the trailer?” he asked Charlie.
“Hell, no. I want to see it, too.”
“You heard them—I’m fine,” Nevada said, walking toward the crowd. “How is this discovery going to mess everything up?”
“We’ll have to find out. It depends on where it is and what will happen to it.” He studied the blast area and the people swarming over the side of the mountain. If any more earth gave way, they were all going to fall.
“We have to get the area roped off,” he told Will. “We’ll need security.” Not just for safety purposes, but if there really was gold… He swore. Nothing about this was going to be easy.
“It’s at the far end of what’s going to be the parking lot,” Nevada pointed out. “That’s good. Maybe the caves are past the property line. Then it wouldn’t be your problem.”
“I’m not feeling that lucky.”
He put his arm around her. “Still okay? No headache or bruises?”
“I got a little banged up hitting the ground,” she said. “Otherwise, I’m good.”
They reached the base of the hill. Before they could climb up, a car drove toward them. Tucker recognized it and the older woman climbing out.
“I received a call,” Mayor Marsha said as she approached. “We have ourselves a situation.” She glanced toward the crowd on the hillside. “They can’t stay there. The ground might not be stable.”
“I’ll get my men out.”
“Good. I’ve already called Chief Barns. She’ll post her people around the area until we can figure out what’s going on.” The mayor drew in a breath. “Is there really gold?”
“That’s what I’m hearing.”
“Because a giant vagina wasn’t enough,” the mayor mused.
“At least the gold will be a distraction,” he offered.
“If you do your job and make the vagina go away, we won’t need a distraction.”
“Oh, right. Good point.”
NEVADA LEFT WORK EARLY. Between the press, the police and interested people from town, the construction site was a busy mess. She would tackle what she had to in the morning. In the meantime she wanted a hot bath and some quiet time to process her new, complicated life.
While the tub filled, she kept having flashbacks to the last time she’d used it. That had been during her night with Tucker, the one that had curled her toes more than once. The man knew what he was doing, she thought as she climbed into the water. If the sex had been half that good ten years ago, she might have tried arm wrestling Cat for him. Not that winning would have made a difference. He’d been obsessed with the artistic beauty.