Sandra Hill - [Jinx] by Pearl Jinx

it.”
    “Will you go?”
    “Where?”
    “The Red Zone. After all, it’s your fault she’s turned to a sad life of boob barin’ and hiney shakin’.”
    “Aaarrgh! Lily does not work at The Red Zone. She’s a student at Penn State, studying to be an architect.”
    “Are you sure about that? Maybe she was so devastated by your jiltin’ her that she quit school.”
    “Our breakup was mutually agreeable.”
    She snorted her opinion. “You know, if you burn your tail, you’ve just gotta sit on the blister.”
    “I think Tante Lulu is having a bad influence on you.”
    “What? I can’t get ideas on my own?”
    “Here’s the deal, Gram. No Red Zone. No matchmaking. You stop bringing up Lily, and I’ll help with the project. I’ll even think about opening up Spruce Creek Cavern to the public.”
    She nodded.
I better hurry on over to Lily’s apartment in Julian and warn her that Mark thinks she’s a stripper. Oooh, boy!
    Up bat-shit creek without a paddle . . .
    “Don’t you laugh. Don’t you dare laugh, or your pretty little ass is going to be sitting right down here in the bat shit with me.”
    Claire laughed anyway.
    And wouldn’t allow herself to relish the fact that Caleb thought her ass was pretty. Or little.
    Caleb had slipped up to his calves in a pudding-like mixture of mud, bat guano, and slimy critters. His boots made sucking sounds as he lifted himself back onto the hard dirt path.
    “It’s barely noon, and already everything has gone to hell in a handbasket.” Caleb threw his hands up in the air and stomped away, up the steps, through the corridor, flipping the bird to Sparky along the way. Outside, he yanked off his paper mask and waded into the stream, where he jiggled one foot, then the other, to remove the goop from his boots. He was wet to his thighs when he joined her up on the arched bridge overlooking Spruce Creek, about forty feet wide at this point.
    Claire had just arrived in the cavern after spending several hours studying the Franklin journal. Even with the temporary lighting strung along the corridor of the cavern and down into the first chamber, there was a sensation of total blackness and silence. Otherworldly. Now, back outside, the sunlight blinded her, and the chatter of birds and the ripple of the stream seemed almost raucous.
    “It’s not that bad . . . your progress so far,” Claire said. “In fact, all things considered, you should be very happy.”
    “How so?” He glanced at her, then leaned his elbows on the bridge rail. When he did, the muscles on his back bunched.
    Good golly! The man was gorgeous. He wore a long-sleeved denim shirt tucked into jeans, which were tucked into heavy boots. His hard hat with carbide light was still on his head, same as hers, and work gloves hung from a back pocket. He hadn’t shaved this morning, so there was a slight stubble of beard. All in all, he looked like one of those construction worker calendar models . . . the Diet Pepsi guy, but better.
    She shook her head to clear it of her inappropriate thoughts. “That journal that Abbie and Mark showed us this morning ratchets this enterprise up another notch or two, I would think. Not only will you be making history here, but chances are there’s more treasure to be found than the pearls. Even with a one-third cut, you could hit the mother lode of treasure hunts.”
    “Yeah, but this is no longer a simple project. We’re going to have to build a walkway from the path through the mud and bat shit, over to the wall. Not an easy job when trying to avoid damage to those crystal stalagmites rising from the floor, or hitting our heads on the stalactites hanging from the ceiling. And snakes . . .” He shivered. “I must have flung a dozen of those buggers out of my way this morning.”
    “Sparky’s kids, no doubt.”
    He pinched her arm for razzing him. “My luck that Sparky’s a superstud. Anyhow, Famosa and Mark went into Tyrone to get some precut planks. We can get to work