“My friend had some footage he’d already designed,” Elle said. “He tweaked it to look more Incan, and then I filmed Patricia while she was gushing over the mummy. I sent the footage to my friend and he inserted her in the stuff he already had. It’s rough—it wouldn’t stand up to examination of any kind. But if you sent it from one phone to another, it would look genuine.”
?
??Just to be safe,” Julia said, making the shocked faces shift back to her, “we thought it would be best if Gran could also produce a piece of gold as evidence.” She took a deep breath. “So I went through her contact list and hit upon a local dealer. He has a small, genuine Incan gold statue we can use. He’s holding it for me here in town.”
“When did you arrange that?” Joe asked.
She blushed, thinking about how she’d spent most of her time since arriving in Cusco. “I called from my room, before I went to the chapel last night.” She tapped her iPad and an image of a small golden llama appeared on the wall. “I can get Gran to dirty it up and tarnish it a little. Right now it looks too polished to have been living in a cave for centuries. Gran’s an art expert; she’ll know what to do to make it believable.”
“The dealer sent photos and we inserted it in the video we made,” Elle said. “That way we can point to it in the footage, to prove it’s real.”
“You borrowed a solid gold antique?” Callum was clearly sceptical.
Julia shuffled as she stared at her iPad. “I, um, bought it.”
“What?” Elle snapped. “I thought this was some shady loan thing. I didn’t realise you’d bought the thing.”
“You have that kind of money?” Ed said.
Julia cleared her throat. “I called Rachel and asked her for a loan.”
There was a stunned silence.
“Let me get this straight,” Ryan said. “You called the Queen of Darkness and asked her to buy you a gold statue? One you intend to hand over to a cartel boss. And she said yes?”
“I told her Gran would reimburse her. I would have asked Gran, but I didn’t want her in on the plan.”
Ryan held up a hand. “Stop. I’m still stuck on the part where you dared to call the Queen of Darkness.”
“Stop calling Rachel that,” Callum said. “She’s one of the partners, and that makes her your boss. Have some respect.”
“Plus,” Elle said, “she’ll buy a voodoo doll with your name on it if she catches you saying it.”
“Enough,” Callum growled. “Let’s get back to business.”
“So,” Julia said, “the plan is to use the film, and the statue, to lure Esteban into a trap. A trap where we take Alice and leave him with nothing. We figured he couldn’t bring his whole army to a meet, and we would have a better chance of dealing with him outside his fortified compound. Basically, we were trying to even the odds and give you a chance to snatch Alice.” She stopped talking and shuffled self-consciously as she waited for their verdict.
Callum looked at each of them. “What do you think?”
“I don’t think we should do this. I think we should keep searching for the treasure,” Ed said. “I know Esteban. This is too much of a risk. Too many things could go wrong if he finds out we’re trying to con him. With the gold in our possession we have a much stronger bargaining position.”
“But what if we never find the gold?” Elle said. “Alice doesn’t have forever.”
“Even as things stand, we’re still in a position of power,” Ed said. “Esteban wants the mummy, and Patricia, very badly. He’s already put word out on the street of a reward for their whereabouts. We can use his desperation to buy more time.”
Joe rubbed a hand over his face. “I don’t know, Ed. You saw what they did to Alice and the fact she knows who her captor is, doesn’t bode well for her. I think Julia and Elle’s plan could work. It could take the pressure off Alice and divert interest away from Patricia.” He looked at Elle. “What did Patricia tell Esteban when he called this morning?”
“I have the recording,” Elle said.
Callum nodded for her to play it, and a male voice with a heavy Spanish accent filled the room.
“Do you have the mummy?” It sent chills up Julia’s spine.
“No, but I’m close. I know where it is. We only need to get it.” Patricia sounded every bit as anxious and afraid as she must have felt.
“Not good enough, Ms. Matthews. We agreed on three days.” The voice was ice.
“I did the best I could. I can’t go faster. I need more time.”