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‘Who else?’ Sophia said from beside Stikes.

The former officer nodded. ‘Considering that there’s absolutely nothing in this part of the desert that would be of value to man or beast, they’re the only people I can think of who would have a reason for coming out here.’

‘But we don’t know they’re in the country,’ Brannigan said from behind Meerkrieger.

‘And we don’t know they’re not. Chase has proved very adept at getting around the world unnoticed.’

‘Good for him,’ said Larry loudly. Eddie’s father was seated towards the back of the cabin with the mercenaries, under guard. The man next to him had standing orders from Stikes if the prisoner made a nuisance of himself, and he carried them out by driving an elbow hard into Larry’s stomach. The older man curled up in pain, gasping for breath.

‘We know they left Switzerland,’ Stikes continued, dismissing the interruption, ‘and they didn’t return to the US, so it’s highly probable that they’re here. Wilde apparently has some sort of inbuilt direction finder, after all. And they have a very strong incentive to find the meteorite before we do.’

‘You’d better hope they haven’t,’ Warden said, with an undercurrent of threat.

Stikes concealed his look of derision until he had turned away to check the view ahead. The volcano was rapidly growing. His cold eyes scanned it, searching for anything standing out against the barren rock…

‘There,’ he said. ‘There they are!’ He pointed, indicating his find to the pilot, who turned the helicopter towards it.

Warden leaned forward to look. A small block of colour was visible on the mountainside: a vehicle. ‘Land as close to it as you can,’ he ordered, then addressed Stikes. ‘Will you be able to find them?’

‘Tracking is one of my specialities,’ the Englishman told him smugly.

The pilot brought the helicopter into a hover over the small plateau, its downwash whipping up a storm of dust and grit that buffeted the parked 4×4. He brought the aircraft down with a bump. ‘Right,’ said Stikes, addressing the members of the Group, ‘I think it will be best if you all wait in the chopper until my men and I find Chase and Wilde and locate the meteorite. It should—’

‘We’re not going to sit here baking in this thing,’ said Warden firmly. The pilot was in the process of shutting down the engines; once the cabin’s air conditioning was switched off, the temperature in the enclosed space would quickly become intolerable. ‘I want to be there to see the stone the moment it’s found.’

‘So do we,’ said both the Bull brothers simultaneously. The others agreed, even the elderly Meerkrieger undeterred by the prospect of negotiating the rough terrain.

‘As you wish,’ Stikes said. ‘In that case, if you’ll follow me…’ As Warden picked up the case holding the statues, the mercenary leader made his way down the narrow central aisle to his eight men at the rear. ‘Everyone arm up and move out. Remember that in no circumstances is Dr Wilde to be killed. Anyone else who might be there is fair game — except Chase. He’s mine.’ He reached past several parachutes on a rack to push a button, and the broad rear ramp lowered to the ground. ‘All right, let’s go.’

He strode down the ramp, the Group members — looking obviously out of place in the raw natural environment despite their newly bought expedition clothing — and Sophia following. The mercenaries pulled back tarps and collected their weapons and survival gear from behind the ranks of seats, then marched after their leader, two of them pushing Larry between them.

Gleaming Jericho drawn, Stikes checked that the Land Rover was empty, then surveyed the steep and barren landscape. There was nobody in sight.

But he spotted a small depression in the blanket of stones covering the ground. On its own it would have meant nothing, but near it was another, and another…

A trail of footfalls, leading away from the 4×4 up the volcano’s side. Two trails, in fact, one lighter than the other.

Sophia recognised his curling smile of triumph. ‘You’ve found them?’

‘I have,’ he replied. He called out to the others, ‘This way!’

They set off up the slope, Stikes leading the pack like a foxhound.

Eddie had eventually found two promising spots on the meteorite to plant his charges, and was now carefully traversing the top of the great rock, looking for a third. If the explosives shattered it along its natural fault lines, the combined blasts might have more chance of pulverising the separate pieces.

It was a long shot, though. So Plan B would have to come into effect, and even that had a major flaw — one that he only had to look up to see. If the worst came to the worst, people could descend on lines from the top of the crater. Considering the Group’s resources, if they found the place it wouldn’t take long for them to realise that.

And he was increasingly thinking there was no ‘if’ about it. They had already triangulated the meteorite’s general position based on the bearings taken in Japan and Switzerland, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that the plane he had seen was carrying out reconnaissance. Finding the Temple of the Gods was a matter of money, material and manpower, and the Group had all three in abundance.

He dismissed the grim thought as he spotted a wide crack in the meteorite’s surface, deep enough to swallow his entire arm. That should do the trick.

It would take a few minutes to rig the detonator and place the explosive. He glanced at the towering temple, seeing the flash of Nina’s camera from the second tier. ‘Might have bloody known she’d wander off,’ he grumbled, before raising his voice to a shout. ‘Oi! I’ll only be a couple more minutes — come back down!’

On the temple, Nina heard him, and reluctantly waved to show her agreement. There was still so much more to see; as well as the statues, the walls were inscribed with more Atlantean texts: accounts of the builders’ journey across Africa and how they had constructed the temple despite the extreme conditions.

But now nobody would ever know their story. The temple was well within the fifty-yard blast radius Alderley had mentioned, so blowing up the meteorite would bombard it with debris, smashing the statues and shattering the ancient records behind them. She would be the only person ever to see the hidden wonder of the lost civilisation close up.

She knew the sacrifice had to be made, though. Taking one last picture of a statue, whom she took to be Eupraxia, the goddess of well-being, she headed back to the narrow flight of stairs.

By the time she returned to the ledge, Eddie was out of sight on top of the meteorite, lying down to push the primed explosive as deeply into the rock as possible. She aimed her camera upwards, trying to get as much of the temple as she could into frame with the mouth of the crater high above…

A sound caught her attention. A soft scuff, like someone stepping on gravel.

She moved across the temple’s front to the tunnel entrance. Nothing but darkness was visible. She listened for several seconds, but the noise didn’t recur. Dismissing it as just the breeze shifting grit on the floor, she turned away, lining up her photograph again—

Crunch.

The same noise, louder, closer.

She whirled — and saw Stikes emerge from the lava tube, his gun pointed at her. Behind him, other faces came out of the shadows, all equally unwelcome: Sophia, Warden, the other members of the Group. And Larry, held at gunpoint by an unsmiling mercenary in desert combat gear.

‘Dr Wilde!’ said Stikes with malevolent brightness. ‘We can’t go on meeting like this.’

‘Eddie!’ Nina yelled. ‘They’re here, they found us! Set off the—’

Sophia rushed past Stikes and slammed a gloved fist against Nina’s jaw. The blow knocked the redhead to her knees. She spat out blood and whipped up one leg, trying to plough a retaliatory strike into the other woman’s stomach, but Sophia neatly sidestepped the attack and drove a boot into her chest. Nina let out a choked gasp of pain.