Capture the Crown (Gargoyle Queen #1) -Jennifer Estep Page 0,10
and no strong emotions jumped out at me. Everything was normal.
I shuffled along behind Penelope and the other miners, heading toward the main checkpoint. The domed ceiling tapered down, morphing into a much smaller square shaft that was only about thirty feet high. Before they reached the shaft entrance, every miner stopped at a table where a man was sitting and shuffling through documents.
He was a large, bulky man, with thick arms and a round stomach that was slowly giving way to fat as he advanced into middle age. He wasn’t wearing a helmet, and his dark brown hair was oiled and slicked back from his forehead. His eyes were also a dark brown, as was the bushy mustache that adorned his upper lip like a trapped fuzzy, woolly worm, but his skin had the unnaturally pale look of someone who had spent more time underground than above it. The Ripley snarling gargoyle crest was stitched in black thread over his heart on his gray coveralls, marking his importance—Conley, the head foreman, and my top suspect.
Conley was one of the few people who had access to the entire mine, as well as the neighboring refinery, and if anyone could make shipments of tearstone disappear, then it was him. Especially since Clarissa—the second, or under, forewoman, the one who had died in that supposed accident—hadn’t been replaced yet.
Conley checked each person’s name off on his master list and handed them a small paper map indicating which section they would be working in. As I neared the table, I reached out with my magic again, this time focusing solely on Conley.
Gotta get more production out of Shaft 5 . . .
Can’t believe that idiot Horace broke another pickaxe . . .
Wonder if Wexel will be pleased with the latest shipment . . .
That last thought caught my attention. Who was Wexel? On the face of things, there was nothing truly incriminating about Conley’s musing. Sending out shipments was one of the foreman’s responsibilities, and it was only natural that he would be concerned about what his customers thought about their goods.
That thought skipped away in Conley’s mind and sank like a stone in a pond, but others sprang up like weeds to take its place, mostly about what he wanted for lunch—grilled pumpernickel bread piled high with red-pepper-crusted turkey, melted Swiss cheese, crunchy kale coleslaw, and extra onion dressing. He even pictured the bulging sandwich in his mind, and the image was so tempting that my own stomach rumbled with anticipation.
I could have probed a little more, but Conley might have sensed my magic. Most people didn’t notice when I skimmed their surface thoughts, but trying to hear someone’s deeper, more serious and private musings took much more power, skill, and control, and the person could sometimes feel that something was wrong, like the difference between a mild spring breeze ruffling their hair versus a cold winter wind chapping their cheeks. So I decided not to take that next step into Conley’s mind. I needed to keep a low profile until I was certain that he was the thief.
Penelope stepped up to the table and jerked her thumb at me. “Okay if Gemma and I stick together again today?”
Conley’s gaze slid down Penelope’s body, even though she was covered from head to toe with her helmet, coveralls, and boots. He leered at her before giving me the same slow, disgusting once-over. His lust bloomed in my mind like a sickly sweet rose, each lascivious thought scraping against my skin like a sharp thorn, and I had to grind my teeth to keep from snarling at him.
“Yeah, sure,” he drawled in an obnoxious baritone, and slid a map across the table. “You’re in Shaft 4 today.”
Penelope reached for the map, but Conley covered her hand with his much larger, beefier one. He leered at her again, then started stroking his index finger over her skin.
Penelope tried to smile, although her expression twisted into a grimace, and her anger, frustration, and fear sliced into my mind like daggers. Conley had done this same thing to her every time we’d gone down into the mine. When I had asked her about it yesterday, Penelope had said that she needed her job too badly to tell Conley to stop.
“Shouldn’t we get to work?” I said in a loud, pointed voice, trying to pry Penelope out of his clutching grasp.
Conley’s bushy eyebrows shot up. “I decide when you get to work, girl.”