Before Ethan could respond, the cavern shook.
A deep mechanical groan rolled through the chamber.
One of the pumps had failed.
Water began pouring across the floor.
Victor shouted at his men.
"Shut it down!"
They rushed toward the machinery.
Ethan ran the other direction.
He knew the tunnel.
He knew the exit.
But as he climbed, the water rose behind him.
The mine began collapsing.
Stone fell from the ceiling.
Ethan pushed forward.
Then a beam struck his shoulder.
He fell.
Cold water rushed around him.
He tried to stand.
Couldn't.
His leg was trapped.
For several seconds, panic took control.
Then he remembered his father's words.
The water remembers the old path.
Ethan looked at the current.
The water was flowing toward a narrow channel.
He pulled his leg free and let the current carry him.
It pushed him through a submerged passage.
He surfaced inside another tunnel.
He crawled toward the light.
When he finally emerged outside, dawn was breaking.
He was bleeding.
His camera was gone.
But he still had the notebook.
And now he knew the truth.
Victor Hale had known his father.
And whatever happened fifteen years ago might have been connected to Red Mesa.
Ethan rode home.
But he didn't tell Nora everything.
Not yet.
Because there was one question he couldn't stop thinking about.
Why had his father died believing someone would eventually come for the water?
THE FIRE AT CEDAR RIDGE
The attack came two nights later.
Ethan woke to the smell of smoke.
He jumped from bed.
Outside, the barn was burning.
"Horses!"
He ran.
Flames climbed the wooden walls.
June screamed inside.
Ethan broke the door with his shoulder.
Smoke filled the barn.
He moved through it by memory.
One horse.
Then another.
He cut ropes and drove the animals toward the opening.
June refused to move.
Ethan grabbed her halter.
"Come on!"
A roof beam cracked.
He pulled.
June finally charged through.
They escaped seconds before part of the roof collapsed.
Nora stood in the yard with a rifle.
"I saw a truck."
"Which way?"
"East."
Ethan looked at the fire.
His jaw tightened.
"They're trying to scare us."
Nora shook her head.
"No."
She pointed toward the house.
"They left something."
Inside the kitchen, a note had been nailed to the wall.
SELL THE RANCH.
Ethan tore it down.
Beneath the note was another message.
YOUR FATHER SHOULD HAVE LISTENED.
Ethan stared.
Now he knew.
His father's death had not been natural.
Or at least, not entirely.
He drove into town before sunrise.
Sheriff Mercer met him at the station.
"You need to hear this," Ethan said.
Mercer listened.
Then Ethan showed him Samuel's notebook.
The sheriff read it carefully.
"I can get a state investigator here."
"How long?"
"Two days."
"We don't have two days."
Mercer looked at him.
"What do you mean?"
Ethan told him about the mine.
The pumps.
The underground river.
Victor Hale.
The sheriff sat back.
"Do you have proof?"
"Not anymore."
"Then we have a problem."
Ethan looked through the window.
"What if I get it?"
Mercer studied him.
"Then I'll arrest him."
"Even if he has lawyers?"
"If the evidence is good enough."
Ethan nodded.
He knew what he had to do.
That afternoon, he contacted an old friend of his father's.
Dr. Miriam Foster was a hydrologist who had studied the region decades earlier.
She arrived that evening.
After examining Samuel's maps, she became visibly shaken.
"Your father was right."
"About the aquifer?"
"About everything."
She pointed to the underground diagram.
"This isn't just a water source."
"What is it?"
"A pressure-fed aquifer."
"Meaning?"
"If Red Mesa continues pumping at this rate, the underground pressure will collapse."
"What happens then?"
"The wells around Cedar Ridge could fail."
"And the river?"
"It could disappear permanently."
Ethan looked at her.
"Can we stop it?"
"Yes."
"How?"
"We need to shut down the pumps."
"Then that's what we'll do."
Miriam hesitated.
"It's dangerous."
"So is losing everything."
That night, Ethan, Nora, Miriam, and Sheriff Mercer prepared to enter the mine.
But someone betrayed them.
As they approached the eastern ridge, headlights appeared.
Dozens of them.
Red Mesa trucks.
Victor Hale stepped out.
Behind him stood armed guards.
"You should have sold," Victor said.
Ethan looked at him.
"Why did you kill my father?"
Victor's face changed.
For the first time, the confidence disappeared.
"I didn't."
"Then who did?"
Victor looked toward the sheriff.
Mercer raised his weapon.
Victor smiled.
"Ask your sheriff."
Ethan turned.
Daniel Mercer stood motionless.
Then he lowered his gun.
Nora whispered:
"No."
Mercer looked at Ethan.
"I'm sorry."
Ethan felt the world tilt.
"You?"
Mercer shook his head.
"Your father found out about the water. He wanted to expose them."