Free Carolyn Jourdan - Nurse Phoebe 02 - The School for Mysteries by Carolyn Jourdan

condition.
    Phoebe crept along in Leon’s ancient little truck, farther and farther into the gloom until she knew she had to be nearing the end of the tunnel. Then she stopped when her headlights illuminated what appeared to be a solid wall of moss-covered concrete in front of her. A moment later she felt something give underneath her.
    She opened the driver’s side door and looked down. She could see that she was sitting on a segment of pavement that was about twenty feet long and separated from the rest of the road by a thin crack at both ends. It was like a truck scale, but concealed.
    There was a low grinding noise and the wall in front of her started to move. A second later, there was light at the end of the tunnel.
    Abracadabra , she whispered, in awed tones. She couldn’t think of anything else to say. The magnitude of this deception stunned her. The level of power, privacy, and security represented by a secret entrance like this was beyond anything she’d ever heard of.
    The world was being turned on its head, again , for the second time in two days. What the heck was going on? And what had she done to be drawn into the vortex?
    Phoebe had no idea who she was on her way to see. It wasn’t unusual for a rural home health care nurse to be dispatched to care for a stranger. The nurses went wherever they were called. Phoebe’s previous work had covered a large, highly dispersed, rural community. But it was odd to not have been given the patient’s name. She’d been so happy to get a job, it hadn’t occurred to her to question it. She’d blithely assumed she was going to see an eccentric musician, but now she doubted if that was sufficient to explain the tunnel gambit unless it was Elvis.
    She came out into bright sunshine on the other side of the high ridge. She rolled carefully along the last remaining bit of paved road that became a manicured pea gravel lane that led up a slight hill. When she topped the rise she was presented with a glorious view. A vast, endless hardwood forest stretched before her, covering the undulations of countless green ridges that, in the distance, disappeared into the world famous blue haze.
    Trees and sky as far as the eye could see. Nothing made by the hand of man disrupted the landscape. That was an increasingly unusual phenomenon these days. Unspoiled panoramas were already nearly nonexistent on the Tennessee side, and now were becoming rare on the North Carolina side, which had historically been protected from overdevelopment by having far fewer roads through the areas adjacent to the Park.
    Two miles to the house , said her scribbled notes. Phoebe continued until the road came to another apparent dead end. She sat in the little truck, not moving. She was facing a pile of boulders at point blank range. They were poised on the edge of a bluff with a tumble of fractured rock typical of the area. Beyond the boulders, the ground fell away for hundreds of feet in a sheer rock face.
    She opened her door and got out.

Chapter  17
    Phoebe stood quietly next to the truck, looking around, enjoying the soft breeze and the splendid view. Then she checked Nick. His breathing and pulse were excellent. His skin was a nice healthy pink except for the left side of his face where he was developing a colorful black eye. He seemed to be recovering nicely. She knew this deep, drugged-induced sleep would be healing for him after all the stress he’d experienced.
    She thought about untying him, but remembered how her ranger friend Henry always held wild critters down until he was certain they were wide awake so they couldn’t accidentally wander into a road or a river or fall off a cliff on account of being woozy.
    With a cliff this close, Phoebe didn’t dare untie Nick. She tugged a corner of one of the blankets loose, though, and rearranged it, draping it over a tie-down so it would keep the sun off his face.
    She walked toward the edge of the cliff, along the row of boulders, and called out,