Project Catchstar: The Claire Everston Adventures

By M. Rodgers

Like Michael Crichton and Andrew Mayne? Then you'll love this fast-paced technothriller, featuring excellent reviews and what one reader called "a heroine who is whip smart, irreverent, and unfailingly brave; spot on research; crisp dialogue...and plenty of cliffhangers..." 

Disgraced at school and betrayed by her former mentor, archaeologist-in-training Claire Everston has been on the run for seven months, desperate to put her past behind her and build a new life.

But now her mentor has gone missing, and a strange undersea discovery has made Claire a target for sinister forces who will stop at nothing to see that Claire's knowledge dies with her.

From the mysteries in the black coral reefs of Hawaii to the secrets of a prized mineral-laden asteroid, Claire must use all of her training and courage to unravel the deadly political and economic agendas that threaten her very existence.

Aided by an ex-Special Forces agent with a troubled past, Claire embarks on a race against time to find her old mentor, clear her name and discover the secret of... PROJECT CATCHSTAR

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mary B. Rodgers
• Release date: Nov 19, 2017
• ISBN: 9781386635987

Book preview

Nothing in life rivets one’s attention quite like the gleam off the barrel of a gun.

That the gun in question was a spear gun and not a run-of-the-mill pistol was immaterial; its proximity, combined with the humorless expression on the face of the man wielding it, assured me that both man and gun would do considerable damage.

I weighed my options. The guy was big—well over six feet—and built like a linebacker. Even if I caught him off guard and managed to disarm him hand-to-hand combat would not end in my favor. So I did what any self-respecting treasure hunter would do.

I threw the treasure at him.

The gold figurine arced through the air on a collision course with the linebacker’s chest. He threw his hands up to catch it, letting the gun fall, dangling from his shoulder harness. His lips twisted as the figurine smacked into his palms; he knew he’d made a mistake, but it was too late. I was already in motion, grabbing my tanks and fins on the fly as I dove into the warm, bubbling water in the center of the cavern.

As I churned beneath the surface, I heard a muffled shout from behind me, but no splash. Good. Ten more seconds, fifteen at most, and I was pretty damn sure that I could lose him. I kicked harder, surging into the wide mouth of the tunnel that marked the cavern’s undersea exit.

The tunnel, an ancient lava tube, narrowed abruptly and forked off in three different directions. My lungs burning, I ignored my guide rope that led down the middle passage and veered into the left one.

Holding my breath for a long time wasn’t a problem; I’d trained for that. But the extra effort I had to expend to propel myself forward, minus fins and one-handed, was wearing me down fast.

A black coral chamber opened up in front of me, its pale fish fleeing before the sudden glare of the dive light at my throat. I shot through it and into the slender passage on the other side.

One submerged chamber down, three more to go.

My head pounding, my body compressed by the enormous pressure of the water, I fought against my oxygen-starved instincts that begged me to open my mouth and inhale. Stinging from the salt water, my exposed eyes manufactured useless tears in an attempt to protect themselves. Already my eyeballs felt like someone had taken sandpaper to them.

Come on, Claire. You can do this. Just a little further…

I passed through the second and third chambers in rapid succession. If memory served, I had one more to go before there would be an opening above where I could surface.

A minute and change. At this level of exertion, I could last another thirty seconds at most.

The tunnel contracted until my shoulders banged against the sides. I’d be bruised tomorrow. My half wetsuit offered some protection, but not enough.

Atavistic stirrings jacked up my heart rate. I never did like being in spaces this tight—always had the irrational fear that I was being digested or something equally unpleasant. Telling myself how absurd that was didn’t help.

Focus, Claire. Just keep moving…

I gripped the bottom of the passage and used it as leverage to pull myself forward. The water pressure lessened as I came closer to the surface.

Almost there.

I entered one more chamber, its walls glowing emerald green. An octopus stretched an inquiring arm out toward my dive light as I sped by.

I dodged her and fought through the last section of the tube, my arms and legs more and more sluggish by the second. My chest felt like a bulldozer was sitting on top of it. I was starting to think I’d misgauged the length of the tunnel when I spotted shafts of light lancing through the sea in front of me. One last set of kicks, and I burst through the surface of the water, sucking in air like an industrial vacuum.

No time to rest. I didn’t know if the linebacker was in pursuit, but I wasn’t taking any chances. I pulled myself up onto the cave floor and lurched through shattered stalactites, wincing as sharp fragments bit into my bare feet. The cracked dome above me tapered toward the back of the chamber where an opening—slight, but manageable—led to another pool of water and an entirely different set of tunnels. Thankfully, I’d charted all of the damn things myself already, although it made me sweat to think of navigating them again with no trail line and no map other than memory to guide me. Vast and complicated, the tunnel network hadn’t been nicknamed The Labyrinth for nothing.

I cursed as I wedged myself and my gear through the tight space that linked the cave’s chambers, leaving behind no small amount of skin from my lower legs in the process. Fading sunlight filtered through the slits in the cave’s ceiling, illuminating the threads of blood that trickled from multiple abrasions on my shins.

Great. Diving in Australian waters—where pretty much everything wanted to poison, bite, or out-and-out kill you—was challenge enough on a good day. Swimming in those same waters while trailing blood was the equivalent of throwing up a neon sign that said, Buffet! Follow the yummy red road! I’d be lucky if I made it back to shore without losing a limb.

I had to chance it. By my watch, the tide had turned fifteen minutes ago. In the next hour, the entire cave system would be fully submerged. If I’d been smart, I would have left as soon as I’d found the figurine.

If I’d been smart, I’d have done a whole lot of things differently today.

I jammed my fins on my feet, checked the oxygen in my tanks, pulled the mask over my eyes, and stuffed the regulator in my mouth. A few precious seconds to shut my eyes and mentally recall the layout below, and I was off.

Somehow, I made it through the Labyrinth and out into the open sea inside of ten minutes. I was feeling pretty good about myself until a long, dorsal-finned shape glided by.

Shit. Seriously?

I tried to calm my swimming so I wasn’t flailing around as much. A steady rhythm was less likely to attract a predator’s interest.

My breathing accelerated as I fought against my rising fear. One life-threatening experience per day was about my limit.

One per year, really.

Again, the long, dark shape cruised by, closer this time.

That’s how sharks zero in on their prey. They have shitty eyesight, so to get a bead on you they track movement and smell. Once they have a good idea of where you are, they start circling, each circle smaller than the last, until their sandpaper skin scrapes against your flesh. They’re trying to make you bleed—makes it much easier for them to hunt you down when you try to get away.

My cuts, although tiny, were more than sufficient already. A shark can smell blood in the water from three miles away, even a drop or two. And this SOB was a lot closer than three miles. It wouldn’t take him very long to pinpoint my exact location.

Damn it damn it damn it.

It swam by once more, so close that I could see one of its flat, unblinking eyes and the jagged stripes that marked its torso and tail.

More good news. A tiger shark. Aggressive as hell and given the prominence of its stripes, a juvenile, which meant it was hungry all the time.

Could this day get any worse?

I was starting to feel like I was trapped in a video game.

I increased my pace, trying to break out of the shark’s ever-narrowing circular swim pattern. Beyond a thick, double ridge of fire coral, I could see the upward slope of beach.

So close.

Just as I crossed the last bit of coral and began my ascent to shallow waters, the shark struck, its long body churning past my legs, its jaws smacking into a section of coral about two feet behind me.

I gave up all attempts at stealth and gunned for the shore. I risked one quick peek over my shoulder. Bits of broken coral and algae swirled around the shark’s snout as it shook itself free from the ridge, its jerky movements indicating its bewilderment at failing to connect with its prey.

That would only buy me a few more seconds, but it might be enough. I redoubled my efforts, legs churning and my shoulders aching with effort as the shoreline currents alternately pulled and shoved at my body. My fingertips scratched and clung to the sandy bottom. I pulled myself to a standing position in the crashing surf and stumbled, my fins now a hindrance. One last powerful surge carried me forward and threw me to my knees at the water’s edge. I rolled onto my side, ripped the regulator from my mouth and spat, my saliva sour with the tang of adrenaline, my breath wheezing in and out of my lungs.

I’d made it.

But I’d thrown away my damn gold.

I pounded my fists into the sand on either side of me. One month of sustained research, two months spent mapping that Gordian knot of tunnels, and now I had nothing to show for it.

As I stripped off the rest of my scuba gear, I peered through the palms that lined an adjacent lagoon. Lucy, my battered old tin can of a boat, bobbed up and down in the smoky green water right where I’d left her. She looked like hell, as always, with a faded paint job and sand dollar-sized patches of rust, but I didn’t mind. I just slapped clear sealant over the rust spots every now and then and called it a day. In my line of work looking like you’re not doing very well is an advantage.

Usually.

I stomped through the sand, dumped my gear at the edge of the lagoon, and cursed out loud. I rocked the poverty image for a reason. Wasn’t tough to do at the moment, given how unlucky I’d been recently. The only bonus was that I was a hell of a lot less likely to attract poachers.

So how the hell had the linebacker tracked me? I’d even been careful to do shore dives, rather than take Lucy closer to the tunnel network. An empty boat anchored out in open water attracted attention, often the wrong kind. People tended to wonder what you were up to, and take it upon themselves to find out

I found that out the hard way when I’d first moved here. I’d found a stash of old coins, marked it, and returned an hour later with full tanks to retrieve it—just in time to watch some asshole speed off with it in his boat, biting one of the gold doubloons between his teeth at me in mockery.

No point contacting the harbor police about the linebacker or my stolen statue. They’d just shrug it off. Harbor police didn’t care for treasure hunters as a rule. They considered us all borderline criminals.

My shoulders and neck ached from the strain of swimming all out for ten very long minutes. I stretched, tilting my head from side to side, and extracted the wisps of hair that had gotten tangled in my necklace. I’d forgotten to take the damn thing off again.

My necklace, a black nautilus shell suspended from a plastic chain, looked exactly like any other cheap trinket that was sold in those crap-by-the-yard tourist shops at the beach. It was actually a flash drive. I’d bought it not because it was camouflaged, although that part amused me, but because it was waterproof—a big plus given my livelihood.

My legs stung as the salt water dried on my cuts. Christ, what a crappy day.

I grabbed my gear, swam out to Lucy, and heaved myself up over the side. Mask, fins, and wetsuit went into the freshwater rinsing tank I’d set up on board. I’d clean everything properly later. The tanks got a quick rinse-and-dry with a ratty towel before I stashed them away.

Pulling dry sweatpants and a shirt over my bikini, I contemplated my next move. Screaming obscenities and burning down a neighborhood or two sounded appealing, but I was weak as a newly-hatched sparrow. I needed food and bed, in that order.

I heated up some canned chowder on my hotplate, wolfed it down, and tumbled onto my bunk. Rooting around underneath, I found my wooden bat and tucked it next to my pillow. In the hour since I’d emerged from the tunnels, there’d been no sign of the linebacker, but I wasn’t taking any chances. My bat might not be as sophisticated a weapon as a spear gun, but I’d found it more than sufficient.

About four months after I’d arrived in Australia, a drunken frat boy from one of the party boats had broken into my cabin while I slept, looking to top off his fun evening with a spot of non-consensual sex.

He left Lucy on a stretcher.

That incident marked the only time since I’d come here that the harbor police were firmly on my side. They’d actually cuffed the son of a bitch to the gurney. And they hadn’t been gentle about it.

I pulled the bat closer to my body. Given my current state of anxiety, snuggling a weapon beat cuddling my pillow hands down.

I jerked awake, rolled out of my bunk, and swung the bat in a wild circle around me, meeting nothing but air. The momentum of my swing sent me stumbling across the cabin. My salt-stung vision was too hazy for me to be able to see much in the predawn light, but someone was in my cabin with me. I could hear him breathing.

Damn it, said a deep male voice. Large hands grabbed my upper arms from behind.

I switched my grip and jabbed the bat behind me like a spear. I was rewarded with a grunt of pain as I connected with something solid.

I jabbed again, aiming lower this time.

My attacker dodged, knocked the bat from my hands, and yanked me back against his torso. Goddamnit Claire, it’s me.

I froze, the heel that I had lifted to slam down on his instep poised in mid-air. I…Joe?

Yeah. He turned me to face him and massaged his gut. Sweat trailed down from his temples. Motherfucker, that hurt.

I smirked at him as my heart rate slowed. Hey. You were the one who insisted that I needed to learn some self-defense maneuvers.

Remind me of this moment when I get my next flash of idiocy, please. He lifted the tail of his shirt to mop his face, revealing a set of tanned muscled abs.

I swallowed hard and looked away, fighting the sudden urge to trail my fingers over that six-pack.

With the exception of the thick ridges of scar tissue that ran down the sides of his neck, Joe was as well-built and even-featured as any upscale catalogue model. He was also funny, charming, and completely disinterested in me.

He’d made that painfully clear when I’d made an ill-fated pass at him out on the docks one night. We’d been talking for a while, the conversation had slowed, and I’d seen something in his eyes—thought I’d seen something, anyway—that gave me the go-ahead to lean in for what I thought would be a passionate kiss.

What I got instead was a hesitant peck on the forehead and an I’m flattered, don’t think I’m not. But you and me—not gonna happen.

My cheeks grew hot with remembered humiliation.

You okay? Not used to getting a DEFCON 1 response from you when I pay you a visit.

I hedged. You know I don’t like getting woken up at this hour. I don’t care what fish is running—

"Didn’t mean to wake you at all. I swing by Lucy sometimes after I come back from night-fishing."

He did?

Just checking in on you, that’s all. Don’t like you being out here all by yourself. I barely peeked in the door when you sprang up and went all ninja on me. What’s got you on red alert?

Nightmares, I lied. Sometimes they seem so real, you know? I picked up the bat, leaned it in the corner and sat down on my bunk. If I told Joe about the linebacker, he’d freak out. I’d have myself a permanent babysitter.

Not that there wouldn’t certain advantages in having his pretty self around—

Huh. Okay then. Sorry about that. His face split in a massive yawn. Been up all night fighting some wily bastard that slipped my line at the last. I’m out. See you at the Anchor later?

Joe’s pride and joy, the Anchor, was hands down the best dockside bar in Port Kinkajou.

Sure, I said, trying to sound enthused.

He nodded, hopped lightly over Lucy’s side into his dinghy and took off at a fast burn, the whine of his Evinrude