LITMIR.BIZ

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Laramie, on a volleyball scholarship. Started out as a psychology major, but after attending a traveling tour of Roman art, I switched majors to art history. Loved ancient art. Those ancient carvings were so raw, so passionate…so unlike anything I’d ever seen growing up in little Chugwater.”

      “What did you plan to do with the degree?”

      “Escape Chugwater. Travel the world, see all kinds of real ancient art, not just pictures in books and on the Internet.”

      He’d never escaped anywhere. Never wanted to. Probably because he’d moved so much as a kid, and traveled over half the globe as a scientist, the last thing he wanted was to escape to somewhere else.

      “So,” he said, mulling over her response, “are you escaping Chugwater?”

      “Almost did,” she whispered. “Still might.”

      She was quiet so long, he figured he’d change the subject. “I love ancient art, myself. Leaf art.”

      She raised her eyebrows. “Excuse me?”

      “I study ancient fossils of plants, especially the period between sixty to one hundred million years ago.”

      She emitted a low whistle. “Now that’s ancient. And I was pretty proud to love first- and second-century art.”

      He smiled. “My area of expertise is the K-T boundary. The era when the dinosaurs went extinct.” He paused. “Typically I stop here unless I’m chatting with scientists or other leaf whackers. I’m accustomed to other people’s eyes glazing over about now.”

      But Bree’s twinkled. “K-T boundary?” she prompted.

      He smiled. “It’s the layer of iridium that indicates that an asteroid—about the size of Denver today—hit the earth, which caused the dinosaurs to go extinct.” Her eyes still twinkled. “So, by excavating fossils from that era, I’m also studying the traces of the K-T boundary and pinpointing when, exactly, the dinosaurs disappeared from the earth.”

      “Wow! Very cool!”

      He grinned. Alicia never got this excited over his work. “Why, thank you. I think so, too.”

      “So, what’s a leaf whacker?”

      “We—paleobotanists and anybody else who joins our excavations—whack rocks to discover embedded fossils, which typically contain ancient leaves. Hence, leaf whackers.”

      “This K-T boundary…where is it?”

      “Sections are all over the globe. The challenge is to find the thread, the link-to-link layers of iridium that prove my theory.”

      Her eyes grew wider. “Does that mean you’ve traveled all over the world?”

      He nodded. “Many places, that’s for sure.”

      She clasped her hands together like a little kid. “You are one lucky guy, you know that?”

      “Lucky to love my profession, yes. But my personal dreams are more simple,” he said quietly. “I’ve seen the big world. I want the smaller one. I want roots.”

      “Not me!”

      “So,” he started, piecing together her dream with her current situation, “when do you plan to see the world?”

      “Don’t know. Right now I just need to get back home…”

      Her eyes moistened and she turned her head away.

      When she stayed that way for several long moments, he got up and headed to the bed. Looking down at her, he reached out, hesitated for a moment, then gently patted her hair. He liked how the silky curls spiraled around his fingers.

      “I’m sorry,” he murmured, not sure why he should be sorry, but wanting to comfort her.

      “It’s been a long day,” she whispered. She slid him a glance, her gray eyes filled with such a gentle sadness, he wondered what exactly she and her “pet” had gone through. And why.

      Were they running from something?

      Up to now, he’d bought her story that they’d been left on the side of the road. After all, this was Colorado, cow—and bull—country. But looking into her eyes, clouded with hurt, he knew, just knew, something more was at stake. Not wanting to dig, or upset her further, he simply stroked her hair, comforting her.

      Minutes later, her eyes closed and she fell asleep.

      4

      “THERE IT IS.” Louis turned off the headlights and eased the trailer down a side street off the main drag of Nederland.

      “Dere what is?” asked Shorty, leaning closer to the windshield as though that would help him see better.

      “In front of us, forty or so feet,” Louie said, jabbing his thumb at the big yellow truck with Nederlander Highlander Ranch in red and blue doughnut-shaped letters on its back doors. “It’s big and yellow and says exactly what that wino said was written on it.”

      “Oh yeah?”

      “Yeah,” Louie said between his teeth. “It’s right frickin’ in front of us or are you frickin’ blind?”

      “Don’t need to get so sensitive, Lou,” muttered Shorty. “I sees it.”

      “Sorry,” muttered Louie, not really meaning it but needing to say something sorta nice so Shorty wouldn’t go all sloppy sad and blow their chance to nab the bull—which meant nabbing a cool half a mil each.

      “Hey, that truck’s so yellow,” said Louie, trying to sound super friendly-like, “it’s like followin’ a moving block of butter.”

      “Yeah, a block o’ buttah.”

      “You and me, Shorty, we were pretty damn smart getting a big black trailer ’cause we blend into the night.” He didn’t really mean that, the part about Shorty being smart, but compliments usually cheered people up.

      “Right now,” Louie continued, sounding as breezy as the winds over the Keys where he’d soon be living, “we’re blending into the night like chocolate frostin’ on chocolate cake. That dude would hafta be glued to his side mirror to realize he’s bein’ tailed.”

      “Chocolate frostin’ on chocolate cake,” repeated Shorty as he took a last drag on his cigarette and flicked it out the window. The burning embers flamed in the darkness.

      Louis slugged Shorty on the arm. “Nice move. Next time, why don’cha set off a flare?” So much for being friendly-like.

      Shorty rolled up his window. “Flare? Wha—?”

      “We’re on reconnaissance. We just found our mark—” Louie nodded toward the yellow truck down the alley ahead of them “—and you toss a lighted cig out the window! How many times I gotta tell ya there’s an ashtray in here! But did you use it? No, better to signal the guy with a miniflare that we’re tailin’ him!”

      “I’ll use the ashtray next time, Lou.”

      “So you’ve said. Now shut up. I’m concentratin’.”

      Louie drove slowly, keeping some distance behind the truck.

      “He’s movin’ awful fast for hauling a bull,” commented Shorty.

      Louis had thought the same thing when he’d seen the truck turn down this side street.

      Suddenly, the Nederlander Highlander truck lurched to the right and parked in a well-lit spot between a scooter and a compact car. Louis did an ultra-smooth glide into a neighboring parking lot, conveniently dark with no streetlights.

      “Primo lookout spot,” he murmured, killing the engine. Damn, he was good.

      They were sweetly hidden in the night gloom.

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