Into the Badlands

Susannah yawned and the mug tilted. Alex jumped up and caught it, then lifted the tray to the end table. She slid down in the bed and curled up on her uninjured side.

“I can’t stay awake anymore,” she muttered. “Could you bring my alarm clock down, and set it? For seven?” Her eyes closed. In seconds, she was asleep.

Quickly Alex did a few chores. He shook her clothes out the back door to get rid of the worst of the sand, then put them in the laundry room. He swept the bathroom floor and rinsed away the sand he’d left in the sink. She hadn’t managed to eat much of her meal. He put the leftover food in the fridge and washed the dishes.

Was there anything else she needed? Painkillers. He found a bottle of acetaminophen and set it on the table beside the sofa bed, along with a glass of water. Remembering how weak her left arm was, he removed the bottle’s childproof lid. There was a pen and some paper by the phone. He scribbled a quick note and propped it against the water glass. Gently, careful not to wake her, he pulled the blanket around her shoulders.

The blanket rose and fell slightly as she breathed. She looked soft and unprotected, as if she didn’t have an angry or defensive bone in her body. Tangled, sand-filled hair had escaped here and there from her braid. Alex was surprised by an almost overwhelming urge to trace the pattern of freckles over her nose.

There was no way she was a fossil poacher.

CHAPTER FOUR

ALEX ROLLED OUT OF BED and tugged the top sheet more or less straight before heading to the kitchen. The one-bedroom suite, with its discolored linoleum and chipped porcelain kitchen sink, had been the only place he could find to rent on short notice. It was luxurious compared to his last home. During the months he spent at a quarry in Mongolia, he’d cooked over a camp stove, washed from a metal basin and shared a tent with a variety of six-legged roommates. Sometimes, especially after a few months in the city, he thought that was the best way to live.

He shook some Cheerios into a bowl and sloshed in some milk. The kitchen window faced north, so rather than enjoying a view of the foothills or the badlands while he ate, Alex looked out at a line of beige brick buildings. In the distance, he could see deciduous woods and rolling meadows. A herd of Charolais cattle, as small as plastic toys, grazed in one of the fields, white splotches against the green.

It was nothing like Susannah Robb’s view. Her place was small and comfortable, but sprouting on the edge of the badlands the way it did, it had a feeling of wildness, too. Maybe he could stay put and work in one place for as long as Bruce Simpson had if he lived in a house that didn’t crush him. Or maybe not.

The sun was still low when Alex headed to the museum, fifteen minutes from town. It had been a short night, but he had too much adrenaline in his bloodstream to feel tired. He was glad to see that the staff parking lot was empty. Aware that he might not be alone for long, Alex quickly let himself into the museum, then into the prep lab.

Labeled cupboards ringed the main room, and heavy metal shelves holding bones and rock stood in rows at one end. Most of the space was filled by wide worktables with overhead lamps the technicians could raise and lower as needed. A second room, where skeletons were put together, branched off from the first.

Surprised that more advanced technology hadn’t found its way onto such an important door, Alex sorted through a ring of jangling keys to find the one that would unlock the fossil storage room. This room was larger than the other two. It had to be, when a single bone could be as large as an average human. On the other hand, some of the fossils could fit in his pocket.

Security cameras recorded traffic in and out. The door was kept locked at all times. Individual drawers inside the room were locked and a locked mesh protected specimens stored on shelves. Stealing from this room wouldn’t be a casual affair, but Bruce Simpson thought someone had managed it. The board was clinging to a hope that the discrepancies in the collection were due to honest mistakes.

Alex decided to double-check Bruce’s findings first. He opened one of the drawers of Diane McKay’s samples. They came from a black shale deposit in the Rockies, an area that had been under water millions of years ago, before the earth’s plates had crunched together, forcing it into the sky. Boneless organisms weren’t usually preserved. These gave a rare glimpse into ancient invertebrate life.

The label on the outside said the drawer contained pieces of shale with thirty-five one-inch-long Marella imprints. The drawer looked full. Handling the specimens carefully, Alex counted. Just as Bruce had said, there were only thirty-one. He checked the next drawer, which was supposed to hold eleven Hallucigenia, a cylindrical creature with seven pairs of tentacles.

There were nine.

The Opabinia was the rarest of the Burgess Shale fossils. Seven specimens should be here. Aware of tension he hadn’t noticed earlier, Alex unlocked the drawer and pulled it open.

Six.

It was the same in several drawers that held groups of small fossils. Instead of ten oyster-laden pieces of shale, there were eight. Instead of thirty small brachiopods, there were twenty-five. Someone had been confident that a casual glimpse in the drawers wouldn’t reveal the loss of a few specimens. The brachiopods wouldn’t fill anybody’s bank account, but the Burgess Shale fossils were well worth the risk.

Alex paced away, too angry to continue counting. He’d spent his adult life finding and studying fossils, trying to build an image of a very different world through keyhole glimpses and guesses. Most of the people he knew did the same thing. He couldn’t imagine the greed that let someone destroy that work. Not just anyone. Someone on staff, who understood the harm he or she was doing.

He flipped through the circulation log, checking who had signed specimens in and out of the storage room. He went back days, then weeks. There was no record of the brachiopods or oysters being borrowed, but three people had recently taken out Burgess Shale specimens. Diane, of course, someone called C.W. Adams from the University of Alberta, and one of the lab technicians, who had only signed her first name—Marie. Diane and Marie had signed the fossils back in the same day they looked at them. C.W. Adams, whoever he or she was, had taken several specimens to the university. Would it help to watch security tapes from the days in question? If the images were clear enough to show the actual number of specimens being removed from, and returned to, the drawers—

“What in the hell are you doing?” The voice was loud and angry.

Alex looked calmly toward the open door. “Morning, Charlie.”

“What are you doing, skulking in here—”

“Skulking?”

“The lights are off, there’s nobody here to see what you’re up to—”

“The cameras can see.”

Charlie stopped quivering at the door and stalked into the room. “There’s a system here, Dr. Blake, a rather intricate cataloguing system. Until you understand it, you shouldn’t be here alone. It’s very easy to mess things up and then the whole thing falls apart—”

Surprised by the conservator’s rudeness, Alex said mildly, “I’ve put everything back the way I found it.”

“As far as you know.” Charlie started pulling drawer handles. “Have you locked up after yourself? We have a security system in place—”

“I’m acquainted with the security system.”

Something in Alex’s voice caught Charlie’s attention. He took a deep breath, then spoke more calmly. “Everything seems to be locked.”

“I made sure of it. The board has asked me to do an inventory—”

That set Charlie off again. “Why didn’t they ask me? It’s my system. I don’t want people in the lab when it’s not open. That’s asking for trouble.” He tilted his head toward the door. “Ready to go?”

Bruce had warned Alex that Charlie tended to be territorial. He’d been running the lab for so long he seemed to forget it wasn’t his personal property. For now, Alex was willing to keep the peace. “I’ll have to continue the inventory, though, so prepare yourself for regular company.”

As he stepped out of the storage room, Alex nearly bumped into a woman just outside the door. His hands reached out to steady her. He took in, at a glance, blond hair twisted into a chignon, smooth, tanned skin and curves apparent even under a lab coat.

“My fault,” she said, a little breathlessly. “I was eavesdropping. What a horrible job they’ve given you. Can I help?”

“I appreciate the offer, but I don’t want to take you from your work.” Alex realized he was still steadying the woman, even though it was no longer necessary. He dropped his hands and took a step back. “I saw you at the staff meeting yesterday. I’m afraid I don’t remember your name.”

She held out a slender hand. “Carol Hughes. I’m a technician here in the lab.”

“Would you have time for coffee this afternoon?”

She smiled. “I’ve got lots of time. For coffee, for a sandwich, for a few days in Bermuda.”

SUSANNAH’S EYES JERKED OPEN. Bright hot midmorning sunlight filled the house. She wasn’t in the loft—she was on the living room sofa bed. She lay still and sifted through jumbled impressions, trying to sort out what had happened.

Blake. Alexander Blake had happened. He’d pulled her out of the sinkhole, he’d brought her home, and he’d tucked her in. She groaned softly at the memory. Never let the competition tuck you in.

While she’d slept, Susannah’s bruised shoulder had set like cement. Painfully she pulled herself up in the bed. Sand sprinkled from her hair onto the sheet when she moved. Under the bandages, scabs had formed on her palms, stiffening her hands. She edged her legs over the side of the bed and flicked off the metal clips fastening the tensor. Her ankle was vividly colored. Shades of purple, blue and red spread out like a sunrise.

“I made a mess of yesterday,” she muttered to her toes. “Why did I let him get to me?” She knew how to get along with colleagues and employers, even if they were difficult. She never acted on impulse. Maybe never was pushing it. She rarely acted on impulse, precisely because she messed things up when she did.

Her clock radio sat on the end table, calmly beaming the time—ten-fifteen. The alarm hadn’t gone off. She was more than two hours late for work, she could hardly move, and she had enough sand in her hair to bury a brontosaurus.

She saw the note first, then the water and the open bottle of pills. Thankfully, she shook two tablets into her hand and transferred them to her mouth, lips against gauze. She needed both hands to manage the glass. Even then, she nearly dropped it.

The note was next. Large sprawling letters covered the page.

Dr. Robb,