“The perfect amount,” she shoots back tartly, darting to his side to thread her arm under his. The sides of their bodies brace against each other in a million-year-long line from shoulder to ankle.
It’s good to feel the fossil heavy in her hands. Good to have something to take her mind off his thighs, tensed like hardwood against her own. Her breast brushes the outside of his arm. He twitches like he’s been stung by a bee.
Even essential touch feels somehow loaded. Volatile.
The second they set the fossil into its crate, they step briskly apart. Griff glances back and forth between them, one eyebrow cocked at a disconcerted angle. Cara smirks openly.
Smithson looks away. “I have a conference-planning meeting scheduled, if you won’t be needing me?”
“Do me a sport and grab Cara an extra bag of plaster before you go?” Griff asks, filling a bucket from the hose. Smithson heads for the shed.
“Do me asport? Did you make that up?” Cara sticks her tongue in her cheek.
Griff thinks for a moment. He’s been challenging himself to come up with new ways not to say no.“If I make anything up, it’s because you like it.”
“Oh, go away,” Cara says, blushing and flapping her hands at him. He grins and obeys.
Ripley wipes her hands on her shorts. The storm prep looks good, but she’s never left the dig during a weather event before. Only the investigation could’ve persuaded her to take a trip.
She didn’t think she’d care this much about what Will was doing, but that was before she read his abstract. It’s hard to be sure his find is the same species as hers when she only has a wing and Will’s wings aren’t complete. But from what she could see in the ridiculously pixelated images, the coracoid—the shoulder bone Smithson made such a big deal about—is very similar; so similar that she had to put her head between her knees for a minute.
Smithson was right about the data, though. The fossil, the scans, the ash analysis—all perfect. Too perfect. She’d give anything to get her hands on that fossil and rerun the tests. But since Will isn’t exactly cooperating, that leaves one option: trying to find someone who knows something and getting them to talk.
Smithson thought they should start with emails and phone calls—might as well do the cheapest, easiest thing first—but so far, the grad-school acquaintances, private collectors, and museum directors Ripley knows have been cagey. Smithson’s luck has been no better.
Only Rita, the other woman in Ripley’s PhD program, was forthcoming—although not about Will. “My advice? Drop it. I know you won’t, but at least stop sending fucking emails. Take people for lunch. Booze them up. And do not let anyone—especially your ex—get wind of what you’re doing.”
Ripley immediately felt stupid and naive. Of course someone has to go see potential sources in person. And given Smithson’s travel issues, it has to be her.
“You going to be okay during the storm, C.?”
“I’ll be fine. If the weather gets too wild, me and James will drive to the big house. Naaáhsa will cook too much food and complain to cover up how much she loves having guests. I won’t be lonely,” Cara says, an odd note in her voice.
Ripley follows her gaze to where Griff squats beside Finn. He points at a couple of spots in Finn’s storm preparations, then gives his skinny shoulder a brotherly slap.
“He’s going to Bozeman with the crew, huh?”
Cara shakes her head. “He’s not the type who can be tied down. No matter what he says.”
“You want to talk about it?” Ripley asks cautiously. She’s been trying to open up more, but despite Cara’s lecture on closeness, the younger woman doesn’t always want to reciprocate.
“Don’t worry about me, Rip. Have fun in Canada.”
“Canada?” comes a voice at Ripley’s elbow, the word finished with a plummy extra consonant:Canader.
It’s unfortunate that when she hears his voice, it both scratches an itch and starts a new one. The second he stops speaking, she wants more. It’s not a great position to be in with two months to go in the summer. She has to try hard to act normal around him.
“Yup, you and me are getting left behind this weekend. Sorry, eh?” Cara gives Smithson a friendly nudge with her shoulder.
“Who’s in Can—”
Jordin trots up to them, vibrating at a near-audible frequency. “Ripley, can you recheck my site?” Belatedly, she clocks Smithson, interrupted mid–hand gesture. “Sorry, James. I just want to make sure everything’s flawless.”Flawlessis Jordin’s whole value system. Except for the bucket and falling in love with the most careless guy in camp, she generally pulls it off. Although Matteo’s far less unreliable these days.
Cara slips away, possibly to evade more questions. Ripley turns to Jordin. “I know you’re careful. I trust you.”
“I deepened the trench anyway. I couldn’t forgive myself if—”
Ripley sets a hand on each of Jordin’s shoulders. “Perfect is theenemy of good, Jordin. You did a good job. I know it’s hard to wait, but it’s all we can do.”
