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THE FOUNTAIN
Bethany shoved her way through the casino’s massive, rotating glass doors and trotted across the wide cement sidewalk toward the fountain. Late spring sunlight showered around her, stinging her skin with the promise of the coming desert summer.
The fountain wasn’t running. It hadn’t been flowing yesterday, either, when she’d walked from the parking structure into the casino, squinting at it from a football field away, nor anytime in the last week while she’d been working at the casino.
Weird.
They’d probably paid millions for the fountain. You’d think they’d occasionally turn the thing on.
The huge pool was probably fifty yards across and half that, wide. The fountains were supposed to be laminar-flow projectiles, which meant that smooth jets of water would fly and dance through the gushing geysers. Video could be projected on smooth sheets of water at the back while music played.
But she’d never seen the fountain turned on.
No one had ever seen the fountain working.
Bethany figured out what the problem was as she neared the huge pool, however, because she could smell the fountain before she got near it.
Algae.
The green stink of fermenting algae rose from the fountain and hung in the air like a cloud of noxious gas.
Math was standing near the fountain—but not too near—waiting for her just like he had texted he would be.
He’d taken off his jacket again and probably left it somewhere in the casino. The sleeves of his white shirt were rolled past his elbows again, baring his strong forearms.
Bethany couldn’t stop staring at his arms and hands. Strong muscle wrapped his lower arms all the way down to his wrists, bulging in all the right ways. A man with that much muscle on his arms, not to mention the thick, dark hair on his head, would have a bunch of black wire on his arms, but Math didn’t. The hair on his tanned arms was light brown, almost more like fuzz. She wanted to reach over and stroke his arm to touch it, wondering if it were silky or soft, but he was her boss.
By all that was magic, she was supposed to be a professional. Okay, she had lied on her resumé, even outright fabricating several previous jobs.
But she could do this.
She was doing it. She’d had more correct-magic streaks than she’d ever had. Even today, she’d done four areas of the main casino room in a row without any mishaps.
Nevermind about the glitterbomb incident of two days ago. Ember and Willow had helped her clean it up, so that totally did not count.
And now she just had to clean this up. It was just a grungy fountain. How bad could it be?
Bethany hurried over to where Math stood. “How long has it been like this?”
He raked one hand through his dark hair, messing it up. “I don’t know. I’ve tried looking at the records. It looks like they turned on the pumps once to make sure it worked, but no one has looked at it since. It’s just been sitting out here in the sunlight, stagnant, growing this green sludge.”
Bethany wanted to pull her blouse up over her nose to filter out the stink but refrained because surely a professional wouldn’t do that. She swallowed down the sick she was pretty sure was just about to jump up her throat.
The retaining wall of the fountain’s pool rose almost to her waist, so she leaned over to get a better look at the algae.
The culture in the pool was composed of several different species of algae, growing in various shades of green, gray, and blue, with streaks of yellow-pink. It looked like blended spinach soup mixed with guacamole and sewage.
The plant matter encrusted the fountain’s mechanical parts, waving gently in the dark water. Layers of it had sedimented on the sides and bottom of the pool, half a foot thick. If someone stepped in, their foot would sink ankle-deep into the slime.
Bethany examined algae, trying to figure out how to remediate it. “That’s disgusting.”
“If you think the fountain is bad, you should see the financial records.”
Bethany stared into the green muck.
A gaseous bubble rose to the surface just below where she was bending over and expelled its fumes, a sulfurous stench that stank even above the rotting vegetation. The gas enveloped her face and burned her skin.
Bethany’s head spun, and she stumbled. The bright Las Vegas sunlight darkened as she crumpled and began to slide, head-first, toward the fetid sludge. She couldn’t even move her arms to push herself away as she nose-dived.
