ONE WAY OUT: Chapter Three
"That lucky bitch." Don Cleary sat down heavily on the nearest boulder, and Alex joined him.
For a long moment, Alex said nothing, listening to the buzzing of flies, the low rumble of voices, the chk-chk of metal tools meeting rock. Then he rubbed his hand over his face and said darkly, "Tell me about it. How the hell can one woman be in the right place so many times in a row?"
It occurred to him that skill was likely involved, but he was in an ugly mood and didn't feel like acknowledging it to himself, much less to Cleary.
"An intact infant rex. Just think what finding one of those would do for our funding." Cleary slumped over, staring at his boots. "Instead it's Ashton who hits the big one, and you know she'll probably sell it to whoever pays her enough. Like she did with that old triceratops with the battle scars I wanted to study. Now it's somehwere in freakin' France."
"By the way, don't say anything about this yet to anybody. I wasn't supposed to tell you, but if I'm going to take Ashton up on her proposition to prep and study the specimen, that'll leave you here alone on the dig. The least I can do is tell you why I'm dumping all this work on you."
"Alex, I was digging up bones before you were even an embryonic gleam in your daddy's eye," Cleary said mildly, picking away the ever-present dirt caking his dry, gnarled hands, the knuckles swollen by arthritis and years of harsh weather and physical labor. "I think I can limp along on my own for a few days while you're off glory hunting."
Alex turned, his already raw temper further chafing at Cleary's comment. "Why the hell do you always say that? Lately I'm getting the sense you resent the hell out of me."
"It's not resentment, exactly." The older man had gone still, his expression a mix of wary surprise and guilt. "Look, there's an ebb and a flow to all things in life. I had my day in the sun, now it's your turn. I can't say I was happy when some controversial young Turk from California hit the department like a whirlwind, but -" Cleary grinned as he slapped Alex on the back -- and it wasn't exactly a gentle tap. "Then I decided that if my glory days were done for, I wanted to be working with one of the top guns in the field. And that happens to be you."
Cleary's answer took Alex by surprise. He'd never considered how he must appear in the older man's eyes, and he couldn't blame Cleary for viewing him as an usurper.
An ebb and a flow summed it up very well, and someday he'd find himself ebbing, too.
"If it helps, I want you to know I have every intention of bringing that fossil back with me to the department, no matter what I have to do to get it. Then it'll benefit everybody, not just the glory hounds like me."
Cleary laughed, but Alex didn't miss the sudden flash of longing in the man's pale eyes. "It would be something, to get a chance to look at an animal like that...one nobody's ever seen so young."
Alex couldn't help grinning. "Then I guess whatever I have to do will be worth the hassle."
"You've never had to work with Ashton on a professional basis before. Do you think you can manage it?"
"I have issues with her ethics, but from all accounts she does decent work. A few guys I know and respect speak well of her."
"If those few guys are the ones I'm thinking of, they're more than a little controversial themselves."
"Birds of a feather and all that." Alex pushed to his feet, then massaged the aching muscles in his back.
"You okay?" Cleary asked.
"There are days I feel every year of my age, and this is one of them. That exposed vertebra we found up there this afternoon is one stubborn bitch. I was turning myself into a pretzel trying to clear it enough to identify it."
"Did you? In all the excitement, I forgot to ask."
"The vertebra is honeycombed, so it's a tyranosaur. But I didn't see anything else near it."
"Just another discarded Jurassic snack, then."
"Yeah, I doubt it'll pan out to be more than a few scattered bones. Nothing to get excited about."
"Not compared to what just fell into your lap, anyway."
"Can't argue with that," Alex admitted, but despite his aching muscles and the weariness dragging at him, a lingering charge from his confrontation with Cassie Ashton sizzled hot inside him. He couldn't wait for a rematch, even one he had no chance of winning.
The woman always riled him to a point where rational thought simply ceased and his primal instincts took over. After every confrontation, it took him hours to cool his temper down to non lethal levels.
"Here comes your little Melissa."
As Cleary's wry tone broke into his dark thoughts, Alex looked up. A familiar blonde was headed his way, and his gaze lingered on the swing of her hips, the bounce of her breasts -- and the part of him not totally preoccupied with the coming clash with Ashton acknowledged that Mel was a fine-looking woman. Fast on the heels of that thought, though, came a prickling of guilt: she didn't rouse any emotion stronger than appreciation for something warm and pretty, and God knew, she deserved better.
"You've kept her around longer than I'd expected," Cleary said, as if reading Alex's mind. "Could it be you've finally met the right one?"
"The look on your face says you don't approve."
"Only because there's rumors that she's been hanging around Billy Landry more."
Alex wasn't angry or jealous, just resigned -- and curious. He tried to place the name but drew a blank. "Landry?"
"New guy. You've got him working with Lee."
"Oh, yeah...nice kid. Stutters when he gets excited."
"That's him. I think he has an eye on your Miss Melissa."
Miss Melissa was almost upon them, and Alex swung his shoulders from side to side until his back cracked. There; that felt better. "He's more her type anyway. If she has half the brain I know she does, she'll figure that out before long."
Behind him, Cleary sighed. "Sometimes I worry about you."
"Don't." Alex glanced down, grinning at his colleague's mother-hen expression. "I'm not worth the trouble."
Then he walked forward to greet Melissa and allowed himself to enjoy her soft warmth as she hugged his arm against her breasts. Until she woke up and smelled the coffee, he might as well enjoy the perks."