Look What the Wind Blew In (22 page)

“Well, hello, you two.” Juan sauntered toward them, handing a cardboard envelope with
Express
written on it over her shoulder to Quint.

Quint cleared his throat. “Thanks, Dr. García.”

“Oh, it’s Dr. García now, is it?” Juan crossed his arms over his chest. “So formal all of a sudden, huh, Quint? What were you two doing in here anyway?” He blinked with exaggerated innocence at both of them.

Angélica trilled out a handful of Spanish curses. She’d never hear the end of it now.

“Just what are your intentions, young man?” Juan’s grin grew even wider, his enjoyment soaring right along with her humiliation.

“Dad, knock it off.” She blazed past him, her skin practically in flames. She needed some fresh air.

“But I’m just starting my Spanish Inquisition,” he called after her.

Quint’s low rumbling of laughter followed her out into the hot sunshine. The grass crackled under her boots as she strode toward her tent.

She smacked the palm of her hand against her forehead. “Way to maintain control of your emotions around the guy, dummy.” What in the hell was she going to tell Jared when Quint was still here come Friday morning? She kneaded her hands together. More important, what in the hell was she going to do about Quint and what had happened back there?

Maybe she should sleep with him and get it over with.

She smacked her forehead again, aiming for the voice inside of it that wasn’t helping one iota.

“
Gatita
!”

She paused without looking back, waiting for her father to catch up.

He grabbed her arm when he reached her side. “Where’re you heading?”

There was a worried tone in his voice that made her look at him. Tension lined his eyes. “Back to my tent, why?

He wrapped his arm around her shoulders, turning her toward his tent. “I need to talk to you alone.”

She blew out an exasperated sigh. “If this is about what happened between Quint and me back there …”

“I wish it were only that.”

Come on!
What now? She halted in her tracks. “I’m getting really tired of this crap, Dad.”

He kissed the top of her head. “I know,
gatita
, but we have a problem.”

Chapter Eleven

Stela: An ancient inscribed stone monument.

Quint waited until he had reached the safety of his sauna, aka tent, to tear open the express envelope from Jeff. He was tempted to open the window flaps so he could breathe while melting to death, but decided to see what he had in his hands first.

Inside the envelope he found four sheets of paper. The top piece was a note from Jeff. The next one was a letter from Dr. Jared Steel requesting his own high school records. Judging by the Eastern Valley Catholic High School logo on the upper right corners of the last two sheets, they were the requested records.

Fanning himself with the cardboard envelope, Quint dropped onto his cot and read Jeff’s letter.

I’m still going through those boxes of Mom’s that I found in the attic above Dad’s office. So far, all of it seems fairly trivial, mostly more random articles from the university newspaper about Dr. Steel. These school records arrived in the mail yesterday morning. The envelope had our mailing address wrong, so it’s a wonder it made it here. The original post date is close to the time Mom passed away. There was no letter of explanation or anything, which makes me wonder if she’d hired that private detective to get this, too. I don’t understand why she would have wanted these. Then again, I don’t understand why my mother was obsessed with Dr. Steel at all. Anyway, I thought maybe you could make some sense of it. If I come across anything else of interest, I’ll send it your way. I hope you’re having more luck than I am.

Don’t let the Yucatán bed bugs bite—or the snakes and spiders. Ha!

Quint let Jeff’s letter drift to the floor and focused on the school records. The top third of the first page listed his hair and eye color, as well as his height and weight for the ninth and tenth grade. The eleventh and twelfth grade slots were empty. The rest of the records noted several instances when Steel had been given detention and why. Quint smirked as he read, remembering his own checkered school life.

At the bottom of the second page, there was a handwritten note:

Jared’s parents died last week in a boating accident. The state has decided to place the boy with a local foster family. He will be allowed to finish the final quarter here, but will be moved into a public high school next year.

Quint felt a pang of sympathy for the kid, being orphaned at such a young age. He tried to picture a younger version of Steel, with blue eyes, dark blonde hair, and a lot less hostility, but he came up blank. That was the only side of Steel he’d ever known.

Gathering the documents, he stuffed them back into the envelope. He started to stash them under the mattress, but then changed his mind. Rolling the cardboard into a tube, he jammed it into the middle of his backpack instead.

He cinched his pack tight and stared at the canvas wall. Sweat trickled down his neck. “Okay, so now what, Sherlock?”

He was still missing some crucial pieces of the puzzle when it came to Mrs. Hughes’ fascination with Steel. He had all kinds of articles and documents on the jerk, but nothing connecting them. No notes on why she went through the trouble to gather all of it.

If only he could figure out a way to bring it up to Angélica without her getting bent out of shape. Being Steel’s ex-wife, she probably knew things about his past that would link the clues Mrs. Hughes had left behind. But after what had just happened between them in the mess tent, if Quint pressed her for information on Steel, would she think he had been warming her up in order to get her to spill personal details?

He scoffed. Of course, and she’d probably also suspect he was going to use whatever she shared in his article.

Fuck. He tossed his backpack on the floor. The damned hard-headed, distrustful, bossy woman! She could light his fuse like nobody else.

His mind flashed back to the moments when she’d raked her teeth over his skin, pulled his mouth down to hers, moaned against him. She knew how to fire him up, too. It was too bad Juan had interrupted them.

Closing his eyes, he replayed that kiss, getting sweaty all over again. Her mouth had tasted sweet from the mangos she’d been eating, while her skin had smelled like coconut sunblock. The two fruits had made an intoxicating combination, especially when she was pressing against him, all soft curves and wet …

The sound of someone unzipping his tent flap yanked him back to the present. He turned, watching the zipper slide slowly along the bottom of the flap.

Somebody was trying to be very quiet about sneaking into his tent. Was it the same person who was terrorizing the rest of the crew? The dig site’s saboteur?

Quint looked around for something to use as a weapon. He looked at a cardboard shipping tube. No, too soft. Maybe that coil of rope hanging by the window. No, his lassoing skills were rusty. There, he zeroed in on a handful of tent stakes tied with a strip of hemp … and what, he’d stab the intruder in the heart? This was turning into an episode of Scooby Doo versus Count Dracula.

He swiped the long handled flashlight from his desk, flipping it around, waving it like a police baton. That was more like it. He crept into position, raising the flashlight.

It was time to put an end to this game of cat and mouse.

* * *

“So, how many of them are leaving?” Angélica asked as she slumped onto her father’s cot.

“Only two—Horatio and Octavio,” Juan answered. “Where’s that book on seashells, the Wayfarers one? Is it somewhere in your messy tent?”

“No, it’s on your desk, right there under those books on structural architecture.” How could he think about seashells while members of her crew were fleeing the dig site like mice from a burning
milpa
? “Have you tried talking some sense into either of them?”

Juan pulled out the book on shells. “It’s no use. They’re convinced it’s the curse.”

“Way to go, Jared.” She wrinkled her lip. “I told him to keep a low profile. I knew something like this would happen if anyone saw him.”

“It was a case of bad timing. He thought he’d waited long enough to avoid running into anyone after breakfast.”

“I think it was a case of arrogant stupidity.” She rubbed her temples, trying to push aside her frustration and figure out a solution.

Juan fished his glasses from his shirt pocket. “Teodoro noticed this morning that some of his
balche
was missing. He suspects the two boys dipped into that last night and that’s why they were lagging behind the others and ran into Jared.” He used his shirt tail to clean his glasses, a crooked smile forming on his mouth. “We’ve all had our share of those mind-numbing
balche
hangovers.”

“Maybe we could offer some kind of incentive for them to stay.”

“Like what?” He slipped on his glasses and flipped open the book. “More money?”

She laced her fingers together, running through numbers in her head. “I can’t give them more pay without giving everyone more, and my budget is already maxed out. Due to the extra crew we took on, I had to cut into our supply allotment in order to give these guys a semi-decent wage.”

“Lord knows the university won’t help.” He was too busy scanning one of the book’s pages to notice Angélica’s grimace.

And if she didn’t provide Jared with a good explanation for Quint staying past Thursday, they’d have an even bigger problem with money from the university.

“There’s the
Lolcatali
ceremony,” Juan suggested as he turned pages.

“You already know how I feel about that.”

He glanced at her over the top of his glasses. “That stubborn streak of yours comes from your mother’s side of the family.”

She stuck her tongue out at him. “I could offer a bonus to all who stay the duration of the dig season, deliverable in their final paycheck.”

Juan lowered the book. “You just said you didn’t have that kind of money left in the budget.”

“I could pull from my personal savings.”

“I don’t like the sound of that.”

“Take it out of one of my retirement accounts maybe.”

“The penalties for early withdrawal are brutal.”

“I’ll do whatever it takes.” She touched his sleeve. “We’re so close. The proof is within our grasp.”

“You’re obsessing again.”

She hated it when he was right. “We all have our vices.”

His focus returned to the pages of the book. “There has to be another way.”

“When you think of it, let me know. Until then the best I can come up with is the bonus option.” She rolled off the cot, sticking her nose in the book along with his. “What are you looking for?”

He turned a few more pages and then pointed at a black and white picture. She recognized the shell at once, telling him, “That’s a member of the
Astraeinae
family.”

“I’ve seen this.” He tapped the picture.

“I know you have. I showed you a likeness of it the other night on that glyph in the Temple of the Water Witch.”

“No, I mean I’ve seen it elsewhere.”

As his words sank in, her excitement welled. She squeezed his arm. “Where?”

“In the Dawn Temple, when Quint and I were working in there this morning.”

“Show me.”

“I will later tonight after everyone is in their tents.”

“Was it on another glyph?”

“No. It was on a
stela
.”

She let go of his arm. This could be the key that led them to the proof they needed. “Did it have a date on it?”

“It might have at one time. A corner of it was broken off and nowhere around.”

“Why didn’t we notice this
stela
before now?”

“I was showing Quint some stability modifications I had done years ago in one of the chambers. It’s in a structurally sound part of the building, so I haven’t been concerned about monitoring it since then.” He closed the book and dropped it onto his desk. “I practically tripped over the thing. Talk about good luck.”

She looked up at him, pausing. “Did Quint see it?”

Juan grinned. “He was too busy worrying about the cracks in the ceiling. I’m beginning to think that boy is a good luck charm.”