Free Jurassic Heart by Anna Martin Page A

a lot for the kids who lived here to do.
    There was no point denying the mood on-site changed after Indiana Jones paid us a visit. Those who had been working for Eric were already a little nervous, and I wondered if I’d lose them altogether. It was a possibility I had to keep in mind; I couldn’t run the site with any fewer people than we I had. We were already at bare minimum. With that in mind, I contacted Sam and asked him to put some feelers out, see if there were any undergrads around who wanted to come up and boost numbers.
    Even though I hated myself for doing it, I decided to keep closer tabs on Andre and Pete, the two grad students. They hadn’t been around when Eric got beat up, but there wasn’t any evidence the toy and Eric’s attack were related. They were the two members of the team I didn’t know as well as everyone else. For the sake of my dig and my friends, I had to watch them, even if the idea was distasteful. So far, Andre and Pete had mostly worked together and kept their heads down, doing good things and always logging everything with River. I liked them, even though Andre continued to be quiet and kept himself separate from the rest of the group. But there was no law against being quiet.
    In an attempt to boost morale, I decided to do a show-and-tell day with children from the local elementary school’s summer program. There was nothing better than having kids around to cement our presence in the community as a positive one, and in my experience the boundless enthusiasm of young children created good vibes across the dig.
    River was working miracles in our small, underfunded makeshift lab, and I used her findings as an excuse to sit inside during the afternoon, poring over the figures and graphs she’d produced.
    “I knew there was a reason I asked for you,” I murmured as she set a mug of coffee, a glass of water, and two painkillers down next to the paper I was reading.
    “My good looks?”
    “That too,” I said with an easy smile and a wink.
    River laughed and swatted my shoulder. “Have you seen this?” she asked, pushing a few wisps of hair away from her face and nodding toward one of the files.
    “No. I’m trying to work through it all in some kind of order.”
    “You’re going to want to look at it. Sam sent it over.”
    I was curious enough to abandon the paper on soil samples (which was admittedly not that riveting) and open the file. A quick scan told me the lab had confirmed my initial identification of the partial skeleton as an Othnielosaurus. “Yes.” I allowed myself a little fist pump. It was the first good news I’d had in a while, and it was always nice to be right.
    It also meant I could justifiably announce the find and start requesting more resources and funding, although since the file had come from Sam, I guessed he was already doing that for me. There was a reason I worked for him rather than freelancing. He made everything so much simpler.
     
     
    “H EY , BUDDY , whatcha working on?”
    I looked out of my trench to where Boner was hunched down, elbows on his knees, peering in at me.
    “I’m knitting a sweater, Boner, what does it fucking look like?”
    He held his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “Whoa. Sorry I asked.”
    I sat back on my heels, reached for my bottle of water, and took a long pull on it. “Sorry. Just frustrated. I’ve been working this area for weeks now, and it’s not giving me anything.”
    “You want to move on?”
    “Not yet.”
    I was still working the Indiana Jones trench, for reasons I wasn’t sure of. I’d been down in the mud and dust for too long, doing the hard labor part of the job, moving big hunks of dirt around in the hope I’d find something.
    “You’re sentimental,” Boner accused, accepting my bottle of water when I offered to share. “If this area isn’t yielding anything, you should find a new spot.”
    “I want another couple of days,” I said. “Then maybe I’ll think about it.”
    He huffed