Free Violet Eyes by John Everson Page B

the green rolling river that led out to the sea. Passanattee wasn’t that far from the ocean, but sometimes, it felt like it was deep inside the swamp. She didn’t know about the food, but Boudreaux’s sure had a great view.
    “How did you end up working for the swamp?” she asked, and then instantly regretted it. She sounded like an idiot. He wasn’t working for the swamp, he was working for the state of…
    “I love the Everglades,” he said. “I grew up in Ohio, and we didn’t have anything but fields. But here…” He shrugged. “I came to school down here, not really sure what I wanted to do. But when I saw the Everglades… I knew that somehow I had to work here. To help preserve the wildlife here. To make sure nobody came in with a bunch of plows and cranes and started filling in the swamps to build new condos. There’s plenty of space around the country for that. But there is only one place that is like the Everglades. And we can’t replace that.”
    “Wow,” Rachel said. “Sounds like you’re a convert.”
    He grinned, and she could see the sparkle in his eyes when he did.
    “Totally. I love this place. And I want to make sure nobody ever comes in here and messes it up.”
    “I think humans pretty consistently manage to mess up just about any good thing they find.” As she said it, a mental image of Anders came to mind. She forced it away.
    “We do tend to abuse nature more than we care for her,” Terry agreed. “But we can do good too. Just look at the story of the Bald Eagle! We nearly took out the whole species with pesticides and hunting, and then people got wise, and realized it would be pretty embarrassing to have killed off our own national emblem. Now there are thousands of them in the skies again—all because people decided to take action. We can do good, when we put our minds to it.”
    “Yeah, but we usually don’t,” Rachel said. “Usually we bulldoze down the forests, fill in the swamps and pour asphalt. You know that, it’s why you’re here.”
    “Are you gunning for the Miss Misanthrope award today?” He smiled, but Rachel saw the crinkle of concern in his eyes.
    “I think I already won the crown,” she said. “But don’t worry, I’ll try not to hate you too!”
    He faked a bow. “I’m honored. But would you still be saying that if I hadn’t picked you up off the ground this morning?”
    “We’ll never know,” she said. “Will we?”
     
     
    Dinner was amazing. Not because of the food, which was great (A Cajun/Caribbean fusion…who knew?)—but because it was so enjoyable to sit and talk, completely at ease, with a man again. Even when she had first met Anders, Rachel had always been a little nervous when they had gone out to dinner or more usually, bars. When she’d met him, Anders had attracted her more from what he didn’t say, than what he did. He had a way of looking at you; a way of making a woman wonder what it would be like to be held by him.
    Anders wasn’t a really tall guy, but his arms had been solid. Muscular. You could tell he was a man who worked with his hands even before you saw the grit beneath his fingers. One look at him bent over a mug at the bar, black T-shirt tight over his shoulder blades, and you knew that this guy would strip down nice, and would make you know you were a woman. Maybe make you feel like a slut , truth be known, because you could tell from looking at him that he probably wasn’t going to bring you flowers; he was probably going to buy you a couple shots and then take you back to his bedroom and bang the shit out of you and then when he’d had his fill, tell you to get out when he was done because he had to work in the morning. And the tattoos of snakes and demons that peeked out from beneath his shirtsleeves only added to the mystique.
    Why would a woman fall for an asshole like that, when you could see the writing on the wall from the very first moment?
    Rachel had asked herself that over and over again for