Chapter Five #2
Then again, everyone had secrets—Vanka and Spiker even more so.
Their lives were hidden in plain sight while their actions were covert.
He likely had as many secrets as she did.
That was why they worked so well together for GSI.
They excelled at their jobs, which meant they were masterminds in hiding as well as finding the truth.
“What’s on the agenda, princess?”
She maintained a neutral expression as she scrutinized him for unspoken details. “Deep time.”
“Is that kind of like deep space?” he grinned. “I hate to break it to you, but it sounds like we’re at the wrong museum. Where are the rockets and moon men?”
She gestured to an exhibit entryway. Deep Time headlined a banner in a font as large and thick as his arm.
Less in-your-face, but still very obvious, was an explanation of the multimillion-year framework that scientists believe Earth has existed.
Whatever had just happened to the child was still a major distraction. “You’re not an idiot.”
Spiker chuckled in that way that always gained him ground with a female asset.
It was a highly tuned mixture of aw-shucks-you-got-me and stealth.
Vanka had always appreciated that tool in his toolbelt, up until the moment he’d just tried it on her.
Ignoring his all-too-familiar charm, she guided them toward one of her favorite exhibits.
“Fossils,” Spiker announced as they crossed under the archway. “This has changed since I was a kid.”
“That’s called science,” she chided. “It changes.”
He shrugged. “But I think they covered the big stuff pretty firmly a few hundred years ago.”
“I can’t tell if you’re intentionally trying to get under my skin or if it’s something unintentional you do for fun.”
“Next, you’re going to tell me an apple didn’t fall on Isaac Newton’s head.” He winked. “I’d bet they’d give you a name tag and clipboard if you asked nicely.”
“Would you shut up and pay attention?”
He laughed. “What is that?” Spiker pivoted toward a reconstructed Titanis. “This thing looks like a peacock reptile.”
“It’s a dinosaur.”
“With feathers?” He snorted, then closed in on the exhibit, mixing into the fray of another school group.
“More than two meters tall, too.” Vanka caught herself and crossed her arms, annoyed that she was so easily distracted by his question and that she still didn’t know what happened earlier, not to mention his head-in-the-sand attitude.
The man spent too much of his free time loafing around on his boat and not enough appreciating the world for what it had to offer.
The school group moved on. A gaggle of tourists angled for their spots. Spiker didn’t move from the exhibit other than to slide right a few feet until he had another placard to read next to another reconstruction or fossil that he’d likely belittle.
Five minutes passed. Two elderly men had outpaced Spiker’s progress by several yards, and Vanka couldn’t see the school group he’d initially finagled his way through.
Was this some kind of punishment for derailing their day to learn about where they’d been?
She couldn’t see his hands. If he was playing a game on his phone and waiting her out, she’d wring his thick-muscled neck.
Another tour group of students approached, and Vanka had had enough of Spiker’s game. She hurried ahead of the docent and reached his side before they were surrounded. “What are you—”
“You knew dinosaurs had feathers?” he confirmed without a drop of irony, and then returned his focus to the small print on the exhibit placard.
She studied his curious behavior. “Yes.”
“And that,” Spiker continued, “birds are descendants of dinosaurs?”
His awestruck tone threw Vanka a curveball. “Well, yes.”
Spiker pursed his lips and lifted his hands in apparent frustration. “You were right.”
“Sorry?” Vanka blinked. “What?”
He moved to the next exhibit placard as if it had a string tied around his waist, reeling him in. “They didn’t teach this in American high schools.”
Vanka didn’t know how to read this situation. “Are you messing with me?”
Spiker had the nerve to look as if she were the one acting out of character. “And the colors? Man, these things look like parrots.”
“Peacocks and parrots.” She kept to his side. “Didn’t know you were such a bird aficionado.”
“Look at this thing.” He gestured at the Phorusrhacos. “You can’t tell me that’s not a parrot on steroids.”
She couldn’t. Nor would she join in with her opinion that its neck made the Phorusrhacos look far more like an ostrich. No need to get into nuance when what she really wanted to do was show him how underwater marine life ended up on top of mountains. “Sure. I see it.”
“You’ve seen this before?”
She lifted her shoulders. “Once or twice.” Or a thousand times. “What difference does that make?”
“I haven’t seen any of this,” he added with a heap of bewilderment and a touch of disappointed annoyance.
“If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t learn about it in school.”
His lips quirked. “Don’t start lying to protect my feelings now, princess.”
“Scout’s honor.” She held up her hand and then gestured to the front of the exhibit hall, where they’d bypassed hundreds of factoids that he probably wanted to read. “Besides, scientists only recently had the technology to analyze fossils for color.”
“After high school, then?” he asked.
“Post-secondary. Think like in the 2000s, maybe 2010s.”
His grin solidified, and Spiker surveyed the exhibit hall, soaking in as much as he could. “All right.” Then, just as abruptly, he focused on her as though he wouldn’t allow himself another glance. It was like he’d had a vision of his beach holiday and watched it vaporize. “Show me why we’re here.”
There was so much they could see first, and wasn’t that one of her most important tenets?
Appreciate, protect, and respect the past so that we’re not doomed to repeat it.
But she respected that he wanted to get the job done.
Vanka needed to remember that and vowed not to leave this building until she found something that tied into their Robin Hood caseload.