Effigy (39 page)

“Your father died on the south end of
Teotihuacan
,” Diego said. “So why were you at the pyramids on the north end?”

This time Eva remained quiet. Diego snagged her hair and pulled her face just inches from his. “Were you planting a bomb?”

“I don’t know anything about a bomb,” she said in a quivering voice.

“I see.”

He turned to John’s guard who promptly traded him for Eva’s other arm. Together, the two officers drug her, kicking and screaming, toward the door.

“Where are you taking her?” John gasped.

Diego held up a hand just as the men were about to pull Eva out of the room. The officers stopped, Eva panting between them. Diego smiled wickedly at John. “Perhaps she’ll be more cooperative when the guards get through with her.”

“But she’s telling the truth! We don’t know anything about a bomb!”

Diego marched straight up to John, his lean frame crowding over him. He pulled the baton from his hip and tapped it just beneath John’s chin. “So you were not going to blow up Pyramid B?” he asked doubtfully.

“Pyramid B?” John was hesitant. “We were nowhere near Pyramid B. Don’t you know your own ruins?”

Diego’s face grew stern. The baton tapped again. “Do you want to die, old man?”

“Pyramid B isn’t in
Teotihuacan
,” John said in a hurry. “It’s a temple. In
Tula
.”

Diego hesitated, his cold dark eyes staring down at him. After a moment, he turned back toward the guards and tore Eva from their grasp. He shoved her to the floor and with a cold glare of disappointment, he clicked the light off again. Without another word, all three men left the room. The door slammed behind them, sealing John and Eva in silent darkness again.

Betrayal

Derek gave one last heave and the root came peeling out of the wall with a wooden groan. When the spray of dust and dirt settled, it hung almost perfectly from the cave’s entrance hole directly above.

“Our stairway to heaven awaits,” he said with tremendous relief. “Of course, no thanks to you guys...”

He spun around to find Peet and Lori all but nestled together near the receding fire. The scene caught Derek by surprise and yet, he thought, it shouldn’t have. No doubt Peet was up to his old tricks, and this time where Lori was concerned, it was personal.

“Well, aren’t we getting cozy in here,” he snarled.

“We’re almost ready,” Lori said, finishing her adjustments on Peet’s wrap.

“Take your time,” Derek snapped. “I’m sure Quickie Peet is enjoying the moment.”

Peet gave him a disdained look.

“What are you talking about?” Lori asked, pausing from her work.

“Why don’t you ask
him
,” Derek said irritably. “I’m sure he’ll be glad for the chance to live up to his reputation.”

“That was uncalled for, don’t you think?” Lori asked.

Derek snorted. “Not at all.”

Lori stood up defensively. “What’s your problem, Derek?”

“I’m up to my neck in dirt trying to get us out of here, and there he sits schmoozing the damsel in distress.”

“Thanks for reducing me to a cliché
,
” she said with a sneer. “Just what is it you have against Dr. Peet?”

Derek approached the glowing embers of the weakened fire. “That tackle at the airport was a bad start,” he grumbled.

“Maybe you shouldn’t have tried running away,” Peet said.

Lori glanced down at Peet, then back again, her fists firmly seated against her hips. “All right, what’s going on between you two anyway?”

Peet pulled himself to his feet. “He hasn’t liked me ever since he failed out of ANTHRO 2100,” he said.

Lori spun on Derek in surprise. “You
failed
?”

Derek stiffened. “A twelve-year-old could have passed that class!” he blurted. His glare shifted past Lori to the professor standing close beside her. “I didn’t fail.
You
 
failed me! You were looking for reasons to fail me.”

Lori crossed her arms. “Dr. Peet doesn’t fail anyone.”

“Nobody that doesn’t deserve it,” Peet added.

Derek felt himself breaking into a heated sweat and took a deep breath. The conversation was shifting unpleasantly out of control with the two of them tag-teaming against him. He needed to shift the focus off of him and back onto Peet.

“Sure,” he said. “He won’t fail anyone who’s mastering anthropology. But I was just majoring in the field which doesn’t make me one of your pets, does it, Quickie?”

The muscle in Peet’s jaw tightened. Derek took that as a sign of confirmation.

“I pass those students who are there to learn the material,” Peet said. “You used my class as a social hour to gather information for your articles and flirt with the girls.”

Derek bristled. “Now if that isn’t the pot calling the kettle black. As I recall, you’ve chased your own share of girls on the sly.”

Lori jumped between them, pointing a stiff finger at him. “Those are just rumors, Derek!”

He smirked. “Rumors become truth when you provide the proof.”

“Why are you turning everything into a scandal?”

“Just ignore him,” Peet said, but Lori’s focus was locked on Derek with no indication of ignoring anything but the professor’s very own words.

She stepped around the respiring embers of the fire until Derek could see the glow of anger in her eyes. She drew her lips tight. There was something erotic about her temper.

“I’ve never seen Peet fraternize with anyone,” she snapped.

“I’m sure you don’t notice such things,” Derek said. “Not when you’re the one he’s fraternizing with.”

Lori looked appalled.
“What!”

Peet was visibly tense. “Now hold on, Derek—”

“Have you forgotten about that little field trip to Saline Wash, Lori? I saw the way Peet looked at you, the way your ideas were the only ones he entertained.”

“Lori’s suggestion to conduct a surface survey further up the wash was sound,” Peet said.

Derek snapped back to the professor. “And you’ve been siding with her ever since.”

Lori crossed her arms defiantly. “You’re being ridiculous.”

“Am I? As I recall, last summer’s field study was supposed to be in
Chaco
Canyon
. But somehow, you and Peet wound up hundreds of miles north of there. Tell me, what were the two of you doing out there
alone
?”

To Derek’s amusement, Lori pursed her lips even tighter. It was about time she understood the full extent of his leverage.

“We were excavating the effigy,” Lori growled.

“The effigy was just a convenient distraction. While the university was busy ogling over this prize you brought them, they somehow overlooked the real issue. But
I
 
haven’t forgotten. I remember where the two of you were
supposed
to be.”

“Don’t turn this into more than it is,” she warned. “You’re forgetting that it was a petroglyph in Chaco that led me back to
Utah
.”

“And just how hard was it to persuade Quickie Peet to tag along?” Derek challenged. “Admit it, Lori. He favors you. He’s always favored you.”

“I don’t favor one student over another,” Peet argued.

“Then why did you take the effigy out of the museum?” Derek pressed.

“How did you know he removed it from the museum?” Lori asked.

“Who else could have brought it out of the museum’s storage? And let’s not forget that I saw the two of you working in the lab.” Before Lori had a chance to respond, Derek added, “Quickie Peet gives you individual attention that he doesn’t give his other students.”

“He’s helping my research,” Lori said. Her anger had subsided a fraction, but there was still a bite to her words.

“Oh, I think it’s more personal than that, and I think you know it too.”

Lori crowded closer until Derek could feel her hot breath on his face. Her eyes were cold as ice, but there were fissures within them that were threatening to break. “What you think doesn’t give you the right to ruin a man’s career.”

Derek snorted and kicked at a glowing log in the fire. A spray of sparks showered the air and a revival of flames brightened the cave walls.

“Seems to me your precious professor is doing a good job of ruining his own career. You’d think he’d learned his lesson the first time.”

Lori’s stern face twisted with confusion. “What do you mean, the first time?”

This is more like it!
Derek finally sat down beside the sputtering fire. Lori’s eyes softened to a loosely concealed dread. He couldn’t help but smile as he reclined back against one elbow and leisurely crossed his outstretched legs. He had her right where he wanted her.

“You know, Lori,” he said, fidgeting with a small stone that he swooped off the cave floor, “journalists are a lot like archaeologists. We both have a way of…digging up dirt. When’s the last time anyone’s uncovered the dirt on Quickie Peet?”

Lori’s expression quickly lost its edge as Derek’s words began to sink in. Despite her rare display of temperament, he found Lori quite easy to manipulate. There had never been a better time to turn the tables and bring her back to him.

She turned to Peet who had a sheepish slump to his posture. The professor looked undeniably subdued. Derek hadn’t expected him to give in so easily. If he had known the professor would roll over like this, he would have given him a piece of his mind years ago.

“What’s he talking about, Dr. Peet?” she asked.

Derek was too eager to let Peet answer. “How about the performance review in May of 2000? Go ahead, Quickie. Tell her about that student you screwed.”

Lori’s eyes widened. “What?”

Peet looked defeated. He returned Lori’s questioning glare with an imploring gaze of his own. “We met at the spring exhibit in the museum. I didn’t realize she was a student until her graduation that May, just before the performance review.”

Derek felt his teeth sinking in. “But you didn’t bother breaking off the relationship when you found out, now did you?”

Peet didn’t respond. He only stared sheepishly at Lori who was gaping back in disbelief.

“You told me you never fraternize with students,” she said.

Derek couldn’t suppress a chuckle. “And look whose pants he’s trying to get into now.”

* * * *

Peet was speechless. He felt himself cowering in the corner he’d been backed into for so long. He couldn’t deny Derek’s accusations, though how the boy had learned of the affair was something of a mystery.