Page 61 of Beasts of Mine

His eyes narrowed because he knew exactly what I'd noticed. I grinned and bounded ahead before he could shove me into a tree.

CHAPTER NINE

EVIE

Mara found me at breakfast with three memory cards spread across the table, my laptop balanced dangerously close to my coffee, and a piece of toast I'd apparently forgotten existed sometime around twenty minutes earlier. None of that seemed to surprise her.

“You're doing the thing again,” Mara told me as she stopped beside the table, a metal mug in one hand and a folded topographic map tucked beneath her other arm. Her hair was twisted into the same messy knot she wore most mornings, and there was already a dark streak of dirt across one knee of her field pants despite the fact that it wasn't quite seven.

“What thing?” I asked Mara, glancing up from a photograph of a toucan I'd been debating whether to include in the final set.

“The thing where you forget food exists because there are pictures in front of you. Eat,” Mara replied, using two fingers to push my plate closer before dropping into the chair opposite mine. Her brown eyes flicked pointedly toward the untouched eggs and then back to me.

“I am eating,” I told Mara, reaching automatically for the abandoned toast and taking an unnecessarily large bite mostly to prove my point.

“Very convincing,” Mara replied, raising one eyebrow as she took a drink from her coffee and turned her attention toward the photographs covering my screen.

I ignored the criticism and clicked forward, only to have the next image fill the display with three leopards sitting together beside the creek. Cat occupied the middle, larger through the shoulders than the other two, his golden-brown eyes fixed somewhere just beyond the camera. The darker leopard sat on his right with the calm dignity of an animal who had apparently been born knowing exactly how to pose, while the amber-eyed one on the left looked as though he'd been holding still through sheer force of will and deeply resented every second of it.

It was one of the best wildlife photographs I'd taken in years.

It was also one I absolutely wasn't showing Mara. I clicked past it before she could lean closer, but not quite fast enough.

“What was that?” Mara asked me, lowering her mug as she leaned sideways in an attempt to see around the edge of my laptop.

“Bad exposure,” I told Mara, moving to the next photograph with what I hoped looked like professional disappointment rather than blatant guilt.

“You changed it pretty fast for a bad exposure,” Mara replied, studying my face over the rim of her mug instead of the screen now.

“I know when I've failed,” I told Mara, reaching for my coffee and taking a deliberate drink while refusing to meet her eyes. Mara continued studying me for several uncomfortable seconds while I pretended not to notice. Technically, there was nothing wrong with photographing the leopards. Explaining why I had multiple photographs of three adult leopards sitting shoulder to shoulder as though they'd scheduled a family portrait would be considerably harder, especially when one of them was a conversationalist with strong opinions about chicken and another had spent most of yesterday trying to shove his face into my camera bag.

She eventually let it go.

Mostly.

“I have something you might actually want more than breakfast,” Mara told me, pulling the folded map from beneath her arm and clearing enough space beside my plate to open it.

“What?” I asked Mara, setting down my coffee and leaning across the table as she smoothed the map flat.

“We maintain a small observation camp here,” Mara explained, tapping a marked spot several kilometers beyond most of the trails I'd been using. She traced the access route with one finger before glancing up at me. “It's nothing glamorous, but wildlife activity has been unusually good around that section for the last couple of weeks. Macaws at the clay lick before sunrise, monkeys moving through around midday, tapir tracks near one of the smaller streams, and one of the camera traps caught a giant anteater two nights ago.”

My toast stopped halfway to my mouth.

“You have a giant anteater using the area?” I asked Mara, staring at the mark on the map before looking up at her with considerably more interest than I'd shown my breakfast.

“Possibly. It was one camera-trap image, so don't start planning the magazine cover yet,” Mara replied, and the small smile pulling at one corner of her mouth told me she'd known exactly which detail would get me.

“I wasn't,” I told Mara, lowering the toast while already imagining at least six different photographs.

“You absolutely were. The camp was built for researchers who need to stay out there for several days instead of hiking in and out every morning. If you want it, it's available,” Mara told me, sliding one finger farther along the marked route while amusement warmed her voice.

“How several are several?” I asked Mara, abandoning the toast entirely as I leaned closer to the map.

“Three nights would be reasonable. Four if the weather stays stable. You'll still be within radio range, and the trail is maintained. Not manicured, but marked well enough that you'd have to put some effort into getting lost,” Mara explained, tapping two points along the route before settling back in her chair.

I studied the map, glanced at Mara, then returned to the route she had marked. There really wasn't anything to consider.

“Yes. Absolutely yes,” I told Mara, already mentally sorting camera equipment.