Page 8 of Torin and the Princess

He screwed up his face. “I don’t think that’s a thing, babe. Not where he would survive, ya know?”

“Yeah, probably, but whatever, I’m not worried. He didn’t look like someone who was from around here, like I’d be more worried if?—”

He checked his watch. “I’m sorry to cut you off, Lexi, I gotta go. It’s a long drive, I don’t want to miss my flight.”

“Yes, of course, yes.”

He picked up his suit bag and wheeled the suitcase behind him down the hall. I held the door for him as he lugged it all out and down the porch steps, then pulled the suitcase careening behind him down the walkway to his Toyota 4Runner.

There was a momentary bustle as Cooper loaded his suitcase and hanging bag into the backseat and then he kissed me goodbye.

“Call as soon as you get to the hotel. I love you.”

“Of course, love you too, and call me if anything weird goes on, promise?”

“Promise.”

“Have a good week.”

“Thanks, Cooper, don’t worry about me, got thisallunder control, and we’re still going out to eat next weekend?”

He sat down in the driver’s seat. “Yep, got the reservations.”

“Perfect, have a good week.”

I waved as he started the car and pulled away.

Dude metme and stood beside me as I looked all around at the first glow of dawn brightening the sky. But then I saw a glisten in the dew near where that guy had been lying.

Weird.

I walked towards it down the lawn with Dude following and found that odd object, lying unnoticed in the grass.

“Uh oh, he’s going to want that...” Dude sniffed it and then batted it with his paw. “Whatever it is.”

I sighed.

That was a complicated thought.Thatsounded like a lot of trouble for me. I added, “He’s going to want thatifhe survives.”

I picked the object up and headed up to the house. It seemed like there was a weight inside that moved around as I turned it over in my hands, trying to understand what it was. The word ‘gyroscope’ came to mind, though I didn’t really know what a gyroscope was.

In the kitchenI poured myself more coffee and made two decisions: One, I would take the object to the hospital in a fewhours. Two, I would try to do an internet search, maybe there was an explanation of what it was.

There wasn’t an explanation.

I tried search terms like,‘metal can heavy like a weird gyroscope that has markings.’ No wonder they didn’t bring back an answer. I removed ‘gyroscope’ because I got weird results, then scanned websites and blogs, but ultimately the search returned nothing helpful.

I drank coffee, leaned against my kitchen counter, with a cartoon turned on the little TV on my kitchen island. Whatwasthis thing?

How often in the world did we come across things that were new, that no one had ever found before?

It was 2004, for sure there would be a blog post about it. But I couldn’t find anything in this first search, which sucked. I loved research and was good at it. I had been researching my family tree and documenting the history of my old Victorian house for months. Stacks of documents and folders were piled all over the desk in my hobby room.

I should have been able to find something...

I sighed, leaning against the counter, thinking about the events of the night. My nerves were jangled — the nightmare, the storm, the stranger, not to mention having an ambulance in my driveway. And Cooper leaving for his trip.

Probably too much coffee, too early.

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