Page 1 of Monstrous Heat
1
NATALIE
I’m not going to let some jerkoff steal my own fucking discovery.Fuming, I stared at my mentor while resisting the urge to rip him a new asshole. That wouldn’t look very good on my academic record, now would it?
“I knew you were the perfect assistant to bring along,” Dr. James Snyder gushed. “I’m sure to get a terrific write up in theQuarterly Archeology Review. Great job, sweetie.”
I’m not your sweetie, dickwad.I ground my teeth and mentally counted to ten. I had to be professional, even if I’d like nothing better than to kick him in the nuts. He controlled my fate, from how excruciating my thesis defense would be to whether the university decided to offer me an assistant professor position. “Youaregoing to credit me in the article.”
His eyes widened at my firm and assertive voice, pretending to be wounded that I’d even suspect him of stealing credit for finding the ruin. “Of course, sweetie. You’re my assistant after all.”
Assistant my ass.
I’d been fascinated by a fifty-year-old picture of a crumbling stone doorway that had been carved to resemble a massive mouth complete with fangs. The site had never been fully explored, and after the original archaeologist died, the ruins had been lost once more. I’d meticulously studied the man’s journals and articles to track the path he’d taken from the Yucatan Peninsula, through the jungles of Guatemala and Belize and eventually to the coast in Honduras where he’d departed for the UK. When I’d pinpointed a possible area in the Maya Biosphere Reserve in Guatemala, Dr. Snyder had agreed to take me along as his assistant, a position coveted by all the grad students and associate professors trying to elevate their game.
He might be a misogynist prick, but Snyder’s charming good looks and clout in archeology circles forced his female students to overlook his many faults. He fancied himself a modern-day Indiana Jones and even wore a ridiculous hat like the famous movie archeologist. Unlike the movie, archeology wasn’t a booming, lucrative industry with tons of potential. Positions were few, far between, and quite honestly, mostly given to men. A fact which burned like acid in the pit of my stomach.
I did literallyallthe legwork for this find. I tramped foot by foot through miles of jungle to investigate every suspicious mound, hill, or pile of rock that had been swallowed up centuries ago.
While he sat back at camp taking selfies and preening for his podcast channel.
At last, I’d pinpointed a possible location for the city. The jungle had done its best to swallow every clue, but I’d finally found a man-made stone wall that potentially marked the city’s boundary.
“Keep me posted on how many buildings are still intact,” Dr. Snyder said. “Plot out everything you can identify on the map as a possible site and enlist Tomas and Jairo to help.”
“What about you?” I blurted out as he turned away.
He turned back with a quizzical arch to his brow. With the sun blazing behind him, his golden hair cast a nimbus about his face. “Me? I’ll be back at Paso Caballos. Someone has to wine and dine the right people to make sure our dig can continue as planned.” He slapped at a buzzing insect and grimaced at the smear on his pristine white shirt. “I can’t endure more than a day or two of camping. I’m allergic, you know.”
So he’d only stayed in the jungle long enough to ensure that I actually found something—that he could claim for himself. While he abandoned me to do all the work, living it up at the posh hotel catering to tourists. Perfect.
“I’ll let you write up the article and we’ll see how it goes. It’ll be good practice for you if you’re hoping to gain a permanent spot at the university.”
Of course, he had to get a dig in, making sure to remind me exactly how “helpful” he could be. But the fuck if I was going to do all the physical work and write everything up, so all he had to do was slap his John Hancock on my fucking research. “Now listen here—”
I clamped my mouth shut when the only other graduate student along on the dig, Holly Price, joined us. Her figure made men drool, her long, black hair was fantastic, and she possessed a terrific fashion sense.
“Ah, there you are, my dear.” Dr. Snyder gave me a careless wave and tucked Holly’s hand beneath his arm. He probably thought it was a gentlemanly, old-fashioned thing to do, but Holly shot me a look of pure horror.
If he’d brought me along to do the physical labor…and he was taking Holly back to the hotel…
“Can’t Holly stay?” I called after them. “I could sure use the help.”
“I need Miss Price’s assistance in town. I’m sure you can manage quite well on your own.”
Holly mouthed,“help me!”but I could only shrug miserably. What could I do? We were both unfortunately at Dr. Snyder’s mercy. We could hike back to the road and try to flag down a local, but he’d paid for the entire trip out of his stipend. He had our tickets. Holly’s gorgeous wardrobe suggested money and lots of it, but she’d admitted over a beer at the airport that she was broke too. We’d both spent entirely too many years in college learning about our outdated passion for lost worlds, though in Holly’s case, her fascination revolved around how ancient cultures used the mostly now-extinct plants in their daily lives.
In a matter of seconds, they were both gone. Towering kapoc trees and thick underbrush swallowed the faint trail, marked only by machete marks through the dense reserve. It’d take them at least two or three hours to hike back to the dirt road pitted with craters and ruts the size of canyons.
I turned in a slow circle, looking around the jungle. The heavy, humid air pressed inward, trying to suffocate me. Miles away from civilization and on my own, except for two local guides that Dr. Snyder had hired. They seemed nice enough, but I couldn’t believe that he’d left a female student alone in the middle of the jungle, so he could try to get lucky with the prettier student he’d brought along.
Some days I hate men. I really do.
Okay, most days. Or maybe the only men I’d ever met were self-absorbed pricks.
Sighing, I pulled out my map. Scanning the trees on all sides, I tried to identify any possible buildings or ruins. Numerous mounds might be piles of stones—or merely tangled vines and snake dens.
I turned to the guides. My Spanish was passable, but thankfully they understood English well enough too. “We’re going to carefully comb these trees, inch by inch. If you see a single rock, we’ll mark it on the map. Even a fallen-down cornerstone might have inscriptions that will tell us the name of this city.”
