Something Wicked

ONE The late-afternoon sun beat down like a curse. A hundred and two in theshade. Not that there was any shade. "Go to hell, Ms. Cluny," reclusivephilanthropist Charles Cunningham Nash had said the last time Regan hadpestered him for an interview. And here she freaking was. A clever woman would have realized fate was conspiring against her whenmechanical difficulties delayed her flight from JFK to Reno. A cleverwoman would have taken the hint when her favorite Louis Vuitton bagvanished into luggage limbo. A clever woman would have said, "Screw this,"when her rental car's air conditioner gasped its last shortly after shecrossed the California border. But Regan had persevered. Huge mistake. The only thing playing on the radio now was static, the gas gauge wasflirting with empty, and Juniper Basin was nowhere to be seen, even thoughaccording to the MapQuest directions she'd tapedto the Corolla's dash,she should have been therealready. She must have made a wrong turnsomewhere. Right. Like the second she'd decided to pursue this story so doggedly.After all, those tabloid photos had been obvious fakes. Alien citiesburied deep beneath the Modoc Plateau? No way. But her instincts had toldher to follow her nose, and damn it, Nash's lame-assed explanation of whathe and his team of archaeologists were really doing out here in the middleof nowhere stank to high heaven. After all, why would anyone investmillions to excavate a nondescript Paleo-Indian village unlikely to yieldanything more exciting than Clovis points and grinding stones? Still, was tracking down the truth worth a detour through hell? The molten sun was riding the rimrocks by the time Regan reached the nextoutpost of civilization, a blink-your-eyes-and-miss-it town named ChiselRock. She pulled up to the pumps in front of the Oasis Truck Stop, where neonpalm trees decorated one windowless side wall of the cinder-block buildinghousing the restaurant and minimart. A shabby twelve-unit motel edged theback of the property, and to the west stood a row of Lombardy poplarskeletons, their elongated shadows stretching across the parking lot likebony fingers. Two dusty pickup trucks, a PT Cruiser, and half a dozencherried-out Harleys huddled in the meager shade. Wasn't exactly the Big Apple, but Regan figured someone inside could tellher how to find the dig at Juniper Basin. She unbuckled her seat belt andstepped out of the car. A bowlegged mutt with a scruffy patchwork coat suddenly bounced out frombetween two big rigs parked along the shoulder on the opposite side ofthe highway. The dog crossed the road at a trot, then made a wide detouraround her before pausing to christen both rear tires of the Corolla. "Amen, buddy." Smiling in grim amusement, Regan filled her tank, thenheaded inside to pay. The Oasis's interior reeked of stale grease. An old-fashioned jukeboxblared eighties tunes at a deafening decibel level. Worse yet, the momentRegan crossed the threshold, six badass biker types glanced up from thepool table in the corner to focus their X-ray vision on the front of hercami. None of which carried any weight when balanced against the blessingof air-conditioning. "Pump two." She handed a twenty to the middle-aged brunette at the cashregister. "What's the best way to get to Juniper Basin?" The cashier rang up the gas and counted back the change. "Never heard ofthe place, but then, I'm from Reno. Haven't lived here long. Josh!" shecalled to a lanky teenager who was busing tables on the far side of theroom. "Yeah?" The kid stuffed a tip in the pocket of his Wranglers. "Lady here's looking for directions to Juniper Basin." The kid ambled across the dining room to Regan's side. "You looking for Mr.Nash, too?" "Too?" she sMulvany, Catherine is the author of 'Something Wicked ', published 2007 under ISBN 9781416525578 and ISBN 1416525572.