One Way Out

Chapter One Cassie Ashton shaded her eyes with her hand and squinted up at a man dangling halfway down the face of a bluff, twenty feet off the ground. The guy in the climbing harness wore jeans, heavy boots, a long-sleeved blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and a very familiar battered white Resistol hat.She'd finally run her quarry to ground.Grinning, she tipped her head back and watched as he braced one gloved hand on the rock and worked the ropes with the other. She waited until he'd secured his footing, then cupped her hands around her mouth and yelled: "Hey, Martinelli!"The white hat dipped as he looked down, and even though he was too far up for her to hear it, his lips formed a coarse word she easily recognized. "What the hell do you want?" he shouted back."Gotta talk to you!""In case it's escaped your notice, Ashton, I'm kind of tied up at the moment."She'd noticed, all right. The leather straps and ropes nicely framed the best, and the most arrogant, ass in all Wyoming."Whatever's in that rock has been there for over sixty million years, and it's not going anywhere now. What I have to talk to you about is important.""Christ, couldn't you once call ahead for an appointment?" He twirled above her as he repositioned himself, muscles pulling at his cotton shirt, straining its seams. "You can't expect me to come running every time you snap your fingers."As the voices of the crowd gathering behind her grew louder, she affected a look of bored amusement and made a show of gazing around the rocky, scrub-brush terrain of dinosaur-rich Como Bluff. "An appointment? What do you think you are, Martinelli? A dentist lounging around some posh office?""Thisismy office. Now go away, call my department, and leave me a message."Which he wouldn't return. Cassie grinned. "I don't think so. Get your ass down here, Professor Martinelli, because I'm not going anywhere until we talk. And you know I mean it.""Don, what the hell is she doing here? Why didn't someone stop her before she got this far?" he demanded."Sorry, Alex. The new kids on the crew don't know her," answered a familiar gravelly voice. "And I was busy working on that hadrosaur leg we found yes-terday. I guess she slipped right past me....You want me to throw her in the creek? I'd really enjoy that.""You're welcome to try it, Igor." Still smiling, Cassie didn't bother turning around to face Don Cleary, the wiry old man she'd teasingly nicknamed Igor because he was Martinelli's second banana.Above her, Martinelli called, "That's a pleasure I'm reserving for myself, Don."Before Cassie could retort, a young man's voice from behind her yelled cheerfully, "Hey, hey, everybody, look who's here...it's showtime!"Fine; if they wanted entertainment, she'd give them something to remember. Something to match that night eight months ago in Medicine Bow when Martinelli had humiliated her in a bar full of people. And last year, and that October three years earlier...and it wasn't like she'd ever live down the acrimonious showdown that had started their feud five long years ago, either.By now, their clashes were nearly legendary.Smile widening into a grin, Cassie pretended not to hear the increasing catcalls, acting as if it didn't matter that her kind would never be welcome here."Come on, Martinelli. Are you just going to dangle up there, safely out of my reach, or come down here and face me like the big ol' manly man you are?"She couldn't resist the "manly man" bit. With his half-supported stance against the rock emphasizing his lean, strong build, he looked like a poster boy for a wilderness outfitter advertisement.For a moment Cassie thought Martinelli would refuse the challenge, but after another mouthed curse he began lowering himself, working the lines and pulleys with an expertise that came from years of climbing mountains and cliffs the world over, hunting fossils, loAlbert, Michele is the author of 'One Way Out', published 2005 under ISBN 9780743485029 and ISBN 0743485025.