The Flock by James Robert Smith Page A

very busy. But, I’d like to make the time to get to know you.”
    Ron pressed his lips together. Okay. A mystery woman . “I can’t imagine what I’d need to know before taking you out. But, okay. Let’s talk about it.”
    For the first time since he’d met her that morning, an expression of something like anger crossed her face. “Not now . This isn’t the time or the place. We’ll talk later. Maybe tomorrow, if you come by the compound. Hell, there’s three days before Friday.”
    Ron reached back and grunted, pulling his wallet free. He opened it, dug around until he found the small bundle of cards he carried there. “Here,” he said, handing one to her. “This is a business card. I have to have them for when I’m doing interpretive talks for schools, tourist groups. They have my home phone number. Give me a call and we can make some time. Just to talk.”
    Without looking at him, Kate reached out and took the card and stuffed it in the breast pocket of her shirt. “Okay.” Her eyes were on the road as they left the town center behind and faded into the darkness toward the residential neighborhoods. “Now. Where did you park your truck?”
    â€œNorth side of town,” he told her. “Phase Three, they call it. I parked right next to that substation.”
    â€œI know exactly where you’re talking about,” she said. “I’ll have you right there.”
    She made a couple of right turns, the headlights of the truck spotlighting freshly mown lawns and smart cars parked in pale, concrete driveways, waiting to pull into wide garages. “I hate this place,” she said. And then they were there, her bright beams illuminating Ron’s truck. “This the place, fella?”
    â€œThis is the place,” he told her, smiling at her and offering his hand. She took it, gripped it, and released him. “Thanks for the ride, good lookin’.”
    â€œAnytime,” she said as he slid out. He smiled again, waved, and shut the door.
    While Ron walked to the truck and climbed in, she waited until he had started it and was pulling away. Once, when she was younger, she had dropped a friend at a vehicle, a situation similar to this one, and had driven away without waiting; the friend’s car had not started and a four-mile hike in the dark had been made to the nearest public phone. She had always felt some guilt over that, and never wanted to repeat that kind of error.
    Falling in behind his truck, she followed for a hundred yards or so. Then he turned south, and she had to bear to the right.

Chapter Thirteen
    Tim Dodd lay in the garden tub and soaked. Soake d, he thought. He was thinking of doing that to the Inquirer . Sure, he was on their dime, but he’d earned it. They were paying for this fourth floor room, an expensive room at that. They were footing the bill for this hot bath and for the room service, which he had abused for the past two weeks. But they had gotten some good articles from him. Roe Fox, his immediate editor, had admitted that they received a flood of calls and letters concerning his pieces on Salutations. He’d boosted sales considerably in the South, Fox had told him. But the story was starting to flicker out. People had seen enough photographs of trussed up alligators in the back of some gator hunter’s pickup truck. And the hospital bed photos he’d gotten of the fat jogger who’d been nailed by the cottonmouth were topflight, certainly. But the paper had run it twice and that kind of stuff was losing its punch.
    â€œEither build up this giant snake thing you’ve got going, or head on back. You can’t run up your expense account like this forever,” Fox had told him.
    â€œI’m not making this up, Roe. These people really are losing their pets to some silent predator coming out of the woods. For real.”
    â€œSave it for the funny papers, Tim.