Read Online Carnosaur Crimes by Christine Gentry - Free Book Online Page A

miles per hour cruising speed, you’re going to get a great view of the full moon and the stars. Where we’re going, there won’t be any more lights.”
    â€œI know we’re headed northwest, but where exactly are we going, Agent Standback? I have a right to know. It’s not like I can change my mind, open the door, and leave.”
    A smile cracked his deadpan expression. “True. Grab that map in the waterproof pouch from your door pocket. Then hit that little switch on your microphone. It’s a reading light.”
    Ansel pulled a 12X12 inch map bag from the elastic-topped receptacle on her right. Rather than the typical air chart, the bag contained a folded USGS map. She clicked the mike switch and a flashlight-like, red glow encompassed her chest and lap.
    When she opened the geological survey map, she was surprised to see a close-up segment of a familiar Montana Badlands area about twenty-six miles north of Jordon. The yellow-green area marked with a “K” delineated the position and areas of contact in the Hell Creek rock formation, a Cretaceous age geological strata which had always been commercially searched by those in search of ore, minerals, and fossils.
    â€œWe’re going to the Hell Creek State Park?”
    â€œClose to it. Ever been to the area?”
    â€œNot by air. I’ve driven through it and once I took a pack trip forty miles west through the Devil’s Creek Recreation area. It’s beautiful, but dodgy to navigate even in good weather. Why does Outerbridge want to meet there?”
    â€œI’ll let him explain,” he said, clamming up.
    Ansel’s heart raced with excitement. She studied the bumps and dips on the map for quite a while. There was no doubt that she was going to the same Hell Creek Formation where Barnum Brown had unearthed his two Cretaceous-era T-rex skeletons.
    The Hell Creek Formation was a desiccated, dun-colored range of hilly terrain peppered with gumbo buttes, and sharp, drop-away canyons eroded away by the Missouri River. It was fringed with ponderosa pines leading down to the shores of Fort Peck Lake. During her pack horse vacation, she’d seen elk, deer, eagles, foxes, and coyotes. Waterfowl even inhabited the lakeside regions.
    When Ansel put the map away and looked up, her breath hitched in her chest. The forward view out the Plexiglas nose was magnificent. The helicopter had climbed to one-thousand feet, just below the clouds which spread over her in wispy, cotton batting patches. Overhead a gigantic, radiant orange moon, pockmarked with blue-gray mountains and craters, spilled pastel light into an infinity of night. Stars flickered like silver glitter thrown across black velvet.
    Ten minutes later, the aircraft’s nose angled downward. When the helicopter descended into the wind, everything below was pitch black. Standback was right. There were no city electrical power grids or road lights. Even the moon looked dimmer, slightly shrouded by gray clouds skimming past them.
    Ansel’s fingers dug into the arm rests as her nervousness returned. “We’re already there?”
    Standback turned his head and smiled again. He was quite attractive, Ansel thought not for the first time. He had narrow lips and straight white teeth. Dimples pierced his cheeks, adding long creases that reached down to the ends of each jaw. His almond-shaped eyes were topped by thick black eyebrows. A five-o’clock shadow of chin and moustache stubble darkened his light brown complexion even more.
    â€œAs the crow flies, our ETA was about thirty-five minutes.”
    She glanced at his hands. He wore no jewelry except a ring on his wedding finger, but it didn’t look like a marriage band. It was black and stoneless, resembling something like a plastic kid’s ring pulled from a novelty bubble gum machine. Standback probably wasn’t engaged or married.
    The helicopter’s pitch changed as they made a continuous