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fast, a sense of wasted time creeping up on
me, and my eyes skimmed over a photograph at the bottom of page four. I started
to turn past, then froze.
    The
photograph was old, but clear. Based on the caption, it had been taken in 1957.
Front and center stood a young white man who looked big and strong, ruggedly
attractive, with a sunny, healthy virility not often seen in the modern male
species. He was dressed in simple clothes, and looked cheerfully dirty. Behind
his right shoulder I saw a giant stone Buddha set in a craggy hill, and at its
base, white tents. His hip leaned against a table set amongst rocks and sand,
its surface covered in small artifacts: pottery shards, small pieces of metal.
    JACK
MEDDLE, read the caption. ARCHAEOLOGIST.
    But
it was the woman on his left I could not stop staring at. She was slender,
dressed in a simple blouse, long pants, and tall boots. She wore gloves, and a
kerchief knotted loosely around her neck. Fine, delicate features, high
cheekbones, full mouth, flawless skin. Hair pulled back. She had striking eyes,
filled with a defiant raw strength that seemed to reach out of the
photograph—daring, haunting. The eyes of a fighter. A Hunter.
    My
grandmother.
    My
lungs ached. I forced myself to breathe. Felt little bodies crowding close and
leaned back as Zee and the others took a look.
    “Oh,”
Zee said, very quietly.
    Took
me a moment to speak. “What is this?”
    “Silk
Road,” he said, as the others all shared a long look. “After the big boom.”
    Big
boom. The bomb. My grandmother had been in Hiroshima during World War II. Never
learned why, only that she was lucky: The bomb fell at 9:15 in the morning. Sun
in the sky. Tattoos secure. The boys kept her alive. Covered her face and
breathed for her until she could travel to safety. Anything, everything, to
survive.
    I
looked at the caption again. Her name was listed only as Miss Chambers, an
alias I was unfamiliar with. Miss Chambers. Adventurer. That was her title.
Appropriate, I supposed.
    I
scanned the article, which discussed how Dr. Jack Meddle had, while on a Silk
Road expedition, stumbled upon an ancient temple buried in the sands almost one
hundred miles north of Xi’an. A place of diverse worship, for Christians, Muslims,
and Buddhists.
    Now
some of the artifacts unearthed from that temple were being displayed at the
Seattle Art Museum, as part of a traveling exhibition of ancient Asian
antiquities. The grand opening, according to the newspaper, was tonight. Part
of a gala celebration timed to coincide with the Chinese New Year, fast
approaching.
    Jack
Meddle was going to be there.
    I sat
back in Badelt’s chair and closed my eyes. I did not believe in coincidence.
Meddle had known my grandmother, and here I was, looking at a photo of them
together, found in the office of a private investigator who had written down my
real name.
    I
looked at my grandmother. Studied her gaze, so much like my own, and felt, too,
that I was staring at my mother. An eerie sensation.
    I
also saw something else that was curious.
    My
grandmother was standing very close to Meddle. So close, in fact, she might
have been holding his hand. Or his waist. Maybe his ass. Hard to say. I could
not see their hands, which were hidden behind their backs. Shoulders pressed
together like glue, bodies turned in, just slightly. The two of them looked
comfortable, like they were used to being close. Working together.
    I
checked the date again—1957. No specific month.
    A
chill swept through me. My mother had been born in 1958.
    “No,”
I said out loud, and looked at the boys, who stared back like choirboys: far
too innocent, little devils. Zee shuffled his feet. Dek and Mal lay curled,
very still, on my shoulders.
    No.
It was impossible.
    But
it also made sense. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. The women in my family
never talked about fathers. Or grandfathers. No record of them in the journals.
One would imagine storks got involved for all my mother had ever