The spring rain was cold and steady. It beat a mind-numbing tattoo on the roof of Lindsay's car as she glared at the brake lights in front of her and seethed.
She hated rain. She hated traffic. She hated having errands foisted upon her by her boss at the last minute. With the combination of all three weighing on her mind, the hate expanded to become almost an entity in itself. Lindsay looked around her, and hated the Audi to her right. She hated whoever was behind her with too-bright lights. She hated the BMW in front of her, and she hated the little bald spot she could just barely see on the passenger in the back seat. She twiddled the radio, and managed to hate every type of music that came through, and hated the static between even more. She hated the slow crawl that moved her relentlessly along the M1.
The minor roads leading to her destination in Buckinghamshire were less crowded, and she made the trip at a good clip. However, the late hour and ceaseless pounding of the rain meant that her mood had not improved perceptibly by the time she reached her destination. The long driveway grated on her nerves, and the shelterless stretch between the cul-de-sac where she stopped and the entrance to the manor mocked her. She sighed and looked at her fashionable and highly un-waterproof pumps with regret. She picked up the bag in the passenger's seat, took a deep breath, and awkwardly sprinted the distance from the car to the door. Her hair was nevertheless stuck wetly to the sides of her face when she made it to the doorsill's overhang, and was dripping onto her blouse. The door opened as soon as she reached it, as if someone had been watching.
"Good evening; please come in." The butler who had opened the door gestured her inside.
Lindsay held out the bag. "I came to deliver this; Dr. Hamilton said you knew I was coming..."
"Yes..." the butler smiled and took the bag, then put his hand on her back and urged her forward. "Have some tea; you look soaked."
The word 'tea' was a magic incantation that instantly won her cooperation. Lindsay pushed her wet hair back and walked from the entryway to the living room, led by the genial butler. He waved her into a beige armchair as he continued through another door.
The chair was soft, almost too soft, and after the hell of a day she had just been through, she felt an urge to relax bonelessly in it. But ogling the rest of the room took too much of her attention. It was spacious, rearing up two floors to a skylight that let off a low drone from the pounding of raindrops. A large staircase at the far end led to a balcony that encircled the room and led off to unknown bits of second story. Two other chairs and one loveseat, all mates to the chair she sat in, were arranged around the room. A small table of some warm, reddish wood sat to her left, resting on elegantly carved legs, and a larger companion stood in the middle of the room. A rich Oriental rug lay on the stone floor, its reds and golds the main source of color. At the opposite end of the room from the staircase, a small computer area made an odd contrast to the old-money fashion that dominated the rest of the room.
The butler came back, having exchanged the black bag she had brought for a silver tray with a pot of tea and a cup. He set the tray down next to her, and she gratefully picked it up and took a sip of what turned out to be strong chai, slightly sweet. For the first time in several hours, she smiled.
Lara sat in Bryce's study, perched on the edge of a chair that was dominated by heaps of wiring. She started to open the bag, then looked over her shoulder at Bryce. He was staring unabashedly at the bag, his breath loud in her ear.
"Do you mind?" she asked, trying to aim a shrug at his chin.
"I'm curious. Whot's in that, then?"
Lara stared at him levelly, until he took the hint and leaned back against his desk, his cheek twitching with excitement. Lara turned back to the bag and opened it, gently lifting out a small, dirty yellow stone. It fit in the palm of her hand, and glinted dully in the light.
"Is that all?" Bryce looked disappointed.
"All? This was quite a find!" Bryce leaned in again as she held it up. "Dominican amber, with an insect inclusion." She pointed to the small multi-legged creature frozen in the chunk's heart.
"Whot kind of insect?"
"Good question. I hope Diane was able to find out something about it. I told her 'borrowing' does not include 'grinding up!'" Lara held the piece to the light, and it glowed bright yellow. The insect was a perfectly formed silhouette; no air bubbles marred the stone.
"She coulda come and talked to you herself," Bryce groused, glancing out into the living room. Hillary had started a conversation with the irate-looking woman who had brought the bag; she appeared to have relaxed significantly since he had brought her in. "Whot's she doin' out there?"
Lara turned her head and grinned. "Jealous, Bryce?" He gave her a wounded look.
"Right-o; I'll go greet the guest and put you out of your misery." She slipped the stone gently back into the bag, swept the clutter off of a corner of the desk (to Bryce's great dismay), set the bag there, and walked out to the living room. Bryce sighed and started to pick up the bits and bobs that Lara had swept onto the floor. Hillary walked in while he was still engrossed in this task, set a cup of tea precariously on a heap of papers next to one of the monitors, and started to root through the bag. Bryce rescued the cup as it started to slide off, and took a sip.
"Ain't much to look at," he commented as Hillary finally found the small stone.
Hillary appeared to agree; he held the stone to the light, turning it this way and that, and shrugged. "Well, Lara went to a fair amount of trouble to get it."
"Eh, the old refrain... Lara wants it, that's good enough for me..." Bryce singsonged.
"It got you hired," Hillary muttered, not quite quietly enough.
Bryce's retort was lost, however, as Lara swept in and snatched the stone out of Hillary's hands. "Keep your fingers off of my things!" she groused. She waved in the general direction of the living room with the hand that held the stone. "Be a dear and show Lindsay out, will you?"
She had a distracted look in her eyes, and hared out of the room before Hillary's "Yes, ma'am," was fully out of his mouth.
Lindsay was in a far better mood than she had been when she arrived. She was warm, dry, full of very good tea, and had enjoyed a stimulating conversation with Lara. The aristocrat had appeared to be a dilettante initially, but her knowledge of virology was, for a layperson, impressive. The good tea and pleasing conversation had mellowed Lindsay enough for her to not be offended by the butler's not-so-subtle hint of the danger of waiting until it was much later to drive home in the rain. He walked her out to her car with an umbrella, and she left the manor in reasonably good spirits.
Those spirits lasted all of about the two minutes it took for her to get rearended. She pulled to the side of the road and sighed, looking back at the single remaining headlight of the car that had whacked her. Whacked her none too gently; she rubbed the back of her now-sore neck. And she had merely been driving at a fairly steady speed! She saw a black silhouette emerge from the other vehicle, and sat back, waiting. She would not get wet because of someone else's inattention. She rolled down her window as the figure approached her door.
It did not pause. Once her window was open, it reached in and put a very meaty hand around her throat, revealing itself as a broad-shouldered man in dark clothing. His collar was turned up, and a black stocking cap was pulled low over his face. The other hand thrust a wicked-looking serrated knife in through the window, and put the point to her nose.
"The rock. Now," the man growled in a voice that grated of too many cigarettes and too much liquor over the course of his lifetime. The accent bore badly hidden hints of Liverpool.
Lindsay's brain ceased to work properly as soon as her throat was grabbed, and the knife did not help matters. Incoherent sounds came out of her throat.
The man leaned in closer. His breath hinted at a mouth that did not receive regular visitations from a toothbrush. "Don't screw with me, bitch."
Her voice came back, slightly. It was very squeaky, and shuddered a great deal. "I left it... back..." she choked.
"At the manor?" he ground. She nodded. The man withdrew his hand and his knife with a muffled curse. "Knew we shouldn't've waited," he grumbled. He spoke more loudly to her. "Too bad you backed into a light pole and busted yer light, innit?" He turned and strode back to the car, which pulled away and made a U-turn with a loud screeching of tires.
Lindsay's hand trembled as she rolled the window closed. She sat there, breathing heavily, waiting for the hammering of her heart to settle to a point where she could attempt to drive.
It had, indeed, been a bitch of a day.