Left Hanging by Patricia McLinn Read Free Book Online Page B

good with a computer.”
    Good with the insides and the outsides. The newsroom aide/sometimes production assistant had gotten my home computer set up fast, as well as running down information for me on the Internet.
    “I will.” He sounded significantly cheered.
    By this time, steer wrestling had ended. Bull riding came last. It’s often the most dramatic, certainly potentially most dangerous. Mike had told me to watch every one of the eight seconds—and well past. After the ride can be the most dangerous for the competitor, not to mention the rodeo clowns, whose job it was to distract the bull from his intention of goring or trampling the competitor. I think I’d skip a want ad with job duties of Draw attention of angry bull, keep it while everyone else flees to safety .
    Mike leaned forward, focusing on the action in the arena. But I wasn’t watching the bull riding.
    I’d turned to reach for my jacket on the seat beside me. A flash of something caught my eye. Something visible in the open space beneath the empty bleacher seat behind me. Something blue.
    Twisting around and down until I was almost lying crossways on the bleacher seat allowed me to see between the floor and seat of the row behind me. What I saw was the blue-haired girl from the animal rights protest.
    Inside the rodeo grounds. The heart of enemy territory. What could she be up to?
    She shifted, and I realized she was not alone. Then I realized what she was up to. What many young people get up to under bleachers.
    She and her companion were upright and not quite doing the deed, but even in the murky light I was pretty sure there were hands inside clothes, and a definite rhythm going.
    I leaned more and made out a black cowboy hat in the faint light.
    Great. That narrowed it to every male in the place and a few of the females.
    A cramp scratched at my side. I shifted  . . . and realized that what little light reached the amorous pair sifted through the open sections between the bleacher seats and foot wells. Considering their position and mine, I figured my legs were shadowing them.
    Adjusting my center of gravity, I lifted my legs, balancing on the seat, along with the support of both hands on the foot well behind my seat.
    “Hey,” Mike protested. I could tell from his voice he was still looking toward the arena. “Put your feet down. I don’t want that shoe closer to my nose.”
    I ignored him. The light was definitely better. I saw the crown of the black cowboy hat clearly. But the darned thing kept the wearer’s face shadowed.
    “What are you doing?” Mike demanded, now speaking from over my shoulder.
    Like the first domino tipping, that started a rapid sequence.
    I reached back with one hand to wave sharply in the universal sign to “Shut up while I’m teetering on this bleacher seat!”
    The scratch of the cramp in my side turned into a claw. And I was no longer teetering.
    With only one hand to balance on and writhing with the cramp, my head dropped, my forehead whacked the foot well, accompanied by an involuntary sound of pain.
    Ms. Blue Hair and her companion looked up. For a fraction of a second, the light shone on her companion’s face, his tilted-back head removing the protective shadow of the brim.
    My feet dropped back to my footwell. By the time I scrambled around to look again—a process made speedier because I no longer cared about noise, but hampered by the full-blown cramp, a sore forehead, and Mike demanding to know if I was having a fit—Ms. Blue Hair and friend were gone.
    MIKE DID NOT seem overly impressed with my tale of how Cas Newton and Ms. Blue Hair were consorting, as well as cavorting, with the enemy. He shrugged and mumbled something about teenage hormones as we applauded the bull riding winner and headed down the grandstand steps. He clearly hadn’t had much experience with PMS to so lightly dismiss hormones.
    I thought back to my encounter with Heather Upton and her mother. Not a pair to take interference