The Death Relic by Chris Kuzneski Read Free Book Online Page A

too.’
    ‘Don’t get me wrong: we can still be friends and all, but …’
    ‘Say no more. I completely understand.’
    ‘No,’ Jones stressed, ‘you can’t understand because you didn’t see it for yourself. To this day, I still have nightmares about your dancing. Honest to God, it was worse than anything I ever saw in Iraq. You looked like Frankenstein getting zapped with a taser.’
    Payne laughed at the description, which was more accurate than he cared to admit. ‘Fine. No dancing for me, and no skiing for you. Is that what we’re looking for?’
    ‘And warm. It has to be warm.’
    ‘A warm place without dancing or skiing. Anything else?’
    ‘Women wouldn’t hurt.’
    Payne nodded. ‘Amen to that.’
    ‘What about Vegas?’
    ‘Fine for me, bad for you. It gets cold at night in the desert.’
    ‘How cold?’
    ‘Low forties.’
    ‘Screw that. I need something warmer than forty.’
    ‘How about Miami?’
    Jones shook his head. ‘Too many nightclubs.’
    ‘And that’s a bad thing?’
    ‘It is for you, because everywhere we go women will be dancing.’
    ‘That’s OK. I’ll sit at the bar and watch.’
    ‘You say that now, but what happens when a pack of supermodels summons you to the dance floor? What are you going to do then?’
    Payne laughed. ‘Yeah, because
that’s
going to happen.’
    ‘You never know, it might. And we simply can’t risk it.’
    He rolled his eyes. Sometimes Jones got ideas in his head that were a little less than rational. Of course, that was part of his charm. ‘Listen, it’s too late to arrange a flight for tonight, so let’s plan our trip after dinner. We can hop on the Internet and look for somewhere new. If we’re lucky, maybe we’ll find a coupon.’
    ‘Sweet! You know how much I love coupons.’

9
    Hamilton pushed the chips and salsa aside. Now that he had established a rapport with Maria, he was ready to talk business. ‘Tell me, what do you know about the Maya?’
    ‘The Maya?’ she repeated, pausing for a moment to gather her thoughts. ‘Local civilization, very advanced for their time. They ruled this region for several hundred years, until the Spanish conquistadores arrived in the sixteenth century. After that, they kind of faded away.’
    Hamilton considered her response for several seconds before shaking his head from side to side. He punctuated his thoughts by giving her a thumbs down. ‘If you were my student, I’d give that answer a D-minus at best. About the only thing you got correct was their name.’
    Her face flushed with embarrassment. ‘Their name?’
    He nodded. ‘Most people call them the Mayans, not the Mayas. It’s an error that drives me crazy.
Maya
is the name of the people.
Mayan
is an adjective that describes their things – Mayan art, Mayan language and so on. At least you got their name right.’
    Sensing a shift in his tone, Maria lifted her glass and tried to ease the tension with a joke. ‘What did you say before? Here’s to small victories!’
    Hamilton forced a smile. ‘Sadly, I was hoping for more from you.’
    Her shoulders sagged, as if the wind had escaped her sails. ‘Listen, I think there’s been some sort of misunderstanding. If you’re looking for an expert in Mayan history, I’m definitely not your gal. In all my years, I think I took one course on Mesoamerica, and I only did that because it was a school requirement. My specialty is Christian history, not ancient civilizations.’
    A master of reading people, Hamilton studied her posture and realized he had been too tough on her. She had gone from eager to defensive in the blink of an eye. To ensure her involvement, he knew he had to walk a fine line between employer and friend. If he pushed her too hard, she was liable to walk away before she even got started.
    With that in mind, he quickly apologized. ‘Please forgive my rudeness. For a brief second, I was back in the lecture hall, trying to motivate students at the beginning of a semester.