Not only was it already hot outside, but I could feelextra heat coming off the man’s gaze in front of me, as well as the man beside him—though one appeared to be from lust and the other from anger.
Feeling the need to move this into safer territory, I decided to push this along.
“If you don’t mind, we’d like to shoot this with the lake behind us. Perhaps down there by one of those coves,” I suggested by pointing to the area about a hundred yards beyond where we had parked our cars.
“Not a problem. That sounds like a perfect place,” Patrick said, again with that dimpled smile, while Hector McGrouchy-pants just nodded in response. “Ladies first.” He held his arm out in front of him to let Christine and me pass.
We set the two men up with the lake and mountains behind them to highlight the surrounding beauty. After we did a sound check and confirmed we were recording, I began to ask questions.
“Patrick, we’ll start with you,” I said, knowing I wasn’t going to get this interview going on the wrong foot by starting with broody Hector. “Many people visit the lake from out of town. What would you say to tourists visiting the lake for the first time?”
“Our desert environment can lead to extreme heat and intense sun exposure, so visitors should take extra precautions against dehydration and sunburn.”
I turned to the broodier half of the interview to ask my next question. “Hector, what about the people whodolivenearby and come to this lake frequently? What advice would you give them?”
“Water levels here are at historic lows,” he responded, sounding oddly more pleasant in his professional mode. Clearly, he had a game face that he could turn on when he needed to. “Coves and even traditionally deep-water areas are now very shallow, and if you aren’t paying attention, you can damage your boats by running aground or hitting rocks.”
Despite both men giving wonderful interviews, I was drawn to Hector. His voice was deep and sexy, albeit not the warm growl I usually preferred. But for whatever reason, he was not a fan ofme, so I focused on the mission at hand and continued on with our interview. Ben and I took turns asking a few more questions about swimming and lightning safety before we wrapped up.
We thanked Hector and Patrick for their time, and they made their way back to their cars. Christine and I trailed them slowly so we could grab some props from the car that we needed for our separate piece on lightning safety.
After we grabbed the items we needed, we headed toward one of the nearby coves so that Ben and I could stand ankle deep in the water—a perfect excuse to cool off. Ben and I both had made sure to pack water shoes since neither of us wanted to accidentally step on broken glass from bottles people had thrown overboard from their boats.
I noticed that Hector and Patrick were talkingtogether by their cars as we walked by, Hector’s eyes meeting briefly with mine. I felt his gaze follow me the entire way as we walked to the cove. I suspected it was because to get there, we needed to walk around a roped-off area, though we had permission to be there. Because the water levels were so low, some of these areas had a steeper drop-off compared to normal.
Ben and I had on our standard uniforms of khaki pants and government-issued polo shirts with the National Weather Service logo. I rolled the pants up to my knees and began to wade into the cool, shallow water.
I let out a deep sigh. “Oh, my goodness, this feels so good.”
“Yeah, it does,” Ben confirmed as he stepped into the water behind me.
“Okay, where exactly do you two want to stand for this?” Christine asked.
We were in the water up to our calves and only about fifteen feet from shore. I looked around and noticed that if we stepped to my left a little and went a tad bit deeper, we could angle it so the larger Anvil Mountains were nicely centered in the background.
“What if we try over here so we can…” I began to move backward until my foot caught on something in the water. I flailed my arms, trying to reach for something to grab onto, but Ben was too far from me, and I fell backward with a big splash into the water. I landed hard on what felt like jagged rocks, and I yelped as shooting pain coursed through my butt, tailbone, and lower back.
Ben quickly walked over to me, pinching his lips as though he was trying hard not to laugh.
“Are you okay?” he asked, extending his hand out for me to grab. “Are you hurt?”
“My tailbone and my pride are sufficiently bruised, but I’m otherwise fine,” I responded as I reached for his hand.
“What happened?” Ben asked as I rubbed my lower back to soothe the growing pain.
“Are you okay?” Christine yelled from her perch behind the camera on dry land.
“You know, girlie, if you wanted a proper swim, you should have brought a suit,” Ben teased as I stared down at my clothes, which were now soaking wet.
Good thing I’d brought an extra set of clothes—though I’d thought I would need them in case I sweated through my first pair, not from falling into the water.
“I was taking a step back and tripped over a rock or something right there,” I said, pointing to the spot behind me.
“Well, let me nudge it back a little so you don’t trip over it again,” he said, leaning over to push the rock back a little with his foot.
Just then, Ben’s face shifted from teasing to a look of confusion, and then he went pale as a ghost.
I looked down to see what he was looking at and noticed a large, oval-shaped rock. It had a yellow-brown tint to it with a greenish hue, likely from algae that had accumulated on it. The image was distorted as the lakewater rippled over it, but there was no hiding one very obvious feature—the two dark circles on the top that looked exactly like eye sockets on a skull.
