Page 168 of Beasts of Mine

Six seventeen. The time pushed at least some of the embarrassment aside because I had an actual reason to stop staring at the evidence of my own instincts.

“I need to work.” I told Luca as I pushed myself higher against the pillows, listening to the birds becoming steadily more active outside. “Morning light was half the reason I stayed out here.”

“You have time.” Luca answered as he checked the watch from where he lay beside me. “But probably not enough to spend twenty minutes glaring at me.”

“I could manage both.” I told Luca, although my gaze had already shifted toward the shutters and the increasingly bright strip of morning visible through them.

“I believe you.” Luca replied, his sleepy smile finally escaping when I continued glaring anyway. I stayed beside him for another five minutes, maybe seven, which was different from going back to sleep no matter how comfortable I had become. By six thirty-five, I was dressed, my hair pulled into a quick braid, and my camera was back in my hands.

Luca walked with me as far as the trail leading toward the upper stream before stopping. He had already learned enough about the way I worked to understand that having someone directly behind me made wildlife photography considerably harder, so after pointing out the quickest route back to the temple, he left me to it.

The early light was worth the overnight.

I reached the upper stream while the canopy was still holding onto the softer light that disappeared once the sun climbed higher. A motmot settled on an exposed branch above the water, the growing sunlight catching the green and blue in its feathers without washing out the darker forest behind it. Farther upstream, a pair of toucans moved through fruiting branches while I worked from the edge of the bank, giving me several usable frames before disappearing deeper into the canopy.

An agouti appeared between the buttress roots a little later, moving cautiously through the leaf litter before stopping near the water long enough for me to get several photographs. I stayed low and still until it continued into the undergrowth, then shifted farther along the bank as the sunlight began reaching through wider gaps above me.

For nearly an hour, everything else returned to the familiar rhythm of work—watching movement, adjusting for light, waiting, and changing position whenever the angle stopped working. This was what I had been missing from the assignment. Not simply different animals, but the upper stream before full daylight changed the shadows and flattened some of the depth I had been trying to capture.

By the time I headed back toward the temple, I had enough new frames on the memory card to know Mara’s overnight suggestion had been worth it. A little before eight, I returned to find Luca in the cooking area with breakfast already waiting and my empty overnight bag sitting nearby.

“You packed my bag?” I asked Luca as I stopped in the doorway, looking from him to the bag before giving him a suspicious look.

“No.” Luca answered as he set a bowl on the table. “I brought it out here so you could pack it.”

“That was a very careful answer.” I told Luca as I set my camera somewhere dry and noticed he had also placed one of my full water bottles beside breakfast.

“I learn.” Luca replied, and the small smile he gave me made it clear he knew exactly why I appreciated the distinction. After breakfast, I packed my clothes, toiletries, medical pouch, and the rest of my supplies. The camera batteries were fully charged, and the waterproof box remained beneath the worktable.

I almost told Luca he could put it away.

Instead, I left it exactly where it was. Malek’s shirt went into my overnight bag, Tavian’s seed and shell went into the protected pocket of my camera bag, and Luca’s blanket stayed on the sleeping platform.

I stood in the doorway for a second longer than necessary, looking at the room I had slept in and the things I was leaving behind before making myself turn away.

At eight twelve, Luca walked with me to the terrace where the radio signal had been strongest the night before. Morning sunlight reached farther across the stone now, warming one side of the old wall while the shaded sections remained cool and damp.

“Base, this is Evie. Morning update.” I spoke into the handset when the channel cleared, resting my camera bag beside my boot while Luca waited nearby.

“Evie, base. Go ahead.” Mara answered through the radio, her voice carrying a faint crackle of static.

“Safe, no injuries, and I got the morning work I wanted.” I told Mara as I glanced over the terrace toward the forest. “I’m packed and starting back now. Expected return is still before ten.”

“Copy that.” Mara answered over the radio, and I could faintly hear paper moving behind her voice. “Weather looks clear for the walk back. See you before ten.”

“See you then. Evie out.” I answered Mara before releasing the button and clipping the radio securely onto my belt. Luca picked up neither of my bags when I joined him, and that probably shouldn’t have felt significant, but it did.

He walked with me through the maintained courtyard toward the path leading back into the older sections of the temple. Morning light filtered through gaps in the canopy, leaving shifting patches across the stones we had crossed the day before while damp air carried the smells of soil, greenery, and faint smoke from the cooking fire behind us.

We reached the first old wall before Luca stopped.

“You’ll come back?” Luca asked, his voice quieter than it had been over breakfast as he watched me.

“I have to go back to the station.” I reminded Luca as I adjusted the camera bag across my shoulder, although the way he looked at me told me immediately that wasn’t what he meant.

“I know.” Luca replied as he rested one hand against the weathered stone beside him. “That wasn’t what I asked.”

I looked past him toward the rooms hidden behind the courtyard walls. Somewhere inside was a sleeping platform covered in blankets and pillows I had rearranged without thinking. A waterproof box sat beneath a worktable beside an outlet he had noticed I could use. One cleared shelf waited above it.