Chapter 57

He continued nodding. “Dr. Avila brought it back from his last trip upriver. I prepared slides and made some sketches of it.”

“What do you intend to do with it?”

“My lab is interested. We’ll try to have it preserved for more extensive study.”

“I don’t suppose you’d be interested in selling it?”

“To your lab?” He tilted his head and regarded me with interest. “Or to you?”

“To me.” My lab wouldn’t care in the least about it, but I’d love to have this beauty for my own collection.

“In a word?” He grinned and patted my shoulder. “No.”

“Well, if you change your mind…” I handed him my business card. “Carlos, why didn’t you tell me? I thought all you found was—”

He’d been leaning against the door frame, grinning in satisfaction, as if we were his prize students, but now he straightened and shook his head, and I shut up. “We found the remains just as a school of piranhas got to it. We happened to have some dry ice, and we were able to return with it packed in the ice chest.”