Thunder in the Night (Crimson Romance) Read Online Free PDF

shape and slipped a rubber band around them. “Clark will give a brief talk on the ruins before we leave this morning.” He glanced at his watch. “Very soon, in fact. Then, the group will split up for the ride to Tikal. It’s lucky there hasn’t been much rain or the roads would be impassable.”
    “Then what? We’d miss the site?”
    “No, then we’d have to be flown in. It wouldn’t take as long to get there by plane, but it would be a bit more expensive, of course.”
    “And this way, we’ll get to see some of the country,” I said. “Some of the forest, too?”
    He smiled, pushing back his chair and rising. “You’ll see plenty of forest, Allison. I promise you that.”
    For an instant, as I sat looking up at him, our eyes met and I felt the welcome stirring of attraction. I lost this game of chicken and looked away first, back at the plates and bowls spread across the table.
    “You’ll excuse me, but I need to speak with Clark before we get underway.” Mart tapped his rolled papers against his temple in a jaunty salute. “It was nice breakfasting with you, Allison. I’ll see you in the lobby.”
    I nodded and watched him thread through the maze of tables and chairs in the dining room. It had been an interesting meal in plenty of ways. Not the least of which was Mart himself, and those deep, dark eyes.
    I almost laughed out loud, listening in on my own thoughts. Here I was, at the beginning of an assignment, wasting valuable time thinking about someone’s eyes. I’d been sent here to do a job and, right now, that job entailed gulping the last of my coffee and joining the others headed for the hotel lobby.
    I followed the sound of chattering voices to where our group was gathered. The Underwoods waved and I returned the gesture, but didn’t push through the throng to reach them. Scanning the group, I noted Clark’s position near the wall. As I watched, he waved his arms overhead in an appeal for quiet.
    “This morning,” he began once the group hushed, “we’ll be journeying to the fantastic Mayan ruins of Tikal. I guarantee you will find the site fascinating and utterly, utterly unforgettable.” He closed his eyes on the second “utterly” and reopened them now to direct his warm smile at each of us. “We’ll be traveling in four-wheel-drive SUVs, so we’ll break into small groups momentarily. I’d like to share a bit of Tikal’s history with you first, however.”
    I fished rapidly for my notebook so I could jot some of this down.
    “Tikal is the largest city ever built by the ancient Mayan Indians and served as the capital. When I say ‘ancient,’ that’s exactly what I mean, too. There is evidence Tikal was occupied as far back as 2500 B.C. and had a population of at least forty thousand. At the site, there are remnants of more than three thousand buildings. The University of Pennsylvania spent years working to restore some of these, cutting back the jungle growth to reveal the structures, but such work is a colossal undertaking.”
    He turned, gesturing to a picture on the wall nearby which showed the flat-topped pyramid with steps down the front. “Some of the temples are as tall as a modern-day skyscraper,” Clark told us. “This one, for instance, is probably fifteen stories high. That’s about one hundred and fifty feet. The tallest, which is still pretty well covered by the jungle, is two hundred and twelve feet high.”
    There were whistles and gasps from the crowd as we tried to imagine an ancient civilization constructing such massive buildings without the aid of modern machinery.
    “For reasons no one fully understands, Tikal was abandoned before 900 A.D. and not rediscovered until the mid-nineteenth century. Today, restoration work continues, so we may all admire and respect the wondrous achievements of the people referred to as ‘the Greeks of the New World.’ On the way to our vehicles, I urge each of you to pick up a copy of this fact sheet on Tikal, put