The office was starting to get hot and stuffy, as it always did in the later part of the work day. She tugged open the top button of her tan park ranger uniform, wishing the stiff cloth were made of something thinner and more breathable. She lifted the next leaf of paper from the enormous basket of park passes she was processing-- Entering them into the database to store them electronically. The basket still looked just as full as it had been this morning. The writing on the paper blurred a little as she yawned widely. She needed coffee.

She pushed her chair back from the desk, getting slowly to her feet, eyes on the grainy, gray-green carpet. The familiar gray stain in a sloppy splotch greeted her from beneath her right boot. The ranger's office wasn't the nicest cabin in the woods, a

I smacked my lips, turning my head from side-to-side, inspecting for any flaws in my makeup I should fix. My lipstick tonight was a bold, sensual red. The usual rule for a bold lip is lighter makeup on the eyes, but I knew what he liked. and that certainly was not a subtle eye. Thick winged liner framed my hazel eyes, with a shimmery, dark-gray smoky eye smudged around them, which shimmered gently in the low, warm lighting of the hotel bathroom. Sometimes I wished they put better lighting in these bathrooms, which would make it easier to fix my makeup, but I could understand why they kept it dim. The gold-framed mirrors and bowl-shaped crystal sinks would't have the same charm under the cool, bland flood that makeup lighting would have produced.

The target was staying on the forty-eigh