Slither - Edward Lee [46]
Nora stopped him. "Oh, Lieutenant? I wanted to ask you something. Didn't you tell us yesterday that the army took all the surveillance cameras off the island when they closed down the missile site in the eighties?"
Trent seemed piqued by the question. "Yeah, sure. This used to be a high-security military reservation. Why do you ask?"
"I think I found a camera, last night." Nora pointed back toward the edge of the forest. it was on this side, somewhere between the campsite and the head shacks."
"I guess they could've missed one," Trent supposed.
"And it was the strangest thing-I mean, I think it was a camera of some sort; it definitely had a lens. But it was really small."
"A surveillance camera would be small," Annabelle said.
Nora restrained most of a smirk. "Small as in tiny. It was like a half inch long, sticking out of a tree, and about as thin as a pencil. Just a stub."
"Might have been an old proximity sensor or motion detector," Trent reckoned. "But it's long been discon- nected.-Were there wires coming out of it?"
"No."
"Any indicator lights?"
"Nothing like that, either."
Trent didn't seem concerned. "Show it to me later, okay? It's probably just one of those old-generation electric eyes that would trip an alarm if someone crossed it."
"I'm sure you're right," Nora said. It just gave me this really uncomfortable feeling. Like when I looked in it, someone was seeing me."
Trent smiled at her paranoia. "I guarantee you, whatever it is, it hasn't been hooked up in over twenty years."
Trent walked off toward the trail.
"Spy cameras in the woods, huh?" Annabelle leaned over to adjust her flippers. "But you were the spy last night."
"Pardon me?" Nora couldn't believe what the woman had said.
"Oh, you know what I'm talking about, Nora. But don't worry, I'm not mad." She smiled to herself. "I'm not the inhibited type, being watched never bothers me. But, honestly, I never figured you for a voyeur."
It was too early in the morning for this. "Hey, I was just going for a walk in the woods. I had no idea you'd be out there fucking."
"Don't get so upset," Annabelle chided. "Nature has a way of taking its course, especially in an environment like this." She stood back up, her posture accentuating her bikini'd bosom and table-flat stomach. "I told you, I wasn't mad."
Nora glared, a headache pecking at her. "I don't give a flying shit if you are."
"I was just going to say"-the blonde maintained a quiet, controlled tone-"that Lieutenant Trent's pretty good, and I'm not a territorial person. So you can go for it, too, if you want. I don't mind."
"You're outrageous!" Nora almost shrieked at her. "I can't wait for you to go back to New Fucking York!"
Now Annabelle tinkered again with the big encased camera.
"Professor Craig-profanity doesn't become you. And you don't have to worry about being embarrassed around Lieutenant Trent."
Nora winced so hard that creases seemed permanently etched into her face. "Why would I be embarrassed?"
"I didn't tell him that you were spying on us last night."
"I wasn't spying!" Nora flat-out yelled.
"Shh! Calm down. Loren's coming back. You don't want him to hear, do you?"
Before Nora could yell further, Loren trudged back up to them, seawater running off his body in rivulets. He seemed frustrated. "Nora, I couldn't find that coolflow you were talking about."
Nora's teeth were grinding back and forth. "I'll be out in a minute."
Annabelle lowered her dive mask over her face. "Loren and I will find it, Professor. But you did a great job finding that first worm. I'm really looking forward to that lobster dinner you mentioned. Maybe later, you can show Loren and me where they are." She absently put a hand on Loren's arm. "We'll have a cookout tonight, it'll be fun!"
Then she and Loren walked back toward the water.
Nora fumed after them.
She didn't know what kind of game the photographer was playing. She looked around, wide-eyed in rage. Have I EVER been