Sphere - Elise Noble Page 0,2

could be questionable at times. None of us were in a position to judge them for that. So far today, they’d been taking care of Josh, even though he was seven years old and probably ruined their street cred.

Dan was the only one of us who looked vaguely happy to be at SciPark. Probably because the three older boys could fend for themselves, meaning she was ready to hit the non-alcoholic cocktails at ten in the morning. On any other day, Carmen might have been okay with the trip as well, but her new rifle had been delivered yesterday, and I knew what she’d rather be doing.

“Can we see the dinosaurs?” Josh asked, and everyone else shrugged.

Jurassic Park it wasn’t. Live dinosaurs would have been an interesting spectacle, but these were all made of plastic and the ones that did move just jerked around on the spot while roars sounded through loudspeakers.

“How do they know what dinosaurs sounded like?” Race asked.

Good question, and I had no idea of the answer. It wasn’t something I needed to know in my line of work. Perhaps if I ever had to go undercover as a palaeontologist… Thankfully, Mack and Dr. Google were on the case.

“Okay, so nobody actually does know what dinosaurs sounded like. Scientists just guess based on the shape of their nasal and throat passages.” She scrolled down farther on her tablet. “In fact, they think a T-Rex made a low rumble, and birds honked rather than sang.”

“Then why don’t these pterodactyls honk?”

“Do you know how many guns there are in America?” I asked. “If we had to put up with constant honking, somebody would shoot the things.”

“But the sign at the entrance said no guns are allowed inside the park?”

Ah, such innocence. I glanced at Ana, and she smirked back. Dan obviously hadn’t corrupted her son completely yet.

“Why don’t we move on to the rainforest?”

“Wait, where’s Josh?” Carmen reappeared with a bag of donuts, and boy did I need the carbs.

“Bradley took him to the gift shop.”

“And you let him?”

“I didn’t think it would hurt. Neither of them’ll want to carry stuff around the park all day.”

“You didn’t think it would hurt?” Carmen stared daggers at me. “Have you met Bradley?”

Five minutes later, I found myself lugging two bags of assorted shite towards the rainforest as Josh waddled along beside Carmen in his dinosaur costume. Every so often, Carmen gave me a sideways glare, and worse, Race had told Josh about the honking and he’d decided to try it out. And people wondered why I didn’t want kids? If this carried on, I might be tempted to use the Walther CCP nestled in the small of my back on myself.

“Isn’t this fun?” Bradley asked.

“Do you want an honest answer to that?”

He ignored me completely. “I loooove amusement parks. Next time, we should come for the whole weekend.”

Next time, I’d be joining Black in Barcelona. Or perhaps I could fly home to London and visit a few old friends? Bradley could take his chances with Ana. Even the debacle at the health farm had been more fun than this.

Although I had to admit that the rainforest was cooler than I thought it would be, and do you know why? Fake rainforests in Virginia didn’t have mosquitos. Or poisonous spiders or bullet ants or giant centipedes. The caterpillars were safely locked up in a glass case, as were the titan beetles, and nobody needed to worry about getting dive-bombed by bees. As with the dinosaur collection, the background noises were piped in, albeit a little more realistic this time.

The long, curved glasshouse took up half of the park’s second ring, heated by solar panels that doubled as part of the “Manmade Miracles” exhibit in the next circle. The boys clambered up a wooden staircase to view the “forest” from above while the rest of us meandered along a brick path that wound through the trees below. Having visited the jungle many, many times before, I’d smoothed my hair down with plenty of anti-frizz serum and worn it in a French plait. The other girls had followed suit with sensible styles and plenty of bobby pins. Bradley, on the other hand, looked like the silver-and-turquoise love child of a Q-tip and a cotton candy machine by the time we got to the animal section, and none of us dared to look at each other because we’d have collapsed into giggles.

A girl holding a tame monkey in a lime-green harness seemed to be having