Page 7 of Ruining His Smirk

I frowned. Living in Antarctica meant living by the supply ship. If something spoiled after the last delivery, that was it. There wasn’t a grocery store a few miles down the road. There wasn’t another shipment next week. Whatever your station had was all you were getting until the next resupply, which was usually months away.

I looked back at Dexter. “This is a good one.”

“Exactly. So I asked Theo.”

“You did?” Theo was Waypoint Station’s chef.

“Theo declined any such accident.”

“So this person…” I glanced at his screen. “doesn’t live here.”

Dexter raised a finger. “One down! And I made Theo call a few chef friends at other stations.”

Okay, now I was invested too. “And?”

“Two more stations have tater tots too.” He pointed triumphantly at the screen. “My friend doesn’t work at any of those.”

The sounds of boots outside interrupted my brother’s detective work and made us both look up. August Dempsey, our station chief, came through the garage door.

“Morning,” August said.

“Morning.” I set my coffee mug down, wiped my hands on my jeans, and stood up.

August looked around the workshop. “Anything urgent on your plate right now?”

“Nah. Finishing work mostly. Nothing that can’t wait.”

August looked at Dexter. “You, son? You busy?”

“Not really.”

“What’s going on?” I stood with my arms crossed over my chest. August didn’t have time to chat. If he was here, he was up to something.

August shifted his weight onto one boot. “You remember that penguin rescue call from last week?”

I nodded. “Hard to forget.” If only he knew how badly I had been distracted lately because of that damn call.

August pulled a cigarette from his pocket. “Mind if I smoke?”

“Your lungs.” I shrugged.

He lit a smoke and blew it out his mouth.

I glanced down at where Dexter was sitting. My brother disliked anyone smoking or drinking. I nodded at him to subtly to endure it.

“The ship’s captain is an old friend of mine.” A rare smile tugged at one corner of August’s mouth. “Hadn’t talked to the bastard in years until that call came through. We’ve been catching up since.”

“Yeah?”

“Hmm. Turns out they’ve got themselves into a bit of a situation.”

“What situation?”

August blew out another ring of smoke into the air. “The ship’s carrying scientists from a bunch of different fields. Marine biology, oceanography, geology… you know. Right now they’re working out in the Weddell Sea.”

I whistled softly. Dexter perked up like a meerkat. The Weddell Sea was rich with marine life. Especially icefish, the subject of Dexter’s thesis. I was no scientist. Hell, I hadn’t evengone to college. Sitting and studying never agreed with me. Give me a tool, tell me what you want, and I could turn any piece of metal or wood into whatever you wanted, but books? Nah.

“Dexter here has been telling me about that part. Isn’t that all icy even in summer?”