MEGHAN McTAVISH

Dr Ellie sat on one of the dark grey leather sofas that were arranged neatly around a smoked glass table in the vast reception area. She should go, she knew. It was pointless just continuing to sit here, with her stomach tying itself in knots and her feet slowly starting to ache in their unaccustomed high heeled shoes.

"But I want what I came for. I won't go back empty handed until I've done everything I can to get it.'

The words hissed in her mind.

Determination strengthened her expression. What she wanted was rightfully hers, and she'd been cheated of it.
Cheated of what she'd been promised, what she needed. Needed now with imperative urgency. And it was that thought only that was keeping her glued to her seat, waiting to be summoned. To be allowed to see him...

She had sat for almost two hours before she finally accepted that she would have to throw in the towel. It was useless,
quite useless. Just like everything else she'd tried. A face to face fconfrontation with The Raptor had been her last resort. Her eyes flashed darkly. Not surprisingly, considering that he was the last person on earth she ever wanted to see again.

Which was why, as she picked up her handbag and prepared to stand, bitter with defeat, her stomach suddenly plummeted right down to her heels. RIght here in front of her appeared a bevy of suited figures, exiting one of the lifts, and sweeping forwards across the marble floors to the revolving doors of the Welcome Center

It was him. The Velociraptor mongoliensis. Commonly known as 'Raptor'.

Her eyes went to him immediately, drawn by that malign awareness that had been like a doom over her ever since that first fateful encounter with him. Half a head taller than the other dinosaurs around him, he strode forward, his pace faster than theirs, more impatient, as they hurriedto keep up.

Ellie felt herself go cold.

"Oh, God, don't do this to me - don't, please!"

Because she could feel it again, feel that tremor in her veins that the Raptor could always set
running in her whenever she looked at him. It was as if she was mesmerised...

She'd forgotten his impact, his raw, physical force. It wasn't just his height, or the breadth of his shoulders, and the leanness of his hips. It wasn't the fact that he looked like a billion dollars in his leathery skin or that his face seemed as if it was planed from a fine-grained stone that revealed every perfectly honed contour. It was more than that - it was his eyes, his dark, fathomless eyes that could look at her with such coldness, with such savage fury ... and with another expression that she would not, would not let herself remember.

And that was when he saw her.

She could see it happening, see the precise moment when he registered her presence. See the initial flash of disblief, followed by blinding fury.

And then it was gone - just gone.

As she was gone from his vision. He had simply blanked her out as if she did not exist. As if she had not been sitting there for two hours, waiting for him to descend to ground level, where the mortals dwelt in their lowly places, far far from the exclusively rich powerful people that made up his world.

He was walking past her, still surrounded by his entourage. Any moment now he would be out of the sheer glass doors. He would be out of the building. Gone from her totally. Still ignoring her totally.

She surged to her feet towards him. Her self-control was at breaking point. She could feel it snapping like a dry twig...

"Speak to me, you bastard! Damn well speak to me!"