Since that job-unlike her internship-came with an actual paycheck, impressing them had become Harley’s biggest goal.

Her duties involved putting together data and analysis on a species indicator report, which was seeking to answer questions about western coyote populations. It sounded a lot more impressive than it actually was. In truth, there was almost no funding for the project, and the staff consisted of two wildlife biologists located in Colorado, and a few lowly, unpaid interns like herself scattered throughout the states of California, Nevada, Idaho, and Wyoming.

But for Harley, it was a foot in the door, because she intended to get that job in Colorado.

When her belly rumbled, reminding her she’d skipped lunch, she got up to look in the refrigerator. Unfortunately, the food fairy hadn’t paid her a visit, so her choices were questionable cottage cheese, an apple, or the last of her emergency stash of double fudge brownie ice cream. She’d been saving that for an extreme disaster, but the possibility of getting evicted for not paying her rent seemed pretty extreme.

She’d just stuffed a large bite into her mouth, and was moaning over the sweet chocolate melting on her tongue when her phone rang.

She looked at it with the same caution she’d give a piqued rattlesnake. It was probably her landlord. Or maybe it was her mom wanting to bring her some tofu concoction in thanks for helping her meet her mortgage this month. Or her father wanting to crash on her couch, since the fun-loving hippie had probably pissed off his latest lover and had nowhere else to go. It could be her sister Skye wanting to mooch food and/or cash, which-no surprise-was in shockingly low supply. Harley loved her family, she really did, but she couldn’t seem to master their carefree, no-worries attitude.