It was a demonstration of her incredible resilience that she was even able to continue attending school after what had occurred to her the previous semester. Because it was just a few months prior that she had escaped the clutches of an abusive boyfriend who nearly had her ensnared by a sex trafficking ring.
Thanks to the relentless efforts of her father Mason and his teammates with Onyx she escaped relatively unscathed, but even so, those with a less sound constitution—if they decided to return to school at all—would have been too shaken up to consider enrolling in summer classes. But not Clara, she knew that the disruptions of recent times threatened to put her behind schedule academically, and that was something she simply couldn’t tolerate.
This semester she was determined to make her studies her number one obligation. But no matter how much she wanted to keep her focus on her grades, there always seemed to be something or someone ready to distract her. She had just cracked open her anthropology book when a young man sat down in the seat next to her.
He smiled gently at her and asked, “You mind if I sit here?”
Since her last bad run-in, Clara was understandably hesitant when it came to guys she didn’t know. But at the same time—just like her father Mason, she was far too logical to allow her emotions to completely cloud her judgement. Despite her fears she knew how to face reality. And in reality—at the moment—there was no rational reason for her to be afraid.
It was broad daylight, in the middle of a busy campus center surrounded by several other students coming and going in all directions. No bad bogey man was likely to assail her and drag her kicking and screaming across the campus food court. She knew that while it was good to be cautious, she also knew that irrational fear could become a crippling paralysis.
Despite what she had been through, she couldn’t make herself so shut off to the outside world that she couldn’t function. She had faced evil and survived, but that didn’t mean that she would be so jaded that she would forever expect the worst out of everyone she met. Instead she smiled openly at the young man, her fellow student, and obliged him, “Sure, have a seat.”
Clara and the other student sat in silence for a few minutes as she quickly scribbled anthropology terms and definitions on a stack of index cards. The young man glancing over at her anthropology book then got her attention by remarking, “Oh—you’re in Professor Meg Williams Anthropology class?”
Clara looked up from her cards and nodded, “Yes I am. Are you in my class?”
The guy shook his head, “No—but I took it last semester.”
Clara asked, “Oh yeah?”
He nodded, “Yeah it’s a good course.” The man then paused for a moment before thinking to introduce himself, “My name’s Travis Jones by the way—nice to meet you.”
Clara in her newfound caution, almost thought of supplying an alias for herself, instead of handing out her real name. She only entertained this notion for a split second however, before she chastised herself for being paranoid. Besides, if someone was really that interested, they could easily snoop around the class roster to find someone’s name.
With a sigh, she introduced herself, “I’m Clara…”
Travis then looked at the chapter that Clara was studying, and commented, “Oh you guys are learning about the indigenous tribes that live up and down the Amazon River. Professor Meg Williams did an excellent lecture series on that.”
He paused, before commenting, “The Amazon seems like a beautiful place, I’d love to go there sometime.”
Clara of course realized the irony of the situation. Because although she couldn’t talk about her father’s secret missions—she knew full well where he was. Even as she was reading about the Amazon in a book, she knew that he was hacking right through Amazonian jungles in person.
Unable to reveal such detail however, she simply nodded, “Yeah—that would be an incredible trip.”
Travis replied, “Yep…It most certainly would.
He smiled, “The trip of a lifetime I would call it.”
The two then quietly went back to their studies for a few moments before Travis spoke up once again, “You know—I’ve actually got a buddy who’s in Brazil right now…”
Clara was surprised to hear this as she inquired, “Really? You do?”
Travis nodded, “Yeah. This guy I know, Brian Nelson—he always goes on all this study abroad trip stuff.”
Clara not aware of any Stanford sanctioned trips to South America asked, “What’s he doing there?”
Travis thought for a moment before explaining, “Well… Brian he’s a political science student—just as I am myself—and he’s always getting involved in these trips meant to foster awareness of international relations and things of that nature.”
Clara slightly smirked, “Oh—that sounds quite enlightening.”
Prompting Travis to laugh, “But to be honest he also loves to find any excuse to party, and these trips abroad often provide him with plenty of that.”
Clara smirked, “So you don’t think he’s out hacking through the Amazon Rainforest to save endangered species?”
It was tremendously ironic for Clara to say as much since her father and his associates quite literally were hacking through the thick of the Amazon even as they were speaking.
Travis shook his head, “No—the guy’s probably living it up at some posh resort in Rio right about now.”
Clara conceded, “Must be nice.”
Flipping through a notebook Travis then offered, “You know what—I’m going to go on a study abroad trip myself at the end of the semester, maybe you could come with me.”
Clara braced herself, thinking, ‘Okay… this is the point where the creepy guy hits on me. Here we go again.’
But as she looked at Travis with his lively and inviting green eyes and ruffled, collar length reddish brown hair,
