Again he shook his head. “And that means?”
“He believed in life on other planets. In fact, he was so sure of it, he wrote several books based on the truth behind popular mythos and the science of the fall of alien man. I guess you can say I came by my geek status honestly. Daddy taught me all he knew, and when I grew up, his words still made sense.” She shrugged. “I went to college, got a degree in psychology which I put to zero use, and discovered my dad wasn’t crazy, but brilliant.”
“What made you certain he wasn’t simply a raving lunatic?” Gerard asked, genuinely intrigued. This woman was so different from what he’d known, gorgeous yes... but stimulating as well.
Her smile was brilliant as she bounced up again and ran back down her hall. She came back seconds later with a large leather bound book in her hands. Gerard’s heart flipped when she opened the book and handed it to him. She pointed to a spot on the page. “Read this.” She fairly vibrated with enthusiasm.
He glanced at the black smudges, nodded as if he had a clue what it said, and closed it. “Yes.”
“Yes! That’s it. That’s all you have to say about that? It’s amazing, it’s true, and my Daddy knew it all along. The Fermi paradox, space is so vast... surely we’re not the only ones to exist in it. Out there, beyond time and matter were other civilizations, peoples.” She pointed to him. “You.” She clapped her hands and he had the sudden sick feeling that she viewed him more as a bug beneath a viewing glass than a man all of a sudden. “Riddle me this, Gerard. Did you happen to travel here through a worm hole?”
He lifted a brow. The woman was insane, he was still stuck on the Fermi-whats-it paradox thingy, and she was talking wormholes... and what the hell was that anyway? A giant worm eating holes in air? Why the devil would that make her so excited? He brushed his fingers through his hair. “I’ve not a clue. Danika swished her wand, and I was yanked through.”
She laughed. “Was there a tunnel?” Her brown eyes glittered. She’d the fevered look of a wolf snapping in for its kill. “Did it shimmer? Swirl? Glow?”
Gods she was gorgeous, skin all flushed and dewy pink. If he could somehow mute her voice, he could stare at her all day. But she was giving him a massive ache in the back of his skull. Gerard squeezed his brow.
“It was blue. What are you saying, mademoiselle?” he grumped.
She rolled her eyes. “Isn’t it obvious?”
Suddenly memories of another woman-- just as lovely as this one-- intruded in his mind. Belle had wielded her sharp wit and keen brain better than any blade. More than once he’d suffered the knowledge that she’d thought him beneath her. Heat stoked the glowing embers in his gut to an incendiary level and his nostrils flared as his fingers clenched.
“There’s life in other planets, dimensions... whatever!” She clapped her hands and laughed, a full throaty sound so sexy and alluring he couldn’t help but lean in to her, even while still fueled with anger. Her brown eyes sparkled, and then she cradled her face in her hands, and sucked in a sharp breath.
“Oh my gosh, I did it again, didn’t I?”
“What?” he grumbled, scooting back on the seat, trying to maintain some distance between them.
She grabbed his wrist. “Oh, Gerard, I’m sorry. Trisha gets on me all the time about how rude I come off sometimes. I’m sorry, I... I just, jeez. How lame. I love science and science fiction and all the weird stuff girls shouldn’t like, which is why I work in a library, and I hope you don’t think I was talking down to you. I swear I wasn’t. I just get wicked excited.”
Not once in all the years he’d known Belle, had she ever apologized for making him feel intellectually inferior. Had Betty truly not meant to offend him? Was her enthusiasm for a subject he found mind numbingly boring, truly that exciting to her?
Betty flicked her hands. “Look, truce okay? Let’s start over here. You’re stuck with me for a month. Let’s try to make it pleasant.” She stuck her hand out. “Hi, my name is Betty Hart. What’s your name?”
Her smile was pure innocence, and his heart tripped when he took her hand. The woman was nuts, and yet she excited him on a level he’d never known before.
“Gerard Caron,” he said. “Good to meet you, folle.” Her skin was so soft, he didn’t want to let go. The feel of her small hand in his large one, the way she looked at him with a mixture of awe and shyness-- he wanted to see her like this always.
“I guess I am kind of crazy.” A good natured laugh spilled from her.
Something strange happened in the center of Gerard’s chest. A tickling flutter of weirdness he’d never felt before, mainly because he’d only ever looked at women with one desire in mind. He couldn’t do that with her, it made her different. But he wasn’t sure yet how.