Maclean looked at Verraday. “Any other questions you want to ask?”
“Just one. Do you remember what superpower the boy said he’d pick if he were a dragon?”
“Yeah,” replied Kyle. “He said he wanted to read people’s minds.”
CHAPTER 7
Maclean was silent and seemed distracted as they headed back to the Interceptor. Verraday was glad for it. He was distracted by memories that had been stirred up by hearing Kyle talk about Rachel. He had had one such relationship. Nikki, his girlfriend for three and a half months when he was working on his doctoral thesis. She was an up-and-coming singer he had met when her band was playing at the campus pub. He was taken by her stage presence and soulful voice. He had met all his previous girlfriends in class or research labs, where introductions occurred naturally and you could generally tell in advance if your overtures would be favorably received.
That was not the case with Nikki. He had taken a chance and introduced himself to her at the bar during a break between sets. He had told her how much he loved her voice. She smiled easily and thanked him. To his surprise, instead of talking about herself, she asked him about his studies. When he told her he was working toward his doctorate in psychology, she raised an eyebrow appraisingly.
“So you think about what other people are thinking?”
“Something along those lines.”
“Good luck with that,” she had replied with mock skepticism.
But her teasing was playful, the kind of teasing meant to entice someone with the right sort of nerve to take it to the next level. He asked for her number, and she gave it to him. He called her later that week. At her suggestion, their first date was at a disco where the DJ was playing heavy electronic grooves.
“Do you dance?” she had asked.
Verraday didn’t. Not well, anyway. But he had quipped, “Sure, when I’m not thinking about what people are thinking.”
“Then stop thinking and come dance with me,” she had responded, slipping off the barstool, hips rolling seductively to the beat, not giving him a chance to deliberate or even take the lead. She didn’t look back until she was in the center of the dance floor. Then she turned around, a Cheshire-cat grin already on her face, knowing he would follow.
They had gone back to his apartment afterward. He had planned to offer her a drink. But the moment he closed the front door behind them, he saw an expectant, feral smile on her face again. So he slipped his arms inside her jacket and pulled her toward him. Her pupils were dilated with desire, but even as he drew her in, she still had that grin on her face, right up until the moment he pressed his lips against hers.
The Cheshire cat became a tigress. They made love twice that first night, and again in the morning, five hours later. He had never had a lover so voracious before. For the next three days, his pelvic bone was bruised and sore. But he savored it as a reminder of that consuming look on her face when she came hard, how instead of closing her eyes, she had locked her gaze with his and urged him on.
Just like Kyle, Verraday ruefully thought, he believed he had found the love of his life. And he had been as wrong as it was possible to be.
Two months after they started dating, Nikki’s band was offered a spot as an opening act for the West Coast leg of a Foo Fighters tour. The tour would wrap up with a finale in LA, with all the major record label executives in attendance. It was an incredible break.
He was thrilled for her. And by then he’d fallen so hard that he’d given her a key to his apartment. And it excited him every time he heard that key in the door and a small bundle of immense talent and energy burst in like a force of nature and bounded into his arms.
Then one day, he’d come home and found her lying in bed. Not seductively but listlessly. She was distant and said she was just having an off day. He tried to talk to her, but she told him she just needed to sleep. But she didn’t sleep—just lay there until the evening, smoking cigarettes, a habit she said she had kicked for the sake of her voice. He knew this was more than just a down day. But when he tried to discuss it, she made a sarcastic remark about him being a half-baked headshrinker and to leave her alone. When he came to bed that night and tried to embrace her, she had pushed his hands away.