by Linda Grimes
“It’s not sincere just because you make your ‘sincere’ face. You have to honestly mean it.” I tapped my foot while he considered. “Well?”
He shrugged and blasted me with the smile he used to use on his mother to get his curfew extended when we were teenagers. “Come on. Have you ever known me to give up on anything that easily?”
He reached for me again, but I evaded his arms. If I’d learned anything about myself recently, it was that I didn’t think clearly when Billy was touching me.
“Is this some sort of game to you?” I said after I’d put adequate distance between us. “If you’re doing this because maybe Mark is starting to pay attention to me—”
“Don’t be stupid.”
“You have to admit the timing is suspect.”
His mouth twitched, and a dimple grew. “Well, it’s possible the spook’s sudden interest in you spurred me to move a little faster than I might have otherwise, but the underlying emotion has always been there. I want you, Ciel. It’s as simple as that.”
“Why?”
“Why?” He sounded confused, like the question had never occurred to him.
“Yeah—why? Seems like you have the perfect lifestyle for someone of your many—and varied—interests. Models and aspiring actresses out the wazoo. Why give that up? Unless you think you can just add me to the bunch?”
The other dimple appeared. “You’d be my favorite.”
“Grrrr!” I marched to the kitchen. I needed ice cream.
Billy followed, trying not to laugh. He caught me before I could open the freezer and turned me to face him, corralling me against the fridge with his arms. “Come on. Where’s your sense of humor? All I want is you.” He cocked his head, and with one finger sketched a line from my earlobe down my neck, dipping lightly into the hollow of my collarbone. There was a kiss on his lips just waiting to ambush me.
“No,” I said, to convince myself as much as him. “I need to think about this more.”
“Okay. While you’re thinking, there’s another matter we can take care of.”
“What?” I said, leery of the determined gleam in his eye.
“Certain damage to my car, and what you owe me for it.”
I swallowed, feeling my eyes widen. “But that wasn’t my fault. You were there. You know that.”
“Doesn’t matter. You were behind the wheel.”
“That is beside the point!”
“A deal is a deal. The driver is always responsible. You know what that means.”
I ducked under his arm. “A busted headlight is hardly a wreck.”
He caught me and pulled me against him. “It is to me. Now,” he said, his lips alarmingly close to my ear, “knickers up or knickers down? I know which I’d prefer.”
I pushed against his chest. “Billy, listen to me—”
He kissed my neck. “Up or down?” he said. I thought he might be stifling a laugh, but it was hard to be sure.
Geez. I had made a rash statement to the effect that he could spank me if I wrecked his car. It was the only way I could get him to let me drive it when I’d tagged along on his last job with Mark—I certainly hadn’t been serious.
“Oh, for Pete’s sake, I was lying.” I hated to admit it, but I had been. Bad me.
“That’s even worse. Now you doubly deserve it.” He nipped my earlobe.
“I still maintain it was not a wreck. Minor damage, at best,” I argued after a tiny moan.
“It’ll only be minor damage for you, too,” he said, caressing my backside. “Tit for tat. Or … we could just renegotiate the terms.” He placed his mouth over mine and did some things with that clever tongue of his.
I squirmed against him, trying to resist—at least, I’m pretty sure that’s what I was trying to do—but my body was only too ready to open itself to negotiations. Stupid body.
A screech, followed by several whoops and a squeal, interrupted us. Billy paused for a second, then resumed kissing me, ignoring the escalating symphony from upstairs. I pulled my lips away from his—reluctantly—and cocked my head at him, lifting my brows.
He emitted a harsh sound through clenched teeth but quickly composed himself. “You’re right. I’ll check on her.”
I stepped back, and Billy turned away from me, shook himself all over, and counted to ten slowly under his breath. The orangutan noises were getting louder.
“What are you waiting for? We need to see if she’s okay.”
“Just give me a second, all right?”
Oh. Well, yes, I could see his dilemma. “Um, can’t you just … adapt?” I asked.
He gritted his teeth. “Sometimes that’s easier said than done.”
I patted his shoulder. “Why don’t you wait here? I’ll go check on her.”
He waved me off, not looking at me. Part of me felt like he deserved it, after what he’d done to me at the zoo. Another part of me wanted to toss Molly a banana and tell her to shut up and go back to sleep.
The fuzzy munchkin was all over me as soon as I opened the door to her room. I patted her back and spoke softly as I paced the room with her. “It’s going to be all right, Molls. Really. I promise. I know this has to be weird for you, and scary, too, but you’re not alone. We’re going to get you fixed. James is coming tomorrow—you know how smart he is—and I’m sure he’ll have you right as rain in no time.”
She settled into soft whimpers, clutching my shirt, her tiny thumb suspiciously close to her mouth. Billy joined us.
“Here, I’ll take her.”
Molly went willingly, hugging her brother tightly enough to squeeze a small oof out of him.
He looked at me with lustful regret. “I’ll stay with her.”
I nodded and turned to go to my room, but was stopped by a hairy, outstretched arm. “You want me to stay, too, Molly?” She nodded vigorously.
“The bed’s a little small for three, Molls,” Billy said. Molly shook her head and held on to both of us.
I sighed. “Come on, you two.”
*
Hours later, Billy sat bleary-eyed at my kitchen table, a far cry from his typically cheery morning self. He’d gotten his wish—a night in my king-size bed—but a hairy little sister added to the equation tends to put a damper on romance. Molly bounced up and down on the chair next to him, sucking orange juice through a bendy straw and slurping soggy cereal straight from her bowl without benefit of a spoon.
“When is James supposed to get here?” he asked, weariness coloring his voice.
“Early afternoon. If he can get away from the lab in time to make the noon shuttle,” I said. “But Mark and Thomas should be here soon.”
“Did you stress the urgency of the situation to James? I mean—Molly, get off the table!—did you tell him this is a family emergency?”
“Yes, I did. But I couldn’t exactly spell out the details to him, could I? Not over the phone. If there’s one thing I’ve learned working with you spooks, it’s never trust the privacy of a phone.”
He glowered at me. “I occasionally do Mark a favor. I am not a spook.”
“Same as,” I snapped, as testy and frustrated as he was, and started clearing away dishes.
After a minute he came up behind me, leaning down to add his bowl to the stack in the sink. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
I pressed back against him and sighed. “Me too.” And I was. I’d been awake most of the night, and not just because I was anxious about Molly. Don’t get me wrong—I was concerned about her, all right. But I’d mentally pushed most of that particular worry off onto James. He was the genius—he’d take care of it.
No, I’d been wrestling with myself about Billy and what I should do with him. Toward dawn I’d come to the conclusion I should just go with the flow. I knew Billy too well to think he’d back off, and, truthfully, I wasn’t sure I wanted him to. Human nature being what it is, I figured the more I denied him—and, okay, myself—the more compelling the attraction would become. If we just scratched the itch
… well then, maybe things could get back to normal between us, and I could settle into the safety of my unrequited passion for Mark. Because, deep down, I really didn’t think that little good-night peck was going to change anything between Mark and me. Once he was sure Billy was out of the romantic picture and back to being his annoying, cousinly self, Mark would revert to his pseudo big-brother role.
A warm hand slid down my bare arm, pausing to play at the inside of my elbow. “Know any good monkey sitters?”
“Afraid not,” I said, wondering if arms can have miniorgasms, because mine felt like it was about to. I placed a hand over his, stopping his fingers from dancing over the sensitive skin before I did something embarrassing.
“Would it be wrong to drug her juice?” he whispered.
I laughed, keeping it soft so as not to alert the primate in question. “Terribly. Though the idea is not without merit,” I said, shifting my hips. He, um, noticed.
And groaned. “When I get you alone…”
I looked up over my shoulder at him and lifted an inquiring brow.
“… negotiations will resume.” He grinned and walked away.
Chapter 6
James stared at Molly. Molly stared at James. They were on the floor, James sitting cross-legged, Molly knees up with hands splayed beside her, gripping the carpet. It was hard to judge who was concentrating harder.
“How long has she been this way?” he said in an oddly electric voice without breaking his eye lock with her. They’d begun the unofficial stare down shortly after he’d arrived. If he thought she was going to look away first, he was seriously underestimating the Doyle competitive streak.
“Late morning yesterday. Roughly nineteen, twenty hours,” I said, yawning. It was still early—he’d taken the red-eye.
“And there hasn’t been any fluctuation in the aura? Not even when she’s distracted or asleep?”
“Steady as an old pro,” Billy said.
Molly straightened her shoulders and curled her lips, but her eyes didn’t slip. I could swear she was proud. Most neophyte adaptors stumbled through their initial adaptions, wobbling in and out of new auras like special effects in a bad sci-fi movie. It took some real skill to maintain an aura this long when you were as new at it as she was.
James nodded, his head bobbing while his eyes remained steady. His strawberry blond hair caught the sunlight from the window behind him. He wore it long, longer even than my current short style. Of my three brothers, James looked the most like me—fair and slim, and not especially tall for a guy. He was four years my elder.
“So the problem is in the on/off switch. Interesting.” His spring green eyes, mirrors of my own, didn’t waver.
“Are you sure she wants to drop the aura?” he said at last.
Molly’s eyes narrowed at the suggestion. She reached out with both long arms, grabbed James by the shoulders, and shook him. His gaze, if anything, intensified.
“Are you really stuck, Molly? Not just grabbing a little attention? This would be a great way to delay your trip back home.”
Molly stood, shaking her head emphatically, looking first to Billy, then to me, and finally to Thomas, the staring contest tossed by the wayside in an effort to convince us wordlessly of her innocence.
I picked her up and gave my brother a dirty look. “James, how could you? Don’t you think she’s upset enough?”
He rose in one graceful motion and laid a hand on her head. “Sorry, Molly. I just had to be sure.”
She was having none of it. She pulled away and stuck out her tongue at him.
He smiled at her—a darned engaging smile, if it’s not conceited to say that about someone who looks so much like me.
“Come on, Molly. I’m a scientist. You told me you wanted to be one, too—you know scientists have to test all theories. Now that I’ve scratched off ‘doing it on purpose,’ I can concentrate on other possibilities. Forgive me?”
“Don’t ask for forgiveness too soon,” Billy said. “It’s a plausible theory. She wasn’t thrilled when I told her we were going back early after she started projecting random aura parts.”
“It would be an effective maneuver if she wanted to stay here. Something I might’ve thought of at her age,” Thomas added. His legal mind was one to appreciate good tactics.
Molly sagged against me, her sense of betrayal evident to all.
“Piss off, all of you,” I said. We girls had to stand together. “James, you should know her better. Isn’t Molly at your lab every spare minute?”
He gave me a look, a mini double take. But it was gone in a flash.
When he spoke again, it sounded remote. “Relax. I told you I believe Molly.”
I could see him regrouping data behind his eyes: sorting, eliminating, categorizing, prioritizing. It wasn’t that he was cold or didn’t care about Molly. It was just the way his brain worked. Affection had its place, and it was firmly behind solving a scientific conundrum. The fact that this one involved an aura-adapting anomaly—possibly a genetic mutation, his current field of study—was icing on the cake for him. It might provide him with the break he needed to crack the code.
Billy still looked skeptical. Thomas accepted James’s verdict as gospel. I was somewhere in the middle but leaned toward giving her the benefit of the doubt.
“We have to get her back to New York so I can run some tests.”
“And just how do you propose we do that, airline security being what it is these days?” I said.
“So drive.”
Billy blanched. His car was here, since he’d been working yet another job with Mark the previous week, so technically there was no reason not to drive. He’d flown up to get Molly and bring her back as a favor to our moms. When she barfed on a plane, the flight attendant had to clean it up.
“But … I, uh, can’t take her home until she’s back to normal—Mommo would have a fit.”
“I need my own lab. I’ve been working on an adaptor genotype, and I can’t risk the data leaking out.”
“Mark could probably find us something secure around here,” Billy pressed.
“God, no. Government noses are the last thing we need sniffing around now. It has to be my lab.”
“Where is Mark, anyway? Isn’t he supposed to be here?” Thomas said.
I shrugged. “Something came up. He’ll be here later.”
Billy ignored us and went on talking to James. “What am I supposed to do with her there? I can’t let you keep her at your lab like some sort of specimen.”
“There’s always your place,” I said helpfully, and enjoyed the wince I’d known would follow.
“That is not a good idea. I have a”—he cut me a glance—“friend staying there right now.”
“A friend?” I said, trying to keep my eyes from narrowing. (It’s harder to do than you might imagine.)
“Friend of a friend, really. It would be tough to explain Molly in her current incarnation.”
“Can’t you just tell this friend to run along? A friend would understand that things come up.” One of his bimbos, on the other hand, might not be so accommodating.
“I also have a job scheduled. I won’t be able to ape-sit—sorry, Moll—after tomorrow.”
“Oh, don’t worry about that. I can help you look after Molly for a few days.”
“Don’t you have a client to take care of?” he said.
“Nope. I called to check on Mr. Brown—you’ll be happy to know he didn’t die—and he assured me Thelma will have her position. I’ve already relayed the news to her. She couldn’t be happier. So it appears I’m all yours,” I said. Sweetly, of course.
*
Mark showed up right after James left to catch the next available shuttle back to New York to begin his preparations. Thomas had already gone back to work. Billy and I were packing.
“How’s Molly? Did James figure her out?” Mark asked first thing.
“Still orange and furry. We’re heading back so he can work on her in his lab,�
�� Billy said.
“Taking your car?” Mark said with a ghost of a grin.
“Ha ha. Yes, we are. Unless you’d care to take her in yours? I’ll throw in Ciel, if that’ll sweeten the deal.”
“Hey!” I slapped his arm with the back of my hand.
Mark laughed. “Sorry, bud, you’re on your own. But I can recommend a good Manhattan car wash.”
Billy gave him a sour look. “You are kindness itself. Hope you don’t need me for anything—looks like I’ll be busy for the next few days.”
Molly joined us before Mark could respond, dragging the backpack she’d been cramming with her currently unnecessary clothing behind her. When she saw Mark, she let go of the pack and climbed into his arms, grinning big and hugging his neck.
“Hello to you, too, Molly,” Mark said, patting her back. “Hope you’re enjoying all this monkeying around while you can, because James is going to have you back to normal in no time.”
Molly nodded enthusiastically. I was glad to see her adjusting to her situation, but hoped she didn’t get too comfortable with her new form. The thing about projecting auras is, once you have the energy, it’s always there within your reach. It could be awkward if Molly decided it would be fun to liven up future school functions with impromptu zoology lessons.
Mark put down Molly. “Billy, can I talk to you for a second?”
“Sure, come on up with me. I have a few more things to get from the guest room. Ciel, keep an eye on the munchkin?”
I nodded, curious, but I was used to the guys disappearing to plot their next job together. “Come on, Molls, let’s go pack some car snacks.”
Billy cut me a look. “No junk,” he said, his voice full of threat.
I smiled sweetly at him. “Would I do that to you?”
*
Mark left after his brief meeting with Billy, with only a “try to keep the girls out of trouble” for Billy and hair ruffles for Molly and me. Apparently things were back to the status quo with him. Just as well, since it appeared I was about to embark on some sort of (probably really ill-advised) romantic adventure with Billy.
I’d gone upstairs right after them to, um, get something I forgot to pack, pausing at the door to the guest room. (Okay, so curiosity won. There are valid reasons for eavesdropping, and I happen to think making sure the two guys currently driving me crazy weren’t discussing me is a damn good one.) Thirty seconds of “the Agency” this and “the Agency” that was enough to tell me it was boring old business, and I’d gone back downstairs. With my spare toothbrush. You can never pack too many toothbrushes.
