Kiss of the Vampire(36)

Tobias drew in a slow breath. The acrid scent of fear clogged the air and pricked at the hunger that always roiled just beneath the surface. He focused his control, fighting back his body’s natural responses, and managed to keep his fangs to himself.

“Do we make you nervous, Doctor?” MacMillan leaned one shoulder against the wall, his pen at the ready over his small notebook.

“Not you. Him.” The scientist looked at Tobias and swallowed again. “I’m sorry. It’s just…I’m not usually around that many EDs. Amarinda was my first. And she made me nervous.”

“Why is that?” Tobias leaned back and crossed one leg over the other, ankle resting on the opposite knee, and tried to look as unthreatening as possible.

“You…vampires I mean…have a very penetrating stare, for one thing.” A bead of sweat rolled down the side of Sahir’s face. He swiped it away with his fingertips, then rubbed his hand against his jeans. “And she was always sniffing. Just like that!” He pointed toward Tobias.

Tobias held the breath he’d just taken and sifted through the assortment of aromas coming off the scientist. Fear, of course. Unease. Building desperation. A little bit of guilt.

Interesting.

He let out his breath. “This makes you nervous?”

“It’s like you’re reading our minds.”

Tobias shook his head. “That’s just a myth. We can’t really read minds.” He leaned forward and held Sahir’s gaze. “What we can do is read emotions and reactions. And your emotions are very telling, Dr. Sahir.”

Nix came closer. “We heard Amarinda was romantically involved with someone here, Doctor. Was it you?”

“No!” Sahir appeared genuinely shocked. “I am a happily married man.” The ring twisted around and around.

“Yes, well, most people who have affairs are married.” Nix picked up a paperweight off the desk and hefted it. She put it down and moved on to a nearby bookshelf. Tobias knew what she was doing, taking stock of the surroundings, which told a lot about the person in them, sometimes more than the person knew. “If it wasn’t you,” she asked, “then who was it?”

“I have no idea.” Sahir tugged on the collar of his shirt. “It wasn’t me.” He cleared his throat and glanced at his watch. “If that’s all—”

“It’s not.” Tobias glanced around the cluttered office. “What exactly did Amarinda do here?”

“She kept an eye to the sky.” He smiled when he said it, as if they should get the punch line to a joke they’d never heard. When none of them reacted, his smile faded and he went back to looking uncomfortable. “Do you know what NEOs are?”

“We’ve had it explained to us,” Tobias said.

Sahir nodded and cleared his throat. “Yes, well, we calculate their trajectory so we know how big a threat, if any, they might pose to Earth.” A bit of the nervousness left his posture. “Some of them are slow enough they can be visited by exploration craft, and samples taken. It’s very exciting.”

“And the rift?” Nix asked, turning around with a paperback in her hand. She held it up.

Even from the other side of the desk Tobias could read the title—What’s On the Other Side? He glanced at the bookshelf and saw what appeared to be a dozen or more books on the subject. He looked at the scientist. “Well, Doctor? Are you investigating the rift here, too?”

“The rift?” Sahir shifted in his chair. “It falls within our mandate, so, yes, we investigate it and the Moore-Creasy-Devon comet that opens it. Or, rather, we will investigate it when it comes along again.” His voice took on a defensive tone. “It’s a very fascinating phenomenon.”

Tobias fought back a grin of triumph. Get the man on the defensive and they’d won half the battle.

“And was that part of what Amarinda was doing here? Was she investigating the rift?” MacMillan turned and rested his back against the wall.

“Not officially, no.” The nervousness returned, and Dr. Sahir’s gaze darted to Nix, who was still at the bookshelf to his left and a little behind him, then to the two men in front of him.

“But unofficially?” Tobias raised one brow.

“She seemed rather fascinated by it.”

“But she wasn’t one of the scientists who was charged with observing and documenting it?” Nix moved around to stand at the front corner of his desk.

“Documenting it?” Sahir parroted. He tried and failed to look surprised.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about, Doctor. That’s what scientists do. They observe. They measure. They document.” She placed her palms on the desk and leaned forward. “What exactly was Amarinda involved with down here?”