“You never would have gone anywhere with it, and you know it!” he shot back. “You were too neurotic, too timid to teach a damn class, much less lecture at the higher levels. You didn’t have it in you to make a name for yourself in the field! You didn’t have to, you could just ride Daddy’s coattails to some nice, cushy community-college job until your crazy mother decided it was time for you to take up nursing duties for her and you died a dried-up old maid. I did you a favor, presenting your research, sharing your information with the world. You never would have done anything with it. You were too scared.”
As hot as the words burned, I knew that Michael, to some extent, was right. The old Anna, the Anna who hadn’t quite come out from under her mother’s thumb, wouldn’t have been able to function as a faculty member at a top-tier university. I wouldn’t have been bold enough to get my work published in the more respected journals. I wouldn’t have risen as high in the academic echelons as my father hoped. And it was probably better that way. I felt far more fulfilled by the work I did for my clients than I would have teaching or lecturing.
A little wound in my heart, a tear I hadn’t even realized was still open and festering, closed with a rush of exhilaration and acceptance. The pain I’d felt from disappointing my father, from failing to reach what was supposed to be my potential, faded away. I owed Michael a debt for helping me find some peace after all these years. But I would never tell him that . . . because he was still a remorseless, plagiarizing, knuckle-dragging Ken doll.
Instead, I smiled nastily, leaning close enough that he shied away from me. “And how does it feel? Knowing your whole life is based on a lie? I mean, how did you even publish anything after your doctoral thesis without my research to prop you up?” He flinched, and my eyes went wide. “You didn’t, did you?”
“Shut up,” he growled.
“You couldn’t get anything published, because you had nothing to back it up!” I cackled. “I bet the ‘publish or perish’ die-hards at the university loved that! Poor little Michael, suffering from academic erectile dysfunction. Is that why you got into ‘freelancing’? Because you didn’t get tenure? How much longer before you figure out you can’t fend for yourself out here in the real world?”
At this point, I sounded more than a little hysterical, howling with laughter at Michael’s expense. Red-faced and livid, he roared, flipping us over and trying to pin me. But my right arm slipped out of his grip, and I snaked it up between us to poke him in the eye with my thumb. He yelped, letting go of me while we rolled. I skidded to a halt at his side, then threw my leg up. I brought my heel crashing down on his crotch with a satisfying thud.
“Now you’re who they’ll call if they need an expert with a doctorate and no functioning testicles.”
Keening, Michael shriveled into the fetal position, clutching at his injured junk.
“And by the way, that’s not silk stitching on the cover, it’s cured catgut,” I said, scooping up his messenger bag from the ground and carefully extracting A Contemplation on Shifters, using one of his intellectual poseur scarves inside as a protective barrier between the book and my dirty hands. “And the author, Friar Thomas, used iron-based ink, not lead. And both of these characteristics and the aging can be pretty easily faked, so it’s hard to determine the age of a work unless you also look into the author’s history and tendencies. If you’d done the tiniest bit of research before declaring the book ‘the real deal,’ you’d know that.” I paused to shove him over with the toe of my boot. “Prick.”
“Your trash talk is not like other people’s trash talk.” Finn was standing by Michael’s Beamer, completely free of his bungee restraints.
“How did you get loose?” I asked, swinging at him. He ducked out of the way but kept me from falling into the car when my fist didn’t connect.
“I have superhuman strength. You think I can be contained with a couple of bungee cords?”
Michael stumbled to his feet. “You’re crazy,” he spat, his face nearly purple with rage. “I’m going to tell everybody worth anything that you’ve gone completely crazy. That you assaulted me and you used some sort of vampire gang to steal an antique from my paying clients.”
“I couldn’t care less,” I told him, waggling the book in my silk-covered hand. “I’ll mail you the scarf.”
“Or I could deliver it personally,” Finn offered. His full-fanged, hateful smile made Michael recoil.