Crimson Psyche (3 page)

Besides, if he wanted to step into an episode of
Supernatural
, who was I to interfere?

I shook my head to clear some of the remaining mental cobwebs and hustled down the carpeted hallway toward the lobby, moving fast enough to generate static around the bottom of my dress. The material sealed itself to my knees and I stopped, resting a hand against the wall next to the reception desk, watching tiny electrical sparks dance along the fabric as I tugged it away from my legs.

Carson’s voice slithered out of the invisible speakers built into the ceiling of the lobby, announcing his next guest: the former Miss Denver, who’d been disqualified when her breast enhancement surgery had been discovered. As if everyone and her sister wasn’t lining up for augmentation these days.

But I felt a little sorry for the poor beauty queen. I wondered if she was as clueless as I’d been about Carson’s sick personality, or if she would be expecting his own personal brand of insanity.

I must have mumbled something out loud while I was bent over the hem of my dress, because a voice answered me.

“Carson Miller is an oozing wart on the ass of humanity — no, wait. He’s what gets sucked out of Porta-potties after sports events. No, wait, he’s what you squish out of an abscessed pimple.”

Surprised, I jerked my head up to discover the source of the horribly accurate descriptions and found a hand reaching out in my direction.

My gaze traveled up — way up — to settle on the amused face of the tall woman standing in front of me.

Instinctively I straightened, grasped the proffered hand and matched her smile. Despite her comfortable running shoes she towered over me. She had to be more than six feet tall, because I’m just four inches shy of that in my bare feet and today I was wearing three-inch heels.

But it was her hair even more than her stature that caught the eye: an amazing waterfall of silky white that fell almost to the back of her knees.

My dark brown hair is very long and curly, but compared to hers, I’ve got a crew-cut.

I stared rudely at the Arctic avalanche flowing down her body, trying to figure out what sort of genetic glitch could give someone so obviously young such pure white hair. After a few seconds, my good manners reappeared and I offered a nod of apology.

She laughed, a warm tinkling sound, and released my hand. “Yeah, don’t worry about it. Everybody has that reaction. I’m the Winter Queen, otherwise known as Maxie Westhaven, the Maxie part being short for Maxwell. My parents definitely wanted a boy.” She laughed again and spun around in a circle. “Ya think they were a little disappointed?”

I added my laughter to hers, my inner therapist glad she had a healthy sense of humor about her Victoria’s Secret body. Her curvy shape wasn’t something you could successfully hide under a Denver Broncos T-shirt and jeans.

“It’s nice to meet you. I’m Kismet—”

“Yeah, I know who you are. I saw your picture in the paper a few months back when you were embroiled in all that vampire stuff. I even tried to interview you then. I just heard you on the radio. Oh, by the way, I’m a reporter for
National Cynic
magazine. Have you heard of us?”

My smile dissolved. Unfortunately, I
had
heard of the rag — and so had anybody else who ever went to a convenience store, gas station or Laundromat. It was impossible to miss the latest edition, which featured an absurdly fake photograph of a two-headed alien on the cover and a story about the merits of treating depression by exorcism, rather than seeing a psychotherapist.

The magazine was positively schizophrenic: it devoted as much space to publicizing ludicrous “cures” and practitioners as it did to debunking fakes, charlatans and New Age gurus in so-called “exposés”.

Disappointed, because I’d immediately liked her, I wrapped my professional aura around me again and reminded myself that I had to be careful with the media. I’d definitely been there and done that and now I knew better than to say
anything
that might put my vampire — or vampire wannabe — clients in danger. Not to mention a certain master vampire who revved my heart rate and jump-started my libido every time he materialized in my room.

I fired up my formal therapist’s voice and answered her question. “I have, yes.”

Maxie apparently noticed my attitude change and distancing maneuver. “Hmm. I can see that my occupation doesn’t fill your heart with joy. Well, let me ease your mind. I didn’t approach you for an interview. Really,” she said at my raised eyebrows, “I just wanted to meet you. You sound interesting. I think we actually might be kindred spirits, because I’m sure you spend a lot of your time convincing confused people that they don’t want to pretend to be vampires, and I spend a lot of mine debunking the ones you can’t talk out of it.”

“Those are polite words for what you do.”

She shifted her weight from foot to foot as if she were impatiently waiting to blast off to the next location. “What can I say? I give them a reality check, just like you do. See?” She shrugged and flipped a thick handful of that long white hair over her shoulder. “We’re on the same side here. And I’ll bet you thought my description of Cretin — I mean, Carson — was on the money.”

I smiled before I could censor myself and met her blue eyes, which were just a shade lighter than mine. The irises were ringed with a thin line of indigo. Golden eyebrows and lashes gave evidence of what her original hair color might have been. I studied her face for a couple of seconds. I’d been so distracted by her amazing mane that I hadn’t even noticed the perfect features. The pandemonium with Carson and Hallow must have thrown me off my game more than I realized.

Gee, Kismet, you’re losing it. Aren’t psychologists supposed to be observant? Wouldn’t you say that’s a handy skill for a therapist to have? I’m definitely slow this morning.

“You’re right. It was on the money, if understated.”

Of course, I didn’t believe for a minute that she hadn’t come over to interview me. My intuition was shooting up flares to get my attention. She definitely had an agenda, and now I was curious.

Thanks to my vampire-elders-enhanced emotion-sensing skills, it was easy for me to read the intentions of most humans and immortals. In Maxie’s case, I wasn’t picking up any negative intent. In fact, she gave off an appealing, whimsical vibe. If she really was just prowling for a story lead, I could hold my own, she’d get nothing from me. I was getting better at playing the media game.

She smiled wide, exposing perfect porcelain. “Can I buy you a coffee?”

I pasted on a pretend-shocked expression. “And you were saying
what
about not wanting to interview me?”

She held up one hand, as if she were preparing to be sworn in for testimony in a court hearing. “I swear on a stack of
Dracula
novels that our conversation over coffee will be off the record. You’re perfectly safe from the creeping tentacles of the Fourth Estate. What do you say? There’s a Starbucks on the twelfth floor. Is that neutral enough territory?” She pointed to the elevator and plastered an innocent expression on her face.

Despite my usual tendency to retain an aloof, professional distance with anyone I met who might be even peripherally involved with my psychotherapy work, I was uncharacteristically tempted to relax my guard a little with Maxie. Surely it wouldn’t hurt to be more open-minded? Probably — maybe. After all, I
had
been thinking about making more human friends lately, to balance the alternative. I wouldn’t ever build any new relationships if I didn’t step out of my therapist role occasionally. There’s a fine line between being careful and being paranoid — a line I frequently tripped over.

“Coffee? Okay, that sounds good.” Now that I’d made the decision and opted for what would be a novel experience for me, I was actually excited about the idea of a few minutes of chitchat with another woman around my own age — and species — no matter what her ulterior motives might be. As fascinating as it was to spend so much time with the undead, I always felt like an outsider — an
other
. Not that I needed any help with that to begin with. “I’ve got a couple of hours before my first client session of the day, so what the hell?”

“Great!” she said, and punched me lightly on the arm. “I think we could both use a little more caffeine.”

I grabbed my coat off the pegs next to the elevator, and while we rode down to the twelfth floor Carson’s sleazy, frantic voice squealed through the speakers, going on about ‘mondo tits’. Comparatively speaking, I guess I’d gotten off easy.

***

“This is some good shit,” Maxie said as she held her coffee mug in both hands and inhaled the aroma. She closed her eyes and smiled, obviously in the midst of a religious experience.

I laughed and took a sip from my mug. Another coffee junkie. At least we had that in common.

As I waited for her to complete her euphoric java worship and open her eyes, I scanned the people in the room. Maxie was attracting a lot of attention, which wasn’t too surprising when you factored in the outrageous hair, the model’s face and body and some indefinable energy that radiated from her. And even though I’d gotten used to generating a little notice in a room myself lately — consorting with vampires tends to bring out a woman’s wilder side — it was actually pleasant to be out of the spotlight.

“So, you want to know about the hair, right?” Maxie blurted, distracting me from my people-watching.

Suddenly, distant laughter echoed in my mind and something moved along the edge of my vision. I swiveled my head to investigate, but nothing was there. Goose bumps ran a marathon up my arms and I stared into my coffee, wondering if the special-blend-of-the-day contained an extra ingredient, or if I was simply having an anxiety attack. It was probably just another ghost — they’d become my constant companions. But after my unnatural experiences, I no longer took anything for granted, not even my sanity.

Especially
not my sanity.

“Doc?”

“What?” I said as I surveyed the room and reminded myself I was in the
normal
world, sitting in a restaurant. For the time it took to drink one lousy cup of coffee, I wanted to pretend there were no paranormal creatures waiting to jump out at me, nothing lurking in the shadows. Just regular nine-to-five types, dressed for corporate success, indulging in a bit of overpriced caffeine. Yeah, but what about the vampire who’d called the radio show? He’d really
felt
like a vampire, and a powerful one, at that. Thinking it was possible for one of them to walk around during the day blew all my carefully constructed denials out of the water. Months ago, acknowledging they existed in the first place had been mind-numbing enough. I didn’t need the terrifying realization that safety was a bigger illusion than I’d already assumed. Part of me longed for the innocent days before I fell into the crack between the worlds.

“Hello, Doc?” Maxie tapped my arm. “You still with me? You’re a little spacey.”

“Huh?”

My gaze snapped back to her fish-eyed stare and for a couple of seconds I couldn’t remember where I was. I blinked and reoriented myself. What the hell was wrong with me? I did have a tendency to daydream, but not usually when I was speaking with someone. I’d worked really hard to learn to stay present with clients. She was right: I definitely needed more caffeine.

“Oh, sorry, didn’t mean to float away on you. Not enough sleep, I guess.” I wiped the corners of my lips with a napkin. “Your hair? Yes, absolutely. I’d love to know about it. You’ve got to admit it’s unique. When did it turn white?” Forcing the vampire thoughts aside, I relaxed into my chair, appreciating the opportunity to discuss something I wasn’t required to give advice on or have an opinion about.

She scrutinized my face for a few seconds longer, one eyebrow raised, then grinned and scooped the thick whiteness back into a tail, holding it with both hands. “When I was a kid, my hair changed overnight, from blonde to white. I simply woke up one morning with old-lady hair. Let me tell you what a shock it was to my family.”

Hmm... she believes her hair changed overnight. Interesting. I wonder what really happened?

“There’s no way your hair could ever be described as old-lady hair. It’s gorgeous.” I studied her, guessing her age to be late twenties to early thirties, then asked, “You simply woke up with white hair? Nothing in particular caused it?” If her hair had really transformed that quickly, there had to be a traumatic precipitating event. Maybe she’d been struck by lightning or experienced a severe fright — or, even worse, suffered an abusive incident. Changes that profound didn’t just
happen
.

She stared off into the distance for a few seconds, then turned back to me. Her eyes serious, she said, “Not that I’ve ever been able to remember.”

Okay, I didn’t want to be interviewed, but I couldn’t help turning the tables on Maxie. Once a therapist, always a therapist; lift up the rock and see what’s underneath, that’s my motto. I’ve never been good at small talk. And, besides, turn-about was fair play: I knew I was sitting with a reporter, and she knew what I did for a living. “Were you examined by a medical doctor?”

“Sure, scads of them. Medical doctors and shrinks and hypnotists. Nobody could come up with an answer, and since there weren’t any negative effects — except for a few vague nightmares — beyond the color shift, I just learned to live with it.”

A psychological mystery: did she know that offering such an intriguing interpersonal tidbit to a psychologist was like waving a red cape at a bull? I suspected her strange situation had been the real reason she’d sought me out. Maybe she’d begun to recall unwanted memories.

I opened my mouth to ask more questions and she scooted her chair closer to the table.

“Do you believe in vampires?” Maxie fixed her eyes on mine, her lips spreading in a Cheshire-cat smile. “Strictly off the record, of course.”

Talk about a quick change of topic, not to mention a masterful evasion. Apparently we were finished discussing her hair.

I smiled in appreciation of Maxie’s tactics; she was probably a very good reporter. Since I definitely didn’t want to discuss vampires, the wheels in my brain started spinning, kicking up mental dust, as I tried to think of something innocuous to say. I’m sure my inner struggle was obvious, because I felt various emotions surf across my face.

I must have hesitated long enough that she thought she’d better try something different, because she said, “Okay, I’ll go first. No interview, honest, just a simple conversation, two ordinary businesswomen talking about their daily lives. A couple of regular professionals, discussing alien abductions, vampires, werewolves, reincarnation, demonic possession and other everyday occurrences. Regular run-of-the-mill rock-and-roll.” Her voice picked up speed and volume as she spoke.

“I’ve been writing for this magazine for five years and I’ve heard every preposterous story you can imagine. I think I could surprise even you. In all that time, as I’ve investigated each bizarre allegation thoroughly, I’ve never come across anything that could be even remotely considered paranormal. Not one real vampire. No werewolves. No aliens. No demons. Just a lot of sick, weird, fucked-up humans craving attention or behaving very badly. I now know for a fact that what you see is what you get. There is no magic. There is no
Wizard of Oz
. Just the demented little man behind the curtain, pulling the levers.” She flopped back in her chair, breathless.