by Liana Brooks
“Write up my packet and finish the paperwork,” Evan suggested. “That would be perfect. I’ll come by and sign everything tomorrow.”
“Right.” The older man shuffled paper. “I’m sorry, did you already send your credentials over? I don’t recall seeing them.”
“I’m sure you saw them. You complimented me on the thesis paper I wrote.” Evan arched an eyebrow. Stubborn old man. Agree-With-Me!
“Quite. Yes, of course I remember now. Age and all.” The dean gave him a weak smile.
Evan stood up. “Thank you so much for the job, Dean. I look forward to working here.”
He ran to the classroom, a small lecture hall on the far side of campus, featuring orange plastic chairs and fake wooden desktops. He scanned the crowd, but couldn’t find Tabitha.
Taking a deep breath, he walked down to the teaching podium and pretended to busy himself with the papers. The material wasn’t all that interesting, only a review of free market eugenics and the synthetic life form Mycoplasma mycoidesJCVI-syn1.0.
The classroom door opened, bringing the smell of dying leaves and something a little too sweet for pleasure. Tabitha’s new perfume.
He looked up, drinking the sight of her in as he tried to prepare an argument for the coming confrontation. He wasn’t following her; he was here for the job. She’d said something about finding work, hadn’t she?
Tabitha took her seat, glanced at him with an easy smile, and then looked away as if he were the least important thing in the world. Again.
Somehow, Evan managed to stumble through the fifty-minute class without begging Tabitha’s forgiveness. Her sweet smile dominated his thoughts as he rambled on about medical testing and...something. There were words, he strung them in sentences, none of that mattered. He felt fifteen again, lost in a hell of shame and fear. Finally, the lecture ended and he could say, “Time’s up. Make sure to study chapter twelve for the quiz on Friday.”
The students filed out. Tabitha collected her books as she chatted with a friend, then turned to look at him with a pretty, pink blush on her cheeks.
He licked his lips as she walked down the aisle between long rows of stadium seats. A wiser man might have run, but he couldn’t. He’d do anything to see her again, take any abuse just to be near her.
She trapped him with her smile as surely as any cage. “Doctor?” she asked, an innocent note of hesitancy in her voice.
“Mister Fascino, for now.” He smiled. “I’m still waiting to defend my thesis.” Wrong answer. He cleared his throat. “Evan works best.” Or Love, Lover, Sexy, Husband, any of those. It didn’t matter what she called him. If she spoke, he would listen.
“Evan.” Her mouth curled around his name the way it did in bed when she begged for release. A prayer, a charm, a promise —on her lips his name became a many-faceted thing. “Are you coming to the department mixer tonight?” she asked.
“Um, what?” He’d been lost in memory.
“The mixer. It’s not quite a dinner, but they usually have pizza and punch, store-bought cookies. You know the drill. We all come and socialize.”
“You like pizza?”
“Love it!” She laughed, the way she always did when they were alone together, and happy.
What was that supposed to mean? There was no hand signal, no hint of what she was thinking. Just Tabitha clutching her books to her chest and looking virginal as the day they married. “Um, I don’t know. I wasn’t planning on going.”
“You should come,” she said. “We graduate students have to stick together.”
“Right.”
Her hand reached for his, a butterfly’s touch. “I’d like you to come.”
If she’d asked him for the moon, he would have found a way to put it in her hands by supper. “I’ll be there.”
She walked away. No backward glance. No significant eye gesture to signal she’d left a note. Nothing.
Evan checked under her desk, under his desk, and by the door. Not even a pencil shaving.
It didn’t make sense. She stormed out of the house furious, and now she acted like she couldn’t wait to see him at dinner? Dinner? Was there some sort of coded message? A cryptogram spelled out in pepperoni?
There had to be a rational explanation for all of this.
He fiddled with his watch and froze. The Agree-With-Me Ray? It wasn’t supposed to work like that. He should have been able to persuade her to listen, but it wasn’t the Morality Machine. Not by a long shot. If it worked like that, everyone from Dean Lang to Tabby’s new BFF would be offering to show him their private leather-and-lace collection.
He grabbed his phone and dialed. “Hert?”
“Yes, Master?”
“How are the girls?”
“Watching a movie, Master. There is popcorn everywhere.”
“Fine. Did you get the video feed of Tabby?”
“Yes.”
“And? What was the signal? What did she do? Did she do something at super speed I didn’t see?”
“We’re still analyzing, Master, but I don’t believe she did anything except invite you to dinner.”
Evan chewed his lip for a minute. “All right. New plan. Find out where this mixer is, get a team in to bug her apartment, and pick some minions to watch the girls. It looks like I’m going to have a late night.”
Chapter Twelve
There should be some background story about my awkward youth or how I was teased as a child, or even how my parents never loved me. I could write that story, but it would all be lies. No one pushed me into a life of crime. I’ve never tried to excuse my behavior that way. I’ve never tried to excuse my behavior at all.
As a boy, I was precocious. As a teen, I was handsome. I never wanted for attention or adoration, but I always wanted more. Intelligent people often take up challenging hobbies to pass the time. I took up the idea of world domination and, unlike all the Goth aficionados in black lipstick, I didn’t sit around paying lip service to the idea. I chased my dreams until the day my dreams changed.
That happens sometimes. Even the best plans need reconsideration when a better offer comes along. When my choice came down to having the world or having Tabitha, I wanted her more.
***
Evan scrounged around the makeshift lab in the rented house. The small, four-bedroom brick Tudor near the university wasn’t much, the only real selling points were the partial basement for his lab and the fenced yard for the girls. While his minions were still busy trying to unpack all the toys, he worked like a maniac on the Morality Machine.
“Hert, did we find that part?”
“The crystal focus, Master? Yes, we have one left.”
“Only one? I need a second one for redundant back up. Using only one focus was my mistake the first time.”
The minion shuffled his webbed feet.
“What?”
“The other is in the Election Ray, sir. I would have to cannibalize that—”
“Never mind.” Evan turned back to the Morality Machine with a glare. “It’ll work. Start running the tests so we can get this calibrated. I need to go get dressed.”
Hert frowned at him as he hurried upstairs. Evan pointedly ignored the look. There were hundreds of things he needed to be doing this week. Chasing down Tabitha hadn’t been on the agenda, but he couldn’t put it off another day, not even another hour.
“Daddy?” Angela walked over to him clutching her stuffed dog. “Where is Mommy?”
“You said Mommy would be here,” Blessing reminded him.
Maria and Delila joined their sisters. Four pairs of eyes watched him with innocent expressions of hope.
Time to lie. “Mommy is working undercover to stop something bad. I’m going to go meet with her tonight, and find out how long this project will take.”
“I want to see Mommy,” Delila said.
“And I promise, Mommy wants to see you. Maybe she can sneak out to see us tomorrow.” He made a mental note to arrange that. “I’m going to get changed r
eal quick, okay? Are you girls all settled in? Do you like your new rooms?” They nodded. He settled them in the living room where they could watch a movie with Hert and the other minions could guard them.
Tabitha wanted to see him. That put it all in perspective. She’d come to talk to him. Obviously, there was a plan. He’d go to the mixer and get a clue. Who knew, maybe he hadn’t lied about her being undercover. Maybe the whole mess the other morning had been an act.
Evan made a mental note to have the minions check for bugs and began pulling clothes from a hastily packed box. He didn’t know what to wear. A classy tux? No. Mixer. What did people wear to mixers? He pulled some faded jeans and a white T-shirt from the box. He hated the generic, blue-collar look, but Tabby loved it. Something about a man in jeans worked for her, and never failed to get him laid. He needed a “No Fail” plan just now.
The mixer was held in the biology department building’s main lecture hall. The maintenance staff had cleared away the chairs. Sad crepe-paper flowers in school colors lay amid the greasy pizza boxes like the tattered standards of a lost legion.
Evan tugged needlessly at his shirt, turned his mini Agree-With-Me Ray to full, and stepped into the room with a confident smile. He’d been to parties before—this wasn’t one. On the scale of entertainment, it ranked somewhere between filing taxes—something he never did—and attending a birthday party with clowns and thirty crying toddlers.
Finding Tabitha was a matter of finding the largest crowd of stuttering males. They surrounded her like Neanderthals worshiping a sun goddess.
Across the semi-crowded room, their eyes met. Blue eyes sparkled like sunlight on the waves. He’d never get tired of that come-hither look.
Evan raised an eyebrow, a silent commentary on her crowd of admirers, and walked to the buffet table to score a cookie. Doctor Charm’s arsenal included flirting. Running to her would only rank him alongside the rest of her adoring sycophants. Husband or not, he had to follow the rules of the game.
When she was ready, she’d break free.
And she did. Evan nearly spit punch all over the white linoleum when he saw her walking toward him with an easy smile on her face. She didn’t look angry. One corner of his mouth lifted in a half smile. That body... All those curves, the satin-soft skin... He was in lust all over again.
“You broke away from the crowd,” he said, sipping his drink to keep from claiming her lips. The memory of her taste turned the sweet punch sour. “Is it always so lively?”
Tabitha shrugged, blushing. “We’re a department of people watchers.”
“Maybe we should hire someone to party while we watch.” He kept her gaze.
Tabitha licked her lips. He almost bent down to chase her tongue and coax it out to play. She giggled, a sweet sound that promised beautiful things.
Maybe he needed to find a dark corner and see if she was interested in a fast anatomy lesson. No. Focus. Wife. “So...” Evan cast around for a topic. “Are you here with anyone?”
Why are we here? was an even better question, but she’d told him to be here, so the answer to everything was here. Give me a hint, Tabby-cat.
“Oh.” She tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. “I’m just here with my roommate, Hilary. There’s...” She giggled again and looked at the floor. “There’s no one.” Blue eyes looked up at him. “Are you seeing anyone?”
Evan took a breath. Deep cover was not a comfortable place to be. Swirling the punch around his cup, he shrugged. “It’s complicated.”
“How can it be complicated? You’re either with someone or you aren’t.” Her hands went to her hips, the flirt was gone. “So, status?”
“It depends.”
“On what?”
“Do you love me?”
She blinked, caught off guard.
“Zinnia! Zinnia, there you are.” A blond man built like a rugby player cut between them. He looked vaguely familiar. “There you are, Z-girl. Sorry I’m late.” He gave Evan a passing glance. “Who’s your friend?”
“Evan Fascino, the new ethics professor I told you about.”
“Ethics professor?” Rugby laughed. “You ever get laid, or are you, like, the fifty-year-old virgin?” He grabbed Tabitha’s arm and she winced.
“Are you all right?” Evan asked Tabitha, blocking Rugby with an upheld arm.
Tabitha looked confused. “I’m fine. I hurt my arm falling down some stairs.”
“Stairs?” The fight. He hadn’t even asked her about the fight. “Let me see.”
“Dude, I got it.” Rugby pushed him back. “I do sports medicine.”
More likely he did anything too drunk to object.
Rugby pulled out an alcohol wipe, rolled Tabitha’s sleeve up, and peeled back the bandage. An angry red gash ran parallel to the scar he’d given her.
Evan felt his heart skip a beat. This was his fault. All his fault. And now some chump was pawing his wife. “Can I help?”
“No, I got it,” Rugby said, waving the wipe past Evan’s nose. A sharp, super sweet smell assailed him.
Evan sneezed. “What is that?”
“This? Just a homeopathic recipe my grandma used to use, mostly lotus blossom. Way better than alcohol. Doesn’t smell bad either. Right, Z?” He shoved the wipe toward Tabitha’s face.
She grimaced and turned her head. “Better than alcohol, I guess.”
“Thane!” someone shouted from the other side of the room.
Rugby frowned. “Be right back. Z, you wait for me.”
“I’ll wait for you,” Tabitha said as her smile faded. When she turned back to Evan her expression was vague, uninterested.
“So, that’s your boyfriend?” Evan felt himself losing his grip on reality as the storm of emotions swept him away. His wife. His. Wife! And she let some strange man patch her up. “Is he why you’re here?”
“What? I’m here because he asked me to wait.” Her face filled with honest confusion. Tabitha rubbed her temples. “I’m...I’m sorry. Sometimes I get these headaches. What were you asking?”
Evan unclenched his jaw to say, “I was asking if you and Rugby were an item.”
“Thane and I?” She shook her head. “He’s like that with everyone. He’s a super...a super protective person.” Her eyes lost their focus again. “He always wants what’s best for everyone.”
“And that means bossing you around?” The temperature of the conversation continued to plummet.
“I’m here alone. My parents live in Wisconsin. I’m not a city girl. I feel out of place here. Thane’s a real friend.”
Evan stared at her. “Wisconsin?” Tabitha’s parents owned a condo in Miami. She’d grown up in West Palm. So why did Wisconsin sound so familiar? He stepped back, not sure what was happening anymore.
“Evan?” Tabitha touched his arm lightly.
He raised an eyebrow, not sure how to go on.
“Have you ever met someone that you trust implicitly from the first time you see them?” She sounded so hesitant. Fearful.
“A few,” he admitted grudgingly, letting her soft touch reel him back in.
A warm smile brought life back to her green eyes. “I feel like that with you. I don’t believe in past lives or anything like that, but I feel like I know you.” She squeezed his arm. “I’m so glad you’re here. We’re going to be great friends.”
He stared at her.
“I don’t even know you.” She’d said as she walked out on him. The words reverberated through his brain. Gently, he lifted her hand to his lips. “You can trust me. With everything.” He kissed her hand as Rugby Thane butted back in. “Ready to fly, Z? We’ve got kicking dinner plans tonight.”
Tabitha turned to Thane, the smile falling from her face. “Sounds great.”
Chapter Thirteen
I should probably say a word about my competition. There is none. As far as you and the rest of the world is concerned, I am the pinnacle of creation, and I have a machine that will make you nod your head in agreement as
I say that.
There are other super villains, of course. They tend to crop up like mushrooms in the wake of every major disaster. I consider them useful. They keep the super heroes occupied and out of my hair while I take over the world. Some of them are even good enough to become reoccurring headlines. But they aren’t as good as me.
Seeing Tabitha with another man, seeing her smile and leave with another man, was a punch to the gut. I’d give up major limbs before I let another man have my wife, but what could I do? She acted like she didn’t know me. Like seven years of marriage never happened. I couldn’t compete with that.
If Tabitha wanted me, I’d fight to the death for her. But when she walked away of her own free will, I was lost.
***
Evan strode out of the building, ready to kill someone for the first time in his life.
She didn’t know him.
She didn’t know him, and she was going to dinner with another man.
He dialed the lab. “Hert, I need perfume samples. Lots of them. And I need the Morality Machine dismantled now. Now! There’s something wrong here. What? What girls?”
His girls. He was already going to hell for not belonging to any of the right religions, stealing money, and being a super villain. Compared to that, forgetting his daughters for a few minutes while his life fell apart was... He took a deep breath. Unforgivable. No wonder Tabitha didn’t love him.
Rubbing his wrist, he took the mini Agree-With-Me Ray off. It hadn’t worked. Maybe it even hurt her. He sucked in the pine-scented night air and tried to focus.
Evan could think of two possible explanations why Tabitha didn’t remember him. The first, and the most obvious, was that the Morality Machine had affected her memory and personality more than he’d anticipated. She still seemed attracted to him, so had he been breaking down her memories all this time, rather than her morals?
The other option was that something else had stolen her memories. A head injury in the fight? She hadn’t hit her head on the ground, but maybe she had a concussion from the creature hitting her? Or she was so angry with him she’d blocked him out of her memory? Or...he dug through his mental file of possibilities.