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CHAPTER 1
Shayna Prentiss left the bar near the University of Washington, wondering if someone had slipped her a roofie. She felt light-headed and from the corner of an eye, she was sure she saw a man, dressed in black, floating in the air. When she turned to look, though, nothing was there.
Had to be drugs.
But she’d been so careful, never letting guys buy her drinks and, once she had a drink in hand, keeping it there. In her undergrad days she’d been through the gauntlet of insanity that accompanied the college journey and had made it a point to learn vicariously from stories that traveled like wildfire around the dorms. More than one student had ended up in the hospital.
But tonight, something must have gotten past her. Had she been distracted? Had she turned her back to talk to someone? Yet she couldn’t think of a single moment when she’d let her guard down.
Or maybe it was just stress. Her replacement passport hadn’t come through yet and she was leaving for Malaysia in two weeks to start her fieldwork. She’d booked the flight months ago to get a solid cheap rate. But she’d gotten so caught up in putting together as many chapters of her dissertation as she could before she left that she’d somehow managed to lose her passport.
She wasn’t the most organized person, but she loved anthropology with a passion and intended to earn her PhD before she was thirty.
The dizziness returned, forcing her to stop to plant a hand against a light standard. And now she had a headache as though someone was tapping on her mind, wanting in.
She took deep breaths.
On a Friday night students headed everywhere, even at ten at night. She’d met up with friends for a drink, happy to unwind for a couple of hours, but now she was ready to get back to work. She tended to pore over her books until the early-morning hours and loved it. From the time she’d started college, she’d scheduled afternoon and evening classes whenever possible. She did her best thinking after the sun went down, preferably with books and papers scattered all around her. Antique statuary helped, as well as the oh-so-stereotypical midnight pizza. She had a fine collection of geodes she looked at or turned over and over in her hands when she was puzzling out some aspect of theory.
The air smelled of rain and the clouds overhead had gathered to form a thick, familiar mass. A distant rumbling of thunder explained things loud and clear.
Great, now it was going to pour—and as usual, no umbrella.
A couple of guys stopped in front of her. “Shayna, how’s it going?” They were in one of the classes she was required to teach as part of her doctoral program. They were young and had that hungry, Friday-night, hoping-to-get-laid look. And unfortunately, she never looked older than eighteen no matter how much makeup she wore.
With thoughts of her latest paper on her mind, she wasn’t interested in encouraging any kind of male attention. “I’m fine. You boys move along and flirt with girls your own age.”
They both grinned. She didn’t always get the same respect as other teachers because of her youngish features. She’d be carded forever, but there was nothing she could do about that.
Waving them off, she hurried up the street, half walking, half running as thunder once more sounded from the north. She was cold now, grateful she’d worn her jeans and not the short skirt she’d actually considered.
As she rounded the corner, however, she swore that flying man appeared again, floating in the air, tracking her. So long as she didn’t look directly at him, she could see him, and this time she took a hard look. He was handsome in a scary way, with short, roughed-up hair and dressed in black leather. He was big, too, like he kept a gym in his garage and spent most of the day there working out.
As hallucinations went, he was amazing.
She forced her gaze away from him and kept moving. Maybe she’d ingested some kind of psychedelic.
But the pressure on her mind increased then broke through. Words followed that set her heart racing. Are you Shayna Prentiss?
She stopped in her tracks and shifted slightly and now she could see the flying man clearly. But it also seemed like wavy lines floated in front of him. “I don’t know what the hell you are, but would just leave me alone?”
His voice penetrated her head once more. So you can see me?
She shook her head in disbelief. The man she’d somehow fabricated from her apparently way-too-vivid imagination now communicated with her telepathically. Before answering his question, she analyzed the situation as best she could. Drugs seemed like the most sensible explanation, but other than some dizziness, she didn’t feel drugged out.
She responded mind-to-mind. Are you talking inside my head?
I am. Shit, you’ve got power and you’re human, right?
Yes, I’m human. Okay, an alien might make a statement like, You’re human, right? although the words seemed earth-colloquial in nature. She’d never been much of an extraterrestrial believer. Intellectually, she knew that unexplained phenomena existed, but she also thought that science could eventually offer a rational explanation.
And you can see me. The flying man wasn’t asking this time.
Should she even respond? The more prudent course would be to get back to her apartment, take two Advil, and go to bed. Hide under her comforter.
Yet the whole situation set her curiosity on high flame, and his question had a simple, scientific basis. I can sort of see you. I mean sometimes I can, better from the side. You have wavy lines in front of you right now.
This really couldn’t be happening. She added, I have to go home now. Maybe you should find someone else to talk to. I’m real busy these days. Understatement.
Once again, she put her feet in motion and kept her head down. Had to be stress. She’d probably just been pushing too hard, as usual.
