42nd & Lex (7 page)

“Crap. I didn’t realize how hard…” His voice
trails off before he finishes his sentence. I can tell he’s holding something
back and I squirm with anticipation. “Uh, so, yeah, can I answer that particular
question later? For now, let’s just say it’s me and not you. Are you hungry?”

I can sense his uneasiness on the subject so
I agree with a nod. For the first time I feel his vulnerability and it prompts
me to back down a little. I am used to getting answers out of people, whether
they like it or not, but I can’t make myself do that to him. I have so much
information to process later, when I’m alone in my head again. Embarrassed that
he’s heard that, I start to answer his question. I can’t think if I’m talking. “Starving,
but I’m going to have to rely on you to order dinner. I don’t read French.”

I move my hand across the table and place it
in his upturned palm. I want to show him that, even without explanation, I
trust he will not hurt me. The languid heat I feel in my belly has nothing to
do with Lucan’s electrical charge. It’s a struggle to keep my body and my mind
on the same cautious page. Our eyes meet and the look on his face says he is concentrating
on not shocking me.

“Look at it again. I want to test something,”
he says as his strong fingers close gently over my hand. His touch is unusually
cool considering we are next to a fire but it does nothing to cool my body.

Christ, I can barely breathe let alone read.
I look down again and the foreign script has transformed itself into plain,
English
text. I gasp and reflexively squeeze his hand. A little aftershock reaches my
palm. “What the…”

“Apparently it goes both ways if we are
touching.” He lets go of my hand and the letters change back to their original
state. For the first time I am afraid. Mindreading I can write off as intuition
and observation. This, however, leaves me with visual proof. “Please don’t be
afraid. I will never hurt you.”

Oh, how I want to believe him! How I want to
believe there is nothing strange about what I’ve just seen; or that, in the end,
it will not be my undoing. But suddenly I am not so sure. The phrase ‘too good
to be true’ is running through my head, mocking me. I take another large sip of
my wine and look around the room. Everyone else seems to be enjoying their
meals without the slightest knowledge of the freak show going on at our table.
Remembering that Lucan can hear what I’m thinking, I mutter a mental apology
and try to rein in my mental chatter.

“I’ll have whatever you’re having,” is all I
manage to choke out.

Lucan summons our waiter and relays the
order. I silently hope he hadn’t ordered escargot.

“The mind reading and the ‘electric fence,’
as you call it,” I narrow my eyes at him for repeating my thoughts. “Are just part
of why we are here. There is so much more, but I beg of you, love, please let
me tell you in my own way and in my own time. Just trust me.”

I nod, feeling like a fallen leaf whipped
around and around in the wind. One second I am leery of this man and what he’s
shown me, and the next I have forgotten all of that and struggle to keep from
mentally undressing him. Trust he’s asking for. More like blind faith. I have
never been good at that, especially when it concerns my heart. What exactly am
I supposed to be trusting anyways? That he’s not a psychopath out to kill me or
that all of this hocus pocus stuff is real and neither one of us is suffering
from some psychotic delusion. I don’t want to believe that I am already in that
deep, but it’s true. I want this to be real. I want him to be real.   

Jesus H! I should be running but my body is
glued to the chair. Maybe he is somehow seducing me into sitting here. After
the bombs he’s just dropped, could mind control be that far afield? No, he’s
not controlling my mind; it’s still just me inside here. I want to be here. I
need to be here. I reach across the table again, taking his hand and a huge
leap of faith. He smiles and I hear him say
“Thank you.”
in my mind. 

Our food arrives and I am forced to remove
my hand from his. Immediately I miss the current running between us. We eat and
talk about where I grew up, how I came to live in the city, and my job. Lucan tells
me he grew up in Ireland –that explains the slight accent and why he called me
‘love,’— and we talk about his charitable endeavors. Our conversation doesn’t
feel so much like a first date, as it does catching up with an old friend. I
don’t need to read his mind to know he feels the same way. 

“So now that we know how I came to work in
the Chrysler, how did you?” I am eager to find out how our paths crossed.

“I
don’t work there, I live there.”

“Right,
like you work so much it’s almost like living there. I feel the same way.”

“No. I really live there. On the 68
^th
floor.” His face is serious. 

“There isn’t anything on the 68
^th
floor, that’s the old Cloud Club. I thought it’s been empty for years. How many
apartments are there?” I can’t even imagine what the rent on something like
that would be. 

“It’s just me.” He sounds mildly
embarrassed. “I own the three floors of the Club, but I just live on the 68
^th
.
The other two are storage and guest quarters right now.”

This just keeps getting better, I muse. Of
course Lucan lives in my favorite place in the city, why wouldn’t he. In its
prime, the Cloud Club was legendary. It was the premier wheel and deal place
for high-powered executives in the early and mid 20
^th
Century. I have
about a dozen books on the building sitting on my coffee table at home and I’m
pretty sure they all say the Club was condemned because no one could afford the
high rent and up keep. The fact that he can afford to fix it up, let alone buy
it, makes me speechless. Lucan is smiling and nodding. 

“Always
trying to sort it all out, aren’t we?” He is clearly enjoying my musings.

“Wait, can you, um, hear me when you’re at
home and I’m in my office?” I am blushing now, the heat rising up my neck and
into my face. Shit.

“No, no. Don’t worry, love. The steel in the
building or maybe the distance blocks it. But I guess that means you’ve been
thinking of me?”

His smile is as wide as a Cheshire cat. The
pink heat in my cheeks grows stronger and I can’t answer. Lucky for me the
waiter returns with the dessert cart providing a distraction. Ordinarily, I shy
away from dessert on a first date, but I need something to calm my nerves. 

 “I’m glad you consider this a first date,”
he whispers.  

I am going to have to stop thinking so much.
Yeah right, there is no way I can stop thinking so much.

“How
about the tiramisu?” I say aloud. 

“You heard the lady. Tiramisu please, Paul.”
Paul selects the tiramisu from his cart and places it on the table between us
with two forks. When he’s gone, Lucan starts the conversation again.

“Is there anything else you want to know
about, Abri?” Lucan asks, putting down his fork after a few bites.

“Tons, but I think it will all lead back to what
you are not ready to tell me yet. And you better keep eating, I’m so not going
to be responsible for eating all of this,” I scold him mildly.  

He shrugs and a smile twitches at his lips in
agreement with my assessment of the situation. I know he hears the million questions
spilling forth in my head. Satisfied with that fact, I turn up my mental volume
and let him have it. His face gives away nothing but he at least obeys my
command to keep eating his half of the dessert.

 “Can I see your apartment then?” The
request falls out of my mouth before either of us can react. I realize it is
incredibly forward and goes against every dating rule I’ve ever read or
subscribed to, but I want answers. Maybe being on his home turf will make him
more willing to talk. I have building security’s number on speed dial, that makes
it okay, right? I am not ashamed he can hear my reasoning, if for no other
reason than he knows I mean to talk and nothing else.

“That is a marvelous idea.” He summons Paul
again and hands him the black card. “Club card,” he confirms.

Paul returns with the card and a slip of
paper for Lucan to sign. He puts the card back in his wallet and stands to pull
out my chair. I follow him to the front of the restaurant again, trying to keep
my mind quiet as I get a look at his backside. The pretty hostess hands Lucan
his jacket and opens the door for us. Then we are back in the overly bright
lobby. Lucan holds the heavy iron door open for me again and I can see the valet
standing at the curb in front of Lucan’s car. I am glad we don’t have to wait,
since I forgot my coat. Hopefully, Lindsey or Max will see it and take it
home. 

“Here.” Lucan takes off his leather jacket
and holds it out for me. “I wondered, but I figured you Iowa girls liked the
cold.” He smiles sheepishly at his assumption.

The jacket smells like good leather and
cologne, not motor oil and mothballs like my grandfather’s. My pulse quickens
and I can’t help but snuggle into the jacket a bit. Lucan pauses for a split
second and his mouth drops open.

He shuts the car door behind me and walks
around to the driver’s side where the valet is standing. They exchange a few
words but I can’t hear them. Lucan climbs in and the valet shuts the door
before returning to his post. A warning chill runs down my spine as I catch a
glimpse of him in the side mirror. Lucan bristles next to me but I chalk it up
to the fact he no longer has his jacket. There is no way he’s creeped out by
the valet guy too.

The streets are completely empty now and
Lucan really opens up the Evora as we cruise back up Broadway. We don’t have to
stop once on the way back since the lights are synchronized. When we reach the
Chrysler, Lucan pulls the car into a gated driveway next to the building’s
loading dock. He swipes the black card and the gate glides open. I had no idea
the building had a parking garage, although I am sure it’s not a public garage
given the security system and that black card. We pull into a parking space and
I notice there are nearly a dozen other luxury vehicles parked in the small
garage. 

“These aren’t all yours are they?” It is the
first thing I have managed to say since we left the Enclave, not that the trip
has take very long. According to the clock on the dash, it has taken three
minutes. 

“If I say yes will you think badly of me?” Lucan
is out of the car before I can answer and is opening my door. 

“No, but I will seriously take you up on
your offer to drive next time.” Some of the cars I have never seen outside the
pages of a magazine and some I’ve never seen before at all. There is an extremely
tricked out Hummer taking up two spaces along the far wall. That would be my
next choice, especially if we can take it off-roading.   

“They are mine then. I collect them.” Lucan
sounds almost embarrassed that he collects luxury vehicles with six figure
price tags instead of something more economical like baseball cards or comics. A
man with the same expensive dark suit as the valet approaches us and greets
Lucan. He takes the keys and we walk towards an elevator in the center of the garage.
Again, he swipes the black card on a reader where the call buttons should be.

“I need to get one of those black cards,
apparently they open any door in the city,” I laugh. 

“Hardly,” Lucan laughs with me. We ride the
elevator up a few floors and it opens in the main lobby. When the door closes
behind us, I notice it is marked Service Elevator.

“So you know we have to go up twice as many
floors as your office to get to my apartment. Are you going to be okay?” Lucan
asks, obviously remembering our previous elevator rides. For the second or
maybe third time, I am embarrassed he can hear my thoughts.   

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I
scoff and hop on to the waiting car. I half expect him to whip out the black
card again but he doesn’t. Instead, he pushes the button for the 66
^th
floor and we head up. “For some reason I don’t feel as anxious in an elevator
when you’re here,” I admit. “I noticed it yesterday. I was going to thank you
but I got...” I stop. He knows this already. He was there, listing to my
thoughts. “Maybe you’re my cure,” I finish.

He winks.

      The elevator opens to the 66
^th
floor but the familiar voice doesn’t announce our arrival, probably because it’s
not on the usual route. The lobby looks just like the pictures in my coffee
table books, albeit a little dusty and worn down. The lighting is sparse, just
emergency lights over head, but I can still make out the marble walls and murals.
I hope I can see this again sometime in the light of day. We walk down the
hallway to another elevator. 

“Just a bit more and we’re there.” Lucan
assures me. This elevator is of the kind you find in Europe that only holds a
few people. 

“Oh my!” I lived in Italy for a summer in
college and took the stairs any chance I could to avoid these things. My
stomach does a back flip and I regret the rich tiramisu. “We can just take the
stairs?”

“I haven’t rewired the lights in there yet
and there are a few loose boards. I don’t think it’s a good idea in those
shoes.” He points down at my feet.

I relent. The stairs sound more frightening
than the elevator at this point. Gathering my courage, I step in and Lucan pulls
the iron grate closed behind us. The elevator jerks and sputters to life, just
like the ones in Italy. And, just like the ones in Italy, it moves at a snail’s
pace chugging itself upward in no particular hurry. I groan. Lucan is watching
me, his gaze a mix of concern and apology. I try to smile and let him know I’m okay.
We are incredibly close to each other in the tiny car and that makes me feel
safe.