An overcast sky swirled above Bear Mountain. Lucy had hiked it countless times with her dad. She’d had many a lesson on flora and fauna in these woods.
It must be three or four o’clock in the morning in Tokyo right now. How was her dad doing? Lucy couldn’t remember ever going so long without seeing him in her entire life. Her mom didn’t seem worried but she’d barely lifted her head out of the Pharmakon over the last few weeks. All she said was that he’d be home as soon as he could.
A twig snapped and Lucy teetered forward, hopping up from the boulder on which she was perched. Her muscles tensed as if expecting a body blow.
“Hiya.” The late-April breeze mussed Ravi’s hair as he patted it down, testing out a lukewarm smile.
Lucy would not be charmed. “Two more minutes and you would’ve been talking to yourself. So spill.”
He took another few steps toward her, hands outstretched in surrender, as if Lucy might bolt at any moment. Which was pretty accurate.
“That’s close enough,” she warned him.
Ravi scratched his temple, coughed into his hand.
“I was going to tell you the truth, Lucy. I was working up to it.”
Been there, done that, she thought. First Cole, now Ravi. Were all guys the same?
“I—I can’t imagine how confusing this all is for you.” His mouth twisted in agitation, his words sandpaper. “You shouldn’t have found out like this.” He clenched his fists.
“The cat is out of the bag, so quit stalling.”
“You have a right to be angry.”
The way Ravi studied her made Lucy feel like a lab specimen. She’d had a lifetime of doctors looking at her that way. She was sick of it.
“Thanks very much for your permission.” Sweat beaded her hairline and she willed the simmering beneath her skin to cease.
“If you have the stone I gave you,” he said. “I suggest you take it out.”
“Why? It didn’t stop me from nearly roasting my boyfriend alive!” she shouted, losing her cool. Was Lucy hallucinating, or did Ravi wince at the word “boyfriend”?
“Black tourmaline is piezoelectric. That’s why it helps keep your condition in check. Just try it.” He fidgeted with his glasses, making his statement half entreaty, half academic lecture.
“What do you know about my condition?” Lucy huffed. “And don’t pretend to be a concerned citizen.”
Annoyance streaked Ravi’s face. “I care about you, Lucy.” He moved forward, taking two long strides. “I care about your … welfare. And I know more about your condition than you do.”
Lucy laughed in his face.
“I know you don’t have epilepsy, for one.”
Her knees went weak. She wanted to yell at him, tell him he was totally off his rocker. But something stopped her. She sagged against the boulder, the fight leaching from her.
“Why would you think that?” Her question came out frustratingly childlike. She watched as Ravi’s face smoothed, shoulders relaxing a fraction.
“The tourmaline wouldn’t affect you if you had standard epilepsy.” His tone was patient. “You only experience similar symptoms.”
Ravi might as well be positing that night was day, and day was night. Her whole life was built on the simple fact that she had epilepsy; that’s the way her parents had built it.
“Then what am I?” She wished she didn’t sound so broken.
He dipped his head, a quarter-smile teasing his mouth.
“Wonder Woman.”
She straightened up. “I’m leaving.”
“Wait—” Ravi grabbed her elbow. “Tell me what you feel. Right now.”
Ticklish. Like a thousand fireflies were lighting her up from the inside.
“Nothing.”
He frowned. “Have you been getting queasy feelings around anyone lately? Maybe something worse?”
You could say that again. “Why? What does it mean?”
“Your powers allow you to read people’s emotional states.”
Lucy ripped her elbow from his grasp and folded her arms.
“I do not have powers.”
“You and I both know that’s not true.” Ravi spoke in deadly earnest and it was enough to wipe the sneer from her face. “What you register as motion sickness, for instance, is actually internal conflict. You’re reacting to the other person’s state of mind.”
“Uh-huh. And how am I doing that?”
“By tuning in to their frequencies.”
Her stomach cartwheeled. “That’s what Tesla believed.”
“Yes, precisely.” Ravi’s eyes sparked with excitement. “Eventually you’ll be able to read people’s minds. Brain waves are just another form of electricity, so it makes sense.”
“Nothing about this situation makes sense,” she countered. Especially since it had been Lucy who had hurt Cole on Saturday. His kisses might have made her feel sick, but she was the one feeling conflicted about him.
“I understand it’s a lot to take in,” Ravi told her.
“Understatement of the millennium.”
Ravi shifted his hip against the boulder so that there were only a few inches between them. “You’re strong, Lucy.” His gaze panned over her. “If anyone can deal with this, it’s you.”
She didn’t know about that. What Lucy did know was that she was the one asking the questions here.
“Answer me this—how do you know about my … powers?” Was she really using that word? “About me? Why did you come to Eaton undercover? How do you have a Ph.D.? How old are you?” The questions came out rapid-fire, Lucy’s frustration mounting with each one.
Ravi’s expression remained neutral. “All valid questions.” Clearing his throat, he said, “As for the last two, I sort of bypassed high school and went straight to Cambridge at fifteen. I just turned twenty-one.”
Wow. Ravi was a hand-to-god prodigy. Lucy shouldn’t have been so glad he was only three years older than her. He had still deceived her.
“As for your other questions, can we walk a little first?” He adjusted his glasses.
Lucy nodded and led him toward a trail she knew well. She wondered if Ravi was aware of the message she’d decoded, but she didn’t want to show him all of her cards.
Silence stretched between them, pierced occasionally by chirping sparrows. Finally, Ravi began, “The answer to how I know about your powers is: my parents.” Acorns and wildflowers crunched underfoot as he spoke. “They were studying your condition when they died.”
“I thought they were researching Alzheimer’s.”
He cut her a startled glance.
“There’s this handy thing called the Internet,” she explained, a mite haughtily. “Just full of information.”
A crooked grin. “So I’ve heard.”
“It’s how I figured out you weren’t who you claimed.”
Ravi’s grin faded. “Out of curiosity, how did you find me out?”
“Reverse image search of your photo on the Eaton High website.”
He held Lucy’s gaze until it became uncomfortable.
“What?” she demanded.
“You just keep impressing me.”
Do. Not. Smile.
“I’m sorry about the deception,” he told her. “Perhaps it was a miscalculation. I needed a way to approach you that wouldn’t raise any red flags with … certain parties.”
“Again with the vague,” Lucy shot back. “Why did you want to approach me? Exactly how long have you been stalking me?”
Ravi came to a dead stop and she jostled into him. He reached for her hand. She shoved it in the pocket of her jeans instead, fingers closing around the tourmaline.
“Look at me, Lucinda,” he implored. Like she could look anywhere else. “The first time I saw you was at the New Yorker Hotel.”
“You were there?”
“No. I saw the surveillance footage.” Lucy had thought she’d gotten away clean. Ha. “The people I work for,” he continued, “they own the hotel. Only someone with your abilities could have opened the door to Tesla’s lab.”
“And by the people you work for, I presume you don’t mean Eaton High,” Lucy said. Ravi shook his head. “Chrysopoeia Tech?”
“That’s part of it,” he replied. “They want to meet you.”
“Who is they?” Lucy couldn’t believe there really was an omniscient, omnipotent they, after all.
“Professor T, for a start.”
She drew her brows together. “And I’m just supposed to go blindly to meet with the members of your shady organization?”
He laughed. “Professor T is hardly shady.”
“But he is an alchemist.”
“You two will get on swimmingly.”
“Swimmingly.” Lucy couldn’t resist mocking his accent despite her erratic heartbeat. Alchemists wanted to meet her. This was all too much. “If you wanted me to trust you, Ravi—you shouldn’t have lied to me.” Lucy squared her shoulders. “What about Mrs. Brandon? Is she part of your organization, or are your sketchy friends blackmailing her?”
Ravi grimaced. “We’re scientists, Lucy. Not mobsters.”
“Scientists who commit identity fraud. Why should I believe anything you have to say?”
“Because what I’m saying rings true to you. But if you want to be sure: hug me.”
What? “Are you serious right now?”
“As a heart attack.”
“That could be arranged,” she informed him, and he gave another soft laugh. “Why on earth would I hug you?” Never mind that Lucy might have fantasized about it once or twice.
Ravi’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “The hug would work in the same way as the tourmaline.” His eyes roamed her face.
“Which is?”
“The Greeks discovered that certain crystals, when placed in hot ashes, attract the ash and then repel it. These crystals, or piezoelectric materials, have a natural frequency at which they resonate.”
“Like a tuning fork?”
“That’s one way to think of it. The harder you strike a tuning fork, the greater the oscillation of the sound waves. The same holds true for your electric field, Lucy.”
She gulped but she didn’t deny it. “Is that what happened—what happened with Cole?”
Ravi took off his glasses and began fiddling with them.
“May I ask what you were doing when the incident occurred?”
“We were in his hot tub, um, we were—” A heat wave broke out across Lucy’s skin as she rambled.
“I think I’ve got the picture.” Ravi clicked the stems of his glasses together more rapidly. “As your heart rate increases, or you have a hormonal surge—cortisol, adrenaline—there’s a corresponding increase in the frequency and amplitude of the oscillation of your electrical field.”
“I figured out that much already.”
“I’m not surprised. Well, the increased frequency makes you prone to—”
“Knocking out the power grid?”
He caught her eye. “I thought that might have been you.”
“Guilty.”
“Because human skin is also piezoelectric, when you hold the black tourmaline against it, the stone couples your electrical field’s oscillations to the vibrations of the tourmaline. The tourmaline will interrupt any increase in your oscillations due to any, er, outside factors. It will anchor your field to the resonant frequency of the tourmaline.”
“Basically, you’re saying it acts like a dampener?” she said, and he nodded. “Will it make me less dangerous?”
“You’re not dangerous, Lucy.”
“I think Cole would disagree.”
Ravi replaced his glasses on the bridge of his nose. “Right. In future, you might avoid any … water sports with Mr. Hewitt. At least until you’ve gained control over your abilities. Water, as you know, decreases the resistance to electricity.”
“Yep.” She hiccupped a tired laugh. “It’s a moot point, anyway. I doubt I’ll be participating in any water sports with Mr. Hewitt again.”
“Oh?” His eyebrows shot up before he regimented his features back into a neutral mask. “Be that as it may—”
“Ravi,” she interrupted. “What does this have to do with giving you a hug?”
Red rose in his cheeks as he explained. “When you touch someone, Lucinda, you’re able to sync with the oscillations of their nervous system. Just as you do with the tourmaline. Those oscillations are then re-created in your own brain—a shadow, if you will, of what’s happening in theirs.” He coughed. “The more … intimate the contact, the fuller the picture you receive.”
“The more accurately I can read people’s emotions.”
He nodded.
“So all I have to do is hug you and I’ll feel what you’re feeling?”
“The more you practice, the better you’ll get at identifying specific emotions. But for now, you’ll be able to recognize that my feelings towards you are … concerned.” He swallowed. “Protective.” Another swallow. “That I mean you no harm.” He dropped his hands to his sides. “But only if you want. The choice is entirely yours.”
Ravi stood scarecrow still. He wouldn’t initiate anything. She needed to go to him.
Lucy took a step forward, releasing her grip on the tourmaline in her pocket. She couldn’t believe that she was entertaining the notion that the universe had supplied the answers she needed when she needed them, but she wanted to believe Ravi.
He was taller than Cole. Lucy had to reach higher to slide her hands behind his shoulders. He shivered, making her hesitate.
“You’re not scared?” she whispered.
“I trust you.”
He might live to regret it. Or … not.
Gently, she laid her head against his chest and she wanted to laugh from the feeling of floating. Was this Ravi’s frequency? She glanced up at him and the blush on his cheeks was distinctly satisfying. Slowly, his arms encircled her waist. Was it possible he’d imagined holding Lucy too?
She grazed his cheek with her hand, the texture of his halfhearted facial hair delighting her. Lucy giggled. She would have sworn she was flying, and yet she also felt peaceful.
“Do you feel that?” she asked.
“Yes.” Barely a whisper.
She should let go. Her instincts—or powers—were telling her that Ravi was on her side. There was no reason to continue the embrace. His arms tightened around her. No reason at all … except she wanted him closer.
Pushing onto her tiptoes, Lucy pressed her mouth to Ravi’s, parting his lips, exploring. They were as soft as they looked. Her mind filled with the hot-pink tendrils of a breaking dawn.
She savored the taste of him as sunlight filtered behind her eyes.
Ravi pulled back. “That wasn’t supposed to happen,” he said in a low voice.
“You didn’t want to?”
“I did. I do. But I’m here to train you.”
“Meaning?”
Ravi released her and Lucy instantly missed the feel of him.
“Meaning this…” He indicated the space between them, “will only confuse matters.”
Talk about being doused with cold water.
“Please don’t take it the wrong—”
“Whatever,” she cut him off. “You got what you wanted. I’m on board with your conspiracy theory.”
“Lucinda.”
“I’d stand back if I were you.” She withdrew the tourmaline and tossed it from one hand to the other, daring him to cross her.
“There are people who would hurt you for being who you are.” His expression grew severe. “I came to teach you how to defend yourself. If we could find you, so could they.”
“Again with the they?” she said irritably. “You’ve heard of smoke and mirrors on your side of the pond?”
“The threat is real,” he ground out.
“Gee, five stars for terrifying the young ingénue.”
Lucy turned on her heel.
“I’m only telling you because I know you can handle it.”
“You don’t know me at all. And I obviously don’t know you, Ravi Singh.”
“Tomorrow. We start training.”
“Whether I like it or not?”
“I’m sorry, but yes.” His tone was cool, determined. “And you can’t tell anyone about your abilities—for your own safety. As well as theirs.”
“Right.” Over her shoulder, she said, “I’ll make my own way home. You’ll probably be watching me anyway. But if you think I’m done asking questions, think again.”
His voice followed her as she stomped away.
“I’d be rather disappointed if you were.”