The Deadliest Bite

for at least thirty seconds, signaling the fact that even though he was stil staying in Morocco with his new girlfriend, Bergman’s paranoia hadn’t slipped a notch. Our cal would be encrypted as thoroughly as if the President of the United States were sharing the line.

I thought Bergman had probably been born with a suspicious nature, but it had been sharpened to its current razor edge in col ege when a classmate had stolen his research and tried to use it to create a brand-new energy source. The fact that he’d blown himself to smithereens instead hadn’t given Bergman much comfort. After that he’d put five deadbolts on the door to his room and informed the rest of us that if we entered without permission there was every chance that we’d be impaled by a jungle spear.

I wasn’t sure what it said about me that I continued to share an apartment with him until I graduated from col ege, or that he remained one of my closest friends to this day. Except that his mind unfolded before me like a work of art. And his inventions gave me happy tingles right down to my toes. Before Matt, and then again before Vayl, hardly anything else in life had done that for me.

Final y Bergman answered the phone, which was when I thought to check my watch. Had I just woken him? Naw, it was already about nine-thirty in the morning over there. He said, “Jaz! It’s you!”

“Yes. Hel o.” Oh man, how do you tell an inventor his cat is on the fritz? Is this a good news/bad news scenario? Wait, I can’t think of any good news. See, this is what Evie means when she tells me I need to work on my attitude. Something good has to have happened lately. I mean, besides the mind-blowing sex with Vayl. And all the other fabulous moments in between, which you can’t really explain to your old buddy. And that’s not his good news anyway.

“Jaz? Are you stil there?”

“Yeah! Hey, Miles, how are you?”

“Great!”

Did that sound fake, or was it just the thousands of miles standing between our cel towers?

“Excel ent! How’s Monique?”

“Great!”

Huh. “Super. That’s good news.” Hey! That’s the good news! Now for the bad news. “Uh, Miles, why I’m cal ing… Astral’s kind of acting up.”

“What’s she doing?” Total professionalism in his tone now, except for that thread of frantic worry he was trying hard to suppress.

I described the problem. He wanted every detail. I had to go watch her some more so I could describe what era I thought the stuntman had been living in when he tried, and failed, to jump a canyon the size of Rhode Island. “What do you think?” I final y asked him.

“Her self-recalibrations may have jogged something loose,” he said. “I’l need to do some tinkering to be sure, but I think I can fix her.”

“So I should, what, shut her down? Box her up and mail her to you?”

“God, no! She’s a member of your team! You can’t function without her!”

“Wel , I wouldn’t—”

“She needs to be repaired immediately, Jaz. I’l be on the next plane out of Marrakech!”

“Bergman! Seriously, I can—”

“I won’t hear of it! I’m booking my ticket online right now.”

“Miles. What’s happening?”

“What do you mean?”

I let a few seconds of silence stretch between us. Then I said, “When Vayl, Cole, and I left Morocco, you and Monique were so lost in Cuddleland you barely said goodbye. Now you can’t wait to leave her?”

“It’s not her, exactly. It’s her kids. They came to visit. And, wel , one of them is only a year younger than me!”

“So?”

I could almost hear Bergman’s gears turning as he considered and rejected reasons he knew I wouldn’t buy in the first place. Final y he said, “I guess I knew it couldn’t last. She’s twenty-three years older than me and—”

“Stop.” This couldn’t be a coincidence. I turned to Aaron. “You’re twenty-three, right?”

“Yeah, how did you guess?”

I didn’t answer him. I was too busy trying to keep up with my racing mind. Raoul had said that E.J. would be twenty-three when she and Cole final y met for the first time. And now Bergman had let slip that Monique was exactly the same number of years older than him. Somebody was trying to send me a message. And considering the sources of the numbers, I had to think that same somebody wanted me to survive this ordeal. I tucked the idea away until I could bounce it off Vayl and went back to my cal .

“Listen, Miles. You’re my best friend. I’l back your play, no matter what you decide. But I’m just saying that’s a pretty ridiculous reason to dump the only woman I’ve ever met who wil cheerful y put up with your bul shit. If it’s something else that you can’t get past, fine. But if al you’re worried about is the age difference, then grab on to this—Vayl is two hundred and sixty-eight years older than me.”

“Damn.”

“Yuh-huh.”

Long silence. “I need to come there. Just for a little while. To think.” My throat closed. More than I wanted my own happiness, I wanted the people I loved to find peace and love in their own lives. Eventual y maybe I’d accept my startling lack of control over their decisions and just let it be. But I knew that at some point I’d