put him on an FBI watch list. I got a few curious stares from the woman one pump over, but I couldn’t blame her. Thanks to my encounter with the anti-Simba, the back of my shirt looked like someone had run me through a woodchipper.
It wasn’t long before I was back on the road, right in the thick of stop-and-go traffic on the causeway. I headed for the University of Miami’s campus, intent on seeing a snarky little guru who could be as annoying as he was helpful.
It was hard to classify my relationship with Dakota Daydream. On the surface, it wouldn’t seem like we had much common ground. He wasn’t a cop; he was a graduate student. I lived for a good mystery, while he was the flip-to-the-end-of-the-book-and-ruin-the-suspense type. He was empiricism, I was rationalism. But we did share a paranormal link, and that was more than enough to bridge the gap.
I’d figured out that he was some sort of plant whisperer when I caught him bringing a plant back to life with just a touch of those slender fingers. He clammed up about the topic, so that was all I knew. He kept insisting that’s all I needed to know.
I tried quite a few gurus before Dakota, but he’d been the clear front-runner. He liked to combine the supernatural with the intellectual, which spoke to me on a cellular level. He was also smart, and an excellent sounding board who never talked more than he listened. Oh, and now and again, he had good advice.
He was also a bit anal about life in general. He’d emailed me a copy of his class schedule at the beginning of the semester, so I knew exactly where he’d be. I parked my car right outside his class window, where he would hopefully see me. Then I got out and leaned against my car, arms folded while I waited. A few moments later, I got a mean face emoji on my phone.
I smiled and texted back, Hurry up already. For Christ’s sake, the class was Applied Skills in Bioinformatics. I was doing him a fucking favor.
He came out a few minutes later, pushing his glasses up on his pert nose. He was a slightly built ginger with an earnest, trust-worthy looking face—one youthful enough that he’d probably get carded for the rest of his life. He was wearing khaki shorts, a shirt emblazoned with a science pun I didn’t understand, and thong sandals that flapped against the sidewalk as he walked.
“You have ten minutes,” he said in lieu of a greeting. “Professor Grant was just getting to the role of plants in the modern world.”
“Sounds fascinating.”
“Nine minutes.”
I huffed. “Fine. I need your help. Or at least your opinion.”
“So what else is new?”
I started pulling my shirt over my head, and his eyes went wide. “I thought… I thought we weren’t doing this.”
“Doing what?”
He pushed his glasses up on his nose again. “I mean, of course I’ve thought about it, even fantasized about it a little, if I’m perfectly honest.”
I shrugged out of my shirt, squinting at him. “What exactly do you think is going to be happening here?”
He ignored me, wringing his hands. “But you were in a relationship, so I knew nothing could ever happen. Besides, it would be disrespectful to Danny, and he’s such a great guy.” His eyes got even bigger. “Oh, God, does he know? He’s going to kill me—”
I smacked his arm. “Will you stop babbling and listen to me? I have a problem here.” I spun around so he could get a good look at my back and the scratches.
He inhaled swiftly. “My God.” His fingers were gentle as he traced the injured skin between my shoulder blades. I glanced in the car window again to take another look. The marks had already faded a bit, vivid pink lines now rather than bloody scratches. If they continued disappearing at their current rate, by nightfall, I doubted they’d be there at all. “Who… or shall I say what in the hell did this to you?”
I faced him as I put back on my shirt. “Would you believe me if I said a man-eating lion?”
“We’re at the point where I believe pretty much all the weirdness you throw at me, Christiansen.”
The worry in his voice made me realize that maybe I was sharing a little too much. I usually enjoyed dumping my ghostly problems on Dakota’s lap because he generally took everything in stride. But we had forged