dead in her coffin a few rooms away, and here she was on the phone talking to him about eskimos. All of a sudden he got real suspicious. "Who the hell is this anyway?" he asked.
There was a long silence. "Chrysalis," the voice said at last.
It sure as hell sounded like her. "My God," Jay said with all the awe he could muster. "You're alive. My darling ... my lover... is it really you, sweet one?"
Another hesitation. "Yes," the voice whispered at last. "It's me, darling. Listen. You must save my archer, he-"
"Yeah, I know, he's been kidnapped by eskimos," Jay said. "Maybe you think this is funny, but I don't. You do a damn good impression, but you're not Chrysalis. So why don't you take your eskimos, put Prince Albert back in the can, and go fuck yourself, okay?" He slammed down the receiver so hard it rang.,
Then he sat there in the dark for a long time, fuming, staring at the phone, daring it to ring again. It stayed silent.
9:00 P.M.
Ann-Marie was eight months pregnant with their child. They made love slowly and gently, Brennan kneeling before her, Ann-Marie lying on her side with one leg straight out, the other drawn upward. She was a slight, slim woman, now swollen to ripeness with the child in her womb. Her small breasts were heavy with milk, their nipples dark, pointed, and excruciatingly sensitive to the touch of his fingertips, the caress of his lips. Her face favored her Vietnamese ancestry more than her French, and she was beautiful, beautiful and hungry for Brennan's touch.
They made love in languorous slow motion, every minute movement of their bodies perfectly mated in rhythm and cadence, and as they made love Ann-Marie changed. Brennan watched her skin fade and flesh disappear, until he could see the network of blood vessels that laced throughout her body, and the bones and organs underneath their son in her womb. Then the baby melted away and changed and Ann-Marie did, too. She became larger, stronger, with wider hips and larger breasts, invisible but for the veins coursing through them and their dark nipples. Somehow they'd changed positions and Brennan was on his back and Chrysalis was atop him, dreamy passion on her enigmatic face, her nipples bobbing on their invisible pads of flesh as she rode Brennan, grinding her pelvis against his in long, slow, hard strokes that made him groan with each thrust.
He reached out to grasp her warm, soft invisible breasts, and they faded like smoke. Chrysalis slowly vanished, but he could still feel her warmth and wetness on his loins, and then like a ghost she slowly coalesced again, but her flesh was opaque, her breasts were small and hard, her body long, lean, and muscular.
"Jennifer," Brennan whispered, and she smiled sadly at him and pulled away, taking all her warmth and leaving him alone and naked. He wept as the pain of her leaving stung him again and again and she slowly faded from his sight in a haze of anguish and tears.
He squinted through the blur. There was a face swimming in the mist, peering closely at him.
"Jennifer," he croaked. His lips were dry, his throat tight and choked.
"About time you woke up," the face said in a naggingly familiar voice. "Let's see if we can bring you all the way out of it."
Brennan couldn't move his arms or legs, but he still had feeling in them. He felt the man grab his upper arm, and then pain shot through it as needles lanced into his flesh in what felt like three or four separate places. Brennan opened his mouth to protest, but couldn't get his tongue or lips to work together. He mumbled something unintelligible, not even understanding himself what he was trying to say. A moment or two passed and suddenly Brennan felt his heart starting to beat faster and faster. His vision cycled in and out, from misty to excruciatingly clear focus, pulsing like a strobe light. He wanted to stand, to shout, to run, but realized suddenly that he was bound in a chair with leather straps. He wrenched at the straps, but they were strong. He gritted his teeth and yanked back and forth, but the chair wouldn't budge and the leather straps only cut into his flesh. He howled, panting in savage, unreasonable rage. He had to stand up and the goddamned chair wouldn't let him! He'd get free, he had to! He concentrated all his