Grand Passion

words.
    Cleo opened her eyes again and stared at the light inside the yellow crystal. Sex wasn't all Max needed from her. He was hungry for other things as well, the same kind of things she had grown up with and that she had deliberately set out to recreate after the death of her parents.
    Max needed a family. Whether he knew it or not, he wanted one. Surely that was why he was hanging around Robbins' Nest Inn even though he knew the Luttrell paintings were not there.
    He's a robot. A very clever, very brilliant, extremely useful robot, but a robot nonetheless .
    “No,” Cleo whispered. Her hands closed into small fists. Max was no robot. But she suspected Kimberly had been right when she implied that Max didn't know much about relationships.
    Cleo blinked, setting herself free from the gentle thrall of meditation. She took another slow, deep breath and uncoiled from the position she had been holding for the past half hour.
    As always she was a little stiff after sitting still for so long. She went to the bank of floor-to-ceiling windows and looked out, startled to see how thick the fog had become.
    It was time to go home. Preparations would be starting for the evening meal, and with any luck, there would be a smattering of new guests checking in for the night. Heavy fog sometimes induced cautious travelers to spend the night at the first available inn rather than drive on to their destinations.
    A woman dressed in a Cosmic Harmony gown and wearing the familiar necklace waved to Cleo as she walked up the path toward what had once been the main lodge of the old resort.
    “Better hurry, Cleo. That fog is going to get worse before it gets better.”
    Cleo lifted a hand in acknowledgment. “I'm on my way, Nebula. Don't worry about Andromeda and the others. They can stay the night at the inn if the fog doesn't clear up later.”
    “Of course, dear. Have a good evening.”
    Cleo nodded at a small group of women who were hurrying from the indoor pool back to the lodge. They waved back. Some were familiar faces, others were visitors who had come to spend a few days at the retreat.
    By the time Cleo reached the parking lot, the fog had partially obscured the trees that lined both sides of the road. Luckily there was rarely any traffic on the narrow strip of pavement that led from the retreat back to the inn.
    Cleo turned on the lights and eased the Toyota out of the small parking lot. The heavy mist ebbed and swirled in front of her, revealing and then concealing the white line. By the time Cleo was halfway back to the inn, she could barely see the road at all. The fog had not been so heavy along this stretch of coastline since mid-January. She slowed the Toyota to a snail's pace.
    The Toyota began to slow still further of its own accord.
    Cleo pressed her foot down on the throttle. Nothing happened. She glanced down at the gauges in concern. With a shock, she saw that she was out of gas.
    But that wasn't possible, she thought, annoyed. She had filled the tank just last week. Someone else had either borrowed her car or siphoned the gas out of it.
    “Damn.”
    It was going to be a cold walk home.
    A few minutes later, bundled up in her hunter green parka, flashlight in hand, car keys in her pocket, she got out of the Toyota and started to walk along the edge of the road. There was less than a mile to go, she assured herself.
    The fog had become an icy gray shroud. It blanketed everything with an eerie stillness. Cleo kept to the far edge of the pavement and listened intently for the sounds of automobile engines. Anyone approaching in a car would be unable to see her until he was on top of her. The safest thing to do would be to get off the road entirely if she heard a car coming.
    All she heard was the cold, relentless silence.
    The gray mist grew heavier. The early night of a Northwest winter was closing in quickly. In another half hour it would be dark.
    Cleo concentrated intently on listening for an approaching car. What she heard was the soft echo of footsteps on the pavement behind her.
    She stopped and whirled around. The fog formed an impenetrable gray wall behind her.
    “Is someone there?”
    The footsteps stopped.
    “Who is it?” Cleo dug out the small flashlight she had brought with her and aimed it into the dense mist. The beam did not penetrate more than a few feet. It revealed nothing.
    Wondering if she had been mistaken, Cleo turned around and started walking more quickly down the road. She kept the