Sizzle and Burn

actors want. Power and money.”
    She smiled. “Total world domination, huh?”
    He didn’t respond to her teasing. “Let’s take one small example. Just think what you could do if you had the ability to slip a few very powerful parahypnotists, sensitives with the ability to install hypnotic suggestions in almost anyone, into various corporations and agencies of the federal government. We’re talking the potential to control CEOs, governors, senators and the president.”
    She jumped a little, spilling a few drops of wine. Grabbing a napkin, she hastily blotted up the liquid. “Okay, I can see where that might be a very bad thing. You said the Society has had this problem before?”
    “There haven’t been many organized attempts to re-create the drug and use it for illicit purposes, but over the years there have been any number of individuals who were unable to resist the lure of experimenting with the formula.”
    “People like my father?” she said coolly.
    Zack folded his arms on the table and fixed her with an unrelenting expression.
    “Judson Tallentyre was the most notorious renegade scientist of his generation,” he said evenly. “When he disappeared with the formula, the Master and the Council made finding him and destroying his lab and his research notes J&J’s top priority. There was a collective sigh of relief in the higher echelons of the Society when Wilder Jones reported that he had completed his mission.”
    Well, he hadn’t tried to sugarcoat that.
    “I should probably give you points for honesty,” she said, “but I don’t feel like it.”
    “I understand.”
    She took a fortifying swallow of wine and slowly lowered the glass. “I didn’t realize the Tallentyre name was so…so infamous within the Society.”
    “If it’s any consolation, the name is well known only at the highest levels.”
    “Oh, gee, that’s a relief.”
    “The reason that the Tallentyre name is not notorious throughout the Society is because the Master, the Council and J&J have deliberately tried to establish the notion that the founder’s formula is a myth. It’s part of the overall plan to discourage men like your father from deciding to become modern alchemists.”
    “My father wasn’t an alchemist.” Anger shot through her. “He was a scientist. And he was brilliant.”
    “He was brilliant, all right. No argument there. That’s why when he went rogue, he became a serious threat. The Council had no choice but to deal with him.”
    “Murder him, you mean.”
    “There is nothing in the file that indicates Wilder Jones murdered your father,” he said flatly. “By all accounts the car accident was just that. An accident.”
    “Just a dose of bad psychic luck?”
    “It happens.” His brows rose slightly. “And don’t smile at me like that.”
    She blinked and stopped smiling. “Like what?”
    “Like you’re telling me to go screw myself. Pisses me off.”
    “Wow. I’ve managed to piss off the man from J&J. What’s the penalty for that?”
    “Keep it up and you’ll find out. Now, do you want to continue playing games or would you like to hear why Lawrence Quinn’s disappearance involves you and your family history?”
    “Tell me about Quinn. If I get bored, I can always go back to pissing you off.”
    “I can promise you that you’re not going to be bored. Yesterday Fallon Jones finally got a lead on the missing Dr. Quinn. Turns out Quinn popped up in Oriana last month.”
    She frowned. “He was in my town?”
    “For about twenty-four hours, as far as we can determine. Then he vanished again. Now, here’s the really interesting part. Lawrence Quinn paid his one-day visit to Oriana on the same day that your aunt died. You’re a hotshot psychic. You tell me. What are the odds that confluence of events is a coincidence?”

Ten
    L ater he walked her back to the inn, exulting in the sensation of having her so close. In spite of the occasional bursts of fireworks at dinner, or, hell, maybe because of them, he was intensely aware of her femininity. It compelled and challenged him in all the ways that a man could be compelled and challenged. It felt very, very good to be with her, enveloped by the intimacy of the night and the rain and the subtle emanations of overlapping waves of psychic energy. It was like nothing else he had ever experienced.
    “That’s really all you have, then?” she said when they reached the top of the stairs and went down the hall. “Just the fact that