Page 15 of The Alien in the Archive

“You,” I whisper.

He tilts his head slightly… and his lip curls. I see the flash of a sharp canine biting into his lower lip.

“Me,” he says.

The single word echoes in my mind, not just my ears. It’s heavier than it should be, like the sound itself carries some psychic resonance, worming its way through my thoughts and settling deep in my chest.

I force myself to breathe, to stand taller than I actually am. It’s not going to do any good; I’ve never been able to make myself look bigger. “You’ve been in my head.”

He huffs out a dark laugh, shaking his head. “I’ve been aware of you, yes. You’re loud.”

“Loud?” I repeat, incredulous.

“Psychically,” he clarifies. “Your thoughts echo like a bell in the darkness. You’ve been stumbling around the Archives, poking at things you don’t understand. I couldn’t ignore you even if I wanted to.”

I flinch at the accusation in his tone. He makes it sound like I’ve been barging through someone’s home uninvited,breaking things along the way. “I’m notpokingat anything, I’m researching. It’s what I do?—”

“Researching,” he echoes, taking a slow step forward. His movements are smooth, deliberate, like a predator circling prey. “And what exactly are you hoping to find?”

“Answers.”

“To questions you don’t know how to ask,” he replies.

Something about him makes me uneasy, but I’m also…I don’t want to name it, don’t want to say it out loud. It’s the way he looks at me, like he’s peeling back my layers, seeing everything I am and everything I’m not.

His brow furrows, and I know I didn’t have to say anything.

He heard it anyway.

The realization sends a jolt of heat rushing to my face. He’s in my head again, sifting through my thoughts like they’re books on a shelf. My pulse pounds in my ears, but I push the embarrassment aside. If he’s going to dig through my mind, he won’t find me cowering.

“I’ve been wanting to meet you,” I go on, because he’s in my head, he must already know. “I saw you a few weeks ago, didn’t I? And I keep hearing you…even when I’m not in the library. You’re the presence I’ve felt since I got here, aren’t you?”

For a second, he doesn’t reply. His eyes narrow slightly, and I can feel the weight of his attention pressing against my mind, testing me, searching for something. The pressure builds, faint at first, but growing stronger. My thoughts are a jumbled mess of half-formed questions and scattered memories, and I have no idea what he’s looking for—or if he’s already found it.

“Perhaps,” he says. “And now that we’ve met, what do you intend to do?”

The question is disarming in its simplicity. He doesn’tsound angry or curious, just…detached, like he’s already calculated every possible answer and none of them matter. Riley went through a major depressive episode a few years ago, and it reminds me of that—like all paths were already decided for him, the future empty of all life.

I size him up, knowing he could catch me if I tried to run. And I know he knows I’m thinking that…because he can read minds.

He’s thefirst person I’ve metwho has the same power I do.

So, I meet his dark, empty shark eyes and I smile.

“Research,” I say.

His lip twitches, and once again I see the faintest hint of a smirk.

“Of course,” he says, almost to himself. There’s a note of amusement in his voice, but it’s buried under something deeper, darker. He tilts his head, studying me. “And what is it, exactly, that you think you’re researching?”

“Why are you asking when you could just read my mind?”

“Because it’s rude,” he shrugs. “If you haven’t said it out loud, I assume I’m not privy to your innermost thoughts. Unless…”

I feel him all of a sudden, crawling into my skull. I collapse into those black eyes for a moment, taking a shuddering, sharp breath. It’s not unpleasant…it’s the most intimate sensation I’ve ever experienced—more than an embrace, more than sex. I find myself wrapping my thoughts around his, and then…

He’s gone.

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