Heat Stroke by Rachel Caine

closer to look at it. “That’s not right.”
    My hair had always been straight. Dark, straight, worn long. For some bizarro reason, I was now blessed with curls.
    â€œNo, I like it.” He wrapped a curl around his finger and brushed it with his thumb. “Think of it as an unexpected appointment at the salon. Look, we’ll get into the finer points of personal grooming later. I need to find out more about what’s going on up there.”
    â€œWith the sparklies. Yeah, they looked real dangerous.”
    He frowned at me. “They shouldn’t even exist. That’s dangerous enough for me.”
    â€œSo? What’s the plan, Sherlock? We stick them in a test tube and start experimenting?”
    He stepped away from me and turned to pace the room restlessly. He was no longer entirely comfortable, I could see that; in addition to the change in body language, he’d put on a pair of blue jeans and a loose, worn gray T-shirt with the logo of some university faded almost to invisibility. As I watched, he formed a blue-and-white checked shirt, buttoned halfway.
    No shoes, yet. He wasn’t quite ready to go. “I have to talk to someone,” he said. “Can I trust you to stay here for a while?”
    â€œCan’t I go with you?”
    He focused on me for a second, then moved his gaze away. “No. That wouldn’t be—a good idea.”
    â€œWho are you going to see?”
    â€œYou don’t need to know.”
    Okay, this was starting to piss me off. “Sorry, is my new Djinn name Mushroom ? Because I don’t like being kept in the dark and fed bullshit, David. Just so you know.”
    I expected him to snap a comeback, but instead he smiled and paused in his pacing. “Are we having our first quarrel?”
    â€œNo, I recall a hotel room back in Oklahoma where you tried to make me claim you as a Djinn slave. That was our first quarrel.” It had been a doozy. The apology sex had been even better.
    â€œRight.” He locked his hands behind his back and wandered to the windows to look out. “Something’s wrong up there. I don’t know what it is, or what caused it. I don’t even know if it’s dangerous, but . . . it doesn’t feel right. And that’s as much as I know, Jo. I need to ask around, see if anybody else has noticed anything. This could be very important.”
    â€œOr it could be leftovers from the big New Year’s Eve party up on the aetheric.”
    He shrugged and folded his arms across his chest as he stared out. “As party favors go, those are pretty persistent.”
    He really was worried. I sat down on the bed and pulled a sheet over myself, kind of a wrinkled toga, nothing elegant but at least a covering. “So go, then,” I said. “If it’s that important.”
    He turned to look at me, and I read a flash of gratitude, just before the phone rang.
    We froze. His copper eyes swirled darker.
    â€œWrong number?” I asked.
    â€œLet’s find out.” He crossed to it, picked up the elegant little handset, and angled to watch me. “Hello?”
    Not a wrong number. His expression went blank and stiff.
    â€œNot over the phone,” he said. “We need to do this in person. Where do you want to meet?” Another pause. “Yes,” he said. Pause. “I know where it is. Yes.”
    He hung up. In the same motion, his favorite olive drab wool coat formed around him, long and deceptively elegant. When he turned to look down at me, he’d also added the round disguising glasses that I remembered so well from the first time we’d met. They made his angular face look gentle, and behind them his eyes had gone a warm brown instead of Djinn copper.
    â€œWe’ve got to go.”
    I didn’t like the way he said it. I didn’t like the sudden tension in his shoulders, either. “Trouble?” I asked.
    He smiled slightly.