Read Online Closest Encounter by E.G. Wiser - Free Book Online Page B

Facebook.”
    “Fair enough,” Beth said “So what does the Department of Xeno-Cryptology want with me? Did you guys find another strange item that you need my legendary skills on? It’d be a nice change if you guys just asked me for my help this time.”
    “Actually I’ve been working with GITI lately. They had something they thought we might both be interested in.”
    “I’m not sure I wore the right underwear for another encounter with that object, if that’s what this is.”
    “They have assured me they have harnessed its powers for goodness or something.”
    “I’d be interested in seeing that.”
    They drove on for a bit in silence before Brad spoke again.
    “I’ve missed you, Beth,” he said. “I really have. I’ve thought a lot about…everything we went through.”
    “Who wouldn’t?”
    “Not just the sex stuff, I mean.”
    “Okay.” Beth didn’t want to pull back emotionally, but she felt it happening all the same. She was nervous, unsure. The world ending in an unstoppable alien-induced fuck-a-thon did not frighten her the way her feelings and the feelings of the man sitting next to her right then did.
    Where is he going with this? Where do I want him to go?
    Her own heart was beating faster inside her chest from just the proximity of him and, because of that, she felt compelled to seal herself off even more. It felt like a weakness. Her impulse was to keep it hidden.
    Brad drove on without saying anything, though she could sense the words building inside him.
    “The thing is,” he said, but then didn’t say anything else for another minute.
    Half a mile later, he started again. “The thing is, I can’t stop thinking about you. And I know what you’re going to say. That it was all due to that alien thingy we found, and it’s not real or it’s residual or I am imagining things based on events that would never have happened under normal circumstance. But that’s not exactly true. What I’m feeling… now …isn’t because of some goddamn space rock.”
    “What you’re feeling now,” she said quietly.
    “Yes… Yes. What I’m feeling now…”
    “Which is…”
    “God damn it all to hell, Beth, I’m in love with you. That’s what I’m saying!”
    Beth laughed and felt as if a lid had been blown off her and all the unnamed tension she had been feeling flew out of her like the spring snake in a novelty gag fake can of peanut brittle. Like that, but not as funny. “Well, I’m glad you said it first!”
    Brad glanced over at her, a confused but hopeful look on his face.
    “I love you, too,” she said and his smile shone back at her like a spotlight.
    He rolled down the window then began to whistle. Not in key.
     

Chapter Thirteen
     
     
     
    The building was shiny, new and absent all signage—a black glass monolith about a mile outside of the city proper, surrounded by nothing but a vacant lot on one side and an abandoned factory on the other.
    It seemed to lack a normal front door, but a portion of it opened up large enough for a car to fit in. Brad drove his car into it. Inside the pathway led to a parking garage as white and pristine as a hospital. Brad parked the car between two gleaming pillars.
    “You seem to know your way around pretty well, Brad.”
    “I’ve been doing a little consulting work for them,” he said, leading her from the car to a nearby elevator that took them to an unlabeled level of the building that felt like it had to be several stories below ground level.
    From there, he led her down a bright, white hallway, into a dark room that was arranged like a small theater, with padded chairs all facing a blank wall.
    He directed her to a seat in the third row and sat next to her.
    “Our first date,” she said.
    He grinned and called over his shoulder to an unseen party: “Okay, Cecil. Show us today’s feed from Project Keyhole.”
    The lights dimmed. The whirring sound came from nearby.
    “So we’re not alone.”
    “Cecil is a computer