Lara winced. "And I'm sure it didn't help matters when my mom came to visit wearing a tiara and sash."
LaToya laughed. "Your mom is wack, girl."
"That's for sure." Lara's mom was still entering beauty pageants at the age of fifty-two. "You helped me, too, you know. It would have been so much harder to rebel against my family and follow my dreams if I'd been all alone. I don't know what I would have done without you."
"To us." LaToya tapped Lara's glass with her own. "The two most bad-ass rookie cops in the big city."
"To us. Live long and prosper." Lara recited their favorite toast, borrowed from the Vulcans on Star Trek.
They ate in silence for a while, and Lara's thoughts drifted back to Jack. The rascal had altered Mr. and Mrs. Trent's memories so that their statements made her sound like a hero. And she had to make sure her story matched theirs. "I have to go see the department shrink."
"That's probably routine procedure." LaToya scooped some potatoes into her mouth.
"I suppose." Lara pushed her fish around the plate. "I'm kinda worried about it. I mean, what if I tell the doctor my story, and he realizes I'm lying?"
"He won't question it. Not when it confirms everything the Trents said."
Lara sighed. "I'm not at all comfortable with everyone thinking I'm a hero."
"Get over it already. That's why we wanted to be cops, remember? We wanted to catch the bad guys and make a difference. Besides, no one's going to believe that some strange guy magically appeared to save the day."
Lara set down her fork. "You believe me, don't you?"
LaToya's brown eyes softened, and she reached forward to touch Lara's hand. "I do. I watched you in the hospital when you struggled to learn how to read and write again. I was with you when we both struggled through classes at LSU. And I survived the academy with you. I know you're not going to lie to me, no matter how strange it sounds."
"Thank you." Lara squeezed her friend's hand, then picked up her fork. "I have to be very careful talking to the shrink. I don't want him thinking that I'm still suffering from my brain injury."
"You're not. That was six years ago. You're over it."
"How can you be so sure? No one remembers seeing Jack but me. What if he's a figment of my imagination?"
"Then who knocked down Mr. Trent? And what about that business card he gave you? His phone number worked."
"That's true." She hadn't imagined the business card.
"You saw him at Ian MacPhie's wedding," LaToya continued. "And I know Ian MacPhie is real. I called him when he was on that dating website."
"You didn't."
"I sure did." LaToya took her plate into the kitchen. "Some lady took my message, then Ian called back really late, about midnight. I was kinda pissed, especially when he said he was already taken, but his accent was really cute."
Lara shook her head. "I can't believe you called him."
"I can't believe you didn't take me to his wedding." LaToya planted her fists on her hips. "I would have loved to see him. Is he as good-looking as his photo?"
"I didn't actually see him."
"Are you crazy? The guy is hot!"
"And taken, remember?"
LaToya sighed. "Yeah, I know. So how does this Jack look? Is he anywhere as cute as Ian?"
Lara couldn't quite recall how Ian had looked. It didn't matter. There was no way he could look better than Jack. She brought her dishes into the kitchen. "Jack is the most gorgeous man I have ever set eyes on."
"Really?"
"Which probably means that I am imagining him." Lara wrenched open the refrigerator door. "How about dessert? I made a Mississippi mud pie."
"Damn, girl, you went all out."
Lara set the pie on the counter. "I wanted him to answer my questions."
"Fine food, candlelight-sounds to me like you wanted to do more than just talk."
Lara shot her friend an annoyed look, then sliced two pieces of pie. "I was merely trying to set the mood so he'd be comfortable enough to spill all his secrets."
"Right." LaToya grabbed a fork and a saucer of pie, then headed back to the table. "Where I come from, Mississippi mud pie means let's get down and dirty, honey."
With a snort, Lara set her plate of pie on the table. She went back to the kitchen for a glass of water. "I'm afraid he's avoiding me 'cause he doesn't want to divulge his secrets."
"Hmmm." LaToya considered with a mouth full of pie. "We want to be detectives, right? We'll just figure out his deep dark secrets on our own."
"I've been trying to do that for a week." Lara sipped water on her way back to the table. "All I can figure out for certain is that he's psychic."
" 'Cause he messes with people's minds?"
"Yep." Lara sat. "But he's got other powers, too, that I can't explain. Like super speed."
"Then he's a superhero. You know, faster than a speeding bullet." LaToya shoved some pie in her mouth.
"This is the real world, not a comic book. How could a normal guy suddenly become a superhero?"
LaToya's eyes twinkled with humor. "Maybe he got zapped by lightning or fell into a vat of acid." _
Lara laughed. "He might look delicious, but he doesn't look deep-fat fried."
"Then he's got to be an alien. That's how Superman got his powers."
Lara ate some pie while she mentally pictured Jack in a latex costume with a cape fluttering in the wind. Damn, he looked good. "I wouldn't be entirely opposed to a superhero if he looks like Jack. But it doesn't explain how he can appear and disappear at will."
"That's a tough one." LaToya stuffed more pie in her mouth, then her eyes lit up. "I got it! Astral projection."
"What?"
"It means he stayed in one spot while his spirit-"
"I know what it means, but Jack wasn't a spirit. He slammed Charlie Trent onto the floor and cuffed him."
"Okay." LaToya frowned. "Then he can't be a ghost."
"No." Lara recalled the way she'd rubbed against him in the church closet. "He is totally solid."
"You've touched him?"
Lara shrugged. "In the process of interrogating him."
LaToya snorted. "I bet. So the only explanation for the disappearing act is the guy knows how to teleport. Like on Star Trek."
"It would appear so, but teleportation hasn't been invented yet."
LaToya pointed her fork at Lara and gave her a knowing look. "That's what they want us to believe."
Lara grinned. "You think NASA or some secret branch of the government has discovered how to teleport?"
"Yeah. And this Jack is one of their secret agents."
"Hard to believe," Lara mumbled with her mouth full.
"I've got it!" LaToya's face beamed with excitement. "He's a secret agent from the future."
"Right. Teleportation and time travel together. That makes it much more believable."
LaToya glared at her. "Hey, it makes sense. People don't know how to teleport now, but they will in the future. Ipso facto, he's from the future."
"And he traveled back in time to throw a bachelor party at the Plaza hotel."
"All right, mock me all you like." LaToya took her empty plate to the kitchen. "But you won't like the alternative. Since humans don't know how to teleport, then your Jack has to be an alien."
"You can't be serious."
LaToya pointed a finger at Lara. "This is the second train of thought that's ended up with him being an alien. A coincidence?" She wagged her finger and her head. "I don't think so. Does he spell his name with an apostrophe? Like J'Ack instead of... Jack?"
"Why would he do that? It sounds exactly the same."
"All the aliens do it. It's part of their code."
Lara snorted. "He seemed awfully human to me."
"He wants you to think he's human, but it's all a fa?ade. He's playing with your mind, making you see him as a human, when he's really a slimy creature with tentacles. And then, he'll impregnate you with his alien baby, and it'll rip right through your stomach-"
"Enough!" Lara took the rest of her pie to the kitchen and dumped it in the trash. "I just lost my appetite."