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lock and get out of the cold. Useless.
    No help for it. I called Jackson.
    * * *
    “It was like he was waiting for me. Right outside my door.”
    “Did you recognize his voice at all?”
    I shook my head. Jackson had come right away when I’d called. I was sitting in his car, parked on the street about a block away from where I’d been mugged. We hadn’t called the police. Too risky for them, Jackson said, but my certainty that the mugger had hit me telekinetically was fading.
    “I probably imagined it,” I said, for about the eleventh time. “It happened really fast.”
    Jackson frowned at me. “That doesn’t mean you imagined it.”
    I wasn’t so sure anymore. It had been a hard week. This was probably some weird product of too much stress and not enough sleep. And the way his hands had blistered, as if they’d been burned...I didn’t have an explanation for that one. I hadn’t even told Jackson about it. I slumped against the cool window of Jackson’s car.
    “Look,” Jackson said, “why don’t you crash at my place tonight. Just for the night.”
    “I can’t ask you to do that.” I thought of my lumpy futon, and for once, it sounded like heaven. Actually, I would’ve settled for the rug on the floor next to it.
    “You didn’t.” He paused. “Mina, look, this sounds like it was more than just some random mugging. He was waiting in front of your apartment, and he was a converter. After what happened last night...”
    “You mean that guy you threw against the wall?”
    “Yes. Greg. He’s not exactly an upstanding citizen.”
    “Well, that’s a shock.” I rubbed my face. “Are you saying this was some kind of retaliation?”
    “I don’t know. But it could be. That plastic bag we found—he’s into something, and we haven’t figured out what yet. He could be dangerous.”
    I chewed on my lip.
    “What I’m saying is, it won’t kill you to sleep in my guest room for the night.”
    I looked at the deserted street and thought of the way the gun had looked in the man’s hand. As if it was all there was of him.
    “All right,” I said. “Just one night.”
    Jackson looked relieved. “Great.”
    He picked the lock so I could get in and grab a change of clothes. I had to wait until he checked the place before he’d let me go inside, and then he made me wait again while he checked the stairwell and the street. He didn’t seem to relax until we were back in his car.
    It took fifteen minutes to get to Jackson’s high-rise downtown. He parked in the garage next to his building, and we took the elevator to the twenty-seventh floor. It looked exactly like every other floor in the building: thick beige carpet with a subtle textured pattern, dark red doors, potted plants every few feet. The only difference between the levels was the artwork on the walls, all of which looked like it came out of doctors’ waiting rooms. Jackson’s floor featured flower arrangements. It was better than the twenty-sixth floor, which I’d once gone to by mistake. It had watercolors of little blonde girls wearing white dresses, posed in various outdoor settings.
    Jackson’s unit was in a corner, which I guessed made it more expensive. More windows. He opened the door for me, and I went into his huge ultra-modern living room with its glass-fronted zero-clearance fireplace and boxy black leather couch. A piano sat in the corner, an espresso-stained wooden upright. I’d never seen him play it. Maybe it was just one of those things that went with his life, like the sleek designer furniture and the gourmet copper cookware. Jackson took off his tie and draped it over a dark-red wingback armchair.
    “You feel okay?” He rested his hands on the back of the couch. He was clearly thinking something. I just didn’t know what.
    “I’m fine.” I readjusted the strap of my duffel bag. The sight of the gun had unsettled me, and I still wasn’t feeling exactly steady. My pulse was pounding. “Thanks for letting me stay