A Cup Full of Midnight by Jaden Terrell Page B

vampire pretenders, and vampire wannabes. A culture in flux, constantly evolving. Razor and his coterie seemed to think they were at the pinnacle.
    It was after midnight before I turned out the light and settled into an uneasy sleep, so I was tired and out of sorts when I showed up at Alan Keating’s office the next day at noon.
    Keating worked out of a small building on the west side of town, a few blocks from St. Thomas Hospital. He shared the building with three other psychologists whose placards read, “Andrea Shilling, Child Esteem Specialist,” “Tony Kent, Psychoanalysis and Hypnosis,” and “Glorianna Plummer,Women’s Issues and Repressed Memory Recovery.”All that was missing was a placard for Madame Zelda’s Voodoo Parlor.
    Keating’s placard said simply, “Alan Keating, Ph.D., Psychologist.”
    The four psychologists shared a receptionist, a sleek redhead with a pair of rings on her left hand and a smile that said maybe her I do had really meant I might .
    Her lips pursed as she studied my ID and then my face. When she handed back my card, her fingertips brushed my hand. “Third door on the right,” she said, her voice sultry. “I think it’s open.”
    Keating’s office was spacious, with pale walls and a wine-colored Persian rug. On one end of the room, a child-sized, kidney-shaped table surrounded by blue plastic chairs dug moons into the rug. Against the wall was a wooden shelf lined with toys that looked like they’d never been played with. At the other end of the room, behind a cherry wood desk so glossy you could see your reflection in it, Alan Keating sat in a high-backed leather swivel chair poring over a sheaf of papers in a manila folder.
    He looked up when I came in. Closed the folder and stood up, fingertips absently straightening the edges. He was dressed in another pricey Italian suit. Same gold tie chain, same gold tips at the wings of his shirt collar. This time, the tie was blood red with a pattern of gold running through it. Crisp. Clean. Careful. It made me want to pitch him into a dumpster.
    He gestured to the cushioned leather seat across the desk from him. “Come in. Have a seat. Let’s get this over with.”
    I settled into the chair, pulling my jacket across my chest to conceal the shoulder holster. His eyes flicked toward it as if he knew it was there. Which he probably did, since I’d shown it to him at the funeral. I let the jacket slip a bit and said, “How’s Byron?”
    “Shaken. As you’d expect.”
    “I need to talk to him.”
    Keating sat. His chair was higher than mine, and he rocked back in it. Fancy. “I’m neither Byron’s warden nor his social director. If you want to talk to him, you’ll have to make your own arrangements.”
    “What about you?” I asked. “What kind of arrangement do you have with Byron?”
    He glared at me. “He’s fifteen, for God’s sake.”
    “That didn’t stop Razor.”
    “I’m not Razor.”
    We stared each other down like a couple of alpha wolves. It was what Josh had called a pissing contest, and it wouldn’t get me any closer to what I needed. I held up my hands to signal a truce. “Okay. I was out of line.”
    “Damn straight.” He stepped past me to a shiny black filing cabinet, yanked open a drawer marked Q–Z, and slid the folder he’d been studying deftly into place. Closed the drawer. Locked it. Then he blew out a long breath, came back around the desk, and slid into his chair. “What is it with you?”
    “Something about your boyfriend,” I said.
    “My boyfriend?”
    “You’re not going to tell me you and Razor didn’t have a thing going?”
    His gaze slid away, back toward the files. “That was a long time ago.”
    “Then it won’t hurt to tell me about it.”
    He pushed himself away from his desk and paced a path from desk to window and back again, then over to a rosewood bookcase filled with professional journals and hardbound books. Absently, he traced the titles with his index finger.