Because she’d been able to dip into his thoughts a few minutes earlier, Delia thought it couldn’t hurt to try again. Just by reading his expression and his body language, she couldn’t pick up on anything that indicated he was lying or misrepresenting the situation, but….
Gotta sell that damn house. My parents want it gone, and the thirty percent they promised me would go a long way toward digging me out of this hole.
After that, what she saw in her mind was more a set of impressions than actual words…money mysteriously being sucked out of his bank account…the dealership where he’d bought his BMW threatening to repo the thing unless he came up with a couple grand in the next ten days…but it was enough to show her that Aaron Sanchez’s financial situation was pretty dire.
Even if the family was willing to get rid of his grandmother’s house at a fire sale price, thirty percent would probably net him six figures. That would certainly be enough to stop the bleeding, even if he’d still need to establish himself at another agency soon if he wanted to get his money flowing in the right direction.
However, what she’d heard with her mind was certainly enough to prove that everything he’d told her was on the up and up. Caleb could look as disapproving as he wanted, but he didn’t have the final say on any of this.
This was her business…and her decision.
“I’m really booked up tomorrow,” she said, and gave Aaron a sympathetic smile. “But Tuesday looks pretty open. How about we set up a meeting for me to walk the house on Tuesday afternoon sometime?”
The relief on Aaron’s face was so obvious that you probably could have used it as an illustration next to the word’s entry in a dictionary. “Tuesday afternoon would be great. Does three o’clock work?”
It would; she had one appointment to show a house at ten-thirty, but nothing after that. Even if she didn’t head down to Laughlin until after lunch, she could easily make it by three.
Well, barring accidents, construction, and all the other complications that could turn a simple hour-and-a-half drive into something much more arduous, but she’d been to Laughlin plenty of times and had never run into any trouble before, so she thought it should be totally doable.
“Sure,” she replied. “Just text me the address, and I’ll meet you there.”
Aaron nodded, looking grateful. “Absolutely.”
He got out his phone and entered a quick message, and a moment later, her phone pinged from somewhere within her purse. Caleb looked even less thrilled by this exchange, probably because it reminded him that she’d gone out with Aaron once, and he still had her in his contacts.
Well, Caleb could think what he wanted. It wasn’t as if she was going out with him, so he didn’t have any say in her personal life. Besides, it had been one and done with Aaron, and she knew she had absolutely no interest in pursuing anything else with him except — she hoped — finding out what was going on with his grandmother’s supposedly haunted house.
All the same, Caleb’s not-so-hidden jealousy might have been amusing to watch if it hadn’t made her brain go in directions she wasn’t sure she wanted to explore right now.
She got out her phone, looked down at the address Aaron had just sent her, and smiled. “Got it. Then I guess I’ll see you Tuesday afternoon.”
At least he got the hint, because he stood at once, saying, “See you then. Just call or text if you’re running late or something.” He paused for a beat or two before he added, the words now directed toward Caleb, “Sorry for interrupting your celebration.”
“No biggie,” Caleb replied, even though Delia thought it was probably a bigger deal than he wanted to let on. “Good luck with your grandmother’s house.”
There wasn’t much left to say after that, so Aaron mumbled a quick goodbye and then let himself out. Quiet descended…although it didn’t last for long.
“I don’t like it,” Caleb said, and Delia crossed her arms. She’d already been pretty sure he wasn’t about to drop this and move on to more neutral topics, but she didn’t much like being proven right so quickly.
“Why not?” she returned. “I mean, cleansing homes of spiritual presences is part of what I do.”
“I know that,” Caleb said, both his tone and his expression now openly irritated. “But are you forgetting that he was being controlled by those bastards at Aegis only a month ago?”
More like five weeks, but Delia decided it was better to let it go. “I haven’t forgotten,” she said calmly. “As far as we can tell, though, Aegis has totally fallen apart, so it doesn’t seem as if they’re much to worry about anymore. Besides, I saw Aaron’s thoughts. He’s not lying…and he’s in a lot of financial trouble. If I can get the house cleansed, it’ll help him out a lot.”
Caleb’s brows drew together even further, creating an obvious line between them. “You were able to read his mind, just like that?”
“Well, I wouldn’t say it was ‘just like that,’” she responded. Her tone was gentler than maybe it should have been, but she didn’t want to get into an argument. “More like I caught one of his thoughts early on, and that somehow made it easier to try to take a second look a little bit later. It’s still not anything I can control with any degree of certainty.”
For a moment, Caleb didn’t say anything. In fact, he reached over and picked up his glass of champagne. The Cristal still fizzed gently inside, but it wasn’t nearly as exuberant as it had been some twenty minutes earlier.
Then, “Have you tried to read my mind?”
“No,” she said at once. Part of her wanted to be offended that he would even ask such a question, although she understood why her off-and-on ability to read minds might have been preying on his thoughts. “At least,” she added, since he didn’t look completely convinced, “I haven’t tried on purpose, and I honestly haven’t seen anything of what’s going on in your head. For some reason, it’s easier with Aaron. I have no idea why.”
Caleb tapped a finger against the side of his champagne flute. “Maybe because his were the first thoughts you were able to hear when your powers started to expand?”
That seemed like as good a theory as any other. It was true that she’d caught just a snippet — a not-very-flattering one — from Aaron’s mind right after she’d told him she didn’t kiss on the first date. At the time, she’d been more shocked than anything else by that glimpse into his mind, but now she thought she could see why it might have been easier today to catch at least a hint of what he was thinking, simply because she’d already done it before.
