They had abandoned their walk because the April night was a bit too brisk and chilled them into the shivers. They were in his truck, parked up on a ridge from which they could see a million miles out into the sky and across the land. If they’d been looking out, that is. With his lips on hers, it was inward that Leigh was looking.

There were things she had learned about herself since the last time they had kissed. She was going to have a lot of startling information for John…but, like a coward, she decided to start slow and sneak up on it.

For example, she explained, her adolescence had been very lonely. She was a woman who had reached her intellectual peak at eighteen and had entered puberty—at least emotionally—at twenty-seven.

John hummed in appreciation, though what he really wanted was to be kissing her neck. He was smart enough to keep that to himself.

Next she went on to explain her marriage, which she knew she had never adequately explained to John before. She and Max had rarely made love. They were a team in the lab; he was her mentor. Since she had never had any friends her own age, since she’d never had a boyfriend in her entire life, she hadn’t realized her relationship with Max was peculiar. If she hadn’t fallen into a “thing” with John, she might not know even now.

“But you’re so gorgeous… ”

She shook her head. “I didn’t think of myself as attractive. Honest. I thought I was a freak. I never dated anyone. I was twenty before I realized my colleagues were intimidated by me, and women seemed to really dislike me. Well, except older, more matronly intellectual women, and scientists. But maybe the hardest thing about living that kind of life is that if you have a terrifically busy mind, it’s fairly easy to avoid looking closely at your personal life. I never bothered to examine my unhappiness closely, because it was easy for me to find something else to think about. It’s a dysfunctional behavior.”

“Maybe a lot of people would like to have something better to think about than their problems,” he suggested.