A Knight in Central Park(17)
“Watching television.” Shelly tossed the sponge into the sink and leaned back on the kitchen counter so she, too, could watch two naked women strip the man bare...one piece of clothing at a time.
“What is wrong with you two?” Joe asked.
Shelly raised a brow. “We aren’t the ones who ordered the porn channel, are we Alexandra?”
“Nay,” Alexandra said. “What is porn?”
“It’s what you’re watching,” Shelly explained. “Women and men all getting it on...you know, lots of sex...naked bodies...”
Joe’s frown deepened. Shelly was one of a half dozen students earning credits as his research assistant, hoping to receive her minor with honors in Ancient History. She’d always been outspoken, but sometimes, like now, her bluntness took him by surprise. “Shelly,” he said, “I think she gets the idea.”
Alexandra paled. “I am a virgin and—”
“Get out of here,” Shelly said with a wave of her hand.
“Should I go?”
“No.” Shelly smiled. “I didn’t mean ‘get out of here’ as in leave, I meant...oh, never mind.”
“I never ordered this channel,” Joe muttered, ignoring them both as he made his way across the kitchen to turn the television off.
“She’s never seen a television before,” Shelly said. “Turn it back on.”
Joe’s headache was back in full force. “She’s never seen a television, she’s a thirty-year-old virgin, and she never lies. Give me a break.”
“Five and twenty,” Alexandra corrected.
Joe cocked his head. “Five and twenty?”
“She’s twenty-five years old,” Shelly clarified, “not thirty.”
Joe raked agitated fingers through his hair. “I’ve got work to do.”
Shelly nodded in agreement. “He’s working on an important project.”
“A project?” Alexandra asked.
“Research actually,” Shelly answered. “He has a chance of being elected to the National Academy of Art and History and Medieval Studies. A huge honor. Kind of like being elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame.”
Alexandra seemed genuinely interested. Once again Joe wondered what Alexandra was up to. This was the busiest time in his life. He needed solitude. He didn’t have time to explain, but he found himself doing exactly that. “The last ten years of my life have been spent with one goal in mind—to be accepted into the Academy. Membership will give me recognition, respect, and enough money to keep my research going for years.”
“It would also make his father proud,” Shelly chimed in.
A part of him wanted to correct Shelly, tell her that making his father proud was neither here nor there, but what good would it do? She’d been working with him for months now, and had obviously recorded all of his personality traits, hoping at some point to help him reach his full potential as a human being.
“Sounds terribly important,” Alexandra said. “Mayhap I can help.”
Joe looked at Alexandra, even found himself smiling.
Her eyes crinkled and small indentations appeared when she smiled back.
“Where did you get those?” he asked when he spotted three exceptional looking stones laying amongst scattered cookie crumbs on the kitchen table. He took the seat next to Alexandra so he could examine them. The stones looked oddly familiar. Had he seen them at the university-at a museum? His blood surged with an excitement he hadn’t felt in a long while.
“Those,” Alexandra said thoughtfully, “are the reason I am here. And when the moon is at its fullest, those stones will take me home again.”
Joe glanced at Shelly.
Shelly merely shrugged.
“I had five stones to begin with,” Alexandra went on, “but one disappeared upon my arrival. I placed the remainder of the stones in the hem of my gown, and then in the pocket of my robe yester eve. But now I can find only three stones. I fret whether ’twill be enough for my return.”
Joe didn’t give much credence to her story, but the stones looked familiar. He wondered if they could possibly be the same ones he’d seen in one of his catalogues? After placing the stones on a clean area of the table, he left the room, returning moments later with two binders filled with pictures and descriptions of ancient art. Joe took the seat next to Alexandra and began to skim the pages.