Chapter 38
Allegra.
In spite of telling himself she was a charlatan, she had filled Spiker’s thoughts beyond anything he had ever experienced before. And when she’d been standing in front of him, close enough to touch, he had thought: look for the wrinkles; the creases in her skin; the aging of her throat; the doubt in her eyes; the tremble of the hand, the uncertainty of her touch; find anything that diminishes her, to make her less than perfect. But then her eyes were upon him and all he could see - all he knew - was the absolute conviction she was beyond reproach. And so his world had turned.
Not that he acknowledged it then or was to do so for many years: locking emotions away had become so automatic it seemed as inevitable as night. But feelings and thoughts so treated cannot be co
