“She is,” Lucien agreed somberly.

With a turn of her head, Meena was unnerved to discover that Lucien was standing much closer than she’d realized…

…less than two feet away from her. He hadn’t even been looking at the painting when he’d agreed that it was beautiful.

His dark-eyed gaze had been riveted on her face.

Blushing, Meena realized she might actually have found a rival for the painting’s beauty in Lucien’s tall frame and perfect features.

He also, Meena had to admit, smelled good. She couldn’t quite put her finger on what, precisely, it was that he smelled like. Jon had been through a succession of men’s colognes in his lifetime, most of them cloying and obnoxious.

But Lucien’s was light and clean smelling.

Meena wanted to pour whatever it was all over herself.

“And what is it about St. Joan,” Lucien asked, smiling down at her, “that appeals to you so much?”

“Oh,” Meena said. She realized with a pang of regret that she’d set herself up for this one.

Still. He’d asked her to trust him when she stood outside the museum.

She couldn’t tell him the truth, of course. She knew what would happen. The same thing that had happened with David. Lucien would think she was a flake. Worse than a flake, even.

He’d think she was a freak.

She wouldn’t let that happen. She was going to hide the truth from him as long as possible.

Forever, if she had to.

But she could tell him a version of the truth, she supposed, without giving too much of herself away.

“I guess,” she said, choosing her words with care, “it’s that she managed to make such a difference in so many people’s lives, despite being poor and a girl…huge handicaps for the age in which she lived. She made predictions, you know…remarkably accurate predictions that at first no one believed. But eventually she convinced enough people that she was telling the truth that she was given an audience with the king. Who believed her.” Meena squinted some more at the painting, trying to imagine what it must have been like for Joan, so determined, yet with so many strikes against her. “Of course people said she was insane. Today some people say that the ‘voices from God’ she heard were adolescent-onset schizophrenia. And as a teenager, I guess she’d have been the right age for it…”

“But you don’t want to believe that,” Lucien said when her voice trailed off.

Feeling herself blushing again, Meena looked down at her feet.

She didn’t kid herself that part of the reason she loved the painting they were standing in front of was that she, like Joan, had her own inner voices to contend with. Not that she believed that her inner voices-the feelings she had that told her how people were going to die-came from God.

But she knew she wasn’t schizophrenic, either.

“A lot of people didn’t believe Joan, either. At least at first,” Meena said finally, raising her gaze to meet his. “But eventually, she persuaded enough people of her sanity that she was brought before the king…and he believed her. How could a crazy woman trick a king whose own father had psychosis? He would have recognized the signs. No,” Meena said, looking back up at the painting and shaking her head. “She wasn’t schizophrenic. She knew things. She was the greatest military strategist the French army ever had…a teenage girl who listened to the voices inside her head and guided her men to victory again and again…”

When Meena looked back up at Lucien, she was embarrassed by the tears that had sprung spontaneously into her eyes.

“Until,” she went on, a catch in her voice, “she was captured by the enemy, abandoned by her king, and burned to death at the stake for being a witch.”

Lucien’s smile had been amused…until her tears came.

Then his mouth gave a twist, and he reached for her.

Suddenly Meena found herself pulled against him, his arms wrapped around her, her face pressed against his chest…

“You look like her,” he said into her short dark hair.

Meena, ashamed of her tears and mortified at finding herself in his arms because she was crying-and over a long-dead saint-felt herself turning redder than ever.

“No, I don’t,” she said hastily against his shirtfront. “I have nothing in common with her at all. Really, I don’t. I-”

“Yes,” he said, holding her away from him by her arms so that he could look down into her eyes. “You do. I noticed it the minute we walked up. Your hair is shorter and darker. But you have the same intensity about you. Tell me something: do you hear voices, too, Meena Harper?”

She didn’t know what to do. She wanted to burst out sobbing. She wanted to burst out laughing. She wanted to cry, Yes. Yes, I do.

Only not about you.

Which could mean only one thing. Either her “talent” was finally going away, or…

He wasn’t going to die. Unlike every other man she’d ever met before to whom she’d been attracted, Lucien Antonescu wasn’t going to die.

Not for a good, long time, anyway.

And then, before she could think of anything at all to say in response to his question, he’d slipped one hand beneath her chin and was tilting her face up toward his, forcing her to look him in the eyes.

“Meena,” he said. His voice was a gruff whisper in the darkened gallery. “What are you hiding from me?”

Her voice was as throaty as his. “Nothing,” she lied. “I swear.”

And then the incredible happened. His mouth came down over hers.

Meena was so shocked that at first she froze, uncertain what to do. It had been so long since a man had kissed her, she couldn’t believe it was happening at all.

And yet, there was the incontrovertible proof that she was in his arms…they were holding her very firmly to him. She could feel his lips against hers, strangely cool, like his fingers had been around hers, but so sweet, so patient, as if he’d be more than willing to wait all night for her to catch up with what was happening…

And suddenly, Meena did catch up. Her heart gave an explosive double thump, and she realized, Why, he’s kissing me.

And she rose up on tiptoe and slipped her arms around his neck, kissing him back, sinking into him, exulting in the fact that his arms were tightening around her, inhaling the crisp clean scent of him. She closed her eyes against the beauty of the painting behind him as he lifted her off her feet and pressed her closer and closer to his heart, which she couldn’t feel due to the frenetic beating of her own.

And then it was as if the ceiling overhead suddenly evaporated and the cold white glow from the stars and the moon above combined into one brilliant shaft and went shooting down toward Meena.

She’d had no idea that being kissed could feel this way.

But Lucien’s kisses made her feel…cherished. His hands cradled her as gingerly as if she were one of the precious objects around them…a vase from the Met’s Chinese art collection he was afraid might crack if he exerted too much pressure on it. His lips explored hers, gently at first, then, when he seemed to realize that she wasn’t going to shatter beneath his touch, with growing urgency.

She couldn’t help letting her mouth fall open beneath his…

And suddenly, it seemed as if something inside him burst. Something that appeared to have been pent-up for far too long, and which let loose at the touch of her tongue to his. All his polite civility was gone.

And Meena didn’t mind at all. His need for her matched hers for him. It was as if he’d asked a question.

And she’d said yes.

The only problem was, the more passionately he kissed her, the louder Jack Bauer’s growls grew. Finally, Meena had no choice but to draw her head away, and, glancing over at her dog, she said with some irritation, “Jack. Shut up!”

Jack Bauer let out a startled yip, stared at Meena with his ears tilted forward…then sneezed.

Meena couldn’t help but burst out laughing. She glanced at Lucien to see if he was smiling as well…