“Cy was so drunk, we found him out in the fields, curled up and sleeping with two goats.”

Veronica laughed and looked at me. “You have interesting taste in females.”

“Well, I do find you attractive,” I replied, watching as her face reddened. “And that wasn’t my fault. It was my first time with airag and this bastard told me it wasn’t potent.”

Sansar-Huu nodded. “It was interesting how those two goats followed you around for days afterward.”

I remembered that. Coney’s concubines, they called them at the time. Nice.

“I take it you don’t date much?” Veronica asked with a little too much interest.

Chudruk chose that moment to pop his head through the little windows to the back of the truck. “You should see his little black book!”

I made a mental note to exact my revenge later.

“What little black book?” Ronnie’s eyes grew wide. Surely she wasn’t that naive.

Chudruk was practically bursting. “Oh, you know, the groupies. Cy has them in almost every city we hit.”

My gut twisted at the reminder. I was hoping Veronica wouldn’t ask about that.

“You brought that up when I interviewed you,” she started. I couldn’t decipher the look in her eyes. “Something about women with carney fantasies?”

This time, all three faces stared at me. I read amusement in Sansar-Huu’s and Chudruk’s faces. But Ronnie’s features had darkened. I wrestled with how much to tell her.

“Come on, spill it,” she said unconvincingly. “It’s for my research.” She didn’t look like she really wanted to know.

Chudruk settled himself in the window. He wasn’t going anywhere, which would make lying impossible. I sighed. There was no way out of this.

“There are some women who have a carney fetish.” That was simple. Maybe I could stop there. I looked around so I could distract everyone by shouting, “Hey, there’s a yak,” or, “Is that Genghis Khan?”

“And?” Ronnie asked, biting her lip.

“It’s usually bored, wealthy housewives. Something about having sex with a carney turns them on,” I started slowly. She continued to stare. Okay. Fine.

I went on. “I have a few women in some of the places we go who make sure I call them when I’m in town.”

“And you have sex with them?”

“Yes.”

Veronica looked like she wanted to punch me. “So you’re a slut.”

I shook my head. “No, I just have a casual sex life.”

“Why sleep with them? They are using you!”

She was going from zero to volcanic in five seconds. “Don’t take it personally, Veronica.”

Chudruk decided this was the time to intervene. “Cy is the most popular. He has all of his teeth and is very clean.”

Oh, yeah, that helped.

“You have the perfect life, my friend.” Sansar-Huu sighed, not helping at all.

“It’s no big deal,” I started to explain. “I only hit most of those towns once a year. And it’s not like I do it for money or anything.”

“But they are using you!” she repeated.

I shook my head. “I don’t see how. Seems to me I benefit from it as well.”

If we weren’t in such tight quarters, she might have put her hands on her hips. “And how do you do that? You are just a hollow figurehead…an object of desire to them.”

“I fail to see what is wrong with that,” I answered honestly. “I have no attachments in my life, and Sartre doesn’t seem to mind. Why can’t I have sex with anyone I want to?”

“What…what about diseases?” she sputtered.

“Believe me, these women take care of their bodies. And I always use protection.” I was starting to get a little annoyed by her anger. This was my life, wasn’t it?

Veronica folded her arms across her chest and stared straight forward.

Chudruk, on the other hand, didn’t shut up. “Do you still see that one blonde from California? Man, she is so hot.”

I turned to him. “You mean Katya?” I was pissed off by Ronnie’s holier-than-thou attitude. “Yup. Saw her last year. She’s very flexible.”

Ronnie practically screamed, “You are such a poodle!”

This caught me off guard. I’ve been called many things in my life, from a greasy goon to a coldhearted killer. But this was new.

“She just keeps you in her purse! On a leash!” Veronica was losing it.

I shook my head. “Not Katya.”

“Oh, and she’s special, huh?” Ronnie snorted.

“No. She’s just lonely. Her husband is an orthopedic surgeon who bought her online as a mail-order bride from the Ukraine. She has a master’s degree in engineering, but no options at home, so she hooked up with a doctor and thought she could have a professional life in the United States.”

Veronica was very silent.

“Unfortunately, her new husband is extremely possessive. Her bodyguards are like prison guards. Katya isn’t allowed to have a job or work.”

“But that’s illegal!”

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But he’ll divorce her if she protests, and her citizenship could be revoked. She’d be right back where she started, in a Soviet-style crumbling apartment block, sharing her apartment with a family of eight.”

Ronnie’s anger had turned into interest. “How can you see her, then?”

“She takes her niece and nephew to the circus. Her sister-in-law picks them up there, she dodges the bodyguards and I usually find her in my trailer.”

Chudruk slid the window shut and Sansar-Huu seemed overly fascinated with his steering wheel.

“So, without you, she’d be nothing more than a prisoner in a gilded cage,” Veronica said slowly.

“Don’t feel that it’s all like that. She’s the exception. The rest are just hot lays.”

I could see her anger rising again. “Why would you tell me that?” she asked.

“Because for one thing, this is helpful to your research. And for another thing, I didn’t want you to get the wrong idea about me.” I grinned.

Needless to say, the rest of the ride was very, very quiet.

Chapter Twelve

Veronica ran off with Odgerel as soon as we parked the truck. Sansar-Huu walked with me to the fighting ring.

“Why did you tell her that last part?” he asked me.

“What?”

“Why did you tell her that most of the time you are just having sex for fun?”

“Because it is none of her business what I did in the past. And I didn’t like being judged.”

My friend nodded. “You are right, but you have a lot to learn about women.” I watched him as he walked away, knowing he was right. But it pissed me off that Veronica, who was supposed to be objective in her studies, would be so angry with the way I’d lived my life so far. This was the main reason I stayed away from attachment in the first place. And here I was, getting involved again.

I didn’t owe Ronnie anything. I was just an oddity she examined and judged…a footnote in a thesis. Actually, I was starting to get angry with myself for the feelings I had for this woman. What had I been thinking? That I could change her? Loosen her up? What an idiot!

Focusing on the competition was my main concern. That was why I was here. Right? I took off my deel and pants and started warming up. Yalta, Zerleg and Zolbin joined me. All three of our matches were in a few hours. We concentrated on watching the games, taking note of the other athletes and their weak spots. I was determined to forget about Veronica.

I was so wrapped up in the contest that I barely made it to do the eagle dance for my own match. Clearing my head as I moved around Yalta, I ran through everything that could happen and how I would counter it. I slapped my thighs and made my way into the ring, squaring off against my opponent.

This time I didn’t look him in the eyes. That barely worked last time. I wanted to try ignoring his face and concentrating exclusively on his movements. In fact, this strategy worked so well I had him on his back inside of a minute.