Standing in the Shadows

Shannon McKenna

For Nicola

ti amo

Copyright © 2003 by Shannon McKenna

Prologue

The windowless room was dark. The only light came from banks of machines that flickered, and made soft, intermittent beeping sounds.

The door opened. A woman entered the room and flipped on a lamp. The light revealed a man who lay upon a narrow mattress made of high-tech black latex foam. His sallow, wasted body bristled with hair-fine needles attached to wires, which fed into the machines behind him.

The woman shut and locked the door behind herself. She was middle-aged, dressed in a white lab coat, with steel-gray hair and an imposing jaw. Her thin lips were painted a bright, cruel red.

She removed the needles from his body with movements both brisk and delicate. She anointed her hands with oil, breathed deeply, and performed preparatory energetic exercises to stimulate the power and heat in her large, thick-fingered hands. She then proceeded to massage him expertly, front and back, from his feet to his balding scalp. She massaged his face, her brow a scowling mask, fearsomely intent.

That done, she took several blood samples. She measured his blood pressure, his pulse. She reapplied the complex pattern of needles, made adjustments in the machines. She replenished the nourishment and medications provided by the plastic bag that dangled from the IV rack. Then she cupped his face in her hands. She kissed him on both cheeks, then on his half-open mouth.

The kiss was prolonged and passionate. When she lifted her head, her eyes were glowing, her face flushed. Her breath was rapid, and the marks of her lipstick against his pale skin made him look as if he had been bitten.

She flicked off the light and left him, locking the door behind her.

Once again, the darkness was broken only by colored lights that flickered and pulsed, and soft, intermittent beeping.

Chapter One

The silver cell phone that lay on the passenger seat of the beige Cadillac buzzed and vibrated, like a dying fly on a dusty windowsill.

Connor slouched lower in the driver's seat and contemplated it. Normal people were wired to grab the thing, check the number, and respond. In him, those wires were cut, that programming deleted. He stared at it, amazed at his own indifference. Or maybe amazed was too strong a word. Stupefied would be closer. Let it die. Five rings. Six. Seven. Eight. The cell phone persisted, buzzing angrily.

It got up to fourteen, and gave up in disgust.

He went back to staring at Tiff's current love nest through the rain that trickled over the windshield. It was a big, ugly town house that squatted across the street. The world outside the car was a blurry wash of grays and greens. Lights still on in the second-floor bedroom. Tiff was taking her time. He checked his watch. She was usually a slam-bam, twenty-minutes-at-the-most sort of girl, but she'd gone up those stairs almost forty minutes ago. A record, for her.

Maybe it was true love.

Connor snorted to himself, hefting the heavy camera into place and training the telephoto lens on the doorway. He wished she'd hurry. Once he'd snapped the photos her husband had paid McCloud Investigative Services to get, his duty would be done, and he could crawl back under his rock. A dark bar and a shot of single malt, someplace where the pale gray daylight could not sting his eyes. Where he could concentrate on not thinking about Erin.

He let the camera drop with a sigh, and pulled out his tobacco and rolling papers. After he'd woken up from the coma, during the agonizing tedium of rehab, he'd gotten the bright idea of switching to hand-rolled, reasoning that if he let himself roll them only with his fucked-up hand, he'd slow down and consequently smoke less. Problem was, he got good at it real fast. By now he could roll a tight cigarette in seconds flat with either hand, without looking. So much for that pathetic attempt at self-mastery.

He rolled the cigarette on autopilot, eyes trained on the town house, and wondered idly who had called. Only three people had the number: his friend Seth, and his two brothers, Sean and Davy. Seth for sure had better things to do on a Saturday afternoon than call him. The guy was neck-deep in honeymoon bliss with Raine. Probably writhing in bed right now, engaged in sex acts that were still against the law somewhere in the southern states. Lucky bastard.

Connor's mouth twisted in self-disgust. Seth had suffered, too, from all the shit that had come down in the past few months. He was a good guy, and a true friend, if a difficult one. He deserved the happiness he'd found with Raine. It was unworthy of Connor to be envious, but Jesus. Watching those two, glowing like neon, joined at the hip, sucking on each other's faces, well… it didn't help.

Connor wrenched his mind away from that dead-end track and stared at the cell phone. Couldn't be Seth. He checked his watch. His younger brother Sean was at the dojo at this hour, teaching an afternoon kickboxing class. That left his older brother, Davy.

Boredom tricked him into picking up the cell phone to check the number, and as if the goddamn thing had been lying in wait for him, it buzzed right in his hand, making him jump and curse. Telepathic bastard. Davy's instincts and timing were legendary.

He gave in and pushed the talk button with a grunt of disgust. "What?"

"Nick called." Davy's deep voice was brusque and businesslike.

"So?"

"What do you mean, so? The guy's your friend. You need your friends, Con. You worked with him for years, and he—"

"I'm not working with him," Connor said flatly. "I'm not working with any of them now."

Davy made an inarticulate, frustrated sound. "I know I promised not to give out this number, but it was a mistake. Call him, or I'll—"

"Don't do it," Connor warned.

"Don't make me," Davy said.

"So I'll throw the phone into the nearest Dumpster," Connor said, his voice casual. "I don't give a flying fuck."

He could almost hear his older brother's teeth grinding. "You know, your attitude sucks," Davy said.

"Stop trying to shove me around, and it won't bother you so much," Connor suggested.

Davy treated him to a long pause, calculated to make Connor feel guilty and flustered. It didn't work. He just waited right back.

"He wants to talk to you," Davy finally said. His voice was carefully neutral. "Says it's important."

The light in the town house bedroom went off. Connor lifted the camera to the ready. "Don't even want to know," he said.

Davy grunted in disgust. "Got Tiff's latest adventure on film yet?"

"Any minute now. She's just finishing up."

"Got plans after?"

Connor hesitated. "Uh…"

"I've got steaks in the fridge," Davy wheedled. "And a case of Anchor Steam."

"I'm not really hungry."

"I know. You haven't been hungry for the past year and a half. That's why you've lost twenty-five goddamn pounds. Get the pictures, and then get your ass over here. You need to eat."

Connor sighed. His brother knew how useless his blustering orders were, but he refused to get a clue. His stubborn skull was harder than concrete. "Hey, Davy. It's not that I don't like your cooking—"

"Nick's got some news that might interest you about Novak."

Connor shot bolt upright in his seat, the heavy camera bouncing painfully off his scarred leg. "Novak? What about Novak?"

"That's it. That's all he said."

"That filthy fuck is rotting in a maximum security prison cell. What news could there possibly be about him?"

"Guess you better call and find out, huh? Then hightail it over here. I'll mix up the marinade. Later, bro."

Connor stared at the phone in his band, too rattled to be annoyed at Davy's casual bullying. His hand was shaking. Whoa. He wouldn't have thought there was still that much adrenaline left in the tank.

Kurt Novak, who had set in motion a chain of events that effectively ruined Connor's life. Or so he saw it on his self-pitying days, which were happening way too often lately. Kurt Novak, who had murdered Connor's partner, Jesse. Who was responsible for the coma, the scars, the limp. Who had blackmailed and corrupted Connor's colleague Ed Riggs.

Novak, who had almost gotten his vicious, filthy claws into Erin, Ed's daughter. Her incredibly narrow escape had given him nightmares for months. Oh, yeah. If there was one magic word on earth that could jolt him awake and make him give a shit, it was Novak.

Erin. He rubbed his face and tried not to think of the last time he'd seen Erin's beautiful face, but the image was burned indelibly into his mind. She'd been wrapped in a blanket in the back of the patrol car. Dazed with shock. Her eyes had been huge with horror and betrayal.

He had put that look in her eyes.

He gritted his teeth against the twisting ache of helpless anger that went along with that memory, and the explosion of sensual images. They made him feel guilty and sick, but they wouldn't leave him alone. Every detail his brain had recorded about Erin was erotically charged, right down to the way her dark hair swirled into an elfin, downward-pointing whorl at the nape of her neck when she pulled it up. The way she had of looking at the world with those big, thoughtful eyes. Self-possessed and quiet, drawing her own mysterious conclusions. Making him ache and burn to know what she was thinking.

And then bam, her shy, sweet smile flashing out unexpectedly. Like a bolt of lightning that melted down his brain.

A flash of movement caught his eye, and he yanked the camera up to the ready. Tiff had already scuttled halfway down the steps before he got in a series of rapid-fire shots. She shot a furtive glance to the right, then to the left, dark hair swishing over her beige raincoat. The guy followed her down the steps. Tall, fortyish, balding. Neither of them looked particularly relaxed or fulfilled. The guy tried to kiss her. Tiff turned away so the kiss landed on her ear. He got it all on film.

Tiff got into her car. It roared to life, and she pulled away, faster than she needed to on the rainy, deserted street. The guy stared after her, bewildered. Clueless bastard. He had no idea what a snake pit he was sliding into. Nobody ever did, until it was too late.

Connor let the camera drop. The guy climbed his steps and went back inside, shoulders slumped. Those pictures ought to be enough for Phil Kurtz, Tiff's scheming dickhead of a husband. Ironically, Phil was cheating on Tiff, too. He just wanted to make sure that Tiff wouldn't be able to screw him over in the inevitable acrimonious divorce.

It made him nauseous. Not that he cared who Tiff Kurtz was sleeping with. She could boff a whole platoon of balding suits if she wanted. Phil was such a whiny, vindictive prick, he almost didn't blame her, and yet, he did. He couldn't help it. She should leave Phil. Make it clean, honest. Start a new life. A real life.

Hah. Like he had any right to judge. He tried to laugh at himself, but the laugh petered out with no breath to bear it up. He couldn't stomach the betrayal. Lying and sneaking, slinking around in the shadows like a bad dog trying to get away with something. It pressed down on his chest, suffocating him. Or maybe that was just the effect of all the unfiltered cigarettes he was sucking on.

It was his own fault for letting Davy talk him into helping out with the detective agency. He hadn't been able to face going back to his old job after what happened last fall, but he should've known better. After putting a colleague behind bars for setting you up to die, well, following cheating spouses around wasn't exactly therapeutic. Davy must figure that Tiff was just the kind of stultifying no-brainer that even his washed-up little brother would have a hard time fucking up.

Oh, man. The pity party was getting ugly. He clenched his teeth and tried to adjust his attitude by sheer brute force. Davy unloaded Tiff and her ilk onto him because he was bored with them, and who could blame him. And if Connor couldn't take it, he should shut up and get another job. Security guard, maybe. Night shift, so he wouldn't have to interact with anybody. Maybe he could be a janitor in some huge industrial facility. Shove a push broom down miles of deserted corridors night after night. Oh, yeah. That ought to cheer him right up.

It wasn't like he was hurting for money. His house was paid for. The investments Davy had forced him to make had done fine. His car was a vintage '67 Caddy that would not die. He didn't care about expensive clothes. He didn't date. Once he'd acquired the stereo and video system that he liked, he hardly knew what to spend the interest dividends on. With what he had socked away, he could probably scrape by even if he never worked again.

God, what a bleak prospect. Forty-odd years more of scraping along, doing nothing, meaning nothing to anyone. It made him shudder.

Connor fished the unsmoked cigarette out of his coat pocket. Everything got dirty and stained, everything broke down, everything had a price. It was time to accept reality and stop sulking. He had to get his life back. Some kind of life.

He'd liked his life once. He'd spent nine years as an agent in the undercover FBI task force that his partner Jesse had dubbed "The Cave," and he'd been good at feeling his way into the parts he played. He'd seen his share of ugly stuff, and yeah, he'd been haunted by some of it, but he'd also known the bone-deep satisfaction that came from doing what he was born to do. He'd loved being in the middle of everything, wired to a taut web of interconnected threads; touch one, and the whole fabric rippled and hummed. Senses buzzing, brain working overtime, churning out connections, deductions, conclusions. He'd loved it. And he'd loved trying to make a difference.

But now the threads were ripped. He was numb and isolated, in free fall. What good would it do to hear about Novak? He couldn't help. His web was cut. He had nothing to offer. What would be the point?

He lit the cigarette and groped around in his mind for Nick's number. It popped up instantly, blinking on the screen inside his mind. Photographic memory was a McCloud family trait. Sometimes it was useful, sometimes it was just a dumb parlor trick. Sometimes it was a curse. It kept things eternally fresh in his brain that he would prefer to forget. Like that white linen halter top that Erin had worn at the Riggs family Fourth of July picnic, for instance. Six goddamn years ago, and the memory was as sharp as broken glass. She'd been braless that day, so it was by far the best view he'd ever gotten of her beautiful tits. High and soft and tenderly pointed, bouncing every time she moved. Dark, taut nipples pressed hard against the thin fabric. He'd been amazed that Barbara, her mother, had allowed it. Particularly after Barbara had caught him staring. Her eyes had turned to ice.

Barbara was no fool. She hadn't wanted her innocent young daughter hooking up with a cop. Look how it had turned out for her.

He knew better than to try to shove memories away. It just made them stronger, until they were huge and muscular, taking over his whole mind. Like the image of Erin's dark, haunted eyes behind the patrol car window. Full of the terrible knowledge of betrayal.

He sucked smoke into his lungs and stared at the cell phone with unfriendly eyes. He'd thrown away the old one after what happened last fall. If he used this one to call Nick, then Nick would have the new number. Not good. He liked being unreachable. It suited his mood.

He closed his eyes, recalling last Christmas, when Davy and Sean had given him the damn thing. It was from Seth's hoard of gizmos, which meant that it had a bunch of high-tech bells and whistles, some useful, some not. He'd leafed through Seth's sheaf of explanatory paperwork, putting on a show of interest so as not to hurt everybody's feelings. He vaguely remembered a function that blocked the incoming number from the display. He flipped through the pages in his mind, found the sequence. Keyed it in, dialed.

His stomach knotted painfully as it rang.

"Nick Ward," his ex-colleague answered.

"It's Connor."

"No shit." Nick's voice was stone cold. "Had a good sulk, Con?"

He'd known this was going to be bad. "Can we skip this part, Nick? I'm not in the mood."

"I don't care about your goddamn mood. I'm not the one who sold you out. I don't appreciate being punished for what Riggs did to you."

"I'm not punishing you," Connor said defensively.

"No? So what have you been doing for the last six months, asshole?"

Connor slumped lower in his seat. "I've been kind of out of it lately. You'd be stupid if you took it personally."

Nick let out an unsatisfied grunt.

Connor waited. "So?"

"So what?"

Nick's tone set his teeth on edge. "Davy said you had some news for me," he said. "About Novak."

"Oh. That." Nick was enjoying himself now, the snotty bastard. "I thought that might get your attention. Novak's broken out of prison."

Adrenaline blasted through him. "What the fuck? When? How?"

"Three nights ago. Him, and two of his goons, Georg Luksch and Martin Olivier. Very slick, well planned, well financed. Help from the outside, probably the inside, too. Nobody got killed, amazingly enough. Daddy Novak must've been behind it. You can do a lot with billions of dollars. They're already back in Europe. Novak and Luksch have been spotted in France."

Nick paused, waiting for a reaction, but Connor was speechless. The muscles in his bum leg cramped up, sending fiery bolts of pain through his thigh. He gripped it with his fingers and tried to breathe.

"I just thought you should know. Considering that Georg Luksch has a personal bone to pick with you," Nick said. "Ever since last November when you smashed all the bones in his face."

"He was under orders to hurt Erin." Connor's voice vibrated with tension. "It was less than he deserved."

Nick paused. "He never touched her. We have only Ed's word that he was planning to, and Ed's credibility is worth shit. Ed was trying to save his own skin, but did you think of that before you charged off to the rescue? Oh no. You had to be the big hero. For the love of Christ. It's lucky you weren't on active duty. You would have been crucified."

"Georg Luksch is a convicted assassin," Connor said, through clenched teeth. "He was ready to hurt her. He's lucky he's not dead."

"Yeah. Sure. Whatever you say. Anyhow, your hero complex aside, I just wanted you to watch your back. Not that you give a shit, or need anybody's help. And you've got better things to do than talk to me, so I won't waste any more of your valuable time—"

"Hey, Nick. Don't."

Something in Connor's voice made Nick pause. "Oh, what the hell," he said wearily. "If things get weird, call me, OK?"

"Yeah, thanks," Connor said. "But, uh… what about Erin?"

"What about her?"

"Novak hasn't forgotten about her," Connor said. "No way has he forgotten. Somebody should be assigned to guard her. Immediately."

Nick's long silence felt ominous. "You are seriously hung up on that chick, aren't you, Con?"

He clenched his teeth and counted until he had his temper under control. "No," he said, in a low, careful voice. "It's just obvious to anybody with half a brain that she's going to be on his hit list."

Nick sighed. "You haven't been listening, have you? You're lost in your own fantasy world. Wake up. Novak is in France. He was spotted in Marseilles. He's a monster, but he's not an idiot He's not thinking about Erin. And don't make me regret keeping you in the loop, because you don't deserve to be there."

Connor shook his head. "Nick, I know this guy. Novak would never—"

"Let it go, Con. Move on with your life. And watch your back."

Nick hung up abruptly. Connor stared down at the phone in his shaking hand, ashamed of having blocked the number. He disabled the function and hit redial. Quick, before he could change his mind.

"Nick Ward," his friend said tersely.

"Memorize this number," Connor said.

Nick let out a startled laugh. "Whoa. I'm so honored."

"Yeah, right. See you, Nick."

"I hope so," Nick said.

Connor broke the connection and let the phone drop onto the seat, his mind racing. Novak was filthy rich. He had the resources and the cunning to do the smart thing, to buy a new identity, a whole new life. But Connor had been studying him for years. Novak wouldn't do the smart thing. He would do whatever the fuck he pleased. He thought he was a god. That delusion had flushed him out before. And that same delusion was what made him so deadly when his pride was stung.

Particularly to Erin. Christ, why was he the only one who could see it? His partner Jesse would have understood, but Jesse was long gone. Novak had tortured him to death sixteen months ago.

Erin had slipped through Novak's fingers. He would consider that a personal insult. He would never let it go for the sake of expediency.

His leg was cramping again. He dug his fingers into the muscles and tried to breathe into it. He and his brothers had each other for protection, but Erin was wide open, laid out on the sacrificial altar. And Connor was the one who had put her there. His testimony had sent her dad to jail. She had to hate his guts for it, and who could blame her?

He covered his face with his hands and groaned. Erin would be at the very center of Novak's twisted thoughts.

Just like she was always at the center of his own.

He tried to think it through logically, but logic had nothing to do with these impulses. He had to feel his way through it. If the Feds wouldn't protect her, then he had to step into that empty space and protect her himself. He was so goddamn predictable. Erin was so innocent and luscious, calculated to push all his lamebrain, would-be hero buttons. And all those years of hot, explicit sexual fantasies about her didn't help either, when it came to thinking clearly.

Still, the thought of having a real job to do, a job that might actually mean something to somebody, jerked his mind into focus so laser-sharp it was painful. It rolled back the fog that had shrouded him for months. His whole body was buzzing with wild, jittery energy.

He had to do this, no matter how much she hated him. And the thought of seeing her again made his face get hot, and his dick get hard, and his heart thud heavily against his ribs.

Christ, she scared him worse than Novak did.

Subject: Re: New Acquisitions

Date: Sat, May 18,14:54

From: "Claude Mueller"

To: "Erin Riggs"

Dear Ms. Riggs:

Thank you for forwarding me a copy of your master's thesis. I was intrigued with your theories on the religious significance of bird imagery in La Tene period Celtic artifacts. I just acquired a third century B.C.E. La Tene battle helmet with a bronze mechanical raven perched on top (see attached JPG). I look forward to discussing it with you.

In addition to the helmet, I have several other new items to show you. I will be passing through Oregon en route to Hong Kong, staying at the Silver Fork Bay Resort tomorrow. I am arriving late in the evening and leaving the following day. This is short notice, and I understand if you cannot make it, but I went ahead and arranged an e-ticket for the SeaTac-Portland shuttle for you tomorrow. A limo will be waiting in Portland to take you to the coast. We can examine the pieces together Monday morning, and then have lunch, if time permits.

I hope you do not find me presumptuous. Please come. I look forward to meeting you in person, since I continue to have the strangest feeling that I know you already.

I trust the same economic arrangement as before will be acceptable. JPGs of the items that I want you to examine are attached.

Sincerely yours,

Claude Mueller

Quicksilver Foundation

Erin leaped out of her chair and hopped for joy. The walls of the studio apartments in the Kinsdale Arms were too thin to permit herself howls of triumph, so she pressed her hand to her mouth to muffle the howls into ecstatic squeaking noises. She reread the e-mail on the screen again and again, just to make sure it still said the same thing.

This job was going to save her sorry butt, and in the nick of time, too. She was probably knocking the rotten ceiling plaster onto the head of her cantankerous downstairs neighbor with her jumping, but she didn't care. Maybe the great Whoever had decided she'd had enough piss-poor luck lately, and it was time to give her a breather.

Edna demanded an explanation for this unseemly excitement with a disapproving meow. Erin picked her up, but she cuddled the finicky cat too tightly. Edna leaped out of her arms with a disgusted prrrt.

Erin spun around in a goofy dance step. Her luck was finally turning. Her eyes fell on the cross-stitch that hung over her computer, which read: "You Shape Your Own Reality Every Day." For the first time in months, it didn't make her feel as if someone were asking her, in the snootiest of tones, "And is this the best you can do?"

She'd stitched the damned thing four months ago, right after getting fired from her job. She had been so angry, she could barely see straight, and the project had been an effort to channel all that negative, destructive energy into a positive direction. She'd written it off as a failed experiment, though. Especially since every time she looked at the thing she wanted to rip it off the wall and hurl it across the room.

Oh, well. It was the effort that counted. And she had to at least try to think positively. With Dad in jail, Mom crumbling in on herself, and Cindy acting out, she couldn't afford one instant of self-pity.

She printed out Mueller's e-mail and the e-ticket itinerary attached to it. First class. How lovely. Not that she would've minded economy. A Greyhound bus would've been fine. Hell, she'd have cheerfully agreed to hitchhike down to Silver Fork, but being pampered was such a balm to her bruised ego. She glanced around the water-stained walls of the dismal studio apartment, the single window that looked out at a sooty, blank brick wall, and sighed.

First things first. She grabbed her organizer, riffled through it until she found today's To Do list, and added: Call temp agency. Call Tonia to feed Edna. Call Mom. Pack. She dialed the temp agency.

"Hello, this is Erin Riggs, leaving a message for Kelly. I won't be able to make it in to Winger, Drexler & Lowe on Monday. I have a last-minute business trip tomorrow. I'm caught up on all the current case transcriptions, so all they'll need is someone to cover their phones. Of course, I'll be back in on Tuesday. Thanks, and have a nice weekend."

She forcibly suppressed her guilt about missing a day's work with no notice as she hung up the phone. Her fee for one of these consulting jobs equaled almost two weeks' pay from the temp agency at thirteen bucks an hour. And wasn't that what temping was all about? Less commitment from both parties, right? Right. Like one of those relationships where you were free to see other people. Not that she was an expert on those. Or any other kind of relationship, for that matter.

The easy-come, easy-go temp concept was hard to get used to. She liked to fling herself into her work and give two hundred percent. Which was why it had hurt so badly when they had fired her from the job she'd gotten out of grad school. She'd been the assistant curator for the growing Celtic antiquities collection at the Huppert Institute.

She had worked her butt off for them, and she'd done an excellent job, but Lydia, her boss, had trumped up an excuse to get rid of her during the media furor surrounding Dad's trial. She claimed that Erin was too distracted by her personal problems to do her job, but it was clear that she considered Erin a liability for the museum's image. Bad for future funding. "Unappetizing" had been the word Lydia had used, the day she'd fired her. Which, coincidentally, had been the same day that a pack of bloodthirsty journalists had followed Erin to work, demanding to know how she felt about the videos.

Those celebrated X-rated videos of her father and his mistress, which had been used to blackmail him into corruption and murder. The videos which, God alone knew how or why, were now available on the Internet for all to enjoy.

Erin tried to shove the memory away, using her shopworn sanity-saving mantras: I have nothing to be ashamed of; Let it go; This too shall pass… None of them worked worth a damn anymore, not that they ever had. Lydia had all but blamed Erin personally for the whole thing.

To hell with Lydia, and with Dad, too, for getting them into this sordid, public mess. Her anger felt like poison running through her body, making her guilty and sick. Dad was paying the highest price he could for what he'd done. Being sour and pissy wouldn't change things, and she had no time to mope. Busy was better.

That phrase was another sanity saver. The best of the lot. It was dorky and uncool, but she was already a lost cause when it came to cool. Look up uncool in the dictionary, and you'd find a photo of Erin Riggs. Busy, busy, busy Erin Riggs.

She sharpened a pencil and crossed off Call temp agency. Sure, it was stupid to put items on her list just to immediately cross them off. Grasping for a cheap, fleeting sense of accomplishment. She didn't care. Every little bit of accomplishment helped. Even the cheap kind.

Mom's bills still headed the list. The scariest, most depressing item. She decided to stall for a couple more minutes, and dialed her friend Tonia's number. Tonia's machine clicked on. "Hi, Tonia? I got a last-minute job from Mueller, and I have to go to the coast tomorrow. Just wondering if you could pass by to feed Edna. Let me know. Don't worry if you can't, I'll find another solution. Talk to you later."

She hung up, her belly fluttering with anxiety as she gathered together Mom's checkbook, bank statements, her calculator, and the stack of unopened mail that she'd collected from beneath the mail slot on her last visit home. Throwing away junk mail cut the pile down to half, but many of the remaining envelopes had Final Notice stenciled across them in scary red block print. Brrr. Special pile for those.

She arranged them neatly in piles. Unpaid property taxes, due months ago. Threatening letters from collection agencies. Past due mortgage payments. Past due phone bills. Medical bills. Credit card bills, big ones. A letter from the bursar's office of Endicott Falls College, "regretting the necessity of withdrawing Cynthia Riggs's scholarship, based on poor academic performance." That one made Erin close her eyes and press her hand against her mouth.

Moving right along. No point in dwelling on it Organization was calming. It put things in perspective. She piled collection agency letters in one pile, past due notices in another, and made three columns in her notebook: Urgently Overdue, Overdue, and Due. She totaled the sums, and compared it to what was left in Mom's account. Her heart sank.

She couldn't cover the shortfall in the Urgently Overdue column, not even if she drained her meager checking account dry. Mom had to get a job; it was the only solution, but Erin hadn't had much luck even getting Mom out of bed lately, let alone out into the workforce.

But it was that, or lose the house she had moved into as a bride. That would push Mom over the edge for sure.

Erin let her face drop down against the neat piles of bills and fought the urge to cry. Sniveling was not constructive. She'd done enough of it in these past few months, so she should know. She needed fresh ideas, new solutions. It was just so hard to think outside the box, all by herself. Her tired, lonesome brain felt like it was padlocked inside a box. With chains wrapped around it.

This job from Claude Mueller was a godsend. He was a mysterious figure, a reclusive, art-loving multimillionaire, the administrator of the enormous Quicksilver Fund. He had found her in a random Internet search on Celtic artifacts, which had landed him on one of her articles, posted on the website she'd designed when she started her own consulting business. He'd begun to e-mail her, complimenting her on her articles, asking questions, even requesting a copy of her doctoral thesis. Oh, boy. The ultimate ego rush for an antiquities nerd like her.

But then he had asked her to come to Chicago to authenticate some new acquisitions, and he hadn't blinked an eye at her fee. Or rather, his staff hadn't. He had been in Paris at the time. She hadn't met him on that or any of the three subsequent jobs, the fees for which had been providential. The first had paid for her move from the apartment on Queen Anne to this far cheaper room in the run-down Kinsdale Arms. The second and third, in San Diego, had covered the insurance deductibles of Mom's recent medical bills. The Santa Fe job had paid two of her mother's past due mortgage payments. And this one, hopefully, would almost cover the Urgently Overdue column.

Working for Mueller had been so dignified. First class, all expenses paid. It had been lovely to be treated with deference and respect. Such a pleasant break from the squalid grind of her daily life; arguing with the bank over missed mortgage payments, begging her landlord to call the exterminator, spending all of January with no hot water. And the sordid details of Dad's trial, surfacing one after the other, until nothing could shock her anymore. Well, almost nothing. Those videos had been quite a jolt.

Enough. Moving right along. So Claude Mueller wanted to meet her in person, did he? How gratifying. She was curious about him, too. She paper-clipped the bills together, put them into the Mom's Bills folder in her file cabinet, and turned her attention to the Mueller e-mail.

She had to hit the perfect tone for her reply. Warm, enthusiastic, but not puppyish or, God forbid, desperate. Reserved, but with just a flash of extra personal interest showing through at the end. Looking forward to it… pleased to have the opportunity to meet you at last, etc. Referrals from Mueller could set her highly specialized consulting business on its way. And she was finished in Seattle with museum work, since the Huppert had fired her. She would have to change cities to get away from the dark cloud that hung over her, and she couldn't possibly leave her mother and Cindy when they were both so unstable.

She had gleaned all the info she could on Mueller from the Internet. He was publicity-shy, though he'd been cited in museum journals for his generous donations to the arts. Her grant-writing and development colleagues were forever swooning over the largesse of the Quicksilver Fund. He was in his early forties, and lived on a private island off the coast of southern France. That was all she knew.

She read over her response and hit send. Who knew? Maybe Mueller would prove to be attractive and charming. His e-mails were faintly flirtatious. He was intellectual, erudite. Wealthy, too, not that she cared, but it was an interesting fact to file away. He appreciated the sensual, enigmatic beauty of Celtic artifacts, which were her passion. He was a collector of beautiful objects.

Nothing at all like Connor McCloud.

Ouch. Damn. And here she'd been quietly patting herself on the back for not thinking of Connor for hours. She tried to wrestle her mind away from him, but it was too late. His hair had grown out, as shaggy and wild as a Celtic warrior the last time she'd seen him, at the Crystal Mountain nightmare last fall. He'd leaned on his blood-spattered cane while Georg was loaded onto a stretcher behind him, staring at her. His face had been so hard and fierce, his eyes boring into hers. Blazing with barely controlled fury. The image was indelibly marked on her memory.

That was the day that her life had begun to unravel. And Connor had been the one to haul Dad into custody. Her father, the traitor and murderer. God, when was this going to hurt a little less?

She'd had a knee-trembling crush on Connor McCloud for ten years, ever since Dad had brought the recruits he was training for the new undercover unit home to dinner when she was sixteen. One look at him, and something had gone hot and soft and stupid inside of her. His tilted eyes, the translucent green of a glacial lake. His lean, foxy face, all planes and angles. The sexy grooves in his cheeks when he grinned. His beard stubble, glinting gold. He'd always been quiet and shy when he ate at their house, his mile-a-minute partner Jesse doing most of the talking, but his laid-back, sexy baritone voice sent shivers through her body whenever he spoke. His hair was a shaggy mane, a crazy mix of every possible color of blonde. She wanted to touch its thick, springy texture. To bury her face in it and breathe him in.

And his body had been the focus of her most feverish erotic dreams in the privacy of her bed for years. He was so tall and lean and muscular. Whipcord tough, every muscle defined, but as graceful and agile as a dancer. She'd loved it when he pushed up his sleeves so she could sneak peeks at his thick, ropy forearms. His broad shoulders and long, graceful hands, those powerful legs, that excellent butt that looked so fine in his faded jeans. He was so gorgeous, it made her head spin.

She'd been tongue-tied and fluff-brained in his presence for years, but any romantic dreams she might have had about finally catching his interest when she grew a bosom, or got up the nerve to talk to him, had evaporated forever that day at Crystal Mountain. When she discovered that Dad was collaborating with a vicious criminal. That Georg, the guy who'd been coming on to her at the ski lodge, was an assassin who was hovering over her in order to control Dad.

That it had been Dad's betrayal that had gotten Jesse killed, and almost cost Connor his life.

She covered her face, trying to breathe through the burning ache in her chest. Boy, had that ever put a damper on her secret fantasy life.

Her own stupidity made her sigh. She had bigger problems than unrequited lust. Beginning with her mother's finances. Busy was better, she repeated as she dialed Mom's number. Busy was much better.

We're sorry, but the number you have dialed has been disconnected… Oh, God. It seemed like just last week that she'd had Mom's phone turned back on. She couldn't leave town without checking on Mom.

She reached for her keys before she could stop herself.

Her car had been repossessed months ago. She still hadn't broken the habit. She ran down the stairs, shoved open the door, and raised her face to the sky. The clouds were clearing. A star glowed low on the horizon.

"Hi, Erin."

That low voice sent a shock of intense awareness through her body. She stumbled back against the door.

Connor McCloud was standing right there, staring at her.

Chapter Two

He was slouched against an ancient, battered beige Cadillac, parked in a tow zone. The stub of a glowing cigarette was pinched between his thumb and forefinger. He sank into a crouch and stubbed it out. His face was hard, and grim with what looked like controlled anger. He straightened up, looming over her. She'd forgotten how tall he was. Six foot three, or something ridiculous like that.

Her hand was pressed hard against her open mouth. She forced herself to drop it. Head up, shoulders back, don't lock your knees, she told herself silently. "Why are you lurking in front of my building?"

His dark brows twitched together. "I'm not lurking," he said. "I was just having a smoke before I rang your bell."

His tawny hair was longer and wilder than it had been at Crystal Mountain. His chiseled, angular face was even leaner. His green eyes were so brilliant against the smudges of weariness beneath them. Wind ruffled his hair around his broad shoulders. It blew across his face, and he brushed it back with his hand. The one with the brutal burn scar.

He could have been a barbarian Celtic warrior heading into battle, with that hard, implacable look on his face. Stiffen his hair with lime, give him a bronze helm, a torque of twisted gold around his neck, chain mail—except that most Iron Age Celtic warriors had disdained armor to show their contempt for danger, the fussy scholar inside her reminded. They'd run naked into battle, screaming with rage and challenge.

Oh, please. Back off. Don't go there.

She didn't want that image in her head, but it was too late. She was already picturing Connor's big, hard, sinewy body. Stark naked.

Her eyes dropped, flustered. She focused on the cigarette butts that littered the ground beside his battered boots. Three of them.

She glanced up. "Three cigarettes? Looks like lurking to me."

His face tightened. "I was just working up my nerve."

"To ring my doorbell?" She couldn't keep the sarcasm out of her voice. "Oh, please. I'm not that scary."

His lips twitched. "Believe me, you are. For me, you are."

"Hmm. I'm glad I have that effect on somebody, because the rest of the world doesn't seem too impressed with me these days," she said.

His eyes were so unwavering that the urge to babble was coming over her. "Why do you need to work up the nerve to talk to me?"

"Your last words to me were less than cordial," he said wryly. "Something along the lines of 'Get away from me, you sick bastard.'"

She bit her lip. "Oh, dear. Did I really say that to you?"

"It was a bad scene," he conceded. "You were upset."

"I'm sorry," she said. "For the record, you didn't deserve it."

His eyes were so intensely bright. How could such a cool color give out such an impression of heat? It scorched her face, made something clench up low and hot and tight in her body. She wrapped her arms around herself. "There were extenuating circumstances."

"Yeah, there sure as hell were. Are you OK, Erin?"

Wind gusted around them, setting his long canvas coat flapping around his knees. She shivered and clutched her thin denim jacket tightly around her. No one had asked that question in such a long time, she'd forgotten how to answer it. "Is that what you waited three whole cigarettes outside my building to ask?" she hedged.

A quick, hard shake of his head was her answer.

"So… what, then?"

"I asked my question first," he said.

She looked down, away, around, anywhere else, but his gaze was like a magnet, pulling her eyes back and dragging the truth right out of her. Dad used to say that McCloud was a goddamn psychic. It had made Dad nervous. Rightly so, as it happened.

"Never mind," Connor said. "Shouldn't have asked. I need to talk to you, Erin. Can I come up to your place?"

The thought of his potent male presence filling her dingy little apartment sent shivers all down her spine. She backed up, and bumped into the wrought iron railing. "I'm, uh, on my way to visit Mom, and I'm in kind of a hurry, because the bus is about to come, so I—"

"I'll give you a ride to your mom's house. We can talk in the car."

Oh, great. That would be even worse. Stuck all alone in a car with a huge barbarian warrior. She couldn't bear his burning scrutiny when she felt so weepy and shaky and vulnerable. She shook her head and backed away from him, toward the bus stop. "No. Sorry. Please, Connor. Just… stay away from me." She turned, and fled.

"Erin." His arms closed around her from behind. "Listen to me."

His solid heat pressed against her body nudged her shaky nerves toward what felt like panic. "Don't touch me," she warned. "I'll scream."

His arms tightened around her ruthlessly. "Please. Don't," he said. "Listen to me, Erin. Novak's broken out of prison."

A cloud of black spots danced in front of her eyes. She sagged, and was abruptly grateful for his strong arms, holding her upright. "Novak?" Her voice was a wispy thread of sound.

"He broke out the other night. With two of his goons. Georg Luksch was one of them."

Her fingers dug into his rock-hard forearms. Her head spun, and her stomach with it. "I think I'm going to be sick," she said.

"Sit down, on the steps. Put your head down." He crouched beside her and rested his arm across her shoulder. His touch was light and careful, but the contact reverberated through her entire body.

"I hate to scare you," he said gently. "But you had to know."

"Oh yeah?" She looked up at him. "What good does it do me?"

"So you can take steps to protect yourself." He sounded as if he were stating something too obvious to put into words.

She dropped her face down against her knees. She shook with bitter laughter, like a dry coughing fit. Protect herself. Hah. What could she do? Hire an army? Buy a cannon? Move into a fortress? She'd been trying so hard to put this nightmare behind her, but she'd just swung around in a big circle and smacked into it again, face-first.

She lifted her face, and stared into blank, empty space. "I can't deal with this," she said. "I don't want to know. I've had enough."

"It doesn't matter what you want. You have to—"

"I'll tell you what I have to do, Connor McCloud." She wrenched herself away from him and rose up onto unsteady feet. "I have to go to my mother's house to pay her bills and mortgage, and get her phone turned back on because she won't get out of bed. Then I have to call Cindy's school and beg them not to withdraw her scholarship. I take the bus because I lost my job and my car got repossessed. I'll worry about homicidal maniacs another time. And here comes my bus. So thank you for your concern, and have a nice evening."

Connor's face was stark with misery. "I didn't want you to get hurt, Erin. I would've done anything to stop it."

The look on his face made her chest hurt and her throat swell shut. The bus groaned to a halt, a suffocating cloud of diesel fumes rising around them. The door sighed and opened its maw for her.

She laid her hand against his broad chest, and yanked it right back, shocked by her own boldness. His body was so hard and warm.

"I know it wasn't your fault," she said. "What happened to Dad. He did it to himself. I knew he was in trouble, but he wouldn't let anyone help him. And none of us knew how bad it was."

"Miss!" the driver bellowed. "You on or off?"

"It wasn't your fault," she repeated. She scrambled into the bus, and clutched the pole as it pulled away, watching Connor's tall form recede into the dusk. Wind whipped his shaggy hair around his stern, sculpted face. The canvas coat flapped. His penetrating eyes held hers, tugging at her, until the bus turned the corner and he was lost to sight.

She collapsed into a seat. Her eyes darted from passenger to passenger, as if Georg would suddenly pop out of nowhere and flash her that seductive smile that had so perplexed her at Crystal Mountain six months ago. She'd been surprised and gratified to be pursued by a guy like that. Almost tempted to give him a whirl just to break the spell of her self-imposed celibacy—but something had held her back.

Her friends had been so impatient with her. What the hell do you want in a guy, Erin? He's smart, he's built, he's charming, he's got a sexy accent, he looks like a GQ cover model, and he's warm for your form! Stop acting like a friggin 'nun! Go get you some, girlfriend!

She'd tried to explain that the easy warmth that Georg exuded didn't warm her. It was sort of like the way her taste buds could not be fooled by saccharine or Nutrasweet. The sweetness didn't follow through, it didn't satisfy. Her girlfriends had shrugged that off as unconvincing. They told her she was too fussy. Or just plain chicken.

The fact that she hadn't gone to bed with that awful man had been her one small, private satisfaction and comfort afterwards, when her world lay around her in ruins.

Nobody in the bus was the right size or build to be Georg. Every time the bus lumbered to a stop, she held her breath until she saw who boarded. A teenage Goth girl with black lips and a pierced face. A portly Latina lady. A young urban professional woman in a suit, coming home from working Saturday at some high-powered job, like she herself so often had, back in the dear old days of steady employment. No Georg. Not that she would necessarily recognize his face, after what Connor had done to it. The memory of that bloody duel made her queasy again.

She was being stupid, really. If Novak really was bothering to think of her, it wouldn't be Georg that he would send.

It could be anybody.

Novak read the e-mail on the screen of the laptop and typed a response. His hands were deft on the keyboard even with the use of only his right hand plus the thumb and middle finger of his left. He stared at the text as he rubbed the stumps of his maimed hand.

A constant, throbbing reminder of the debt he was owed. The wind on the terrace made his eyes tear up. They burned and stung, unused to the colored lenses, and he pulled the case out of his pocket and removed them. The glues and the custom-made prosthetics that changed the shape of his features were uncomfortable, but temporary. Just until he could organize a final bout of cosmetic surgery.

He gazed out over the city. Such a pleasure, after months of staring at the walls of a prison cell, to cast his gaze out toward ranges of ragged mountains that hemmed in the jewel-toned greens and blues and silver grays of Seattle. He hit send, and took a sip of cabernet out of a splendid reproduction of a second-century B.C.E. Celtic drinking cup. It was fashioned from a real human skull, decorated with hammered gold. A fanciful indulgence, but after his prison experience, he was entitled.

He had Erin to thank for this expensive new caprice. Odd, that he had not developed a taste for blood-drenched Celtic artifacts until now. Their penchant for ritual murder resonated in his own soul.

The sacrifice that he had planned was blessed by the gods. He knew this was so because Celia had come to him in a vision. He was always moved when one of his angels visited him. They had come to him in the hospital where he lay near death, and they had comforted him in prison. Souls he had liberated, forever young and beautiful. Their shades had fluttered around him, distressed to see him suffering. Belinda had come, and Paola, and Brigitte, and all the rest, but when Celia came, it was special. Celia had been the first.

He savored his wine, his pulse leaping at the memory of the night that had marked his life. He had taken Celia's lovely body, and as he spent himself inside her, the impulse rose up like a genie from a bottle, huge and powerful. The urge to place his thumbs against the throbbing pulse in her throat, and press.

She had thrashed beneath him, her face turning color, protruding eyes full of growing awareness. Celia could not speak, she could only gasp, but he had sensed her passionate assent. They had been linked, a single mind. She was an angel, offering herself to him.

The fanged gods had claimed him as their own that night. And he had understood what tribute the gods demanded to confer power and divinity. They had marked him, and he would prove himself worthy.

Celia had been a virgin, too. He had found that out afterwards, when he washed himself. How poignant. It was a curse to be so sensitive. Doomed to grasp for the spontaneous perfection of Celia's sacrifice, over and over. Never quite reaching it.

The door to the terrace opened. He felt the red, throbbing glow of Georg's energy without turning. "Have a glass of wine, Georg. Enjoy the pleasures of freedom. You refuse to relax. This puts us at risk."

"I don't want wine."

Novak looked at him. The thick, shiny pink scar that marred Georg's cheek was flushed scarlet over his prison pallor. His beautiful yellow hair had been shorn to stubble on his scalp, and his eyes were like glowing coals. "Are you sulking, Georg? I hate sulking."

"Why won't you let me just kill them?" Georg hissed. "I will be a fugitive for the rest of my life anyway. I don't care if—"

"I want better than that for you, my friend. You cannot risk being taken again."

"I have already made arrangements," Georg said. "I will die before I go back to prison."

"Of course you have. I thank you for your dedication," Novak replied. "But you will see, when you are calmer, that my plan is better."

Georg's face was a mask of agony. "I cannot bear it. I am dying." The words burst out in the obscure Hungarian dialect they shared.

Novak rose from his chaise and put down his wine. He placed the scarred stumps of his maimed hand against Georg's ruined face. His cosmetic surgeons would improve matters, but the young man's youthful perfection was gone forever. Another score to settle.

"Do you know why the butterfly must struggle to escape its chrysalis?" he asked, sliding into dialect himself.

Georg jerked his face away. "I am not in the mood for your fables."

"Silence." The nails of his left thumb and middle finger dug into Georg's face. "It is the act of struggling that forces out the fluid from the butterfly's body and completes the development of its wings. If the butterfly is released prematurely, it will lurch around, swollen and clumsy, and soon die. Never having flown."

Georg's lips drew back from his gaping, missing teeth with a soundless hiss of pain. "And what is this supposed to mean to me?"

"I think you know." He let go. Blood welled out of the red marks that his nails had left. "Struggle is necessary. Punishment exalts."

"Easy for you to talk of punishment. You did not suffer as I did, with your father's money to protect you."

Novak went very still. Georg cringed away, sensing that he had gone too far.

Georg was wrong. His father had taught him about punishment. That lesson was frozen in his mind, dead center. A tableau in a globe of imperishable crystal. He turned away from the memory and held up his left hand. "Does this look as if I know nothing of punishment?"

Georg's eyes dropped in shame, as well they ought.

A gull shrieked in the darkening sky. Novak looked up, and exulted in the wild creature's freedom. Soon he would be reborn, with no father, no mother. He would be spotless, surrounded by gods and angels. He would be free at last, and he would never look back.

He jolted himself back to the present. "Be grateful that you have been chosen as my instrument to make this sacrifice, Georg. My gods are not for cowards, or weaklings."

Georg hesitated. "I am not weak," he said sourly.

"No, you are not." He patted Georg's shoulder. The younger man flinched at the contact. "You know my tastes just as I know yours. I would rip their throats out with my teeth and drink their blood, if I had that luxury. But I cannot compromise this new identity before I have even established it. You know exactly what it will cost me to step aside and let you play… while I watch."

Georg nodded reluctantly.

"I have chosen you to tear them to pieces for me, Georg," Novak said gently. "And still, you cannot wait. You whine. You complain."

Georg's eyes narrowed. "Do you plan to give it up, then?"

"Give up what? Drinking the blood of innocents?" Novak toasted Georg with the skull goblet and smiled. "You know me too well to ask such a stupid question."

Streaks of purplish red appeared on Georg's cheeks. The flush faded almost instantly to ghostly pallor. "I will help you," he said.

"I know you will, my friend," Novak said. "And you will be rewarded for your loyalty. You must be patient, and trust me."

The terrace door opened, and Tamara and Nigel stepped out. Nigel looked uncomfortable, but that was his natural state of being.

Tamara smiled, stunning in her brief, ice-green dress. She'd changed her chestnut hair to red and her golden eyes to green since he had sent her to monitor the household of Victor Lazar, his old friend and nemesis. He suspected that she had done her duty there with a fraction too much zeal. Perhaps he was being unfair.

In any case, red suited her, and after six months of enforced celibacy, it suited him, too. She was astonishingly beautiful. He would settle for nothing less in his bed. And her ability to hack into computer databases and change the nature of reality to suit his whims was nothing short of magic. She was immensely talented.

Nigel cleared his throat "The courier has just delivered the blood samples from Switzerland," he announced.

Novak nodded his approval. Plans were proceeding with orderly smoothness. "Excellent. You know what needs to be done. See to it."

"The switch is arranged," Nigel said. "I have identified a technician at the DNA laboratory named Chuck Whitehead who is perfect for our purposes. I will arrange for him to do the switch late Sunday night According to my statistical analysis, that's the period when the laboratory is most deserted. I will dispose of him afterwards myself."

"I have some good news, as well," Tamara said. "We won't need to bait the trap after all. The transponder on McCloud's car shows him parked outside Erin Riggs's apartment for thirty-five minutes this afternoon. He then followed her to her mother's house."

His eyes wandered over her body, appreciating how the sheath set off her long, perfect legs. "Wonderful. Stalking the poor girl already."

Tamara's smile widened. What a remarkable creature. Wanted all over the world for computer crimes and fraud, and her sexual skills were just as prodigious. She would do absolutely anything.

In fact, now that he thought about it, her lack of squeamishness was almost inhibiting. A touch of disgust or fear was like a pinch of salt that brought out the flavor of a dish. After so long without sex, he had been less discerning than usual, but his natural high standards were quickly reasserting themselves.

He was irritated. He wondered if she were doing it deliberately. Unacceptable, that one of his servants should presume to manipulate him. How dare she.

Georg stirred restlessly, his fists clenching. "So the police must have told McCloud that we are free," he said.

Tamara turned her brilliant smile upon him. "It would seem so."

"Then Erin knows that I am coming for her."

Tamara's smile faltered at the concentrated malevolence in Georg's voice. Then the smile quickly reappeared… and gave him an idea.

"No, Georg," he said. "Don't be obtuse. Erin knows nothing of the sort. I have spent a great deal of money to arrange for reports of our sighting in France."

"I am dying," Georg moaned, in dialect. "I suffer."

Novak sighed. Georg could be so tedious. The poor man was a volcano of festering anger from his traumatic prison experience.

Perhaps he should offer Tamara to Georg, and observe the results. He could gauge her loyalty and commitment, and at the same time, siphon off some of Georg's restless, dangerous energy.

"Stay and help us celebrate, my dear," he said. "Georg, would you care to indulge? Let Tamara ease your torment."

Georg's ruined mouth twisted in a feral smile.

Novak studied Tamara's reaction. Her expression did not waver, but he sensed the tightening in her jaw as the smile froze into place.

His loins stirred. Yes. This was what had been missing. Delicious.

He smiled at Nigel. "Nigel, you may stay. Tamara likes to be watched, no? Did you learn to love it during your time with Victor?"

Her smile was like a neon sign, bright and empty. "Of course, boss," she said, without missing a beat.

Nigel's face paled, but he knew better than to decline. Poor, sexless Nigel. This would be good for him. He was less manually skilled as an assassin man Georg, but the mask he presented to the world was impeccable. He was a dried-up, forgettable, middle-aged gray man, whereas Georg had lost his ability to blend. Georg was now no more than a deadly weapon to be kept hidden until violence was called for.

Georg wrenched Tamara's fragile dress down. The shoulder straps broke, and she stood naked on the terrace, the chilly evening breeze making her dark nipples tighten. She waited, unsure of what was expected of her. It was rare, to see her at a loss. Arousing.

Nigel grimaced, afraid to look away. Georg unbuttoned his pants.

He settled back on his chaise, lifted the skull goblet to his lips, and gestured for them to begin.

It occurred to him, as he watched the spectacle, that he could liberate Tamara after her usefulness was done. The danger to his new identity would be minimal. Tamara was estranged from what family she had. She barely existed on paper. The contacts through which he had found her would not ask questions. Her body would never be found.

Perhaps she had been offered to him just for this purpose.

Georg was being very rough. Novak sipped his wine and thought about reining him in. He did not want Tamara damaged, at least not yet. But then again, the show suited his mood, just as it was.

The ancient Celts believed that the skulls of their victims had potent magical powers. Perhaps he would make a new drinking goblet out of Tamara, decorated with hammered gold. What he had planned for Erin Riggs and Connor McCloud was a gift for his fanged gods.

But Tamara would be all for him. A special treat.

The earthy, rhythmic sounds of the act taking place on the terrace were drowned out by the voices of his angels in his head, like the wind in the leaves. Tamara would soon join their ranks.

Punishment exalted. His angels knew this. And the word they whispered, over and over, was always "Never… never… never…"

In every language on earth.

Mom's car was in the driveway, but the house was dark. Erin was surprised to discover that her heart could actually sink any lower.

She approached the handsome Victorian house where she'd grown up. The overgrown rhododendrons wreathed the porch in shadow. The Fillmores next door had mowed a surgically neat line where their lawn ended, to accentuate the ragged forlornness of the Riggs's lawn and make their silent protest plain.

She rummaged through her purse for the keys and let herself in, deliberately making a lot of noise. She switched on the porch light. Nothing happened. She peered up at it, and realized that the bulb was gone. Very strange. If Mom had removed it, she would have replaced it.

It was as dark as a tomb inside, with the blinds drawn. She flipped on the floor lamp in the living room. Nothing. She tried to tighten the bulb. There was no bulb.

She tried the track lighting in the dining room. Nothing. Maybe the power was out… no. The lights had been on at the Fillmores'.

"Mom?" she called out.

No response. She felt her way slowly, toward the utility closet where the lightbulbs were kept. She grabbed three, and stumbled back. She screwed a bulb into the living room lamp and flipped it on.

The sight jolted her rattled nerves. The rolling table that held the television was dragged away from the wall. The cables that connected it to the power strip were torn away. The cable box lay on the ground. Her first thought was of burglars, but nothing seemed to be missing.

Her dread intensified. "Mom? Is something wrong with the TV?"

Still no response. She threaded a bulb into the hanging lamp over the dining room table. The room looked normal. She climbed onto a chair to replace the bulb in the kitchen ceiling lamp.

The light revealed a cluttered mess. She peeked in the empty refrigerator, sniffed the milk. It had turned to cheese. She would load the dishwasher and set it running before she left. Maybe do some grocery shopping, but that would leave her no money to travel with.

She headed for the stairs, and gazed, tight-lipped, at the new pile of untouched mail below the mail slot.

There was still a bulb in the wall sconce on the stairs, thank goodness. She started to climb, passing photos of herself and Cindy, her grandparents, and her parents' wedding portraits. The four of them, skiing together in Banff on that vacation they had taken five years ago.

She knocked on the door to the master bedroom. "Mom?" Her voice sounded like a frightened child's.

"Honey? Is that you?" Her mother's voice was froggy and thick.

Her relief was so intense, tears sprang into her eyes. She opened the door. Her mother was sitting on the bed, blinking in the light from the stairs. The room smelled stale.

"Mom? I'm turning the light on," she warned.

Barbara Riggs gazed up at her daughter, her eyes dazed and reddened. Her usually meticulous bed was wildly disarranged, half of the mattress showing. A terrycloth bathrobe was draped over the television. "Mom? Are you OK?"

The shadows under her mother's eyes looked like bruises. "Sure. Just resting, sweetie." She turned her gaze away, as if looking her daughter in the eye were an activity too effortful to sustain.

"Why is the bathrobe over the TV?" Erin asked.

Her mother's neck sank into her hunched shoulders like a turtle retracting into its shell. "It was looking at me," she muttered.

Those five words scared Erin more than anything else had that day, which was saying a hell of a lot. "Mom? What do you mean?"

Barbara shook her head and pushed herself up off the bed with visible effort. "Nothing, honey. Let's go have a cup of tea."

"Your milk's gone bad," Erin said. "You hate it without milk."

"So I'll just have to cope, won't I?"

Erin flinched at her mother's sharp tone. Barbara's eyes softened. "I'm sorry, sweetie. It's not you. You're an angel. It's just… everything. You know?"

"I know," Erin said quietly. "It's OK. Let me make up this bed."

She tucked and straightened the bed, but when she grabbed the bathrobe to pull it off the TV, her mother lunged to stop her. "No!"

Erin let go of it, but the robe was already sliding onto the floor with a plop. "What is it?" she asked. "What is it with the TV?"

Her mother wrapped her arms around her middle. "It's just that I've, ah… I've been seeing things."

Erin waited for more, but Mom just shook her head, her eyes bleak and staring. "What things?" Erin prompted.

"When I turn on the TV," her mother said.

"Most people do," Erin observed. "That's what it's for."

"Do not be snotty with me, young lady," Barbara snapped.

Erin took a deep breath and tried again. "What do you see, Mom?"

Barbara sank back down on the bed. "I see your dad, and that woman," she said dully. "In those videos. Every channel. Both TVs."

Erin sat down heavily on the bed. "Oh," she whispered. "I see."

"No. You don't. You can't." Barbara's voice trembled. She wiped her puffy eyes, and groped for the bedside box of Kleenex. "The first time, I thought it was a dream. But then it started happening more often. Now it's all the time. Every time I touch the thing. Today it turned itself on. I swear, I didn't even touch it today, and it turned itself on."

Erin had to try several times before she could choreograph her voice into being low and soothing. "That's not possible, Mom."

"I know it's not," her mother snapped. "Believe me, I know. And I know that it… that it isn't a good sign. That I'm seeing things."

Their eyes met, and Erin glimpsed the depths of her mother's terror. The yawning fear of losing her grip on reality itself.

She reached for the controls on the TV.

"No!" her mother cried out. "Honey, please. Don't—"

"Let me show you, Mom," she insisted. "It'll be perfectly normal."

An old Star Trek episode filled the room. She changed channels, to a rerun of M.A.S.H. And again, to the evening news. She changed that channel quickly, in case news of Novak's escape should be announced. That was all Mom needed to hear tonight. She left it on a perky commercial for floor wax. "See? Nothing wrong with the TV."

Her mother's brow furrowed into a knot of perplexity. A chorus line of dancing cartoon mops high-kicked their way across a gleaming cartoon floor. "I don't understand," she whispered.

"Nothing to understand." Erin tried to sound cheerful. It felt forced and hollow. She flipped off the TV "Come on downstairs, Mom."

Barbara followed her, with slow, shuffling steps. "I don't know whether to be relieved, or even more frightened that it was normal."

"I vote for relieved," Erin said. "In fact, I vote that we celebrate. Get dressed, and we can go out to the Safeway. Your fridge is empty."

"Oh, that's OK, honey. I'll do it myself, tomorrow."

"Promise?"

Barbara patted her daughter's anxious face. "Of course I will."

A teabag dangled inside the teapot, fluffy with mold. "How long has it been since you ate, Mom?" Erin demanded.

Barbara made a vague gesture. "I had some crackers a while ago."

"You have to eat." Erin rummaged through the clutter for the dish soap. "Did you know about Cindy's scholarship?"

Barbara winced. "Yes," she murmured. "They called me."

"And?" Erin scrubbed the teapot with soapy water, and waited.

No reply was forthcoming. She looked over her shoulder, frowning. "Mom? What's happening? Tell me."

"What do you want me to say, hon? The conditions are clear. The scholarship is only valid if Cindy keeps up a 3.0 average. It was 2.1 last semester. Her midterms this semester were a disaster. There's no money for tuition if she loses that scholarship."

Erin stared at her in blank dismay. "Cindy can't just quit school."

Barbara's shoulders lifted, and dropped.

Erin stood there, frozen. Her soapy hands dripped onto the floor.

Mom looked so defeated. Now would be the moment to pull a rabbit out of a hat, but there was no money for tuition at a private college. Not even fees from her new client could solve a problem of that size. The CDs were cashed in. The new mortgage had gone to pay for Dad's defense.

Erin wiped her hands on her jeans. She groped for something positive to say as she gazed at her mother. The impulse sagged and faded into silence. Barbara Riggs had always been so well dressed and perfectly made up. Now her face was puffy, her eyes dull, her unwashed hair snarled into a crooked halo.

Suddenly the messy kitchen was too depressing to endure. "Let's go into the living room, Mom."

Barbara flinched. "I don't want to look at the—"

"There's nothing wrong with the TV. Once I hook it back up, I'll show you that it's as normal as the one upstairs. There's no space on this table for me to open your mail. Come on, let's go."

Erin scooped up the mail on her way in, trying not to notice her mother's stumbling, shambling gait behind her. She flipped on the lamp in the living room. Something was odd. She hadn't noticed it before, distracted as she'd been by the disheveled state of the TV. "Why is the clock turned to the wall? And Grandmother Riggs's mirror?"

Her mother's blank, startled gaze lit on the stained wooden backing of the antique mirror. The wire that held it to the hook barely cleared the ornate gilded frame. Her eyes widened. "I never touched it."

Erin dropped the mail on the couch, and lifted the mirror off the wall. It was incredibly heavy. She turned it around.

The mirror was shattered.

Cracks radiated out of an ugly hole, as if someone had bashed it with a blunt object. Glinting shards of mirror glass littered the carpet. Her mother's horror-stricken face was reflected in the jagged pieces.

Their eyes met. Mom held up her hands, as if to ward off a blow. "It wasn't me," she said. "I would never do that. Never."

"Who else has been in the house?" Erin demanded. "How on earth could you not have heard the person who did this?"

"I… I've been sleeping a lot," her mother faltered. "And a couple of times, I, ah, took some Vicodin for my headaches and my back pain. And when I take a Vicodin, an army could troop through here and I wouldn't hear them. But God knows, if there's one thing I would never forget, after everything that's happened, it's to lock the doors!"

Erin laid the mirror carefully upright on the floor against the wall and wrapped her arms around herself.

Seven years of bad luck. As if they hadn't had their quota.

Another thought struck her. She glanced at the grandfather clock, another of the treasures that had come with Grandmother Riggs from England at the end of the nineteenth century. She turned it around.

The face of the antique clock was shattered.

She drifted to the couch and sat down. The pile of mail beside her suddenly seemed much less important than it had minutes before.

"Mom, maybe you should talk to someone," she whispered.

Barbara's reddened eyes swam with desperate tears. "Honey. I swear. I did not do this. Please believe me."

A heavy silence fell between them. Silence that was like darkness, teeming and writhing with terrible possibilities.

Erin shook herself and got to her feet. "I'm going to clean up that broken glass. Then I'm taking the frame and clock to Cindy's room until we can repair them. And then we're going to clean up your kitchen."

"Don't worry about it, sweetie. I'll do it."

"No, you won't," Erin said.

Barbara tightened the sash of her bathrobe with an angry tug. "Do not take that tone with me, Erin Katherine Riggs."

Her mother's sharp response made her feel better, oddly enough.

She murmured a garbled apology and hefted the mirror, shaking as much glass as she could out onto the floor. Busy was better. Activity blocked thinking, and she didn't want to think. She preferred to scurry around, hauling the mirror and clock upstairs, gathering up slivers of glass from the carpet and putting them into a plastic bucket.

That was better than chewing on the two possibilities available to her: Mom had done it and didn't remember doing it, or Mom hadn't done it. Which meant that someone else had.

She wasn't sure which notion terrified her more.

She shouldn't leave Mom at a time like this, but she couldn't afford not to go to Silver Fork. They needed that money so badly. Her mind ran over the problem the way the vacuum cleaner was running over the rug. Each time she thought she was done, she heard another little ting. Always more of them, hidden in the deep pile carpet like tiny, cruel teeth awaiting unwary bare feet.

Barbara ran a sink full of hot, soapy water, and was washing the dishes when Erin came back in from emptying the garbage. It was bad enough to have admitted to those hallucinations, or whatever they were, but to have her daughter think she was so far gone as to smash family heirlooms… that was unthinkable. Heaven knew, if she were to smash a Riggs family heirloom, she would damn well remember doing it.

Erin leaned against the porch doorway. Barbara's heart ached at the pinched, anxious look in her daughter's face.

"Thought I'd get to work on this mess," she said awkwardly.

Erin looked relieved. "Great idea."

"I'll just load up this dishwasher and set it running. Maybe we can nuke a couple of Budget Gourmets. Have you eaten?"

"I should get home. I have to pack for my trip tomorrow. Let's put one in for you." Erin peered into the freezer. "Swiss steak and chicken teriyaki are your choices, Mom."

Barbara's stomach lurched unpleasantly at the thought of food. "Leave them for now, hon. I'll have one later. What's this trip of yours?"

"I'm going to the coast. Another consulting job for Mueller."

"Oh, that's lovely! You see? Cream always rises to the top, no matter what happens. You're going to do just fine, sweetie."

"We all will, Mom," Erin said. "But you've got to stay on top of your mail, and we've got to work out a plan for paying the bills. And you've, uh, got to cool it with the Vicodin. You need to be more alert. If… if somebody is coming into the house."

Barbara nodded, and tried to smile. "Of course."

"I'll help as much as I can, but I can't do it alone." Erin's voice shook.

"Yes, I know," Barbara hastened to say. "I'm sorry I scared you, baby. I'll pull myself together, and we'll all be fine. You'll see."

"Cindy, too. Maybe we could set up a meeting with the scholarship committee, convince them to give her another chance. She can't just quit school. I'll call her tonight."

"Yes. You do that. She looks up to you," Barbara encouraged. "I appreciate your help, hon. I really do."

Erin pulled on her jacket and hesitated, gazing at her mother with big, worried eyes. "Are you sure you're going to be OK, Mom?"

"More than sure," Barbara assured her. "You go and get packed. Have a good trip. Call when you get there, OK?"

"I can't," Erin said. "Your phone's cut off."

Barbara flinched. "Oh, God. Well, don't worry about it, hon. I'll take care of it right away."

"I'll do it when I get back, Mom," Erin offered. "I don't mind."

"Don't worry. Run along and get ready. You have to be at your best tomorrow," Barbara urged.

Erin gave her a tight, lingering hug and a kiss, and left.

Barbara peered out the window and watched Erin run down the sidewalk, light-footed and graceful. She turned the corner and was lost to sight.

Barbara straightened up and looked around with a new sense of purpose. She twitched the crocheted throw on the loveseat back into place and rearranged the pictures on the mantel. She gathered up the mail and rifled through the envelopes with a semblance of her old efficiency, shaking her head at all the past due notices.

It was time to stop moping and working herself into a state. Making her little girl worry herself sick. For heaven's sake.

She stared at the TV with hostile eyes, and finally knelt down, plugged in the power strip, reattached the cables, and pushed it back to its place against the wall. She took the remote in her trembling hand and held it out in front of her like a weapon, challenging the blank screen. The mail crumpled against her chest in her shaking hand.

Enough foolishness. What she had seen was the result of too many sedatives. And it would be nice to watch the evening news.

She turned it on.

Gleaming, naked bodies, grunts and moans… the film flickered, but the images were horribly clear. Her husband. His mistress. She stabbed at the remote. The TV did not respond. She stabbed at the off button on the TV itself. Nothing. The thing was possessed.

She knocked the appliance onto the floor, but the bodies kept on grunting and heaving, lewd and bestial. Cackling, demonic laughter echoed in her head. She lunged for the fire iron by the fireplace and smashed it down against the screen. It sparked and popped, spraying glass all over the carpet. The demon TV was finally silenced.

Barbara Riggs stared at the fire iron protruding from the TV's shattered belly. She lifted her hands to her face. Envelopes fluttered down around her like snow, forgotten.

She sank to her knees. A high-pitched mewling sound was coming from her mouth. Shards of glass ground themselves into her knees. She barely felt them. Her heart pounded. Her lungs wouldn't take in air. She was coming apart. Shaking to pieces.

The terror filled her mind like black smoke, bearing her under.

Chapter Three

The car pulled to a stop beside Erin. She jumped and cowered back against the ivy-covered stone wall until she heard Connor's voice coming out of the dark interior of the vehicle. "It's just me."

Relief, anger, and excitement all mixed and fizzed in her belly. She brushed herself off and groped for her dignity. "You scared me!"

"Yeah, I noticed. Pretty spooked, aren't you?"

She could think of no reply to such an obvious statement, so she just started walking again.

The car followed her slowly. "Come on, Erin," he cajoled. "I'll give you a ride home. You're safe with me. Get in."

She glanced down at her watch. The next bus wouldn't pass for twenty minutes. "It makes me nervous to be followed around," she snapped.

"That's tough. It makes me nervous to see you alone on the street at night," he replied. "Get in."

She got in. The window whirred shut, the locks snapped down, and she was alone in a car with Connor McCloud. The fierce barbarian warrior who had played a starring role in her sexual fantasies for years.

"You need a full-time bodyguard until Novak's back in custody," he said sharply. "You can't wander around by yourself. It's not safe."

"A bodyguard?" She snorted in derision. "On my budget? I can barely afford to feed my cat."

"I'm not asking for pay."

"You? " She stiffened. "Good God, Connor, you can't—"

"Put your seatbelt on, Erin."

Her stiff, chilly fingers struggled with the belt. "I don't want a bodyguard," she said nervously. "I particularly don't want you for a bodyguard. Nothing personal, but I don't want to have anything to do with the Cave. I don't want to see Dad's ex-colleagues ever again."

"I'm not with the Cave anymore," he said. "Haven't been for months. They don't think you need protection. I do. This is my idea, and I'll take responsibility for it."

"Oh. Uh…" She searched desperately for words. "I, um, really appreciate the thought, Connor, but—"

"You don't take me seriously," he said. His voice was sharp with frustration. He flipped on his turn signal, and turned onto her street.

"Novak is probably busy plotting to take over the world by now," Erin said. "I'm sure he has better things to do than bother with the likes of me. And how do you know where I live, anyway?"

"Phone book."

"That's not possible. I'm not in the book yet."

He slanted her a wry glance. "You're in the database, Erin, even if you're not in the book. Anyone could find you." He parked in front of the decaying façade of the Kinsdale Arms and killed the engine. "This place is grim. What happened to your apartment on Queen Anne?"

Another surprise. "How did you know about—"

"Ed bragged about you when you got that hotshot job at the museum and moved into your own place," he said. "We all knew."

She winced at his mention of her father, and stared down at her lap. "This place is cheaper," she said simply. "Thanks for the ride."

His car door slammed, and he followed her into the lobby. "I'll walk you up to your apartment."

"That's not necessary, thank you," she told him.

Her words were futile. He fell into step behind her as she started up the staircase. She had no idea how to deal with him. He was so stubborn and determined, and she didn't want to be rude to him.

Six flights took forever, with his huge, quiet presence behind her. She stopped in front of her door. "Good night," she said pointedly.

He stuck his hands in his pockets and stared down at her with unnerving intensity. "Erin. I really didn't want you to get hurt."

"I'm all right," she whispered. It was a lie, but she couldn't resist the impulse to comfort him. She'd always been a hopeless softie. She found herself staring at the hollows under his cheekbones. The sensual shape of his lips, bracketed by harsh lines. It had been so long since she'd seen his gorgeous, radiant grin.

The words flew out of her mouth. "Do you, um, want to come in?"

"Yeah," he said.

Her stomach did a terrified back flip. She unlocked her door.

He followed her into her apartment. She flipped on the floor lamp she'd found at a rummage sale years ago, with a wicker laundry basket she had rigged for the lampshade. It cast a strange pattern of warm, reddish slices of light and shadow around the cramped room.

"It's not much," she said hesitantly. "I had to sell most of my stuff. Here, let me move this pile of books. Sit down. I can make you some coffee, or tea, if you'd like. I'm afraid I haven't got much to offer in the way of food. A can of tuna and some toast, maybe. Or cereal."

"I'm not hungry, thanks. Coffee would be fine." He wandered around, studying her pictures, scanning the titles of the books piled against the wall with evident fascination. Edna jumped down from her favorite perch on the bookshelf and stalked over to investigate him.

Connor crouched down to pet her cat, and Erin hung up her jacket and put the kettle on. His eloquent silence unleashed too much dangerous speculation in her mind. She turned around.

The chitchat she'd been rehearsing froze in her throat. The raw force of his gaze sent a shock wave of feminine awareness through her. He was staring at her body, measuring her with intense interest. She felt naked in her jeans and T-shirt. "You're thinner," he observed.

Her instinct was to back away, but the sink was already pressed against her back. The room was terribly small with him in it. "I, uh, haven't had much of an appetite, the past few months," she said.

"Tell me about it," he murmured.

Edna arched and purred beneath his hand, which was very odd. Edna was a nervous, traumatized ex-alley cat. She'd never let anyone but Erin touch her, and now look at her, flinging herself onto her back. Writhing with pleasure beneath Connor's long, stroking fingers.

Erin wrenched her gaze away from the unsettling spectacle. "This has been the one time in my life I've managed to lose weight without trying," she babbled. "And I'm too stressed out to enjoy it."

"Why did you ever try? Your body is gorgeous."

His tone was not flattering or flirtatious, just a flat request for information. "Well, I, uh… I've always been a little too—"

"Perfect." He rose to his feet with sinuous grace, still studying her body. "You've always been perfect, Erin. You don't need to lose weight. You never did. Try not to lose any more."

She was completely flustered. "Ah… OK."

A sweet, brief smile transformed his lean face as he sat down in the chair she'd cleared for him. Edna promptly leaped into his lap.

Erin scooped coffee into the filter with trembling hands. Busy, busy, busy—

"Erin, can I ask you something personal?"

Her skin prickled at his tone. "That depends on the question."

"Last fall. At Crystal Mountain. That guy, Georg. Tell me the truth. Did you go to bed with him?"

She froze into agonized stillness, keeping her back to him. "Why does it matter to you?" Her voice was small and tight.

"It just does."

His question brought all the burning shame rushing back. She turned, and lifted her chin. "If I say yes, that means you'll lose all respect for me, right?" She flung the words at him.

"No," he said quietly. "It means that when I hunt him down and start beating him to death, this time I'll finish the job."

The kettle began to warble. She couldn't respond to it. She was paralyzed by the bleak intensity of his eyes. The warble rose to a shriek.

Connor jerked his chin toward it.

Erin grabbed the kettle with shaking hands. "I think you'd better leave," she said. "Right now."

Her voice sounded tight, breathless. Not authoritative at all.

Connor's gaze did not waver. "You promised me coffee."

His face was implacable. He would leave when it suited him, and not before. And she had no one but herself to blame for inviting him in.

Connor placed Edna gently on the ground. He got up and wandered over to her desk, studying the photos and cards pinned to the corkboard. The travel itinerary and the printed-out Mueller e-mail lay on the desk in plain view. He picked them up and examined them. "Going someplace?"

"Just a work thing."

He frowned. "Didn't you say you lost your job?"

"I work for myself now. I've started my own consulting business."

"And you're getting by?" His gaze swept the tiny, wretched room.

"I'm not supporting myself with my business yet," she said stiffly. "I'm temping to make ends meet. But I have high hopes."

He held the e-mail up to the light and read it.

"Excuse me, Connor, but those are my private papers, and I did not invite you to look at them."

He ignored her, his gaze fixed on the page. "So Claude is delighted to meet with you at last, huh?" he said softly. "Who is this Claude?"

"None of your business. Put those down. Now."

He glanced up, and took in the steaming mug in her hand. His eyes went right back to the e-mail. "I take it black," he said absently.

"Put those papers down, Connor." She tried to make her voice steely and commanding. It just sounded scared.

"So old Claude feels like he knows you already. Isn't that sweet." He laid the papers on her desk, and walked to the table, staring at her with narrowed eyes. "So, this Claude. You've never met him?"

She set his coffee down in front of him. "He's a client of mine. Not that it's any of your business."

"Art appraisal?"

"Authentication," she corrected. "Mr. Mueller recently developed an interest in Iron Age Celtic artifacts, which are my specialty."

He sipped his coffee, frowning. "How recently?"

"I've never discussed that with him," she said. "It's not—"

"What do you know about this guy, Erin?"

She bristled at the challenge in his voice. "Everything I need to know. He treats me like a professional. He pays well, and on time."

"But you've never met him?" His eyes probed her, merciless.

"I've met members of his administrative staff," she said. "He runs a charitable foundation called the Quicksilver Fund."

"So why haven't you met him yet?" he persisted. "Because he's always had other pressing engagements," she retorted. "He's a busy man."

"Is he now," Connor said. "Isn't that interesting." Coffee sloshed over the table as she slammed down her mug. "What the hell are you insinuating, Connor?"

"Do you know anyone personally who has met this guy?" She pressed her lips together. "I know people whose arts organizations have received grants from him. That's enough for me."

"No, it's not enough. You can't go on this trip, Erin." She jerked onto her feet, jarring the table painfully with her thigh. "The hell I can't! I am hanging on by my fingernails, Connor. That client is the best thing that's happened to me in the last six months! I will not jeopardize my business just because you are paranoid!"

"Erin, Novak is out there somewhere," Connor said. "I've been hunting him for years. I know his smell, and I'm smelling it now. He lives to fuck people up. You're Ed Riggs's daughter. You were in his sights. He won't forget you. Count on it." Erin sank down into her chair. "Mueller can't possibly have anything to do with Novak," she said coldly. "Novak has been in a high-security prison ever since he was released from the hospital. Mueller started hiring me four months ago. We made plans to meet on two other occasions. Once in San Diego and once in Santa Fe."

"But he never showed up?"

She lifted her chin. "He had unexpected business."

"I just bet he did," Connor said. "I need to check this guy out."

"Don't you dare!" she flared. "Don't even think about messing with the last good thing I've got going. Everything else in my life has gone straight to hell. Don't you think you've done enough?"

Connor's mouth tightened to a grim line. He put down his cup, stood up, and headed for the door. His limp was just a barely perceptible, hitching stiffness in his leg. And it still broke her heart.

"Connor," she said. "Wait."

He pushed the door open, and waited, motionless.

"I'm sorry I said that." She got up and took a step toward him. "I know it's not your fault. It's been… a really awful time."

"Yeah." He turned and looked at her. "I know what you mean."

It was true. He did know how bad it was. She saw it in his eyes. He'd been betrayed and set up to die. He'd lost his partner, Jesse. He'd lost months of his life in a coma, suffered the shattered leg, the burns.

Connor had lost far more than she in this awful business.

An impulse from deep inside kept her feet moving until she stood right in front of him. His scent was a mix of soap and tobacco, resiny and sweet. Pine, wood smoke, and rainstorms. She stared straight up into his face, like she'd always wanted to do, and breathed him in. She drank in all the details: the sheen of beard stubble glinting metallic gold in the light from the corridor outside. The shadows beneath his brilliant eyes, the sharp line of his jutting cheekbones. How was it possible for a mouth to be so stern, and yet so sensual?

And his piercing eyes saw right into her soul.

She lost herself in it. She wanted to touch his face, to trail her fingers over every masculine detail, to feel the warmth of his skin. She wanted to press herself against his lean, solid bulk. She wished she had something to feed him, whether he was hungry or not.

Connor reached behind himself and shoved the door shut without breaking eye contact. She needed so badly for someone to know how lonely and lost she felt. Her mother was adrift in despair. Most of her friends were avoiding her. Not out of unkindness so much as sheer embarrassment, she suspected. But that didn't help the loneliness.

Connor saw it all, and it didn't embarrass him. His gaze didn't shy away. She didn't shy away, either, when he reached for her.

His touch was so careful and delicate, she could barely believe it was happening. Her eyes welled up. He smoothed away the tears that spilled over with a brush of his thumb, and folded her into his arms.

He pressed her face against the canvas of his coat. His hands stroked the length of her spine as if she were made of blown glass. He tucked her head under his chin. His breath warmed the top of her head.

She squeezed her eyes shut. He'd hugged her before, at her graduation party, at holiday gatherings, but not like this. Quick, nonsexual, brotherly hugs, but even so her heart had almost exploded out of her chest, it beat so fast and hard. His broad frame felt harder than she remembered, his muscles like tempered steel.

He'd been concentrated into the pure, potent essence of himself.

She wondered if the way she felt about him was written all over her face. He held her so carefully, vibrating with tension. Maybe he was afraid of hurting her feelings, or that she would misunderstand his friendly gesture and demand something he didn't want to give. All those years of romantic fantasies, all that heat, all that pent-up hunger, he had to feel it. Dad had said that he was psychic.

He'd seen everything: how lonely she felt, how needy. He stroked her hair, as if he were petting a wild animal that might bolt, or bite.

She didn't want careful, or gentle. She wanted him to push her onto the narrow futon cot, to pin her down with his big, strong body and give her something else to think about. Something hot and scary and wonderful. She could scream, she wanted it so bad. She wanted to wrap her arms around his neck, pull him closer, and just gobble him up.

God, how could he not pity her?

That thought stung her. It gave her the strength to jerk away. She dug in her pocket for a Kleenex. "Sorry about that," she mumbled.

"Any time." His voice sounded thick. He cleared his throat.

She kept her face averted. He had to leave, and fast, before she burst into tears and covered herself with glory. "Um, I have to pack. I've got lots to do, so, uh…"

"Erin—"

"Don't start." She backed away, shaking her head. "I'm going on this trip, and I don't want a bodyguard, thanks for the offer. Thanks for the ride, thanks for the advice, the sympathy and the… the hug. And now, I really, really need to be alone. Good night."

He made a sharp, frustrated sound. "You need better locks. Hell, you need a new door. It's a waste to put a good lock on a door like this. I could kick the hinges in with my bad leg." He scanned her apartment, scowling. "I'll call my friend Seth. He can install something that—"

"And how am I supposed to pay him?"

"I'll pay for it myself, if you're short on cash," he said impatiently. "Seth'll give me a good deal. It's important, Erin. You're not safe here."

"Thanks, but I can take care of myself. Good night, Connor."

"Does your mother have an alarm system?"

She thought of the shattered mirror and clock. An eddy of sickening fear swirled in her belly. "Yes. Dad insisted."

"Then maybe you should go stay with her for a while."

She bristled. "And maybe you should mind your own business."

He frowned, and pulled a matchbook out of his jeans pocket. "Give me a pen," he demanded.

She handed him a pen. He scribbled on the matchbook and handed it to her. "Call me. Anything happens, day or night, call me."

"OK," she whispered. The matchbook was warm from his pocket. Her fingers tightened over it until it crumpled in her hand. "Thanks."

"Promise me." His voice was hard.

She tucked it into her jeans pocket. "I promise."

One last, searching look, and he finally walked out the door.

A sharp knock made her jump. "Use the deadbolt," he ordered from outside. "I'm not leaving until I hear you do it."

She pushed in the bolt. "Good night, Connor."

He was silent for a few seconds. "Good night," he said quietly.

She put her ear to the door, but could not hear any footsteps. She waited a moment, opened the door and checked. No one was there.

She was finally alone. She slammed the door shut. After his bullying and lecturing and intimidating her with that overwhelming macho charisma, she'd thought his departure would be a relief.

Instead, she felt bereft. Almost piqued at him, for letting her drive him away so easily. Yikes, how clingy and passive-aggressive of her. She was in worse shape than she'd thought.

But how incredibly sweet of him to care.

Connor leaned his hot face against the steering column. He couldn't drive in this condition. He would kill himself.

His heart was thudding, his ears roaring. He was on the verge of coming in his pants. If she'd leaned just one breath closer to him, she'd have felt his hard-on, pressing against his jeans like a club. Those amazing, liquid brown eyes that a guy could get lost in, Jesus. Her eyes on his face had felt like an embrace. He'd wanted to grab her and kiss her so bad, his muscles were cramping from the effort of holding back.

Maybe she would have melted against him and kissed him back.

Yeah, and pigs had wings and hell had a skating rink. The closer he stuck to harsh reality, the less liable he was to screw up.

It was so ironic. Right before the huge fuck-up that had landed him in a coma and killed Jesse, he'd been working up the nerve to ask Erin Riggs out for dinner and a movie. Ever since she'd turned twenty-five. That had struck him as the magic number. She'd attained the status of fair game. He was nine years older than her, which wasn't all that excessive, but when she was seventeen and he was twenty-six, he'd known damn well it would've been sleazy to hit on her. Once she hit her twenties, he'd been really tempted. She was so juicy and innocent—but Ed would've ripped his head off if Connor had gotten anywhere near his precious baby girl. There was that to consider.

But the main reason he hadn't made a move was because she'd been gone so much, on study-abroad programs and archeological digs; six months in France, nine months in Scotland, a year in Wales, etc. He'd had some casual girlfriends in the meantime, some of them nice women, but he'd always pulled back when they started talking about the future. He'd braced himself to hear about Erin getting engaged.

Didn't happen. She'd finished grad school, gotten her curator job, moved out of the group house with her college girlfriend and into her own apartment. Twenty-five years old, and amazingly, she didn't have a boyfriend. It was time. All was fair in love and war, and all that crap. If Ed didn't like it, he could shove it.

But the shit had hit the fan before he ever got a chance to follow through. When he woke up from the coma and found out that he'd been betrayed, and Jesse murdered, he had no energy to spare for romance. He'd loved his partner like he loved his own brothers. He'd thrown everything into getting back on his feet so he could hunt down Lazar and Novak, flush out the traitor and avenge Jesse.

All of which had culminated in hauling Ed Riggs into custody.

Damn, he couldn't help but think that putting a girl's dad in prison for murder pretty much wrecked his chances of getting a date with her on a Saturday night. Particularly considering the shape he was in these days. He glanced into the rearview mirror, and winced.

He'd always been lean, and he forced himself to work out hard to compensate for the bum leg. He'd built back all the muscle mass that he'd lost in the coma, but he had no fat left on him at all. He could see every individual muscle and tendon moving under his skin when he looked at himself in the bathroom mirror. A goddamn walking anatomy poster. The burn scars didn't help much, either. Neither did the limp.

He wasn't much of a prize. Working for his older brother, snapping pictures of unfaithful spouses. He had no future. He barely had a present. All he had was a past, and everything in it nixed his chances of getting into Erin Riggs's bed.

What an idiot. Lusting after an ivory tower princess behind a wall of goddamn thorns. He wanted so badly to claw his way into that tower, and find out what went on behind those big, serious eyes. He wanted to make her smile. She hadn't smiled tonight. Not even once.

With that bracing thought, he put the car in gear and headed toward his brother Davy's lair, down on Lake Washington. Davy would be pissed at him for showing up three hours late, but he would just grumble and throw a steak on the grill. His stomach twitched with approval, one of the first signs of life he'd gotten from that quarter in a long while. Davy and Sean had taken up the practice of calling him at regular intervals and reminding him to eat. Annoying, but he guessed he was lucky that somebody cared. Otherwise he would be lost in space.

His younger brother Sean's Jeep was parked in the driveway. He was going to get lectured from both sides. They were talking on the back porch as he opened the door. Their voices suddenly ceased.

Two pairs of green eyes almost identical to his own scrutinized him as he stepped out onto the deck.

"You're late," Davy said. "We ate."

"Novak's busted out," Connor told them. "With two of his goons. One was that guy I roughed up last November. Georg Luksch."

They listened to the water lapping against the pebbles under the deck for a long moment.

"You think he's going to want to play with us?" Davy asked.

Connor sank into a chair, bone tired. "It's what he lives for."

Sean buried his face in his hands. "God. I'm swamped trying to get this business off the ground. I don't have time to play with Novak."

"I'm less worried about us than I am about Erin," Connor said.

Davy and Sean's gazes narrowed in on him, like a couple of laser beams. He bore it stoically.

"What about Erin?" Davy's deep voice was low and wary.

Connor folded a scrap of paper he'd found on the table into an origami unicorn. One of his bored-out-of-his-mind-in-rehab activities that had evolved into a full-blown nervous habit "He had Erin in his clutches once. I pulled her loose. He's not going to forget that. Georg Luksch won't forget it, either. She's pretty, and young, and clueless. He goes for that. And he's going to want to punish Riggs for failing him."

"Erin is not your problem," Davy said. "You did your best for her. You didn't get much thanks for it. The most you can do is warn her."

"I already did."

Davy and Sean exchanged meaningful glances.

"You talked to her?" Sean demanded. "Tonight?"

Connor braced himself. "I went to her place," he admitted. "Followed her to her mom's house. Gave her a ride home."

Sean winced. "Uh-oh. Here we go again."

Davy took a swig of beer, his hard, lean face impassive. "How's she doing?" he asked.

"Not well," Connor said. "Like hell, actually. Since you asked."

"Look, Con," Sean began. "Don't bite my head off, but—"

"How about you don't even start?" Connor suggested.

Sean barged on, undaunted. "I know you've been carrying a torch for that chick for years, but your testimony put her dad's ass in jail. You cannot be her hero, dude. You're just going to get hurt."

Sean's words made him feel bleak and sad, not angry. "Thank you for sharing your opinion," he said. He unfolded the unicorn, and scribbled Claude Mueller's name, e-mail address, and the flight information that he'd memorized onto the paper. He pushed it across the table toward Davy. "Would you check these out for me?"

Davy picked it up and examined it. "Who is this guy?"

"This is the mysterious millionaire who has recently developed a passionate interest in Celtic artifacts. Erin's flying down to Portland, to be met and driven to Silver Fork Resort, where she will proceed to authenticate a mess of priceless relics for him."

"And what is it exactly that bothers you about this?" Sean asked.

"Neither she nor anybody she knows has ever actually seen the millionaire," he said. "He's always been too busy to meet with her since he started hiring her. Four months ago."

"Ah." Davy's voice was thoughtful.

"Find out who's paying for those flights," Connor told him. "And find out everything you can about the Quicksilver Foundation."

"I'll see what I can do."

"She's leaving tomorrow. I told her she needed a bodyguard, and she spit in my eye," Connor said. "Threw me out of her apartment."

"I don't blame her," Sean said. "A guy who looks like you is not a good fashion accessory for a bodacious babe."

"Bite me," Connor said wearily. He pulled his tobacco and papers out of his pocket.

"Did it occur to you to shave, or brush your hair before you inflicted yourself on her?" Sean lectured. "Jesus, Con. You barbarian."

Connor nodded toward his older brother. "Davyl's got beard stubble. Bug him for a while."

"Davy's another story." Sean's voice was elaborately patient. "Davy irons his shirts. Davy eats. Beard stubble is a very different fashion statement on Davy."

Davy stroked his stubble and gave Connor an apologetic shrug.

Connor looked at Davy. "Speaking of food. You promised me a steak."

Davy looked startled. "You mean, you actually want some?"

"I'm hungry," Connor said.

Sean's jaw sagged. "So having Erin Riggs spit in your eye stimulates your appetite, huh?" He sprang to his feet. "One rare T-bone coming right up. I'll nuke you a baked potato, if you want."

"Make it two," Connor said. "Lots of butter and sour cream and chives. And don't forget the black pepper."

"Don't push your luck." Sean's grouching was belied by his huge grin. He kicked open the screen door and bounded toward the kitchen.

"When do you need the Mueller info?" Davy asked.

"Tomorrow morning. I'm taking a road trip down to Portland."

Davy's face darkened. "To meet her plane? Oh, Christ. Forget the hero routine just this once. Call Nick. They're the ones who should—"

"I already tried Nick. They think Novak's back in Europe."

"They probably have good reason to think so," Davy growled.

"I've got a bad feeling," Connor said. "She can't go meet this guy all alone. If Ed were around, it would be his job to look after her, but—"

"But Ed's not around," Davy cut in. "And that is not your fault."

"It's not Erin's fault, either." Connor avoided his brother's gaze as he finished rolling the cigarette. "And I don't blame myself."

Davy slammed his beer bottle onto the table, a rare show of temper for his self-contained brother. "The hell you don't. You can't save the whole world, lamebrain. Get your own life back on track before you go racing off to rescue some damsel in distress."

"I didn't ask for your opinion on my love life," Connor retorted.

Davy's lowering eyebrows shot up. "Whoa," he said. "Back up two steps. Who said anything about your love life?"

Connor cupped the cigarette in his hand and lit it. He took a deep drag and exhaled, to calm himself down before he dared to speak.

"Leave it alone, Davy," he said.

"Watch it, Con," Davy said. "You're treading on shaky ground."

Sean burst through the screen door and passed Connor a cold beer. "Food'll be out in a few," he announced.

"Thanks," Connor muttered.

Sean looked from one brother to the other. His eyes narrowed. "Did I miss something?"

"No," Davy and Connor said, in unison.

Sean scowled. "I hate it when you guys do that," he snapped. He slammed the screen door behind him, hard.

Connor finished his cigarette in grim silence. Davy for once had the good sense to nurse his beer and keep his mouth shut.

Sean kicked open the door a few minutes later and placed a loaded plate in front of Connor. He dug into it without hesitation.

His two brothers silently watched him consume a twelve-ounce steak, two big baked potatoes, a sliced tomato, and three big hunks of hot, toasted French bread slathered with garlic butter.

Connor finally noticed their fixed stares. "Cut it out, you guys," he protested. "Quit watching me eat, already. You're inhibiting me."

Davy crossed his arms over his barrel chest. "Give us a break. We haven't seen you eat like that for sixteen months."

"It's awesome." Sean's face was unusually serious. "That's a week's worth of calories for you, Con. All in one meal. Check you out."

Connor mopped up the last of his steak juice with a hunk of bread. He felt a vague stab of guilt. "You guys shouldn't worry. I'm fine."

Davy snorted. "We'll see how fine you feel when you get back from Portland."

Sean frowned. "What's this about Portland?"

"He's going to be Erin's welcoming committee when she goes to meet the mysterious millionaire who may or may not be Novak," Davy told him. "He wants to guard her luscious body. Personally."

"Oh, Christ. You don't say. Well, finish your dinner, then. You're going to need your strength. What hardware you taking?" Sean asked.

"Just the SIG. And the Ruger SP-101, for backup."

"Want some company?" Sean asked.

Connor glanced at him, startled. "I thought you were busy."

"I'm not too busy to watch my brother's back," Sean said.

Connor's mouth twitched. "Think I need a baby-sitter, huh?"

"Interpret it however the fuck you want."

Connor finished the final swallow of beer. "I'm OK on my own," he said. "Thanks. I'll let you know if I change my mind."

"You want Erin all to yourself, huh?"

Connor ignored his younger brother's taunting with the ease of long practice. "Would you guys contact Seth and Raine about Novak?"

"I'm on it," Sean said promptly.

"I'll go get to work on this info," Davy said. "Get some sleep, Connor. You look beat. Crash here, and I'll give you the rundown over breakfast. The bed's already made up for you on the side porch."

"Thanks." He got to his feet and stared at his brothers, struck by the bizarre urge to say something sentimental to them.

Sean read it in his eyes, took pity on him, and headed him off. "Get a goddamn haircut if you're looking to get laid, Con."

Connor winced. "You are such a pig."

"Sure, but at least I look good," was Sean's parting shot.

Connor flopped onto the bed, staring out at the mass of tree branches that swayed outside the glassed-in side porch. The chair next to the bed had a towel, washcloth, and a pair of Davy's folded sweats lying on it, presumably for him to sleep in. He was exhausted, but his mind was buzzing. He closed his eyes, and his photographic memory promptly served up the image of Erin puttering around in her kitchen, her sweet, curvy body delicious in the faded jeans and T-shirt.

Fresh fodder for his sexual imagination. He'd fantasized about sneaking into her bedroom at Ed and Barbara's house for years. He'd imagined himself, a big, blundering bull in that feminine world of ruffles and lace, puffy pillows, perfume bottles, lingerie. And Erin, backing up toward her bed, her eyes heavy with excitement as he locked the door.

That fantasy had infinite variations, all of them red hot and X-rated, but tonight the setting changed by itself, unguided by his conscious mind. The ultra-femme bedroom of his fantasies gave way to the crowded studio apartment in the Kinsdale. Painfully neat and organized, the braided rug brightening up the scarred linoleum floor, the crazy quilt covering the narrow cot. Heaps of books piled against the wall. Alphabetized, for God's sake. How cute. Every detail lit by the patterned glow of the basket lamp and charged with erotic heat.

The Kinsdale room didn't make him feel clumsy and alien like the fantasy bedroom did, but it was even more alluring, because Erin was all over it. Her practicality and tidiness, her whimsical sense of humor, her refusal to give in to self-pity. Bright colors, indomitable spirit. That room was sexier than any place he could have dreamed up on his own.

He buried his face in the coarse wool army blanket and let the fantasy unfold. He kissed the salty tears off her cheeks, and she opened and clung to him as he devoured her tender mouth. He knelt down and nuzzled the warmth of that velvety strip of skin between the T-shirt and the waistband of her jeans that had so tantalized him tonight. He popped the buttons of the jeans open and tongued her navel as he dragged those jeans and panties down over her curvy hips, her round ass. Slowly, inch by precious inch, reveling in her hot female smell: baby powder and flower petal and ocean salt. He breathed it, in big, greedy gulps. He peeled every scrap of clothing away until she was naked, arms held out to him, her eyes soft with trust.

Yeah. Trust. He shoved away the derisive voices in his head. This was his fantasy, and he'd run it how he damn well pleased.

She trembled as he put his arms around her from behind and explored the exquisite, plump fullness of her breasts. Vivid details were imprinted in his mind as if they were memories, not fantasies. Her nipples puckered against his hand, tender buttons of flesh aching to be tongued and suckled. Her hair clip pulled loose, and her glossy hair tumbled and slid across her shoulders like a swath of dark satin.

He slid his hand over the rounded swell of her belly, delving into her dark thatch, searching for hidden treasure in the wet, secret heat of her cleft. She tightened around his fingers and flung her head back against his shoulder, squirming and whimpering with pleasure.

He pushed her down onto the bed and pushed her soft thighs until they sprawled apart. He cupped her rosy ass cheeks, kissed and tongued the folds and hollows between her legs, the electric fuzz of dark hair. He opened her like a dripping fruit with his tongue, sliding it along the glistening, succulent folds of her labia, wallowing in her colors and flavors. Lazy and slow, taking his time. Suckling her clit, flicking and lashing it with his tongue. He would bury his head between her thighs and thrust his tongue deep. He would make her buck and writhe and press her cunt against his face, until she jerked and sobbed and came.

And then he would do it all again.

Usually he finished himself off with the next logical step; clambering over her damp body and shoving himself into her quivering depths, sliding deeper and slicker with each thrust until his orgasm thundered through him. Tonight, he didn't get that far. He came along with her imagined orgasm, the pillow muffling his cry as he spurted into the washcloth. He pressed his face against the pillow, breath heaving.

When he lifted his head, he was startled to find his face wet with tears. That was weird. He wiped his cheek and stared at his wet hand for over a minute, but he was too tired to be overly freaked out about it.

He cleaned up in the back bathroom, dragged the blanket over himself and sank like a stone into real, honest-to-God sleep.

Chapter Four

"Sure, I can drop by and take care of kitty. No problem," Tonia said. "I have to come by really early, though. That OK?"

"Sure. I always wake up at the crack of dawn anyway when I have to catch a plane. Thank you so much, Tonia. You're an angel."

"I know. Get some sleep, chica. You have to look gorgeous for the zillionaire. I'm so excited that you're finally meeting him. 'Night, then. See you bright and early tomorrow morning."

Erin hung up, crossed Call Tonia to feed Edna off the To Do list, and proceeded to pace around the room like a caged animal. Every dish was washed, every crumb wiped up, every doable item on the To Do list was crossed off, except for Pack, which rated its own separate list.

Her rolling carry-on was small, so she'd been forced to eliminate several items, the latest of which was the little black dress she'd thought to take in case Claude Mueller proved to be interesting. For some reason, the brief, devastating encounter with Connor had taken all the fizz out of that possibility. As long as she had this stupid crush on him, every man she met would suffer by comparison.

Not that she hadn't tried. With Bradley, years before.

Something tightened up inside at the thought of Bradley. Ouch. Cancel that thought. If there was a fancy meal, she would wear her black pants and her silk blouse. Neat and sensible, and no chance that anyone could think she was hoping to attract romantic attention. She had no stomach for it. Which left room for the sewing kit, which she hated to leave. You always needed a sewing kit when you didn't bring one.

She was climbing the walls. She needed to laugh, or cry, but if she started crying she might never stop. She needed sleep, so she could wow them with her professional fabulousness. She needed to stop thinking about the way Connor could melt her into a puddle of terrified yearning with one exquisitely gentle hug.

She needed distraction. Packing and neatening were not enough. She'd promised Mom that she would call Cindy tonight. Now there was a worthy problem. She had to save Cindy's future from being derailed.

She dialed the group house where Cindy lived with her college girlfriends in Endicott Falls. "Hello?" responded a breathy voice.

"Hi. Victoria, right? It's Erin, Cindy's sister. Is she there?"

"No, she's down in the city with Billy," Victoria told her.

"Billy?" Erin's stomach fluttered with unease. "Who's Billy?"

"Oh, he's her new boyfriend. He's a really cool guy, Erin. Don't worry, you'll like him. He's, like, totally hot."

"What's she doing in the city? Don't you guys have finals?"

Victoria hesitated. "Um, I don't know Cindy's exam schedule," she hedged, uncomfortable. "But I'll tell her to call you when she gets back. Or you could try her cell phone."

"Cell phone? Since when does Cindy have a cell phone?"

"Billy gave it to her," Victoria bubbled. "He's so cool. He gives her designer clothes, too. He drives a Jag, and Caitlin told me that Cindy told her that it's not the only awesome car he's got. Plus, he's got a—"

"Victoria. Would you please give me Cindy's cell phone number?"

"Sure. It's right here on the message board."

Erin wrote it down with white-knuckled fingers. She barely heard herself as she thanked Victoria and got off the phone. She sat there on the bed, trying to reason away the dread that sat inside her like a cold stone. She was just spooked, she told herself. This news about Novak, the strange scene with Mom, the unsettling episode with Connor, it had thrown her off balance, and she was seeing everything as sinister. There was no reason to panic yet. Maybe this Billy was a perfectly nice guy.

Uh-huh. Sure. A perfectly nice guy who happened to drive a Jaguar. Who showered a nineteen-year-old girl with expensive clothes and electronic toys and lured her away from school during finals week.

It was strange. It was scary. It stank.

Her parents' reasoning behind encouraging Cindy to go to a private college in the small town of Endicott Falls was in the hopes that she would have more guidance and supervision than she might find in a big, sprawling public university. The thoughtless, impressionable Cindy was so eager to be liked. Willing to be led anywhere, just to be cool. The opposite of her shy, cautious older sister. And so pretty, too. Much prettier than Erin. Walking bait. Erin already hated Billy and his Jag. She hated him more with every number she pressed.

She was startled when the phone actually rang.

"Hello?" said Cindy's bright voice.

"Hi, Cindy. It's Erin."

"Oh. Um… hi. How did you get this number?"

Erin gritted her teeth. "Victoria gave it to me."

"What a ditz. I'm gonna have to kill her."

Her breezy tone put Erin's nerves on edge. "Why wouldn't you want me to have it, Cindy?"

"Don't even start," Cindy said, giggling. "You're such a little old lady. I didn't want you to worry, that's all."

"Worry about what?" Erin's voice was getting sharper.

"About me staying in the city with Billy for a while."

"Staying where, Cin?"

Cindy ignored her question. "I was going nuts in that sleepy town. Nobody does anything but study during exam week, so I—"

"What about your exams?" Erin burst out. "Why aren't you studying, too? Your scholarship was contingent on keeping your GPA—"

"See? I told you. This is why I didn't call. I knew you'd get all self-righteous on me. Billy offered to take me—"

"Who is this Billy?" she demanded. "Where did you meet him?"

"Billy is great," Cindy snapped. "He's the best thing that's happened in my shitty life since Dad got thrown in jail. I'm just taking a break from that tight-ass place and having some fun—"

"Cin, what kind of fun?" Her voice was a nervous squeak.

Cindy giggled. It was a trilling, mindless sound, so unlike her normal laughter that it made Erin's flesh creep. "Like, please," she said. "As if you'd know what fun was if it pinched you on the butt. Take a chill pill, Erin. I'm with Billy. I'm safe, I'm fine. I'm over the moon."

Erin was bewildered by the wall that had suddenly risen up between her and her sister. "Cin, we have to talk. We've got to figure out how you can stay in school. Your scholarship—"

"Oh, don't worry." Cindy giggled again. "My financial problems are at an end. That scholarship is, like, so minor, Erin."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Panic was clutching at her chest, making her heart pound. "Cindy, you can't just—"

"Don't get your panties in a wad. There are lots of ways to make money. More than I ever thought, and Billy is showing me how to—huh? What? Oh… yeah, totally. Billy says to tell you that college is overrated. A big fat waste of time and money. Who cares about Chaucer or counterpoint or Freud or the Industrial Revolution, anyhow? I mean, like, get real. It's all just theory. Life is to be lived. In the moment."

"Cindy, you're scaring me to death."

"Relax already. I'm just trying my wings. It's so normal. Just because you never wanted to party doesn't mean I can't, does it? Don't say anything to Mom, though, OK? She'd go ballistic for sure."

"Listen, I need to talk to you about Mom, too—"

" 'Bye, Erin. Don't call me, I'll call you. And don't worry! Everything will be totally cool." The connection abruptly broke.

Erin redialed the number. The prerecorded message informed her that the party she was trying to call was unreachable.

Like she didn't already know.

She slammed the phone down and curled up on her bed. She fished the matchbook that had Connor's phone number written on it out of her pocket, and stared at it.

Anything happens, anything at all, call me, he'd said. Promise me.

She was so tempted to call him and sob out all her problems to him. He was so warm and strong. He beckoned like a lighthouse in a storm. She wiped tears angrily away. Not an option. Connor was the last person she should turn to for help. No matter how terrified she felt.

Oh, Christ. There were at least a dozen big, scary-looking vitamin pills lying on the table next to a tall glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice when Connor stumbled out of the back bathroom in the morning. Davy had the imperturbable macho-zen act down to a high art, but he still insisted on treating his younger brother like a goddamned invalid.

Davy glanced at him, jerked his head toward the vitamins, and narrowed his eyes, as if to say, Don't even think of struggling.

"I start with coffee, not orange juice," Connor grumbled.

"This is my house. I am boss in my house. If you swallow them all down without giving me any shit, I will give you some coffee," Davy said. "And then we'll go over the Mueller stuff."

That snapped his mind to instant alertness. "Find anything interesting?"

Davy gave him an oblique look. "Want some breakfast?"

Connor yawned. "Hell, yes." His stomach was groaning.

Davy blinked. "I'll be damned. I'll go put on some eggs and ham for you. Two eggs or three?"

"Four," Connor said.

A grin split Davy's stern face. He vanished into the kitchen.

Connor was frowning at a weird transparent amber pill when Sean wandered out onto the porch. "What is this crap?" he asked plaintively. "It looks like a congealed glob of oil."

"It is a congealed glob of oil, you ignorant slob. Four hundred ECU of vitamin E in a gel capsule. Good for skin, nails, hair, and scar tissue. Take it. You need all the help you can get." Sean placed a mug of coffee in front of him. "Davy says if the pills are gone, you can drink this."

Connor studied his brother's sartorial splendor with wondering eyes. Sean always looked well-groomed, even when he just rolled out of bed. Some recessive gene that Connor had utterly failed to inherit.

Sean was decked out in a wine-red sweater that showed off all his muscles. Tight designer jeans. Hair mussed into perfect stylish disorder. A whiff of expensive aftershave drifted over and assailed Connor's nose.

He closed his eyes against Sean's blinding glory and swallowed down the gummy capsule. "What are you still doing here?"

Sean grimaced. "Woman trouble. Julia is camping out in her car in front of my condo. I told her from the start not to get all intense on me, that I'm not looking to commit right now. Didn't work. Never does. So I figured if I don't come home till morning for a few nights, she'll figure I'm boffing someone else and get a clue."

"You slut," Connor said. "Someday you'll pay up, big time." He picked up the last vitamin, a big, yellowish brown pill. "This is the one that makes your piss turn chartreuse, right?"

Sean glanced over at it. "That's the one. B complex. Great stuff."

"It looks like a rabbit pellet," Connor complained. "And it smells like horseshit. Why do you guys torture me with this crap?"

"Because we love you, asshole. Shut up and eat the pill."

Connor froze, startled by the edge in Sean's voice. Sean stared out at the water. A muscle twitched in his sharp, clean-shaven jaw.

For a moment, he caught a glimpse of the depths of his brothers' worry for him, and a hot ache swelled up in his throat He covered by shoving the evil-smelling pill into his mouth, and choking it down with a gulp of coffee. "Jesus. I've got yellow skid marks on my esophagus."

"Suffer," was Sean's succinct rejoinder.

They sipped their coffee. This tense, meaningful silence was too much for him to take first thing in the morning. He had to knock it down to the level of bullshit banter, so they could both breathe again.

"So, uh… Julia," he ventured "Is she the aerobics instructor with thighs like a vise?"

Sean seized onto the change of subject with evident relief. "Hell, no. That was Jill. You missed Kelsey, Rose and Caroline."

"Ah. I see," Connor murmured. "So what's with this Julia?"

Sean winced. "Curly blonde hair, big blue eyes, five-inch heels. I met her at a club a few weeks ago. It was fun for a while, and then bam, out of nowhere, she mutates into this gigantic bloodsucking insect."

Connor winced. "Shit. I hate it when that happens."

"Me, too. Lurking in the dark outside my condo all night, brrr. Creeps me out. Next thing I know, she'll be boiling my bunny."

Connor made sympathetic sounds. "Sounds painful."

The screen door flew open, kicked by Davy's massive booted foot. He laid two plates before his brother. Thick slabs of grilled ham, a heap of scrambled eggs full of melted cheddar. Four pieces of toast, dripping with butter. A pile of fresh honeydew, cantaloupe, and pineapple chunks with a big scoop of cottage cheese perched on top.

Connor blinked. "Whoa. So, uh… where's my damask napkin and my lemon-scented finger bowl?"

Davy shrugged, unembarrassed. "You need protein."

No arguing with that. He dove in, ignoring his rapt audience. A few minutes later, he pushed back two highly polished plates. "Let me have it," he said. "What's up with Claude Mueller?"

Davy flipped open a manila folder full of computer printouts. "There's not as much as I would've expected, for such a rich guy," he said. "Born in Brussels in '61. Mother Belgian, father Swiss, a big shot industrialist. Outrageously wealthy. Claude was sickly as a child, suffers from some weird form of hemophilia, now more or less under control. A reclusive loner type. He studied art and architecture at the Sorbonne from '80 to '83 and then gave it up due to ill health. In 1989, his parents were killed in a car accident. Claude was the sole heir to a fortune of around a half billion or so."

Connor choked on his coffee, and wiped his mouth. "Jesus," he said. "Hard to wrap your mind around that much money."

Sean gave him an evil grin. "My mind is stretchier than yours."

"Poor Claude was traumatized by his parents' deaths," Davy went on. "From that point on, he secluded himself on a tiny private island off the south of France. Never married, no children. All he cares about are antiquities. He had a collection of medieval reliquaries, weapons, Viking and Saxon artifacts, and of course Celtic stuff. He's a big presence on the 'Net. Spends lots of time in art history chat rooms and message boards. He administers the Quicksilver Fund, which he established in the early nineties. It's a stinking pile of money that he doles out to arts organizations. All of whom suck his virtual toes."

"Photos?" Connor asked.

"I couldn't find a recent one. These are over sixteen years old." Davy shoved a pile of color printouts across the table to him.

Connor pushed aside his plate and leafed through them.

Claude Mueller was thin, nondescript, neither handsome nor ugly. Bland features, olive skin, blue eyes, thinning brown hair. The clearest of the lot was a passport photo taken two decades ago. A chubbier version of the same man, with a mustache and goatee.

Connor studied them, letting his mind float open like a net, scooping for images, connections, snags, feelings. Nothing jumped out, nothing flashed by. All he felt was a prickling, restless unease. "Novak could pass for this guy," he mused. "Same height and build."

Davy and Sean's swift glances clearly continued a conversation they must have started last night after he'd gone to bed.

Davy shook his head. "I got into the database of the Quicksilver Fund last night. I found the transactions for the plane tickets Mueller bought for Erin in the past few months. The pressing business that kept Mueller from meeting Erin in Santa Fe was ill health. I saw the medical records. Two days before she was scheduled to go to Santa Fe, Mueller was admitted to a posh private clinic in Nice for a bleeding ulcer."

Something tightened steadily in Connor's stomach. Even though he knew this news should be making him feel better.

"I hacked into the clinic's records," Davy continued. "He couldn't make it to the meeting because he was vomiting blood, Con. Not because he was sitting in jail, plotting Erin's downfall."

Connor set down his cup. Davy's tone was flat, his voice unreadable. "Since when do you read French?" he demanded.

"I hung out in northern Africa for a while after Desert Storm, remember? They speak a lot of French in Egypt and Morocco. I picked it up. It's not hard, if you already know Spanish."

Connor stared into his coffee. So Davy knew French. His brother was full of surprises. "Wasn't it a little too easy, finding all this info?"

"Yeah, it was easy," Davy said slowly. "It's possible that it's an elaborate, fiendish plot. Anything's possible. But spending untold amounts of money to put together a cover story this complicated, all for Erin Riggs's benefit? Come on, Con. Sure she's a cute girl, but—"

"I'm not suggesting that it would be all for Erin's benefit," Connor snarled. "It's to Novak's benefit to have another identity."

Davy looked away. "It's like Nick said, Con. Novak's run home to hide under Daddy's wing. It's the smart thing to do."

"But he's insane." Connor looked from Davy to Sean. Both his brothers avoided his gaze. "He doesn't reason like a normal human."

"You have to face reality, Con." Sean's mouth was tight.

Connor clenched his jaw. "And what is your version of reality?"

Sean looked like he was bracing himself. "That you hate the idea of this girl you've always wanted going to meet a filthy rich guy who goes nuts for Celtic art. Nobody could blame you for hating it."

The food in Connor's belly congealed to a cold lump.

"Let her go, Con." Davy's voice was heavy. "Move on."

Connor rose to his feet and snatched the sheaf of paper from the table. "Thanks for your help. If you'll excuse me, I've got stuff to do."

"Yo, Con," Sean said, as Connor shoved open the door.

Connor jerked around with a this-had-better-be-good expression.

"The guy may have more money than God, but hey… he urps blood," Sean pointed out. "Bleeding ulcers are not sexy. Take what comfort you can from that."

Connor slammed the porch door so violently that it rattled in its frame. They braced themselves. Slam went the front door, too.

Sean dropped his head down and bonked his forehead against the table. "Shit, shit, shit. Just shoot me now. Put me out of my misery."

"Yeah, that was brilliant." Davy's voice was dour. "You always hit a nerve. Straight on, bull's eye."

"It's a family trait." Sean raised resentful, narrowed eyes.

"You were the one begging to be put out of his misery," Davy observed. "Not me."

Sean slumped down into his chair. "I didn't think things could suck any worse for him than they already did. I was wrong."

"Things can always get worse," Davy pointed out. "Always."

"Aw, shut up," Sean muttered. "Goddamn pessimist."