“Painful.” He almost smiled. “Oh, yes. It’s all of that. May I move the lantern now?”
“What? Oh. Yes. Sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Remembering is a kind of thinking. A very special kind.” He took several steps toward the north corner of the cabin. “Was the loom right up against the wall?”
“No. It was a reverse-weave loom, so G’mom had to leave space to check the design.”
He gave her a blank look.
“The back of the weaving was toward the weaver,” Serena explained, “so to see the design, she had to walk around to the other side, which faced the wall. She hung a mirror on the wall to check it through the warp threads, but the best way was to check it face-to-face.”
“Why did she weave that way?”
“Do you really want a lecture on the reasons for—”
“No,” he cut in hastily. “I’ll take your word for it. So the loom was about three or four feet out from the wall?”
“Closer to three feet. The braces on the loom stuck out about two feet on both sides of the frame. She wouldn’t have needed much more room than that. She kept the loom out of the way as much as possible. The cabin is small and G’mom wasn’t a big woman, for all her self-sufficiency. She was maybe five feet three and really lean, as if life and the desert had sweated out all her softness.”
“So the braces kept the loom frame about two feet from the wall. Could she step over the braces?”
“Easily.”
He sat on his heels and stared at the floor that would have been behind the loom before it burned. After a few moments he brushed aside small piles of charred wood and ashes. In the side light, a stone bobbin looked like a palm-sized, reclining ghost. Absently he picked up the bobbin and rolled it on his left palm while he moved the lantern around with his right. There were other ashes, other bobbins. He dropped the one he had and with the side of his hand swept everything away from the wall, to the place where the heavy loom would have stood.
“How wide was the whole loom?” he asked.
“Six feet, at most, including the frame. There were rollers at the top and bottom to take up woven fabric and let out more warp threads for weaving.”
Though he nodded, she doubted if he was really listening. She got up and walked over to him. Standing out of his light, she watched his eyes probe the wall and floor as though he could see through them. She had an odd certainty that he was using a lot more than ordinary vision to study the stones.
Pattern master.
She ignored the unwanted murmur in her own mind. “What are you looking for?”
“An opening,” he said without looking up.
“Into stone?”
“The wall isn’t thick enough, even at the bottom, to protect the book from damage by fire. It has to be the floor.”
She dropped down on her knees and began sweeping burned debris off the stone with both hands. Bobbins rattled and grated, rolling in eccentric circles on the rough stone floor with an unhappy noise that made her bite her lip.
Like bones disturbed in a crypt.
“Go away,” she muttered.
Erik looked up in surprise.
“Not you,” she explained. “The other Serena.”
“Oh. Her. Tell her to take the other Erik with her.”
Her head snapped up. “You, too?” Then, quickly, “Of course. Damn. Is he as handsome as you?”
“Is she as beautiful?”
“I’m not beautiful.”
“I’m not handsome.”
She opened her mouth, sighed, and swept strands of hair away from her face. “All in who’s doing the looking, is that it?”
“Yeah, that’s it.” He ran the back of his fingers down her cheek, leaving a trail of soot. “Beautiful.”
She rolled her eyes. And then she smiled almost shyly.
He tugged at her scarf, savoring the special feel of the cloth. Without warning he planted a lingering kiss on the neck he had revealed, and then went back to staring at the stone floor as if he had never stopped.
Ashes and dirt had darkened any scrape marks that might have been left by use, but nothing could erase the faint outline where stone had worn against stone each time the hole was opened or closed. There was a reddish stone set off-center in the faint rectangle. It was part of the pattern that was woven through the floor itself.
And it looked loose.
“Gotcha,” he said softly. “Take the lantern again.”
She grabbed the wire and moved back a little to give him more room.
Delicately he probed around the edges of the reddish stone, which was the size of his fist. It wobbled very slightly. He pressed harder on that spot. The rock tilted up and came loose. He picked it up and set it aside.
The top of a steel eyebolt that was more than an inch wide at the eye gleamed slightly against the greater darkness in the small opening. He knelt and gripped the ring.
“She would have had a tool for leverage, probably a fire poker, but I think I can . . .” His shoulders bunched as he heaved upward on the heavy ring.
“Let me help.”
“No room.” He grunted, shifted his weight, and pulled again.
With the grating reluctance of something that hasn’t been shifted in a long time, the lid of stone pulled free.
Both of them stared down into the opening. It was as long as his forearm and almost as wide, too deep to see the bottom. He reached for the lantern just as she shifted it and stared in.
Empty.
Disappointment speared through her. Then she saw that the darkness wasn’t even.
There was something at the bottom of the hole.
She lowered the lantern until both of them could see the bundle of black cloth.
“Go ahead,” he said, reaching for the lantern. “It’s yours. Get it.”
She set the lantern down. “There’s room for both.”
Together, breathless with hope, adrenaline roaring in their ears, they reached into the hole with one hand apiece and eased the surprisingly heavy bag into the light. Reverently they set it on the stone floor.
After a moment Serena picked apart the bow on the rawhide tie and unlaced the hand-woven sack. As the cloth fell to the floor, she drew in a sharp breath, pleasure and disbelief together.
Covered in beaten gold, incised with two intertwined initials, studded with polished gemstones, the Book of the Learned shimmered like a dream in the lantern light.
“Well, ain’t that pretty.”
Erik and Serena whirled to face the voice.
Wallace was standing in the doorway of the cabin. The blue steel of the gun in his bandaged hand gleamed as coldly as his smile.
He was still smiling when he shot Erik. “That’s for the cliff, asshole.”
Chapter 70
The impact of the bullet spun Erik around and dumped him on his back across the Book of the Learned while pain spread in blinding waves up from his right side. Serena threw herself over him, both protecting him and searching frantically for the wound.
“Gun,” Erik muttered against her ear.
She lifted her head and stared at him. Glazed with pain, his eyes bored into hers, willing her to remember what he had told her once before. She shoved one hand beneath him and held her other over the wound on his side.
“Get away from him,” Wallace said harshly.
Serena ignored him and continued groping frantically beneath Erik. The butt of the gun bumped coldly against her fingers.
“You silly bitch! Get away or I’ll shoot right through you!” Wallace yelled.
A shot caromed off the stones. Grit peppered Serena’s face. “Don’t be stupid!” she yelled without looking up. “If you shoot through either one of us you’ll ruin the book and all you’ll have to show for your time is two bodies and a handful of shit!”
Wallace had expected anything but the rough edge of Serena’s tongue. Adrenaline hummed through him, giving him the erection that only violence could. If he killed her n
ow, he would be stuck beating off. Fucking a corpse just wasn’t as good as having a live one, willing or unwilling.
He took a long stride to the right and immediately felt better. He could see Erik’s hands. They were slack, empty. His own bandaged right hand ached from the kick of the gun, but it had worked well enough to put a man down and keep him there.
“Okay, bitch. Show me your hands.”
“Before or after I keep him from bleeding all over the book?” She had her fingers through the trigger guard, but finding the bloody little safety was—
“Show me your hands!”
Serena spun around, shooting as she turned, hearing Erik’s advice ringing in her memory: Don’t be girly or coy. Just shoot and keep on shooting.
Her first two bullets were wild, but so were Wallace’s. His injured hand just wasn’t as quick or accurate as it should have been. Ricochets slammed around unpredictably, chewing chips out of stone.
The rest of Serena’s shots weren’t wild. She didn’t count how many times she hit Wallace. She just clenched her teeth and fired until the gun was empty and he was lying sprawled and motionless against a blood-spattered wall.
Distantly she realized that she was still pulling on the trigger and Erik was talking to her.
“It’s over, Serena. Listen to me. You’re all right. He’s not going to get up again.”
Numbly she lowered the gun.
Erik looked at her bleached skin and bleak eyes, and wished he could wipe the past few moments from her memory. But he couldn’t. He knew he should tell her to get Wallace’s gun, but he wasn’t going to do that, either. He didn’t want her to get any closer to the bloody mess than she already was.
Besides, it was a dead certainty that Wallace wasn’t going to be doing any more shooting.
“Look at me, Serena. Not at him. At me.”
She turned toward Erik, took a wrenching breath, then another. The sight of blood pulsing down his right arm shocked her back into control. She went to her knees beside him in a rush.
“You’re bleeding too much,” she said, dropping the gun.
“A little blood always looks like a lot.”
She saw the ruined cloth and gore along his ribs. “If you tell me it’s just a scratch, I’ll shoot you myself.”
“No worries,” he said through his teeth. “It’s not a scratch.”
“I have to stop the bleeding.”
“Pressure.”
Without a thought to its venerable history, she began yanking the scarf off her neck.
“Stand up and get away from him.”
For a shocked instant both Erik and Serena thought the voice was Wallace’s. Then Erik looked past her at the black-dressed figure standing in the doorway, holding a gun on them.
Chapter 71
Paul Carson,” Erik said grimly.
The gun in Paul’s hand was pointed at Serena. It didn’t jerk or waver.
“I’d rather not shoot you,” he said matter-of-factly, “but I haven’t yet decided whether you’re in on the scam with North and Wallace.”
“Wait,” she said. “You don’t understand. There’s no—”
“Move, Serena,” Erik cut in. A pattern had just condensed in his mind. An ugly one.
“But—“ she started to object.
“Do it.”
Unwillingly she stood and backed away from Erik. Her steps brought her no closer to Paul. He smiled at her caution.
“Commendable, if a bit late,” Paul said, but he was watching Erik with the eyes of a man who knew who his enemy was. “I see you’re too clever to grab at straws.”
“There’s no scam,” Serena said urgently. “I remembered where the Book of the Learned was and we got it, and then Wallace shot Erik and I—I shot Wallace.”
Paul slanted a speculative glance at her. “Thank you. It saved me the trouble. You surprise me, Serena. You must have more of your grandmother in you than anyone thought. That was one tough old bitch. Like you, she wouldn’t negotiate no matter what the price.”
“So you killed her,” Serena said.
He shrugged. “She was threatening the House of Warrick.”
“The woman in Florida?” Erik asked. “The guru in Sedona? Bert?”
“Of course.” He looked at Serena with pale eyes that felt nothing, saw everything. “Put your hands on top of your head and turn around, and walk backward to me. If you get between me and your boyfriend while you do it, you’re both dead.”
She believed him. He wasn’t like Wallace, pumped up and flushed with adrenaline, wanting an audience. Paul was steady as a stone and every bit as hard.
“I thought fire was more your style,” she said bitterly.
“Whatever keeps the cops guessing,” Paul said. “You have three seconds, Serena. Two.”
She turned around and awkwardly started walking backward.
“Keep you hands on top of your head,” he ordered. “Keep backing up. More. Slowly, Serena. Stop. Good. Move just once and he dies.”
Erik watched like a predator.
Paul didn’t give any opening. He was cool and professional. Deadly.
“Where’s your car?” Erik asked casually.
“In back of a dead man’s shack.”
Erik didn’t have to ask who had died. There was only one house within easy walking range: Jolly’s. “And Wallace’s car? Where did he hide it?”
“In front of the old man’s shack, right where I told him. Right where the police will find it when I notify them.”
“Anonymously, of course,” Erik said. “You don’t want to disturb their fantasy that Wallace worked alone.”
Paul didn’t bother to answer the obvious. Holding the gun on Erik, watching him, Paul reached out with his left hand to search beneath Serena’s jacket for weapons. The first thing his groping fingers found was the scarf dangling loosely around her neck.
He screamed and shoved her away as though he had grabbed burning napalm.
Erik’s left arm moved in a blur. One of Lisbeth’s stone bobbins hurtled across the cabin and buried itself halfway in Paul’s temple. His scream stopped as quickly as it had begun. He toppled backward over Wallace and went down hard. He stayed there.
The stench of gunfire, blood, and death clung to everything.
Erik forced himself to his feet. He thought he would pass out before he picked up Paul’s gun, but he felt a lot better with it in his hand.
“Sit down before you fall down,” Serena said, her voice strained.
“I’m—”
“You’re shot, that’s what you are,” she cut in savagely, “so just shut up and sit down.”
Erik compromised. He shut up.
She whipped the scarf off her neck, folded it into a thick pad, and held it over his ribs where blood was coming out much too fast. Breath hissed through Erik’s teeth as pain tried to send him to his knees. The only thing that kept him upright was the knowledge that Serena wouldn’t be able to get him into the car on her own.
To her surprise, blood discolored the hastily made bandage but didn’t immediately soak through. Gritting her teeth, she pressed harder to slow the hot red flow. She didn’t know how much pain Erik could take without fainting, but she was afraid she was going to find out. She watched him with anxious violet eyes.
Pale, trembling, smeared with ashes and blood—she was the most beautiful thing Erik had ever seen. He started to tell her when Niall spoke from the darkness beyond the ruined walls.
“If you shoot me, boyo, go for the heart. I’ve already got a pisser of a headache.”
Erik’s smile looked more like a feral snarl. “What took you so long?”
Niall stepped into the light of the lantern. He was as pale as Erik and almost as bloody; scalp wounds were worse for bleeding than anything but tongues.
“You look like hell,” Erik said.
“You should see the other guy,” Niall said.
He glanced at the gun in Erik’s hand, recognized it as the one taken by the attacker
—Paul or Wallace, from the look of it. Apparently Niall had been slotted to be the bad guy, complete with murder weapon in his dead hand. Sweet. Really sweet.
“Has that gun been fired tonight?” Niall asked as he went to check on Paul and Wallace.
“Not by me.”
Niall grunted. “Good. It’s mine.”
He saw the oddly shaped stone sticking out of Paul’s skull, checked for a pulse, didn’t feel anything conclusive, and started frisking him. When he checked for a sleeve knife, he saw Paul’s hand.
“Christ Jesus,” he muttered. “What did you do to him, hold his hand against the lantern until he confessed?”
Erik and Serena exchanged puzzled looks and said nothing.
Niall collected all the weapons he found and put them across the room. When he was finished, he put his hands around his mouth and hollered, “Come on in, Ian. Dana’s Fuzzy took care of it.”
“I had a partner,” Erik said, giving Serena a bittersweet smile. “I’m not sorry Wallace is dead, but I’m sorry you were the one holding the trigger down.”
Niall gave Serena an approving look. It changed to surprise when he spotted the gleaming gold cover and pools of colored gems on the floor behind her. “I take it that’s the prize.”
“Yeah,” Erik said.
“Sit down before you fall down, boyo.”
“Take your own advice,” Erik retorted. “I’m feeling better every second. It’s not nearly as bad as I thought when the bullet hit. Serena has the bleeding under control.”
Niall walked over and looked at the thick pad of cloth Serena was pressing against Erik’s ribs. “Bet that stings like a bitch,” he said neutrally.
“No bet,” Erik said through his teeth, “but it’s easing up quicker than I expected.”
Niall reached out to the pad. “Here, let me have a—shit!” He snatched back his hand and shook his fingers as though they had been singed. “What’s on that thing, acid? How can you stand it against the wound?”
“What are you talking about?” Erik said. “It feels cool and soothing.”
Niall looked at his fingertips in the lantern light. They appeared normal. Felt normal except for a residual tingle. “Bloody hell.”
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