by Nina Croft
“What is it?” Christian asked.
“I’m not sure.”
He was lying. Maybe because he didn’t want to talk in front of them; she couldn’t be sure. But she had an ear for these things.
He reached out with one finger and touched the mark, suspicion flaring in his eyes. “You said this was done last night. It’s almost healed.”
Shit. “I think the man did something to heal the cuts. Afterward.”
“That was nice of him, but a little out of character.”
“Maybe not. He didn’t know I was there. He believed Sister Maria would have to make it on her own.”
“And the two of you didn’t think to go straight to your superiors?”
“He said he would come after us if we didn’t deliver the message.”
“Hmmm.”
Roz wasn’t sure if he was convinced, but it would have to do. Now, to see if she could get something useful out of this meeting. “So, Mr. Lamont, do you know what it was they came for?”
His gaze shifted from Maria’s back to her face, and she was caught in the stare of those wicked blue eyes.
“No.”
Yeah, he was lying. “Do you know who they were?”
“No.”
Definitely lying. But there wasn’t any way she could make him tell her. And she wanted out of here. All she could do was tell Asmodai what had gone down and hope that he wouldn’t be too pissed off. Maybe he could get some information from Piers Lamont.
“Do you need a place to stay?” Christian asked from behind her. “You’ll be safe here. We can get a room ready for you.”
Like hell, she was staying here.
“Thank you for your kind offer of hospitality. But our Order’s Mother House is in London. I think we would feel more comfortable there. If it’s all right with you, I’ll ring from reception and get someone to collect us.”
She caught a glance flash between the two men and held her breath. Piers gave the slightest of nods, and she relaxed.
“Okay, I’ll call Graham, and he’ll take you up. And thank you for bringing the message.”
Bowing her head, she peered up from under her lashes. “God led us here. You are meant to find these creatures of Satan and bring them to God’s justice.”
She thought she might have gone too far as amusement flickered across Piers’ expression. “Yeah, we’ll definitely do that.”
Chapter Three
Piers flung himself full-length on the sofa, arms clasped behind his head, as he considered the meeting. Sexy nuns aside, this was actually bad news. Really fucking bad.
“So, did you recognize the sign?” Christian asked.
The question interrupted his less than happy thoughts. “Oh, yeah.”
“And I take it the message meant something?”
“It did.”
“And are you going to share?” Christian’s voice held an edge of impatience.
“No.” Piers didn’t want to talk about this until he’d had a chance to decide what he wanted to say and what he really wanted to keep quiet about. “It’s nothing to do with the Order. It’s personal.”
Christian didn’t appear convinced. “Do you think you should have let the sisters go?”
“Hell, yeah—they didn’t know anything else.” Besides, they wouldn’t be hard to find—the Little Sisters of Mercy. Piers was planning a visit real soon.
“You’ve got that gleam in your eye,” Christian said. “Nuns are off-limits.”
“Since when? She was hot, and I think she liked me.”
Christian shook his head but dropped the subject. “I’m heading home.” He turned to leave, but paused at the door. “Well, at least you don’t look bored anymore.”
No, he definitely wasn’t bored.
…
Roz dialed the number quickly from memory. Ryan had been trying to contact her for the last twenty-four hours. He could give her a lift home and explain why he had been filling up her cell phone with increasingly urgent messages. It was well after midnight, but she reckoned Ryan wasn’t much of a sleeper.
The red-haired receptionist, Graham, was observing her closely, an amused expression on his face. Roz resisted the urge to tell him to piss-off. That would hardly be nun-like. Instead, she turned away to give herself some semblance of privacy and spoke quietly.
“Can you pick me up? I’m in the city—SA International—you know it?”
“I know it.” Ryan sounded sleepy. Maybe she’d woken him up after all.
“Good, I’ll be waiting outside.” She put the phone down.
“You’re welcome to wait in here until your ride comes.” Graham said.
“No, thank you. I think we could both do with some fresh air.”
He let them out through the big glass double doors and stood watching. It occurred to her that she should perhaps have told Ryan to pick them up somewhere else. Did she want this man to see who she was going with? But she was almost one hundred percent sure they’d bought her story. Otherwise, why would they have let them go? Hopefully, she’d seen the last of The Order of the Shadow Accords, and of Piers Lamont.
The night was warm and the streets deserted. They were in the business district and just about everywhere was closed down for the night. Some of the tension drained from her and she breathed in deeply; she loved the scents of London—car fumes and hot city streets—and the river, which wasn’t far from here. Leaning back against the glass wall, she wondered what she should do first when she got home, a hot, bubbly bath or a big glass of scotch. Maybe a big glass of scotch while in a big, bubbly bath. She’d give herself this evening off, and tomorrow she supposed she was going to have to contact Asmodai and tell him she’d failed. If he didn’t already know. She’d only failed once before, and the consequences hadn’t been pleasant.
“You lied.” Sister Maria spoke from beside her. “We have no mother house in London.”
Roz had almost forgotten the nun was there. She was such a quiet little thing. Though she had seen everybody she knew slaughtered only hours earlier; perhaps an element of quietness was understandable.
Roz cast her a sideways glance. Sister Maria seemed to be coming around a little, a bit of color returning to her cheeks.
“I know,” she replied, “but I didn’t want to stay there. What do we know about them really? Except that they’re somehow connected with the people who broke into the convent last night.”
“I didn’t like them. They felt somehow wrong. I don’t think they were men of God.”
Roz had a brief image of those sinfully wicked blue eyes. “No, I think you might be right.”
“So where are we going?”
Roz pursed her lips. The way she saw it, she had three options. She could leave Maria on the side of the road and drive off with Ryan, she could drop her off somewhere along the way, or she could take her home with her. Her mind baulked at the last option—she never took anyone home; her apartment was her sanctuary. But she couldn’t really leave her here. For one thing, through the glass walls, she could still see Graham watching them both from the reception desk. It would appear odd if she just left Maria. Why the hell hadn’t she arranged for Ryan to pick her up somewhere else?
She knew why, of course. She’d been rattled and not thinking straight. That she’d walked right into the lair of the dreaded Order of the Shadow Accords had totally shaken her. And then to have to confront the first serious case of the hots she’d had for over fifty years had shaken her further. She shifted as a wave of remembered heat washed over her.
“Well?” Maria asked.
“Sorry,” Roz muttered. “I was thinking of something else.” Yeah, six-foot-four inches of stunningly gorgeous man all wrapped up in black leather and totally out of bounds. “I don’t suppose there’s somewhere I can drop you off?”
She felt like a complete heel as fear flashed across Maria’s face. The sister reached out a trembling hand and rested it on Roz’s arm. “Don’t leave me. I don’t know why, but I feel
safe with you. Tomorrow, I’ll think about getting word to the Mother Superior, but tonight I just want to forget.”
Oh well. She could share her scotch—there was enough for two—and tomorrow she could arrange transport for Maria to the mother house. It was actually situated in Devon. She’d hire a car and driver, make sure Maria got there safely. And that would be that. Way above and beyond the call of duty as far as she was concerned.
“You can come home with me tonight,” she said.
Maria frowned. “Home? Wasn’t the convent your home?”
“Well—” Luckily, at that moment Ryan drove up in a black SUV and pulled up beside them, saving her from any further explanations. “Our ride’s here. Look, Maria, it’s probably better you don’t mention what happened until you’ve talked to the Mother Superior.”
Maria bit her lip but nodded.
Ryan leaned across, pushed open the passenger door, and grinned. “Shit, Roz, what the fuck fancy dress are you wearing?”
Beside her, Maria flinched.
“Don’t say anything, Ryan. For once, just keep your smart mouth shut. And open the back door—Sister Maria is coming with us.”
“Don’t tell me she’s a real nun.”
Roz smirked. “I bet you never had one of them in your car before, did you, Ryan?”
“That’s the goddamned truth.”
Roz tugged open the back passenger door, ushered Maria inside, and climbed in beside Ryan. Leaning back in the seat, she closed her eyes only to open them when the car didn’t immediately move. Ryan was half turned in his seat, staring at her.
Christ, had he never seen a nun before?
He looked his usual scruffy self; his thick dark hair mussed from running his hands through it—something he claimed aided his thought processes. His long, lanky frame was dressed in jeans and a battered leather jacket. He had a lean, handsome face and a slightly crooked smile that gave him an endearing quality. He was a good-looking guy, but she’d never allowed herself to think about Ryan that way. They used each other, and in doing so Roz had exposed more of herself to Ryan than she had to anyone else in five centuries. She couldn’t allow him even closer.
“Are we waiting for something?” she asked pointedly.
“I need to talk to you.”
“So I gathered from the twenty messages on my cell.”
“You could have answered one of them.”
She shrugged. “I was a little indisposed.”
He peered over his shoulder at the nun in the back. “I’ll bet.”
“Just get us away from here, and you can talk.” She sighed inwardly. So much for her nice relaxing night. Ryan only came to her with the nasty cases. The ones where he had no clue.
Her unique talents enabled her to find things, including people. The first time that had happened, it had been by accident. She’d been watching a newsflash about a kidnapped girl, and all of a sudden, she’d had a vision, seen where the girl was being held, and known she was about to die. Roz had phoned the police but was met with disbelief, so she’d gone to the station and eventually managed to get an interview with Ryan, the lead officer on the case.
He hadn’t wanted to believe her either, but something must have made him take the chance.
After that first time, she’d promised to help with other cases, but only if he agreed to keep her input a secret, and only in life and death situations. Because if certain people became aware of what she was, her own life would be forfeit. Asmodai had told her that much.
She understood it was her way of payback. You didn’t become indebted to a demon and expect to live a decent, honest life. She’d done some bad things in her time. Nothing she couldn’t live with; Asmodai had always seemed to know what lines she wouldn’t cross, and if she didn’t always ask why he wanted the things she “found” for him, then she thought she could be excused a little self-deception.
The truth was, five hundred years ago, she hadn’t wanted to die, certainly not on top of some peasant villagers’ bonfire, and she didn’t want to die now. What she did crave was her freedom.
Ryan drove out onto the road and opened his mouth, but she butted in first.
“Not here. You can come to my place and tell me.” He knew where she lived—he’d dropped her off before—but he’d never been inside. Her home was private, but tonight she would share it with Sister Maria. Besides, she reckoned she was nearly done with this life; it was almost time to move on and set up a new identity for herself. It would have to be away from London, at least for a while.
After fifteen minutes, Ryan pulled up in the underground parking beneath her building.
“You’re really letting me in?” he asked as he grabbed a file from the side-pocket of the vehicle and climbed out.
She shrugged. “Well, we do have a chaperone.” She waved at Sister Maria, who half-clambered, half-fell out of the back of the SUV.
“You are going to tell me what this is all about, aren’t you?”
“Nope.”
They were silent as she led them to the elevator and pressed the button to the top floor. When the doors slid open, she fished her keys out of her bag and let them in.
Ryan whistled. “Nice.”
She strolled across the floor toward the sofa, tugging the headdress off then tossing it in the nearest bin.
“Jesus, that’s a relief.” She fluffed up her short hair with her fingers. “If I’d had to wear that thing one more day, I swear I might have gone seriously insane.” She glanced back to see the shock on Maria’s face. “Feel free to do the same,” she said. “Plenty of room in the bin.” Maria didn’t respond, just sidled around the edge of the room and watched her as though Roz had suddenly morphed into the antichrist.
“Make yourselves at home,” Roz said. “I’ll be right back.”
She strolled into the bedroom, slamming the door closed behind her. Not bothering to unfasten the tiny buttons, she ripped the hated robe open to the waist and dragged it down over her hips.
Her shoes went next, then the scratchy cotton underwear followed them onto the growing pile, until finally, she stood naked in the middle of the room. She scowled as she glared at the sigil circling her right arm. The mark of her bondage. And here for the foreseeable future—who knew when she would be rid of it now her supposedly last job had gone so badly wrong.
After pulling some clothes out of the wardrobe—panties, jeans, a black T-shirt—she dressed quickly, ran a hand through her hair, and headed back into the living room. She didn’t feel comfortable leaving the nun and the detective alone together.
She needn’t have worried. Ryan was at the bookcase scanning the titles, no doubt trying to fill in the gaps he didn’t know about her, as though her reading material would do that. Maria was still standing exactly where she’d been, just inside the door. Her eyes widened as she took in Roz’s changed appearance.
“Sister Rosa?”
Roz shrugged. “No one by that name here. I’m Roz. Why don’t you sit down and make yourself at home.” She waved toward the cream sofa, and Maria hesitantly shuffled across and collapsed, hands clenched on her lap. The woman was so uptight.
“And you, Ryan. Stop nosing about—you won’t find anything.”
He picked up a book. “Salem Possessed: The Social Origins of Witchcraft. Interesting reading.”
“It is. Feel free to borrow it. Now sit down—you’re making the place look messy.”
Ryan glanced at the sofa but obviously thought better of seating himself too close to Maria and sank down onto the chair opposite, the file clutched in his hand.
Roz got a bottle of scotch from the cabinet and three glasses then sat beside Maria. She poured drinks, pushed one across the coffee table toward Ryan and handed a second to Maria, who peered at the amber liquid as though it were poison.
“Go on,” Roz said. “I won’t tell, and it will make you feel better.”
She swallowed her own in a single gulp and poured another. Sister Maria watched her then copied
her, swallowed the drink in one go, and held out her glass for more.
Roz raised an eyebrow but topped up the drink and turned to Ryan. “Okay, what do you want?”
He glanced toward Sister Maria. “Is she okay to hear this?”
“She’s fine.” Besides, she didn’t think Sister Maria was taking much in. Even before the scotch, she’d been developing a glazed expression in her eyes. Now she was resting back against the sofa, her eyes closed.
Ryan placed the file on the coffee table and slid it toward her. “We have a missing girl, Jessica Thomas. Fifteen years old, disappeared about twenty-four hours ago as far as we can tell.”
Dread filled her. So many times, Ryan came to her too late, and the victim was found dead. She hoped that wasn’t the case this time, but twenty-four hours was quick for him to involve Roz, and she knew there must be something else. No doubt, Ryan would tell her when he was ready.
The file was light and when she opened it, she found a single photograph and a sheet of paper. She scanned it quickly; just bare details. The photo showed a pretty girl, slightly plump with dark hair and a sweet smile.
“There’s something else,” Ryan said. “She’s not the first girl to go missing. There was another last week.”
Roz glanced at his face. His expression was grim, and she knew this wasn’t going to have a happy ending.
“She was found dead less than forty-eight hours after she went missing.”
“How did she die?”
“Well, that’s the odd thing. Exsanguination. She’d been drained of blood. Real weird shit. Some of the guys think we’re dealing with a cult. Ritual sacrifice—witches or something.”
He gave her an odd glance, and a flash of anger tore through her. Ryan knew her better than anyone did. He was the first person she had opened up to in fifteen years of being Rosamund Fairfax. Then something like this happened, and he was looking at her as if she were some sort of monster.