Breath of Magic

by Teresa Medeiros

  As they stepped off the elevator, Arian's foot snagged in the cumbersome skirt, ripping a delicate row of lace from the hem. She wanted to tear the hateful thing off her body with her bare hands and shred the rumpled satin to tatters. She would never wear white again, she vowed. White, with its deceptive promise of new beginnings and bright tomorrows.

  Darkness had fallen and rain lashed at the windows. Lucifer had curled up in the middle of the ottoman, soothed by the arrival of three cases of gourmet kitten food and a shiny new litter box. As they entered, he thumped down to the carpet, yawning a welcome, then trundled over to greet them.

  He butted his head against Arian's ankle in a shameless bid for affection. She knelt to scoop him up, rubbing his warm, furry body against her cheek. "There's my sweet little devil," she crooned. "Have you been lonesome without me? And to think, silly Sven said black cats were b-b-bad luck." Her voice broke, her shoulders convulsing with the wracking sobs she'd been holding in ever since the moment Tristan's gaze had shifted from suspicion to utter loathing.

  She buried her face in the cat's silky fur, unable to bear Sven's stoic indifference in the face of her grief. Like Linnet, Tristan had condemned her without a trial. And she would never be able to forgive him, not in this lifetime or any other.

  The very last thing Arian expected to feel was a big hand awkwardly stroking her hair.

  Copperfield was lying in wait for Tristan when he returned from the lab that night. He followed him through his office door before Tristan could slam it in his face. Ignoring his uninvited presence, Tristan went straight to the bar, poured himself a neat Scotch, and downed it in one gulp.

  He poured himself another and went to the window, drawn by the kindred darkness of the rainy night.

  Cop switched on the cozy glow of the desk lamp and Tristan had to grit his teeth to keep from recoiling from his reflection. He knew he felt like a savage, wild-eyed beast. He just hadn't realized how much he resembled one. He abandoned the window, preferring Copperfield's scrutiny to his own.

  Cop eyed him up and down as if he didn't much like what he saw. Tristan didn't think he could blame him.

  His friend's disapproving gaze hovered at the glass gripped in his white-knuckled hand. "I would have thought you'd want a clear head to consider all of this."

  Tristan took another generous swallow of the whisky. "The last thing I want is a clear head."

  It should have been glaringly apparent that he wasn't fit company for other humans, but Cop propped his hip on the edge of the desk anyway. "Something keeps nagging at me," he confessed. "Why would Arian go to the trouble of contriving such an elaborate lie only to throw in the one element that made it impossible to believe?"

  Tristan shrugged. "Maybe she believes it. Maybe Arthur has used Warlock to brainwash her and she's just another of his hapless victims. Maybe I should rush up to the penthouse, fall to bended knee, and beg her forgiveness for doubting her loyalty."

  It took Cop a beat longer than usual to realize he was being mocked. He glowered at Tristan. "I'm no scientist, but you admitted yourself that the numbers don't quite add up. That the Warlock you designed would never have been capable of rearranging a human's molecules into a goat's. Or of making an inanimate broom fly-"

  "Finch has had ten years to bastardize my work," Tristan reminded him. "Ten years to toy with enhancements and modifications. For all we know, the damn thing could make a goat fly."

  "What about time travel?"

  Tristan shrugged. "We played around with the idea, but never managed to manipulate time by more than a few seconds. What are you suggesting? That Arthur bought himself a one-way ticket to the seventeenth century?"

  Copperfield swore beneath his breath. "You won't even let yourself consider the possibility that Arian might be telling the truth. You're too gutless to – "

  Tristan slammed the glass down. Scotch splashed over the rim to drench the stack of unsigned contracts on his leather blotter. "They're carbon-dating the broom even as we speak! I've dispatched researchers to Boston and Gloucester to comb through any seventeenth-century records that might prove or disprove an Arian Whitewood's existence. But you know what? They won't find anything. And you know why? Because she's a heartless, lying witch. She lied about the necklace, she lied about Finch, and she lied when she said she loved me!"

  Cop swallowed hard before blurting out, "I want to take Arian to a hotel."

  "That's a bit unconventional, isn't it? It is my wedding night."

  Cop refused to meet his eyes. "You can't just detain her against her will. That's kidnapping."

  Tristan sank down in his chair, feeling an eerie composure creep over him, a composure more dangerous than any of his ranting. He nodded at the phone. "If you think she'd be safer in police custody than with me, why don't you hand me the phone and I'll call them?"

  Cop hesitated, then snatched up the receiver and held it out to him. "At least in jail, she'll have some legal rights."

  Tristan ignored the offering, his smile ruthlessly pleasant. "Are you planning to defend her?"

  Cop slammed the phone back in its cradle. "I'd rather defend her against you than defend you against rape charges."

  Tristan's smile didn't flicker, although he staggered inwardly from the double blow. The blow of having his best friend think the worst of him and the blow of knowing he was dangerously near to the truth. He'd be a fool not to let Cop bundle Arian into the limo and get her the hell away from the Tower. Away from him.

  He opened his mouth to say so. "No. I won't let you take her."

  Cop stiffened. "Then my letter of resignation will be on your desk first thing in the morning."

  Tristan didn't say anything flippant, didn't pull open the drawer to remind him of all the other times he'd threatened to quit, but hadn't. Throwing his boss one last pained glance, Cop started for the door.

  Tristan watched him go, counting his faltering footsteps, watching the second hand on his desk clock sweep away twenty-five years of friendship. The brass hand crept toward the twelve; Copperfield's hand closed over the doorknob.

  "Cop?"

  Copperfield paused, too proud to beg.

  "When Arthur disappeared and I was charged with his murder, you never once asked me if I was guilty. Why not?"

  "You were my friend. I figured if you killed him, you had a damn good reason." Cop flashed him a tired ghost of his sunny grin. "I never liked the son of a bitch anyway."

  He pulled the door shut behind him, leaving Tristan alone to watch the interminable minutes of his wedding night tick away.

  The sky hurled inky gouts of rain against the windows. Thunder rumbled around the Tower like the low-pitched growl of some prowling beast seeking to claw its way into a man's soul. Tristan stood in his darkened office, worshiping the unholy chaos of the storm and sipping Scotch straight from the bottle.

  He had thought the whisky might douse the flames raging through his brain. But it only seemed to feed them, sending them shooting higher and higher until the holocaust crackling in his ears threatened to engulf his will, his conscience, and his very sanity.

  The clock on his desk read eleven forty-five. In fifteen more minutes, his wedding night would be over. Fifteen minutes with Satan nipping at his heels. Fifteen minutes of sucking smoke and brimstone into his tortured lungs. Fifteen minutes that would last the rest of his miserable, lonely life.

  A flash of lightning blinded him, but did not erase the image imprinted on his memory. An image of a rumpled, battered Arian, her eyes darkened by despair, her shoulders slumped in defeat. He took a burning swallow of the liquor, despising himself for pitying her almost as much as he despised himself for still wanting her so badly.

  She had dared to look at him as if he'd broken her heart. Dared to make him feel as if he were the one who had deceived and betrayed her.

  Eleven-fifty.

  Another flash of lightning, this one even more brutal than the last, showed Tristan what might have been instead of what was – he a
nd his bride cuddled beneath the quilts of the king-sized brass bed in the honeymoon suite at the Carlyle; Arian's succulent lips parting to receive fresh strawberries dipped in champagne from his fingertips, her cheeks still flushed in the warm, sweet aftermath of their loving. Tristan swung away from the window to blot out the image, seared by a combustible mix of longing and lust.

  Eleven fifty-five.

  Arian had cost him everything. His humanity. His pride. His best friend. She'd left him nothing but the white-hot throb of his desire.

  Eleven fifty-nine.

  Tristan's fist swiped the clock from the desk before it could chime midnight, shattering time with a single swift blow.

  Sven had locked out the penthouse elevator on the thirteenth floor just as his boss had commanded him to do, but all it took was a deft inputting of Tristan's executive code to send it soaring skyward.

  Tristan was already envisioning his bride, her skin pale against the black satin sheets, her supple limbs sprawled in the innocent abandon of sleep. He would slip into the bedroom between flashes of lightning and gently cover her mouth with his own. He had no way of knowing if she would welcome or reject his embrace and no way of knowing if it still mattered to his jaded conscience.

  The arriving chime of the elevator was drowned out by a sullen growl of thunder. Navigating the shadows, Tristan stepped over a limp puddle of satin before he realized what it was – Arian's wedding gown, peeled off and discarded like the hollow disguise it had been.

  He paused to crush the costly fabric in his fist, his throat tightening at the lingering aroma of orange blossoms and cloves. He'd never wanted anything so badly as he wanted his wife at that moment. Not even revenge.

  Letting the gown trickle from his fingers, he padded toward the bedroom and eased open the door. For an elusive instant as he stood there in the dark, he fancied he heard the mellow sound of her breathing, the echo of a wistful sigh.

  Lightning flared, its eerie flicker illuminating the room.

  The bed was empty. The sheets undisturbed.

  Tristan tore through the penthouse in ten seconds flat, activating every door and switching on every lamp until the suite blazed with light. He looked under the bed, then charged for the closet, nearly battering the door down with his fists when it refused to open on the first try.

  He kicked over racks of ridiculously expensive leather shoes and tore down entire rods of Armani suits, searching every corner, every shelf, and every crevice large enough to harbor a woman of Arian's size. When his search proved to be in vain, he spun around in the center of the enormous closet, his chest heaving with desperation.

  A shelf perched high on the wall caught his eye. He stood on his tiptoes and felt along its length, some instinct already warning him what he would find.

  Nothing.

  No homely black dress with wilted collar and cuffs. No homely black dress that had made Arian look like an escapee from a witch-hunt reenactment at a quaint Salem inn. The sort of inn that attracted wealthy blue-haired widows and antique-seeking yuppies craving a supernatural thrill.

  He staggered out of the closet, wondering if he could have been so terribly wrong. Wondering if Arian hadn't twitched her nose or crossed her arms and blinked herself right out of his wretched life.

  As he wandered into the living room, his dazed perusal discovered what his frantic search had not – a panel of drywall propped against the wall like a piece of missing puzzle. It seemed Arian had exited his life by more conventional means than a broom – through his secret escape hatch, up to the roof, and down the express elevator to the street.

  Sven, Tristan thought, shaking his head in disbelief. Who would have thought sweet, dumb Sven would have the guts to do what even Copperfield hadn't? Defy his boss's wishes and smuggle Arian to freedom.

  A breeze that smelled of rain blew through the gaping hole, sending a scrap of paper fluttering off the coffee table. At first Tristan thought Arian had left him a note. So long, sucker, or some other such sentimental farewell scribbled on the back of one of their wedding napkins in her peach-flavored lipstick.

  But closer examination revealed that she hadn't left him a note. She'd left him a message.

  The million-dollar bank draft in Tristan's hand bluntly informed him that wherever Arian had fled, she wasn't holed up in some luxury hotel in Arthur Finch's bed, giggling over her husband's gullibility. The check was no longer crisp and new, but worn and creased as if it had meant less than nothing to its temporary owner. A blotchy tearstain smeared the arrogant flourish of his signature.

  Tristan sank to his knees on the floor, crumpling the check in his fist. He might have remained that way until his first anniversary if something hadn't butted up against his thigh.

  He reached down blindly, encountering the beguiling softness of baby cat fur. The persistent creature began to worry his thumb.

  Tristan detached its sharp little teeth before they could draw blood and cupped the tiny kitten in his palm, bringing it to eye level.

  "You were her familiar," he said hoarsely. "You were supposed to take care of her."

  The kitten retorted with a plaintive mew that sounded suspiciously similar to, Like hell, bozo. That was your job.

  "Yeah, well, I blew it, too," he confessed.

  Tristan rose, cradling the cat against his chest, and wandered to the window to gaze out over the vast and rain-drenched city. Arian was out there somewhere amid the shuffling homeless and street gangs and wailing sirens. Utterly defenseless. Without her magic. Without her cat. Without him.

  And he would sell what was left of his worthless soul to find her.

  27

  "What do you mean you let her go alone? Are you out of your freaking mind?" Grabbing the gigantic Norwegian by the collar of his pajamas, Tristan hoisted him out of his bed and slammed him against the nearest wall.

  It had taken Tristan over fifteen hours to trace Sven to this cozy TriBeCa walk-up. Fifteen hours of prowling the city streets in icy drizzle, shoving fliers printed with Arian's bridal portrait into every face he saw – drunk faces, white faces, black faces, sympathetic faces, suspicious faces, apathetic faces, frightened faces, hostile faces. He had attracted the usual share of predators throughout the day – baby-faced kids with fuchsia mohawks, pierced noses, and automatic weapons bulging beneath their leather vests, grizzled vets in camouflage pants with flat, lifeless eyes and needle-scarred arms. They would trail him for a few blocks, nudging each other or their invisible demons and hungrily eyeing his expensive coat, his leather shoes. But something in his unshaven face, something feral and slightly mad, would send them slinking away in search of easier prey.

  Arian had been missing for almost twenty-four hours.

  Tristan had spent the first three hours on the telephone, shaking down every police captain and precinct chief who'd ever entreated him to sponsor their annual charity ball. He didn't give a damn if he could hear their wives grumbling in the background or if their own muttered oaths changed to poorly suppressed mirth when they learned the billionaire hotshot from Fifth Avenue had misplaced his bride. All he gave a damn about was that they get on the phone and roust their grumbling men out of their warm, cozy beds to look for Arian.

  Tristan spent three to five a.m. putting his considerable organizational skills to use. He called in most of his own staff, promising them triple overtime for working on Sunday, and helped them assemble and copy a hundred thousand fliers printed with Arian's likeness. He looked away each time a fresh stack emerged from the copy machine, each time he read the mocking words: Reward for the Safe Return of Arian Lennox – One Million Dollars.

  But even when he'd been assured that half of his dedicated staff was saturating the city with fliers while the other half manned the Tower phones, even when he knew a veritable army of New York's finest was combing the city streets, even when he learned that no one of Arian's description had been admitted to any of the area's hospitals and the poor, strangled brunette lying on a cold slab down at the city
morgue was some other man's wife or daughter, it still wasn't enough. So at dawn, when a bitter north wind was already threatening to turn the rain into snow, Tristan had turned up the collar of his coat and ducked out of the Tower on foot without his security detail for the first time in seven years.

  Fifteen hours later, he was roughing up his own bodyguard in a bedroom draped in a dizzying array of paisley and chintz. "You just turned her loose? You didn't offer to go with her? To protect her? How could you do such a witless thing?"

  Sven hung limp in his boss's grip, too stunned and remorseful to put up even a token protest. "She would not let me go. She said she'd already cost me my job and was afraid you'd send me to jail if you found us together." He hung his shaggy head in shame. "I did not want to lose my green card."

  Tristan released him, biting off an oath. "If I hadn't been 'such a bastard, maybe none of this would have happened." He laughed bitterly. "But I'm damn good at it, you know. I've had a lifetime of practice."

  He paced the small room, growing more claustrophobic with each pass. The proliferation of flowers and stripes was making his weary eyes cross. When he spotted the sleek Walther on the bureau, he knew exactly what he'd been looking for. As Tristan drew the gun from its leather holster, Sven threw his hands up, obviously thinking he was done for.

  But Tristan simply checked to make sure the gun was loaded, then jammed it into the waistband of his jeans. "You head toward the Lower East Side. I'm going north. She might have sought shelter in the park."

  "Sir?" Sven called out meekly as Tristan strode toward the door. "Am I fired?"

  "Hell, yes, you're fired!" Tristan barked. "Now get to work!" Sven was still scratching his head, struggling to comprehend this bewildering turn of events when Tristan pivoted on his heel. "One more thing, Nordgard."

  "Sir?"

  Tristan's smile was almost conciliatory. "The next time you move, would you please take the time to upgrade the address on your personnel file?"