by Rebecca York
Unable to squelch a feeling of anticipation, she got up and unlocked the door that she’d locked a few minutes earlier. While she was up, she made a quick trip to the ladies’ room where she used the facilities, then combed her chin-length blond hair, stroked a little mascara on her lids, and put on some fresh lipstick.
“Going out on a date?” Betty Custer asked as she came out of the other stall. Betty worked down the hall for a trucking company. A petite redhead, she was a few years older than Olivia, and they’d gotten to know each other.
“I wish,” Olivia answered. “Carl has me stuck here for the evening.”
“You’re not putting on lipstick for Carl, are you?” Betty asked as she washed her hands.
Olivia flushed. “Luke Garner is coming by.”
When she’d found out Betty had gone to high school with Luke, Olivia had pumped her for information about him. And Betty knew Olivia liked him.
“Did he finally ask you out?” Betty asked.
Olivia inspected her appearance in the mirror, liking the way the mascara set off her blue eyes. Not too bad for a woman who’d been at work all day. “Maybe I can push him over the edge tonight.”
“Good luck.”
oOo
In truth, Luke Garner was not fifteen minutes away. He was in a parking lot a few blocks from the Peterbalm offices.
From his remote location, he’d disabled Olivia’s computer, and now he was on his way over to fix the problem he’d created.
Damn. He hated lying to Olivia, but that had been part of his cover assignment from Decorah Security.
Frank Decorah had told his staff that something big was going to happen at Peterbalm’s. It had to do with a crate of antiques that had been shipped from France. There was an item in the consignment that Frank wanted secured. And Luke had been given the assignment of scooping it up. He was in the Decorah IT department, but really, he wanted to switch to the detective staff. And maybe this gig would do it.
Another plus for Luke was that he’d grown up in Baltimore. And he’d actually worked for a computer shop in the city before joining the Decorah IT team.
All that had made it easy for Frank to get him onto the Marathon repair staff. Decorah was paying his salary, and Luke simply had to be on standby to fix any computer problems at Peterbalm—of which there had been a lot recently.
He started his engine and drove the few blocks to the warehouse where Peterbalm had his import business.
It was after hours. Olivia would be alone. Too bad his dealings with her had to be strictly business. But when the Decorah assignment was over, maybe they could get something going. Unless she found out he was the one who’d been screwing up her computer.
He gave Decorah a call and got Brand Marshall, one of the agents.
“The shipment Frank’s looking for may have come in from France.”
“Okay good.”
“I disabled the office machine, and I’m on my way to see what’s up.”
“Keep us informed.”
oOo
Olivia paced back and forth as she waited for Luke to arrive, glancing occasionally at the carved chest that still sat on the table with the other antiques. It was just a box, for Lord’s sake. But the damn thing made her nervous. She couldn’t help thinking that it was going to bring her bad luck. Really, she’d like to get it out of the office. But she couldn’t just throw it away. Not when Carl had already seen it.
Wait—what was she thinking? Throw away a valuable antique. Of course not.
Instead of focusing on the chest, she turned her thoughts back to Luke Garner. By her standards, he was a rough-around-the-edges kind of guy. Not like the young businessmen or lawyers she’d met at church. But she’d been attracted to him from the first time he’d come to the office to fix a mysterious computer glitch.
She thought back over their phone conversation. He’d been flirting with her. Hadn’t he?
Maybe they could keep the banter going in person.
A noise at the door made her go rigid. When she whirled around, she saw Luke and breathed out a sigh.
“That was fast. Thanks for coming.”
“For you—anything.” A cocky smile flashed across his face as he strode into the room, glancing from the computer to her and back again. “So what’s going on with this puppy?” he asked.
“It froze and now it won’t boot.” As she answered, she realized that it was after hours, and they were alone in the office together. At her invitation.
Was he thinking about that, too?
He went over and fiddled with the keyboard and got the same non-response that she had.
When his cell phone rang, he pulled it out, checked the number, and scowled.
“Who’s that?” she asked.
“A client.”
“And you’re not going to respond?”
“I’m busy.”
He put the phone on the desk, then sat down and started typing on the keyboard.
“I see what’s wrong,” he said.
“Thank God. What?”
“Give me a minute.”
He typed some more, and the screen flashed to life again.
“It’s fixed?” she asked.
“Uh huh.”
“What were you working on?”
“I’m logging in a shipment of antiques.”
“Like what?”
She waved her hand toward the crates. “All of that stuff.”
oOo
Luke got up and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. When Decorah had called back, he hadn’t been able to respond in front of Olivia.
But the shipment was almost certainly what Frank was waiting for. In it was supposed to be an antique wooden chest with flowers and stuff on it. Frank hadn’t had a picture, but he’d said it would be distinctive.
“What if I helped with the unpacking?”
“Would you?”
“Sure.” He walked toward the cases, then stopped at the table where she’d set the objects she’d already removed. The box was there. At least, it looked like the right box.
Now that he saw it, he had the feeling he shouldn’t pick it up. He did it anyway, turning it over in his hands. “What’s this?”
“My friend, Beth Lawrence, says it’s from an old religious cult. The Moon Priests.”
Somehow, hearing the name sent a shiver over his skin.
“She says they were supposed to have magic powers.”
“Oh yeah?” Frank hadn’t been specific about why they were supposed to secure the box.
“When I touch it, I get this tingling sensation.”
He did too. He should put the damned thing down. But he felt compelled to move his fingers over the sides of the chest. When he pressed the lower right side of the box, a panel sprang back.
“Hey!” He propped his hips against the table as he turned the box, holding it up to the light and looking at the design. Then he pressed a flower on the left side. Again, a panel opened.
“Stop,” Olivia said, her voice uneven.
He shook his head. From the moment he’d seen the box, he’d known he had to get his hands on it.
“I think it’s . . . dangerous,” she said, but now her voice seemed to be coming from a far distance. “You remember that chest in the Raiders of the Lost Ark?”
“What about it?”
“When the Nazis opened it, something bad happened to them.”
“This isn’t the lost ark.”
“It’s from an ancient religion.”
“And?”
“And . . . it’s giving me the creeps.”
He nodded, but now it seemed impossible to put the thing down. Instead, he kept working on the pressure points. More panels opened, and then the top sprang up.
A white mist came blasting out of the box like it had been fired from a cannon and struck him in the face.
Chapter 2
Olivia gasped.
The whole room seemed to go cold as the white vapor enveloped Lu
ke. He made a strangled sound and staggered back, the fingers of his right hand clamped around the chest. With his free hand, he scrabbled at the edge of the table as he tried to steady himself.
His face had turned pale as death, and a shudder raced across his skin.
“What the hell . . .?” The sentence ended in a wheeze as he tried and failed to fill his lungs.
While Olivia watched in horror, his body began to jerk, like someone having a grand mal seizure. But she was sure it wasn’t because he had any illness. It was from the white mist,
“Luke!” she screamed as he toppled forward, knocking the pitcher off the table when he fell.
The delicate china shattered, and Luke’s body continued to shake as he hit the floor.
“Oh Lord.”
Olivia dropped to her knees, quickly pushing the shards of porcelain out of the way as she knelt beside Luke.
His eyes were closed, and his body was still shaking, his muscles twitching and contracting.
Finally, the quaking stopped, and she whispered a silent prayer.
He lay deathly still, his face pale as salt and his breathing shallow. But at least he was breathing. And when she pressed her fingers to the artery in his neck, she felt his pulse beating and also the warmth of his skin.
“Luke?”
He didn’t answer. What had that awful white mist from the box done to him? Was it some kind of poison? It couldn’t be a virus or bacteria, could it? Not and put him out that fast, she told herself.
But she couldn’t help wondering if she was going to start gasping—then go unconscious.
“Luke?” she said again. She shook his shoulder gently, but he didn’t move. She glanced toward the phone on the table, thinking she should call 911. He needed medical help—help she couldn’t provide.
But when she started to get up, his hand shot out and captured her wrist, holding her in an iron grip.
Her gaze shot to his face as his eyes blinked open and focused on her. They were Luke Garner’s dark eyes, the eyes that had given her an admiring look when he’d first come strolling into the office. Yet, at the same time, they belonged to someone else. A man who was more assessing. More commanding. More dangerous than Luke Garner had ever been.
That was impossible. But she couldn’t shake the conviction that the man clamping her wrist in his hand had changed in some fundamental way when that mist had hit him.
He was staring at her mouth with an open lust that Luke would never have let her see. Or had she been fooling herself about him all along? Was he really a lot less civilized than she’d assumed?
His lips moved, and he said a bunch of syllables that made no sense to her. It was like he was suddenly speaking in a language she couldn’t understand.
“What?”
He didn’t reply.
When she tried to pull away, he kept his fingers clamped around her wrist, but his gaze had turned inward, and it looked like he was listening to some voice she couldn’t hear.
When his lips moved again, he murmured her name, although the accent was strange—as though he had spoken some other language all his life.
“Olivia.”
“You recognize me?”
“Yes.” He had switched from the foreign language to English. “You were with him when he opened the box. Part of his mind was focused on the puzzle of the box. The other part was thinking about how much he wanted to make love to you.” Again, his accent was unfamiliar.
Make love to her? She’d deal with that later.
“What do you mean—him? It was you,” she said in a voice she couldn’t keep steady.
“It was me,” he said slowly, apparently considering the statement. Then his gaze focused on her again.
“Yes, you. Luke Garner.”
“Luke Garner?” he mused. “A strong name. Good.”
He was regarding her with frank sexual interest. “You’re lovely,” he said, his tone deep and rough.
“I have to call 911. You need to go to the hospital.”
His eyes turned fierce. “No.”
Before she could move, he reached up with his free hand and drew her down against the hard wall of his chest.
She managed to say, “Don’t,” before he cupped his hand around the back of her head and brought her lips to his.
His mouth moved under hers, hungry and demanding, like a man who had been denied all pleasure for a thousand years or more. Or maybe a man released from prison and desperate for the sensations of the world.
He changed the pressure of his lips, subtly softening the kiss, and that was sexier than his previous assault.
As he devoured her mouth, his hands were busy, sliding down her back, molding her body to his. Heat roared through her veins.
Somewhere in her mind, she was shocked. By her own behavior and by his.
This was wrong! Luke had just gotten hurt. And she shouldn’t be draped on top of him making out.
If this was Luke.
A dart of fear stabbed her as that notion lodged in her brain again. This had to be Luke. Who else could it be?
The frantic thought evaporated as soon as it had formed. She was too busy responding to the sexy man who clasped her in his arms.
When he realized she wasn’t going to pull away, he drew her lower lip into his mouth, sucking and nibbling. He was good at what he was doing, and she heard a small murmur of arousal rise in her throat.
He seemed to drink in the sound as he silently asked her to open for him. She did, thrilling to the stroking of his tongue against hers. As he deepened the kiss, he slid her body fully on top of his, then swept his fingers across her back, pulling out the hem of her blouse. His hand slipped inside, and as he stroked her skin, he made a needy sound deep in his throat.
His hand was large and warm and firm against her heated flesh.
She moaned again as he reached with his other hand to cup her bottom through the fabric of her slacks, pressing her middle against his erection.
He was ready to make love to her. And she responded with a surge of arousal.
“Hold me,” he said in a gritty voice.
She did as he asked, clutching his broad shoulders as he reversed their positions, coming down on top of her, then raising up on his hands so that he could look into her dazed eyes.
It felt like the world had vanished. Only the two of them existed in a bubble of supercharged sexuality.
She had been attracted to Luke Garner. She had wondered what it would be like to make love with him. Well, now she was finding out. In the past few moments he had turned into the most exciting man she had ever met.
She knew without doubt that he would have her naked soon, and then he would join his body with hers—right here on the floor of her office.
His foot moved, and his boot scraped across the floor, hitting a piece of the pitcher that he’d pulled off the table when he fell.
The sound grated along her nerve endings. When she lifted her head, he kept her on top of himself, yet at the same time, awareness sparked in his eyes.
“What was that?”
“The pitcher. You pushed it off the table when you went down.”
He made a sound that might have been a curse—in that foreign language he’d used before.
“We’re in danger,” he said in a low voice as he moved her off of him so that he could stand and help her to her feet.
“What danger?”
“From the thieves who want the box.”
The answer made no sense to her, yet she heard the absolute conviction in his voice.
He flexed his muscles, moving his arms and legs like a man stretching after a long night’s sleep.
Again he seemed to be paying attention to some voice she couldn’t hear.
“Who are you listening to?” she asked.
“Luke Garner.”
“You are Luke Garner,” she snapped.
“Yes. And also I am Zabastian, the guardian of the box.”
“Oh come on.” Even as she spoke
, she was wondering if he’d seriously damaged his brain when he’d hit the floor. Or had she damaged hers? He’d hurt himself, and she’d come down on top of him, her lips fused to his. Not exactly administering mouth to mouth resuscitation.
She could say that he’d pulled her down. But she hadn’t objected. And he certainly hadn’t been behaving like the Luke Garner she knew. That guy was shy—at least with her.
This man was anything but shy. He was commanding. He knew what he wanted, and he knew how to get it.
He interrupted her thoughts with another of his cryptic comments.
“Luke is still here. But he is not in control. He cannot be. Not now.”
“What are you talking about? Why are you sounding so . . . stilted?”
Ignoring her, he reached down to scoop the box off the floor. “How did you come by this?”
“It arrived in a shipment of antiques—from France.”
“I do not understand the reference,” he said, standing quietly again. Then his expression cleared. “Luke has told me about France. The Coneheads are from France.”
She laughed. “Is that what he thought of first? There are a few other things—like Bordeaux wine. Onion soup. And champagne.”
“We will discuss France later. We must leave before the thieves arrive.”
He turned toward the door.
“Wait a minute. You’re not going anywhere until you explain who you are, if you’re not Luke.”
“I already told you my name. I am Zabastian, a warrior whose spirit was trapped in the box.”
Okay. She’d play along, trying to figure out his game. “Like a genie in a bottle?” she asked sweetly.
“I have heard of that. The genie grants wishes?”
“Yes.”
“I do not,” he said firmly.
She stared at him. Maybe he wasn’t playing games. Maybe he was sick—like with multiple personality disorder or something. And he’d hid it pretty well until he hit his head.
“Luke is still in your body?” she asked carefully.
“Yes.”
“Let me talk to him.”
His face contorted. “We do not have time for a conversation now. We are in danger. We must leave this place.”
Her exasperation bubbled over. “Let me talk to Luke!”
oOo