by Ким Харрисон
Still smiling, I rolled to my feet and padded into the living room to get the phone before the machine picked it up. Poor Nick. I was sure he felt that last one.
"Nick," I blurted before he could say anything. "I'm sorry. Jenks's kids had me under the kitchen table and were throwing splat balls at me. God help me, but it was funny. They're in the garden right now, making rings around the ash tree and singing about cold steel."
"Rachel?"
It was Glenn, and my mirth died at his worried tone. "What?" I said, looking at the trees through the shoulder-high windows. The spots of water covering me were suddenly cold, and I clasped an arm around myself.
"I'll be there in ten minutes," he said. "Can you be ready?"
I pushed my damp hair back. "Why? What's happened?" I asked.
I heard him cover the receiver and shout something at someone. "You got your warrant to search Kalamack's property," he said when he returned.
"How?" I questioned, not believing Edden had caved. "Not that I'm complaining!"
Glenn hesitated. He took a slow breath, and I heard excited voices in the background. "Dr. Anders called me last night," he said. "She knew you were going to follow her, so she moved her presentation to last night and asked me to go with her instead."
"The witch," I exclaimed softly, wishing I could have seen what Glenn had worn. I bet it had been sharp. But when he remained silent, the cold feeling in my stomach solidified into a sour lump.
"I'm sorry, Rachel," Glenn said softly. "Her car went off Roebling Bridge this morning, pushed over the rail by what appeared to be a huge bubble of ley line force. They just pulled her car from the river. We're still looking for the body."
Nineteen
My foot jiggled as I impatiently stood beside the stack of manuals and empty paper cups that lined the sill of Trent's gatehouse. Jenks was on my earring, muttering darkly as he watched Quen punch a button on the phone. I'd seen Quen only once before—possibly twice. The first time, he was masquerading as a gardener, actually managing to catch Jenks in a glass ball. I had a growing suspicion that Quen had been the third rider who tried to run me down on horseback the night I stole my blackmail disc from Trent. It was a feeling that solidified when Jenks told me Quen smelled just like Trent and Jonathan.
Quen reached in front of me for a pen, and I jerked back, not wanting him to touch me. Still on the phone, he smiled carefully, showing me extremely white, even teeth. This one, I thought, knew what I was capable of. This one wouldn't underestimate me as Jonathan continually did. And though it was nice being taken seriously for once, I wished Quen was as egotistical and chauvinistic as Jonathan was.
Trent had once said Quen was willing to take me on as a student—after the security officer got over his desire to kill me for infiltrating the Kalamack compound. I wondered if I would have survived having him as a teacher.
Quen looked about the age my father would be if he were still alive. He had very dark hair that curled about his ears, green eyes that always seemed to be watching me, and a dancer's grace that I knew came from a lifetime of martial arts practice. Dressed in a black security uniform with no insignia, he looked like he belonged to the night. He was a shade taller than I was in heels, and the strength in his lightly wrinkled physique had me on edge. His fingers were quick on a keyboard and his eyes were faster. The only weakness I'd noticed was a slight limp. And unlike everyone else in the room besides me, he had no weapon that I could see.
Captain Edden stood beside me, looking squat but capable in his khaki pants and white shirt. Glenn was in another of his black suits, trying to look collected despite his obvious nervousness. Edden, too, looked worried that he was going to have egg on his face if we didn't find anything.
I adjusted my bag higher onto my shoulder and fidgeted. It was full of charms to find Dr. Anders, dead or alive. I had made Glenn wait while I whipped them up, using the paper she had written her address on as the focal object. If there was a shoe box left of her, the charms would light red. With them was a lie amulet, my wire-framed glasses to see through ley line disguises, and a spell checker. I was going to take the opportunity while talking to Trent to see if he used a charm to disguise his appearance. Nobody looks that good without help.
Outside, parked in the lot beside the gatehouse, were three FIB vans. The doors were open and the officers looked hot as they waited in the heat of an unseasonably warm afternoon. The breeze from Jenks's wings sent a wisp of hair to tickle my neck. "Can you hear him?" I breathed as Quen turned away and began speaking into the phone.
"Oh, yeah," the pixy muttered. "He's talking to Jonathan. Quen is telling him he's standing in the gatehouse with you and Edden with a warrant to search the property and he bloody well just better wake him up."
"Him being Trent?" I guessed, and felt my earring swing as Jenks nodded. I looked at the clock over the door, seeing it was a little after two. Must be nice.
Edden cleared his throat as Quen hung up. Trent's security officer made no bones about letting us know he was unhappy. His light wrinkles deepened as his jaw clenched, and his green eyes were hard. "Captain Edden, Mr. Kalamack is understandably upset, and would like to speak with you while your people carry out your search."
"Of course," Edden said, and a small sound of disbelief escaped me.
"Why are you being so nice?" I muttered as Quen ushered us through the heavy glass and metal doors and back into the strong sun.
"Rachel," Edden breathed, tension carrying through his whisper, "you will be polite and gracious or you will wait in the car."
Gracious, I thought. Since when were ex–Navy SEALs gracious? Hard-nosed, aggressive, politically correct to the point of being anal. Ah…he was being politically correct.
Edden leaned close as he held the door to one of the vans for me. "And then we're going to nail his ass to a tree," he added, confirming my suspicions. "If Kalamack murdered her, we'll get him," he said, his eyes on Quen as the man swung into an estate vehicle. "But if we bull in here like storm troopers, a jury will let him go even if he confesses. It's all in the procedure. I've stopped traffic in and out. No one leaves without a search."
I squinted at him, putting a hand to my hat to keep it from blowing off. I'd much rather have screamed in with twenty cars and sirens blazing, but I'd have to be satisfied with this.
The drive up the three-mile entry road through the wood Trent maintained about his estate was quiet since Jenks had gone with Glenn in the estate car to try and figure out what kind of Inderlander Quen was. We followed Quen's security vehicle around the last turn and pulled into the empty visitor's parking lot.
I couldn't help but be impressed by Trent's main building. The three-story edifice was settled in among the surrounding vegetation as if it had been here for hundreds of years rather than forty. The white marble sent glints of sunlight to pool against the trees like a sunrise from the west. Large pillars and wide shallow steps made an inviting entry. Surrounded by trees and gardens, the office buildings had a sense of permanence those in the city lacked. Several smaller buildings sprawled from the main one, attached by covered walkways. Trent's renowned walled gardens took up much of the side and back, the acres of well-tended plants surrounded by fields of grass and then his eerie planned-out forest.
I was the first one out of the van, my gaze crossing the road to the distant low-slung buildings where Trent raised his thoroughbreds. A tour bus was just leaving, obnoxiously noisy and emblazoned with advertisements to visit Trent's gardens.
Jenks flitted up to land on my shoulder, since my current earrings were too small for him to perch on, grumbling about his inability to figure out what Quen was. I turned back to the main building and started up the stone steps, heels clicking in a steady cadence. Edden was quick behind me.
My gut tightened when I saw a familiar silhouette waiting for us by the marble pillars. "Jonathan," I whispered, my dislike for the extremely tall man swinging into a slow hatred. Just once I'd like to climb those stairs and not have h
is haughty eyes on me.
My lips went tight and I suddenly was glad for having worn my best suit-dress despite the unseasonable heat. Jonathan's suit was exquisite. It had to have been tailored to him since he was too tall to be able to buy anything off the rack. His dark hair was graying around the temples, and the wrinkles around his eyes were embedded as if acid had etched them in concrete. He had been a child during the Turn, seemingly marked forever by its fear in his gaunt, almost malnourished stance.
Tidy and overdressed, his manner screamed British Englishman, but his accent was as midwestern as mine. He was clean shaven, his cheeks and thin lips never stirring from a perpetual frown unless it was at someone's expense. He had grinned the entire three days I had been a mink trapped in a cage in Trent's office, his vivid blue eyes alive and eager as he tormented me.
Quen strode quickly up the stairs to pull ahead of me. My eye started to tic as the two men put their heads together. They turned, Jonathan's professional smile laced with professional irritation. Nice.
"Captain Edden," he said, extending his thin hand as Edden and I halted before them. Edden's muscular build looked almost dumpy as he shook hands with him. "I'm Jonathan, Mr. Kalamack's publicity adviser. Mr. Kalamack is waiting for you," he added, the congeniality in his voice never reaching his eyes. "He asked me to relay his desire to help any way he can."
Jenks snickered from my shoulder. "He could tell us where he stashed Dr. Anders."
He whispered it, but both Quen and Jonathan stiffened. I pretended to check the French braid I'd put my hair in—subtly threatening to smack Jenks—then put my hands behind my back to forestall a handshake with Jonathan. I wouldn't touch him. Unless it was my fist in his gut. Damn, I really missed my handcuffs.
"Thank you," Edden said, eyebrows raised at the evil glances Jonathan and I were exchanging. "We'll try to make this as quick and nonintrusive as possible."
As I stood and glowered, Edden pulled Glenn aside. "Keep the search low-key but thorough," he said as Jonathan's eyes flicked over my shoulder to the FIB officers assembling in a loose conglomeration on the wide steps. They had brought several dogs with them, all wearing blue body sleeves with FIB emblazoned on them in yellow. Their tails waved enthusiastically and they were clearly eager to get to work.
Glenn nodded, and I swung my bag around. "Here," I said, pulling out a handful of charms and dumping them into his grip. "I primed them on the way over. They're set to find Dr. Anders whether she is dead or alive. Give them to whoever will take them. They'll turn red if they get within a hundred feet of her."
"I'll make sure every team has one," Glenn said, his brown eyes startled as he tried to keep from dropping them.
"Hey, Rache," Jenks said as he flitted off my shoulder. "Glenn asked me to tag along with him. You mind? I can't do anything sitting pretty on your shoulder."
"Sure, go ahead," I said, thinking he could search the garden better than a pack of dogs.
A worried frown crossed Jonathan's long face, and I beamed sarcastically at him. Pixies and fairies weren't allowed on the grounds as a general rule, and I'd wear my panties on the outside for a week if someone would tell me what Trent was afraid Jenks might find.
Quen and Jonathan exchanged a silent look. The shorter man's lips went tight and his green eyes pinched. Looking as if he'd rather make mud pies out of crap than leave Jonathan alone to accompany us with Trent, Quen hustled after Jenks. My eyes tracked the security officer as he all but flowed down the stairs, his hurried grace mesmerizing.
Jonathan straightened as he returned his attention to us. "Mr. Kalamack is waiting for you in his front office," he said stiffly as he opened a door.
I gave him a nasty smile as I lurched into motion. "Touch me, and I'll hurt you," I threatened as I yanked open the door next to the one Jonathan held.
The main lobby was spacious and eerily empty, the hushed murmur of business silenced with everyone gone for the weekend. Not waiting for Jonathan, I went straight down the wide corridor to Trent's office. Hands fumbling in my purse, I pulled out my ungodly expensive and criminally ugly charmed ley line glasses and put them on my nose. Jonathan gave up on his show of decorum, leaving Edden behind to catch up with me.
I strode down the hallway, my fists clenched and heels thumping. I wanted to see Trent. I wanted to tell him what I thought of him and spit in his face for having tried to break my will by putting me in the city's illegal rat fights.
The frosted doors to either side of me were open, showing empty desks. Farther down was a reception desk tucked into an alcove across from Trent's door. Sara Jane's desk was as neat and organized as the woman herself. Heart pounding, I reached for the handle of Trent's door, jerking back as Jonathan caught up. Giving me a look that could rock an attacking dog back on his haunches, the tall man knocked on Trent's wooden door, waiting until his muffled voice came before opening it.
Edden came even with me, his cross look faltering in shock as he saw my glasses. On edge, I touched my hat and tugged my jacket straight. Maybe I should have asked Ivy for a loan and gotten the pretty ones. The sound of water over rocks filtered out of Trent's office, and I entered hot on Jonathan's heels.
Trent rose from behind his desk as I came in. I took a breath to give him a snide but sincere greeting. I wanted to tell him I knew he had killed Dr. Anders. I wanted to tell him he was scum. I wanted to get in his face and scream that I was better than him, that he would never break me, that he was a manipulative bastard and I was going to bring him down. But I did nothing, taken aback by his calm, inner core of strength. He was the most self-possessed man I had ever met, and I stood silent as his thoughts visibly shifted from other matters to focus on me. And no, he didn't use a ley line charm to make him look that good. It was all him.
Every strand of his wispy, almost transparent hair was in place. His gray, silk-lined suit was unwrinkled, accenting the narrow-waisted, wide-shouldered physique I had spent three days ogling as a mink. Standing taller than I was, he gave me his trademark smile: an enviable mix of warmth and professional interest. He adjusted his jacket with a casual slowness, his long fingers drawing my attention as he manipulated the last button. There was only a single ring on his right hand, and like me, he wore no watch at all.
Trent was supposed to be only three years older than I—making him one of the wealthiest bachelors on the freaking planet—but the suit made him look older. Even so, his nicely defined jawline as well as his smooth cheeks and small nose made him look suited more for the beach than the boardroom.
Still smiling that confident, almost pleased smile, he ducked his head, taking his wire-rimmed glasses off and tossing them to the desktop. Embarrassed, I put my own charmed spectacles away in their hard leather case. My eyes went to his right arm as he came around to the front of his desk. It had been in a cast the last time I saw him, which was probably why the gun he'd shot at me missed. There was a faint ring of lighter skin between his hand and the cuff of his jacket that the sun hadn't yet had a chance to darken.
I stiffened as his gaze drifted over me, resting briefly on the pinky ring he had stolen from me and returned to prove he could, finally settling on my neck and the almost invisible scarring from my demon attack. "Ms. Morgan, I wasn't aware you could work for the FIB," he said by way of greeting, making no move to shake my hand.
"I'm a consultant," I said, ignoring how his liquid voice had pulled my breath tight. I had forgotten his voice, all amber and honey—if color and taste could describe a sound—resonant and deep, each syllable clear and precise yet blending into the next like liquid. It was mesmerizing in a way that only ancient vampires could match. And it bothered me that I liked it.
I met his gaze, trying to show a mirror image of his confidence. Jittery, I extended my arm, forcing him to respond. His hand came out to meet mine with the barest of hesitations. A stab of satisfaction warmed me in that I had made him do something he didn't want to, even if it was something this small.
Feeling cocky, I slipped
my hand into Trent's. Though his green eyes were cold with the knowledge that I'd forced him into touching me, his grip was warm and firm. I wondered how long he had been practicing it. Satisfied, I loosened my grip, but instead of doing the same, Trent's hand slipped from mine with an intimate slowness that wasn't at all professional. I would have said he had just made a pass at me but for the slight tightening of his eyes, which spoke of a wary caution.
"Mr. Kalamack," I said, refusing to wipe my hand on my skirt. "You're looking good."
"As are you." His smile was frozen in place, and his right hand was almost behind his back. "I understand you're doing reasonably well with your little investigation firm. I imagine it's difficult when you're just starting out."
Little investigation firm? My unease flashed into irritation. "Thank you," I managed.
A smile quirking the corner of his mouth, Trent turned his attention to Edden. As the two professional men made polite, politically correct and hypocritical niceties, I glanced over Trent's office. His fake window still showed a live shot of one of his yearling pastures, the artificial light shining through the video screen to make a warm patch of glowing carpet. There was a new school of black and white fish in the zoo-size fish tank, and the freestanding aquarium had been moved into a recess built into the wall behind his desk. The spot where my cage had been held a potted orange tree, and the scent-memory of food pellets made my stomach clench. The camera at the ceiling in the corner blinked its little red light at me.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Captain Edden," Trent was saying, the smooth cadence of his voice luring my attention. "I wish it could be under better circumstances."
"Mr. Kalamack." Edden's sharp staccato sounded harsh against Trent's voice. "I apologize for any inconvenience incurred while we search your grounds."
Jonathan handed Trent the warrant, and he looked at it briefly before handing it back. "Corporal evidence leading to an arrest in the deaths known as the witch hunter murders?" he said, his eyes flicking to mine. "That's a little broad, isn't it?"