Cyn turned a puzzled look on Nick. “Do you think Marshall plans to use the manacles for something . . . violent? Granted, his sexual tastes are unconventional, but I couldn’t find anyone who’d been hurt by them. His partners are all part of the same underground community and seem willing enough.”
Nick regarded her silently for a moment, trying to figure out the best way to convince her that getting the manacles back was an urgent matter without revealing too much. He’d assumed she and Raphael wouldn’t need much convincing, because of their personal experience with the manacles. And it had seemed to be enough, right up until the moment Isaac Marshall was identified as the buyer. Cyn had a point about Marshall not being violent, and not particularly dangerous, at least not overtly . . . though he had no doubts that Marshall would feel quite justified in killing anyone who tried to steal from him. Unfortunately, that only argued against going after the damn things, because it might be more dangerous to try to take them, rather than leaving them in place.
But Nick had reasons of his own for getting the manacles into his own collection. Reasons he wasn’t eager to share. He glanced up and found the damn vampire staring at him, his black eyes intent and seeing far too much. Suddenly, the vamp’s lips curled into a smug smile, and he laughed.
CYN JOLTED IN surprise when Raphael laughed. Not only because he didn’t laugh like that very often, but because there was a cruel edge to it that she found troubling. She opened her mouth to ask what was going on, but in the same moment, everything changed.
Nick jumped to his feet, kicking the heavy coffee table out of the way as he launched an attack. She felt the faintest brush of his power before Raphael roared his fury and shoved her aside, pulling on his own power to slam Nick backward, the force of his attack so great that the sofa Nick had been sitting on went flying toward the door. The two of them faced off, only inches apart, chests heaving, hands curled into fists, while a crackling energy pounded through the room. The walls seemed to pulse from the pressure, the crystal chandelier overhead chiming a discordant music.
Raphael’s guards were there in an instant, Juro even sooner. Nick gave them an unconcerned glance then turned back to Raphael with a sneer. “Calling in the troops? Afraid to stand on your own, vampire?”
Raphael shot a quick look at his vampires, holding them in place as he snarled, “You should have stayed where you belonged, sorcerer. This is my world now.”
Cyn felt like she was in the middle of an electrical storm. The hair on her arms was standing stiff and straight, and her ears ached from the unbearable pressure. She was only feet away from them, but Raphael and Nick seemed unaware of anyone but each other. Raphael’s eyes were pure silver and filled with hate, and Nick seemed taller and bigger, radiating a power that Cyn had never known he possessed.
She glanced once at Juro, who had settled into a wait-and-see stance near the entrance to the room. But she wasn’t willing to wait. She wanted to know what the hell had happened. Granted, they’d been bickering for days, but what had set them off like this? She played back the conversation in her head. They’d been talking about the manacles and why it was so important to get them back since Marshall had no history of violence. What did it matter whose vault the damn things sat in, as long as they were secure? She tilted her head curiously at the thought. Why did it matter? Why was Nick so set on having them for himself?
A loud crack of power abruptly snapped in the room, like a mini lightning strike. And like lightning, it dispersed, reaching up to the light fixture and spreading outward, crackling against the lamp to Cyn’s right and burning a trail over her bare forearm.
She cried out in shock as unexpected pain raced up her arm and squeezed her heart.
Raphael spun at the sound of her cry, concern replacing the anger in his eyes as he wrapped his arms around her, sheltering her from the energy still sizzling through the room. “Lubimaya,” he whispered. “I’m sorry.”
Cyn nodded, soaking his shirt with unwilling tears that she couldn’t seem to stop, still trying to make sense of what had happened. She looked over Raphael’s shoulder and saw Nick watching them unhappily. But was that because she’d been hurt, or was it something else? What the hell was happening here?
She pulled back enough to meet Raphael’s eyes. “What’s going on?” she asked him, and was surprised when, instead of answering her question, he swung them both around to face Nick.
“Don’t.” It sounded like an order coming from Nick, but she could see the plea in his eyes.
“What?” she asked, more confused than ever.
Raphael shot Nick one of his most cruel smiles and said, “He created them.”
She frowned in confusion at first, but then switched her gaze to Nick, staring at him, waiting for him to deny it. But he wasn’t looking at her. He was too busy glaring his hatred at Raphael. But what he didn’t do was deny what Raphael had said. Nick had created the Amber Manacles? She’d thought they were friends, but now she wondered if she knew anything about him at all.
“Nick?” she said, asking him for this one truth.
His gaze shifted to her reluctantly. “It was a long time ago,” he said quietly. “The world was a different place.”
Cyn examined what she was feeling in that moment. It was stupid to be hurt by this news, on top of everything else she’d learned about him. It was even worse to feel disappointed, as if he’d let her down somehow. He didn’t owe her anything. And the reality was that Raphael had done a lot of terrible things in the past and would do so in the future, too, without a second thought. His world was a violent place, so maybe Nick’s was, too. Magic of whatever kind changed a person; immortality changed him even more. So Nick had created a set of handcuffs designed to torment a prisoner. She’d seen Raphael torture prisoners with incredible cruelty, sometimes in search of information, and sometimes simply to exact revenge on someone who’d crossed him. How was that any different?
She sighed, knowing the answers to her questions weren’t easy, if there were any answers at all. Maybe the worlds of magic and humanity should simply never have crossed paths. And maybe that was even more true of sorcerers and vampires. It seemed Raphael and Nick had had the right of it all along. She glanced around at the ruin of the living room. Those two needed to stay far away from each other, because they sure as hell weren’t getting anything done this way.
Cyn made a decision in that moment. She’d joked about it to Raphael, but the truth was that she didn’t need either one of them mucking things up, adding their personal drama to what was really just a basic breaking and entering. She’d do it herself. Go in, get it done, and get out. Nick could take the damn manacles and go back to Florida. And Raphael could flip him off, then go uptown to meet Rajmund.
And she and Sarah could go fucking shopping.
But first . . .
“All right,” she said calmly, smoothing a hand over her hair, which was still crackling with electrostatic energy. “So how do we do this?”
Nick had been watching her, his hazel gold eyes begging her to understand. But now he shuttered that emotion, his gaze going flat and businesslike. “We need to move on Marshall before he knows we’re coming. He’ll have guards on his estate, and some of the artifacts he owns are quite dangerous in the right hands. He’s not an adept, no magical ability of his own, but he has resources. There’s no guarantee that he doesn’t have someone on staff with enough magical talent to be a problem.”
“Can you sense them, if he does?”
He nodded. “If I can get close enough. A decent adept can shield, but not from me. I’ll know if there’s a magic user on the estate.”
“Okay, so we go in there tomorrow night,” she said.
“He’ll expect that,” Nick protested. “By now, he knows that the previous owner was a vampire, but he won’t know that she’s dead . . . which means, if she wants her pro
perty back, she’ll come at night.” He sucked in a breath and glanced at Raphael. “Cyn and I should go in during the day.”
If Cyn hadn’t been holding on to Raphael, the two of them would have started in on each other all over again. His arms were steel bands around her, his eyes flashing silver as he stared at Nick and said with a deceptive calm, “No way in hell.”
Nick opened his mouth to snarl back at Raphael, but Cyn interrupted.
“Enough,” she snapped. “This is getting us nowhere. We’ll all go in together tomorrow night. And we’ll deal with whatever, or whomever, we find,” she added in a loud voice when Nick would have protested. “I’m sure between the three of us, we can handle whatever security enhancements Marshall has waiting. Now, if you two don’t mind, I’m tired and I’m sore—” She ignored the flash of guilt on Raphael’s face. “—and I want to go to bed.”
She eased herself out of Raphael’s grip gently, not wanting to upset him. She wasn’t angry with him, or with Nick either. Despite the violence of his attack, she’d never felt threatened. He’d actually been fairly pinpoint accurate in targeting only Raphael. She was, however, sad. As if by discovering how little she knew about him, she’d actually lost a friend.
But more than anything, she was sick and tired of dealing with their drama. And, besides, she needed some time alone to come up with her own plans for breaking in to Marshall’s vault tomorrow.
CYN WAS ALREADY in bed by the time Raphael finally made it to their suite on the second floor. She knew he’d needed to deal with his vampires, to reassure them that he was all right, and to make sure that they didn’t decide to kill Nick for the crime of threatening their lord. Assuming they could kill Nick. She didn’t know what kind of power he had, though she suspected Raphael, at least, could kill Nick if he tried. It was likely that the only thing holding him back earlier had been his concern over her reaction.
“Everything okay out there?” she asked, glancing up from her iPad as if she’d been doing nothing more than reading a book . . . rather than hacking into the Dobbs Ferry city building office to get blueprints of Isaac Marshall’s estate. It had been shockingly easy. The local government really needed to beef up its Internet security.
Raphael studied her briefly, his black eyes trying to see into her brain to figure out what she was thinking.
Ha! Fat chance of that.
“The sorcerer went back to his hotel for now,” he said finally. “We’ll meet here tomorrow night and discuss our plans on the way to Marshall’s estate.”
“You think that’s enough time to plan?” she asked, as if it mattered. By the time they met tomorrow night, the deed would be done . . . by her.
“It will have to be. There’s only so much time I can waste on reclaiming something I don’t care about.”
Cyn swallowed the conciliatory words that sprang to mind. There was no point trying to persuade the two of them to get along. “What about your vampires?” she asked. “Do they get to party when this is all over with? I mean, as long as we’re in New York?”
Raphael smiled as he walked over to the huge walk-in closet, stopping to pull his sweater off before answering her question. “I’ve already sent some of my guard into the city to feed. Rajmund has given us carte blanche at any of his clubs.”
Cyn had trouble remembering what she wanted to say. A half-naked Raphael was a sight to behold, his chest and shoulders padded with muscle, his abdomen and belly ripped and tight. She licked her lips as he disappeared into the closet, freeing up some of her brain cells. “Did Juro go?” she asked finally, mostly because Juro was living with her best friend Lucia and she wanted to know if he was being a good boyfriend.
Raphael reappeared, fully naked, damn him. He gave her a knowing look before answering her question. “Juro is downstairs. He only feeds from Lucia these days, as you well know.”
She shrugged, pretending innocence. “I thought maybe since he’s here, and Luci’s way back there . . .”
“And if I was here, and you were way back there?”
Her gaze narrowed. “I’d stake you in your sleep.”
He laughed, then crossed to the bed, leaning over to kiss her as he pulled the covers back and climbed in next to her. “I want no one but you, my Cyn.”
He pulled her down under the covers, tossing her iPad to one side, wrapping his arm around her and holding her close. A naked Raphael was a thing of beauty. A naked Raphael holding her close sent a delicious thrill chasing along her nerves, making her pussy warm and wet with excitement. Unfortunately, her pussy would have to wait a few hours. The night was too short, the sun nearly risen. Raphael’s arm was tight around her, but she’d spent enough nights with him by now to recognize the encroaching signs of his daylight sleep. His heart began to slow its steady rhythm, his breathing became deeper, each breath longer and slower, and his muscles gradually took on a languid quality.
The fingers that had been playing with her hair fell suddenly still against her neck, and Raphael tipped his head to kiss her temple. “Don’t do it, my Cyn,” he murmured.
She stiffened guiltily, then forced herself to relax. “What?” she asked, feigning confusion.
He didn’t fall for it, of course. “Whatever it is you’re planning. Don’t do it. Unless you’d like your sweet ass to be bright pink tomorrow night.”
She snorted. “Promises, promises.” That drew a sleepy smile from him. She pushed herself up and placed a soft kiss against his lips. “I love you, fang boy.”
“I love you too, my Cyn. But I know you. We’ll go after the manacles together tomorrow night as planned. Let the damn sorcerer take the risks to reclaim them. And then we’ll go home and get back to our lives.”
“After shopping,” she reminded him, and he smiled again.
“After shopping,” he agreed, his eyes already half-closed.
“Sounds like a plan,” she said sincerely. Although she didn’t tell him that the only part that sounded good was the getting back to our lives. And the shopping. Everything else he’d said was bullshit. He couldn’t even say Nick’s name, and yet somehow the three of them were supposed to agree to a plan, act on it successfully, then bid each other a fond farewell . . . all in one night. Yeah, right.
“Cynthia,” Raphael said in his best, half-asleep, tough guy voice. He only used her full name when he was trying to project a stern, you-will-obey-me attitude. It never worked, but she gave him props for trying.
His breath ran out in a long sigh, and his arm loosened, eventually falling from her shoulder. The sun was up.
“Don’t worry, baby,” she said softly. “I know what I’m doing.”
She waited until she knew he was asleep, and then she climbed out of bed and got dressed. Early morning was the best time to sneak onto an estate like Isaac Marshall’s. His guards would be relaxed, tired, and still propping themselves up with large doses of caffeine. And then there were his rather vigorous nighttime sexual habits that she’d uncovered. She was willing to bet—she actually was betting—that he slept late most mornings, but especially on the proverbial morning after. Based on his credit card usage, there was a very telling pattern in Marshall’s shady social activities. She knew which nights he habitually indulged, and Sunday night, last night, was a day he never seemed to miss. She hadn’t shared this with Raphael or Nick. She suspected it was because, in the back of her mind, she’d already known she’d be going in solo.
That didn’t mean she wouldn’t prepare, however. Contrary to how Raphael seemed to view her actions, she always did her research. She enjoyed the adrenaline rush of taking on a dangerous task, but the real thrill was making it out the other side successfully. She rolled over and grabbed the iPad that Raphael had tossed aside, then pulled up the blueprints to Marshall’s estate once more. She’d already marked the areas in his estate house that she considered suspicious, meaning they we
re possible locations for his vault. If he was as secretive as Nick indicated, he wouldn’t show the vault itself on these official blueprints. The places she’d highlighted were rooms that didn’t seem to fit their description. A ballroom with only one entrance marked. A basement kitchen with no plumbing. One of those had to be the vault. Hopefully they weren’t both vaults, because it would be bad enough trying to gain access to one. There were so many things that could go wrong with her plan, but her nightmare scenario was discovering something like a bank vault, with individual drawers and compartments each secured with a separate key. Anything else, and she was confident she could crack the main door security. And after that . . . well, she hoped Marshall was vain enough to display his collection, letting her shop through the aisles for what she wanted.
She didn’t wear her usual breaking and entering clothes, which would have been black combat pants and boots, with a long-sleeved T-shirt. That outfit made sense, but it would be much harder to explain if she was discovered. Instead, she went with functional but stylish. Skinny black jeans and black, flat-soled leather boots that hit her knees. She wore a black, long-sleeved T-shirt, but this one had a low, V-neck that framed her full breasts and displayed considerable cleavage. Boobage wasn’t her norm when going into a combat situation, but when discovery was a possibility, it was always good to keep the sexy option open.
She’d already downloaded the blueprints onto her cell phone, so she checked the battery charge, then slipped the silenced phone into her pocket. Letting herself out of the secure suite, she made sure it was all locked up behind her, then headed downstairs. Steve Sipes met her at the bottom of the stairs.
“Going out, Cyn?”
She nodded. “Having lunch with a friend. She’s in New Jersey, so I’ll be taking one of the SUVs, if that’s okay?”
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