Glad his near accident and resulting flush were invisible in the darkness, Sebastian hurried after the guard, all his attention back on their mission. The man led them to the corner farthest away from the bar and stopped in front of the silver doors of an elevator where he scanned his thumb on the wall-mounted reader pad. With a flash of green from the security lock, the elevator doors slid silently open and their small group stepped inside. The moment the doors closed behind them, the noise cut off as suddenly as it had started. Sebastian resisted the urge to make a sly comment about it—it would be unwise to joke about magic in unfamiliar company—and instead stared at his fuzzy reflection in the silver doors while the elevator slowly ascended to the next floor.
Their guide led them down more wood-paneled corridors that made Sebastian think of his Great-Grandfather Dee’s manor in England. They finally stopped before a set of double doors, which the guard opened and gestured them through. Sebastian could have sworn he felt the brush of a warm feline body against his ankles as they entered, but when he glanced down he didn’t see a thing.
Romano’s office looked like something straight out of a sun-kissed villa, the kind usually surrounded by olive groves or fields of ripening wheat. Gone was the wood paneling and darker, English-looking accents, replaced by stucco walls of cream that made the room seem airy and twice as large as it actually was. Several well-placed landscape paintings decorated the otherwise unadorned walls, their rich colors of green, blue, and gold transporting the viewer to the fragrant hills of some far-off country—Italy, Sebastian assumed, based on Romano’s name. The furniture was simple but elegant, matching the uncluttered look of the walls with just a pair of bookcases, a few side tables, and a handful of cushioned chairs. Romano’s desk was the only grand thing in the room, but even it was airy looking for all its size, with slender curving legs and rose-colored wood inlaid with gold and mother-of-pearl.
Sebastian only had a moment to appreciate the beauty of the room before his eyes were drawn to the man who pushed himself up from the desk and rounded it with slow but sure steps. Every inch of him radiated command, from his fitted pinstripe suit the color of desert sand, to the five o’clock shadow on his square jaw that made him look rugged rather than unkempt. His mahogany hair was just long enough to have a bit of a curl, and his brows were thick, heavy, and currently low over dark eyes that examined Sebastian and Mallory with interest.
“Welcome, Mr. Blackwood,” Romano said in a carefully refined accent that had only the faintest hint of something exotic lurking in the undertones. He came to a stop in front of Sebastian and held out a hand.
Sebastian took it, hiding his trepidation behind a cocky smile. The other man’s grip was firm, but not crushing, and he lingered after Sebastian would have let go, holding Sebastian’s gaze intently as if he could read something in it. Sebastian matched him stare for stare, calling up every ounce of brazen swagger he possessed and pushing all his fears and insecurities behind a protective mask.
For the second time, Sebastian’s ring warmed, and it made his hand itch. But he held firm until he felt Romano’s grip loosen. The man stepped back and returned to his chair, and Sebastian took the opportunity to sink, uninvited, into one of the seats in front of the desk. He felt rather than saw Mallory move into position on his left, angled so she could easily keep the desk and the door both in her vision.
“Thank you, Daniel, that will be all,” Romano said.
Their escort exited on silent feet, closing the office door behind him. Sebastian didn’t hear him retreat down the hall, and figured it was safest to assume he’d taken up a guard position outside.
“You are not Mr. Blackwood.”
Romano’s statement held no accusation, but Sebastian knew he’d be a fool to assume there wasn’t a healthy dose of suspicion lurking beneath that curious gaze.
“Oh, but there you’d be wrong,” Sebastian said, leaning back casually in the chair. “I have to admit, I look more like my mother than my father, so no harm done. I don’t normally mention the ‘Junior’ part when I’m out and about. My old man still uses it like I’m five, but then Dad always does whatever he wants, and never bothers asking the rest of us.” He smiled at Romano, showing all his teeth.
The man looked at him in silence for a while longer, then shifted his gaze to look past Sebastian’s shoulder.
“A pleasure to see you again, Ms. Jian. It seems impossible, but I must say you have grown even more beautiful since the last time I saw you.”
It took a supreme act of will not to roll his eyes, and Sebastian could just imagine the expression of pure stone—very deadly stone—on Mallory’s face. The fact that she didn’t reply made Sebastian grin, an expression he didn’t even try to hide.
“I wouldn’t bother if I were you, Mr. Romano. Believe me, I’ve tried every trick in the book and I’ve never even gotten her to crack a smile. She never drops the professional bodyguard act. It gets pretty annoying, but I guess I can’t complain if she does her job, right?”
“Indeed,” Romano said, his voice soft, his eyes anything but. After another moment, they flicked back to Sebastian. “I was not aware Mr. Blackwood had a son.”
Sebastian forced a chuckle, readying the explanation he’d practiced in front of the mirror in his apartment. The trick to lying was not to lie, just tell a carefully worded bit of truth and let the listener draw their own conclusions. “Doesn’t surprise me. After all, I had the audacity to be born a mundane, so it’s not like Mr. High and Mighty Wizard goes around bragging about me.”
The flash of resentment in Romano’s eyes made Sebastian’s lips curl in a knowing smile. He’d guessed right. If Romano had been a wizard, especially one from such a powerful family, there was no way he would be running around managing a restaurant and nightclub. That meant Romano was a mundane child in a wizard family—an initiate, as a family as old as Romano’s would surely still call them—who did a lot of work for the family and got little appreciation for it. Sebastian planned to play on that.
Betraying no reaction to Sebastian’s grin, Romano leaned forward and steepled his hands together. “You’ve come to visit at a rather...odd hour. Does your father know you are here?”
“Oh, we just came from the opera.” Sebastian waved a hand dismissively, neatly sidestepping the question.
Romano’s eyebrows rose. “Indeed? What performance did you attend? Opera is one of my guilty pleasures, when time permits.”
“Oh, just La bohème.”
“Ah, the tragedy?” Romano said.
Only a flash of warmth from the truth coin in his pocket gave Sebastian warning, and he spoke on instinct, not even having time to worry if his answer was correct or not.
“Nah, it’s more of a romance, I’d say. But then, a story is barely a story without a bit of romance, right? Of course, you could get into a whole argument about how much romance makes a story ‘a romance,’ as opposed to just romantic. But we both know I didn’t come here to talk about opera.” He gave the man across the desk another smile, and this time didn’t even try to make it warm.
“And what, pray tell, did you come for, Mr. Blackwood?” asked Romano, leaning back in his own chair.
Sebastian shifted his weight forward to place his elbows on his knees, using the brief pause to mentally catch his breath and slow his racing heart. If he hadn’t been warned by his truth coin of Romano’s deceptive intent in that comment about the opera, he might have completely ruined their whole operation.
“I came to give you a present.”
Romano’s eyebrows rose, and Sebastian laughed, genuinely delighted.
“Everyone knows you and Anton Silvester are rivals and you’d like nothing more than to take him down a few pegs,” Sebastian said. “Well, Anton has something I want, and he won’t sell it to me. I’ve offered him far more than it’s worth, but the idiot won’t make a deal—says it’s priceless and not for sale. I know he’s lying, though. He’d sell his own mother if he thought he’d get some profit ou
t of her.” Sebastian glared at the desk, letting a hint of petulance creep into his voice. It wasn’t hard. Anton was a pain in the butt at the best of times. “He’s doing it out of spite, I’m sure of it—thinks I’m not ‘worthy’ or something. So, I’m going to teach him a lesson.” He looked back up at Romano and smiled grimly. “I’m going to hire you to steal it for me.”
Silence followed Sebastian’s bold statement, and he let it stretch on, waiting for Romano’s reaction. He and Mallory had argued long and hard about how to get what they wanted from Jacopo Romano. Sebastian had wanted to coax it out with charm, maybe even a bit of bribery if necessary. But Mallory assured him that wouldn’t work—and not just because she didn’t have faith in Sebastian’s wheedling skills. Based on what she knew of Romano, the man was too intelligent and cautious to fall for something that straightforward. She had wanted to avoid the human component altogether and just sneak into the Castle to steal the information off Romano’s computer. But Sebastian had argued fiercely against that, pointing out that if the business was owned by wizards, there was too much risk of impassable wards or curses that would get Mallory caught—or worse, killed. The fact that she had iron knives capable of “cutting through” magic didn’t reassure him. There were too many unknowns involved and not enough time to prepare for such a tricky break-in.
In the end, they had compromised. Mallory would help Sebastian infiltrate the Castle and get him face to face with Romano, at which point it was his job to sell the con, dangling the opportunity to humiliate the competition as bait.
The only question was, would Romano go for it?
The man was good, Sebastian would give him that. No hint of what he was thinking escaped his cool, calculating mask—he had a poker face to rival even Anton’s.
Finally, Romano spoke. “And what, exactly, does Mr. Silvester have that you wish me to...acquire for you?”
Bingo.
“Here, take a look yourself, it’s kind of hard to describe with words.” Digging in his pocket, he withdrew his porthole, opened it, and plucked out the slender thumb drive he’d secreted there. Then he leaned forward and offered the drive to Romano.
For a moment, Sebastian was worried the man wouldn’t take it. Finally, Romano plucked the drive from Sebastian’s grip, then plugged it into his computer to open and view the drawings Sebastian had made earlier that day. Sebastian was no Picasso, but he was a fair hand at sketching. Perhaps he could have even excelled at it, if he’d pursued art instead of revenge after high school. As it was, the images should be good enough to serve his purpose, which was to keep the thumb drive plugged into Romano’s computer for at least five minutes, per Mallory’s orders.
“Sorry I don’t have any photos of it—the previous owners have always been pretty secretive about the artifact, if you know what I mean—but I had an artist do their best rendition. I think you might recognize it,” he finished, a sly note in his voice. Despite Romano’s expert control, Sebastian had noticed a flicker of surprise in the man’s face when he’d opened the first picture and gotten a look at the artifact.
“You see before you the legendary Lugal-nam. I know my dad’s been after it for years. Won’t he be surprised that I found it before he did?”
Romano’s eyes lifted from his computer and contemplated Sebastian, and with that look Sebastian’s guess was confirmed. Somehow, the Blackwood alias was connected to John Faust’s obsession with the artifact Sebastian’s family had protected for generations before Sebastian had summarily destroyed it. Is that why the alias was so similar to his own name? Sebastian itched to grill Romano on what he knew about “Mr. Blackwood” and how the name was connected to the Blackwell family, but he knew he couldn’t. Even if Romano had been inclined to answer his questions, the act of asking would prove Sebastian didn’t know as much as he should, were he truly a Blackwood himself.
“Very interesting, Mr. Blackwood,” Romano said in a carefully neutral tone, though his eyes glittered intently. “And what makes you think I, or anyone in my employ, would participate in an act of thievery? Are you implying that I engage in illegal activities?”
Sebastian gave a knowing smile. “Why of course not, Mr. Romano. In my eagerness, I simply misspoke. I know you are acquainted with a great many, shall we say, talented individuals, one of whom may be able to ‘acquire’ this artifact on my behalf.”
“In that case, perhaps we might discuss some sort of arrangement,” Romano said as he reached to pull the thumb drive from his computer.
Sebastian’s hand jerked forward. “Wait!” It hadn’t been five minutes yet, judging by the clock on the wall behind Romano, and Sebastian scrambled for an excuse to delay as Romano’s brows drew together. “Did you look at all the photographs? I want to be quite sure we are all familiar with the artifact in question, so there will be no mistakes.”
With a closed look that could just as easily have hidden suspicion as exasperation, Romano eased back into his chair and returned his attention to the computer. It took him only another minute to examine the rest of the sketches, but it was enough. When he leaned forward again to withdraw the thumb drive, Sebastian did not stop him, simply held out a hand with a polite smile.
But instead of returning it, Romano hesitated, his eyes narrowing in a searching look, as if he could see past Sebastian’s facade. Then he curled his fingers around the drive and leaned back.
“I believe I shall keep this for the time being. That way I’ll have the pictures on hand as we iron out our arrangement.”
Sebastian gave an apologetic smile, trying not to let any hint of tension show. That drive was the linchpin of their whole con, programmed with a virus from one of Mallory’s helpful hacking buddies that surreptitiously copied the host’s files in a matter of minutes and stored them on a hidden folder within the drive. If they left without that drive, they might never get another chance at the information—and they might never find Lily.
“I’ll get you another copy of the sketches as soon as possible, Mr. Romano, but I need the drive back, if you don’t mind. It’s one of my dad’s super high-tech new gadgets and he’ll notice if it’s missing.”
“Surely someone of your...status in life could just as easily purchase a replacement?” Romano’s returning smile was close-lipped, but still came across as if he’d bared a mouth full of shark’s teeth.
“It’s, um, a prototype. One of a kind,” Sebastian said, and stood to cover his urge to wince—the excuse sounded lame, even to his own ears. “How about I just take that and leave you to your evening. I’ll be in touch soon about our little project.”
Romano stood as well, slowly, all hint of a smile gone. “I wish you a pleasant evening, Mr. Blackwood.” When he made no move to hand back the drive, Sebastian coughed and shifted awkwardly.
“My drive?”
“Consider it fair payment for intruding so late and without an appointment.”
Romano’s voice was flat and cold, and Sebastian sensed Mallory shift behind him in response. The tension in the room ratcheted up and Sebastian’s pulse quickened, but he resisted the urge to react in kind. All was not lost yet, even if Romano was suspicious.
“Come on, Mr. Romano, let’s not be petty. I’d be happy to throw in a generous gift to whatever offer I make—some expensive wine, perhaps? But I really must insist you return the drive. It isn’t mine to give away.”
“Then you should not have given it to me under false pretense,” Romano said very softly.
The man’s tone made Sebastian’s pulse speed up, and it sent adrenaline coursing through him until he ached with the need to move. But he held perfectly still, wary of making the wrong move.
“I don’t know what kind of game you are playing at,” Romano continued, “but I must warn you that I do not appreciate being manipulated. I will look into your offer—and this innocent little drive you seem so attached to—and if all seems to be as it should, I will contact you so we can speak further. I may even return it, should I be taken by a particularl
y generous mood.” He gave that close-mouthed shark-tooth smile again, then called toward the closed door. “Daniel! If you would escort our guests to the exit, please.”
Sebastian took several steps to the side, getting out from between the chair and the desk so he could move more freely. Meeting Romano’s eyes, he nodded amiably and gave the man an easy smile, but did not turn to leave as he heard the double doors open and Daniel murmur a polite, “If you’ll follow me, please.” Mallory had gone over this contingency—this and about a dozen others—and Sebastian knew exactly what he needed to do. As soon as he heard a muffled thud and soft grunt of pain, he lunged around the desk toward Romano and the drive still held in the man’s fist. Instead of jerking away, Romano’s free hand shot forward to the underside of the desk’s lip, almost as if he were going for a gun strapped there. But no gun emerged. Sebastian felt a tingle wash over his body, and then—
Everything in the room froze.
Sebastian couldn’t move, couldn’t look around, could barely even expand his lungs to breathe. The antique clock on the wall behind Romano’s head had stopped ticking, and the sounds of fighting behind him had ceased.
Romano, still in Sebastian’s line of sight, smiled and slowly removed his hand from under the lip of his desk.
Love, Lies, and Hocus Pocus Identity Page 16