The Key of Darkness (The Bradbury Institute Book 1)

by Sonya Clark

  “Look, if you intend to steal-” Eve stopped, shutting her eyes. With no phone, tied up, and alone, there was nothing she could do to prevent this man from stealing the box. All she could do was hope he’d be willing to leave her alive and unharmed.

  “Oh, I do intend to steal. Now that I’ve got you safe and secure I can do just that.” He glanced around, eyes widening slightly when they landed on her purse. He dumped the contents on the floorboard and leaned over to rummage through them.

  “What are you doing?” Was the mysterious box not his target after all? Could this just be some coincidence? “There’s nothing that’s be valuable to you in my handbag. I never carry much cash.”

  “I’m not interested in your cash.” Tossing aside lip gloss and a compact, he picked up her e-reader, flipped the cover open and thumbed the power button.

  She blanched, remembering what she’d been reading earlier. Please dear God don’t let him read it out loud.

  Someone heard her silent plea. Mirth danced in his dark eyes and sly grin. “My, my, Miss Kane. What naughty books you’ve been reading.” He wagged the device at her in playful admonishment.

  Eve refused to discuss her reading choices with a thief who’d tied her up. “How do you know my name?”

  He dropped the device and picked up her wallet, opening it to display her driver’s license. Tapping a finger on the plastic, he said, “I know where you live too. Which is good because I think I just might have to send you flowers.”

  Eve shook her head, unable to come up with a response. Not only was this her first experience with crime, it was downright bizarre.

  The thief continued to pick through her belongings. She spotted the ring box from Mrs. Delafield and a stab of panic lanced through her. He could take the damn mystery box, but not her ring. It was far too precious a gift to lose, especially to someone who would most likely sell it in some low rent pawn shop.

  Though there seemed to be nothing low rent about this thief. Eve knew a finely tailored suit when she saw one. That’s exactly what he wore under his black trench coat, a sharply tailored black suit in a stylish cut. The mask was finely made as well, possibly silk, though she’d have to touch it to know for sure. It was shaped in an angular pattern to match the planes of his face and did a better job of accentuating rather than hiding.

  Any more appreciative thoughts of his appearance fled when his hand plucked the ring box from the floor. Nimble fingers opened the box and he stared at the ring with an odd expression for a moment before snapping the lid shut.

  “Look, that’s just an old piece of costume jewelry that’s not worth anything.” Eve spoke so quickly the words nearly ran together.

  The thief placed the ring box in a pocket inside his coat. The corners of his mouth turned down. “I’m disappointed you would lie. I thought better of you, Miss Kane.”

  Damn it. “All right, yes, that was a lie. Please don’t take the ring. It was a gift from a dear friend. Please.”

  The mischievous glint returned to his eyes and a grin dimpled his cheek. “Why Miss Kane, tied up and saying please.” He gave the word a breathy emphasis, like it might have been in a very different circumstance. “I like that.” His fingertips teased her ankle.

  Eve kicked his hand away. “Well, I don’t like you.” Of all the times to be fresh out of a snappy comeback…

  He laughed, the sound rich and throaty. “I’ll have to convince you I’m likeable then.”

  He opened the door and turned to her. “Tell me Miss Kane. What’s your favorite flower?”

  “Tulips.” The word slipped out before she could stop herself.

  The thief blew a kiss as he picked up the box then left the vehicle, slamming the door shut. Eve swore.

  How in the hell was she going to explain the loss of that damn box to this mysterious Bradbury Institute?

  Chapter 4

  Pete Cadkin stared through the rain at the limo’s headlights, his cell phone at his ear. There was no answer. He closed the phone with an angry snap and cursed in German.

  The woman in the driver’s seat hit the wiper blade controls, sending water flying and giving them a brief clear view of the vehicle parked by the side of the road. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.” Sanngrid Madsen primarily functioned as the director’s assistant but she frequently worked security jobs with Pete. She was also his best friend.

  “No kidding.” Phone still clutched in his hand, he gestured at the limo. “Everybody’s dead and the Key is gone. What do you want to bet?” He swore again, this time flavoring his German with a bit of Norwegian.

  “Probably.” She tucked a lock of her short blond bob behind one ear. “Most likely.”

  Pete grimaced, in no mood for dead bodies or cold rain or dealing with a missing grimoire. Especially this missing grimoire. He just wanted to go home, watch his new blu-ray of Out of the Past, and warm up on the couch with a bottle of scotch. “One of us has to check.”

  Sanngrid laughed. “You’re head of security, you do it.” Her indistinct European accent was soft.

  He returned his phone to his pocket and held out a fist. “Come on.”

  “This is called delaying the inevitable.”

  “Damn straight.” They shook their fists. Scissors cut paper and Pete lost.

  Voice full of fake helpfulness, Sanngrid said, “Do you want the umbrella?”

  “Shut up.” He steeled himself against the damp cold and left the car.

  Pete approached the limo warily, gun drawn. Rain hit his face sideways. The trees a few feet from the roadway moved with the wind, ominous shapes in the dark. There were no outward signs of car trouble or sabotage. He knocked on the driver’s window, getting no response. Tension coiled in his neck muscles as he reached for the door handle. He aimed the gun and flung the door open.

  The driver slumped unconscious over the wheel. Pete checked the man’s pulse. Strong and steady, and no signs of blood or bruising.

  Someone inside the passenger compartment banged on the partition. “Please help!”

  Pete pushed the driver to the passenger side, wincing when the unconscious man’s head bounced on the far door. He found the button to lower the smoky glass and pressed it.

  A blond sat in the back seat, her wrists and ankles bound. Green eyes stared out of a heart-shaped face. Her full lips were drawn in an annoyed line, but looked capable of so many better things. She had to be Mrs. Delafield’s assistant - the conservative black dress looked appropriate for a funeral. The killer heels in the floor and the suggestion of dark polish on toes barely visible under black stockings struck him as less conservative.

  Plus she was tied up, but then he’d noticed that already.

  He swallowed. “Are you hurt?”

  “No, just tied up. Is the driver okay?”

  “Yeah, just knocked out.” He wiped away the droplets that ran down his face from his soaked hair. “Did they take the box?”

  “Yes. I’m sorry, there was nothing I could do.”

  “I know.” He would not have expected one person to stop what likely happened here. “Frankly, I’m a little surprised they left you and the driver alive.”

  She drew her golden brows together. “It was just one man.” She raised her hands. “Could you untie me, please?”

  Pete nodded. “Hold on.” He pressed the button, the partition raising with a whisper. One man? Of all the people that might be after this thing, who would send just one man? He dived back out into the rain and quickly entered the passenger compartment.

  She was tiny, and shivering in the chill that seeped through from outside. He stared for a beat too long, mesmerized by the corner of plump bottom lip caught by her teeth.

  She raised her tied hands again, the request repeated in her eyes.

  He shook his head to clear it. “Yeah.” He struggled with the knots, and with trying not to touch her any more than necessary. No matter what he did, the fabric would not budge. An alarm rang in his awareness. “Damn it.”


  “I couldn’t get them either. My name is Eve, by the way. Eve Kane.”

  “I know. We were expecting you.” He waved his hand over her wrists in mounting frustration. “One guy, you say? Not a group?”

  “That’s correct. He wore a mask and he used his tie to bind my wrists and my scarf around my ankles.”

  “Son of a bitch.” The knots made him suspect but there was a way to confirm it. “Did he flirt with you?”

  Eve Kane started guiltily. “Um.”

  Pete swore again.

  “You work for the Bradbury Institute?”

  “Pete Cadkin, head of security,” he supplied. “You’re gonna have to sit tight while I drive this limo back to the institute. The driver needs a healer and we’re gonna need a wizard to do a reversal spell on the magic used to bind those knots.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  It was a nice, calm reaction, and he liked that. It made him curious, but curiosity wasn’t something he indulged in these days. Neither were tied-up hot blonds. The knots he couldn’t untie itched against his nerves, sharp cat claws of irritation. He scowled. “You just went down the rabbit hole, Alice.” He left her alone with whatever thoughts she was hiding behind her impassive gaze.

  Once settled behind the wheel, he flashed the lights at Sanngrid and called her on his cell. Then he made more calls, to various people at Bradbury. The more he thought about the contents of that box, the more his stomach churned. This was a disaster in the making.

  Chapter 5

  Eve rubbed the circulation back into her wrists. The skin was still warm from whatever spell the wizard had done to untie the knots.

  The man named Rami didn’t look like a wizard. Tall and lanky, about her age, he looked pretty ordinary. Shaggy black hair framed a pale face with deep set dark eyes, a nose that looked like it had been broken once or twice, and a mouth just slightly too large for the rest of his features. Loose corduroy pants and a White Stripes tee hung on his slim frame. His attitude was open and friendly, a far cry from the other man.

  Mr. Bad Attitude was how she thought of him, having completely forgotten his name. A six foot slab of walking muscle wrapped in a tailored suit, he had eyes like the sea in winter and thick wheat-gold hair brushed back from a widow’s peak. And a near-constant scowl. It was distracting, wondering if he might be handsome if his features could smooth into something less fierce.

  Eve welcomed the distraction, because otherwise she might have to think about the fact that a wizard had whispered a chant over her hands to undo magically secured knots. Psychometry was one thing, but this…this was far down the rabbit hole.

  “What a lousy night you’ve had,” Rami said. “Tied up, robbed, squinted at.” He jerked a thumb at Mr. Bad Attitude, who ignored the wizard. “Well, don’t worry that I called the boss Dragon Lady, she’s really very nice.”

  They were travelling down a long hallway poorly lit by the occasional wall sconce. Eve could make out little in the gloom. Art hung at intervals on the walls. They passed closed doors, a few suits of armor, and accent tables with floral centerpieces.

  At the end of the hall was an elevator flanked by another accent table, this one with an arrangement of dark red flowers Eve didn’t recognize. Mr. Bad Attitude stabbed the up button like it had done him personal harm.

  One of the flowers extended from the vase and stroked its petals on Mr. Bad Attitude’s biceps.

  Eve fell several feet further down the rabbit hole. “Um.” Not sure what to say, she merely pointed.

  “It likes him,” Rami said. “We don’t know why.”

  Mr. Bad Attitude slapped the flower away. A few petals drifted to the carpet as it retreated to the vase.

  “So what were you delivering?” Rami sounded genuinely curious but also eager to make small talk. “Was the robbery a carjacking or something?”

  Before Eve could say anything Mr. Bad Attitude spoke. “Knox Delafield stole one of the Keys of Darkness.”

  “Shut the front door!” Rami stared at the bigger man in disbelief. “Pete, you cannot be serious.”

  The elevator door whooshed open and they stepped inside, Mr. Bad Attitude once more delivering violence to a button. Pete. His name was Pete Cadkin, she recalled, and he was head of security. He did not make her feel very secure.

  “As a heart attack,” he said.

  Something else tripped across Eve’s memory. “I know that name, Knox Delafield,” she said. “I worked for his grandmother. Why would he steal something she wanted donated to this institute?”

  “Because he’s a professional thief and he just made the biggest score of his life. If he can find a buyer crazy enough for it.” Pete met her gaze with the blistering force of his dark blue eyes. “Rebecca Delafield didn’t so much as make a donation as send the thing here for safekeeping. What’s in that box is a supernatural loose nuke and now a thief is going to put it on the market.”

  She looked from Pete to Rami, trying to form the words to ask more questions. This was just too insane.

  Rami looked sick. “I think I might soil myself.”

  Once they finally arrived at the director’s office, Pete and Rami waited in the anteroom while Eve entered alone.

  The office was large and pleasant, decorated with shades of cream and jade. Antique furniture was placed in strategic locations to break up the space. A large oak desk was stationed in front of a wide floor to ceiling bay window. A settee and chairs were grouped around a coffee table with a fireplace nearby. Two closed doors were on opposite sides of the room.

  The woman behind the desk had a striking beauty. Perhaps in her early fifties, hair the color of maple leaves in autumn brushed her shoulders. Sharp cheek bones, a wide mouth, gray-blue eyes full of humor, wearing a tailored pearl gray suit dress and high heels. Everything about her said elegant and cultured. She rose and came around the desk, hand outstretched.

  “Eve, it’s good to meet you. Rebecca spoke so highly of you. My name is Judith Templeton and I’m the director of Bradbury Institute.” She sounded genuinely welcoming but there was a glint of steel in her eyes that made Eve understand why Rami called this woman the Dragon Lady.

  “Thank you.” Eve shook hands with the director, glad her gift did not work with people. So far what little she’d seen suggested those at Bradbury might not care to have their secrets known by a stranger.

  The director sat on the settee, gesturing for Eve to take the chair. A tea service was a welcome sight on the table. “I guess you need to know what happened,” Eve said, eyeing the tea pot and almost wishing for something stronger.

  Judith poured tea into two cups. “Please. It’s important that we know as much as possible.”

  Taking the cup offered her, Eve began to recount the evening. Most of it, anyway. She left out the thief flirting with her, the sensations transmitted from his silk tie. She also left out the part where she tried deliberately to read the box.

  Even so, she felt she had the right to some answers. “They said…that is, Rami and,” the other man’s name escaped her again.

  “Pete,” Judith supplied.

  Eve gave her a look of thanks. “Yes, they said the man who stole the box was Mrs. Delafield’s grandson Knox. And that the box…um…the phrase supernatural loose nuke was used.”

  An expression somewhere between amused and annoyed crossed Judith’s face. “Rebecca never told you about this place, did she?”

  “No.” A nervous tingle ran through Eve. She wanted to know it all. The institute, the mysterious box, the Delafield connection. If Mrs. D had known about her unusual gift, as Eve suspected, did that mean these people knew too? And if they didn’t know about her specifically, did they know about that kind of thing in general? What could they tell her about this strange ability she’d been born with?

  Eve had a feeling a single answer would lead to a dozen more questions. She didn’t like to admit it, but the truth was she was tired of not knowing. Not understanding fundamental things about herself. She’d nev
er met another person with a similar ability, or even someone who accepted such a thing was possible. Not until she’d begun to suspect that Rebecca Delafield knew the truth. How Eve wished she’d had the nerve to speak to Mrs. D openly, instead of being fearful of being wrong and winding up shunned.

  The director drew in a breath. “The Bradbury Institute is the current iteration of a very old organization. Different names have been used over the centuries and in various locations, but we all specialize in the same thing.”

  “Which is?”

  “The occult, of course. Tell me, what sort of impressions did you receive when you touched the box?” Judith watched Eve impassively over the rim of her tea cup.

  This was a test. Eve knew it. She knew it, and she was annoyed by it, but still she did not want to fail. She opened her mouth, closed it again as she considered what to say. Thinking about the almost angry way the box kept its secrets from her. “I couldn’t really tell anything about it. It was almost as if, as if.” She paused, searching for an analogy. “Like it was defending itself.”

  “So the box is warded?” An unfamiliar voice came from behind.

  Eve swiveled in the chair to see a man leaning against the closed doorway at the edge of the office. A tweed jacket, button down white shirt, and jeans made him look somewhat professorial. Short black hair stuck up at odd angles. Full lips and bright blue eyes dominated a handsome face. He stepped into the room, taking a seat beside Judith.

  The director introduced him. “Eve, this is Chet Kedrova, the head of Archives.”

  Chet jumped in. “Did it block you completely or were you able to get anything at all?”

  Eve placed her tea cup on the table. “For just a second I could see a book. It was covered in blood. That’s it. Then it got hot…very hot. So I stopped.”

  Chet and the director exchanged a significant look. “Think he can open the box?”