by Sarah Fine
The box was empty.
Staring at the dark wood grain within, I ran my fingers over the space as my mouth went dry. “Hey, Dad?”
“Yeah, honey?” His heavy footsteps reached me from the hallway. “What do you need?”
I turned to see him hovering in the doorway. He hadn’t entered this room since Grandpa had been carried out of it, his body enclosed in a gray vinyl shroud. “Sorry—I know I said I’d handle this, but—” I held out the open box. “Do you know what happened to whatever was in this box?”
“I’ve never seen it open before. Maybe it was already empty?”
I lowered the box to my lap, biting my lip. “No, there was definitely something in here. Do you trust Wanda?” His nurse had visited him nearly every day since last spring. She’d been at his funeral and cried her eyes out.
Dad’s brow furrowed. “She never seemed like the type to steal an old man’s things. She took great care of him. What about that replacement nurse who was here the day he died?”
“I wouldn’t have thought she’d had the time,” I murmured. “She and Ben were only in here for a few minutes before . . .” I sighed and rubbed my stinging eyes. Maybe he’d decided to hide the relic somewhere else. “Did Grandpa have any other stuff?”
“I have a few boxes of old books and letters of his in my office.” He bowed his head, revealing his bald spot. “I haven’t been able to bring myself to go through them.”
“I can do it, Dad.” I got up and walked over to hug him.
“He was such a cool old guy,” Dad said with a pained chuckle. “Much cooler than I ever was.”
“He was definitely cool.” I squeezed my dad’s paunchy middle and laid my head on his shoulder. “But so are you.”
He kissed the top of my head. “Only because I can claim you as my daughter.”
We walked down the hallway with his arm around me, and I cradled that empty box, my thoughts spinning. Dad went out to mow his expansive lawn by the lake while I sat down to go through the boxes. But a few hours later, I was coated in dust and hadn’t found anything except a packet of letters and postcards my grandpa and grandma had written to each other while Grandpa was traveling the world for “business.” Apparently my grandma had never known her husband’s true occupation, and Grandpa had never told my dad, either. I was the only one who had known his secret, and now I was alone in it.
I trudged up the front steps to our cottage and pushed open the door to find Ben standing in our living room, a packed bag on the couch. My stomach dropped. “If you’re breaking up with me, can you do it tomorrow?” I said, my voice cracking. “I don’t think I can—”
“What? No!” Ben had me in his arms before I could draw another breath. “Oh my God, Mattie. I’m so sorry. Here I thought I was being romantic, and I’ve already screwed it up.”
I sniffled and looked up at him. “Romantic?”
He stroked my cheek. “You’ve been through hell this past week, and I was hoping I could lift your spirits. This was what I was talking to your mom about while you talked with Grandpa a few weeks ago. What do you say to a weekend in Chicago?” He held up his phone and I read the screen.
“The Waldorf Astoria? Ben, that’s got to be hundreds of dollars a night!”
“I know. Your parents kicked in some of it.”
“I thought you didn’t want to ask them for money.”
“This was small. I’ll pay them back.”
“But you couldn’t pay them back for a loan to save the clinic?”
He let me go and stepped back, his jaw set. “So much for the romantic part of things. I’ll go unpack this.” With his shoulders slumped, he went to pick up the bag.
Feeling like a jerk, I held up my hands. “Wait. I’m sorry. It’s just been a tough day.”
He set the bag down. “Any reason apart from the obvious?”
“No.” I didn’t want to bring up anything remotely associated with the magical world with Ben for fear of another fight. “It was just hard. I went through Grandpa’s things. He led a really interesting life.” My voice grew strained. “And I’m sad that it’s over.” The tears welled up, streaking down my face. “I wasted my last few months with him.”
Ben pulled me down onto the couch. “Grandpa told me he wanted me to take care of you, Mattie. He told me to give you a good life. It was the last thing he said to me.” He guided my head to his shoulder. “And that’s what I’m determined to do. I’m going to take care of both of us. Do you trust me to do that?”
You trust me, Mattie Carver, Asa murmured. Just admit it.
I shivered. “Yeah,” I whispered, clinging to Ben’s solid body as if it were a buoy in a storm. “I do.”
“Wow,” said Ben as we walked through the revolving front doors and into the lobby of the Waldorf.
“Definitely wow,” I said, glancing up at the giant chandelier, which looked like needles of ice that had skewered dozens of glass snowflakes midair. It was supposed to be beautiful and impressive, but to me it was just a painful reminder of the lingering shard of agony in my chest. I’d wanted to believe it was getting better, but since Grandpa’s death it had taken on a sharper edge. I didn’t want Ben to know, though. It was so obvious he’d planned our weekend down to the last detail, all with an eye toward cheering me up.
“—massage for you,” he was saying as he led me toward the elevator.
“What? Sorry. I spaced out.” I gestured back at the murderous-looking chandelier. “Kind of dazzled.”
“So you like it?”
“Nah. I hate luxury in any form. Are you kidding?”
He entwined his fingers with mine and pulled me onto the elevator. “Good.”
Our room was on the fourth floor, a study in white and gray, but still pretty cozy. I plopped down on the bed and spread my arms. “So what’s on our agenda?”
The mattress sank as he sat down next to me. “I got us reservations at Shanghai Terrace.”
“Chinese food? Not in actual Chinatown, though, right?”
He blinked at the sharp note of panic in my voice. “No. The restaurant’s less than a ten-minute walk from here. Why?”
Because the magic boss of Chinatown, Zhong Lei, was one bad dude who I hoped would respect the fragile truce in the magical mob war Asa and I had basically caused. I’d also almost killed one of Zhong’s Ekstazo henchmen, but in my defense, he had been trying to murder me with orgasms at the time. “No reason. It’s just far.”
“I packed you some walking shoes, but that doesn’t mean you have to use them. Hell, if you want to stay in and order room service, just say the word.” He checked his watch. “The masseur should be here any minute.” He threw me a nervous glance. “And there’s something I need to talk to you about before he arrives.”
I sat up. “What’s wrong?”
He got to his feet, suddenly fidgety. “You said you trusted me.”
“Yeah . . .”
“Okay, I need you to remember that. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, Mattie.” He rubbed his hands along his thighs, and I wondered if he was missing his lucky agate, the one that had been infused with Ekstazo magic. “I’ve barely slept the last few weeks. I’ve researched every possibility to save the clinic, and I came up empty.”
“Me too,” I said softly.
“I could do work in another clinic, but I know how much the place means to you. The way your face lit up when Mrs. Chang brought in her new vizsla puppy the other day—”
“His name is Rudy.”
He gave me a sad smile. “See? You know all their names without checking the charts. You know exactly where they like to be scratched, exactly what their families need to hear. And I can’t bear to take that from you.”
“I’ll be okay, Ben.”
“No. We can’t lose this place, Mattie. I won’t be able to live with myself if we do.”
“So you’re going to borrow from my—”
“No! We can do this on our own if you’ll just keep an open mind!”
I tensed at the strident edge in his voice. “Okay,” I said slowly. “My mind is open.”
His hands fell away from his hair, and he let out a breath. “Thank you. I promise I’ll get us through this.”
“Ben, you’re starting to scare me.”
“You don’t have to be scared. It’s nothing you haven’t done before.”
Just then someone knocked on our door. Ben walked swiftly over and opened it, and in walked a man toting a thin black rectangular case. The guy was slender with pale, ashy skin and a steel-gray buzz cut, and his arms were covered in thick, dark hair flecked with silver. He was wearing an untucked white polo shirt that bore the overlapping W and A of the hotel logo.
“Where are we gonna do this?” he asked in an accent that pegged him as Australian. Or from New Zealand. Or South Africa. I wasn’t exactly a woman of the world at that point.
“Um, here?” Ben gestured at a space between the bed and the window. “What do you think, Mattie?”
“Are you getting the massage, or am I?”
The masseur’s eyebrows shot up and he looked at Ben, but then his face relaxed into a friendly grin. “You are, sweetheart.” He unfolded the case, and it turned out to be a portable massage table.
I looked down at my skirt and sweater set. I was feeling kind of tense—Ben and I hadn’t finished our conversation, but maybe if I were more relaxed, I could keep an open mind. “Give me a chance to change.”
I went into the bathroom and put on a fluffy white hotel robe. When I came out, Ben and the masseur were chatting in low tones. They stopped when I approached the table. “Just discussing our plans for the weekend,” Ben said. “Marcus here knows the city really well.”
Marcus gestured at the massage table. “Up you go, my lady.”
I sat up on the table. “Do you have a sheet I can cover myself with?” I glanced around, but the table was all he’d brought into the room.
Ben pulled the blackout curtains shut. “Mattie, this is what I needed to talk to you about.” His eyes crinkled—his apologetic look. “Marcus is a conduit.”
“What?”
“Calm down,” he said, coming forward to take me by the shoulders. “I told you I’d been thinking, and I wasn’t kidding. Mattie, this could be all we need.”
I struggled to escape his grip, but he held me to the table. “If you’re suggesting what I think you are, the answer is no.”
“You said you trusted me. We’re going to do this together.”
Raw panic was making my muscles twitch. “Ben, if you’re asking me to transport magic to avoid detection, it must be big, and if it’s big, then it’s—”
“Fucking valuable,” said Marcus, wedging himself in next to Ben. “Your fiancé told me you’ve worked for Frank before, and I checked into it. You’ve got a bit of a reputation, Mattie. Lots of people interested in what you can do.”
I stared at Ben. “Where did you get the magic, Ben?”
His cheeks darkened. “I don’t want you to worry about that.”
“Let me go!”
“Not before you hear me out. I’ve come into possession of a relic,” Ben said, his fingers still clamped around my upper arms. “And I know it’s worth a lot of money. But we have to get it into the hands of the right buyer, and that means transporting it across the country. I checked into it—a reliquary’s the only way to do it without being caught. Forget about saving the clinic—we could be set for life, Mattie. We could have ten clinics if you wanted.”
“And I’ll get a sweet commission,” said Marcus. “Just relax, sweetheart.”
“I’m not your sweetheart,” I snapped. “You can’t do this to me. Let. Me. Go.” I glared at Ben. “I can’t believe you set this up without telling me. You lied. Again.”
“I didn’t lie. I just left a few things out, but I was trying to tell you.”
“Semantics!” Now I understood why Asa hated them so much.
Ben sighed. “Mattie, this would save us.”
My chest felt brittle and thin, the walls of my vault scraped away by months of jagged pain. “I can’t do it.”
“You did it when you were with my brother.” The bitterness in his voice made me want to slap him.
“To save your life.”
He looked down, and then his arms fell away from me. I quickly sat up. “You’re right.” He looked over at Marcus. “I’m sorry. She doesn’t want to do this.”
“Yeah?” Marcus rolled his eyes. Then he pulled a gun from beneath his shirt and aimed it at Ben’s head. “How about now?”
Ben’s hands rose from his sides. “Come on. This isn’t the way to resolve this.”
“Fuck yeah it is, mate. Get your girl on the fucking table before I paint this place red. She is necessary. You are not.”
“Mattie . . . ,” Ben said in a shaky voice.
I glanced around for anything I could use as a weapon, but the nearest option was a clay vase about ten feet away. “Who do you work for?” I asked Marcus.
“Freelancer.”
“This is Zhong’s territory.”
“And don’t I know it, sweetheart. If we don’t get this magic into you real soon, his people are gonna know it’s here. He owns a sniffer.”
“Chinatown is miles away.”
“But this relic is hot. Already done my research.”
“It’s worth millions, Mattie,” Ben said, taking a step to the side. His gaze darted to the vase for a split second before returning to me. “So let’s get this done and make sure Marcus gets what he deserves.”
I forced myself to keep a straight face, but part of me wanted to cheer. Ben was on my side. I could practically see his thoughts. “Okay. I trust you.”
He held my gaze with his honey-brown eyes. “I’m going to be worthy of it.”
Marcus groaned. “Lie down, would you? I wasn’t joking about Zhong’s people. He’s got spies everywhere looking for side deals going on in his territory, and all they have to do is call in his sensor to find us. If anyone spotted me, they’ll be paying us a visit. So with all due respect, let’s move the fuck along.” His voice had risen steadily until he was nearly yelling.
Trembling, I lay on my back, deliberately not looking in Ben’s direction. As soon as my head hit the headrest, Marcus leaned over me and pulled a set of straps around my arms, awkwardly fastening me into place with one hand as he kept the gun aimed in Ben’s general direction.
“You got the relic?” he asked Ben.
“Yeah, it’s right here.” From behind Marcus, I heard a faint clinking sound.
He looked over his shoulder at Ben and nodded. “Good. Bring it over, and when I give the signal, hand it to me.”
As Marcus turned back to me, Ben slammed him in the side of the head with the vase. I clamped my eyes shut as it shattered, then opened them to grope for the straps holding me to the table. Grunts punctuated the struggle, but then Ben managed to strip the gun from Marcus and clock him with it.
The conduit slumped over on top of me, his bare arm across my throat. “Ben,” I gasped.
Ben leaned over me, his face sheening with sweat. “Did you hear him, Mattie? Zhong’s people could be here any minute.”
He had something grasped in his free hand. The other held the gun.
“Then let’s get out of here. Get me off this table.”
“I don’t think we should risk it.” His jaw was rigid. “We have to do it this way.”
“Ben?” I began to struggle in earnest, desperate to wiggle out from under Marcus’s dead weight.
“We’ll be safer if we do this. Marcus said it would only take a minute.” Ben opened his fingers to show me what he was holding.
I stared at the golf ball–size locket on its thick gold chain and held my breath as he flicked the latch, revealing what was inside.
And then I started to laugh and cry at the same time. “That’s my Grandpa’s relic,” I said as he slid the knobby lump of gold onto his palm. It looked so similar to the original
Strikon relic, only a slightly different shape, rounder, fewer edges. And now I knew who had taken it from Grandpa’s wooden box. “But it’s empty, Ben. You set all this up for nothing—the magic that goes with that relic died with Grandpa.”
Ben tilted his head. His eyes were shining with emotion. “I’ll explain everything once we’re safe. I promise.”
And with that, he pressed the hunk of gold to the back of Marcus’s neck, and every cell in my body exploded with agony.
CHAPTER FIVE
Considering that I’d gone through this already with the original Strikon relic, which housed the most powerful pain magic in existence, you would think that I could handle the Sensilo relic.
And you’d be wrong.
My mind shattered as all my muscles locked and my teeth clamped together so tightly that I was lucky I didn’t bite off my tongue. All the emotions of every single person nearby came at me at once, a hurricane of joy and rage and jealousy and despair and so much raw feeling that I couldn’t tell one mood from the other, only that it was overwhelming, crushing, punishing. I felt everything they felt. I sensed everything they were going through, everything they were intending to do. From somewhere inside the brutal storm, a shard of magic sliced across my raw, torn soul, telling me there were naturals nearby. I tried to hold on to it but couldn’t—the magic picked me up and twisted me, wringing me out, and it felt like a thousand knives were being driven into every part of my body.
And then just my chest.
And then just my heart.
Until only one knife remained, twisting mercilessly.
“I’ve got you,” said a deep voice echoing through the hollowed-out cavern of my skull.
“Oh thank God,” I murmured.
Firm hands hoisted me up, and I was pressed to a hard chest. “I’m getting you out of here.”
“I’ve missed you so much,” I mumbled, but the words were garbled and weak. I tried to open my eyes, but the dizziness was so overwhelming that I clamped them shut again. “I didn’t want to, but I did.”
