by Marina Myles
“Show me the woman I love,” he commanded.
The coin’s surface glimmered and projected an image of Rose lying in her bedroom. Outside her door, he could see Lorenzo Marconi locking her in.
“Damn it!” Drago rasped.
Should I open the lock with my telekinetic powers? Or should I let Rose stay where she’s safe, at least for now?
Blowing out an exasperated breath, he told himself to calm down before he did anything. He decided to check on Richard Bellum. In the past, the coin had helped Drago prevent the reporter’s investigations from going too deep.
“Show me Bellum.”
The silver lei displayed an image of the aggressive reporter speaking to Felix Huxtable, Drago’s old boss in the Bowery.
In the wavering scene, Bellum pushed his boater hat back on his forehead. “And you’re sure you saw Dragomir Starkov conjure up flashes of the past with his coin, Huxtable?”
“Yeah, yeah.” The side-show shyster shifted his fat cigar from one side of his mouth to the other. “I saw Starkov speak to it and magic happened right then and there. Never saw anything like it.”
“You know, I believe you,” Bellum said.
Huxtable grunted.
“I’ll be bringing a young woman around tomorrow night. I want you to tell her the same thing you told me,” the reporter instructed.
“Why?”
“Because Rose Carlisle holds the key to my future as a reporter. She’s going to help me blow this story wide open.” Bellum paused. “People are going to be talking about this real-life sorcerer for years.”
“Well, no one came round here asking me about Starkov until you. Of course, I told people about the coin but they never believed me.”
“I presume you tried to get the coin from Starkov?”
“Yeah, but he stuffed it in his pocket and ran off before I could. Never liked that shifty Romanian.”
“I never liked you, either,” Drago muttered under his breath.
Bellum turned to go. “I’ll bring Rose to see you at midnight.”
“Hate to say it, but it’ll cost you.” The hustler managed to choke the words out between cigar puffs.
“Cost me?”
“I was just starting to make money off Starkov’s performances before he left me high and dry. I intend to make something now.”
The Bowery image waved and the coin suddenly went dark. Drago rested his head against the headboard. He flipped the object over between his fingers. Will Rose be able to escape from her room tonight? If so, I need to protect her from Bellum and Huxtable.
“If you slimeballs think you’re going to expose me,” he growled out loud, “you have another think coming.”
In the tunnel that led to the Bowery, the tip of Richard Bellum’s cigarette burned a bright red. He had glanced at his watch three times in the last minute. Now he took an uneasy look around and lifted his jacket collar up against an apprehensive chill.
The Bowery, which was the seediest part of Coney Island, stretched along the amusement park’s boardwalk. It was home to shoddy music halls, carnival con artists, bawdy theaters, and curious patrons who wanted a closer look at anything amoral. Muggings and knife-fights had been known to occur in this very tunnel.
Of course, being a reporter who chased after the sensational hardly made Bellum better than those hoodlums, but he considered it a half-step up.
Why the hell aren’t you here, Rose?
A few minutes passed, then a bottle clinked and rolled forward in the tunnel. Wearing a frown, Rose materialized a few seconds behind the bottle. “I nearly tripped and killed myself!”
“And I’ve been growing gray hair waiting for you here,” he cried. “What took you so long?”
“You don’t want to know,” she said.
With an impatient harrumph, Richard threw his cigarette to the ground and snuffed it out with his shoe. He looked up and down the tunnel. “Come on, Huxtable’s waiting for us.”
As she followed her boss into the heart of the Bowery, Rose wished she’d brought along a perfume-dipped handkerchief. Stinking of beer, cigars, and body odor, the place was completely unfit for a lady. Of course, Rose had been no lady when she’d stolen out her bedroom window and shimmied down the enormous elm adjacent to it twenty minutes ago. But she couldn’t care less.
Trying not to dwell on the punishment she would receive upon her return, she accompanied Richard past a row of penny arcades. They stopped at a group of red-and-white tents. Carnival games abounded around them, but the booths seemed a far cry from the innocent ones at the other end of Coney Island—booths Rose had visited as a child. Felix Huxtable stood in front of the center tent. Colorful posters adorned the ramshackle structure, advertising such oddities as a bearded lady, a snake charmer, and a fully tattooed man.
Huxtable, who was busy hawking the show to passersby, stopped in mid-sentence when he saw Richard Bellum. “Did ya bring my money?”
Begrudgingly, Bellum slipped the carnie a few dollars. Rose frowned yet said nothing. Apparently this was how it worked in the depths of the Bowery.
“Step over here,” Huxtable instructed as he stuffed the payment into his trouser pocket. “Yer holding up traffic.”
When the man removed his visor, Rose took a moment to sum him up. He had a ring of black hair that didn’t match his graying eyebrows, and his jowls were meatier than a bulldog’s. Paunchy, short, and dirty, the fellow reeked of corruption and cheap whiskey.
Pushing down the bile that slid up her throat, Rose extended her hand for Huxtable to shake. “I’m Rose Carlisle.”
“Yer the lady who wants to know about Dragomir Starkov?”
“Yes,” she replied in a hushed tone. If Drago happens to see me here, it will look bad. He might think she was going behind his back.
“What do ya want to know about that slippery Romanian?” Huxtable asked.
“Can you tell me how Mr. Starkov came to work for you?”
Grunting, Huxtable sucked in his enormous belly, only to let it sag free an instant later. “It was three years ago, on a summer night much like this. Seein’ as how I’m the best manager in the business, Starkov sought me out. Although he claimed he’d been a respected magician in Romania, he said he wanted to start from the ground up here in the States. Made me suspect he was running away from somethin’.”
“Starkov commanded a following even here in the Bowery?” Bellum asked.
“That’s right.” Huxtable pulled a fresh cigar from behind his ear and lit it. “He started off as a sideshow act, but his tricks were always damned impressive. Levitated people. Had a dog jump through a hoop only to make the animal vanish midway. And he could guess a customer’s birthday, every time.
“After word of Starkov’s talent spread,” Huxtable said, “he abandoned me go to one of them fancier theaters along the Boardwalk. And when he needed an assistant, my daughter, Katherine, started working for him.”
“Katherine is your daughter?” Surprise vibrated through Rose.
“Yes, and she was happy working for that cad until he threw her out like yesterday’s trash. I have a mind to pound a lesson into Starkov’s foreign brain . . .”
“So you’re bitter enough with Drago to talk to us?” Rose asked as calmly as she could.
“That’s a good way of puttin’ it.” Huxtable paused. “The point is I’m a master at spottin’ a fake. But the more I watched Dragomir, I came to realize he’s in league with the devil.”
Rose raised an eyebrow.
“His tricks can’t be explained.” Huxtable seethed.
“Are you hoping we expose Dragomir Starkov as some sort of warlock or sorcerer?” Richard asked.
“It’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” Confusion washed over Huxtable’s unshaven face.
“Miss Carlisle is torn over her feelings for Mr. Starkov,” Richard said. “Seems she’s fallen in love with him.”
Huxtable moved closer to Rose. His body stench and rancid breath nearly knocked her off
balance. “You’re a female reporter, ain’t ya, doll?” he asked. “A rare breed. Shows you’ve got courage. I’d say you aren’t afraid to know everything about Starkov. Am I right?”
“I want to know about the Romanian coin he carries around with him.”
Huxtable’s eyes lit up. “Pulled it out one night, stealthy-like. Didn’t think no one was watching him. But I was. I crept up behind and saw him talk to this coin. It flashed glimmers of light, then revealed Starkov and what he did in the past. The past as in a hundred years ago—when people were travelin’ around in horse-drawn carriages with their servants. Even odder, Starkov didn’t look no different.”
Now Rose knew Huxtable was full of hot air. Either that or he was suffering the ill-effects of the beer. “You were drunk,” she accused.
He looked hurt. “I was sober that night, doll.”
“You’re nothing but a money-hungry man out to seek revenge on an employee who abandoned you,” she spat.
“That’s my father you’re talking to!” a voice cried out behind them.
Rose and Richard wheeled around to see Katherine, Drago’s former assistant, emerge from one of the tents.
“How come I didn’t put two and two together?” Richard asked.
“I gave you the surname ‘Heath’ when you interviewed me, Mr. Bellum.”
“Your stage name?” He rubbed his chin.
“Yes.”
One look at Katherine’s red, swollen eyes told Rose the brunette had been crying. She’d made an attempt to catch her hair up in a chignon, but large, unruly pieces escaped it. Her mussed hair and rumpled dress gave Rose the impression that the girl hadn’t taken the news of her termination well.
“I’m sorry I spoke to your father that way just now,” Rose apologized. “But what he claims is too fantastic to be true.”
“I also saw Drago talk to that blasted coin.” Katherine said. “He would pull it out, sometimes late at night. He always murmured quietly enough to avoid being heard and he always turned away from me, but I could tell something unnatural was going on.”
“Why didn’t you expose Starkov then?” Richard asked.
Katherine’s face flushed. She studied the ground.
Rose’s heart plummeted. She’s in love with Drago.
These people were coming dangerously close to discovering Drago’s dark secret. What would happen if his genuine powers were out in the open? Katherine wrapped her arm around her father’s shoulder and lifted her chin defiantly. “I want both of you to leave.”
“We’ll leave,” Richard said. “Rose has heard all she needs to.”
“I heard all I need to as well,” Katherine remarked in a strange voice.
“What do you mean by that?” Rose turned around.
“I overheard you and Drago talking inside the Sunshine Theater last night.”
Rose gasped. “You were there?”
Anger flashed in Katherine’s brown eyes. “I was gathering my things from the dressing room.”
“What did you hear?”
“I heard Drago begging you to be my replacement.”
Rose’s eyes narrowed. “He didn’t beg me. He asked me.”
Glaring, Katherine remained silent.
“Drago is moving his act to the Herndon Hippodrome,” Rose said, “so he desperately needs an assistant.”
“He had me.” Tears threatened to spill down the girl’s freckled cheeks.
“Drago and I have come to know each other well,” Rose explained.
“I guess he’s moving on to bigger and better things.”
“I’m sorry, Katherine. I truly am.”
“It doesn’t matter. What’s important is that I heard you and Drago discuss his abilities to enact real magic. That’s why he wants you to be his new assistant.”
Rose’s heartbeat stuttered.
“Is this true?” Richard asked sharply.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Rose avoided Richard’s hawk-like stare and Katherine’s accusing eyes.
“I heard what I heard,” Katherine stated.
Rose shook her head. “You heard wrong.”
“Just get out!” the scorned girl said.
Bellum took Rose’s arm and led her away. Once they reached the end of the row, he released her. “Steady there. I thought you were going to pounce on that woman like some rabid animal.”
“She hated me the minute she laid eyes on me.”
“How do you know?”
“Women sense these things.”
“Maybe she was jealous of the attention Drago showed you. It was obvious he fell for you right away.”
Had the entire audience noticed it?
“But that’s irrelevant,” Richard went on. “The important thing is Katherine corroborated her father’s story about the coin. What’s more, why the hell didn’t you tell me about Starkov’s genuine powers?”
Since Drago wasn’t here to defend himself, it was left to Rose. “There is no such thing as real magic, Richard.”
He grabbed her by the arm. “I want to know everything Starkov told you.”
She wormed against his grip. “Let go. You’re hurting me!”
“Spill the truth, Rose. Our jobs depend on it.”
A noise sounded behind them. Rose and Richard whirled around. Standing atop a half-wall, Drago loomed over them like an imposing skyscraper. He curled his hands into fists and glared at Richard.
“Starkov?” Bellum went pale.
“It takes a real weasel to bring a woman to the Bowery then manhandle her.”
Drago looked incredibly appealing in a dark jacket over light trousers, both cut expertly to fit his muscularity. He tugged his ascot cap lower on his forehead, leapt to the ground and stalked toward Richard. The sight of his long duster rippling behind him made Rose’s pulse jump.
Bellum backed up.
“Why the hell do you persist in writing about me?” Drago roared.
“It’s my job.”
Shoulders hulking, Drago shook his head. “You’re paid to write reviews of my shows, not bare my private life to the public.”
“I’m paid to give readers the stories they want.”
“Where I come from, journalism—and being a gentleman—must mean different things.” He reached out and grabbed Bellum by the lapels. “Stay out of my life!”
Richard shrank. “I only want to show people that your talents are like nothing they’ll ever see again.”
“Let the public come to its own conclusion. And don’t ever try to manipulate Rose into doing your dirty work again.”
“Y . . . yes,” Richard stammered.
“In fact.” Drago’s face grew crimson, “I’ll give you a chance to redeem yourself. I want you to recommend Rose to the editor-in-chief of The Daily Gazette.”
“What? The largest newspaper in New York?”
“Yes. I want you to write her a recommendation and then I want you to tear up the photo you took of me on the laundry line.”
Richard shot a pained look at Rose. She looked away, her face hot.
“If you don’t do these things,” Drago fumed, “I’ll hunt you relentlessly—and I won’t stop until you’re either fired . . . or dead.”
“You’re threatening my life?”
“You catch on quick, Bellum. But on second thought, maybe I’ll make you disappear . . .
Drago stared deeply into Richard’s eyes. The reporter shut his eyes and jerked his head away. “Don’t try to hypnotize me!”
At that, Drago released Bellum with a ferocious push. Bellum stumbled back and slammed his head against a brick wall. Pressing a hand to his bloody wound, he yelled, “You’re finished in this town, Starkov! I guarantee all your secrets will be exposed!”
“Shut up, Bellum.” Drago clasped Rose’s elbow and said, “Let’s go.”
Rose took in a long breath. “I’m not going anywhere with you.”
CHAPTER 18
Resentment blazed through Rose. “Thanks for sho
wing up when you did, but now Richard knows I told you about the photo.”
“That’s the least of our worries.”
She anchored her hands on her hips. “You’re right. My biggest worry is that Richard may not welcome me back to The Gotham Times. What’s more, you threatened his life!”
“I can’t have him exposing my secrets.”
She made no reply.
Drago stared at Rose with shock. “You’re angry?”
“Anger is what you get when you presume to fight my battles for me.”
“You need protecting.” He gathered her close.
She tried to wriggle free but his embrace was too tight.
“I might need protection, Drago, but not all the time.”
“You mean too much to me for me not to guard you.”
She studied the anguish in his eyes, then let out a heavy breath. Drago had come at a good time. Who knows what Richard would have resorted to in order to get the information he desired?
Shuddering, she sagged against his solid chest.
“Let’s talk about this somewhere else,” he suggested. “My motor car is right over there.”
To avoid people’s curious stares, she nodded and allowed Drago to take her to the waiting vehicle. Parked along a road at the top of a sandy incline, the stunning Garford shone as if it still graced the showroom floor.
Drago opened the car door. Once Rose settled on the tufted passenger’s seat, he joined her inside. Shifting the car into gear, he maneuvered it along the glistening streets of New York, wearing a scowl.
“I think you have some explaining to do,” he said above the engine’s roar.
Her heart drummed. “You’re wondering what I was doing at the Bowery in the first place?”
He nodded.
“I wanted to find out everything Richard knows about you. I was there for a meeting he set up between me and Felix Huxtable.”
“Despicable man,” Drago growled.
“Most despicable,” Rose agreed. “After showing me how bitter he is that you cut him off as manager, he told me about the coin you talk to.”
