“Apparently, the count had a comprehensive listing of all the paintings stored in the castle, including the ones he bought and sold over the years. He kept detailed records of who he sold them to and the compensation he received. That will help the authorities track down and return some of the stolen art. I also asked for copies of the pages around the time when he imprisoned Marika. Maybe I can get some of the answers Juliette needs. But I don’t think it’s a good idea for her to see the actual diary. If the woman they found in the dungeon was her mother, it would be hard for her to read it.”
“She’s a strong woman,” Will pointed out. “I think you underestimate her. I just want to make sure Juliette will be safe.”
“As far as we know, the man, or vampire, or whoever he was, is gone,” Jack said. “Did he burn up? Is he finally dead? Who can tell? It’s a mystery we may never solve.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Jack sat on a couch in the waiting room at the hospital in Bermuda, while Will paced.
“Is Kate still in with Juliette? What’s taking so them so long? Why hasn’t the doctor released her?”
Jack flashed a reassuring smile. “I’m sure everything is fine, or we would have heard by now. Why don’t you sit down? There’s something I’d like to discuss with you.”
Will turned and sat on the couch next to Jack.
“It’s obvious you care a lot for Juliette.”
“I love her, Jack. I know it hasn’t been that long, but these things happen. I’ve been alone for years, and her life hasn’t been easy. I think we could be good for each other. She makes my heart happy.”
“I’m glad, and I think you would be good for each other. That’s one of the reasons I wanted to talk with you. Have you ever thought about what you’re going to do once we get back to Atlanta? Your job and your life is in Graysville, and I doubt Juliette will ever leave Kate, especially now. You don’t know yet, but Kate and I are having a baby. That is, Kate is having a baby, but the thing is, Juliette is going to be a grandmother.”
Will shook Jack’s hand. “Congratulations. That’s great news.”
“Thanks. We couldn’t be happier. If you have any idea of getting serious with Juliette, I thought you should know what you’re up against.”
“I’m willing to do anything, anything, to see if there’s a chance for us.”
“Then I think you’re going to like my proposition.”
“What kind of proposition?” Will asked, keeping an eye on the hall where Juliette’s room was located.
“The Crystal & Hale agency is growing. As we solve more cases, our agency is becoming more prominent, and we’re getting busier. Right now, there’s only Kate and me, and Juliette, and their psychic talents are a great help, but neither of them have law enforcement expertise. The thing is, I need another investigator. A man I can trust, a man I can count on to help carry the load. I would like that man to be you, Will.”
“You’re offering me a job?”
“I sure could use your help. I know you’d be giving up a lot, leaving Graysville. You’re the big fish in a little pond, and we’re only a small agency now, but we’re beginning to get a national—even an international—reputation, and I think we work well together. We can learn a lot from each other. The work is exciting, nothing run of the mill. I’ll make it worth your while.”
Will didn’t hesitate or take any time to think it over. “Since my wife died and my mama passed, I don’t have any real ties or obligations in Graysville. I love that town, but my term is almost up, and I was just deciding whether or not to run again. I’m not in it for the money, but they just lowered the salaries of all the elected officials in the county. There are plenty of good men who could run and do a great job. He’s young yet, but Luke Slaughter is a fine officer, for instance, and he’s studying to be a lawyer. He’s got brains enough for both of us. Got to make room for the next generation. I could convince him to run. It may be time for me to hang up my hat, so to speak. But I’ve still got a lot of good years left in me. I’ve enjoyed working on this case more than any case I’ve had since I’ve been on the force. And it would give Juliette and me more time together. To get to know each other. For her to decide whether she really wants a future with me. I could make her happy, Jack. I know I could.”
Will got up from the couch when he saw Kate and Juliette coming toward them. “I should probably talk it over with Juliette before I commit, make sure she’s on board. Make sure she doesn’t mind having me around on a permanent basis. Because I plan to marry that woman.”
Chapter Thirty
The Nagy Chronicles
1625—I met the count when he was still a baron and before his sons became princes, while he was head of a minor noble family in the northern part of the kingdom of Hungary. He was dashing and brash, and I was a young, impressionable soldier in his charge. It didn’t matter that I was about to marry Marika, a girl I had been in love with since childhood. A girl who swore her love to me.
The count had his eye on me and, one night, after a particularly bloody battle and an even sweeter victory, when we were both exhausted and were under the influence of too much to drink, he professed his feelings. I thought of Marika, but the count and I were brothers in arms. We had sworn to die for each other. That night, what followed seemed a most natural course of action. In return for my body and my lifelong loyalty, he offered me his love, his protection, his family name, his wealth, a title, and the gift of immortality. When he put his mark on me, he was my first, for Marika and I had not yet lain together.
And although I never would have imagined wanting what we had together, it was a glorious night. A night I will always remember. And indeed, I did love him, first in the way a soldier loves his commander, but then in a more intimate and intense way. A carnal love, born of lust. But that love changed me. After that, I was no longer the man Marika fell in love with, and I had to turn away from her, for her own protection. She was shocked and shattered. Eventually, she married someone else, and I moved in with the count, in his castle on the hill. I never stopped loving Marika and sometimes, in the middle of the night, I would come down from the castle to visit her. She never knew I was there, or that I had to live with the pain of watching her with another man—her husband and her beautiful daughters—and I continued to watch her, and watch over her, until the day she died.
And what of my count, my sire, the man who initiated me into his secret brood? He went on to marry and start a dynasty, to live in other, richer castles, and he left me in mine. Eventually, we grew apart, but for his occasional visits, which always left me wanting more. Wanting more comfort. Missing his company and companionship, and also missing my first true love. And wondering whether things would have been different if I had stayed with Marika and lived a normal human life. Those centuries were some of the longest and the loneliest, and I’m afraid I developed some vile habits that made me ashamed. I cavorted with my kind in a number of empty, mind-numbing relationships, and engaged in other liaisons to try to recapture the human love I had with Marika, some by mutual consent and others, yes, often, by force when it suited me and my victim was unwilling. But I am what I am. And there is no going back. In my world, there are no second chances. There was no one I cared to share eternity with. I was known by many names through many lifetimes. But the given name Gedeon caught my fancy. The Devastater. So that identity stuck. For my family name, I kept the name of my noble sire, Nagy, which in Hungarian means a large and powerful person.
1945—By the end of World War II, while many of the royal landowners were displaced, jailed or deported, I joined the Arrow Cross, a Hungarian Fascist movement aligned with the German Nazis, that seized power in 1944. At first, it was just a diversion, but it turned out to be a wise decision, since my castle and all surrounding lands were spared. And then I began to enjoy the night forays into Budapest. We would roam the streets in our green uniforms and badges—a set of crossed arrows—and rob, terrorize, and slaughter the unfortunate locals.
My home was a fortress, so the castle was the ideal storage depot for the Nazis’ stolen loot, as were the salt mines, cellars, convents, and other safehouses that had been earmarked by the Reich. And when the Soviet troops drove the Nazis out of Hungary, they left behind vast stores of treasures—thousands of sculptures, paintings, watercolors, furniture, and other priceless art and antiquities looted and seized from Italy and France and museums throughout Europe. No one knew about my secret cache, and because I had enough money to pay off the Soviets, my castle and all my holdings were spared. I was a survivor, in the strictest sense of the word.
I was a patron of the arts, and I had recovered these precious works of art. Every day, I would enter the storage rooms in the castle and catalog the treasures—landscapes, skylines, and portraits by Van Gogh, Matisse, Degas, Picasso, Chagall, Vermeer. The list was endless, as were the opportunities to unload the masterpieces to “collectors” to finance the upkeep of the castle.
1983—I had all the riches in the world but no one to share them with. There were many women, of course, and men, over the years. I had needs, after all. But none captured my heart or heated my blood like my Marika, my first love. So when I first laid eyes on a beautiful gypsy camped outside my castle, I knew she was Marika incarnated and that, by some great miracle, she had returned to me. She was the image of Marika, right down to her beckoning violet eyes and coal black hair. I had to make this woman mine. She didn’t remember me, or what we had together, so she was shy at first. How could I tell her we had met in another lifetime? Where could I find the words? How could I tell her we were destined to be together? I didn’t want to scare her away. So, even though I was impatient to bed her, I courted her until she seemed to develop genuine feelings for me.
I vowed to be her protector, and, with a young daughter to feed and no means of support, at first she was receptive when I wooed her. She said another man had made similar promises and did nothing to protect her when his wife sent her away. I was jealous of that man, but I held my temper. Instead, I gave her gifts and treasures and spoke to her of my love. I even had her portrait painted—a portrait of Marika and her daughter—so I could look upon her beauty anytime I pleased.
And I was happy with her, until one day she noticed my eyes wandering to Ilona. Marika’s daughter was growing more lovely and ripe each day. And I wanted to taste her, just a sample, for she reminded me of a younger Marika, and I desired her. Marika pulled away from me because she didn’t understand my hunger and my needs. But she knew I was powerful, and that I would get my way eventually, and that nothing she could say would stop me. She agreed to marry me if I would leave her daughter alone. I was delirious. Finally, I would be reunited with my true love.
But all those centuries of corruption made it impossible for me to resist the temptation, impossible for me to be denied. I sent my guards to pick up the child and bring her to me for a closer inspection. I told them to tell her mother I only wanted to make the child feel welcome in our home, that I had a special dress I wanted her to wear to the wedding, and a special room picked out just for her in the castle, close to ours. There were preparations to be made, and I wanted her to be a part of them. I paced my bedroom, stroking my beard and rubbing my thumb across my bottom lip in anticipation of my juicy pre-wedding appetizer.
They marched down the hill, and when they returned empty-handed, reporting the child had vanished, I’m afraid I lost my temper, and Marika paid the price. I thought Marika would come around, eventually, and tell me where the child was, but no amount of torture or pain or starvation made a dent in her defiance and, one day, when I had her brought to my bedroom, it was her body I held, but her spirit had already left this earth, before I could make her mine forever. I thought we were going to share everything. But my true love was gone from me again. And I vowed that if I ever found Ilona, I would put my brand on her so I wouldn’t have to face eternity alone.
I spent countless restless nights and countless florints searching for Ilona. I hunted her down in the dark throughout Europe and all over the world, but I never found her. It was almost as if she had disappeared from the face of the earth, without a trace. No doubt her mother had woven a protective spell over her daughter, shielding her from my sight. For Marika had powerful magic, which she undoubtedly passed on to her daughter. I’d lost Marika, and without Ilona to replace her, I knew I would never be content. I would never be at peace. So I continued to search…
****
Jack put down the transcripts of the diary and rubbed his eyes.
“If Gedeon is still alive and breathing in this world, in whatever form, he’ll never give up trying to find her,” Will lamented. “I’ll have to keep a close watch on Juliette.”
“And Kate,” added Jack, thinking also of the precious new life she was carrying. “I hope to God we’re rid of the beast forever.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Lost and Found
Somewhere, in a lamplit room, powered by the pulse of an amethyst amulet, a lone woman types a list of artists’ names on a dusty, clunky, but reliable portable typewriter. The list, smudged in places, of great masters and modern artists from this school and that, an untraceable list, too sensitive to appear in any computer database, will be couriered to a certain address. And the paintings will make their way back to this museum and that, to the households of this descendant or that dealer.
Just a list. Not the golden tones of a Rembrandt or a glint of gold from a Klimt or the flash of light from a Monet. Just a name, a hint of the value finally restored to the art world. A repair, to the rent in civilization, that will occur when the missing masterpieces are delivered to their final destination.
Lost and stolen paintings suddenly, miraculously, find their way back to their proper places in the world. Appearing as mysteriously as they disappeared. The woman knows nothing more than the name of the man who will come by for the list. She has her assignment, as have many others in a long chain.
Epilogue
One Year Later
Juliette bounced baby Aurora Dawn Hale on her lap. She loved playing with her brand-new granddaughter, and so did her new husband, who had taken to calling himself Granddaddy Will. They were babysitting their little angel while Kate and Jack were out on a date, hopefully busy making more grandchildren.
“Now, Juliette, don’t you go filling Aurora Dawn’s head with any ideas, like how to turn her granddaddy into a frog, or worse.”
Juliette smiled. “I would never dream of teaching her to do anything like that, as long as you behave yourself. But she does have psychic talent. You can tell already. She’s going to surpass her mother and her grandmother. The other day, a crow flew down from the sky and landed on the side of her stroller. She reached out to pet it, and they came to an understanding. But I’m going to take it slow. She’s only a baby. She’ll have plenty of time to discover her abilities. She needs a chance to have a normal childhood, play games, hear stories.”
Will got down on Aurora Dawn’s level and looked into her violet eyes, eyes the same color as Kate’s and Juliette’s, and ruffled her black ringlets with his fingers. The baby already had a full head of hair, and she was a stunner. She certainly had her granddaddy under her spell.
“Now, Aurora Dawn, Granddaddy Will is going to tell you a special story,” he began. “It’s a fairy tale, really.” Aurora Dawn looked up into his face, and she really seemed to be listening.
“There once was a beautiful gypsy princess who fell under the spell of an evil sorcerer. The mother of the princess foretold that although her life would be difficult, one day she would be happy and meet her true love. That would be me, your Granddaddy Will.”
Aurora Dawn smiled and wrapped her tiny hand around Will’s finger while Romeo, Kate’s Bichon Frise, sat calmly at Will’s side, his paws on Will’s shoes, guarding the baby.
“The beautiful princess fell head over heels in love with the handsome chief of police when they met in the faraway land of Graysville. They g
ot married and lived happily ever after.”
Juliette smiled and dangled her amethyst necklace in front of Aurora Dawn’s face, and the baby pulled at the chain. At her touch, the stone glowed, and Aurora Dawn giggled.
“That is a sign of your ultimate power, little one. This amulet will be yours one day, Aurora Dawn, and you will be the most fabulous, most mystical, most beautiful, and most powerful princess in all the land. And you will have the happiest life. And one day, you will meet your prince and find true love, just like I did.”
A word about the author...
Marilyn Baron is a corporate public relations consultant in Atlanta. She’s a PRO member of Romance Writers of America (RWA) and Georgia Romance Writers (GRW) and winner of the GRW 2009 Chapter Service Award and writing awards in single title, suspense romance, paranormal/fantasy, and fiction with strong romantic elements. Marilyn is a new appointee on the 2015 Roswell Reads Steering Committee.
She writes humorous coming-of-middle-age women’s fiction, historical romantic thrillers, fantasy, and psychic suspense. She graduated from the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida, with a Bachelor of Science in Journalism (Public Relations sequence) and a minor in Creative Writing. Born in Miami, Florida, Marilyn lives in Roswell, Georgia, with her husband and they have two daughters.
She says: What’s unique about my writing? I try to inject humor into everything I write. I like to laugh, and my readers do too. I tend to feature older heroines, because, let’s face it, we’re not getting any younger. I love to travel. My favorite place to visit is Italy, because I studied in Florence for six months in my junior year of college.
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