Chapter 11
JEWELERS’ ROW HUDDLED ON A NARROW street between Walnut and Chestnut, about two blocks from the agency as the daemon walks on a bright morning at the tail end of spring. Brad enjoyed the sunshine, already warm enough for summer, beating on his shoulders. They passed Washington Square, where the trees had fulfilled the hazy promise of spring, settling into rich greens against a sky so sharp a blue it left nicks in even a daemon’s soul. Beside him, Lily tucked her hand into the crook of his arm.
“It’s not home,” she said, and grinned up at the sun. “But it could definitely be worse.”
It had been worse, for both of them, but agreement might tempt fate. He didn’t trust this case. Wasn’t sure he trusted Paimon, and certainly didn’t trust Matt Shields’ motives. Daemon lords never told their whole truth. He just hoped Shields’ secrets didn’t bite them in the ass. Or something. He didn’t have all the specifics of ass-biting, except that he’d kind of liked it when Mai Sien Chong did it, but figured Matt Shields might want a bigger chunk, without dinner first.
They passed into the shadows when they turned the corner onto Sansom Street. Newer shops at street level shouldered narrow storefronts crammed into old brownstones, half a flight up, half down, a shop in each direction. Hundreds of shops crammed onto one narrow block and spilled over at the cross streets. Over his head neon diamonds wider than the span of his arms hung over half the storefronts. The other half, wholesalers and traders and appraisers, all the business of a market in gems that fueled the glittering retail stores, hid its less public face behind smudged and grated windows.
Brad stopped at a brownstone halfway down the block and followed Lily up a half-flight to a door with no handle next to an empty display window with “Appraisers, Buyers, Sellers, Family-owned since 1851” printed in gold leaf on old glass.
The receptionist greeted them from behind bulletproof glass and pressed a button under her desk to allow them entry into a narrow passageway where Bill Sanders waited with a smile and an outstretched hand. He was short and balding, with a rumpled shirt and glasses with special lenses propped on top of his head. Brad had worked with him before, so he wasn’t surprised by the callused grip. Bill knew gems from the mine to the ring finger.
Lily worked with him more often and gave him a kiss on the cheek. She had convinced him she was European—“not from here”—with a wave that could have meant anywhere, including the second celestial sphere, he supposed, but Bill had settled on France, and complimented her American accent. She was the agency’s expert in colored stones and took the lead, which suited Bill just fine.
“We have two today,” she told him when they had settled across a narrow gray counter with a microscope and caliper on it. “We are agenting the better one for our client. We’ve accepted the smaller one as partial payment for the sale and we need to value it for his bill before I have it set.”
“So you’re not selling it?”
Lily handed him the five-carat ruby with a shake of her head. “I’m keeping it, for a necklace.” She never wore rings. Brad had never asked her why, and didn’t intend to do it now.
“Beautiful stone.” Bill held the ruby up to the light. “And this is the smaller one?”
“It probably won’t cover the commission on the whole contract,” Brad answered.
Bill nodded, taking it in, but not really, Brad knew. However well they prepared him, he wouldn’t be ready.
“Provenance?” he asked, and pursed his lips in a silent whistle, looked at it through a loupe and then under the microscope. “The condition isn’t perfect, some minor abrasions. And it’s a cushion cut. That cut went out of fashion more than a hundred years ago. It’s back, by the way, which increases its value, but this is not a new stone. A lot of the older stones were recut into ovals or rounds, so a stone this size in its original cut is exceedingly rare. If we had the provenance, we could certify when and where it was mined, maybe even who cut it, and who he cut it for. All those things add to the value.”
Matt Shields had said he had the original documentation for Grayson Donne’s transfer of the gem as payment for tasks performed, but he’d been less forthcoming about what that documentation showed. That was one more mystery Brad wanted answered before he went much further. “He has proof of ownership,” he said, “but the documentation we’ve seen is contemporary, a bequest of sorts.”
Bill nodded. “I should send this to the lab,” he said. “They can look for signs of heat treatment and give us a definitive report, but I’d guess you are looking at about $50,000 for this stone, as is. An interesting history might bring four times that much at auction. You may owe your client a refund.”
Brad just smiled at that. Lily drew the second ruby from the velvet bag.
Chapter 12
THE HOUSE WAS EMPTY, except for the restoration service, who had set up their ladders in the circle of charred carpet. The woman in charge wore a functional navy business suit, flat shoes, and a pentacle on a chain around her neck. She had chin-length red hair, freckles scattered lightly across her nose, and eyes almost the color of Ariton’s fire. Not a daemon, though. He could tell the difference by the prickle of his skin now, didn’t need to be trussed up like a lamb to the slaughter and thrust screaming into the second celestial sphere to figure it out. Fortunately, he’d come through the door this time.
She shot him a calculating glance and wrapped her hand around the pentacle she wore around her neck. “Claire Murphy,” she said, and called the workmen down from their ladders. “Break. Half hour for lunch.” When the men had filed out, she turned back to Evan.
“I sent the day- jobbers home with full pay. It’s on your bill.” She was nervous, and maybe he understood that, but not why she was angry. “We’ll clean it, but we won’t fix it, so don’t try to use it.”
“I didn’t know it was broken. What’s ‘it,’ by the way? And how many people who aren’t working today did you just put on my payroll?”
“Two.” She answered the last question first. “If that isn’t satisfactory, we can pack up and be out of here in ten minutes.”
Evan considered leaving and coming in again, but he’d already used up his do overs for the month. He couldn’t figure out why she was pointing all that righteous indignation in his direction anyway.
“Crack in the third arm of the pentagram.” She gestured at a spot the workers had already cleaned. “Don’t use it again. Next time it won’t hold. You’ll wind up dead, and I’ll just have to clean the grease off your ceiling.”
He didn’t see the crack but took her word for its existence. Matt Shields was just the most recent of half a dozen cases that could have damaged the plaster one way or another. But they’d had the original work done by two separate contractors so that neither knew the whole design hidden in the scrollwork. Claire Murphy shouldn’t have noticed it either. Except, he did have a perfect circle burned into the carpet. And another perfect circle where the pentagram in the ceiling had contained even the smoke from the blaze.
She was wearing a pentacle. Sigh.
“It’s not what you think.”
She didn’t answer that, just looked up at the ceiling.
He didn’t talk about agency business outside the agency. Ever. But she’d already drawn her conclusions. Maybe he could turn the argument—or add some damage to obscure the pattern and start over with a new restoration service. He could find somebody in New York, but he wasn’t sure the people he needed didn’t have some restorers’ graffito tag to warn each other off the strange-o clients.
“It has two uses. You could summon something, if you were that stupid.” He’d done that, once, sort of. Had to, and on balance it could have worked out worse than it did. But it wasn’t his gig. “Sometimes, it’s just protection—it can stop a misunderstanding from turning into a funeral.”
She stared up at the ceiling some more, processing that. “Somebody named Matt Shields left a message. Asked if you wanted him to fix the bell.” She nodded once, like
that answered the question of the misunderstanding, which it did, but she shouldn’t have known that. “I think you’d better get hold of him and tell him ‘no.’ The tourists like it cracked.”
Evan closed his eyes and counted to ten. When he opened them again, she was looking at him, stunned. “You’re not just some weirdo freak, are you? You’re the real deal.”
“Not mutually exclusive categories,” he said, but he wasn’t stupid enough to give her an answer.
She jumped when the door opened.
Not Lily. A split second of gratitude for that. Matt Shields wasn’t much lower on the “trouble” scale, though. He was wearing new jeans, a clean tee, and a fresh flannel shirt. Same boots. Smelled better. Stack of comics tucked close under one arm with B.P.R.D. , “Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense,” on the top. Evan stifled a snort he’d rather not explain to Claire Murphy. Given the option—and Matt Shields had a pile of rubies in his pocket that gave him plenty of options—daemon lords of the second celestial sphere didn’t usually dress like lumberjacks or collect comics in which superhero demons saved the world.
Shields tilted his head back to examine the ceiling. “You need some fill over there,” he said, and pulled his free hand out of its pocket to point at the third arm of the pentagram. “If you’ve got some plaster mixed, I can take care of it.”
Claire Murphy must have recognized the voice from the phone message; she beat Evan to the question he wouldn’t have asked in her presence—“Did you fix the bell?”
Raised eyebrows. Shields was trying to figure where she fit. Evan held up his hands, stop or surrender, he wasn’t sure himself which, but his head was starting to hurt and this time it had nothing to do with a computer monitor to his temple. “I just got here,” he said, “She was working on the ceiling when the call came in.”
A little shrug, then. “Too many people around,” he said, “and they seemed to like it that way. It’s not like you can ring it, where they’ve got it.”
Evan pointed his index finger at his temple and twirled it, but Claire Murphy wasn’t buying that explanation. She still might bolt, but for the moment she looked sort of like she had a handful of fireworks in full bloom—caught between terror and fascination.
“I could help you with this,” Shields said, “And then, maybe—”
“Yo!” Evan suddenly had the full attention of the room. “Let the lady do her work. You’re paying her; that’s all the help she needs. You’re going to get me sued for sexual harassment here!” He pointed with his thumbs in the general vicinity of his shoulders, hoping Claire Murphy thought he was gesturing about her imaginary lawsuit when he really wanted Matt Shields to remember what happened when daemons and humans hooked up. Lily never kept the same actual body long enough to get pregnant and he figured his father had worked out his own solutions before he. . . didn’t want to go there, but he was sure his father wouldn’t risk another Evan. But Matt Shields had been living in a freaking box.
Whatever message he got, it took him off the hunt. “Are you hungry? I’m starving. There must be lunch around here somewhere.” A few blocks over, the bell of St. Peter’s Church rang out the time—noon. And yeah, Evan was hungry. But Matt Shields was a daemon lord of Paimon, and Evan owed his allegiance to Ariton.
“You’re my client, not my friend. I can give you a list—”
Claire Murphy’s expression closed right up, but Shields read him just fine, turned his head so only Evan could see the amber fire in his eyes. “Allies, though. Right?” he said, all business. “That’s the contract.”
Evan knew what it meant to be the only one of his kind in the universe, knew what that isolation must feel like to a daemon lord who, in his natural home, joined with hundreds of his host-cousins to become the single mind of his Prince. Lily and Brad had each other, and they could go home briefly whenever they wanted, permanently if they wanted it badly enough to kill him for it. They had their own connections in this world as well. But Matt Shields had lived in a box. The church bell rang again. “Box,” it rang in his head, “Box.”
He figured they both could use a friend. They had a contract, after all. “How about a cheese steak?”
“Cheese on a steak?”
He really had been living in a box. “Not that kind of steak.” Evan took the books and put them on the desk—a copy of The Goon slipped out, and he wondered again what kind of life Matt Shields had built for himself in the shadow of the thing that bound him to this world. Not one with cheese steaks in it, apparently.
“It’s a sandwich,” he said, “You’ll love it,” and nudged him toward the door before the daemon lord could object in a way that would be hard to explain to Claire Murphy. “It’s just a few blocks. We can walk.”
“Okay, but then I have to get back to Greg’s. I promised to tighten up some loose doorknobs, fix a leaky faucet. Gotta pay for my books!”
Bemused, Claire Murphy stopped them at the door. At least she wasn’t angry anymore. “Misunderstanding?” she asked.
Evan didn’t answer, just swept a hand over his forehead, pushing hair that didn’t exist anymore out of his eyes while he tried to figure out how to get Matt Shields out of there without any more questions. It seemed to be all the answer she needed.
“We’ll take care of the break in the plaster.” She studied him for a minute, frowning slightly. “You’re not what I expected. I thought a Magus would be, you know, scarier?”
“I’m not a Magus,” he objected, but Matt Shields laughed at him.
“He is,” Shields said, but not to Evan. “He just doesn’t realize it. But you’re wrong about the scary. He’s that too.”
Claire Murphy gave him another close look. “He doesn’t realize that either, does he?” Again, not talking to him.
“Nope,” Shields confirmed, though how he’d come to such a sweeping conclusion on just one—okay, memorable, and maybe scary—meeting. So, not a fruitful line of objection.
Evan wanted to say, “Hey, you’re conspiring with a daemon here—I’m the human!” but he kept his mouth shut. It was only partly true, and he didn’t want to freak her out again. Not while she still had work to do on his ceiling. So he fell into the banter with all the good grace he could manage. “I’m not. Really, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are.” Both of them. Together. For a guy who’d been living in a box, Matt Shields seemed more human than Brad or Lily sometimes.
“A magus would already have his cheese steak,” Evan pointed out.
“I can take a hint.” Claire Murphy turned back to his ceiling, letting him off the hook for now. Evan nudged Matt Shields toward the door before they decided to pick up where they left off. “Come on, Hellboy. Let’s get out of here.” Shields laughed, but he moved.
Chapter 13
LILY SET THE SECOND RUBY ON A VELVET cloth. “We are looking for a private sale for our client,” she said, and added, “as quickly as possible. He has his eyes on a new home.”
“Does your client have provenance on this one?” Sanders didn’t touch the stone.
Lily leaned forward, elbows on the counter, and gave him a conspiratorial smile. “If he does, he isn’t sharing it,” she said.
Brad figured her efforts were wasted this time. Sanders couldn’t take his eyes off the ruby. “I’m not qualified. You’ll need a good lab report and a well-advertised auction. If it’s a known jewel, it could be priceless, but that doesn’t mean you can sell it fast or for what it’s worth. It may not move at all.”
The stone would move; it was just a question of when. In the meantime, they might have to buy the damned strongbox themselves. They could write a check for the appraised value out of the agency accounts, but if there were buyers out there who knew about Matt Shields, appraised value might mean nothing at all. So Brad ran the agency’s assets in his head, calculating how much they could liquidate on short notice. Evan must have run the same numbers this morning, without the hope of recouping the loss.
“Can you at least size
the stone for me?” Lily asked with a smile that Brad knew better than to trust on any day. “And confirm that it isn’t manufactured?”
She nudged it with one well-manicured index finger, no color on the nail, just a finish like a pearl that set off the deep red of the ruby. “I need to know whether the stone is worth the trouble or if we’re looking at a con,” she said, with “help me” in her voice.
It was an out—all Sanders needed. He snapped on a pair of latex gloves and took up the calipers in one hand and the stone in the other. A fake had never been in question. Man-made? Maybe. But some stones had a life of their own. Saunders measured, punched the numbers into a calculator, added a factor for hardness and density, and scrawled the answer on a slip of paper that he pushed across the counter.
“A bit over 85 carats. The value per carat increases with the size of the stone, and its cut and clarity, of course. The last significant ruby sold for about $200,000 per carat. That was 17 carats, so your stone should be worth quite a bit more per carat, but only the sale will tell you how much more. Buyers always weigh the rarity of the gem, including its history, with the amount they are willing to pay for a stone of any size.”
He slipped a loupe over one eye and looked into the stone. Silence for a moment while he studied the gem. When he looked up, the color in his face was shifting alarmingly from pink to gray. “You don’t have a good stone.” He set the ruby carefully on the velvet bag on the counter. “You may have one of the great missing jewels of history.”
Sanders went to a battered filing cabinet in the back of the room. From the top drawer he pulled out a journal, old by the look of it, and leafed backward through the pages. Then he pulled open a draw overstuffed with dusty folders full of crumbling pages. “We’ve been putting this stuff on the computer, but it hasn’t been a priority.” A minute more of shuffling through the folders, and he found the one he wanted, drew it out and brought it back with him, turning the yellowed pages as he maneuvered the cramped space.
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