Mission: Irresistible

by Lori Wilde

  “Maybe I’m still embarrassed about last night.”

  “Aw, Cassie, you don’t have to be embarrassed about that. You were just being yourself. I like how open and honest you are.”

  If he only knew. Right now she felt about as open and honest as an alcoholic Enron executive. And as guilty.

  “I’m going in,” she said and nodded at the house, desperate to get out of this conversation.

  “And what if some nosy neighbor decides to notify the police?” he asked.

  “We’ll just say we dropped by to see an old friend. He didn’t come to the door. He’s plump; he’s middle-aged. He doesn’t eat right. He’s a heart attack waiting to happen. We were worried.”

  Cassie didn’t wait for Harry to follow. She took off around the side of the house. The grass whimpered for a good mowing, and her sandals sank deep into the dewy foliage. The itchy Bermuda seeds tickled her ankles, and several narrow blades lodged between her toes.

  Ugh. The sacrifices she made for her job.

  She cornered the house and was pleasantly surprised to find the back door standing open. No breaking-and—

  entering charges needed. Well, no breaking anyway. Technically, she supposed she would still be entering. She started up the back stoop, but a hand reached out and snagged her elbow.

  “Are you crazy? Buy a déjà-freakin’-clue. Didn’t we just go through this last night?”

  She turned to look at Harry. “Hey, I like the déjà-clue thing. Way to reference pop culture. Didn’t know you had it in you. Now let go of my arm.”

  “Woman, don’t you have even a whisper of common sense? An unknown man in a mummy costume has been stabbed, an ancient amulet has been stolen, and your apartment was plundered. Figure out the appropriate response. Danger. Proceed with caution.”

  “Fiddle.” She blew a raspberry. “If his place is empty, Clyde is long gone.”

  “There could be someone else inside instead of Clyde.”

  “Oh.” He was right. She hadn’t considered that.

  “I’ll go first. You stay right behind me.”

  “Can I wrap my arms around your manly waist?” she teased, to lessen the tension and to keep him from noticing any more changes in her behavior.

  “Are you physically incapable of going five minutes without flirting?”

  “Pretty much.”

  A grin tugged at the corner of his mouth, but he managed to fight it off. “Just follow me.”

  Harry ascended the stoop, Cassie at his heels. He pushed the door open. The hinges creaked ominously.

  She made spooky horror movie noises.

  “Shh.” He frowned and whispered fiercely, “What if someone is in here?”

  “The cow already got out of the barn on that one. I don’t think our presence is going to come as a news bulletin.”

  “Good point,” Harry admitted and stepped over the threshold.

  The kitchen was lit only by the morning sun dappling through the bare window. Except for the refrigerator and stove, the room was vacant. No dining table, no toaster on the counter, no dirty dishes in the sink. But there was dust on everything. It looked as if Clyde didn’t live here anymore.

  Very strange.

  They moved into the tiny living room. Harry led the way, and it was all Cassie could do to keep from resting her hands on his shoulders. But she was still anxious about trusting him. She wanted to believe in him, but Ahmose had raised enough doubts in her mind.

  They skulked down the narrow hallway and into the first bedroom. It was as dusty and empty as the rest of the house. They took a quick peek into the adjoining bathroom.

  Nada.

  One room to go.

  The room at the end of the hall.

  “If this was a horror movie, this is where the audience would be screaming at us not to go into the room. You realize we’re the too-stupid-to-live people.”

  “I promise you that Freddy Krueger isn’t in there.”

  “What about Jason?”

  “Him either.”

  “Michael Myers?”

  “Nope.”

  “Leatherface?” Cassie asked. “He’s the scariest of all with that chain saw. Rrrrrrrrr.” She pretended to slice him up with a chain saw.

  “Knock it off.” Harrison squared his shoulders and moved toward the door. Cassie crept after him.

  He turned the knob.

  Blood swooshed through her ears.

  Harry edged the door open.

  Something darted out.

  Something small and gray and fast.

  A mouse!

  Cassie shrieked, wrapped her arms around Harrison’s neck, and jumped into his arms. “Omigod, omigod, omigod. I would have preferred Leatherface.”

  “You’re afraid of mice?”

  “Petrified.”

  “He’s more afraid of you than you are of him,” Harrison said.

  “I seriously doubt that. You’re incredibly lucky I didn’t pee my pants.”

  He was holding her and chuckling. Cassie could hear his laughter deep inside his chest.

  She didn’t want to get down. It felt kinda nice in Harry’s arms, and there was a mouse lurking in the house. But she wasn’t a lightweight and she didn’t want to break his back, so she let go of his neck and set her feet on the floor, all the while casting a suspicious gaze in the direction of the mouse.

  “Let’s wrap this up.” He stepped into the room the mouse had come out of. Tentatively, Cassie crept in behind him.

  It had a short stairway leading down into a cellar.

  Oh no. She wasn’t about to go down there. She quickly backpedaled.

  “Where you going?” Harry started down the steps.

  “That’s okay, you go on, report back to me.”

  “What? You chicken to go down to the cellar?”

  “No.” Terri-fickin’-fied.

  “Brock-brock.” He made chicken noises and flapped his arms like wings.

  “Don’t make fun of me. I’m claustrophobic.”

  “And after that big speech about jumping headlong into the water.”

  Why did he have to call her on this? She hadn’t been in a cellar in eleven years. She never wanted to be in one again.

  “You know the only way to get over a fear is to face it,” he said.

  “I know.”

  Crap. He was going to goad her until she went into the cellar. With no windows and only one door to escape through.

  “We’ll leave the door open. I’ll be right with you.” Yeah, famous last words. Probably what Ted Bundy said to his victims.

  Don’t exaggerate. Harry’s not a serial killer.

  Maybe not, but he could very well be a thief who was trying to frame her for his crime. If that was the case, why had he brought her to his conspirator’s house?

  Maybe he had wanted to lure her here so he could lock her in the cellar. That thought froze her.

  He extended his hand. “Come on.”

  Don’t go!

  “You can do it.” His smile could have melted the polar ice caps. She was such a sucker for a great smile. How pathetic was that?

  “Can’t I just wait here?”

  “That doesn’t sound like the Cassie I know.”

  “All right,” she said. “But if I do this, the next time I want you to do something adventurous, you can’t hold back.”

  “Deal.”

  She could do this. No problem. Just a simple cellar. She gulped and eased down the stairs.

  “Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?” He reached up and pulled the dangling cord on the bare lightbulb. It took every ounce of courage she possessed not to fling herself back up those steps.

  “Hey, look here.” He squatted on the dirt floor. Cassie could clearly see the imprint of what looked like a coffin delineated in the dirt.

  Their eyes met. “Solen’s sarcophagus.”

  Harry trod across the floor, headed for a cabinet positioned in the corner beside a cedar hope chest.

  “Where you
going?” she asked, quickly covering the gap between them.

  “We’re here. We’ve come this far. Might as well check out every nook and cranny.”

  “Such a thorough little scientist.”

  The expression on his face was somber. “I’ve got to be honest with you, Cassie. I’m really getting worried about Adam. What if he’s”—she could tell he was having trouble even saying the word—“dead?”

  His voice cracked, and the sound of it squeezed her heart. There was no doubt in her mind that he cared about his brother. He wasn’t lying. This wasn’t an act. Ahmose had to be wrong. Harry would never put either his job or his brother in jeopardy by stealing an ancient artifact.

  Unless he’s just a damned good actor. It’s not like you’re the best judge of a man’s character.

  But she could not deny the look of concern in his eyes. He was extremely worried about his brother.

  Harry reached for the handle on the cabinet door.

  “Ooh, wait, wait.” She shook her hands like she was drying her fingernails after a manicure. “Let me brace myself in case there’s another mouse in there.”

  “Tell me when.”

  She gritted her teeth and tensed her shoulders. “Go.”

  Harry wrenched the cabinet open, and they found themselves staring down at a bolt of white linen.

  The mummy hit the ground rolling.

  Ooph.

  Stunned, he lay there gasping like a guppy. It was a long drop for a three-thousand-year-old guy with a leaky stab wound in his back.

  Get up. You ain’t got time to laze around.

  He heard shouts from inside the warehouse. Knew his absence had been discovered by Nike and Froggy Voice. Frantically, he rolled over on his side, tried to force his legs to obey.

  After a couple of wobbly attempts, he managed to drag himself to a standing position.

  Get the hell out of here.

  Right. Which way?

  If he took off in the wrong direction, he could easily run into Nike and Froggy, and if he did, he knew there would be no getting away. In his present condition, he couldn’t outrun an infant.

  He swung his head around, spied a delivery van parked on the street at the end of the alley. Maybe he could hide behind it until the coast was clear.

  Hurry, hurry.

  Something brushed against his leg. He looked down and saw he was starting to unravel. A long strip of linen was dangling from his elbow. If he wasn’t careful, he’d trip himself. Tucking the material into his fist, he took off at a lope, headed in the direction of the van, but just as he reached it he tripped in a pothole and went tumbling headlong under the vehicle.

  He bit down hard on his bottom lip to keep from crying out. He was underneath the van’s back tire, and when he rose up he bonked his head on the axle.

  Son of a wh—

  Something fell off the undercarriage.

  He peered at it, blinking. It was a small oblong black box with a magnet on one side.

  A hide-a-key. He smiled. He was saved.

  Hope spurring his recovery, he scooted from underneath the van, slid open the box, and retrieved the key. He was just about to hop behind the wheel and take off when he heard a pounding noise coming from the back of the van.

  Was someone in there?

  You don’t have time to mess around. Get moving. Get out of here.

  Bam, bam, bam.

  Get in the van. You can look in the back later.

  He hopped inside, started the engine, and drove away just as Froggy Voice and Nike came bursting from the warehouse. Cutting the corner so short that the van bounced up onto the curb, he stomped the accelerator and careened three blocks through heavy traffic. All the while the knocking in the trunk was growing louder and louder.

  Damn, shut up.

  What if it was Kiya? The thought suddenly occurred to him.

  Okay, that did it.

  He pulled over to the shoulder, left the engine idling, and got out.

  Vehicles blew past him. Someone honked.

  Cautiously, he inched his way to the rear of the van. He grabbed hold of the door handle. Preparing to run at the first hint of trouble, he gingerly pulled the door open and peered inside.

  The person bound and gagged on the floor looked familiar, but he couldn’t place the name. Slowly, the mummy approached. A pair of gray eyes beseeched him.

  “Hey,” said the mummy. “Am I supposed to know you?”

  CHAPTER 16

  Clyde’s the mummy?” Harrison fingered the bolt of linen.

  “No.” Cassie shook her head. It reassured her that he looked genuinely confused, and reinforced her trust in him. “There’s no way. The mummy was stabbed in the back.”

  “Unless the stabbing was faked.”

  “No. It was real blood, and Clyde was in the museum looking fine just minutes after I found the mummy in the courtyard.”

  “Could he have stabbed the mummy?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Or,” Harrison said.

  Their eyes met.

  “Clyde and the mummy were working together,” they said in unison.

  Cassie was certain that Harry was as surprised by this insight as she was. Ahmose had to be wrong about him, that’s all there was to it.

  “I’m guessing the mummy created the distraction while Clyde doused the lights and snatched the amulet,” Harrison said.

  “But if Clyde and the mummy were in cahoots, then who stabbed the mummy?”

  “Could it have been a third party?”

  “Somebody horning in on Clyde and the mummy’s caper?”

  “But who?”

  “Maybe it’s the same person who ransacked my apartment.”

  “Or maybe Clyde ransacked your apartment. Maybe the mummy double-crossed him. Or perhaps Mummy Man was the one who trashed your place.” Harrison set the bolt of linen back in the cabinet.

  “I’m telling you that mummy was in no shape to do anything more than breathe—and he was doing very little of that—much less ransack and double-cross.”

  “And then there’s the central question.” Harrison brushed his fingertips against his pant legs.

  “Yeah,” Cassie said. “Who’s the mummy?”

  “Adam?”

  “What now?”

  Harry took the djed from his pocket and fingered it, a faraway look in his eyes. He seemed to use the thing to help him think. “My brother’s in trouble,” he murmured.

  “Call him again.” Cassie handed Harry her cell phone. “I’ll check out the cedar chest.”

  Palming the djed, Harry accepted her phone and pulled out the antenna. Cassie sank to her knees beside the cedar chest, praying there were no mice inside there either.

  She undid the clasp and cautiously eased open the lid, not sure what to expect. She was slightly disappointed to find sweaters. She lifted them out one by one.

  “I can’t get any reception down here,” Harry muttered.

  About halfway to the bottom of the chest, underneath all the sweaters, Cassie found something disturbing. It was a Minotaur mask and a wax seal with the sign of the Minoan Order engraved into it. She caught her breath. The implication was clear. Clyde was a member of the Minoan Order.

  She started to call out to Harry to tell him what she found, but then she hesitated. As much as she did not want to believe Ahmose, the part of her that had trouble trusting any man whispered in her head. What if Harry and Clyde were in this together?

  But then why had Harrison brought her here?

  She pivoted in her squatting position to see where Harry was and if he was watching her, and that’s when she realized she was alone in the cellar.

  And the door at the top of the stairs was swinging closed.

  It clicked shut with an ominous sound.

  Cassie freaked. She totally lost it. Terrified, she flew up the steps and charged the door. No, no, she could not be locked in a cellar. She would die. No place to go to the bathroom. No food to eat. Not enough air.


  Help!

  Her knees were rubber, her body instantly drenched in sweat. She slammed both palms hard against the door. “Let me out! Let me out! You can’t lock me in here!”

  Two seconds later, Harry wrenched the door open and she tumbled out onto the floor, gasping frantically. He stared down at her. “It wasn’t locked.”

  She swatted his leg. “I told you I didn’t like cellars, and you left me down there alone.”

  “I thought you were following me. I had my mind on Adam and I—”

  “You forgot me,” she accused. She was not going to cry. She would not.

  “Not on purpose. Why are you clenching your fist? You gonna hit me?”

  “Maybe.” No crying. Stop sniffling.

  “Jeez, Cassie, I had no idea you were so claustrophobic.” He bent down to help her up, but she squirmed away from him.

  “You forgot me.” Her bottom lip trembled.

  “Okay. I forgot you. I’m sorry. I was focused on calling my brother, and when I focus on something I get absentminded about everything else.”

  He looked remorseful, but she wasn’t letting him off the hook. Five minutes ago she’d been sure Ahmose was completely wrong about Harrison; now she wasn’t so sure.

  “Just calm down,” he soothed. “Take a deep breath.”

  “Don’t tell me what to do.” She pushed past him, headed for the back door. For fresh air and freedom.

  He followed her. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

  “I’m not crying,” she said, drawing in great gasps of air, the morning sun warming her face as she walked out into Clyde’s backyard.

  “What’s this then?” He caught up with her and reached out to stroke her cheek damp with tears.

  She jerked her head away and glared. “I’m not crying.”

  “Oookay, if you say so.”

  “You can be a big ol’ jerk, you know that?”

  “Do you want to tell me why you’re overreacting?” he said calmly.

  His calmness made her want to punch something. “None of your damned business.”

  He raised his palms. “All right, obviously you have a thing about getting locked in a cellar, and you don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Damn skippy.” She rubbed a tear from the end of her nose with the back of a hand.