by Alex Archer
A burgeoning migraine gave no regard to the time, either. He should take his medication. Already he was beginning to see spots before him, gray holes in his vision. Though the TV was on, the sound was off. He couldn’t see the news-caster’s face unless he blinked. That granted momentary relief from the visual spots.
The crawl across the bottom of the CNN broadcast flashed a breaking news story. Ben squinted to read it. A professor at Columbia University had been found dead. He had taught in the Sociology and Anthropology department and was the rock star of the campus. He had been garroted with a guitar string.
Ben pressed two fingers to his temple and rubbed at the sting pulsing in his head. Was there no end to the ineptitude of those he had chosen to work for him?
“I should have taken care of this myself from the start,” he muttered.
But he’d always believed leaving the dirty work to others best. Benjamin Ravenscroft was a known public entity. He couldn’t afford a slipup, or to be connected to anything immoral or just plain dirty. Not that he didn’t positively drool to get his hands on the inept and smash their faces into a brick wall.
He slammed a fist on the conference table. The force toppled the empty paper cups left behind from his afternoon meeting. Anger bled through his veins, pulsing with each squeezing grip at his temple.
Shoving aside the pile of mail he’d been going through, Ben picked up the letter opener.
The headache gripped more fiercely. He squeezed the thin staff of steel. If he was home, Linda would touch him, ease away the pain.
No longer. Once Linda had nursed his headaches, leading him into the dark bedroom and pressing a cool cloth over his pulsing brow. Gentle touches reassured, made him know that, even though he could not speak for the pain, she was there.
But Linda hadn’t touched him since Rachel’s diagnosis.
Why couldn’t she speak to him in anything less than a scream? She blamed him for all their troubles. For Rachel’s sickness. For his headaches. For the maid quitting after the dog bit her. She would blame him for the housing crisis if she could.
He was just trying to take care of his family in the only manner he knew—by hard work, and by investigating all means to curing his daughter.
Ben had to prove to Linda he was not the man she thought he was. He would win back her love, her welcoming smile and gentle touch.
A twinge of red pain struck his temple. Ben cringed, leaning over the table. Gripping the letter opener as if to break it, he was about to stab the stack of officious charity requests when a knock at the door stopped him.
Like a guilty child trying to hide the evidence Ben swung the letter opener behind his back.
He’d never escape the guilt of his own ineptitude. His inability to make the world right for those he loved the most. He could sell air, for Christ’s sake. But save his own flesh and blood?
“What is it?” he snapped.
Harris stepped inside, pushing the door with a careful hand. “Sorry to bother you so late, boss. There’s no one here, so I let myself in. You okay, boss?”
No, he wanted to tear out his brain and slam it against the wall. “Just a headache,” Ben said. “Your man finish the job?”
“Er…”
“Apparently he did. I saw the news. So where is it?”
Harris rubbed a palm over his knuckles. A bruise near his left temple looked fresh. “There was a snafu,” he said.
“Snafu?”
Ben didn’t want to hear this. Yet if the operation was going to fall apart around him, he needed to stop it before it bled out. Had to contain the damage. Like his pulsing migraine, it threatened to explode.
His knuckles tightened about the letter opener.
“The police were called,” Harris said. “Jones was arrested.”
“You kept my name out of the deal, I expect?”
“Of course, Mr. Ravenscroft. I never use names with my men. But the skull…”
“Let me guess. No skull,” Ben snapped sarcastically. “But why should I expect success from you?”
“Jones had the skull,” Harris began, as always tracking the floor with his gaze. “He called me for pickup, said he was being chased.”
“By the police?”
“No, by some woman. Then he was cut off. I didn’t get there until the police had arrived. I stayed out of sight while they made the arrest.”
Ben stabbed the table with the letter opener. The high-gloss mahogany cracked. Damn his frustrations. “A woman?”
One guess who that might be.
Clinging to the shaft of steel, Ben pressed his free palm to the table’s slick surface.
“Would that be Annja Creed?” He could not look at Harris. The gray spots had multiplied. “That same slender bit of a woman who managed to fall from a bridge and not die, as you would have me believe. Wonder how she managed to rise from the dead? And then to chase a big fellow like Jones? And slip away with the skull?”
“She must be working for Marcus.”
“The thief? I don’t think so. I tracked their e-mails online. She had no clue who he was or what artifact he had before they met. Despite his duality to me, Cooke was careful not to reveal his identity.”
“Maybe Serge…”
“Serge?” Ben swung upright, the letter opener tearing slivers of wood.
“H-he gave me this.” Harris tapped his jaw. “He was on the scene, trying to find Creed.”
Ben hadn’t considered the connection, but it was possible. It would surprise him, though, if Serge had made a friend, and one so gorgeous and famous as Annja Creed.
On the other hand Serge was positively clandestine. All the time. The man could have a harem for all Ben knew.
“So Creed took off with the skull?”
Harris exhaled. “No, some man got it.”
“Some man? Not Serge? Not Creed? But some person you don’t even have a name for?” He hissed madly. “How many people know about this skull?”
“Sorry, Mr. Ravenscroft.” Harris tugged at his tie. “Jones texted me from the warehouse just before the police nabbed him. Said a strange man took off with the skull. He said the skull did something to him.”
Tapping the tip of the letter opener against his chin, Ben slid a leg along the table. Tightening his jaw, he closed his eyes. “Did something?”
“It was like a hurricane, but inside the warehouse. The other man held it up, and it blew Jones and the Creed woman from their feet.”
This was incredible to learn. So the Skull of Sidon did possess powers. But to give all good things? What good was blowing two people away? And not killing them? Unless it was a good thing to the man who now possessed the skull.
Ben wasn’t sure how the skull worked. Perhaps the individual bearer determined exactly what goodness could be reaped from the skull.
“Were they together, do you think? Creed and the other man? Did you get his name?”
“No name, but yes, they were initially together. But I think he left her behind.”
“You think?” He looked up at Harris, but his vision was littered by blurry gray spots. Nauseous, Ben winced at the command the migraine had over him.
“I wasn’t going to get too close to the warehouse. Cops, remember?”
“And you…lost her?”
“Are you sure you’re okay, boss?”
“Yes!” Struggling for breath, Ben spoke rapidly. “You didn’t follow the woman?”
“There were cops all over like ants to peanut butter.”
“Perhaps she left with the police? Did they take her into custody?”
“Couldn’t tell. I was busy getting the hell out of there. Whoa—hey now, boss.” Harris flinched as Ben tossed the letter opener in the air, and caught it, wielding it like a blade before him.
The migraine threatened to fell Ben to his knees. Going fetal was always a last resort. And not the image he wished to convey to his man.
“Harris…you’re fired.”
“But, sir—”
He could not see the man’s face at all now. But he didn’t need to. Controlled by pain, Ben flinched his tightened muscles.
Thrusting, the letter opener slid neatly into Harris’s skull through his nasal cavity. Ben barely had to push.
In his fury, he intended to scramble gray matter. Hadn’t the ancient Egyptians done something similar before mummifying their dead?
He slapped a hand over Harris’s mouth to silence the scream. Shoving the stuttering man against the wall, Ben pushed hard. Pushing away his own pain. Murdering it.
The letter opener stopped, obviously hitting bone. He twisted and was able to cut the blade through the interior. His entire body pressed along Harris’s body; Ben felt the man’s muscles contract.
Harris dropped, dragging jelly fingers down the front of Ben’s shirt. There was very little blood from the hemorrhaging brain.
Dropping the letter opener on the stack of discarded envelopes, Ben stepped away from the damage. His hip jolted against the meeting table. He let out the breath he’d squeezed back since the weapon had entered the man’s nose.
His neck flushed with warmth. He lifted his hands to study them. He saw clearly. No blood, yet his fingers shook. Heartbeats pounded with unrelenting vehemence. He hadn’t noticed his heartbeat at all while committing the violence. Now he could not hear beyond it.
What had he done? The headache…it had taken control. He did not—
“I…didn’t…”
But he had. He’d killed a man.
It had been so easy. Natural. The pain had transferred from his skull, through his fingers and away from his body.
He tugged his foot from under Harris’s leg. Thick fluid oozed out the nose and over the man’s parted mouth. The head, tilted forward onto his chest, would keep the blood from dripping onto the floor.
“What the hell?” Ben scrubbed fingers through his hair and tugged hard. It alleviated some muscle tightness. The headache had moved to the back of his scalp, just a dull pulse now. “I…have to get rid of this.”
Yes. Think clearly. Beyond the migraine. Now was no time to panic. It was too late for regret.
He must know someone who could take this away. Move the body without anyone noticing. What did they call people like that?
“Cleaners,” Ben muttered, shocking himself with the knowledge. He stumbled, tripping over Harris’s hand. He caught himself against the boardroom table and pressed his face to it.
Ben exhaled and slumped onto the chair. He collapsed forward, arms folding in and head bowing. A glance over his shoulder checked Harris’s face. Still no excess blood. When had his blurred vision dissipated?
There was a man he knew who would know the right people. And it was not Serge.
Ten minutes later Ben had been promised a cleaner would arrive within the hour. Stepping over Harris’s body, he dragged the door closed behind him. He had to tug. The body had slumped and blocked the door. Harris’s ear bent awkwardly. The door dragged flesh, but finally it closed.
He phoned his secretary at home. “I was thinking,” he spoke carefully, molding his words before letting them out, “we’d head for the Jumeirah. I want to relax tonight on some luxurious sheets with room service. How does that sound to you?”
“You spoil me, Ben. Shall I give the hotel a call?”
“Yes. I’ll meet you in the lobby in an hour. I’ve got some tidying up to do here and a last-minute phone call with a client on Tokyo time.”
“Shall I order champagne?” Rebecca asked.
Champagne to celebrate his first murder?
“Why the hell not?”
26
Garin strode to the front door and, gripping the handle, for a moment wondered if it would be Annja on the other side. It should be.
Unless she hadn’t gotten away from the murderer in the warehouse.
Did the possibility of her injury, or even death, bother him? He allowed regret no more than a flash. Regret was best reserved for opportunities not taken and love. Both things he avoided like the black plague.
“Garin!”
Hand still clutching the doorknob, Garin grimaced at the male voice on the other side. Not Annja, but a man he hadn’t seen for months. And he never regretted his absence.
He opened the door and Roux charged through. Looking like a silver-screen star with white hair that clashed with his tan skin and sunglasses perched on his head, Roux marched into the living room where Garin had left the skull on the coffee table.
A rush of anger, trepidation and misplaced admiration battled within Garin. He hated that he could never sort out his feelings about the man. Usually anger won.
Nothing wrong with that.
Roux snatched the skull with a swift hand. He turned on Garin furiously.
“So this is what you’re after now?” the Frenchman said. “I thought I’d seen the last of this thing five centuries ago.”
“I’ll take that, old man.” Garin slapped the bottom of Roux’s hand, popping the skull into the air. He snatched the small cranium like a basketball and tucked it against his chest. “What brings you to New York? The European women growing stale for you?”
“I could ask the same of you. You never went in for American women.”
“I’ve always enjoyed women. Any nationality will suit.”
“So that’s why you’ve bought this place?” The old man’s eyes scanned the room. His expression indicated he was not impressed. “New hunting grounds to stalk?”
“It’s a rental. But you didn’t come here to inspect the decor or marvel over the great deal I got for it.”
“I don’t care what you spend your money on. Unless it swipes a sweet deal out from under me. How did you manage to win that auction in Brussels? I had two buyers to ensure the Fabergé egg would be mine.”
“That was you at the Brussels auction?” Garin chuckled. “I had no idea I was bidding against you. But thanks for telling me. Makes the win all the sweeter.”
Roux bristled and cast a glance out the window, down toward the park. He was not here for a pleasant chat. His entire frame was stiff, strung tightly. “Where’s Annja?”
In an involuntary attempt not to mirror the man, Garin’s shoulders relaxed. He swung out an arm.
“You expect to find her here, in my home? I know you distrust me, Roux, but to suspect that Annja and I—”
“You used her to find that damned necromancer’s nightmare, then ditched her, didn’t you?”
Garin gave the skull a spinning toss. The slap of it against his palm satisfied. When he’d wielded the skull toward his opponents, it had given him good things—the defeat of the opposition and an ability to escape cleanly.
“It is a sweet little thing.” He kissed the skull’s overlarge cranium.
“You forget your lessons so easily, Garin.”
“And you think everything that happens to a man is a lesson. Some things happen for no other reason than that’s what was supposed to be. No lesson. No greater meaning. That’s it, Roux. I’ve got the prize and you don’t. So I’ll be seeing you.”
The old man raised a brow. Over the years they’d developed a balance of power between them neither could ever be satisfied with, but which both tolerated.
Roux sat opposite where Garin stood. He would not be shooed from the premises so easily.
There was no love lost between the two of them. Roux had taken Garin on as an apprentice when he was a teenager. More like slave. Though he’d not been beaten, overmuch. Roux had certainly held the teenage Garin in fear for his life should he disobey a command. His master had been rumored to be a wizard, and that frightened Garin into compliance for a good many years.
Garin had taken escape from Roux at first opportunity.
Fortunately for him, he’d gained immortality before that escape.
“Did you take a look at the sword while you were with Annja?” Roux asked.
“I did as it was sweeping threateningly before my eyes. The woman owns the thing, you know? It’s like
an extension of her now. It is a wonder to witness.”
She was a wonder. Garin had not in his endless lifetime met a woman who intrigued him so thoroughly. She may not be the strongest or even close to devious, but she did embrace every situation the sword led her into with a marvelous gusto.
“And when you could not get her to hand it over to you, you took the skull instead,” Roux deduced. “Didn’t you learn a lesson the first time we wielded that monstrous thing?”
“That was your mistake, old man.”
“There is no wise means to handling that abomination. Unless it’s now got an instruction manual?”
“Get over it. I won this fair and square. There was a three-way battle, and I emerged the successor.”
“Three?” Roux leaned forward. “Don’t tell me the bone conjurer was in the mix.”
Garin glanced out the window. He didn’t want Roux in on this one. The man would be better to walk away and leave the dangerous bit of cranium to him.
“Well?”
“You asked me not to tell you. Make up your mind, old man.”
“You are as old as I, so do not toss about the unremarkable moniker. What did Serge do to Annja?”
“It was not the conjurer but a thug who worked for an unknown entity. Annja didn’t have a clue who he was.”
But Garin did. He’d yet to meet Benjamin Ravenscroft, but he might before he left New York. Opportunity was rattling at his door, and he was just too curious not to crack it open for a peek. As for his original client, well, a little bidding war always sweetened any deal.
Garin sat and leaned forward. “You make me wonder about your attachment to the woman, Roux. Just when I’ve begun to think you’ve a sort of father-daughter thing going on, you surprise me with intense concern for Annja’s well-being. Do you love her?”
“You are an idiot, Garin.” Roux lunged.
Garin saw the punch coming. He kicked high. His foot connected with Roux’s gut. The old man grunted. It was a mere tap.
The skull toppled to the floor as Garin swung a fist. Roux blocked the punch with a forearm to his wrist. It was like an iron bar, his arm. For some reason their immortality kept them strong. It was as if each year hardened them—their muscle, their mien, their minds.
