They stood, staring at each other. Sofie let herself relax, let all her emotions show.
Archie looked away from her, down to where Evan sat. “Enjoy her did you? Fancy a foursome?”
Out of the corner of her eye Sofie saw Evan get to his feet. Fully in control, his body uncurled until he stood facing Archie across the long room. “No.” it was all he said but there was a menace in the tone, a warning. Say no more, or I’ll hurt you.
“Didn’t enjoy her, or don’t want a foursome?”
“None of your business and no.”
Archie strode forward, fists raised, and Evan moved to meet him, knees slightly bent, arms away from his side.
Sofie recognized the pose. Archie was a good fighter, but someone had trained Evan, if not the Agency, someone who knew how to defend himself. The fight was over almost before it had begun. When Archie struck, Evan was waiting, ducking under the blow and seizing the fist in one hand, twisting the arm and spinning Archie around to hold the wrist in a painful grip. If he twisted, he would break Archie’s wrist. “Not in here. There are too many valuable things.” The tone was gentle, but emotionless, a reminder.
Archie grunted. “All right. Let go.”
Evan did so. He stepped back, to stand at Sofie’s side, not too close. “I merely offered Sofie somewhere to sleep,” he said. “What you decide is up to you, though it sounds as though she’s made up her mind”
Archie opened his mouth, but he was interrupted before he could speak. A cultured, American voice sounded behind him. “Howell, you drag trouble behind you. What have you done now?”
Sofie gasped. She had seen him once at a distance, but once seen, never forgotten. The tall, elegant, black-clad figure before her bowed his head slightly in greeting and then turned to close the door. Evan stood frozen, his face unreadable. Archie stepped aside to let the newcomer come further into the room. Gwyneth stared and stepped back against the wall.
“How did you find me?” Evan asked. “I thought I came here incognito.”
“You called your mother yesterday,” Cristos said. “It took five minutes to trace the cell link.”
Chapter Six
“You’re talking to my mother again?”
“She was worried when you wouldn’t tell her where you were so she came to me to see if I knew. I didn’t, not until I checked her cell.”
Evan’s mouth twisted in annoyance. “I wouldn’t have used it if I’d realized you’d get hold of it.”
“If you were on Agency business I’d be severely displeased. You weren’t, so it’s understandable. Why did you ring your mother?”
“To check in.” Evan paused. “With you.”
Cristos smiled. A rare facial expression for him, but Evan had seen it before. “Good.” He looked around the room, and saw Sofie. “Dr. Adams.”
Evan was pleased that Sofie merely smiled and answered. “Cristos.” At a crooked brow she introduced him to Archie and Gwyneth. Cristos shook their hands and dismissed them. He did it in his usual elegant manner, on what was essentially their territory. “I’m afraid I have business to discuss with these two people, but I would love to come up to the site and see your work later. I’ve always had an interest in old things.”
Archie murmured something and left. By the look of her, Gwyneth had wanted to escape the moment Cristos entered. Evan wasn’t surprised. Cristos had that effect on a lot of people.
“How did you know me?” Sofie was new to this game.
Cristos gave her an easy smile. “I looked up your ID. I saw a tape of one of your lectures. Impressive. Did they tell you I’d requested your services?”
“I’m FBI,” she reminded him.
Cristos shrugged, a small gesture of one Armani-clad shoulder. “It can be arranged.”
“Why do you want me?”
Cristos looked at her aslant, a gleam in his silver gray eyes. “A leading question, Dr. Adams. You might want to rephrase that.”
She grinned, ice broken. “Perhaps.”
“To answer your question, I would have thought it was obvious. You have a considerable talent in a new science, Dr. Adams, one I would dearly love to use.”
“How would you use it?”
Cristos regarded her closely. Evan enjoyed not being the center of his attention and settled back to watch. “I know what people call us, but higher up they are more appreciative. I believe there is more than straight science in this world, but science is our starting point. You have arcane and unusual knowledge which would counteract some of our wilder contacts.”
“What do you do, precisely?”
She’s interviewing him, Evan thought delightedly.
“We’re very good at surveillance,” Cristos said. Evan knew how much of an understatement that was. “We take a few unusual cases that come our way, cases the other departments can’t handle. I keep us busy.” He shot a glance at Evan and he came alert. There was something wrong. He moved closer to Sofie.
“Dr. Adams, while I would be delighted to offer you a position in Department Fifty-Seven, I didn’t fly across the ocean for that alone.”
Sofie turned to Evan. “Shall I leave you alone to talk to Evan?”
“No.” Sofie turned back to Cristos. “It’s you I came to see. Both of you, actually.” Now Evan stood right next to her. Cristos glanced at him over Sofie’s head, a warning in his eyes. “There has been a development in a case, Dr. Adams, and unfortunately it involves you. I flew here early, to tell you and to offer you our help, if you want to take it.” Evan waited. From the brief glance Cristos had given him he knew the news was bad.
“The day before last the body of your roommate was discovered.”
“Oh my God!”
Evan no longer cared for appearances. He curved his arm around her shoulders loosely, giving her a choice. He was glad she chose to move towards him instead of away. He felt the need of some support himself. Cristos waited. Without looking in his direction Evan knew Cristos was watching her closely, gauging her reaction and reaching out with his mind. He felt it. For the first time in his life he stopped thinking of the gift as a useful tool and regarded it as an intrusion. He wanted Sofie left alone, so he opposed the searching mind with his own. He knew he’d been successful when Cristos shot him an irritated glare. He didn’t respond.
“Do you need to sit down?”
Sofie shook her head against his shoulder, then raised her face and dry eyed, looked at Cristos. “Tell me about it. Why are you involved?”
“It’s the serial killer. The one you were investigating before you came here.”
“Good God!”
“Dr. Adams, the authorities will catch up with you today. You weren’t hiding, so you’re easy to trace. You have to decide what you want to do.”
“What will happen?”
“The FBI will take you off the case. It’s gotten too close to you. There’s a chance the young woman was mistaken for you, and this is too much of a coincidence.” He paused. “This makes it three. We have a serial killer on our hands.”
After a pause Cristos continued. “I want to move fast. If we leave today they won’t catch up with us.”
“What do you want from me?”
Evan exchanged a glance with his boss. “Ideally I want you to join my team, but that’s your choice. I want in on this investigation. I want to know what’s going on. I know there’s more to this than the perverted acts of a serial killer. There’s something they’re keeping so close I can’t get it. They usually keep something of the M.O. back, but this is different.”
Evan felt Sofie tense, and understood why. She’d told him. Would he now tell his boss? He felt as if it was some kind of test. He intended to pass it, so he said nothing.
Cristos waited a moment before shrugging and moving away. “Can you leave today? I was told you were here to get married. Are you married? Do we have to consider taking a husband with us?”
“No.” Sofie’s reply came firmly. “That’s off.”
“I�
��m sorry.” The reply was perfunctory. Evan knew Cristos didn’t really care whether her marriage was off or on, except for the complications it might bring to his plans. “Then shall we go? I’ll make the arrangements while you pack. I take it you have your passport with you?” Sofie admitted that she had.
She preceded Evan to his room. Evan stayed close, as though danger was already upon her. She waited until he had closed the door. “Thank you.”
“What for?”
“Not telling him what I told you last night.”
Evan grimaced. “I might have to tell him yet, but I wanted to talk it over with you first.”
“Will you get into trouble if he finds out you knew but didn’t tell him?”
“Probably. It doesn’t matter.” It honestly didn’t. He didn’t care if Cristos found out or not. All he wanted at that moment was her good opinion.
“You can tell him.”
“Thank you.”
Evan busied himself packing the things he’d only unpacked the previous day. He felt as though it had been much longer. Something inside him had changed. He wasn’t sure what it was yet but he knew he would find out before too much longer.
Chapter Seven
Sofie moved her head and came awake, jerking up with a start when she realized where she was. The second time she had slept with Evan. Only this time they were fully dressed and in the company of other people. If they’d been in Economy it wouldn’t have surprised her to find herself leaning against the shoulder of a relative stranger while she slept. It happened all the time. But they were in Club class, with broader, more comfortable seats, and an attendant who came and tucked them in. What was more, she was held in his arms, not propped up against his shoulder. The armrest between their seats had been raised, so it no longer impeded their linked bodies. Had he done that?
His response was the same too, a smile and a kiss. Gentle and friendly, but she knew Evan wasn’t naturally a friendly person. “We’re nearly there,” he murmured. “About ten minutes, I think.”
She’d hardly had time to run a brush through her hair and wipe her face before the seats were raised and seat belts clamped into place. Still disoriented by the swift, but luxurious journey from Tintagel to New York, Sofie consulted her watch and realized she was still on British time. Perhaps she always would be.
A private plane to Heathrow, where they were expected and rushed through security to the next plane for New York, which had left at three o’clock in the afternoon. That meant it was still three o’clock, or thereabouts, taking into account the six hour flight.
“How are you feeling?” Evan’s look spoke only of friendly concern.
Sofie shrugged. “Fine, I think. My sleep pattern will be shot to hell, though.”
“We’ll handle it.” What did he mean by that? Sofie could have sworn she saw a gleam in his eyes, though she was damned if she knew what it meant.
She busied herself collecting her things together, but traveling with this kind of luxury meant she had little to do. Her luggage was collected for her and placed in the waiting limousine. They climbed in.
Only then did Sofie remember the one thing she should have done before she left the country. “My mother,” she gasped. “I didn’t ring my mother.”
Cristos handed her his cell phone. Sofie opened her mouth to protest at the cost, but closed it again. Anyone who could afford to travel like this wouldn’t object to the occasional cross Atlantic phone call.
Closing her mind to the mundane concerns Sofie dialed her mother and heard the familiar voice. “Hello.”
“Mum, it’s Sofie. Something’s happened, so fast I’m still coming to terms with it.”
“Are you all right, dear?”
“Yes.” Typical of her mother to think first of her daughter’s health and safety. Sofie felt warmed by the concern. “I’ll ring you later, if I can. But there’s a couple of things. There’s not going to be any wedding.” How to explain? Best keep it simple, tell her mother something she could understand immediately. “Archie was cheating on me, and I found them together.”
“Oh, Sofie!”
The immediate sympathetic response brought Sofie nearer to tears than she had been since that terrible scene the night before. Was it only the night before? “The other thing is that I’m back in New York. I’ve been brought back to look at a case, and considering how things are with Archie, I was glad to come.”
“Oh, I see.” Dull now. Sofie’s mother had never approved of her switch in career.
“I’m sorry, Mum, I know you wanted it to work out. Take care now!”
She hung up and handed the phone back before her mother could start. It was likely she would receive a long email in the next day or two. She wished she’d never bought her mother that computer and shown her how easy it was to operate.
“Trouble?”
Sofie looked at Cristos, who had asked the question. “Not really. My mother liked Archie, is all. And she’s a typical mother, always asking about me. She loves me really.”
“Is that typical?” Cristos’s cold gaze swung to Evan, sitting next to Sofie on the long limousine seat, his arm stretched out behind her head.
“I wouldn’t know. Miranda doesn’t worry about me.” Sofie was mildly surprised to hear Evan refer to his mother by her Christian name.
“Oh she does. Never doubt that.”
The tension in the car had increased. Sofie wanted to ask, and remembered that when she’d found her son missing, his mother had gone to Cristos. “What is it with you two?”
Evan raised an eyebrow and looked at Sofie, his eyes bleak. “Cristos was married to my mother once. Briefly.”
Another shock. How many more were coming? Sofie stared at Evan, trying to see the truth, but Evan wasn’t telling. She turned to look at Cristos, and saw the half smile quirking on his thin lips. “We don’t advertise it. It has no relevance to our professional relationship, or our private one. I would have employed him for his talents in any case. And yes, it is up to me. Department Fifty-Seven is mine. I run it. The Agency doesn’t like to admit it exists.” The smile broadened ever so slightly. “When there’s something they can’t explain, when they need help that’s a little different, they call on us. If you come to me, you’ll get a much freer hand than they usually give.”
“I work from home,” Evan added. “It suits me.”
“You’ll never get complete acceptance in the Bureau, Sofie,” Cristos continued in relentless pursuit of his goal. “You’re a foreign national. You can only get clearance up to a certain level and that hampers you for the best assignments, the highest level. I can arrange to give you better than that. You’re prospects are better with me.”
Sofie knew that was true. Unless she took citizenship she would always stay at a low level of security with the Bureau. While it made sense, it frustrated her, had frustrated her to the point where she had considered applying to MI5 for a job, where she could be cleared right up to the top, if need be. But the prospect hadn’t appealed. She loved the USA with its vitality, its excitement, and already she felt more alive here than she ever had at home.
“No need to make a decision now,” Cristos went on. “I’ll take you to your apartment, and we’ll go from there. There’s no reason to announce our arrival before we get there.”
Sofie was tired. Traveling always made her tired, but it was late afternoon, and sleeping now would only disrupt her sleep even more. She agreed to the plan, and turned to look out of the window.
Driving through New York in a limousine was new to her, and gave her a new perspective on the city. The soundproofing allowed only a muffled echo of the busy city streets to filter through, and the darkened windows added another distance to the scene. It was more like watching a film, a commentary she didn’t belong to. She didn’t like it. She wanted to belong.
“What is it?” Evan unnerved her, the way he could tell when she was disturbed.
“It all seems so far away,” she murmured, turning back to look a
t him.
“You don’t like that?”
“No. I like to be a part of things.”
Evan touched her hand, the only part of them that physically connected, but for the intensity of feeling he evoked in her he might as well have joined them top to toe. “You can’t be, not for a while,” he said. “I’ll try to help, but there’s only so much I can do.”
“It shouldn’t last long,” Cristos told her. “The murderer has left a number of unique clues. A shame we don’t know what they are.”
“I know.” She turned away from Evan, but not before she’d seen the look of relief in his eyes.
She proceeded to tell Cristos about the symbols, and the belladonna. His expression sharpened, concern turning to interest. He put one finger to the very center of his top lip, pressing in, thinking hard, before he removed it and spoke again. “We need to find out what the runes mean, and what language they come from. Belladonna isn’t an unusual drug, especially in these days of laser eye surgery. It’s used to dilate the eye in almost all eye ops, and it can paralyze muscles, too. The chemists isolate atropine from it. But belladonna, unrefined belladonna, might be different. I have a number of occult shops in my file. I’ll get on to them and see if they’ve noticed an increase in sales.”
“We did that,” Sofie told him. “None. The Bureau is investigating out of town places. The second victim came from New Orleans, so they’re looking there.”
“Quite an occult community down there,” Cristos commented, his hands at rest on his lap. “They’ll have quite a time of it, trying to find the right shop. I doubt they’ll find anything. The murders weren’t committed in New Orleans. I think I have a few more outlets on my books. I’ll check them.”
“Will you share with the Bureau?” asked Sofie, keen to help the organization that had been good to her.
“If I think it will help them.”
Sofie repressed her protests. She knew Cristos needed to trust her implicitly, but she wondered what she’d got herself into with this enigmatic man. She was still reconsidering her plans when the limo drew up in front of the brownstone building that had been her home for the last six months. She had begun to regard South Brooklyn as her home, with its friendly neighbors and homey atmosphere. Archie, flushed with his new job, had hunted an apartment down in Manhattan, near the Met, where he was to work, but that apartment was much smaller, despite its astronomical price tag. Sofie had gone along with him, but privately hoped they would move, once Archie found his way around, to an area where they could afford more space. Like here.
Lynne Connolly Page 5
