Twelve Shades of Midnight:

by Liliana Hart

  It had felt real because it was real.

  He’d never checked her credentials, which was a damn rookie mistake. When he’d called the hospital this morning, Chuck had been busy with tests and hadn’t yet called back. Rhys had yet to ask Chuck about Sienna Aubrey.

  Whoever she was, she’d just wormed an invitation into the storage facility to examine the collection. She could be here to cover up evidence of her crime, the supposedly haunted mask her ticket in the door.

  He set the box in the back of the SUV and slammed the rear door closed. With both fists planted on the bumper, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath, going over everything in his mind, looking for magician’s tricks that could have fooled him.

  She’d planted the suggestion of the box being heavy by pretending to be unable to lift it. In contrast, when he picked it up, it had seemed extra light.

  Hooks in the trunk of her car could have latched the box down, explaining why he couldn’t lift it later. All she’d need to do was slide it off the hooks as she lifted.

  But the car would have bounced when he tried to lift it, if it had been stuck to the trunk. It hadn’t. Had it?

  “You sonofabitch,” she said in a cold voice. “You’re thinking I’ve somehow conned you, aren’t you?”

  He opened his eyes. She stood in the storage facility doorway with hands planted on her hips. Her amber eyes reflected both hurt and anger.

  “I have to consider the possibility. Otherwise, what kind of an investigator would I be? I can’t rule you out simply because I want to screw you.”

  “Last I heard, you aren’t an investigator, you’re a lawyer.”

  He could understand why his suspicion hurt, but the fact that she couldn’t accept that he had doubts when everything about this was insane… That sort of pissed him off. “Investigating the crimes I prosecute people for committing is a large part of what I do. And I happen to be good at it.”

  “I don’t need this crap. If you don’t trust me, search the damn artifact collection yourself. You wouldn’t want me tainting the evidence anyway.” She hitched her purse up on her shoulder and headed down the gravel driveway.

  “It’s three miles to Chuck’s house from here.”

  She glared at him over her shoulder, then turned back to the road. “I climb mountains for fun. I think I can handle three miles downhill.”

  Rhys watched her walk away, completely at a loss. Was this argument some sort of manipulation by the mask, or had he been insane to believe her in the first place? The idea of a supernatural object controlling and communicating with him seemed utterly nuts in the bright light of midday. He couldn’t begin to fathom why he’d believed her.

  The man he’d seen, the one who supposedly resembled the museum curator? His features had been generic. White male, tall, fifties, thinning gray hair. The description fit millions of men. And Rhys had been distracted by Sienna as she rubbed her body against his, doing everything she could to hinder him.

  He couldn’t explain everything, but the more he thought about it, the more it appeared that Sienna Aubrey had played him. The question was: why?

  Black rage. Pain. Remorse. Regret. Self-loathing. Could she feel worse about herself? Worse about Rhys? Worse about her small existence in the cosmos?

  The answer was a decided no.

  She hadn’t stormed off hoping he’d follow her. That wasn’t a game she played. No, she’d stormed off because the awful feelings repelled her. Or Rhys did. Like magnets with the same polarity. She’d had to leave.

  Before the blackness of self-loathing consumed her.

  She’d marched a few hundred yards when the blackness faded to storm-cloud gray. By the time she reached the chain-link fence that enclosed the power plant, the cloud lightened to simply gloomy. She came to a dead stop.

  Oh crap.

  Every negative reaction, every thought, every hostility, every unpleasant emotion she’d felt toward herself and Rhys had come from the mask. Only now as its grip lightened could she sense the tendrils of the mask’s psychic signature.

  Why had the mask pushed her toward Rhys, then repelled her so completely? She’d been ready to hike all the way back to Chuck’s house, hop in her rental car, and drive to the airport. In the grip of the mask, she’d embraced the idea of never seeing Rhys again, but she’d been tricked. Driven away. Had the mask planted the seed of doubt in his mind to begin with?

  Why?

  The crack of a bullet broke the early afternoon silence.

  She turned and sprinted back toward the industrial park.

  The shot echoed through the climate-controlled artifact storage room. Rhys dropped to the ground, heart pounding as he reached for his gun, holstered at the small of his back.

  What the hell was going on? He’d spent a few minutes looking over the cedar box—checking for grooves or hooks, and finding none—then debated whether or not he should chase after Sienna, but had decided to enter the storage facility. He’d done little more than unlock the door, flip on the lights, and head for the office in the back, when there’d been a deafening bang and he’d felt a rush of air next to his shoulder that could only be a bullet traveling at a thousand feet per second.

  He heard footsteps, then a thud. A piercing high wail followed. The alarm system had been triggered. The shooter had opened the back door? The high-pitched squeal drowned out all other sounds. Red lights flashed over the front door and reflected off metal shelves near the back wall. The rear exit? He hoped to hell the shooter had bolted out the back, because he’d never hear someone sneaking up on him under the shrill wail of the alarm.

  Jesus, he’d been inches from being shot.

  In his mind, a vision took over. The siren became muted background noise as he experienced a different moment. The mask wanted to show him something. He was with Sienna, inside the storage facility. She strolled next to him down the extra-wide aisle and tugged on his hand, leaning her head toward his shoulder as she pointed out an object on one of the tables. “That totem is sim—”

  The crack of the shot echoed. Next to him, the bullet that had sailed harmlessly past him in reality instead found Sienna, hitting her in the temple.

  She was dead before she hit the ground.

  Chapter Six

  The alarm echoed across the flat landscape, spurring Sienna to run even faster. Rhys. He needed her. She reached the industrial park and tucked herself into the shadow of the CrossFit gym as she caught her breath.

  Running into a building with alarms blaring after hearing a gunshot couldn’t be the smartest choice. But what could she do?

  Where is Rhys?

  Her heart slammed against her ribs. Her entire body rocked with the force of it.

  Please let Rhys be okay. Please.

  She didn’t even know who or what she prayed to, because an ancient mask had crossed the paranormal divide and shattered all her previously held conceptions.

  Then a vision came. An alternate dimension? A now in which she hadn’t stormed off. She glimpsed into a multiverse in which she felt a brief flash of unspeakable agony. Then she felt nothing at all.

  His doubts, her anger, the mask had orchestrated both, triggering her storming exit and saving her life. Rhys knew that on a deeper level than he’d ever known anything before.

  If they hadn’t argued, if she hadn’t left, she’d be dead.

  The alarm cut out. Automatic shutoff, or something sinister? He was still grappling with how close they’d come to Sienna’s death, caught between dimensions where he was trying to figure out what was real and what was—thankfully—an alternate reality.

  Unless…whoever had fired the shot had met up with her on the road.

  He bolted to his feet, no longer concerned the shooter was still in the building. He had to find Sienna. Now. The bright sun blinded him as he charged through the open front door. He paused by Chuck’s SUV to give his eyes a moment to adjust and scanned the distance. He could see for miles, but there was no sign of her.

  If
she’d heard the gunshot and come back, the shooter could easily have caught up with her by now.

  He studied the buildings and saw a splash of red peeking out from the corner of the gray CrossFit gym. Sienna’s purse? It was at the right height given the way she wore it across her chest.

  He pushed off the SUV and ran to the corner, aware he could be leading the shooter right to her. He prayed the shooter was gone. Surely, given what the mask had just done, it would find a way to stop him if he were putting her in danger again.

  He was more certain than ever the mask had chosen him, had even put them in bed together, because Sienna was in danger. The artifact had chosen him to protect her, and the method it employed to get him to care about her had been effective.

  He rounded the corner, and there she was. Relief swamped him as he pulled her to his chest. He ran his hands up and down her spine, the need to touch her, to prove she was alive and unhurt, overwhelming him. He cradled her damp cheeks between his palms and looked into her amber eyes, which overflowed with tears. Her name came out as a choked rasp, and he kissed her as if she were the only source of oxygen in his universe.

  She kissed him back, her response as deep and frantic as his.

  He murmured endearments against her lips and stroked her face, her hair, her shoulders, her back.

  “I died, Rhys.” She let out a choked sob. “I was dead.”

  “I know, love. I know.”

  “I felt the bullet. Horrible pain. And then…nothing.”

  He’d had the horror of watching, but she’d felt it. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart.” His words were beyond inadequate.

  “Please. Can we go home and do something life affirming?”

  The way she called Chuck’s house home triggered a warm ache in his chest. As if any place they were together would be home. “We need to call the police and report the shooting. Then yes. Anything you want, yes.”

  She pressed her head against his chest and hugged him tightly. “Okay.”

  They stood there, leaning against the building for several minutes. He stroked her back, giving thanks they were in this universe, where she had a future, even as his mind reeled, accepting once again that the mask was some sort of supernatural object.

  A patrol car came rolling down the U-shaped gravel driveway. He wasn’t surprised to see Officer Tourney at the wheel. Odds were the officer was responding to the alarm. Rhys tucked his arm around Sienna’s waist and approached the vehicle.

  Tourney was more curious as to why Rhys and Sienna were at the storage facility than he was about a shot being fired. When he couldn’t find a bullet hole—because it had flown straight out the open front door—he said they’d merely heard a firework. While it was true the town was full of popping and shooting sounds with the coming Midnight Sun festivities, no one had set any off in the vicinity of the storage facility.

  Rhys was a damn explosive ordnance expert. He knew what fireworks sounded like, and he knew guns.

  No amount of arguing swayed the man. As for the alarm, Tourney was certain Rhys had failed to properly enter the code, and it had gone off after a thirty-second delay.

  “Clearly you’ve both been influenced by Chuck’s paranoia.” The officer rolled his shoulders in a self-important manner. “And are wasting my time.” With that, he left.

  One good thing came of Tourney’s crappy investigative instincts—the storage facility hadn’t been declared a crime scene and off-limits. Rhys turned to Sienna, “Do you want to go through the collection now or come back later?”

  Her tears and fright had faded as her anger with Tourney grew, and she was composed now, ready to fight, no longer in retreat mode. “Let’s go through it now. If we leave, I don’t know if I could muster the courage to come back. At least now we’re certain we’re the only ones here.”

  He dropped a kiss on her lips. “You’re pretty damn amazing.”

  “Hardly. I’m scared to death, and I think I might hurl.”

  “Yet you’re still on your feet.”

  “Only because I hate crawling.” She turned to a table that had artifacts spread out on the surface, both in and next to portable glass display cases. “I take it Chuck was prepping artifacts for a display?”

  “Yes. He’d planned to have a booth at the festival, showcasing art and prehistory of Itqaklut. It was when he was gathering items for the booth that he realized pieces were missing.”

  “No one from his office took over to finish the display after he got sick?”

  “He changed the access code the moment he realized artifacts were missing. No one on his staff could get in to finish the display. He wanted it that way.”

  “So right now, you and Chuck are the only two people who know the code? Someone was here earlier, and he—or she—was inside the building, but the alarm wasn’t tripped when they entered.”

  “Yeah. I wondered about that too.”

  She studied the display boxes. “Do we start with the items we know are missing, or with what’s here?”

  “Chuck made a list of the items he couldn’t find. He said it’s on the desk in the back office.”

  “Let’s check it out,” she said and took a firm step forward. She faltered when she reached the point in the center aisle where she’d been shot, but this was the second time since the vision—the first being with Officer Tourney—she’d traversed this path, and he was impressed with her ability to power through and move forward.

  But then, everything she did impressed the hell out of him.

  In the office, she flipped through the papers on the desk. “I don’t see a list here.”

  He frowned. “Chuck said it would be here. I guess we know what the gunman took.”

  She powered up the desktop computer. Rhys leaned over her to type in the password Chuck had given him. “See if you can find it on the computer.”

  He pulled out his cell phone and dialed the hospital, but this time Chuck was sleeping. He tucked the phone away and said, “If you were going to rob a tribe of cultural history artifacts, what would you take?”

  She frowned. “Hard to say. As far as I know, some items are more valuable on the black market than others. Tools—arrowheads, knives, adzes, and awls, among other items—in general are pretty easy to come by and therefore aren’t likely to be highly prized. Objects with artistic value and difficult preservation, like basketry and carved wood, are rare and would therefore have higher perceived value.” She was stiff as she spoke, and her words seemed forced.

  “You’re uncomfortable,” Rhys said.

  “It’s a touchy subject for archaeologists—and museologists—we aren’t very far removed from the days when both professions were no better than looters, and most people still don’t know trafficking in artifacts is no longer part of the profession. In fact, it’s a quick way to get blackballed. As someone who works primarily with NAGPRA issues, I’m especially sensitive. Nowadays, artifacts aren’t valuable because they’re rare or pretty—like, say, a gemstone. They’re valued for the information they tell us about the past. And a sparkly artifact that tells us nothing is worthless.”

  He sat down in the rolling desk chair and pulled her onto his lap. “You needn’t worry I’ll judge you for making guesses as to why artifacts might be valuable. I get it that you don’t see their monetary worth.” He wrapped a hand around the back of her neck and pulled her face to his.

  A scant inch separated their lips when she said, “Shouldn’t we be… working?”

  “Maybe. But I need to hold you. Just for a moment. Or five.” He brushed his lips over hers. He wouldn’t pressure her into a deeper kiss. He really just wanted—needed—to touch her. He was still rattled by the vision and knew she was too.

  She smiled softly and relaxed against his chest like a cat. He wrapped his arms around her and closed his eyes.

  “Seventeen hours,” she murmured.

  “Pardon?”

  She lifted her head and brushed her lips over his. “How is it that we only met seventeen
hours ago?” She left his mouth and nibbled along his jaw, the gentle scrape of her teeth triggering a low growl in the back of his throat.

  “I’ve decided to stop questioning it.” He slid his hands under her T-shirt, stroking along her ribs, hardly able to believe it was his first time touching her bare skin in that particular spot. Nothing about this was normal. The chemistry, the heat between them was tangible.

  Seventeen hours?

  No way. Maybe only seventeen hours in this dimension, but his body, his mind, must have tapped into a dozen others in which they were already friends, lovers, partners.

  He slid his hands higher, cupping her breasts. She purred and shifted on his lap so his erection pressed between her thighs. She slid her tongue inside his mouth and made a soft sound in the back of her throat.

  “I want to make love with you,” she said against his lips.

  He groaned and kissed her deeply, then pulled back. “Not here. We need to finish. Then we can go back to the house.”

  She gave him a sexy, saucy smile as she undid the top button of his shirt. “I bought condoms. At the grocery store.”

  He nipped at that perfect freckle on her bottom lip. “I know. I saw them in the basket.”

  “They’re in my purse.” She tilted her head toward the red bag she’d dropped on the floor by the door.

  He chuckled. “No. The first time I make love to you isn’t going to be on a desk in what is essentially a warehouse office.”

  “When will you make love to me on a desk in a warehouse office?”

  “The eighth time.”

  “You’re pretty confident there will be an eighth time.”

  He nuzzled her neck, loving the humor in her voice. The way she melted in his arms. “I’m confident there will be a hundred and eighth time.”

  Her fingers threaded through his hair as she tilted back her head to give him better access to her neck. He sucked on her earlobe, then trailed kisses down to the hollow of her collarbone. “Are we crazy, Rhys?” Her tone had grown serious.