Ice Blue

by Anne Stuart

  Taka tightened his grip on her neck, exerting just a tiny bit of pressure, and he saw the sudden doubt in her eyes. He needed to move fast, because he didn’t want that doubt to increase, to turn into terror before it went blank, and hesitation would only hurt her.

  “I’m guessing you’re some kind of private security guard hired by my mother,” she continued, when he didn’t answer her questions. “She must have had second thoughts. She knows how determined her precious guru can be when he wants something, and maybe she thought I was in danger. Too bad. They just didn’t realize how easy it would be to steal the bowl from the museum.”

  He loosened the pressure an infinitesimal amount. Nothing that she would notice. “What do you mean? The Sansone has state-of-the-art security.”

  “Well, you’d think they’d at least try to get it,” she said. “Most of the security is focused on the more valuable pieces. It would have been a lot easier than they thought—I was counting on them going for it sooner or later.”

  “Counting on them to steal the urn?” He was totally confused by this point. “Why?”

  “Because it’s a fake,” she said in that maddeningly calm voice. “The real one is hidden. Sorry, but I don’t trust my mother not to sell me out. I’m really quite touched that she hired you—”

  “I don’t know your mother.”

  Her smile faded. “Then why were you watching me? Why did you come after me? Who are you?”

  Your worst nightmare, he wanted to tell her. But the game wasn’t played yet, and he still had a job to do.

  He’d have to kill her later.

  3

  “Where is the Hayashi Urn?”

  Summer glanced over at his cool, exquisite profile in the darkened car. Now that she was beginning to calm down from the adrenaline rush of her abduction, she was starting to see things a little more clearly. And she was beginning to have the extremely unhappy suspicion that her dangerous night was far from over. Why the hell had she told him the bowl in the museum was a fake?

  “Someplace safe,” she said. “I think you ought to take me home now.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said, starting the car. “Unless the urn is hidden there, which means it’s probably gone by now.”

  “I’m not an idiot. Someone already ransacked my place looking for it. It’s hidden where no one can find it.”

  “Where?”

  Right. She was up shit’s creek, from the frying pan into the fire, and she hadn’t even realized it. He was driving fast again, and she couldn’t very well unlatch the door and jump out, even if she’d seen it done in dozens of movies. She’d end up roadkill…. She was better off taking her chances with this elegant stranger. He was hardly the type to hurt her.

  “Look, I don’t know who you are or why you happened to be hanging around the museum if my mother didn’t hire you, but I’m not about to tell you a damn thing. I’ve already said too much. Either take me home or drop me off on the next street corner, and I’ll find my own way.”

  He said nothing, keeping his attention on the road in front of him. They were heading toward the freeway again, and once on it she’d be effectively trapped. Maybe she’d just end up with a few bruises if she tried the rolling-out-of-the-car trick. She slid her hand toward the seat belt clasp, but he moved so fast he scared her, clamping his hand down over hers and pulling it away.

  “Don’t even think about it,” he said, speeding up even more.

  He was holding her hand in an unbreakable grip. She probably ought to struggle, hit him, anything to distract him from the road. She’d survived one car crash tonight; she’d probably survive another if it happened before they were going too fast. She just didn’t know which was the greater risk—careening off the road in this little car or staying with this man.

  He wasn’t going to hurt her, she told herself. He wasn’t going to touch her. He’d rescued her. She just needed to hold on to that belief and she wouldn’t panic and make stupid mistakes.

  “All right,” she said, relaxing the fist she’d automatically formed, and after a moment he released her hand. She could see his profile in the flickering light of the oncoming cars, and she stared, fascinated. No one that beautiful could be a killer, could he?

  She shook the distracting thought from her mind. “Where are you taking me?”

  “You wanted to go home, didn’t you?” He pulled onto the freeway, and Summer closed her eyes, certain she was going to die, after all. But a moment later they were speeding down the HOV lane, still in one piece, and she let out her pent-up breath. When she got home she was going to lock all her doors, strip off her clothes, climb into her tub and never come out.

  She tended to drive her Volvo too fast, and if she’d been behind the wheel they would have reached her little bungalow in fifteen minutes. He made it in ten, pulling up outside the run-down cottage and leaving the car still running. She’d been desperately trying to think of ways to get rid of him once they got to her street, but it was turning into a non-issue, leaving Summer even more confused. She hadn’t told him where she lived.

  “We’re here,” he said, putting the car into Neutral. “I’d see you to your door, but I expect that would only make you more nervous.”

  “You mean you’re just going to let me go?” she said, disbelief warring with hope.

  “It looks like it, doesn’t it?”

  “And you’re not going to tell me who you are, or why you were following me? Or how you knew where I lived?”

  He shook his head, saying nothing.

  “I guess I should count my blessings then?” she asked, reaching for her seat belt. This time he didn’t stop her, didn’t move as she opened the door and slid out. Her legs were a little wobbly, but she managed to disguise it by clinging to the door for a moment. She still didn’t recognize what kind of car it was—something low and sleek and fast, but she wasn’t enough of a real Californian to care about cars. She was going to have to come up with something to tell the police, but right then her brain wasn’t working on all cylinders.

  Her mother hadn’t taught her anything worth knowing in twenty-eight years, but Hana had instilled good manners no matter what the circumstances. Clinging to the door, Summer leaned over, peering into the darkened car. “Er…thank you for saving my life,” she said lamely.

  There was just the faint ghost of a smile on his rich, beautiful mouth. “It was nothing,” he said, and the depressing truth of it was, he meant it. Her life was nothing to him. Not that it should matter, she reminded herself. She preferred being invisible.

  She could feel his eyes watching her as she walked up the narrow sidewalk to her front door. She was overcome by the same sense of intrusion, invasion, protection. It was a crazy combination of all three, though she wasn’t quite sure where the protective aspect came from. Maybe simply because he’d saved her before scaring her.

  She closed the front door behind her, triple locking it, and then leaned against it to catch her breath. She heard the sound of his car drive away, out of her life. The last ounce of tension finally drained from her body, her knees gave out and she sank down on the floor, leaning against the doorjamb and putting her head against her knees as she shook.

  She had no idea how long she sat there, curled up in a kind of mindless panic, but at least she wasn’t crying. She never cried—not since she’d been told of her Hana’s death in a hit-and-run accident. Summer had been fifteen. That made a solid thirteen years without shedding a tear, and she intended to keep it that way.

  And she’d cowered enough. She grabbed hold of the doorknob and pulled herself to her feet, steeling herself to ignore the faint tremor in her legs. She peered out the window, but there was no sign of the sleek, low-slung sports car and her nameless rescuer. He was gone. If only she could rid herself of the almost physical feel of his eyes on her, still watching her.

  She switched on a light and winced in the blinding brightness. She’d be happier in shadows right now, but shadows could h
ide scary things, and she had no intention of being scared anymore. She’d fought that battle once before, and she wasn’t going to let herself be vulnerable again.

  Her feet hurt, and she realized belatedly that sometime during the night she’d lost her shoes. They were expensive, but uncomfortable, and good riddance. She was going to strip off her clothes and throw them out, too, get rid of anything that reminded her of this hideous night. But first she was going to eat something, anything, have a glass of wine and try to rid herself of the lingering touch of his eyes, watching her.

  The Ben & Jerry’s had ice crystals, the raspberry yogurt was past its due date, the cheese had mold. She couldn’t find the wine opener, and the only beer she had in the fridge was Sapporo—no thank you. She didn’t want to think about anything Japanese and she walked through her living room with eyes averted, pushing the shoji screen aside. There was nothing she wanted more than to strip off her clothes and climb into the hot tub, but Hana-san had trained her well. Summer’s feet were grass-stained and bloody, and she wanted to get the feel of the night off her before she settled into the blessed warmth of the water. She showered quickly, then climbed into the big cedar tub just outside her bedroom.

  It was a blessing. She closed her eyes and let the warm, healing water flow around her. For a few minutes she didn’t have to think, didn’t have to worry. For a few blessed moments of peace she could just be.

  And try to rid herself of the irrational feeling that somewhere out there he was still watching her.

  For a smart woman, Summer Hawthorne was annoyingly brainless, Taka thought as he skirted the back of her bungalow. He’d already checked it out several days ago and knew just how pathetic her security was. Her house had been broken into recently, and yet she’d taken no measures to fortify the place. All three locks on the back door were easy to pick, the chain would break with one good shove and she had no outdoor security, no sensors or alarms. He could slip behind the house, disappear into the overgrown shrubbery and no one would even notice.

  Her curtains were pathetic, as well. The faux-Asian synthetic rice paper shades were practically useless. She’d left the lights on in her living room and kitchen when she’d disappeared into the bathroom, and she was soaking wet and naked when she reemerged and climbed into the wooden tub, closing her eyes in obvious bliss.

  So he could safely assume that she hadn’t been lying—the Hayashi Urn was nowhere near her. He’d done a fairly thorough search the last time he’d been there, though far more discreetly than the Shirosama’s goons, and he doubted he’d have missed it, though at that point he hadn’t been specifically looking for it. He’d thought it was already at the museum.

  He’d been looking for any kind of clue that would lead him to the shrine. If they found it before the Shirosama managed to discover it, the Committee could stop the cult leader’s plans cold. The Shirosama needed the sacred location for his crackpot rituals, and without it he and his followers would be too superstitious to move ahead with their plans. It was only a few days till the Lunar New Year, the date the Shirosama had decreed was the most auspicious for his mysterious ritual, and at least for this year his time was running out. If they could just stall long enough, keep Summer Hawthorne and the Hayashi Urn away from him for the next few days, they’d have an entire year to figure out how to stop him.

  And then there would be no need to silence her before she spoke the truth she didn’t know she had.

  The urn in the museum was an excellent forgery—Taka had enough of a gift at ceramics to recognize the hand of a master. It had been an error on his part not to recognize that the ice blue glaze had been a little too uniform, but then, he’d been concentrating on other things.

  Too bad he couldn’t just let it go at this point. The Shirosama would steal the fake from the museum, never knowing the difference, but he still needed Summer Hawthorne. In truth, she might be the more valuable part of the equation, and Taka knew what his orders were. If necessary, he was to destroy a priceless piece of Japanese art, culture and history, and execute the woman who held the key to where it belonged. And he wasn’t supposed to think twice about it.

  It was the “if necessary” part that was the problem. The Committee, and the ruthlessly practical Madame Lambert, trusted him to make that judgment call. But he wasn’t quite sure he could trust himself at this point.

  Because he didn’t want to kill Summer Hawthorne.

  If she was found floating in her hot tub, the Shirosama would know there was nothing he could do, and he’d be stopped cold.

  It was simple. Practical. Necessary. Except that this scenario meant the Hayashi Urn would stay lost.

  The bowl would stay in one piece, however. And sooner or later, maybe decades from now, maybe after they were all long dead, it would reappear. That knowledge should be enough to satisfy the committee.

  Taka took less than thirty seconds to pick the locks. He moved through the house in complete silence—he could come up on her, push her under the water, and she’d never have a chance.

  Drowning wasn’t a good choice. He wouldn’t be able to make it look like an accident, it took too damn long and she’d be frightened. He didn’t want to scare her if he could help it. He just wanted it over, if that’s what had to be.

  She was sitting in the tub, her back to him, her long hair loose, dark with water. She was humming, some tuneless little song that was making this whole fucking thing even harder, but he couldn’t let himself hesitate. He moved so fast she didn’t have time to turn around, to know he was there, sliding his hand under her thick veil of hair, finding the right spot and pressing, hard. She was unconscious in a matter of seconds, and he pushed her down on her back in the water, holding her there.

  She lay still beneath his hands, her hair fanning out around her, her face still and peaceful and eerily beautiful; he knew she couldn’t feel a thing.

  But he couldn’t do it.

  He hauled her out of the tub, a naked, dripping deadweight, and threw her over his shoulder. He didn’t know how much water she’d swallowed, only that it wasn’t enough to kill her. He tossed her on the bed, rifled through her drawers and grabbed whatever clothes seemed suitable. All black—she didn’t seem to own anything in color, including her underwear. He was about to dress her when he heard the noise outside. The Shirosama already knew he’d lost his quarry, and he’d sent new stooges after her.

  Taka wrapped Summer’s unconscious body in the bedspread, tossing the dark clothes into the cocoon before he lifted her again. She was damn heavy; American women, no matter how thin, always seemed to weigh more than other women. Maybe they simply had bigger bones. Not that Summer Hawthorne was a delicate flower. He’d been working, but an important part of his job was observation, and Summer Hawthorne naked had a soft, curvy body, not his usual type of woman.

  He shifted the weight, tossing her over his shoulder again, and a moment later he was gone into the night, as the white-robed brethren broke in the front door.

  Summer was cold, wet, miserable and totally disoriented. She was immobilized, moving fast and she felt like she was choking, coughing up water. When she could finally catch her breath she tried to push the wet hair out of her face, only to find her arms trapped at her sides. She shook her head, realizing in sudden horror that she was back in that damn car with that damn man, hurtling through the night once more.

  “What the hell…?” she said weakly, struggling. She was wrapped in her bedspread, her arms at her sides, the seat belt strapped around her, and the man driving didn’t even glance at her.

  “You had some unwanted visitors. I figured you were better off with me than the holy brothers.”

  She tried to speak, coughing instead, the spasms racking her body. “They must have tried to kill me,” she managed to choke out. “How did you know?”

  “I was keeping an eye on things. I didn’t think they’d give up that easily.”

  She was silent for a moment. “How many of them did you kill?”

&
nbsp; He glanced over at her. “You think I’m a cold-blooded killer?”

  “I have no idea who or what you are.”

  “Takashi O’Brien. I work for the Japanese Department of Antiquities. We’ve been looking for the Hayashi Urn for a long, long time.”

  She blinked. He didn’t exactly fit her idea of a Japanese bureaucrat, but then, nothing was fitting her preconceived notions today. “Why didn’t you just come to the Sansone and ask if we knew anything?”

  “We had no interest in drawing the attention of the True Realization Fellowship. We needed to secure it before they could get their hands on it.”

  “Why?” Her teeth were chattering. He reached over and switched on the heat, and she glanced at the dashboard clock. It was just after 1:00 a.m. It had been less than three hours since she’d left the museum. Three hours to change a lifetime.

  “You can worry about that later. In the meantime we need to get you someplace safe and warm.”

  “And dry,” she said. “And dressed,” she added in sudden horror. “I’m not wearing anything under this, am I?”

  “Since you don’t make it a habit to bathe in your clothes, then yes, you’re naked. I grabbed some clothes for you when I got you out of there—they’re tucked somewhere between you and the bedspread.”

  She wasn’t cold now, she was hot. For reasons she didn’t want to think about she tended to be extremely inhibited, more so since her mother had always made it a practice to prance her perfect body around the house in various stages of undress, particularly if there happened to be men around. And the thought of this exquisite, enigmatic man hauling her own wet, naked body around was enough to make Summer wish those monsters had ended up drowning her, after all.

  Except then she would have been naked and floating in her tub. Please, God, if I’m going to die, could I at least do it with my clothes on? she begged. Particularly if the oddly named Takashi O’Brien was going to be there.