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My feet dragged with exhaustion when I climbed the stairs the following evening, but I knew as soon as I turned the handle to my apartment door someone was already inside.
I flinched at the convulsive movement of the ray gun in my purse and took a calming breath. “Down, boy,” I said, patting my purse as I walked through the door.
From the delicious odors wafting through the living room toward me, I had a good idea of who was in my kitchen.
I wasn’t wrong. Knight stood in front of the stove, shirtsleeves rolled up to bare his forearms, a dish towel draped across his shoulder as he stirred something in one pot, while steam roiled off boiling water in another. An open bottle of wine stood at his elbow, along with my best glasses—filled with a rich burgundy of some sort. From the oven came the heavenly aroma of garlic, butter, and warm bread.
His obvious comfort level and sheer competency robbed me of speech, and any words I might have said about him breaking into my apartment died with the faint rumbling of my stomach. As I watched, he grabbed a potholder and cracked open the oven to check the baking bread.
I cleared my throat. The oven door clanged shut, and he spun in my direction with a yelp.
Spying me in the doorway, he scowled and pressed a hand to his chest. “Give me a heart attack, why don’t you?”
“That’s what you get for sneaking into my apartment. You’re lucky I didn’t shoot first and ask questions later. But I assumed most burglars wouldn’t cook an Italian dinner before robbing me.”
The pasta on the back burner threatened to boil over. Turning off the gas, he carried the pan to the sink and poured everything into a colander sitting there. Steam billowed up. “No doubt, you’re right. That goes double for nefarious gang members seeking revenge or information.”
“If they offered garlic bread, I’d spill my guts.”
He handed me a glass of wine and offered his in a silent toast. “But of course.”
After my long day at work, I didn’t even hesitate. We clinked glasses, and I sipped from mine, eyebrows lifting at the smooth, mellow flavor. Whatever the label was, it wasn’t the cheap stuff. “Not that I’m complaining—and I’m not—but to what do I owe this honor?” I nodded toward the set table and the cooked meal with a wave of the glass.
“Let’s eat first while everything is hot. Sit. Tell me about your day.” He took the bread out of the oven and transferred it to a small bowl.
I felt the furrow creasing my brow as I took my seat. “How very... chummy of you.”
He served up a plate of spaghetti in a sauce thick with chunks of tomato, onions, and meat with the flourish of an experienced chef. After placing the bread on the table between us, he sat down with his own plate. “Don’t look at me like that. I don’t have designs on you. Well, I do, but not your virtue.”
That assurance somehow fell flat instead of providing comfort.
He rolled his spaghetti around the tines of his fork. “My reasons for being here can wait. As for why I made dinner, I was hungry. If I have to eat one more of those horrible packaged sandwiches they see fit to feed me at Redclaw...suffice to say, the wrapper is tastier. Anyway, here I am. Two birds, one stone.”
His fork was halfway to his mouth when he paused, aghast. “What are you doing?”
I laid down my knife and continued with just the fork. I’d never gotten the hang of twirling pasta and I wasn’t about to drop food all over the tablecloth. “Cutting my pasta. What does it look like?”
He shook his head in mock sorrow. “Philistine. Any Italian mother worth her salt would slap you on the spot before kicking you out of her house. Anyway, how are things going in the rarefied atmosphere in reception? Though they let you out for a little bit, didn’t they? I take it you saw Dr. Botha.”
“I did.” On his arrival, Dr. Botha had summoned me to the lower levels for the requested blood samples, and I’d seen for the first time the extensive underground layout. The new security measures were in place there as well. They’d cleared the room behind the bookcase and now the area contained only a guard behind a desk. One also had to enter a code on keypad to open the door at the far end of the room leading to the subterranean chambers.
“And?” Knight prompted, tearing off a hunk of buttered bread.
I shrugged. “And nothing. The doctor drew several tubes of blood, asked me some questions, and had me pick up a few devices to see if I could activate them.”
“Same here. Gallons of blood. I’m sure I’m quite anemic now.” The smile he gave me over his wineglass was friendly enough, but then his eyes narrowed. “Have you made any progress regarding Margo’s death?”
By now I’d adapted to his rapid changes of both mood and subject, so I shook my head. “I’m sorry. Miss Climpson has me bogged down in paperwork. At the moment, I’m privy to little information aside from what comes across my desk. Speaking of which....” I realized I’d never told him about the strange package from the day before and its mysterious, flammable contents, so I did.
His eyes gleamed when I described the properties of the suit. “Fascinating. And sent by Ryker’s brother. Funny how we’ve not met the man. Dragoncloth, you say? That must be a fancy name for—” He shook his head. “No, it can’t be. You don’t think...?”
“Dragons really exist? I hardly think so. Wouldn’t they be sort of hard to hide?”
His index finger moved back and forth in agreement. “Right. Good point. Though we can’t really be sure, now can we?” He squirmed in his seat.
I didn’t blame him. The possibility that dragoncloth wasn’t just a colorful descriptive term weighed heavily in the air between us. The logical argument, “There are no such things as dragons” didn’t hold much water when your coworkers could shift into another form. After all, wasn’t my boss a Phoenix-shifter?
Knight cleaned his plate before I’d eaten a third of mine. He tore off another large chunk of bread. I eyed the rest and wondered if I would have to fight him for it.
“So then you don’t know about the big hullabaloo?” Knight pinched a piece of bread off his portion and popped it in his mouth, licking the butter off his fingers.
I watched his actions somewhat distractedly, and then, feeling my cheeks burn, forced my concentration on my plate once more.
“I know something has everyone quite flustered. Lots of activity in and out of the main office, and no one looks thrilled about it.”
Knight wiped the lips I’d been staring at a moment before and flung down his napkin to leap up and cross over to the counter. He held up a folded newspaper and flourished it at me in triumph.
“I presume you have something to share?”
“You presume rightly.” He dragged his chair beside mine and pushed the paper in my direction. “Everyone is frosted because someone stole a cache of artifacts right out from under Redclaw’s nose.”
The folded paper lay between us.
“They reported it in the news?” I couldn’t believe it.
“No, no. Nothing like that. Okay, seeing as you don’t know, Redclaw had a holding area outside the city where they stored a bunch of these devices until someone could deliver them to the office. Apparently, some bright lad thought it a more expedient way of transferring said devices, and as I’ve mentioned before, they’re like nothing currently in development anywhere on the planet. Anyway, someone must have been watching—or worse, there was a leak—and the truck transporting the goods was hijacked. The thieves took everything, including the manifest listing what was on the truck.”
“How do you know all this?”
Knight’s lips pressed into a grim line. “Both the driver and the guard were injured. I heard the lab rats in the basement talking about it, and I coerced them into spilling the beans.”
For a moment, I wondered if Knight meant actual rats until I realized he was referring to the other technicians in the subterranean labs. In my defense, talking rodents wouldn’t have been the most bizarre thing to have happened at Redclaw.
“So how does the newspaper come into it?”
Knight opened the paper to the society page and tapped a large photograph. “What do you see here?”
The caption on the photo read, “Summer starts early at the Poseidon Club.” The image itself could have been taken at any of a dozen or so nightclubs I’d frequented before my father’s death. The photographer’s flash had captured his subjects in various states of merriment with broad smiles and lifted glasses of champagne. In the foreground, with her head tossed back to show off a diamond necklace and her cleavage to their best advantage, Em gazed lovingly up at Eddie, who smiled possessively back at her. Behind them, the other revelers were not as distinct, but evening gowns and tuxedos were de rigueur.
“Em and her fiancé at a dance in the Hamptons. Which reminds me, I forgot to pick up my dry cleaning.” I pushed the paper back at him.
He stopped the slide of paper with his hand, causing it to buckle against fingers before he smoothed it out. “Look again. What’s that on the side table? Beside the bottle of champagne.”
Frowning, I drew the paper closer. Though that part of the room wasn’t lit by the flash, I made out what appeared to be a man’s wristwatch lying on the table. Instead of a dial, however, the object had a familiar design with a raised triangle in the center. “What is it?”
“I don’t know but it’s one of ours, you can bet on that. I’ve seen enough of these babies now to spot one.”
I studied the photograph in more detail. “Just because you think you see an artifact in this image doesn’t mean the whole cache of missing devices is in the Hamptons. It may be something someone discovered without knowing what it is. Or it could even be some kind of new Swiss watch.”
Knight leaned in to look at the paper with me. “I might be inclined to believe that except for this guy.” He pointed to the photograph.
A handsome man stood behind Eddie, an enigmatic smile on his face as he held a glass of champagne.
My pulse quickened when I realized I’d seen him before. “Who is he?”
“Don’t you know? That’s Rian Sterling. Up and coming industrialist. Rich inventor. He’s in the papers all the time.” The little sniff Knight made suggested a degree of jealousy there.
“He was in the office the day I went in for my interview.” I’d know those intense eyes and that tousled dark hair with the curious streak of silver anywhere.
“Was he now? Interesting.” Knight stroked his chin as though he were a college professor considering an esoteric theory. “I’d say that makes it even more likely there’s something going on in the lovely Hamptons. Aren’t you supposed to go down there for a party or something this weekend?”
“Tomorrow. Bridal shower. I’m taking the train. Em will send someone to pick me up at the station.”
“Call her right now. Tell her we’re coming down tonight.”
“We?” I supposed I sounded sharp, for Knight gave me his most charming smile.
“Yes, we. I rescued my car from outside Moneta’s. We can be there in a few hours and it might be useful to have our own transportation. You have the perfect excuse for checking this out. We have to go.”
“And just how do you plan to keep your absence a secret? I think someone will notice if you’re gone from Redclaw all weekend.”
“I may have done some tinkering with one of the devices I’ve been working on. Fascinating little thing. I’ve been able to record images of myself eating, sleeping, reading and so forth in my monk’s cell and put it on a loop. The device can project a three-dimensional image into the room. It’s better than television, if you can believe that. It’s like watching a play. There are only a couple of guards on the weekends. Unless someone tries to speak to me, they’ll never notice I’m gone.”
“As impressive as your aptitude with the artifacts may be, I’m already on thin ice as it is.” Folding the paper, I thrust it aside.
“Hey, you’ll be there on the spot regardless. If you happen to stumble upon their missing do-dads while you’re there, what can they say? You can always tell them you noticed an artifact and thought it warranted a closer look. If anyone will get in trouble, it’ll be me. They won’t fire me. I’m not on the payroll anyway.”
“Perhaps keeping you in seclusion—and alive—is your payment for now.”
“I’m not without resources. Besides, I’ll be with you.”
“Precisely why I’ll be the one that gets blamed if something happens.”
“You can hardly be held responsible for my actions.”
He had a point, but I doubted Ryker would see it that way. “There’s no reason for you to come. I don’t need you.”
“I’m cut to the quick.” He laid a hand over his heart in mock wounding. “And here I am, your date for the wedding, too. Never mind, Miss Independent. I’d like to point out I’m the resident genius when it comes to these artifacts. I’m going with or without you.”
The grin that accompanied his statement went a long way toward persuading me to accept his way of thinking. I had serious doubts it would go down the way he predicted, but he was right. I’d be right there on the spot. It would be impossible not to poke around. “Resident genius, my foot. You’ve been at Redclaw, what? Three days now?”
“I’m a quick study.”
The bright intelligence in his eyes was hard to resist. “Very well. If you’ll pull out my suitcase from the bedroom closet, I’ll go downstairs and phone Em so she can expect us.”
“Brilliant.” Knight bounced up and out of the room.
I picked up the newspaper. So the man with the topaz eyes had a name. Rian Sterling. The day of the break-in, Ryker had accused Billy of working for someone named Rian. And Ryker had a brother who was an inventor whose name began with an R. Someone who may or may not be working against Redclaw’s interests.
The sensible thing to do would be to contact Ryker and let him know what was going on. If the device in the photo was part of the missing shipment, then I should let him know. If said device was merely a new artifact someone had discovered, then someone needed to collect and catalog it anyway. But if Rian Sterling was involved, Ryker would most certainly want to know—especially if Rian was his brother.
The Hamptons were my old stomping grounds. No one would challenge my presence; it was expected. Even if Ryker gave me leave to look around, he’d never agree to Knight coming with me on Redclaw’s behalf. No doubt Ryker would provide me with some agent to act as my fake boyfriend for the weekend, but the notion of pretending to date Pompadour or his cohort made me shudder. I not only needed someone I could trust, I needed someone who would blend in at the country club. Someone no one would question as my date.
Knight and I had a good working relationship. Despite his rogue tendency to buck authority, Knight had proven himself adaptive and able to think on his feet.
If I found the hoard of missing artifacts and the people behind their theft, I’d prove beyond all doubt my worth to Redclaw. If it turned out to be a wild goose chase and we got caught acting without authorization, my goose would be truly cooked.
So we wouldn’t get caught.