Moving Target (41 page)

Niall strangled a laugh into a cough and studied his hands as though they had just grown fur.

Erik looked at the other man. “Such sweet reason. How have you avoided strangling her?”

“Clean living and constant prayer,” Niall said dryly.

Dana ignored them and glanced at Serena. “Did your grandmother ever say anything about when the leaves first went missing?”

“No.”

“You sound quite certain.”

“I am. Until her death note, she never mentioned the Book of the Learned to me. Not by name. She talked about my heritage, and how my mother had forfeited the right to so much as look at it.”

“By running away?” Dana asked.

“No. By taking the name Charters. Grandmother was afraid that it might lead back to her.”

“Even though she used the name Weaver?” Erik asked.

“Yes.”

“What was she afraid of?” Niall asked.

“She never said. She just spent her life hiding.”

“And one of the things she was hiding was the Book of the Learned,” Niall said. “The name Charters must be tied to it somehow.”

“I’ll bet the book descended through the grandmother whose maiden name was Charters,” Erik said.

“Interesting,” Niall said, “but not particularly useful except as a measure of Ellis Weaver’s paranoia.”

“Fear,” Serena corrected softly, rubbing her palm against her scarf. “When she was discovered, she was murdered.”

Niall grunted. “All right. So what gave her away?”

“Probably the questions she asked when she decided to go after the missing pages of the Book of the Learned,” Erik said. “It’s the only thing that fits the pattern of the murders.”

“It does?” Dana asked. “How?”

“Think about it. She must have known where the missing pages went. Or she hired someone who found them.”

“Wallace?” Niall asked.

“He has my vote so far,” Erik agreed. “Put Shel on it. Check Morton Hingham’s records. She would have hired an investigator through him, the same way she kept her truck registered in his name and her taxes paid on her property in her assumed name.”

Dana reached for one of the portable phones that were scattered throughout Rarities. Very quickly she was talking to Shel.

“Why do you think it’s Wallace?” Serena asked.

“He’s still alive,” Erik said bluntly. “He has the background to make homemade fuel bombs and lure law-enforcement types down blind alleys when they investigate a murder. And three out of four of those murders were written off as random or suicide.”

“What about Bert?” she asked with a shudder.

“I’ll bet it’s written off to a meth lab or a drug war,” Erik said. “Or simply kept open and never solved, because the cops don’t connect it to the other murders.”

“Aren’t we going to tell the police?”

“No hurry,” Niall said. “You and Erik are the only obvious targets left, and you’ll be well covered.”

“Erik?” Serena said unhappily. “Why would he be a target?”

“Same reason Bert was,” Niall said easily. “Bert knew something. Whoever chucked those bombs can’t be certain that Bert didn’t tell us before he cooked.”

Serena flinched. Erik put his hand over hers and gave Niall a hard look. Erik might be pissed off at Serena, but he was damned if he would let Niall upset her.

Niall smiled widely. Gotcha, boyo. Or rather, she has you.

“But Wallace said he was working for someone else,” Serena objected. Then she said quickly, “Forget it. I’m not thinking very well. Of course he would say that, even though he was clinging to the cliff and Erik was firing rocks at him.”

Dana smiled like a cat. “You didn’t mention that part, dear boy.”

Erik ignored her.

“Like I said, you’re wasted as a Fuzzy,” Niall said.

Erik ignored that, too. “At least now we know how to draw him out into the open without putting Serena at risk.”

Serena blinked. “We do?”

Niall nodded and said to Erik, “Good. Because that was my next suggestion and I knew you wouldn’t go for it when I asked her.”

“What was?” Serena demanded. “What are you talking about?”

“Bait,” Niall said succinctly. “Erik just volunteered.”

O
nly if there’s no other way,” Dana cut in quickly. “You know how I feel about putting nonsecurity types in the line of fire.”

“We don’t have enough time to put Fuzzy boy through a brushup course,” Niall said, his voice impatient.

“I’m not suggesting that,” Dana said with deadly clarity. “I am simply saying that we will try all other avenues first.” She looked from Niall to Serena. “The most obvious course is to find the Book of the Learned and use it as bait. From what Erik told me, your grandmother believed she had left enough clues that if you followed her instructions, ‘the Book of the Learned will follow.’ “

“I’ve tried,” Serena said, rubbing her aching scalp. “I simply don’t get the point she was trying to make. Or points.”

“Was your grandmother always paranoid?” Niall asked.

“Cautious,” Serena corrected. “Yes. As long as I can remember.”

“And longer,” Erik said. “She refused to speak to your mother after your mother ran off and changed her name to Charters.”

Slowly Serena nodded.

“That suggests to me that the name Charters was closer to her than she admitted to you,” Erik continued. “Her own maiden name, perhaps. That would be the only reason she would get so angry when her daughter used it, putting it into the public records where anybody who was persistent enough could find it.”

“Factoid?” Dana said sharply. “Did you hear that?”

Silence, then “How long ago did she last use the name Charters?” came out of the speakers.

Three people looked at Serena.

“No more recently than forty-five years ago, certainly,” Serena said. “She would have been about thirty-five years old, give or take.”

“Give or take what?” Factoid said sharply.

“I . . . five years?”

“I’m asking you,” Factoid muttered.

“I don’t know. She was approximately eighty when she died. At least, I think she was. Maybe it was just something I assumed.”

“What was her birth date?” Factoid asked.

“I don’t know. We didn’t celebrate it. We barely celebrated mine. In fact . . .” Serena frowned. “I remember arguing about it. Awful. A real screamer on both sides. I wanted my birthday on its real day. She tried to get me to change my birthday and last name just after I came to her, but I wouldn’t. It was the only thing I had of my own mother. I refused to let it go.”

“Which state was your grandmother married in?” Factoid asked.

“She never said.”

Factoid said something that sounded like fuck.

“That’s two,” Niall said.

Silence.

Erik said, “Serena is thirty-four. Her mother ran off when she was seventeen. Assuming she got pregnant pretty quick, she was eighteen when she had Serena. Serena was thirty-three when her grandmother died. Assume Ellis—Lisbeth—was eighty when she died. That makes her, at most, twenty-nine when she switched identities. She could have been as young as nineteen. Look for marriage licenses featuring a maiden name of Charters in that time span.”

“A joke, right?” the speaker snarled.

“No.”

“Well, suck, man! That puts me lip-deep in microfilm again! None of the states have computerized dick from the old days.”

“Pull in every researcher we have except the ones working with April Joy on the Singapore project,” Dana said instantly. “If that’s not enough, hire more.”

Factoid flipped the switch off and yelled obscenities until he ran out of breath. Then he flipped the switch on again and said, “Working.”

“While he tears his retro lime-green hair out,” Niall said, “let’s explore another route to the truth.”

“Such as?” Dana asked.

“Such as when did Ellis-Lisbeth start after the missing leaves?” Niall looked at Serena.

“I don’t know,” she said. “Her note didn’t say anything about it, but if I had to bet, I’d guess it was a few months before she was murdered.”

“I agree,” Erik said. “That’s how the murderer found her after all those years. She had to come out of hiding to reclaim the pages.”

Niall grunted. “Does that get us anywhere new?”

“Not me,” Erik said. “Dana?”

She shook her head. Her fingers were doing the flute thing again.

“Serena?”

“No.”

Silence.

“Did you ever see the Book of the Learned?” Dana asked Serena finally.

“Yes, I think I did. Or did I dream it?” She frowned, wondering how she could sort out dream and memory. Or if it was even possible.

“When?” Dana asked.

“I . . . sometimes I can almost . . .” Slowly Serena pulled the stretchy band off her thick braid, shook it out, put her face in her hands, and rubbed her aching head. Hair the color of fire tumbled down and piled like burning coals on the steel table.

“What do you remember?” Erik asked softly.

“The initials intertwined. Grandmother’s hair a tarnished silver with a halo of lantern light. Something whispering like dry hands rubbing. Gold gleaming and running and sliding and flashing when she turned pages in a thick, old book. A book whose cover was an etched gold plate studded with gems. A book whose marker was a piece of uncanny cloth woven by a sorceress long dead. It looked just like the scarf . . .” Serena tilted her head up and saw Erik watching her with eyes like hammered gold. “A dream. That’s all. Just a dream.”

“The cloth isn’t a dream,” Erik said.

“What cloth?” Dana asked.

Sighing, Serena reached beneath her hair. The cloth, as it often did, had somehow wound itself securely around her neck. Not tightly. Just not so loose that it got in the way. “I couldn’t bear to leave the scarf behind once I’d touched it,” she said, unwinding the old cloth from around her neck, “so I’m telling myself it looks better for being worn.”

Erik glanced at the cloth and smiled at the complex play of color, texture, and design. The fabric was radiant, almost incandescent, as though it brimmed with life. “If it looked any better, it would glow in the dark.” He held out his hand. “May I?”

She draped the textile over his hand, but didn’t completely let go of it herself. “You’re right. It looks richer now than it did before I wore it.”

“Maybe it’s like vellum. Maybe it needs to be touched to retain its highest gloss.” He stroked the fabric with his fingertips, then rubbed it against his cheek. If he noticed that Serena hadn’t let go of the scarf, he didn’t say anything. “Incredible texture. Soft but not filmy, solid but not harsh, velvety but with no direction to the nap.”

And it had never felt better than last night, wrapped around both of them like a vibrant colored shadow, caressing their naked skin. But there was no need to talk about that. Like the lovemaking itself, it was private.

He spread the cloth over his palm and admired the ripple of light across the unusual surface. “Like holding a rainbow.”

Dana and Niall looked at each other. Neither of them saw anything particularly spectacular in the piece of fabric Erik was admiring. It was interesting, but hardly deserved the reverence in his words and expression.

Niall leaned closer, started to pick up the fabric, and promptly dropped it. “Don’t know what you’re raving about, boyo. Feels like scratchy English tweed to me. About as flashy, too.”

At first Erik thought the other man was kidding. Then he realized that Niall was quite serious. Erik held the cloth out to Dana. After a slight, reluctant tug, Serena let go.

“What about you?” Erik asked Dana.

She picked up an edge of the fabric, ran it between her fingers, and said, “I’m with Niall. Factoid?”

“From here it looks like a piece of burlap.”

Serena looked at Dana and Niall, then at Erik. “I don’t get it.”

“ ‘ . . . the cloth a guardian stronger than armor and a lure to just one man. Uncanny cloth woven by the sorceress Serena of Silverfells,’ “ Erik quoted softly.

“Is that from the Book of the Learned?” Serena asked.

“The book, Erik the Learned’s memory, a dream.” Erik’s mouth twisted into a wry line. “I’m not sure it matters. Nearly a thousand years ago this was woven by Serena of Silverfells.” He laid the cloth over Serena’s hands but didn’t let go of it himself. “Now it belongs to another Serena, also a weaver. And so does the Book of the Learned. All she has to do is remember.”

Unease rippled over her like a cool breath. He was so certain, his eyes so clear, as deep as time, waiting . . .

Her fingers clenched in the fey cloth. “I can’t remember what I never knew!”

“You will.”

Her chin tilted. “You lost me on that last one.”

“Then you’ll just have to trust me, won’t you?”

She bit the inside of her lip, then realized that they both were holding the ancient, extraordinary cloth, their fingers touching, overlapping, locking together. Slowly she let out a long breath that was almost a sigh of surrender. “I don’t have much choice, do I?”

“You always have a choice,” Erik said roughly. “That’s what scares the hell out of me. If you choose wrong, you die.”

C
leary Warrick Montclair paced one of the Retreat’s spacious suites and looked at her watch.

“Shit,” she hissed between her teeth.

“What?” Garrison asked.

“It’s too late to talk to them tonight.”

Her son sighed. “Then relax, Cleary,” he said patiently. He had learned at a young age that she preferred to be called that name rather than the more generic “mother,” especially when she was stressed and impatient. Lately, that had been one hundred percent of the time.

“How can I relax when Daddy is so upset?” Abruptly she realized she was almost shouting. She took a slow breath. “Where’s Paul?”

“Through the connecting door, like always,” Garrison muttered, but not loud enough that his mother could hear. If she wanted to pretend she was the virgin Sister Cleary, it was no skin off his butt. At least Paul took some of the hysterical edges off Cleary. Garrison supposed that was a good enough reason to tolerate the older man, even though Paul often acted like he was in charge. Yet Garrison admired Paul as much as he resented his unswerving business sense. Personalities never made Paul lose his temper. “Want me to get him?”