Touch of Darkness (13 page)

"You might be right."

She twisted to look at him. "What's wrong?"

"What do you mean?"

"You sound so ... neutral. And you look—" He
looked funny. Sort of knowing, and filled with suppressed excitement. "You're the archaeologist. I'm only the amateur. Am I reading this wrong?"

"You're reading it exactly as I would. Except . . . I don't think that's gold." He pointed at the screen, at the object the devil gave Clovus.

"What do you think it is?"

"I think it's a holy object."

"Because of the halo." That shot her theory about the Varinski treasure all to hell. "But what is the devil doing with a holy object?"

"Nothing good, I'll bet."

"No." She tapped the desk.

"You're disappointed."

"I don't know." She thought about the details of the Varinski mythology. "There's the part about the icon—"

"Icon?" Rurik was instantly alert.

"Nothing. I just . . . nothing." She did not need to go into that right now. Turning back to the screen, she said, "Look. Clovus is sick." The stone carver had rendered the picture of Clovus's various bodily disorders with disgusting completeness.

"And he blames the object, whatever it is, and sends it to the king with one eye." Rurik leaned back in the chair and pressed the heels of his hands to his forehead. "That would be perfect!"

"Perfect?" She could hardly contain her disap
pointment. "If the Hershey bar were in Europe somewhere? Why?"

"Because otherwise, this object was blown sky-high in the tomb, and even if it wasn't destroyed, it's going to take ten years to sift through the wreckage and catalog every piece, and who the hell has ten
years?"

"Right," she said sarcastically. "Now all we have to do is figure out which one-eyed, mean son-of-a-bitch eleventh-century European ruler he sent it to."

In the end, for all his disclaimers, Rurik deciphered enough of the Old English to figure out the one-eyed king had lived and pillaged in Lorraine, now a province on the far eastern edge of France. They would
start there.

His scholarship impressed Tasya. That and the heat he provided by sitting close, and his fingers rubbing at the base of her neck . . . she liked sitting here with him, deciphering the carvings, talking about their next move. They were comfortable with each other, two people who had a lot in common. Almost . . . friends.

Friends, except for the fact that she hadn't been completely frank with him—to say the least—and there was that sex thing that they did so well and which made her want to run so far away.

Because Rurik Wilder would never be threatened by her career and her independence, and scamper
away. Rurik Wilder wasn't threatened by anything. He wanted a relationship with her—what kind and how long, she didn't dare ask—and that terrified her. Terrified her because of the people who chased her. Terrified her because he could get hurt. And that wouldn't be fair to him.

While she pulled the card, replaced it in her camera, and stashed her camera safely away, he cleaned the remnants of the photos from Mrs. Reddenhurst's computer. Tasya watched with a sense of satisfaction; they'd done a good night's work. They made a good team.

He switched the computer off, then turned, and so swiftly she didn't have time to back up, he caught her hand in his. "Now, tell me about you and the Varinskis."

The reckoning had come sooner than she'd thought.

Chapter 12

"I don't know where to start." Tasya tried to run
her fingers through her hair, and at once the rigid spikes reminded her what she had done to change her looks, and why.

"Start at the beginning." Rurik used his toe to pull the chair right in front of him, and pointed.

She might not like his attitude, but she sat. After all, she owed him. She'd got him involved in something so far above his head, he could never handle it.

Although perhaps she was kidding herself. Because as this day had worn on, she'd become more and more impressed with his competence. The guy had a way about him: he'd dug her out of the tunnel, hidden that backpack full of survival supplies, scouted out the B and B—all actions that revealed
his character. This was a man who expected danger and prepared for trouble.

Still, she'd brought the trouble, so she leaned forward. "You know who the Varinski Twins are?"

"Two experienced assassins from a legendary Russian—well, now Ukrainian—crime family who were caught in Sereminia committing murder for hire and are now in prison awaiting trial."

"Exactly. They're not the first members of the family to be caught, but they are the first ones who haven't managed to 'escape' "—she used air quotes— "before their trial. The Varinskis have been hiring themselves out as mercenaries for a thousand years, committing horrible misdeeds, and they've never been convicted of a single crime." She leaned farther forward, enthusiasm for her subject warming her. "Can you imagine that? A thousand years."

"Incredible." He sat completely still, listening as if she were the most scintillating speaker in the world. "Why do you know so much about them?"

"I've done my research."

"What kind of research?"

"Every kind. At the library, online, I've done interviews." That wasn't all, but she suspected he wouldn't approve of the rest.

She was probably saying too much. But she never got to talk about this stuff. Not with anybody who hated the Varinskis like she did. Here was Rurik,
his archaeological site blown sky-high, his life's work ruined—he would understand. "I've documented the Varinskis' history, their legend, and their crimes. Do you know the oldest Russian mention I could find is almost eight hundred years old, an illuminated manuscript that spoke of a treasure of great worth which the first Konstantine Varinski had given 'to the devil' to receive his supernatural abilities."

"What supernatural abilities would those be?" Rurik sounded polite, like someone who thought his leg was being pulled.

Tasya didn't blame him a bit. "I know—I can't believe the Varinskis got away with this bullshit, either. Supposedly, these guys are shape-shifters, and change into predators whenever they want to. The monks were afraid of them, and said this deal with the devil turned the Varinskis from humans into demons. Every Russian document I found after that said the same thing, and claimed that that is why they're such good trackers and why nobody can escape them. Is that not the best PR you've ever
h
eard?"

"Amazing." Rurik leaned back, arms crossed over his chest, his face just out of the light. "What do you think the truth is?"

"I discovered that Konstantine had paid somebody, some powerful man, probably a representative of the czar, a whole bunch of money to do as he
wished without interference on the Ukrainian steppes. Once Konstantine received that permission, he proceeded to make quite a name for himself as a brutal warrior." She wouldn't talk about the stuff Konstantine had done, since Konstantine made Clo-vus seem mild by comparison. "He raised more brutal warriors, and they raised more, continuing the family tradition as men who hire themselves out as trackers and assassins, men who fight as mercenaries in any army. They don't marry, they go out and rape women, and if the women know what's good for them, they give over their babies. Supposedly, the Varinskis have only sons—"

"That is possible, since it's the male who determines the gender," Rurik interposed.

"Yes, but with these guys, I'd suspect they're leaving the girls out to die."

Rurik almost spoke, then returned to watchfulness. "All of the Varinskis are trained to be soldiers of breathtaking viciousness."

"So you don't believe the supernatural part?"

"Oh, please."

"You don't believe in the supernatural."

"No. I believe in what I can see and taste and touch." She didn't even believe in God. She'd lost that faith the same night she'd lost her parents. "I tracked down what I believe to be the piece of the Varinski family treasure—"

"The treasure Konstantine gave to the devil?" With Rurik's face in shadow, she could see only his eyes, and they were alive and watching. "Why doesn't the devil have it?"

"According to the Varinski myth, the devil divided the treasure into four parts and flung the pieces to the four winds."

Rurik shook his head. "He flung them to the four corners of the earth."

"That's right. You do know your stuff!" She gave him points for that one. "The devil flung the pieces to the four corners of the earth. The accounts disagreed about the treasure and what it was. Some said gold. Some said silver. Some said it was a holy icon of the kind all Russian families keep in their household shrine."

Rurik's gaze flicked to the computer, and he nodded.

"I thought if it was that valuable, it was probably gold, and the etching and illuminations all showed photos like the ones on the stone panel." She tapped the memory chip in her shirt pocket. "I deduced that the agreement giving Konstantine his rights as a son of a bitch must be etched on the treasure somehow."

"Okay," Rurik said slowly, frowning. "That's a big leap."

"If Konstantine Varinski was so worried about the, urn, Hershey bar that he made up the story about
the devil flinging it to the four corners of the earth, then there's
something
incriminating on it."

"If everything you say is true—the Varinski legend is bogus, they don't change into beasts of prey, and they merely use the myth to scare people to death— then yes, that would seem logical. But what if—"

"What if they really change into animals?" She laughed lightly.

In one swift move, he sat up straight, into the light. His face was alive with exasperation, and she would have sworn he was going to do something rash, although what, she didn't know. He subsided back into his chair, but she sensed a vigilance and an impatience, like the attitude of a hawk waiting for a mouse to bolt from its hole.

"It truly is a great myth. They're not werewolves, controlled by the moon, or vampires who can't go out at night. They can go anywhere anytime as men or as beasts. That makes them so much more dangerous, doesn't it?" She laughed again. "Talk about PR!"

"Incredible." He seemed to pick his words carefully. "What if the Hershey bar is merely a Russian family icon, and you've gone to all the trouble of tracing the Varinski treasure to CIovus's tomb on the Isle of Roi?"

"But don't you see? The Varinskis are
the
international, high-tech, successful trackers and assassins in the business. They blew up the tomb." She put her
hand on his knee. "They're trying to hide something."

"So you're convinced it was the Varinskis who blew up the tomb." His leg was taut as steel beneath her grip.

"Of course I am. And if you think about it, so will you be." She tightened her fingers, then let go. "You said you didn't believe in coincidence."

"Then, likely, they wanted to kill you. The Varinskis don't like people poking around, exposing their secrets."

Rurik knew more about the Varinskis than she had imagined. "That's possible."

"You're taking your possible death very calmly." She thought of several answers, and discarded them—they all sounded so melodramatic. "That treasure chest was such a disappointment. When you got to the bottom and the tablet wasn't there, I almost
cried."

"I'm almost crying right now." He did look a little flushed. "As much as I hate to ask . . . what are you doing with all this information?"

"I wrote a book."

"You wrote a book about the Varinskis?" Rurik's
voice rose.

So did her eyebrows. "It's good!"

"Do me a favor. Let's not find out."

"My
editor
says it's good."

In tones of horror, he asked, "You have an editor?" "It's going to be published in two months. In hardcover!" She'd used all her skills as a writer to knit the facts and fantasies together into a compelling read. She was proud of herself—and he was puncturing her exhilaration. "Do you know anything about publishing?"

"I know most books fail. Maybe no one will notice yours." He sounded positively hopeful.