Some of the text was printed in gold ink, some in black. The gold ink shimmered even in the most shadowy areas of the overstuffed shop as Crys walked it back to the children’s section, easily navigating the maze-like shelves without looking up.
Becca was there, on her knees, sliding the new books into place after noting them in the open ledger beside her. Crys glanced around at the shelves, which were painted pink and blue and green in this area, rather than the standard brown and black in the rest of the store. Kid-sized chairs and a small sofa, both upholstered in bright polka-dotted fabric, were there for reading comfort. A decade ago, on the wall next to the large, round window that made this alcove the brightest part of the shop, her father had painted a mural of a fantasy land with a golden castle and two princesses who looked a great deal like Becca and Crys. The painted words Imagination is Magic curved around the fluffy white clouds in the bright blue sky.
Daniel Hatcher used to organize and host readings every Saturday in this kids’ nook, free for all children and parents. He always made sure there were drinks and snacks available. Local children’s authors would visit and talk to the kids and sign books. And this had also been the place Crys and Becca had lounged for hours in their childhood, spending time together reading and discussing book after book after book.
Times had changed. The nook, once a place of magic and fairy tales, now looked weathered and old. The only ghosts to be found back here were memories of a different time.
“What’s that?” Becca asked, drawing Crys out of her reverie.
“Good question. Jackie sent it. I don’t know what it is, but I hope it’s worth big bucks.”
Becca stood up and brushed some dust off her jeans. “Let me see it.” Crys handed it over, and Becca’s eyes widened as she took it. “Wow. It’s beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. I wonder how old it is.”
“Very old,” Crys replied. “That’s my professional opinion.”
Becca sat down on the small sofa and began to carefully flip through it. “I wonder what language this is.”
“No idea whatsoever.”
“This is like something you’d find in a museum.”
“Do museums pay lots of money for ancient books no one can read?”
This earned Crys a sharp look. “It’s not all about money, you know.”
“Let’s go ahead and agree to disagree on that.”
Becca traced her hand lightly over a fully gold page, the writing so tiny and cramped that there was barely any of the thin paper showing. The ink shone bright in the light from the window, even as dusk had started to descend over the city.
“Don’t get your greasy fingers all over it,” Crys said. “It’ll decrease the value.”
“Quiet.” Becca’s voice was hollow now, distracted, as she peered at the pages, her brows drawing together.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.”
“You look constipated.”
Becca shook her head, not bothering to respond to Crys’s smart-ass comment with even a glare. “This book . . . I feel like I can . . . I don’t know. Sense something from it.”
“Sense something?” Crys laughed and looked up at the ceiling. “Spirits, come to us now! Speak to us through the pages of this weird old book.”
“Shut up. It’s not like that. It’s not . . .”
“Not what?” Crys prompted when Becca fell silent.
Becca’s breathing quickened, her chest rising and falling rapidly.
That was alarming. “Becca, what’s wrong?”
“This book . . .” Becca whispered hoarsely, as if the words were getting stuck in her throat. She began to tremble. “It’s doing something . . . to me. I can feel it . . . pulling.”
“Pulling? Pulling what?” In seconds, a chill spread through Crys, bringing with it a dark and heavy feeling of dread. “You’re starting to freak me out. It’s just a dumb book. Give it back to me.” She held out her hand and waited for her sister to hand it back to her. “Come on! What are you waiting for?”
Becca lurched up to her feet off the small sofa. “I can’t seem to let go of it. I’m trying, but I can’t.”
The golden page began to glow.
Crys swore under her breath. What the hell was going on?
She reached forward to grab it out from her sister’s grip. The moment she touched the book this time, a violent shock tore through her, as if she’d jammed her hand into a light socket. It knocked her backward, and she fell flat on her back on the far side of the alcove. The wind had been knocked from her lungs, and she struggled to find her breath. As fast as she could, she scrambled to her unsteady feet.
“Get that thing away from you, Becca!” she gasped.
Becca’s eyes had filled with the bright golden light from the book. “I don’t know what’s happening. What . . . what is it doing to me? Help me!” Her voice broke with fear. “Please, Crys, help me!”
Crys lunged toward her sister just as light started to stream out of the book, momentarily blinding her and making her stagger back again. She blinked, rubbing her eyes, only to see that sharp beams of this impossibly bright light had wrapped around Becca, slithering around her chest and arms and face like a thousand golden snakes.
Becca screamed, and the bone-chilling sound drew a frightened shriek from Crys’s throat. The book finally dropped from Becca’s hands as she crumpled to the floor in a heap next to it.
Crys scrambled to Becca’s side and grabbed her sister’s shoulders, shaking her. “Becca! Becca, look at me! Look at me!”
The golden glow from the book coated her skin and gathered in her eyes for a moment longer before it finally extinguished.
Becca stared straight ahead, her expression slack.
“Please!” Crys yelled, shaking her harder. “Please say something!”
But her sister didn’t respond. She stared, she blinked. She breathed. But Becca Hatcher was gone—mind and soul.
Gone. In an instant.
Leaving Crys behind, alone . . . with the book responsible.
Chapter 2
FARRELL
The Raven Club wasn’t his favorite bar, but it was the noisiest one he knew. Silence meant thinking. And thinking meant remembering.
Tonight he wanted to forget.
Half a bottle of vodka also made forgetting a lot easier. And the club offered its fair share of dark-haired beauties to help take his mind off the date on the calendar.
“You are very helpful, you know that?” he said to the girl on his lap, weaving his fingers into her long hair, which was stiff with hair spray. She wore a low cut, sparkly top and a skirt short enough to get her arrested in many places around the world. Luckily, Toronto wasn’t one of them.
She brushed her lips against his throat. “I aim to please.”
“Aim a little lower, would you?”
“Anything you want.”
He did another shot and glanced at the time on his phone. Midnight. He’d successfully made it through the third of April.
Suddenly, the sickly sweet scent of the girl’s floral perfume had begun to chase his buzz away. Girls, thinking it made them smell like money, piled that garbage on way too thick for his taste.
“Enough,” Farrell said as he pushed her off his lap.
“Oh, come on. We’ve barely gotten started.” She stroked his chest and unbuttoned the top of his white Prada shirt. “Here we are, all alone, just the two of us. It’s destiny, baby.”
He tried not to laugh. “I don’t believe in destiny.”
The private lounge he’d reserved offered a sliver of privacy, but Farrell would hardly call them alone. Only twenty feet away, through a shimmering curtain, was the rest of the club. The sound of throbbing music had begun to make his head ache.
He’d kill for a cigarette, but he was trying to quit.
> The brunette had caught his eye when he’d gone to fetch a bottle of Grey Goose from the bar. He had no idea how old she was under all that makeup. Maybe twenty. Maybe thirty. He didn’t really care.
“The night’s still young,” he told her. “We have time, Suzie.”
“It’s Stephanie.”
He gave her one of his best smiles, which never failed to work wonders with difficult females. Right on schedule, her serious expression faded and her eyes sparkled with interest. He didn’t have many talents, but effortless charm and a way with women were two of them.
Also, the public knowledge of Farrell Grayson’s upcoming inheritance helped get him all the female attention he’d ever want.
One hundred million dollars of his grandmother’s vast estate, left to him in her will—with a stipulation: He didn’t get his hands on it until he turned twenty-one.
Only 576 days till he finally had the freedom to do as he pleased without being caught under his parents’ thumbs, totally dependent on his monthly allowance.
“Suzie . . . Stephanie . . . Sexy . . . come back over here, whoever you are,” he said, patting his knee. She did as requested, smiling now.
Her tongue tasted like rum, he thought absently. And Diet Coke.
His phone vibrated and he glanced down at it. It was a message from his kid brother, Adam.
im in big trouble can you come get me
It included an address to one of the seedier neighborhoods downtown.
Another text message swiftly followed: never mind im fine
Yeah, right. Farrell slipped the phone into the inner pocket of his jacket. He grabbed the bottle of vodka and took a swig from it, feeling the pleasant burn all the way down his throat.
Fun was over. Duty called.
“Got to go,” he said.
Stephanie’s eyes widened with surprise. “What? Where?”
“I need to deal with a family thing.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“No thanks,” Farrell said without hesitation.
“Oh, come on.” She traced her long fingernails up his arm. “We’re having such a good time. You really want it to end so soon?”
“I really couldn’t care less.” He kept his smile fixed as her expression fell. “What? You thought this was an open casting call for the role of Farrell Grayson’s girlfriend? Sorry to disappoint you.”
Her surprise faded and her eyes flashed with anger. “Asshole. Everything they say about you is true.”
She got up from his side and stormed out of the lounge, shoving the curtains out of her way, but her arms and hair still got caught in them in her furious need to make a dramatic exit.
Fine with him. He’d never liked the taste of rum anyway.
Since having his license suspended four months ago, Farrell had had to get used to having a chauffeur. It was either that or take public transit—and both of his parents were appalled by the thought of a Grayson riding the subway.
Not that any of this was their fault; it was entirely his. Wrapping his Porsche around a tree had totaled the car, landed him with a DUI the family lawyers were still sorting out, and sent him into the hospital with a serious concussion.
You’re damn lucky you didn’t hurt anybody else, the voice of his conscience snarled. It sounded exactly like his older brother, Connor. All their lives, he’d been the one offering up such pearls of wisdom, whether Farrell wanted them or not.
When the limo reached its destination, Farrell, unsteady on his feet from the amount of liquor he’d consumed, approached a low-rent apartment building.
Out front, several of the streetlamps were broken, casting the treeless area in darkness, apart from the light of the nearly full moon. Shadows moved to his left across the concrete parking lot, but he paid them no attention. He wasn’t looking for trouble—not tonight.
“Wait here,” he told his driver.
Farrell went upstairs and knocked on the door to the apartment number Adam had texted. After a moment, it opened a crack.
“Sorry, we didn’t order any,” the kid said with a smirk.
Farrell smiled at him, then kicked the door open, breaking the security chain. “Where’s my brother?”
The kid scrambled backward. “Hey, I was just kidding around. I was going to let you in. Farrell, right? I’m Peter.” He nodded toward the corner. “That’s Nick.”
The other boy, Nick, watched the two of them warily, taking a shaky step backward as Farrell fisted his hands and moved menacingly toward the first kid.
“Where is Adam?” he growled. “Don’t make me ask again or you’ll regret it.”
“Back room,” Peter said, then cleared his throat. “It’s cool you’re here. You’re welcome to join the party. We don’t mind sharing.”
Farrell moved through the small apartment toward the closed door at the rear. It opened before he reached it, and Adam’s nervous face greeted him.
“Oh, hi,” Adam said.
Yes, his brother definitely looked nervous. Nervous and guilty. “What the hell’s going on?”
“Nothing.” Adam rubbed a hand through his light brown hair. “I mean, everything’s fine. You should go back to whatever you were doing, and I can . . . fix this.”
“Fix what?” When Adam didn’t answer, Farrell shook his head. “I’m taking you home. It’s after midnight. Isn’t that your curfew?”
Adam scowled. “I’m too old for curfews.”
“Our beloved parents might disagree with that. I know they did when I was sixteen. Let’s go.” He blew out a breath. Maybe he was taking the wrong approach. “I got the latest KillerMan movie all loaded up. I know you want to see it as much as I do.”
One thing the brothers shared was their love of Korean action movies. Never dubbed, always with subtitles. They watched at least one a week together in the Graysons’ home theater.
“But the party’s not over yet,” Peter whined.
So these were Adam’s new friends. Both of them gave Farrell a deeply uneasy feeling.
“Party, huh?” he said. “Three kids out late on a Friday night in some sketchy apartment. Doesn’t seem like much of a party to me.” He was met with silence, and he returned his attention to Adam. “What’s in the room?”
Adam grimaced. He held the door open only wide enough for him to look at Farrell, not wide enough for Farrell to see beyond.
“I told you not to come.”
“Yeah. Right after you said you were in trouble. What’s in the room?” he repeated.
“Nothing.”
Farrell already felt his hangover circling like a mean-spirited vulture. “Show me right now.”
“Yeah, let’s show him.” Nick, with a big, sleazy grin on his face, approached slowly. “The fun just got started. Adam’s first, but you can go second, if you’d like.”
Farrell pushed the door open to reveal a small bedroom. The bed was unmade, the curtains askew. It smelled sour, like unwashed clothing.
An unconscious woman lay on the bed.
“Explain,” he bit out through clenched teeth. “Now.”
“She was looking to party—she just needed a bit of a push.” Peter shrugged. “Led the three of us back here before she passed out. It’s her place.”
She was at least ten years older than the boys. Her red lipstick was smeared, and she smelled like cigarette smoke and alcohol.
“Who drugged her?” Farrell asked as evenly as he could, flicking a glance at Adam. “You?”
Adam shook his head, his expression bleak.
“Did you touch her?” She was still wearing all her clothes, even her panty hose and stiletto heels. But he had to ask.
“No,” Adam replied in barely a whisper.
“He’s been in here for half an hour,” Peter said with a laugh. “We were getting bored waiting for him to ge
t started.”
Farrell ignored him, keeping his attention on Adam. “Were you going to?”
A shadow of fear and uncertainty slid behind Adam’s eyes.
Nick shook his head, grinning. “We tried to help your brother pop his cherry, and this is what—”
Farrell couldn’t hold his anger in anymore. He exploded. He grabbed Nick by his throat and slammed him against the wall, rattling the cheap framed art. “Listen to me very carefully. If you ever—ever—get my brother involved in something like this again, I’m going to kill you—both of you.” He sent a death glare toward Peter before returning his attention to the kid in front of him. “You hear me?”
Nick’s eyes bugged. “Whoa, wait—”
“If you come anywhere near Adam again, I will personally slit you open and watch your guts spill onto the floor, and I’ll enjoy every minute of it. And if I hear that you ever do this to another woman, you will deeply, deeply regret it. Understood?”
Nick nodded frantically. Peter’s acne stood out like bright red dots on his pale face. They both answered in unison: “Understood.”
Farrell finally released Nick. “Get the hell out of here, both of you.”
The two boys scrambled to leave the apartment without another word of protest.
Adam had pressed himself back against the wall, as if wishing he, too, could run away. “Farrell . . . I swear I wouldn’t have—”
“Shut up. Just shut your mouth.” He looked down at his hands to find that they were shaking. He clasped them together as he moved toward the woman on the bed. She groaned and shifted on the sheets. A tacky necklace with a big, fake ruby hung around her neck. Her hair was a brash yellowy blond, with an inch of black roots.
Her fake lashes fluttered, and her eyes opened a crack. A drunken smile stretched her red lips. “Hey, baby. You ready to have some fun?”
“I’ve had my fun for tonight.” He grabbed a blanket and pulled it over her. “Sleep it off. You’ll feel better tomorrow.”