“Gabriel is here, then,” Luke deduced, his light blue eyes suddenly flashing with hyperawareness as he scanned the faces of the passengers with renewed interest. The other two men turned to join him, and as if on cue, a sable-haired man dressed in black stepped off the train and onto the platform.
“And we have visual,” Luke muttered.
As one, the three men stepped back and into the shadows of the alley between the train station and its neighboring houses. Once they were safely sequestered in the relative darkness, Ely turned up the collar of his coat. “Daniel’s here somewhere; I can feel him. He can see us and we can’t see him, so pinning him down won’t be easy.”
“It’ll be easy if we take the archess. He’ll follow her like a fly to honey,” said Luke.
“Luke’s right. She’s our bargaining chip. And the General wants her, anyway,” agreed Mitchell.
Ely nodded. “My thoughts exactly.”
Mitchell chuckled darkly, flicking his cigarette into the nearest trash receptacle. “I know.”
* * *
Daniel watched through narrowed green eyes as the Adarians slipped into the alley. He could follow them and listen to what they had to say, but he’d already pressed his luck enough just being within close proximity. It was sheer fortune that Mitchell hadn’t managed to catch his thoughts. It was like a dart game with that man; sometimes he nailed you and sometimes he didn’t. This time, he’d missed, but if Daniel didn’t get out of there soon, Mitchell would have him pinpointed and everything Daniel had planned would be obsolete.
As would his life.
Silently cursing his luck, Daniel slipped behind the train and followed the tracks a few hundred yards. How the hell had they found him? He’d left no indication of where he was going. And none of the Adarians could scry or divine as he could. What the hell was going on?
A harsh vibration in the air scraped across his skin and he paused. Black was nearby. Daniel bent and peered beneath the tracks to the space on the opposite side. Sure enough, a pair of black motorcycle boots stared back at him. But within a few seconds, they turned and began striding away.
Daniel swore softly and ran his hand over his face. He needed to get to the archess before Gabriel did. Before Ely and the others did. He had seen her heading around the building to where she no doubt intended to hide in the women’s restroom, so he had a jump on the archangel. But Mitchell could read minds; he might have the same information, stolen directly from Juliette’s brain.
This was a royal fucking mess.
Daniel’s mind spun as he attempted to come up with a makeshift plan. Quickly, he glanced at his watch and then glanced up toward the conductor’s seat. The train would take off again in another four minutes.
Daniel made up his mind and broke into a run.
* * *
Juliette was about to duck into the restroom when she caught sight of something out of the corner of her eye. She stopped and did a double take. It was a taxi. Sitting right there at the curb, its light on, its cab empty. The taxi driver leaned over in his seat and gave her a wave.
Juliette couldn’t believe her luck. But she wasn’t about to waste time questioning it. With but a second’s pause, she waved back at the taxi driver and raced to his car. He got out and made his way around to her side, ready to take her carry-on bag, despite its small size. “Where ye headed?”
“Can you take me all the way to Inverness?”
The man’s eyes widened as he set her bag in the trunk. Then his face contorted a bit while Juliette imagined he tried to hide a mile-wide smile, and finally he nodded. “Aye, boot it’ll cost yae a posh pound or tae,” he replied.
“Do you take credit cards?”
“Aye.” He nodded, opening her door for her. Juliette glanced once over her shoulder and then slid into the back of the car. No sign of Gabriel yet. While the driver got behind the wheel on the right side of the car, Juliette fingered the credit card, license, and folded wad of pounds she had placed into her zip-up hoodie before she’d left the cottage. As long as she could get away with using the credit card, she would, so that she had receipts to show to Lambent’s office. Besides, you never knew when you would need cash.
The taxi pulled away from the curb a few seconds later, and Juliette glanced once more out the rear window. She stifled a gasp as Gabriel Black stepped into the sunlight on the sidewalk beside the women’s restroom. She was at once caught by the arresting profile of his tall figure.
Juliette quickly slid down in the seat and ducked her head. He was either dangerous or insane and possibly both. This was her one hope at escaping him. On instinct, she closed her eyes and held her breath.
After a few seconds, she sat up again and looked around. The taxi had pulled away from the station and was on one of the main roads. Safe for the time being, Juliette exhaled and ran her hand over her face.
“Are ye here on business or pleasure?” the taxi driver asked.
Juliette glanced up and caught his reflection in the mirror. He looked to be a middle-aged man, but as with so many people in Britain his complexion was on the pale side, which kept the wrinkles at bay. His eyes were blue; it was the most common color she’d come across thus far.
“A bit of both, I guess,” she replied, noting a slight tremble in her tone.
The man in the mirror smiled a strange smile, his blue eyes turning more intense. “An’ which would yae be hidin’ from, there? The business or the pleasure?”
Juliette felt the heat rise up her neck and into her cheeks. He noticed me hiding from Black, she thought. Of course he noticed. She was being a conspicuous idiot. She wasn’t exactly giving Americans a good name with her behavior.
She tried a smile, but it came out lopsided. So she shrugged instead. Pleasure, she thought, unable to keep the memory of his kisses from her mind. “Neither,” she lied. Hoping that he would get the hint, Juliette turned to gaze out the window, hiding her blush as best she could.
The taxi driver must have caught on that she didn’t want to talk, because he said nothing further and the car was almost painfully silent for the remainder of the trip. When they reached Inverness, he drove her to a car rental shop and let her off.
She tipped the driver well and continued to count her blessings when the rental shop had available vehicles. She chose the cheapest, and then rented a navigation system to go with it. A quick stop at a convenience store for a Diet Sprite and a Wispa bar, and she was on her way once more.
It was late on Sunday night when she finally pulled into the parking garage adjacent to her hotel in Glasgow. This was the hotel in which Samuel Lambent had apparently booked her a room. As uncomfortable as it made her feel to be beholden to someone for a place to stay for the night, at that moment Juliette was enormously grateful that she wouldn’t have to go through the booking process and cross her fingers for a room. The drive had been hard, the day trying, and she was very tired. She just wanted to get into her room, take a long, hot shower, and curl up in bed with a bunch of junk food and the Syfy channel.
When she checked in at the front desk, the woman behind the counter gave her a big smile. She had thick, shining brown hair, flawless skin, and bottomless dark eyes. She welcomed Juliette and very quickly and efficiently logged her into the system. She then handed her the key card to one of the hotel’s four top-floor corner suites. Juliette stared at the card, blinked a few times, and then frowned. “Are you sure you have that right? A luxury suite? I’m just one person—”
“Yes, Miss Anderson,” the woman said with a smile. She was foreign, as far as Scotland was concerned, because she had no trace of a Scottish accent. She sounded more American than anything else. The name tag on the woman’s vest read LILY.
“Mr. Lambent has secured the room for you for the next week and has placed a deposit on it so that if you wish to continue your stay, you may, at his expense.”
Juliette stared at the woman. She ran Lily’s words once more through her brain to make sure she had processed them
correctly. “A week?” Juliette asked softly. This was a very nice hotel. And the suite had to cost a fortune for one night alone. The last thing she wanted to do was wear out her welcome with the man who was funding her burgeoning dream by taking advantage of him and his money.
“Yes,” Lily said, nodding reassuringly. Her natural, friendly smile was still in place. “And he has left this message for you as well,” she then added, taking a beige envelope from a slot behind the desk and handing it to Juliette.
Juliette turned the envelope over. On the cover was her name, scrawled in black ink with what looked like a calligraphy pen. On the seam on the back was a wax seal, deep charcoal gray. It was a pair of angel wings.
“One last thing, Miss Anderson.” The woman drew her attention once more and Juliette glanced up. “Your meals are to be on Mr. Lambent as well. You can order anything you wish from room service and the cost will be added to his tab.” Lily held out Juliette’s receipt and a second key card for her, but it took a moment for Juliette’s body to move properly. She was still getting over the fact that Lambent had given her the luxury suite for a week. Free meals were yet another shock on her tired brain.
As if Lily understood what was going through her head, she smiled sympathetically and true kindness touched the darkness of her pretty eyes. “If you need anything, Miss Anderson, my name is Lily. Don’t hesitate to call the front desk and ask for me. I’ll be happy to help in any way that I can.”
Juliette managed to nod and return the smile, though she knew that her surprise clearly showed through. She took the things from Lily’s hand and said, “Thank you.”
“My pleasure,” Lily said. “You’ll want to take the South elevator. It will ascend straight to your room.”
Juliette headed toward the elevator with her small carry-on bag. Once inside, she stared warily at the dozens of round numbers on the panel and chewed on her bottom lip.
“Up we go,” she whispered as she pressed the button for the top floor and then slid her hotel card into the slot when the red pass-code light came on. Apparently, not just anyone could get to the top floor; you had to have a key. It was the first time she had ever stayed in a location so exclusive. And though it made her feel somewhat like a phony, on the upside, she felt safer. She doubted anyone with chloroform was going to be waiting in her room in this hotel.
The ride up was much quicker than she would have expected. The elevator never once stopped for the other floors. It just shot straight to the top, and Juliette felt as she always felt on “lifts” like these: as if her stomach had taken up residence in her shoes.
Once it reached the top and stopped, the doors dinged open and Juliette found herself facing an elegant foyer. The floors were marble and the walls were painted in tasteful murals. Gold-gilded mirrors graced the entryway. Everything shone.
“I think the elevator went too far,” she muttered as she stepped off the lift and her boots clicked on the marble floor. The stone had gold and silver veins in it, polished to perfection. “It’s dropped me off in heaven.”
Distractedly, she stepped forward so that the elevator could close behind her. The doors dinged shut and the lift descended without her.
Juliette turned to face the entryway to her suite once more. Massive double doors, also gilded, beckoned to her. I don’t deserve this, she thought. She’d been in Scotland a week already and had yet to do any real, hard research for Lambent’s show. To say nothing of the research she’d planned on doing for her own thesis.
In all fairness, her world had been turned upside down of late. First the healing, then the storms. And then she found out she had telekinesis. How was any of this possible? Why her? And why now? And then there was Gabriel Black and the stranger who had attacked her in Stornoway. It was all too much and her lapse in focus was logically forgivable. She’d gone from town to town so fast and so furiously, her mind wrapped up in the chaos of the moment, that any kind of quality work on her part had been all but impossible to undertake. But Lambent wouldn’t know that.
Juliette stood there in the entryway and rubbed her eyes. Her right hand still clutched the envelope that Lily, the woman at the front desk, had given her. Juliette glanced down at the envelope and sighed. Then she opened the double doors and stepped into the suite beyond.
It was everything she had feared it was going to be. Plush white rugs covered the marble floor in elegant disarray, the leather couches wore throws of cashmere and silk, and there were three different rooms—each with its own bathroom. Each bathroom possessed a jet tub, also constructed of marble. Each bed was draped in Egyptian cotton. And the honor bar carried a full bottle of Grande Siècle champagne.
Once she’d been through the entire suite, Juliette stood at the center of the massive hotel room and spun in a slow circle. Then she sat down on the couch and opened the envelope from Samuel Lambent.
She pulled out the folded document and read it carefully. And then she groaned and fell back against the thick cushions of the expensive leather sofa.
“Tomorrow. He wants to meet tomorrow,” she muttered to herself. “Figures.” She’d hoped she would have at least one extra day to actually do some research and concoct a halfway decent report by the time she met with her benefactor. But no such luck.
She didn’t even have the option of staying up all night to “study.” It was Sunday night and everything in the civilized world shut down early on Sundays. She hated Sundays for that reason, alone. She could always go online; the Trinity Hotel had an excellent Internet connection. But anyone could go online to research something and Juliette had a feeling that Samuel Lambent, the incredibly wealthy and intelligent media mogul, would know online research from the real deal.
“Christ,” she swore, as a feeling of dread sank heavily over her. “I am so screwed.”
* * *
Samael leaned back in the large leather chair and thoughtfully placed his fingers against his lips. His charcoal gray eyes watched the screen before him carefully as his mouth curled into the slightest of smiles.
“Welcome, Juliette,” he spoke softly.
The woman on the screen nervously clutched an envelope in her hand as the elevator she rode in sped upward through the many floors of the hotel. She was priceless—a treasure. And the fact that she was finally under his roof, within his reach, sequestered from the others who sought her, was fair consolation for the trouble that he had gone to in order to get her there.
His smile broadened as he watched her step off the elevator to stare, wide-eyed, at the double doors that led to her suite beyond. He chuckled softly at her innocent indecision. She was feeling guilty, no doubt. Unworthy.
As if.
She had no idea how precious she was. Samael had been forced to send one of his own men into the fray of her pursuers at the Muir of Ord train station in order to extract the archess before one of the others could get to her. She’d become the unwitting prey in a feeding frenzy of sharks. They’d scented blood in the water.
Juliette Anderson was painfully vulnerable at this stage. She’d only recently discovered her ability to heal. Her other powers were bombarding her all at once now, one after another, leaving her breathless beneath their supernatural onslaught. Naturally, she had no idea what was happening to her or why.
She was confused and lost and alone.
Again Samael chuckled, the sound as dark and sexy as the distant rumble of a Harley’s engine. “Don’t worry, little one,” he said as he watched Juliette finally step through the double doors and disappear into the suite beyond. “I’m right here.” And I’m going to make it all better.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Juliette had been told that Mr. Lambent wished to meet her in the hotel’s restaurant for lunch at one on Monday. So she spent Sunday night researching online until she could no longer stay awake. Then she shut her laptop down and began going through the meager belongings in her carry-on bag.
She soon realized that she hadn’t been thinking clearly when she’d hurriedl
y packed for the train ride the day before. She had no idea what people wore to fancy business lunches, but she was guessing it wasn’t the same kind of clothing a PhD student wore on campus.
If she woke up early enough, she might get lucky and find a shop nearby that sold suits or business-casual clothing. Otherwise she was going to end up meeting the world’s most powerful media mogul in jeans and a bulky sweater.
Juliette was literally too exhausted to worry properly about it. She set her alarm for six a.m. and crawled into bed still dressed.
The next morning, after a hot shower and several hot cups of coffee, she was a little more clearheaded. She took the elevator to the concierge’s desk and asked for Lily. When the girl at the desk went in the back room to see whether Lily was working that day, an incredibly striking young man came out.
He was tall and slim, with dark brown hair and stark blue eyes. The name tag on his crisp, dark blue suit read JASON. He smiled warmly at Juliette and took her hand to introduce himself. Apparently Lily wasn’t working that morning, but Jason was the concierge; he clasped her hand between both of his, and assured her that if there was anything at all she needed, he would be able to get it for her.
Juliette was more than a little self-conscious about asking him about shopping. She didn’t want to admit that she didn’t have the right clothing to meet Samuel Lambent. But before she could explain why she was asking, Jason was smiling and waving her concerns away. “Not to worry,” he told her confidently. “I know exactly what it is you need.”
It turned out that he wasn’t exaggerating. He sent her into the hotel’s café, instructing her to get anything she wanted for breakfast, and assured her he would take care of everything.