Assassin's Honor (5 page)

           
Arrogant bastard.
He was laughing at her. "Well, I don't have what you're looking for."

           
"I see."

           
He narrowed his gaze to study her for a long moment. She didn't like the way his intense scrutiny seemed to bare her soul to him. It disturbed her. He walked past her to study the artifacts shelved on the wall behind her father's desk. So much for making him think she was a threat. But with his back turned, she'd be stupid not to make a run for it.

           
Emma leaped toward the door. It slammed closed before she'd gone two steps. Still racing forward, she tugged on the doorknob, desperate to escape. The door didn't budge. Oh God, if he could make knives stick in the walls, close doors, and keep them shut, what else was he capable of? A sinking feeling gnawed at the pit of her stomach. He'd managed to squeeze her wrist without touching her--could he choke her to death, too?

           
Panic set in. Whirling around, she realized she had nowhere to run. Her back flat against the door, she rebelliously met his gaze as he moved toward her. Large hands braced on either side of her, the man pinned her between
himself
and the door. She drew a quick hiss of air into her lungs.

           
Dark blue eyes narrowed as his gaze slowly dropped to her mouth. It lingered there for a breathtaking moment. A slight shudder rippled through her as his gaze slid downward in open appreciation. She didn't know what was worse, his blatant interest in her physical attributes or the pleasure his interest gave her.

           
God in heaven.
Had she totally lost her mind? The man had broken into her home, practically threatened her with bodily harm. There her thoughts stumbled. Well, he hadn't actually threatened her. All he'd done so far was intimidate her. Emma flinched as he exhaled a harsh breath.

           
"You really don't know where it is, do you." Not a question, but a resigned statement. "Show me the coin."

           
"I'm not showing you anything," she snapped.
"Except the door."

           
If she had to die, then she damn well wouldn't make it easy for him. His amusement returned as he leaned into her more. Less than an inch separated their bodies now. She caught a whiff of spice wafting off him as his warm breath caressed her ear. Damn. She was an idiot to even think the guy smelled heavenly.

           
"Aren't you the least bit curious?" His whisper tickled the side of her neck with heat. She swallowed hard at the way her body reacted to him.

           
"Curious about what?
How you got into my home? Why you're threatening me? Whether you're going to kill me?" At her words, he jerked back from her, his features hard as an ice sculpture.

           
"If I wanted to kill you, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Now show me the coin."

           
Something in his voice warned her to do as he said. She sidled past him, noting the small earpiece and wire that disappeared beneath his clothing. Her heart sank. He wasn't alone. He'd brought backup.

           
Shaking with fear, she leaned over the desk and pushed the papers aside, taking care not to expose the cipher. Her fingers never even came close to the coin before it flew past her into his hand. God, how in the hell did he do that?

           
Transfixed by his ability, Emma stared at him in awe and terror. She'd heard of telekinesis, but never seen it in action. And unless he was a magician, she couldn't come up with any other explanation. He studied the antiquity for a long moment then sent her a grim look.

           
"Where did you get this?"

           
"Charlie Russwin. I'm not sure where he found it," she answered automatically.

           
"This one is different from the other one," he murmured as he looked at the coin again. "The Sicari emblem isn't as clearly defined."

           
Floored by his statement, she stared at him with her mouth open for several seconds. How did he know about the other--? Cairo. He was the man she'd seen in the shadows at the police station. She should have realized it sooner. It was why he'd seemed so familiar and yet unrecognizable. Her gaze narrowed as she watched him examine the coin.

           
"You were at the police station." At the quiet accusation, he slowly raised his head to look at her. His expression revealed nothing, but she thought she saw a glint of admiration in his dark gaze.

           
"Yes."

           
His brevity annoyed her.

           
"That's all you have to say?"

           
"For the moment."

           
There it was again, that amusement of his. She wanted to punch him. Who was this guy? There weren't many people who knew about the Sicari Order, even among academicians. He extended his hand to return the coin to her. She hesitated. What kind of thief would give it back as if they'd been discussing work?

           
His amusement deepened as his dark eyes dared her to take it from him. Infuriated by the challenge in his glittering gaze, she snatched the bronze currency from his grasp. The moment she came into solid contact with the coin and his fingers, a strong charge of electricity charged through her. The images came fast and furious. Dark, mysterious, and potent, they held her powerless.

           
Suddenly, death filled Emma's mind with its foul stench.
Dark, torturous, and bloody.
The Roman soldier was dying. He laid the coin in the palm of a young man's hand and wrapped the fingers around the coin. The new owner lifted a young boy up onto a horse then gave the child the coin, pointing to the words on its surface.

           
As if someone had spun her around until she was dizzy, the images collapsed in on one another until a clear picture came into focus. The hooded figure, his cloak flowing out behind him, strode through a massive cathedral. Deadly purpose filled the assassin's stride, the coin in his pocket a family talisman. He vanished in the shifting images until a woman's face flashed before her.

           
Death had frozen the woman's pain on her face. Then with the speed of a freight train, the vision threw her forward. The stranger stood over a dead man, his sword dark in the moonlight. Blood covered his hands and she wanted to scream at the sight of it. Rage, pain, grief, love, and something much darker flowed through the coin and his fingers and into her mind. The overwhelming power of it made the room spin as she fought to remain upright.

           
Desperate to break the connection and find sanctuary from the deluge of emotions, she jerked her hand free of his. The Sicari coin fell to the floor, where it bounced several times with a repetitive clang until it went silent.

           
The man reached for Emma, but she staggered away with a cry that stopped him. Falling to her knees, she bent over to touch the floor and prayed for the nausea to pass. Once in a while, she'd pick up images from another individual when they'd hand her an artifact.
Never anything like this.
The intensity of the graphic scenes and the emotions she'd felt had been overwhelming.

           
"Let me help you."

           
His words struck her as funny. He'd broken into her home, demanded she hand over an object she didn't have, and now he wanted to help her? It was his fault she felt so crappy. She choked out a bitter laugh.

           
"No . . . thank you. I think you've done . . . quite enough for the moment."

           
"You're a telepath." Crouching beside her, he studied her with thoughtful deliberation. Like Lake Michigan during a storm, the deep blue of his eyes echoed with a mysterious, dark danger. And he was dangerous. He'd killed before. She'd seen the blood on his hands. It chilled her. No, it was the coin. Everything she'd seen had come from the coin. None of what she'd seen was related to the stranger. Her breathing hitched at the memory of those last images. She had never been a good liar.

           
"If you mean . . . I can hear what people . . . are thinking. No," Emma muttered as her equilibrium began to right itself. She uncurled from a fetal posture and eased herself up into a sitting position. "When I touch inanimate objects--antiquities, I see images, flashes of past events."

           
"Does it always make you this ill?"

           
"No." She pulled in a deep breath. "But then it's unusual for me to see things when I touch someone."

           
Unusual?
This was the first time she'd ever had a physical reaction this strong--this overwhelming--when taking an artifact from someone else. Occasionally, she'd glimpse some small tidbit of a colleague's past when objects had changed hands. But even then, her physical reaction had been little more that a bite of static electricity. Nothing so intense it would make her sick to her stomach. Even then, all she'd ever experienced was an awareness of incidents, not images. And most definitely not images like the ones she'd seen with this man. She shuddered. He must have served as a conductor of sorts.

           
"But you did see something when I handed you the coin."

           
The flat, emotionless statement made her heart pound as fear pumped blood through her veins at an accelerated rate.

           
"Everything was pretty much a blur," she lied as her gaze slid away from his. Strong fingers grasped her chin, and she stiffened, waiting for the electric shock and the visions to happen again. But they didn't. She closed her eyes in a brief prayer of gratitude. He'd simply been a conductor for the coin, which explained why some of what she'd seen had been associated with him.

           
"I seem to recall advising you not to lie unless you do it well."

           
A hint of irony touched his lips as he effortlessly pulled her to her feet. Large hands cradled her waist as he steadied her. The touch made her heart skip a beat as a jolt of awareness slid through her veins. Primal and intense, the sensation swept through her like a wave crashing against a rocky coastline. Suddenly realizing she hadn't contradicted him, she swallowed hard.

           
"No.
Really.
Everything was jumbled together. Most of it didn't even make sense."

           
Releasing her, he folded his arms across his chest to study her with a watchful gaze. His features suddenly brought to mind the bust of Ptolemy they'd uncovered at the dig last year. The arrogance and unrelenting expression on his face only emphasized his likeness to the ancient Pharaoh.

           
"Most of it?"
His eyebrow arched with wry skepticism. "What did make sense to you?" That hadn't been a question. More like a command. If she obeyed, he might let her live.

Chapter 3

           
ARES knew he intimidated her. The fear flashing in those wide hazel eyes simply confirmed the knowledge. Yet she remained defiant. He liked that about her. Even that day in the Cairo police station he'd admired her strength and courage.

           
She'd been even more frightened then.
Frightened and vulnerable.
It had been that vulnerability that had made him reach out to comfort her when he shouldn't have. But he'd been intrigued by Emma Zale then just as much as he was now. And that wasn't good--especially when she was so easy on the eyes.

           
Her light brown hair barely touched her shoulders, and there was just a trace of red running through it. The color suited the fire in her.
A flash of spirit that still burned in those beautiful eyes.
Long, dark eyelashes almost brushed her cheeks as she averted her gaze in an attempt to hide her rebellious expression.

           
Then there were her curves. She'd lost some weight since that day in the Cairo police station, but she was still full and lush in all the right places. His fingers bit into his biceps. Christus, he needed to focus on why he was here, not Emma's softly rounded body.

           
But it was difficult to ignore the way her cardigan caressed amply rounded breasts or how her jeans hugged her voluptuous hips. A man could get lost in her body if he played his cards right. He grimaced at how easily she could distract him. She tilted her chin up and met his gaze.

           
"You've killed before," she said softly.

           
He went rigid.
Merda.
What else had she seen? Tension stretched the muscles in his jaw so tight his whole face ached. God help him, and her, if she knew too much. If the Praetorians suspected for one moment--he dismissed the thought. She flinched as he narrowed his gaze at her.