Trouble and Treasure (#1, Trouble and Treasure Series) (9 page)

If this woman didn't irritate me so much,
I could sympathize with her situation; she'd had one hell of a
night. Yet for some reason this chick irritated me, so I pulled my
lips back, my teeth stuck together in the worst smile I could
muster.

It wasn't until I gunned the accelerator
down the immaculately graded stones, tires slipping as they tried
to get traction on the uneven surface, that I answered her. “You do
not want the list of people that are after you, honey,” I took
great pleasure in using that pet name because of the distinctly
irritated look she shot me. “First things first: you need to tell
me where the rest of the globes are.” I turned to her as I made it
to the end of the driveway and onto a large country
road.

She didn’t answer right away, she
hesitated. I sure as hell hoped it wasn't because she was caught
with a desire to open the door and roll out of the car, in her
never-ending attempts to flee me.

“
Amanda, I need as much information as you
can give me. Please don't tell me that those globes are back at
that house.” I doubted they were. If Maratova had found the globes
lined up neatly under her pillow, I would have heard about it by
now.

She bit her lip, and I only noticed
because I took the time to take my eyes off the road to glance her
way. “Amanda?”

“
Well,” she began in a small voice,
“Technically I... don't have them yet.”

My lips curled into a frown. “Sorry?” my
voice bottomed out low. This wasn't all some game, was it? Had
Amanda Stanton been lying when she'd told that auction room she had
the full set of the Stargazer Globes?

My throat became dry at the prospect of how
fucked up this could be.

“
I know where they are, I just don't have
them yet,” Amanda started to play with her fingernails, rubbing at
her hands nervously.

Before I could blow a gasket at the
prospect Amanda had been lying all along, and that the only
Stargazer Globe had already been sold off at auction, I took a
calming breath. “Where are they, Amanda?”

“
Oh,” she clamped her hands tightly on her
lap, “They are in his book. Well,” she moved her hands about as if
she was trying to extinguish a fire, “I don't mean to say that
they're in his book, like they are somehow squeezed between the
pages, because that would be silly.”

I didn't even bother to point out that
yes, obviously that would be silly, as silly as the current
conversation. All I cared about were those globes, not how
ridiculously cute Amanda's lips were as she caught them between her
teeth.

“
What book?” I asked after it became clear
Amanda was going to leave out the most important detail.

“
My great-uncle's book. The one on his desk
where I found the original globe, the one that had been in the
attic full of treasure.”

“
Sorry? The roomful of treasure? What are
you talking about?” my tone was terse; this was like getting
information out of a two-year-old.

“
I found the original globe, the one sold
at auction, in my great-uncle’s attic. While the rest of his house
was full of junk, well, the attic was full of treasure,” she said
matter-of-factly, “There were even gold statues. My great-aunt,
owing to the fact she is the executrix of the estate, dealt with
those. She left me that inane-looking globe and all of Great-Uncle
Stanton's papers. I suppose she thought they weren’t worth
anything.”

I snorted. It didn't surprise me that Imelda
Stanton wouldn’t have thought much of the dusty old Stargazer
Globe. She wasn't the kind of old dame to look beyond
appearances.

That Amanda had obviously thought there was
something to the Stargazers, or at least enough to put them up for
auction and find herself in the biggest trouble of her life, was
interesting.

That the globe sold at auction had been in a
room full of treasure, well that very was interesting indeed. Could
it be that old crazy Arthur Stanton had already brought all the
Stargazers together and found some of the treasure from them (it
wouldn’t be all, not unless he’d hollowed out a whole city
underneath his manor and had stacked it to the brim with the
world’s greatest antiquities)? I had no idea, but it was something
to think about. I realized as I let a genuine smile spread my lips
that any clues I was looking for might be in the book Amanda was
talking about.

I took a corner too hard, Amanda grabbing
hold of the armrest, her legs stiffening as she tried to keep
balance, her skirt riding up. I flicked my gaze down to her knee,
then up to her face. “Where is the book, Amanda?”

She caught me looking at her legs, and
sucked in her lips and narrowed her eyes. As if I was interested
anyway.

“
It's at the local library,” Amanda said
with a shrug.

Before I could worry that yet again the
next piece of the puzzle was back at old Stanton's house, it was as
if she had come at me with a right hook, right out of the blue.
“What?”

She offered an awkward smile around
gritted teeth. “Well, you see, I accidentally took it to the
library when I was returning a whole bunch of other books. They
called the other day to let me know, but I haven't had a chance to
go pick it up yet.”

I burst into laughter. Seriously? She had
taken what could be one of the most valuable books in human history
to the library by accident? I got the distinct impression that if
you were to loan the Mona Lisa to Amanda, with explicit
instructions to keep it safe, you would walk in the room five
minutes later and find it ripped on the floor, Amanda playing with
her fingers awkwardly by its side.

I grinned. Stupidity aside, this was
pretty good news. It was at the library; it wasn't back at the
house. Maratova wouldn't have had a chance to get his hands on it
yet. He probably didn't even know it existed. And unless Amanda had
written up on a message board with giant marker that she had to go
back to the library to pick up the book that had the locations of
the four Stargazer Globes in it, Maratova wasn’t going to find out
any time soon.

At that point I did something brash, because
fuck it if I wasn’t in a brash mood. I did a bootlegger turn on a
tiny narrow country road. The library was in the other
direction.

Amanda shrieked, sounding like some
stereotypical soapy heroine who’d stepped on a mouse. “What are you
doing?” She tried to keep herself steady as the car screeched
around in an arc, smoke curling up from the tires. Her legs splayed
out all over the place, her skirt rising up until it was several
inches above her knees, her hat tumbling right off her head as her
hair bunched up over her face.

“
I'm going to the library,” I said in the
coolest voice I could manage as I let go of the park brake and
gunned the accelerator to speed out of the dangerous turn. My car
scraped past a hedge, several leaves and twigs falling on Amanda
through the partially opened window.

The look on her face was worth it. I could
bet my own expression wasn’t anything but cool and calm as I
straightened up the vehicle and continued down the road at a
cracking pace.

She sat there with her mouth open, trying
to rearrange her skirt as she picked the twigs and leaves from her
hair and threw them out the window. “You mad bastard.” She grabbed
the hat and shoved it on her head.

I offered a sweet smile in return. One
hand on the steering wheel, one hand still resting on the
gearstick, and with no other vehicles in sight, I turned to her.
With a serious expression I tilted my head to the side. “Amanda
Stanton, I need you to tell me what is in that book.”

She looked at me, mouth wide open, brow
pressed with amazement at my antics. “Are you out of your
mind?”

I shrugged. If doing a bootlegger turn on a
narrow country lane in an effort to get to the library as quickly
as I could in order to get a book that told me the location to some
of the greatest treasure maps on earth was mad, then yes, I was
mad.

She continued to stare at me, her mouth
still wide, wide open. “I don't have my library card on me,” she
pointed out primly.

I snapped my head to the side and gave a
short, sharp laugh. “I hate to point this out, sweetie, but you own
the book.”

“
They don't know me, they're going to need
some ID to ensure that I am who I say I am.”

I didn't bother answering, because I
couldn't think of a statement that could show her how damn stupid
she was. So I shook my head, ran a hand over the sharp stubble
collecting on my chin, and hoped like hell I wouldn't have much
more to do with this woman.

After a while a thick silence descended over
us. Amanda sat tensely, her hands pressed over the hem of her
skirt, her ankles locked neatly, her head turned towards the
window, the massive brim of her hat hiding her face. For my part, I
drove and thought about how much shit I was in.

Sebastian Shaw

We made it to the library in good time,
perhaps too good, as when Amanda pulled herself out of the
passenger seat, she had to steady herself, one hand clutching the
roof. She also gave me a mutinous stare. I cracked a grin. Though I
thought there was little chance of finding Maratova tucked up in
the library, possibly in the kiddies’ section with his men around
him as he taught them to read from a picture book, I was still
careful. I walked in first and told Amanda in no uncertain terms to
keep her face hidden. Even cramming her hat further onto her head
when I didn't think it was down far enough. Ha, you should have
seen the look she gave me at that.

The library was small, unsurprisingly,
considering the tiny size of the town. Along the main road I
counted all of one coffee shop and several ridiculously expensive
boutique stores that sold everything from thousand-pound scarves to
those trinkets women seem to have everywhere once they pass the age
of 40. There was also a police station. Though I thought the size
of the town could hardly justify one, I had to remind myself it
wasn’t population pressure that kept the boys in blue close at
hand, it was relative wealth. A single well-equipped and
well-trained team could easily blast their way through the country
estates around these parts and retire after one night. While I'd
taken perverse pleasure in teasing Amanda, and while I may have
overstated a few things, I hadn’t been lying about Maratova. If the
girl was dumb enough to go to the police, she would end up in his
hands by the afternoon.

The library was a small old building, with a
stand of birch trees lined up behind it, their leaves brushing
against the sandstone white-washed walls.

I strode ahead, opening the door briskly,
the handle giving a pleasant crunch as I yanked on it. I heard
Amanda mumble behind me; it seemed that woman mumbled at
everything.

I strode up to the counter, sure to let my
most charming of smiles widen the corners of my lips as I nodded at
the middle-aged woman behind the desk. The effect was always the
same: the lady’s cheeks flushed, she blinked, then she looked to
the side, possibly to check it was indeed her I was smiling at. By
the time I made it to the counter, placing a hand neatly on the
clean bench top, she obviously had no illusion as to who had caught
my attention, and dammit if she didn’t blush that bit harder.

“
Hello, ma'am.” I kept that smile on my
face and kept my hand flat on the bench top, the hint of my
expensive gold watch peeking out from my expensive suit
jacket.

The lady pushed her glasses up her nose
with her thumb, one corner of her mouth curling, one cheek
dimpling. “How can I help you, sir?”

“
Well, I'm here to pick up a book.” I
nodded gently.

Instead of the woman saying that this was a
public library and everyone was here to pick up a book, so there
was no need to state the bloody obvious, she smiled again, a second
dimple pushing in at the other cheek.

“
Sir, what book would that be?”

Amanda gave a strangled cough, pushed past
me, whipped off her hat, and shook her head. “Hi, I'm not sure if
you remember me, but you called me the other day to say that I had
accidentally brought in one of my own books when I was returning my
library books. My name is—”

I coughed loudly, slapping Amanda on her
shoulder. She bounced forward, mumbling a terse swear word.

“
It's a brown leather-bound book,” I smiled
again, and I tried to make it as dazzling as I could, “You can't
miss it.”

The woman nodded, smiling at me. She wasn't
paying any attention to Amanda at all. She then disappeared to a
side room, telling us she would return with it in a moment.

As soon as she was gone, I turned to
Amanda, my teeth set hard. “Put your fucking hat back on and leave
this to me like we agreed.”

If I’
d thought she'd been mutinous before, I was wrong. Her
eyebrows descended all the way down to her eyes, her lips drawing
in so much I could only see a hint of pink flesh as she sucked them
into her mouth. Her chin dimpled and hardened as if she’d turned to
bloody stone.

An old woman in pearls and silk walked
past, a book in her hand, which she clearly hadn’t checked through.
I turned to her, offered her one of my smiles, and patted Amanda
hard on the back to ensure my flighty charge's horrible expression
didn't kill the old dame.