Victoria Nelson - Blood Lines Part 13

"The papers your cousin came over to the museum for." Dr. Shane shook her head at his blank expression. "You called her yesterday, asked her to check for them at the museum after work...?"

All at once, Celluci understood. "Oh, that cousin. Those papers." He wondered if Vicki had left him in the dark on purpose or if it just hadn't occurred to her to fill him in on their new relationship. "They turned up this afternoon at the office. I guess I should've called to let you know." He tried a charming smile and made a mental note to take care of Vicki later. "Idid call to ask you to dinner."

"So you did."

She didn't appear particularly charmed, but neither did she appear completely immune.

Celluci was having a little trouble deciding how to approach the evening. Rachel Shane could have information that would help them find and capture the mummy, which meant he'd have to question her and, to complicate matters, he couldn't question her directly or she'd want to know why. He couldn't tell her why.

"Look, this is where things stand: the mummy that killed Dr. Rax is now rampaging through the city and we need your knowledge to catch it. "

"And where did this mummy come from?"

"The sarcophagus in your workroom. "

"But I told you that was empty. "

"The mummy messed with your mind. " "Excuse me, waiter, could you call 911? I'm having dinner with a crazy man. "

No. Telling her would merely cut off the only source of information they had. A scientist trained to pull knowledge out of bits of old bone and pottery simply wouldn't believe that a few of those old bones got up and committed murder on the say-so of a homicide detective, a smart-mouthed PI, and a... a romance writer. She'd need proof and he simply didn't have any.

Telling her would also ensure that he'd never see her again, but with four people dead what she thought of him personally became significantly less important.

When it came right down to it, he needed the information and he'd have to use her interest in him-or, more exactly, her perception of his interest in her-to get it. He'd once watched Vicki pump a man dry by spending two hours batting her eyelashes and interjecting a breathless "Oh really?" into every pause in the conversation. He wouldn't have to sink that low, but even so, Rachel Shane deserved better. G.o.d willing, he'd get a chance to make it up to her another time.

As dinner progressed, he had no trouble getting her to talk about herself and her work. The police had long since learned to exploit the human fondness for self-exposure and an amazing number of crimes were solved every year when the perpetrator just couldn't keep quiet any longer and told all. Nor was it difficult to steer the conversation sideways into ancient Egypt.

"I have the feeling," she said as the waiter set desert and coffee on the table, "that I should only have given you my name, rank, and serial number. I haven't been so thoroughly interrogated since I defended my thesis."

Celluci pushed the curl of hair back off his forehead and searched for something to say. He had, perhaps, been probing a little deeply. And he had, perhaps, not been as subtle as he could have been.

The desire to be honest kept fighting with the need to be devious. "It's just that it's a relief not to be talking about police work," he told her at last.

A chestnut brow rose. "Now, why don't I believe that," she mused, stirring cream into her coffee.

"You're trying to find something out, something important to you." Lifting her chin, she looked him squarely in the eye. "You'd find out a lot faster, if you'd come right out and asked me. And then you wouldn't have wasted an evening."

"I don't consider the evening to be a waste," he protested.

"Ah. Then you found out what you needed to know."

"d.a.m.nit, Vicki, don't twist my words!"

Both brows rose, their movement cutting the silence to shreds. "Vicki?"

He did say Vicki. Oh, s.h.i.t. "She's an old colleague. We argue a lot. It just seems natural that a protest like that would have her name attached."

The brows remained up.

Celluci sighed and spread his hands in surrender. "Rachel, I'm sorry. You were right, I did need information, but I can't tell you why." "Why not?" The brows were down, but the tone was decidedly cool.

"It would put you in too much danger." He waited for her protest, and when it didn't come he realized he was waiting for Vicki's protest.

"Does this have anything to do with Dr. Rax's death?"

"Only indirectly."

"I thought you were taken off the case."

He shrugged. Anything he said at this point could give her ideas and telling her about hiring Vicki-not to mention Vicki's supernatural sidekick-would only complicate things further.

"You know I'll help in any way I can."

Most of the people Celluci met divided the man and the cop into two very neat and separate packages.

Certain subtle differences in tone and bearing indicated Rachel Shane had just closed the first package and opened the second.

She kept him in police officer mode for the rest of the evening, and when he dropped her off at her condo he had to admit that, although he felt like he'd just finished Archaeology 101, as far as dates went, it hadn't been exactly a success. She obviously had no intention of inviting him in.

"Thank you for dinner, Mike."

"You're welcome. Can I call you again?"

"Well, I tell you what." She looked up at him, her expression speculative. "You decide you want to see me and not the a.s.sistant Curator of the Royal Ontario Museum's Department of Egyptologyand you dump the hidden agendas and I'll think about it." Tossing a half smile back over her shoulder, she went into the building.

Celluci shook his head and slid back into his car. In a number of ways Rachel reminded him of Vicki.

Only not quite so... so...

"So Vicki," he decided at last, pulling out of the driveway and turning east toward Huron Street without really thinking. It wasn't until he was searching for a parking s.p.a.ce, which was, as usual, in short supply around Vicki's apartment, that he wondered what the h.e.l.l he was doing.

He drove twice more around the block before a s.p.a.ce opened up and he decided he didn't need an excuse for being here; he didn't even particularly need a reason.

When Vicki heard the key in the lock, she knew it had to be Celluci and, for one brief moment, she entertained two completely opposing reactions. By the time he got the door open, she'd managed to force order on the mental chaos and was ready for him.

If he thinks he's going to get sympathy after Dr. Shane dumped him early, he can think again.

"What the h.e.l.l are you doing here?" "Why?" He threw his jacket over the bra.s.s hook in the hall. "Are you expecting Fitzroy?"

"What's it toyou ?" She pushed up her gla.s.ses and rubbed at her eyes. "As a matter of fact, I'm not. He's writing tonight."

"Good for him. How long has this coffee been sitting here?"

"About an hour." Settling her gla.s.ses back on her nose, she watched him fill a mug and rummage in the fridge for cream. He seemed, well, if she had to put a name to it, she'd say melancholy came closest.

Christ, maybe Dr. Shane broke his heart . Her own heart gave a curious twist. She ignored it. "So.

How went the date?"

He took a swallow of coffee. Two strides brought him across the tiny kitchen and up against the back of Vicki's chair. "It went. What's with all the books?"

"Research. Believe it or not, a history degree is appallingly short on coverage of ancient Egypt."

Behind her, Celluci snorted. "You're not going to find much help from historians."

Vicki tilted her head back and smiled smugly up at him. "That's why I'm researching myths and legends.

So, uh, Dr. Shane didn't respond to the celebrated Celluci charm? Guaranteed to get a confession at fifty paces?"

He pushed her head forward, put down the coffee cup, and dug his fingers into her shoulders. "I didn't turn it on."

She sucked in a sudden breath; part pain, part pleasure. "Why not?"This is kind of like picking a scab , she decided.Once you get started, it's hard to stop .

"Because she deserved better. Bad enough I spent the evening under false pretenses. I had no intention of compounding it. Christ, you're tense."

"It's not tension, it's muscle tone. What do you mean, she deserved better? You've got a lot of faults, Celluci, but I never thought false modesty was-ouch-one of them."

"She deserved honesty. She deserved to have me thinking of her, not of how much she could tell me."

Well, as my mother always says, if you don't want to know, don't ask. "You liked her."

"Don't be an a.s.s, Vicki. I wouldn't have asked her out to dinner if I didn't like her-I could have picked her brains in her office a h.e.l.l of a lot more cheaply. I find her attractive, intelligent, self-confident..."

Of course, the trouble with picking scabs is when you get deep enough they start to bleed.

"... and, as a result, I found I spent most of the evening thinking about you." He gave her shoulders a final dig, picked up his coffee, and went into the living room.

Vicki opened her mouth, closed it, and tried to sort out some kind of response. From the beginning, they'd never talked about their relationship; they'd accepted it; they'd left it alone. When they got back together last spring, it had been under those same parameters.That son of a b.i.t.c.h is changing the rules ... But beneath the protest she recognized a surge of relief.He spent most of the evening thinkingabout me . And beneath the relief, a hint of panic.Now what ?

He was waiting for her to say something but she didn't know what to say.Oh, G.o.d, please, send a distraction !

The knock on the door jerked her around so fast her gla.s.ses slid down her nose. "Come in."

"I asked for a distraction, not a disaster," she muttered a moment later.

Celluci snapped the recliner forward. "I thought you were supposed to be writing tonight," he growled, standing and scowling down the hall.

Henry smiled, deliberately provoking. He had known Celluci was in the apartment before he knocked; he could hear his voice, his movements, his heartbeat. But the mortal had the days; he would not have the darkness as well. "I was writing. I finished."

"Another book?" The word book came out as if it were something that turned up on the soles of shoes after a brisk walk through a barnyard.

"No." He hung his trench coat up beside Celluci's jacket. "But I finished the work I intended to do tonight."

"Must be nice as it isn't quite midnight. Still, it's not like it's real work."

"Well, I'm sure it's not as strenuous as taking someone out to dinner, then maintaining the illusion that you're interested in her when you're really only interested in what she knows."

Celluci shot a furious look at Vicki, who winced and said hurriedly, "Low blow, Henry. Mike had to do that, he didn't want to."

Henry moved into the kitchen, which put the two men, although in separate rooms, less than ten feet apart with Vicki, still sitting at the table, squarely between them. He inclined his head graciously. "You're quite right. It was a low blow. And I apologize."

"The f.u.c.k you do."

"Are you calling me a liar?" Henry's voice had gone deceptively soft; the voice of a man who had been raised to command, the voice of a man with centuries of experience behind him.

Celluci couldn't help but respond. His anger didn't have a snowflake's chance in h.e.l.l of making an impression against the other man and he knew it. "No," he forced the words out through clenched teeth, "I'm not calling you a liar."

Vicki looked from one to the other and had a strong desire to go out for pizza. The currents running between the two were so strong that when the phone rang she felt she had to fight against their pull to answer it.

"Hi, honey. It's after eleven and the rates are down so I thought I'd give you a call before I turned in."

Just what the evening needed. "Bad timing, Mom." "Why? What's wrong?"

"I've, uh, got company."

"Oh." While not exactly disapproving, the two letters carried a disproportionate amount of conversational weight. "Michael or Henry, dear?"

"Uh..." Vicki knew the moment she paused that it was a mistake. Her mother excelled at reading silence.

"Bothof them?"

"Trust me, Mom, it wasn't my idea." She frowned. "Are you laughing?"

"I wouldn't think of it."

"Youare laughing."

"I'll call you tomorrow, dear. I can't wait to hear how this comes out."

"Mother, don't hang..." Vicki glared at the receiver, then slammed it back down onto the phone. "Well, I hope you're happy." She shot up out of the chair and kicked it back out of her way. "I'm going to be hearing about this for the rest of my life." Glaring from Celluci to Henry and back, she raised her voice an octave. "'Don't say I didn't warn you, dear. Well, what do you expect when you're seeing two young men... I'll tell you what I expect, I expect you both to act like intelligent humans beings and not like two dogs squabbling over a bone. I can't see any reason why all three of us can't get along!"

"You can't?" Henry asked, mildly incredulous.

Vicki, recognizing sarcasm, turned on him and snapped, "Shut up, Henry!"

"She always was a lousy liar," Celluci muttered.

"And you can shut up, too!" She took a deep breath and shoved her gla.s.ses up her nose. "Now then, seeing as we're all here together, I think we should be discussing the case. Do either of you have any problems with that?"

Celluci snorted. "I wouldn't dare."

Henry spread his hands, his meaning plain.

They moved into the living room, all three of them aware this was only a postponement. That was fine with Vicki; if they had things to work out between them, they could do it without her in the line of fire.

"... so there's no obvious reason why it murdered Trembley and her partner but only mind-wiped the people at the museum." Celluci took another swallow of coffee, grimaced at the taste, and continued.