A.K.A. Goddess (26 page)

“Another hour,” Lex promises, finding me on the terrace of our oil-mogul host’s penthouse suite. “Then we’ll go.”

He and I have already argued about fossil fuels tonight. We’ve also argued about whether me getting into our host’s face about environmentally safe alternatives will do any good. Lex has asked me to play nice. Stupidly I’ve agreed.

So tonight I’m a hypocrite, a fake face among fake faces.

And speaking of fake….

“I had a painful chat with Phil’s date,” I say.

Lex is nothing if not chivalrous. “She’s not so bad.”

“How can you tell? Her hair isn’t really blond, her eyes aren’t really purple, and she’s got caps on her teeth. Her breasts, her butt, her nose…someday that poor woman’s going to wake up and wonder why she thought bagging a Stuart was important enough to go all, well, Frankenstupid for him.”

“He didn’t hold a gun to her head.” Lex seems distracted.

“At least they match. Why didn’t you tell me about Phil?”

He turns away from the skyline, to me. “What about Phil?”

He doesn’t know? “Taffy said he got a certain, ahem, surgical enhancement himself. She’s pretty happy with it.”

Lex blinks, not getting it. He can be so cute, sometimes. I silently count. I’m to four when his eyes widen. “No!”

“Yep. He super-sized. Family resemblance between you two never was strong.” I have had no cause for complaint.

“I mean—no.” He recoils. “Phil wouldn’t do that.”

“We’re both talking about your cousin, right?”

“But that’s mutilation.”

Talk about your double standards. “Oh, so when Taffy does it, it’s to be expected, but when Phil does it—”

“I’ve got to talk to him.” Only then do I realize how much fury is simmering beneath Lex’s clenched jaw. “I’ll ask Dad to see you home.”

“First? I can get home on my own. Don’t you dare inflict your father on me. And second, what’s wrong?”

“Just because you’ve started taking martial arts classes doesn’t make you Wonder Woman. How about my friend David?”

“Lex.” I narrow my gaze at him. “This is going to sound perverted but, what’s Phil’s penis have to do with you?”

“Stuarts don’t self-mutilate. I’ll get David.”

“No. You won’t. I’m out of here.”

“Maggi,” he protests—but only once. Before I’ve even managed my dramatic exit, he’s gone off after his cousin.

Is it any wonder I’m wary of marrying into this family?

T he party was formal.

“This is incredible,” said my cousin Lil, awed, as she pulled to a stop in front of the mansion where the party was being held. She’d driven across southern England to pick up Rhys, me and my new gown at the train station.

That, and to do her part for the Melusine Chalice.

Thanks to the Chunnel, we arrived from Paris almost as quickly as she made it from the Salisbury Plains.

“It’s certainly excessive,” said Rhys, from where he’d managed to fold himself into the Ford Fiesta’s back seat.

The FitzGeoffrey estate looked like someplace the royal family would stay. Easily four stories high, it rose in grand, column-fronted majesty before arching into two separate wings ending in turrets to either side. The paved drive, wider than most two-lane roads, circled around a tiered fountain. And down the landscaped hill, near what looked like a six-car garage, a series of limousines and BMWs and Aston-Martins congregated, along with drivers, waiting for partygoers to summon them.

Lil’s snub-nosed Ford, a cross between hatchback and wagon, belonged at this mansion even less than I did.

“I think he’s trying to intimidate me,” I murmured, turning my invitation over and over in my gloved hands.

We took in the floodlights, and the colonnade, and more glittering beveled glass—every window lit—than seemed possible.

“I think he’s succeeding,” said Lil. “Uh-oh!”

The “uh-oh” came as a large man, dressed in black, crossed to our car. He looked like a bouncer.

“They let us in the gate, didn’t they?” I assured her.

“I wish you weren’t doing this,” said Rhys, behind me.

Lil turned in her seat. “You don’t like Satan, either?”

Rhys said, “Excuse me?”

By then the bouncer was tapping on my window. I cranked it down. He asked, “Do you have an invitation, miss?”

I handed it to him.

“We’ll go wait with the other drivers,” said Lil. “We’re only a phone call away. If you need anything…”

“May I see some identification, please?” How times have changed. I handed the guard my International Driver’s Permit.

“I won’t need anything except a ride home.” Tonight, home would be the cottage Lilith shared with her husband and three children. “But thank you.”

My door opened, compliments of big guy. “Everything seems in order, Miss Sanger. Please enjoy your evening.”

“I need to fluff you,” Lil called, getting out.

Rhys touched my bare shoulder, from behind. “Maggi…”

“I know. You wish I weren’t doing this.”

“Actually, I was going to say he won’t be able to resist you. But I wonder…can you resist him?”

“After what he’s done?” I hesitated. “I sure hope so.”

Then I put my gloved hand in the bouncer’s and stood.

Lilith moved around me, making sure my skirts fell properly and my headdress wasn’t crooked, just as I had for her at her wedding five years ago. But what I wore was nothing like her wedding dress. It had sleek, slim lines and showed a lot of skin. What material it possessed was a vibrant mixture of heraldic blues, whites and silver, reminiscent of the Middle Ages, but the tiny chain straps, plunging neckline, and plungier back were far from medieval. The skirt split up the front and back, hinting at long lengths of my high-booted legs, shadowed behind a material that resembled fine chain…or, if you thought about it, scales.

An understated headdress duplicated the effect with silver chain, draped over my upbraided hair like a royal elf’s. Around my neck, in my ears, and on one of my upper arms, I wore heavy silver cuffs that each resolved itself into an ouroborous—a snake eating its tail, symbol of life, death and rebirth.

The whole outfit was on loan from Sergio’s granddaughter, who worked at the Galleries LaFayette. If this one ended up getting rained on, spilled on, or, say, run over by a Metro train, it would cost me about what I’d paid for my first car—but it was worth that risk.

Whether or not anybody but me recognized it, I was going in as a priestess of Melusine. I was going for our grail.

Lil drew back and nodded. She’s a year older and looks nothing like me—shorter, with short blond hair and round, pink cheeks. I was so glad she was here. Lil and I were like sisters.

“Sic ’em, love,” she said.

And with a deep breath—though not too deep, considering the gown—I turned and mounted the twenty-something stone steps that led up to the main verandah that opened into the high, front foyer of the FitzGeoffrey mansion.

I’d attended similar parties—silent servants, men in tuxedoes, women draped in jewels, and a live orchestra in the gallery. Very likely there were royals in attendance, or not-so-distant relations, and certainly members of parliament. I wouldn’t be surprised to run into the prime minister.

But I didn’t expect to stroll right past old Mr. Stuart.

If he recognized me—and I suspected the geezer was sharp enough—Mr. Stuart did not say so. I felt coiling unease, to hear his voice and see him holding forth with two men who looked like politicians. What in the world was Deuce doing here?

That’s the name he went by, being Alexander Rothschild Stuart II. Classier than “Junior,” you know. I’d always felt gratitude to the man’s wife that Lex had never become a Trey.

Making a mental note about where Deuce was and whom he was with, I accepted a glass of champagne off a tray and continued farther into the house, toward the back gallery with its refined music. I sensed eyes on me, but refused to turn and look.

That’s when I heard Phil, though not from where I’d sensed my hidden watchers. I’d recognize his obnoxious laugh anywhere. Sure enough, when I rounded a corner into the high-ceilinged, dark-paneled gallery, there he stood with his second wife, holding another man’s arm with the intensity of his latest joke.

His wife, Tawny’s, bored gaze found me. Her eyebrows arched, but she did not come to say hello. We knew each other from the occasional family function, and I’d attended her wedding as Lex’s date, but we were not close.

Again I felt eyes on me. I scanned dancing couples and clusters of conversation at the edges of the room. Some men’s gazes were checking me out. Others weren’t so admiring.

Something about one watcher’s eyes bothered me. I couldn’t place the color from across the room, and I was sure I hadn’t met this balding bear of a man, and yet his eyes, almond shaped like a bull terrier’s….

It clicked.

It was one of the men from Fontevrault. He’d been wearing a ski mask then, but I knew those eyes. And if one pair of the eyes I felt watching me were his…

What had I just walked into?

A familiar presence stepped close enough to warm my back, leaned over my shoulder, and a familiar voice murmured in my ear, “Welcome to the shark tank, chum.”

I was so stunned to be surrounded by Comitatus that I didn’t speak. Lex aimed a bitter air kiss toward my cheek, palmed my shoulder and turned me firmly toward the dance floor.

For a moment I went with that. Speaking took thought; dancing with Lex could be done on instinct. Even if he was not the man I’d thought, our bodies had a powerful acquaintance.

And he did look unfairly good in his tall, debonair, literally born-to-wear-a-tuxedo way.

But not as good as I looked.

As we stepped into the Gershwin piece and moments passed without assassination attempts, I noticed that Lex’s fingers, leading me, felt unusually hard against my spine. He gripped my gloved hand surprisingly tightly. His usually cool gaze…

Was icy.

True, it’s hard to tell with someone as composed as him. But was that anger I saw in his hazel eyes? His cheek and jaw were clenched. And his possessive grip—

With silk gloves on, it took no effort at all to slide my hand from his. “What have you done?”

“Me?” He reached to reclaim my escaped hand, but I drew it back and stopped dancing.

“Play nice, or I’m out of here,” I warned.

“And that would be a first.” He said that as if this had anything to do with our previous breakups.

We glared at each other. No matter why he might be angry, I wasn’t backing down. Not even if it brought certain hench-thugs down on me. Not this time. Not with secret-society guy.

Lex gave in first, with a slow exhale that eased the worst of the ire from his gaze. He held out his hand in request, instead of demand—still tight-jawed, but compromising. Barely.

I let him have my hand, and we began to dance a little less like wrestlers and a little more like, well, ex-lovers. Not great progress, but a marginal improvement.

“What the hell have you done?” I repeated beneath my breath, letting him lead me through both the music and the posh handful of dancers. I knew better than to say the C-word around here; there’s a reason secret societies don’t have company picnics or matching caps. “You brought me behind enemy lines?”

“No,” Lex murmured. He wasn’t one to feign innocence, but neither did he look at all guilty. “I sent you an invitation behind enemy lines. You came of your own free will.”

Careful not to glance toward the watcher from Fontevrault, I asked, “So is this a test or a trap?”

“That might depend on what happens upstairs.”

“You have got to be joking.”

His stiff posture and scornful silence reminded me of what we both knew. Lex Stuart was no comedian.

It made pretty good blackmail. I felt sick, to think of what I might lose—information, assistance, my best chance to retrieve the Melusine Chalice. But there must be other options.

“Bite me.” I turned, and I left. Began to leave.

He shadowed me, leaning dangerously close to murmur, “So you think all these bad guys will allow you to just walk out?”

“You aren’t fooling me,” I whispered back. I even sent a friendly wave toward Phil and Tawny. Not liking lies didn’t keep me from being good at them. “Not everyone here is part of your warped little club. This party is to impress someone—probably the politicians. If they’d already bought in, it would be a waste of money. And since kidnapping and scandal tend to make politicians nervous, you’ll let me go.”

I kept walking, out of the gallery and toward the foyer.

Following, Lex said, “Don’t get your tails in a twist, Melusine. I meant that we’d go upstairs to talk.”

He was almost loud enough for someone else to hear, despite the music and pockets of conversation. Almost.

I spun around—he stood very close, even now—and studied his posture, his handsome, angry face. “Why did you call me that?”

“Of course, you’ll have to look like you’re into me for us to fool anybody,” he said coolly, not answering my question. “But don’t worry. That’s the only performance you’ll have to give tonight, no matter how good you are at it.”

Oh boo-hoo, did he think he was insulting me? Curiosity outweighed insult by a landslide. Sure it was dangerous. But I liked to think I was becoming more dangerous myself, lately.

I stepped closer, ducking my head for the benefit of anyone watching, as if I were apologizing. But what I actually said to him was, “Two conditions.”

“You called me for a favor. What makes you think—”

“One, you keep your goons away from me and my friends. I’m here under a flag of truce, or I’m not here at all.”

“And your second request?”

“My second demand,” I clarified, “is that once we’re in your room tonight, the illusion of romance is over. No touching. No kissing. No romantic expectations.”

“Not a problem.”

“Swear on it,” I warned.

His eyes searched mine. “You really don’t trust me, do you?” he marveled. “Well, don’t worry your pretty little head about it, Mag. I agree to your terms.”

I made a mental note to smack him, once I had what I wanted, for that sarcastic, “pretty little head” comment. But what I said was, “On your mother’s soul.”