Return to Bombshells
I am so excited to be
writing for the new Silhouette Bombshell line! For more information on
the books in general, be sure to check out the
Bombshell
Authors website. But in the meantime, here’s a taste of what’s to
come….
Chapter 1
One moment I was studying the five-thousand-year-old statue of a husband
and wife, one of several in the Metropolitan Museum of Art's sprawling
Egyptian wing. What kind of romantic problems had they faced, I mused.
Deception? Cross purposes? Old wounds? Had love won out?
The next moment, I sensed someone
behind me, all size and impatience and body heat.
And not in a nice way.
"So you decided to be good, huh
Maggi?" The voice was too thick to be pleasant even if its owner tried.
He didn't.
I recognized billionaire
slimeball, Phil Stuart, even before I turned. And here I'd thought that
this $1000/plate event was exclusive.
"I'm always good," I told him,
masking my unease as I turned anyway. Phil was nobody I wanted at my
back. "But if you mean well-behaved, maybe not."
"You gave up on those stupid
goddess cups, right?"
Gave up? It hadn't been two
months since I'd rescued the antique chalice of my ancestors, a holy
relic called the Melusine Grail, from thugs sent by this guy. Since
then, I'd been preoccupied helping nurse my sometimes-lover back to
health after a vicious knife attack.
By more thugs.
Probably sent by this guy.
Supposedly the two incidents were
unrelated. I didn't need psychic abilities to doubt that. Either way,
I'd had an excellent reason for not seeking out a second chalice.
Really.
I didn't need Phil tossing out
double-dog dares.
Phil Stuart always looked a
little off to me. Like a poor imitation of something better. Other than
to check for the bulge of a gun or a ceremonial knife under his tux, I
barely glanced at him before noting the two suited gentlemen lurking by
the ancient stone archway. Was he kidding?
"Bodyguards, Phil?"
"Right?" He leaned closer, into
my personal space. "You've given up on those stupid goddess cups?"
"Not your business." I knew how
to stand my ground, even in two-inch, ankle-flattering heels. "Back
off."
"Or what?"
He wasn't an immediate danger to
me. This may sound weird, but ever since I'd drunk from the Chalice of
Melusine--my family goddess, a goddess renowned for her prophetic
scream--my intuition had sharpened to the point that my throat
tightened whenever something threatened me. And my throat felt fine just
now.
Then again, Phil rarely did his
own dirty work.
He raised his voice. "Or what?"
A smooth voice beyond him said,
"Or you'll make your date jealous."
Speaking of deception, cross
purposes, and old wounds.
Lex, my sometimes lover and
current escort, had returned from fetching champagne. Beside him stood a
small, blond woman in an expensive gown. A black gown, naturally--this
was a New York arts event. But Lex, healthy again and wearing a tuxedo
with an ease GQ models would envy, was the one on whom my gaze lingered.
Alexander Rothschilde Stuart III
wasn't so tall he towered, nor so athletic that he bulged. His
ginger-brown hair sported an expensive but conservative cut. His face
revealed generations of upper-class ancestors, all pulling together in
the sweep of his jaw, his cheeks, his nose, understated and yet, well
perfect.
Maybe too perfect. But, good or
bad, it was him. Lex was what Phil, his cousin, could never copy. When I
wanted him, that was great. When I felt unsure of our relationship, it
really complicated matters.
Lately, things had been very
complicated.
"Maggi," Lex said coolly, passing
me a champagne flute, "Have you met Phil's new girlfriend, Tammy?"
"Let's go," said Phil--but I was
already taking Tammy's manicured hand in my own.
"Pleased to meet you," I said.
"I'm Magdalene Sanger. Are you sure you know what you're doing with this
guy?"
"Hey!" Phil protested.
Tammy's eyes widened. Her lips
parted. "Why do you--?" Then, quickly, she looked down at our hands.
I'm not psychic, sore throats
aside. I just knew Phil.
"Now," Phil insisted. But this
reception was for patron-circle members, on a Monday night when the
museum normally closed to the public. If he made a scene, he would do so
in front of the crème de la crème of city society. I hadn't pushed him
that far. Yet.
Then again, this was my first
drink of the evening.
Tammy slid an annoyed glance
toward Phil, then said, "Pleased to meet you, Magdalene. That's a
fascinating necklace you're wearing."
"Thank you. It's called a
chalice-well pendant. It--"
"Enough!" Sure enough, at Phil's
exclamation several patrons turned to see who had been so gauche. Even
Lex's lips twitched, which is about as close to a guffaw as my ex-lover
is capable. "Stop talking to her, damn it!"
Tammy blinked, as if seeing him
for the first time, then laughed. "Why in the world should I not talk to
her?"
"Probably because his wife left
him after talking to me," I guessed. That had been shortly after Lex
landed in the hospital. The woman had good reason to be concerned.
Now
my throat tightened in warning.
I spun in my heels and nailed
Phil with a glare that stopped him cold, before he'd surged forward a
full inch. Everything about his posture said he'd meant to strike out at
me, public place or not. And so it began.
Or continued.
"Here, Phil?" I warned softly.
"Now?"
And since most bullies are
cowards, he said nothing.
This time when someone stepped up
behind me, the sense of solidity and body heat belonged to Lex. So was
he backing me up, or readying to help his cousin?
Either way, my bare back welcomed
his nearness.
"You know," murmured Tammy into
the uncomfortable silence that followed, "Perhaps I'll catch a cab home.
Thank you for the invitation, Phillip, but--"
"You can't leave," protested
Phil, and Tammy arched an eyebrow at him in challenge.
"Thank you, Magdalene," she said
as she turned away. "It was a real pleasure to meet you."
"For three minutes?" Phil's heavy
head swung back to me for one last glare before he trailed his
girlfriend from the gallery. "You met her for three freakin' minutes.
Tammy!"
His bodyguards trailed after
them.
"I hope she'll be all right," I
murmured in their absence. I'd felt jittery all evening. Not sore-throat
jittery, but still.
"Phil's made mistakes." Lex took
a sip of his champagne. "But he's a Stuart. There are lines even he
won't cross."
I did a double take. Did he
honestly believe that? Did he mean it as assurance?
Then he distracted me by sliding
a hand across the small of my back and murmured, "Why do you keep doing
that?"
So he'd noticed, too. Phil's
wife. A nurse who stood up to a condescending doctor. A waitress who
suddenly found the strength to take down a rowdy customer.
A little girl, whom I'd helped to
her feet when Lex and I were jogging in the park, who finally hit her
brother back.
She never does that,
exclaimed her surprised mother.
"And don't say,
doing what,"
Lex continued, his voice mild but his hazel, almost golden eyes
demanding.
"I'm not doing anything. Not
deliberately." That would mean I had some kind of, well, magic. I
didn't, sore throats aside. I wasn't sure I wanted the responsibility.
He looked particularly
inscrutable.
"But maybe," I admitted, mulling
it over. "Maybe the Melusine Grail is."
In a nearby display case sat a
small, carved goblet of blue faience. It wasn't a goddess cup, but I
turned under Lex's hand and escaped for a closer look anyway.
My name's Magdalene Sanger. I'm a
professor of Comparative Mythology at Clemens College outside Stamford,
Connecticut. And as it turns out, I'm descended from goddess
worshippers. Long ago, when such beliefs became a burn-at-the-stake
offense, women across the world hid their most sacred relics and taught
their daughters and their daughters' daughters where to find them.
Grailkeepers. Like me.
Until recently, guarding the
knowledge of these lost chalices had been enough. But Phil Stuart and a
secret society of powerful men had gone after my family's cup. I'd
rescued it--and learned the truth, which was this:
After hundreds, maybe thousands
of years, mere knowledge was no longer enough.
Lex's reflection appeared in the
glass case, over my shoulder. "How's an old cup that's not even here
making women more--" He frowned, at a loss. "More."
"Legend says the goddess grails
will increase the power of women a hundredfold," I reminded him. "And I
do still have the Melusine Grail. Sure, it's hidden away for now."
He didn't ask where. I definitely
didn't tell him.
"But still, I drank from it. I
took the essence of, of
goddessness
into me. Maybe that connection is what's empowering other women, at
least when I touch them."
"So you don't need to go looking
for more cups?"
"Of course I do."
His ghostly image scowled.
In some ways,
I thought,
he's more dangerous than Phil.
At least I felt certain about
where Phil stood.
Even when I turned and looked at
Lex straight on, I knew damned well I wasn't seeing all of him.
He breathed out his next
question. "Why?"
"You know as well as I do.
Because a secret society of powerful men, called the Comitatus, are
after them. They destroyed the Kali Grail in New Delhi--"
"You can't know that was them."
"You're right, because they work
in secret." I frowned into my champagne. "But I know some of them went
after the Melusine Chalice. I know they came after me. Is there any
reason I should give them the benefit of a doubt?"
Lex's mouth flattened as I kept
talking.
"That's the problem with
secrets," I continued. "I could have been dating a member of the
Comitatus for years--hell, I could've dated one of its most powerful
members--and never known it. I could have considered marrying him, and
because of some stupid vow of secrecy, he would never have told me who
he really was."
"I can't talk to you when you're
like this." Lex's reflection turned away from mine and faded, like a
ghost's.
Whether I wanted to or not, my
heart lurched. I turned after him. "That's our problem. You can't talk
to me."
Because that whole previous
speech had been a big, fat load of sarcasm.
Turns out, Lex was one of the
most powerful members of the Comitatus. From what I'd pieced together,
the only reason he wasn't in charge was because a childhood illness had
taken him out of the running as a leader of supposed warriors. More's
the pity.
Despite our own
problems--previous deceptions, and cross purposes, and scars that might
or might not yet heal--I had to believe things would be different with
him in charge.
I had to.
I caught up to him and put a hand
on his arm, hard and fit beneath his tuxedo jacket. "I have no reason to
trust them. And since you can't talk to me--"
"I can," Lex insisted. "About
anything but that."
"It's a hard thing not to talk
about. You must know something good about those men, something worth
saving, but I haven't seen any proof of it. And now--"
Now Phil Stuart scowled at us
from across the room, bodyguards instead of a date at his side. His fear
of me, of what he couldn't understand, made him dangerous. I looked from
him to Lex again, noting how tight Lex's jawline had gotten with the
strain of his own secrets, and I consciously chose against fear.
"I trust you," I vowed softly,
hopefully. "I trust that you know what you're doing, that it's something
honorable and right. I've got to believe that, for both our sakes."
My voice faded, the closer his
face leaned toward mine, the more intently his golden eyes focused on my
lips. The nearer he came, the shorter my breath fell.
But again, not in a good way.
The last time we'd been lovers,
before his attack, I'd known nothing of his involvement with the
Comitatus. The truth had just about broken my heart. I
did
want to trust him--but maybe hearts are slower to heal than knife
wounds.
He must have seen something in my
eyes, in my posture. We've known each other since childhood, after all.
He reads me pretty well.
Abruptly, he turned away. "I'll
get us another drink."
And then I was alone in the
crowd, feeling cold and foolish and more than a little frustrated--which
is when I saw it.
It was another glass case,
another small sculpture in blue faience, apparently the Egyptians'
earthenware of choice. This one wasn't a cup but a tiny figurine, a
woman on a throne with a child in her lap.
I could have looked away, if I'd
wanted to. But, pulse accelerating, I could not have wanted to.
The size of the figurine, perhaps
six inches, in no way matched the scope of its subject. But from the
headdress, I recognized her--or should I say, Her--all the same. Isis.
Goddess of Ten-Thousand Names. Oldest of the Old. Sitting there amidst
relics from her ancient, half-forgotten world, nursing the tiny god
Horus on her lap.
This Grailkeeper business would
be so much easier if she spoke to me, even in my head--if she flat-out
said
Maggi, this is your next assignment.
It didn't work that way of course. So far, a sore throat in the presence
of danger was as tangible as the magic of the goddess got. Except....
Something vibrated against my
fingertips. I nearly dropped my purse before remembering my cell phone,
tucked inside it. I drew it out, saw an international exchange on its
display.
I thumbed the on button. "Hello,
Rhys," I said softly, and not just out of politeness for the other
museum patrons. The moment felt almost holy. "Tell me you know where the
Isis Grail is and I'll believe in magic."
"I do not know for certain," came
the lilting Welsh voice of my friend, an archeology student at the
Sorbonne who was interning with an expedition to Egypt. "But someone
seems to think I do."
My sense of unease returned--and
only partly because I'd just seen Lex, across the room, conversing with
his cousin Phil.
"Why do you say that?" I
deliberately turned my attention back to the statuette.
I trust him, I trust him, I trust him.
The tiny blue Isis wore a crooked
smile, as if to say, "Gotcha."
"I say it," said Rhys, "because
somebody tried to kill me today."
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