She glanced back into the woods, wishing her mother could be at the reception tonight. “Not just for my sake, Mum,” Keira whispered. “For your own.”
Chapter 2
Boston Public Garden
Boston, Massachusetts
7:00 p.m., EDT
June 17
Victor Sarakis didn’t let the heavy downpour stop him.
He couldn’t.
He had to warn Keira Sullivan.
Rain spattered on the asphalt walks of the Public Garden, a Victorian oasis in the heart of Boston. He picked up his pace, wishing he’d remembered to bring an umbrella or even a hooded jacket, but he didn’t have far to go. Once through the Public Garden, he had only to cross Charles Street and make his way up Beacon Street to an address just below the gold-domed Massachusetts State House.
He could do it. He had to do it.
The gray, muted light and startling amount of rain darkened his mood and further fueled his sense of urgency.
“Keira can’t go to Ireland.”
He was surprised he spoke out loud. He was aware that many people didn’t consider him entirely normal, but he’d never been one to talk to himself.
“She can’t look for the stone angel.”
Drenched to the bone as he was, he’d look like a madman when he arrived at the elegant house where the benefit auction that Keira was attending tonight was being held. He couldn’t let that deter him. He had to get her to hear him out.
He had to tell her what she was up against.
What was after her.
Evil.
Pure evil.
Not mental illness, not sin—evil.
Victor had to warn her in person. He couldn’t call the authorities and leave it to them. What proof did he have? What evidence? He’d sound like a lunatic.
Just stop Keira from going to Ireland. Then he could decide how to approach the police. What to tell them.
“Victor.”
His name seemed to be carried on the wind.
The warm, heavy rain streamed down his face and back, poured into his shoes. He slowed his pace.
“Victor.”
He realized now that he hadn’t imagined the voice.
His gaze fell on the Public Garden’s shallow pond, rain pelting into its gray water. The famous swan boats were tied up for the evening. With the fierce storms, the Public Garden was virtually empty of people.
No witnesses.
Victor broke into an outright run, even as he debated his options. He could continue on the walkways to Charles Street, or he could charge through the pond’s shallow water, try to escape that way.
But already he knew there’d be no escape.
“Victor.”
His gait faltered. He couldn’t run fast enough. He wasn’t athletic, but that didn’t matter.
He couldn’t outrun such evil.
He couldn’t outrun one of the devil’s own.
No one could.
Chapter 3
Beacon Hill
Boston, Massachusetts
8:30 p.m., EDT
June 17
Not for the first time in his life, Simon Cahill found himself in an argument with an unrelenting snob, this time in Boston, but he could as easily have been in New York, San Francisco, London or Paris. He’d been to all of them. He enjoyed a good argument—especially with someone as obnoxious and pretentious as Lloyd Adler.
Adler looked to be in his early forties and wore jeans and a rumpled black linen sport coat with a white T-shirt, his graying hair pulled back in a short ponytail. He gestured across the crowded, elegant Beacon Hill drawing room toward a watercolor painting of an Irish stone cottage. “Keira Sullivan is more Tasha Tudor and Beatrix Potter than Picasso, wouldn’t you agree, Simon?”
Probably, but Simon didn’t care. The artist in question was supposed to have made her appearance by now. Adler had griped about that, too, but her tardiness hadn’t seemed to stop people from bidding on the two paintings she’d donated to tonight’s auction. The second was of a fairy or elf or some damn thing in a magical glen. Proceeds would go to support a scholarly conference on Irish and Irish-American folklore to be held next spring in Boston and Cork, Ireland.
In addition to being a popular illustrator, Keira Sullivan was also a folklorist.
Simon hadn’t taken a close look at either of her donated paintings. A week ago, he’d been in Armenia searching for survivors of a moderate but damaging earthquake. Over a hundred people had died. Men, women, children.
Mostly children.
But now he was in a suit—an expensive one—and drinking champagne in the first-floor chandeliered drawing room of an elegant early nineteenth-century brick house overlooking Boston Common. He figured he deserved to be mistaken for an art snob.
“Beatrix Potter’s the artist who drew Peter Rabbit, right?”
“Yes, of course.”
Simon swallowed more of his champagne. It wasn’t bad, but he wasn’t a snob about champagne, either. He liked what he liked and didn’t worry about the rest. He didn’t mind if other people fussed over what they were drinking—he just minded if they were a pain in the ass about it. “When I was a kid, my mother decorated my room with cross-stitched scenes of Peter and his buddies.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Cross-stitch. You know—you count these threads and—” Simon stopped, deliberately, and shrugged. He knew he didn’t look like the kind of guy who’d had Beatrix Potter rabbits on his wall as a kid, but he was telling the truth. “Now that I’m thinking about it, I wonder what happened to my little rabbits.”
Adler frowned, then chuckled. “That’s very funny,” he said, as if he couldn’t believe Simon was serious. “Keira Sullivan is good at what she does, obviously, but I hate to see her work overshadow several quite interesting pieces here tonight. A shame, really.”
Simon looked at Adler, who suddenly went red and bolted into the crowd, mumbling that he needed to say hello to someone.
A lot of his arguments ended that way, Simon thought as he finished off his champagne, got rid of his empty glass and grabbed a full one from another tray. The event was catered, and most of the guests were dressed up and having a good time. From what he’d heard, they included a wide range of people—academics, graduate students, artists, musicians, folklorists, benefactors, a couple of priests and a handful of politicians and rich art collectors.
And at least two cops, but Simon steered clear of them.
“Lloyd Adler’s not that easy to scare off,” Owen Garrison said, shaking his head as he joined Simon. Owen was lean and good-looking, but all the Garrisons were. Simon was built like a bull. No other way to say it.
“I’m on good behavior tonight.” He grinned, cheekily putting out his pinkie finger as he sipped his fresh champagne. Owen just rolled his eyes. Simon decided he’d probably had enough to drink and set the glass on a side table. Too much bubbly and he’d start a fight. “I didn’t say a word.”
“You didn’t have to,”