“I don’t see anything that even remotely resembles a weapon,” Julian said.
“No,” Fallon agreed. “But there’s something of a paranormal nature in here. I can feel the energy.”
Isabella tapped the shoulders of both men. “Excuse me. Mind if I take a look?”
Fallon stepped back. So did Julian.
She ducked under the velvet rope and stepped into the bedroom, concentrating on the trail of fog.
The mists led straight to the top of a pink-and-gilt chest of drawers. For the first time, Isabella took out her own flashlight and switched it on. She started opening and closing the drawers. Most were crammed with dainty petticoats, nightgowns and other items that had been made for a little girl.
The bottom drawer was filled with small pink and white socks and a cauldron of boiling fog.
“Got it,” Isabella said.
“What is it?” Julian asked urgently.
“Hang on.” Isabella dug beneath the neatly arranged socks and saw an elaborately wrought hand mirror. She aimed the beam of the flashlight at the object and caught her breath. The mirror was spectacular. The gold-and-silver frame was intricately worked in an elaborate Baroque design that subtly incorporated ancient alchemical symbols. Strange crystals glittered in the light. Although the object looked as if it had been crafted during the seventeenth century, the glass was not dark with age.
Captivated, she reached down to grasp the curved handle.
Electricity sparked through her. She flinched but she did not let go.
“This thing is definitely hot,” she said softly.
“Are you okay?” Fallon asked.
“I think so.”
She looked into the mirror, aware that Fallon and Julian had come up behind her and were doing the same thing. They were all fascinated, she realized.
It was like looking into a pool of liquid mercury. She could almost see her image but not quite. The seemingly solid glass of the mirror appeared molten. Silver energy swirled just beneath the surface, compelling her to look deeper.
“It’s incredible,” she whispered.
“Lower your senses,” Fallon ordered.
The razor-sharp words snapped her out of the mini-trance. Startled, she hastily cut her talent. The surface of the mirror took on a more normal appearance. She could still sense the power in the artifact, but it no longer exerted the strong pull that it had a few seconds earlier.
Julian plucked the mirror from her hand. Energy whipped the air around him. His triumphant excitement was palpable.
“Damn, you did it, Isabella,” he breathed. “This has to be the para-weapon that the broker left here.”
“But what does it do?” Isabella asked.
She half expected Fallon to respond. He was always the one with the answers. But for once he had nothing to offer.
“I told you, I don’t know exactly how it works.” Julian examined the back of the mirror. “All I can tell you is that the black-ops folks who hired Lucan to make the buy are willing to pay a hell of a lot to get it off the market.”
“Time to go,” Fallon said. “We got what we came for. Let’s move.”
The chillingly neutral quality of his voice sent a shiver of awareness through Isabella. Something was wrong. In that moment she knew that he had recognized the mirror and had some knowledge of its power.
She looked at him, but in the deep shadows it was impossible to read his face. She heightened her talent a little and saw the heat in Fallon’s eyes. It was not the kind she associated with their lovemaking. Fallon was jacked and dangerous.
“Jones is right,” Julian said. “Let’s get the hell out of Dodge.”
He went swiftly toward the doorway. Fallon grabbed Isabella’s arm, his grip uncharacteristically rough. She turned to look at him in surprise. But he was already shoving her across the room toward the bed.
She landed with a jolt and a shocked gasp. When she opened her eyes, she saw that Julian had spun around in the doorway. The mirror in his hand flashed white-hot.
The room was suddenly ablaze with a blinding paranormal fire. Isabella realized that although she could still see and hear and feel, she felt terrifyingly numb. It took her a heartbeat to understand that was because her para-senses were frozen.
She was vaguely aware that Fallon was in motion, launching himself through the raging storm of psi. He slammed into Julian. His momentum took both of them to the floor in the hallway. They landed with a sickening thud.
The energy storm cut off abruptly when Julian lost his grip on the mirror. But when Isabella tried to raise her talent, she discovered that her senses were still numb.
The sickening sounds of hand-to-hand combat brought her up off the bed. She found the flashlight she had dropped and staggered across the room to the doorway. She had to grip the frame to stay on her feet.
Fallon and Julian were locked in a cage fight because of the narrow confines of the hallway. The primal nature of the battle sent a nauseating wave of panic through Isabella. Fists rose and fell, smashing again and again into muscular flesh. Boots and shoulders struck the wall. She caught glimpses of blood as the two men heaved and rolled and collided again and again.
A lethally thin blade flashed evilly in the shadows. She could not tell which man gripped the knife. But in the next moment she heard a terrible crack. Fallon had slammed Julian’s hand against the floor.
The knife dropped on the carpet. Julian howled, rolled onto his side and clutched his broken wrist.
“Bastard,” he snarled. “You son of a bitch. You should be dead.”
“You’re not the first person to tell me that.” Fallon got to his feet. There was blood on his face. He took his gun out from under his black leather jacket. “The Quicksilver Mirror can kill,” Fallon said. “But only in the hands of a talent who is powerful enough to control the maximum amount of energy latent in it. You just weren’t strong enough, Garrett.”
“Shit.” Julian groaned. He sat up, cradling his injured wrist. “The last thing I need is a lecture on para-physics from Fallon Jones. Just shoot me now.”
“Good idea,” Isabella said.
Fallon looked at her. “Are you okay?”
“Yes—no.” Another flicker of panic shivered through her. “Fallon, my senses are frozen.”
“So are mine.” Keeping the gun trained on Julian, he picked up the mirror. “But they’ll recover in time. If the mirror doesn’t kill you, the effects are temporary.”
“Oh, good. For a moment there I was a little worried.”
Fallon prodded the groaning Julian. “On your feet. We’re leaving before the maintenance people show up and start asking a lot of questions about the damage to the hallway.”
Julian got to his knees. “How the hell do you plan to get me out of here? That’s my hunter who’s standing guard down there.”
“Not anymore,” Fallon said. “After he got us inside, he was replaced by a J&J agent. I called in some talent from L.A.”
Julian’s face twisted in disgust. “How did you figure it out?”
“I didn’t know you were after the Quicksilver Mirror until I saw the damn thing,” Fallon said. “But there were a few details that didn’t sit right. You gave off the vibes of a guy who was working his own agenda. What pissed me off and made me decide that you were one of the bad guys was how you used Isabella and then sent that hunter team to grab her in Phoenix when you discovered that you needed her after all. That’s no way to treat a lady, Garrett.”
Julian shot Isabella a fulminating look. She gave him her most dazzling smile.
“I was following Lucan’s orders,” Julian said, turning sullen.
“I called Lucan again after you left the trailer today. Gave him a different theory of the crime. He agreed to play it out and see what happened.”
“Whose theory of the crime?” Julian demanded.
“Isabella’s. I’ve learned the hard way not to ignore the gut reaction of a trained investigator. She was sure you were behind the arms dealing in Department A.”