“It took some doing, but once I located him, I was able to get the names of the most likely auction dealers from him before he suffered his heart attack.”
“Before you murdered him, you mean. You sent those two men to kidnap me.”
“I had hoped to avoid violence, but when it became clear that youhad another client and that your dear brother was not going to be able to convince you to work for him, I realized I had to take more drastic measures. I wasn’t absolutely certain that you would show up at Webber’s house, but it seemed likely. I didn’t have time to watch the place myself, so I hired that pair to pick up any female seen leaving his place. Obviously, they did a very poor job of grabbing you. I assume you had Coppersmith with you that day?”
“Yes.”
“That explains why you got away,” Lander said. “Never mind, what’s done is done, and it’s all ending the way it’s supposed to end. Let’s have a look at the lab book.”
He opened the leather cover and examined the first page.
“There’s Willis’s name,” he said. “The dates are correct.” He turned one page and then another. His eyes tightened. “This is a record of experiments conducted on rare earths and crystals taken from a mine, but there’s no mention of paranormal properties or the location of the mine.”
“The book is still encrypted,” Abby reminded him. “It won’t make any sense to you until I break the code.”
He closed the book with a snap. “Do it now.”
“You promise you’ll let us go?”
“I promise,” Lander said. Anger flashed in his cold eyes. “I told you, I have no reason to kill either of you.”
“He’s lying, Abby,” Dawson said.
Lander aimed the gun at him. “It occurs to me that now that I have your sister, I don’t have any more use for you.”
Dangerous currents swirled in the atmosphere. Dawson started to sweat. He gasped for breath.
“No.”Abby grabbed the lab book. “You said you wouldn’t hurt him. I’ll break the code for you.”
“Do it,” Lander snarled.
She jacked up her energy, found the frequencies and held out the lab book.
“Okay,” she said. “It’s done. Here, take the book and let us go.”
Lander reached for the book, ignoring her plea. His fingers closed around the spine. Abby seized the energy of the encryption and sent it into his aura.
Lander stiffened. His eyes widened in dawning horror.
“No,” he screamed. He tried and failed to let go of the book. “You can’t do this to me. I’ll kill you first, I swear it.”
His left hand was still frozen to the book. Abby sensed that the energy of the unlocking code was channeling straight into his aura. But he was so much stronger than she had realized. He managed to let go of the lab book. Gaining strength, he turned the pistol toward her.
“Bitch,” he screamed.
The barrel of the pistol glowed hotter. Icy currents flowed around her heart.
Sam came through the doorway, the Phoenix ring on fire. Paranormal lightning crackled across the small space, igniting Lander’s aura. Ultralight flames blazed. Lander jerked and twitched and writhed.
He stared at Sam from the heart of the inferno. “No.It can’t end like this. The crystals aremine.”
In the next instant, he crumpled to the floor. His aura and the psi-fire winked out with a terrible finality.
Sam scooped up the crystal gun and looked at Abby.
“I told you this was a bad plan,” he said.
“I thought it all went quite well,” she said. Her voice sounded far too high and thin.
