Page 89 of Dark Lover

The trapdoor was opened. Sam saw a ladder leading up to the floor above the dungeons and glimpsed familiar black pointy-toe shoes.

Hemmer pushed her hard at the ladder.

Sam grabbed it reflexively.

The monk of Carlisle got down on his knees to grin at her. “Hello, Sam. I am going to make good all of my threats.”

“Lucky me,” Sam said.

He added, “As for the other prisoners, they’re there to feed my dogs.”

“NICK, MACLEAN IS on his way up.”

Nick was on the telephone, speaking with his contact at the CIA, who ran the agency’s counter-evil unit. The unit was as clandestine as CDA. It fought all government-directed evil from abroad. Like HCU, it was under-funded and understaffed, in spite of the fact that it had hundreds of ongoing investigations into hundreds of foreign governments. His CEU counterpart had needed his take on a matter involving a new rash of witch burnings in Madrid. As he hung up, he was suddenly uneasy, and it wasn’t because they’d both agreed that one demonic cult was responsible for all the incendiary violence across the globe.

His gut churned, a damned familiar sensation. It signaled impending doom.

“Where’s Rose?” he asked. Damn it, he was worried about her. But Sam could take care of herself.

“I don’t know,” Jan said. “Nick? Maclean sounded strange, tense…intense.”

“Send him in,” Nick said, standing. He had great instincts. They’d been finely honed in the nine or ten decades he’d been fighting evil in all its forms and incarnations. Something was wrong. It wasn’t Maclean, because he didn’t give a damn about him. Once they had the page of illusion, Maclean could go his merry way. Interpol and Scotland Yard could have him. He might even make the intros himself.

No, his gut was telling him that someone he cared about or was responsible for was in danger.

He called after Jan, “Find Sam. I want an update.” He glanced at his wristwatch. It was one thirty in the morning. Why wasn’t Sam with Maclean? She was supposed to work him. By now, she might even know where he’d hidden the page.

Deciding not to wait for Jan, he speed-dialed Sam’s loft. There was no answer, and his sense of doom intensified. It was Rose, he thought. She was in trouble.

Maclean strode into his office without knocking, his eyes ablaze.

“Where is Sam?” Nick shot.

“Hemmer took her back in time, probably to the monk.”

Nick was furious and incredulous at once. He cursed. She could not be lost in time. “And you just stood there and let him grab her?”

“I was occupied with the monk,” Maclean spat. “Will ye do something to find her? Or will ye sit there on yer ass and let her die?”

“I don’t sit on my ass, Maclean. And before you start pointing that finger at me, why didn’t you follow them? Oh, I forgot. You’re afraid of the leap.”

Maclean shook with fury. “They left so swiftly, I couldn’t tell where they went!”

Nick knew he’d been too hard on him. Maclean was unused to the power and he’d only met a handful of men, all Highlanders, who could actually follow a demon through time. He reminded himself to keep his cool. It had been eight years since he’d lost an agent in time. He buzzed Kit Mars. “Get up here, please.”

Maclean paced right up to him. His nose almost touched Nick’s. “The monk and Hemmer paid us a visit after ye left. They’re working together. How will ye find her? She’s in the past. She could be anywhere!”

Nick stared, leaping into his mind, and he was shocked.

Maclean was terrified that Sam was going to be tortured. So many horrific graphic images were roiling through his mind, so rapidly that they blurred. But it didn’t matter. Nick saw it all, and what he didn’t see, he could assume, suspect and guess. He saw the instruments of torture. He saw chains and bars, cages, racks. He saw demon audiences. He saw beasts and monsters. He saw a maze. He saw blood, he saw rape.

“Tell me what ye plan to do!” Maclean shouted at him.

Nick recoiled. For one unbelievable moment, he felt sorry for Ian Maclean.

Then he came to his senses. “Sam is as tough as they come.” But as he spoke, he was calculating the odds. He had faith in her, but he’d never count solely on faith. She wasn’t immortal. She could die.

He’d rather die himself than lose another agent in the damned and shifting sands of time. Rose was his agent, his responsibility. He had to go back and help her elude the demons and return to the present.