Donovans 01 - Amber Beach

noticed the amber when her alarm clock screamed and he showed up nearly naked at her door. She hadn’t noticed the pendant last night.
    “Are you wearing it now?” she asked Jake.
    “Yes.”
    “Why weren’t you wearing it last night?”
    “Later,” he said without looking away from the amber in front of him.
    While Jake worked, Resnikov told Honor about the amber woven like sunlight through the darkness of ancient Baltic cultures. Amber to cure illness, amber to protect the body in war, amber to speed the soul on its final journey. Amber as the sign of the Celtic male sun god. Amber as sacred to the ancient mother. Amber as the precious residue of tears cried by the goddess Juarate, who fell in love with a mortal man and thereby ensured his death and her eternal grief . . . .
    Amber, always amber, the only stone that was warm to the touch, the only stone that could be carved with a simple knife, the only stone that crackled with life when rubbed by fur, the only stone that floated on the mysterious breast of the ocean. Amber, the divine made tangible. Amber, the burning stone of man’s desires.
    “Very nice,” Jake said, looking up finally. “An excellent sampling of eighteenth-century carving techniques. And someone resisted the temptation to fill in the missing pieces with Dominican amber.”
    Resnikov laughed softly. “You have not forgiven me for that table, have you? But it was an honorable take.”
    Jake grunted.
    “I would like to have seen the whole of the Amber Room,” the Russian said, watching him more closely, “ or even just a single panel. To enter the room was said to be like being reborn into a world made wholly of sunlight.”
    Instinct and intelligence combined into a coolness sliding down Jake’s spine. “I’m betting on the side of those who said that room burned to ash.” He pushed his chair back as though to leave.
    “Not so quickly, my friend,” Resnikov said. “There are other pieces that require your fine touch.”
    Jake looked at Honor.
    “You couldn’t drag me out of here with amber horses,” she said instantly. “This amber is fantastic. Designs are going through my mind like chain lightning.”
    The smile he gave her was as warm as the touch of amber. She found herself responding before she could think of all the reasons she shouldn’t.
    Resnikov lifted out a long, shallow box that had been constructed with a care that bordered on obsessive. The box itself was wrapped in intricately tooled leather that had designs embossed on it in gold. The clasp and hinges were hammered from solid gold. The lining inside the box was a dark, very fine suede. Eight uneven compartments held amber carvings that seemed simple, almost crude, next to the elegance of the box itself.
    Jake whistled. “How many people did you kill for this lot?”
    “Ah, Jacob. Always the jokester, yes?”
    “Not this time.”
    “Then you will be pleased to know that no blood was spilled,” the Russian said smoothly.
    “I would be pleased if I believed you.”
    “It is the truth.”
    “Then some folks must have died of natural causes,” Jake said, unconvinced. “You would have to pry these pieces out of a collector’s dead hands. Or a curator’s. No one would willingly part with these artifacts . . . if they’re real.”
    “That is what you are here for, is it not? To determine if these are genuine.”
    Without another word Jake bent over the box. The difference in him was obvious to Honor. When he handled the other pieces of amber, he had been intent, interested, and appreciative. Now he was utterly focused. He radiated a kind of intensity she had seen in him only once before—last night, when he had taught her so much about the nature of sensuality and passion.
    The first piece of amber appeared to be a small, worn head of an ax carved out of pale butter. When Jake gave it a delicate, questing touch with his fingertip, a flush of memory and new hunger coursed through Honor. Holding her breath without knowing it, she watched while he ran his sensitive fingertips over the miniature ax head as though he were blind and reading Braille.
    “Unbelievably smooth,” he said after a time. “The drill holes that decorate it feel like they were polished after the piece was made.”
    “Is it a fetish?” Honor asked.
    “Of a kind,” Jake said. “Amber was believed to give immortality to its owner. Neolithic hunting societies sometimes buried their members with amber grave goods. Amber