Rarities Unlimited 02 - Running Scared

kids.”
    Risa didn’t realize she was rubbing her temples again until Shane stroked his hand over her hair. Listening to Niall’s deep, slightly rough voice recite the bare statistics of Cherelle’s life made Risa’s throat ache. Nowhere did she hear the laughter or see the sparkling mischief and lightning quickness of a much younger Cherelle.
    “I’ll go back to the Seton house at dark,” Ian said. “I don’t expect to find anything, but it’s a base we have to cover.”
    Niall looked at Shane, “You’re sure these three jokers were the source of your Druid gold?”
    “Yes.”
    “Would it hold up in court?”
    “Not with Cline dead. But I’m sure.”
    Niall’s mouth turned down. Things that go bump in the night. He had learned not to question them. “Right. So we’re sitting here with four gold pieces the Brits are screaming at Uncle Sam to hand over.”
    “What’s their proof of ownership?” Risa asked.
    “They’re cobbling it together as fast as they can.”
    “They better cobble up a beaut,” Shane said. “In the absence of clear provenance, possession counts for a lot.”
    “I’ll let you explain that to April Joy.”
    Shane’s dark eyebrows went up. April Joy was one of Uncle Sam’s up-and-comers in the murky sphere of geopolitics. She was intelligent, pragmatic, beautiful, and utterly ruthless when the job required it. Given the people she played with, that was most of the time. A few months ago she had tried to recruit him for a sting against the Red Phoenix triad that involved using Tannahill Inc. as a laundry for dirty money. He had declined. She hadn’t liked it, but she didn’t have any leverage on him, so she’d taken his refusal like an adult.
    “I thought she was working on Asian gangs that were penetrating the U.S.,” Shane said.
    “She is.”
    “What does that have to do with Celtic gold?”
    “Good question,” Niall said. “Be sure to ask her if you see her.”
    “Thanks, but I’ll pass,” Shane said. “I’m not getting in that tiger’s face unless she gets in mine first.”
    “Your mother didn’t raise any dumb ones,” Niall said, grinning.
    “Actually, it was my father who taught me how the world really works.”
    The careful neutrality of Shane’s voice made Risa wince. She had always felt she’d missed something by not knowing her parents. Then again, from what she’d heard about Shane’s father, maybe she was better off.
    “What’s the basis of the British claim on the gold artifacts we bought?” Risa asked.
    “Probability,” Niall said. “For damn sure they didn’t originate in, say, Africa.”
    “If origin was the only requirement for ownership, the contents of the world’s museums would undergo massive redistribution,” Risa said.
    “That’s why we have politicians and bureaucrats—they swap favors and tell us peons where to send the goodies.”
    “Speak for yourself,” Shane said. “I’m not sending that gold anywhere on the say-so of some D.C. political hack who wants a free tour of London in return for sticking it to me over the gold.”
    “That’s why you wanted me to bring the goodies back, isn’t it?” Niall asked, smiling.
    Shane’s answering smile would have looked good on a crocodile with a full belly. “From time to time Rarities Unlimited has to trade favors with governments in order to survive. I don’t.”
    “Sure you do, boyo. You just haven’t been brought to it yet. Hell, even your old man finally learned to bend his knee to Uncle Sam.”
    “I’ll savor that image all the way to Sedona.”
    Risa sat up suddenly. “Sedona? I’m going with you.”
    “I never doubted it.” Shane’s mouth turned down. He didn’t want her to go, but his instincts said not only that she would go but that she should.
    “What’s in Sedona?” Ian asked.
    “The last known address for Cherelle Leticia Faulkner.”

Chapter 46
    Sedona
    November 4
    Evening
    F rom the air, Sedona looked like a jeweled spiderweb flung across the black velvet land. The small airport was on top of a mesa, connected to the town by a steep, zigzagging road. While Shane discovered the limits of the local cellular connections, Risa drove the rental car—truck, actually—down the narrow road to the main highway.
    “Right,” Shane said into his cell phone/computer. “We’re on our way to Camp Verde. No lights followed us down from the airport.”
    “Keep looking, boyo,” Niall said. “I don’t want a second dead body to turn up