Rarities Unlimited 02 - Running Scared

collectors, or a private sale to an interested individual.”
    “Is it for sale?” Shane asked bluntly.
    “Yes.” Dana said.
    “May I?” he said, but he was already holding out his hand in silent demand.
    Risa gave him the torc.
    For a moment he simply closed his eyes and absorbed the weight, texture, and feel of the ancient jewelry. He couldn’t have said why he approached collecting gold artifacts this way; he knew only that he always had. No matter how spectacular a piece might appear, if it didn’t feel right, he didn’t buy it.
    When his eyes opened they were the clear, bottomless green of imperial jade. And he was looking at Risa, into her.
    The hair at the nape of her neck prickled. She turned away from him so quickly she nearly stumbled. “Tell your client that, subject to verification of provenance, he has an offer of three hundred—”
    “Four,” Shane interrupted curtly.
    “Four hundred thousand dollars,” she said between her teeth. “If he is uneasy that I would be both appraiser and acquirer, Tannahill Inc. will pay for a neutral appraisal.”
    “Right,” Dana said. Mentally she toted up the commission to Rarities and smiled. “He won’t kick. He requested you by name.”
    “Probably because he wanted Shane’s attention,” Risa said with faint bitterness. On her own she wasn’t well known enough to attract artifacts of the quality Shane was holding now.
    “Doubtless,” Dana agreed. “Anyone with a fine gold artifact to sell anywhere in the world has heard of Shane Tannahill and the Golden Fleece.”
    “It certainly makes my life interesting,” Risa muttered.
    “Buying all that lovely stuff, eh?” Niall asked.
    “No. Dealing with all the ‘lovely stuff’ that elbows its way out of the world’s sewers holding gold in both fists.”

Chapter 3
    Sedona
    Halloween night
    T he book in Virgil’s lap was heavy, scholarly, and filled with beautiful drawings and color photos of Celtic art. He didn’t need to look at the pages to know what was there. They filled his memory. The book was just one of many he had collected to educate himself about the nature of the gold artifacts that were packed in three World War II ammunition boxes under his bed. All of his past addresses were neatly stenciled on each box, a ritual recitation of all the places he had fled.
    But no more. He finally understood that he couldn’t outrun the unthinkable.
    He had chosen the spirit-infused Southwest for his last stand. He had hoped that putting the boxes of gold in the center of the three leaning stones he had found at the base of the nearby cliff would somehow . . . return the gold.
    And free him.
    When that plan had failed, he stuck the boxes under his bed and read books in hope of finding knowledge that would allow him to control whatever lived in the gold. That hadn’t worked either, but hope was as persistent as breath. And as necessary.
    He had kept on reading and hoping to find the key that would set him free from the curse of Druid gold.
    Once he had even tried to go back to the Welsh autumn, to the place where he had dug out the treasure more than half a century ago. Gold, sacred gold, three times three times three artifacts that were the core of Druid rituals—rituals where life ended and began again, where kings waited while Druids spoke to gods, where the very course of the sun and moon were assured. Beltane in May, when the time of warmth and hope returned to the land, and Samhain in November when the time of cold and desperation began once more.
    Samhain, when what was real and what wasn’t flowed together and created an eerie whole.
    It had been Samhain when he returned to Wales to find again the nine hills, six oak trees, three leaning stones, one tiny spring. He hadn’t taken a metal detector that second time. He wasn’t after gold. He was after absolution.
    He hadn’t found it, nor the black spring in the center of the stones. The very place that he had discovered so easily in time of war eluded him in peace.
    Defeated, still cursed, he had fled back to America. Here he remained, older and no wiser for all the books he had read. Nowhere in those books had he discovered anything to equal the twenty-seven objects he had found in the Druid grove. Nowhere in any of the modern fancies about white-robed Druids had he found anything to equal the power of the ancients whose minds had held the entire reality of a culture. Druids who cured the sick or made the healthy ill. Druids who