Page 21 of It takes a Psychic

“I said I’ll see you home.”

It was clear he had made the decision and there was no point arguing about it. He was a man on a mission. For a time tonight she had become entangled in that mission, so he had made the decision to get her out of what was going to be a very messy situation—probably so that she would not blab to the press or the cops about his own involvement with the raid, the FBPI, and the missing artifact. In other words, he had whisked her away from the scene to keep her quiet.

That raised an interesting question, one that ought to worry her a lot more than whether or not Oliver Rancourt was going to disappear from her life.

“I wonder how Hollister’s public relations department will handle the media after the news of the raid breaks,” she said. “It’s bound to get a bit sticky when word gets out that the endowment fund was taking huge donations from an organization that was the target of a stolen antiquities raid.”

“Not your problem,” Oliver said. “The university authorities will want to do everything they can to keep their involvement with the Society hushed up.”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Trust me, your boss and everyone else will do their best to make any evidence of a connection disappear. They definitely won’t want their star para-archaeologist linked to the story.”

“I told you, my status as a star is temporary, but you’re right. The last thing Morty will want to do is admit that a member of the staff participated in a ceremony intended to validate stolen antiquities.”

“Morty?”

She winced. “Dr. Morton Bullinger, head of the Department of Para-Archaeology.”

“Right. Morty. He will definitely have to protect you in order to protect himself and the university.”

She slanted him an assessing look. “What about you? Are you worried about your reputation as the director of the Rancourt Museum?”

“No one who can do any damage recognized me at the reception,” he said.

Absolute confidence resonated in his voice. He was very sure of his talent for going unnoticed, she realized.

“Except me,” she said dryly.

He gave that a moment’s thought, as if he had just now realized she knew some of his secrets and might be a liability.

“Except you,” he said. “Are you planning to tell Morty or the media that I was at the reception tonight?”

His cool tone sent a shiver across her nerves.

“Of course not,” she said quickly.

“Good,” he said. “I appreciate that.”

She was not sure how to take his words. Perhaps he had been lying to her all along. That would certainly explain why she had never heard of the Rancourt Museum or the Foundation. Maybe they didn’t exist. For all she knew, Oliver was precisely what she had assumed him to be at the start—a professional antiquities thief. That did not rule out thepossibility that he occasionally did favors for the FBPI. Everyone knew that law enforcement often used shady characters for intelligence purposes.

Still, he had helped her escape what could have been a very unpleasant situation, one that had the potential to do a lot of damage to her own career. Getting arrested tonight would not have been a good look.

“Sounds like we have a deal,” she said.

Oliver smiled, evidently satisfied. “It does, doesn’t it?”

Chapter Six

The dust bunny abruptly lostinterest in the evening’s adventures when the sled came to a halt at the hole-in-the-wall exit. Oliver watched her bound off the vehicle, chortle a cheery farewell, and vanish into the maze of tunnels.

“Looks like the party’s over as far as she’s concerned,” he said.

Leona sighed. “I’m going to miss her.”

He got a shock of knowing.I’m going to miss you,Leona Griffin.

He turned to look at her, trying to pin down exactly what he was experiencing. It was as if he had just turned a corner in the Underworld and walked into a kaleidoscope of sensations. He was getting hard. This was not a good time for that particular distraction.

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