"I want to believe you," he said. "Please help me."
"Let me ask you this," Shan said. "When did you get the crane?"
"Fair enough," Ian said. Thankfully, he also turned his head and faced forward again, removing that powerful gaze from the side of her face. "My parents gave me the statue ten years ago, as a graduation present when I got my Ph.D. They bought it at a private auction the autumn before. It had no papers, no recorded archaeological context, so I didn't donate it to a museum, as I do with most of their other gifts."
"Ten years," said Shan. "That's a long time." She turned left down a small side road when Ian pointed at it. "My family has owned that particular statue for almost fifteen hundred years."
She heard Ian's breath falter. "That's a long time, too," he said.
"That statue and its four siblings have been guarded by my ancestors for more generations than I can count. It's the cornerstone of our past and our future, of our power and our pride." Ian pointed again, and Shan turned right, fast. The tires squealed. "So you tell me, Professor. Which one of us is the thief?"
Before he could answer, Shan saw the bright neon sign advertising the Mighty Marmoset Sports Bar. What kind of stupid mascot was a marmoset? She whipped the car into an open spot just past the door, yanked on the parking brake, and looked at Ian. The car continued to rumble beneath them. Shan shifted into park and twisted the ignition to off. The engine died, and silence filled the vehicle.
"I'm--"
"No. Save it," Shan said. "This isn't the time. Let's just shelve the name calling and get out of this alive. Okay?"
She turned to Ian, forcing herself to look him in the eyes, even though she really wanted to just stare at his shoulder, or look past him out the window. She was afraid to see the effect of her words, and angry that she had let herself lash out. Most people didn't understand. They didn't have the kind of past she had, the kind of responsibility. But Ian was an archaeologist dedicated to finding the truth about ancient cultures. Something told her that he would understand, or at least try to. He didn't deserve the guilt trip she was trying to foist on him. She looked into his eyes, silently begging him to say something.
"Okay," he said quietly. Shan's gut twisted. That wasn't the something she'd been hoping for. An arrogant backlash would have made it easier for her to maintain her anger and resolve. Hell, everything would be easier if she didn't like Ian. She could take the statue and leave him to run to the police for safety. It wasn't her fault that Ian had the crane, or that his friend Buckley was clueless enough to have it photographed. It wasn't her fault, and they weren't her responsibility.
But her mother would disagree. The women of the Jade Circle devoted themselves to the protection of the helpless, the underdogs. The Circle was broken, but Shan couldn't knowingly dishonor its mission.
"Let's go meet Buckley."
Ian said nothing as they got out of the car and walked into the bar. If his head was bothering him, he hid it well behind a mask of determination. Already, she missed his quirky smile. She couldn't help but feel like she had banished it.
The Mighty Marmoset was a small, dark room filled with the raucous noise of a hockey game blaring on the multitude of TV sets embedded in the walls. Taped, no doubt, since few people played hockey in the middle of the night. The place smelled of cheap beer and greasy pizza. About half of the tables and ripped-vinyl booths were occupied by students, their books and papers and cups of coffee or beer arrayed before them like objects on an altar. Shan was momentarily glad that she had skipped the whole college thing. They looked like zombies.
Except for one.
The man from the magazine article, Dr. Daniel Buckley, sat in a booth with an almost-empty plastic cup of beer in one hand and a fistful of pretzels in another. He had a round face, a crop of short blond hair, and a stocky build. More like an ex-football player gone soft than a man using his brain for a living.
"Bucks," Ian said. Shan nodded and motioned for Ian to go first. He squeezed into the booth opposite Buckley, and Shan followed, the messenger bag nestled safely between them. Shan looked up to find Buckley unapologetically scanning her features and breasts.
"I thought you were grading exams tonight, Dash," said Buckley, keeping his eyes on Shan.
Shan raised an eyebrow and smirked. Oh, joy. Buckley possessed a frat boy attitude to match his looks.
"I
was
grading exams," Ian said quickly. Too quickly. Shan kept her eyes on Buckley, just in case Ian was blushing. For a second, though, she felt her smile become just a bit more genuine than she'd intended.
"Oh?" said Buckley. "Then I should borrow your syllabus." He extended one meaty paw--thankfully not the one full of pretzels--toward Shan. "Daniel Buckley.
Professor
Daniel Buckley."
How, exactly, was the man making every sentence feel lewd? It was a true talent. Shan shook his hand, irritated that she hadn't washed the blood off her knuckles back at Ian's house.
"Shan."
Buckley stared deep into her eyes as he changed his grip and pulled her hand toward his mouth for a kiss. Shan smiled sweetly and let him. Was it her fault he was such a stereotypical schmuck? Too bad Buckley looked down at the last second, even as his big, football-player lips were ready to brush her flesh. Apparently, Buckley wasn't a big fan of blood. He dropped her hand instantly and scanned Ian's battered face.
"What the hell is going on here?"
"If you're done looking like an idiot, I'll tell you," Ian said. Shan pulled her hand back but left it on the table. She enjoyed the idea that it might make Buckley squirm.
Ian told Buckley about the crane. He had Shan produce the magazine article. He left out the details of their fight, saying only that the thief had killed the security guard, and that they'd barely escaped with their lives. The account was efficient and accurate, up to a point. She admired Ian's apparent understanding of what Buckley needed to know, and what he didn't need to know. Shrewd, that's what Ian was. Maybe he and Buckley would be able to evade the bad guys after all.
"Okay," said Buckley. He tossed a pretzel into his mouth and proceeded to talk while eating it. "Assuming I believe you, which I probably do, what's next?" He threw two more pretzels in. "I bet there's some great reason why we can't go to the police, right?"
Shan and Ian looked at each other. Her turn.
"Yes, there is," she said. "The people who want the crane have a lot of money. The police, no matter where we are, can't be trusted."
"Now wait a minute--"
"The crane belongs to me and my family," Shan continued, "but I doubt the Chinese government would see it that way. I can't afford to have the authorities involved."
"Come on, Bucks, you know how governments get with their trinkets," Ian said. Shan disliked the word trinket, but she suspected Ian had chosen it on purpose.
"Yeah, I know how it is," Buckley said, "but this means you're picking up the tab, Dash. And I'm about to get very, very drunk."
"No, you're not," Shan said. "You and Ian need to get out of town, tonight. As soon as we're done talking."
"Wait a minute--" Ian tried.
"Look, you either go on vacation before that goon comes back, or you'll be lucky to live out the week." Shan looked at Buckley. "Do you understand?"
"It can't be as bad as that," Buckley said.
"Oh, yes it can," Shan snapped. "That security guard, the one with the billy club he never got to pull out of its holder, was dead in seconds." The security guard's distorted face filled Shan's mind. She thought of Ian's head twisted unnaturally, his neck purple and ugly. No. She couldn't let that happen. Ian had a brain. Ian would understand.
"I don't understand," Ian said. "It's okay for you to risk your life, but not for me? Or Bucks?" he added.
"Exactly right," said Shan. She took a quick look around the room, but no one seemed to be paying attention to them. Good. "I have no doubt that you guys mean well, but you're professors. You need to stick to your books and let me handle this."
Buckley snorted. "It's not like we're historians," he said. "We're archaeologists!"
Shan raised an eyebrow.
"Archaeologists are made of sterner stuff," Ian said, his tone and expression deadly serious.
Shan couldn't help it. She laughed.
Buckley turned to Ian. "She obviously hasn't seen you in a pit. The man wields a mean trowel."
"Okay, not even I can keep my dignity with praise like that," Ian said.
Shan laughed again. Damn. She liked Ian, and now even Buckley was starting to grown on her.
Which, of course, was all the more reason to send them off someplace far away. Someplace safe.
"I could try to blackmail you," Ian said. "I've got an almost photographic memory, and there's a dead man back at the university. You didn't do it, but it would take you a long time to untangle yourself from the mess if I gave them a good description of you."
"You wouldn't--"
"No, I wouldn't," said Ian. "I'm merely trying to illustrate some of my options."
"And now that's my option, too," said Buckley.
Ian frowned at Buckley. "Bucks, the point was that I'm not going to use blackmail. You're undermining my argument."
"Right. Sorry," said Buckley. "Please continue." He tossed three more pretzels into his mouth and chomped down.
Shan looked back at Ian, her irritation growing. It was late. Her leg ached from the cut, and every time she moved, the dried blood cracked and reopened the wound. Worse, she was sitting on a vinyl seat in a collegetown bar at almost three o'clock in the morning. She should have just taken the crane and disappeared.
Ian cleared his throat. "As I was saying, I have no intention of turning you in to the police, or of reporting the crane missing, or anything like that--"
"What a relief," Shan said wryly.
"--but I do think we can help each other out." Ian leaned in. Shan and Buckley followed suit. This close, Shan could smell the beer on Buckley's breath and hear the crunching of his jaw as he ate his pretzels.
"We're in danger," continued Ian. "Bucks and me. Big danger." He spared a glance at Buckley, who simply shrugged his agreement. "And you need the other jade animals," he said to Shan. She hadn't told him about the other animals, but yet he knew. How? She nodded slowly. Ian took a big breath. "And I think I know where the next piece is. The dragon. I know where the dragon is."
Shan stilled the muscles of her face, forcing herself to remain calm. "Tell me," Shan said, her voice quiet and dark. Then she remembered what Ian had been through this night, and added, "Please."
Ian opened his mouth to speak, but it was Buckley's voice she heard.
"Oh, shit."
Shan turned toward the front door in time to see her one-eyed opponent from the university send three well-toned men and one dangerous-looking woman in their direction.
"Why do bars always lead to bar fights?" Shan muttered as she squeezed out of the booth.
Shan stood up next to their booth and reached back to grab the crane. Ian snatched the messenger bag just before her fingers got hold of it and slipped the strap over his head.
"Go. Fight," he said. "I'll take care of this."
Shan frowned, but only for a second. Then she had to turn and throw the first man over her shoulder and into a table full of books and empty plastic cups. People flew pretty far when you used their own momentum against them, but Shan was still surprised at the loud crack of the table breaking and the ensuing chaos.
The other bar patrons scrambled to gather their things and headed for the back door. Actually, there weren't as many screams as she had expected. Perhaps the late hour or general inebriation of the crowd was to blame. Or maybe bar fights had become passé from overuse. The bartender, a burly fellow in a tight black T-shirt, remained stoic behind the bar, watching. He must have tripped the silent police alarm. That gave them less than ten minutes to get the hell out of Dodge.
Shan tried to keep herself between the bad guys and the booth. She told herself she was protecting the crane, but she really didn't want to see Ian take another blow to the head, or worse. If he knew where the dragon was, she needed him alive and thinking clearly.
Yeah, that was the reason. It had nothing to do with Ian's boyish smile, lanky frame, or sense of humor.
Shan dodged and kicked, blocked and rolled. Behind her, she heard Buckley trading punches with one of the goons. Luckily, One-eye stayed by the door. He must have been severely injured in their previous tussle. The woman came at Shan. Probably in her late thirties, she wore an army-green tank top and a pair of tight, black jeans. Her blonde hair was pulled out of her face in a long ponytail.
The woman drove her heeled boot into Shan's chest with astounding speed. Shan stumbled backward, gasping for breath. She grabbed the offending boot and twisted it sharply. Ponytail had no choice but to spin horizontally through the air in order to keep her knee from breaking.
"We have to get out of here!" Shan yelled.
"Tell me about it," Ian growled. Shan caught a glimpse of him throwing a handful of something white--salt?--in his opponent's eyes. Smart lad.
"Okay," said Buckley. He ducked under a goon's fist and thrust upward into the man's groin. "But you'd better take us the hell with you, then."
Shan leaped backward, narrowly avoiding another one of Ponytail's lightning kicks. She countered by spinning around and whipping out her foot, heel first, at the last minute. Ponytail ducked just in time and shoved upward, upsetting Shan's balance. Shan used her leg's sudden change in direction to flip over backward to get out of Ponytail's range.
"If you've got a brilliant plan, Buckley, let's see it," said Shan. "The police will be here before we can finish this."
The next sound Shan heard was a gun being cocked. Such a small sound, and, at the same time, so deafening. The room fell silent instantly.
"Okay, back off," said Buckley, his voice low and steady.
Shan turned and saw some sort of gun held solidly in Buckley's hands. He seemed calm as he pointed it first at one goon, then the next. Wisely, the goons backed up.
"Don't suppose you have a permit to carry a concealed weapon?" Ian asked quietly.
"Not exactly," said Buckley.
"Brilliant."
"Come on, boys," Shan said. "We'll have time to point fingers later." She backed toward the rear of the bar and motioned for Ian to follow. She needn't have bothered. Ian was already moving, clutching the messenger bag to his side. Buckley came last, the look in his eyes cold as he stared at their opponents.
"You will die," said One-eye in Mandarin.
"But not before you do," Shan answered. And then they were off, running for Buckley's car. Shan's rental was still parked in front. Buckley tucked the gun back in his waistband.
"We'll have to ditch the gun," Shan said.
"This gun just saved our lives." Buckley pulled keys out of his pocket and pressed the key fob. A huge Explorer beeped and blinked a few feet away.
Shan let Buckley slip past her before opening the rear passenger door. "Even so," she said, "we're not going to make it through the airport with that thing."
"The airport?" Buckley got into the driver's seat and slammed the door shut. Shan looked at Ian, who was now buckling himself into the front passenger seat.
"The airport," Ian said. "We're all going to France."
Buckley shifted into reverse and took them out of the parking lot at a disturbing speed. "France," he said. "That's one hell of a road trip."
"We'll need to stop by your houses and get your passports," Shan said. "If I create a distraction, can you..."
In the front seat, the men were looking at each other and grinning. Almost as one, they each reached into their back pockets and pulled out little blue books.
"Archaeologists," Ian said. "Remember?"
"Sterner stuff," said Buckley, as if that explained it all.
And in the backseat, Shan rolled down her window and laughed.
"Coffee or tea?" asked the flight attendant.
"No, thank you," said Shan. Ian sat beside her, asleep. He'd insisted on stopping at a pay phone to call his teaching assistant before they left. Shan didn't want to risk it--didn't want to stop for anything. But her mission was about duty. She didn't want to be the kind of hypocrite that would deny Ian the right to fulfill his.
Buckley was back five rows and on the other side of the plane, also asleep, if he knew what was good for him. Shan held the crane on her lap, covered by a thin blue airline blanket. She ran her hands over the crane's wings and age-dulled beak. More than fifteen years had passed since she'd seen or touched it.
Fifteen years since she'd watched her mother's early morning martial arts rituals, brought her mother tea, or even hugged her. It was strange, but even after all this time, Shan could remember every detail. Her mother's black eyes that breathed red dragon flames when she was angry. The pink silk dress she wore all the time, embroidered with butterflies and hummingbirds. Shan hated that dress. Pink looked terrible on her mother. But her mother laughed when Shan complained. "Many things which appear to be opposites are actually perfect for each other," she would say. "A sword and a scabbard exist for very different purposes, yet wouldn't you say they were meant to be together?" Shan remembered pouting, not wanting to think about yet another one of her mother's riddles.
"Those look like pleasant memories."
Shan covered the crane at the sound of the voice, but it was just Ian.
"You should be asleep," she said quietly. "You need your rest."
"Oh, and you don't? Even superheroes need to sleep."
In the quiet light of the nighttime airplane, Ian's eyes seemed impossibly dark. His hair stuck up in a variety of all-new directions. Maybe that was the style he was going for, after all, she mused. It certainly captured his carefree charm well enough.
"I'm not a superhero," she said, still rubbing the crane.
But my mother certainly was
, she added silently.
Ian leaned his head closer to hers when he talked, probably so they wouldn't disturb the elderly lady sleeping to his right. His shoulder pressed against hers, his left arm touching the length of hers along the armrest. Shan felt suddenly aware of her own breathing and the tremendous effort it seemed to be taking.
"You're not going to give me some crap about being just an ordinary woman, are you?" Ian said.
Shan turned her face toward his. They were remarkably close now in the darkness. More intimate than a candlelight dinner at some fancy restaurant, with the white noise of the airplane creating a cushion of sound all around them.
"There's nothing ordinary about being a woman," Shan countered. "A few of my skills just happen to be a bit more exotic than most. But you should see me try to make scrambled eggs," she said, smiling. "I'd trade all my flying kicks for a decent scrambled egg skill any day."
Ian laughed softly. "Eggs, it turns out, are one of my specialties. Eggs and every form of potato you can cook over a campfire."
"Another archaeologist skill?"
"You bet," he said. "It's not all monkey brains and live snakes like Indiana Jones would have you believe."
"I don't know," Shan said, "monkey brains don't sound so bad after that so-called meal they served us an hour ago. I think the ham sandwich is trying to pick a fight with my stomach."
"What? You don't know stomach-fu? That's a shame." Ian's arm rubbed against hers, probably accidentally. Shan leaned in, casually increasing the pressure. And the heat. She felt the skin on the back of her neck tingle. Ian smiled. "Being defeated by a ham sandwich is pretty pathetic. Worse even than saying 'greeb,' I'd wager."
"Oh, now you're pushing your luck," Shan said. Or did she just mean to say that? She found herself staring into the playful shadows of Ian's face, fascinated by the way his lips curled at the ends when he smiled.
These sensations came with little red warning flags. At this point, Ian was practically covered in the damn things. So many men say they aren't threatened by your strength, Shan thought. They say it more to convince themselves than to convince you. Trouble is, you end up believing them just when they figure out the truth.
"Something's wrong," Ian said.
"No," said Shan, too quickly. She took a deep breath and smiled. "Tell me about your life since you graduated."
Ian raised an eyebrow. "You mean since I got the crane?"
"Busted," Shan admitted.
Ian leaned back in his chair and sighed.
"When I was in college--no, even before that. From the first time I went with my father to a museum--I was all of eight--I've been fascinated with the past." Ian's voice was more than wistful, thought Shan. It sounded almost euphoric. "I read voraciously, I traveled with my parents and made them drag me to castle ruins, museums, and even lectures. I studied languages."
"A man with a mission," Shan said. Maybe Ian would be able to understand her mission and how important it was to her. How it
was
her.
"Everything was great up through grad school," Ian continued. "I went on digs, I worked on my thesis, I made contacts. Everyone thought I was really going places."
"And somewhere in there you met Rachel?" Shan asked.
Ian blushed. Or was it just another shadow appearing on his face? Hard to tell. "Yes, on a dig. We both thought it was love, but we were both too ambitious. Neither one of us wanted to move or change areas of study or make sacrifices of any kind. So I guess it wasn't."
"So what happened after grad school?" Shan asked.
Ian gave a quiet snort. "Well, now, that's the real question, isn't it?" He shook his head, as if in disbelief. "Everything just sort of slowed down. I got my job at the university and I just started doing it. I got a respectable and thoroughly unexciting archeology project lined up in Ireland, and I've been making slow, unexciting progress on it for the last ten years." Ian shrugged. "What happened after college? The hell if I know."
But Shan did. She held the reason in her hands, hidden beneath a thin piece of synthetic fabric. The crane represented balance and grace. Shan had been foolish to think those virtues alone would have solved her problems. Balance, by itself, was just stasis.
"I'm...I'm feeling a little tired," Shan said. "I'm going to try to catch some sleep."
"Sounds like a good plan," Ian said, but he had that same look of concerned suspicion he'd worn earlier in the conversation.
She didn't want to explain. Her muscles ached. She felt grimy from all the traveling and fighting. She was afraid their current trip to France, which was testing the limits of her last credit card, would be for nothing. Or worse, would get one of them killed.
Her brain simply couldn't handle the idea that she'd somehow failed Ian as well as her mother. She should have found the five Jade Circle animals years ago. If she added the guilt of Ian's ruined life to her shoulders, she was afraid she just might collapse from the weight.
One thing was certain, however. Shan would happily let Ian carry the crane for the rest of this trip. She couldn't afford to be swayed by its power, to lose her focus. Not when the pieces--ancient and powerful--were finally starting to fall into place.
"I look like a raspberry muffin," said Shan, regarding herself critically in the mirror of a small tourist shop at the airport. She wore a puffy pink jacket, a striped knit hat, and matching gloves. Price tags dangled as she twisted and turned before her reflection.
"I'll give you strawberry muffin," Ian said diplomatically, "or even watermelon, if they made such a thing. But you're simply too pink to be raspberry."
"Gee, thanks," said Shan. "Are you sure this is the only one in my size?"
"Let me get this straight," said Buckley, leaning against the shop wall near a stack of stuffed animals dressed in skiing outfits, "you have no problem with Ian and me dressed like friggin' Pillsbury doughboys, but you've got a problem with pink?"
Shan looked at Ian, resplendent in a white jacket with orange lightning bolts along his sleeves, and then Buckley, who was trying to look cool in a light-blue jacket with the words "SKI GOD" written on the back.
Shan sighed. "We're going to get attacked before we even find the bad guys in these things."
"C'est la vie," said Ian, with an accent that made Shan melt. "Let's pay and hit the road."
"Ooh, look who's mister French all of a sudden," said Buckley.
Ian held up his hands defensively. "Hey, I'm not the one who decided to study Swahili because a certain 'golden-skinned goddess' was in the class. You made your bed, now lie in it."
"And so I did," chuckled Buckley. Then he said something that somehow managed to sound lewd in what Shan could only assume was Swahili.
She couldn't complain, though, because Buckley pulled out a credit card and paid for all their clothes without a word. Then again, this whole stop had been his idea, once Ian had said they were headed for the Alps. Shan probably would have trudged ahead without thinking about the cold. It was that damn tiger mentality again. Maybe being around Ian and Buckley was a good thing, as long as she could keep them both safe.