Silver Master by Jayne Castle Read Free Book Online

get home tonight.”
    So much for that ploy. Nevertheless, she sniffed and blinked furiously, as though trying to suppress a flood of tears. “I have your card, Mr. Oakes.” She added a delicate sob to her voice. “I’ll give you a call if she ever shows up again and brings back the relic.”
    â€œYou do that.” He went back out into the hall. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some work to do. See you at seven tonight.”
    That stopped her cold. She cleared her throat. “I, uh, sort of assumed that this new development meant our date was probably off.”
    He paused and looked back at her. “Guess again, Miss Ingram. You and I are going to be spending a lot of time in each other’s company until that damn relic reappears.”
    She knew a threat when she heard one.
    â€œNo offense, Mr. Oakes, but under the circumstances, I don’t think it would be a comfortable evening for either of us. What do you say we postpone the issue of a date until we see whether or not Araminta comes back with the artifact?”
    â€œNot a chance,” Davis said. “By the way, under the circumstances , you can forget about taking a cab to the restaurant. Something tells me you might not show up.”
    â€œOh, good grief, if I say I’ll be there, I’ll be there.”
    â€œI’ll pick you up.”
    â€œYou don’t have my address.”
    â€œNot a problem. I’m a private investigator, remember? I find things. You’d better believe I’ll find you.”

Chapter 3
    SHE MUST HAVE SENSED THE ENERGY THAT HAD PULSED between them. He couldn’t have been the only one who had felt that high-rez stuff ricocheting back and forth back there in her office. Or was he?
    Davis got out of the parking garage elevator and made his way through the rows of cars to where he had left the Phantom. He was still half-aroused.
    Max was waiting for him when he reached the car. The dust bunny was napping on the passenger seat in his favorite position, flat on his back, all six paws up in the air. When Davis opened the door, he stretched, opened his blue eyes, rolled over, and made little chortling sounds.
    â€œHey, there, buddy.”
    They did the brief greeting ritual, which consisted of him patting Max on the top of his furry head and Max bouncing up and down a little.
    â€œI should have taken you in there with me,” Davis said. “You might have saved the day. Takes a dust bunny to catch a dust bunny, I always say. As it is, we’ve got a whole lot of new problems.”
    He set the briefcase on the floor on the passenger side. Max hopped up onto the back of the seat where he had an excellent view. Max liked riding in cars.
    Instead of rezzing the engine, Davis sat for a moment, hands resting on the wheel, trying to suppress the unfamiliar sense of anticipation and hungry excitement that was flooding his veins.
    â€œDamn near knocked me off my feet, Max. Felt about nineteen again. And it’s not like she could ever get hired to read the evening news on the rez-screen. I mean, she’s attractive, okay? But not in the usual way. She’s, I dunno, different .”
    Max made understanding noises.
    Different. That was it, he thought. She wasn’t perfect. In his experience, perfect was pleasant to look at, but it was never interesting for long. Perfection never made you curious. It never raised any questions. Everything was on the surface with perfect. You knew in your gut that, in the end, perfect was going to be boring long-term.
    No, Celinda Ingram was not perfect. What she was, he thought, was fascinating. Fascinating always carried some risk.
    He looked through the windshield at the Slider parked nose to nose with the Phantom and summoned up a mental image of the mysterious woman in the office four floors above him.
    Hair the color of rich, dark amber, caught up in a severe knot at the back of her head, a couple of wisps dangling down