Chapter 4 #4
The dragon froze. Demetri stopped breathing.
For one suspended instant, somewhere in the deep place where his magic lived, he felt something he had not expected — a small recognition, an answering pulse, the faint resonance of a sigil registering a reader who had been entrusted with its magic.
Had she sensed the elven magic? Or had the book chosen her?
The book was bonded to the Drakovich line, keyed at its forging to recognize a Drakovich descendant.
It should not, by any rational accounting of the world, have responded to a human cataloger from San Francisco named Veronica Sokolov.
And yet, over six weeks of quiet handling, it had given her a small instinctive understanding of its nature.
Demetri. The dragon’s voice was very quiet now. She has knowledge and yet knows nothing. She understands everything and nothing at the same time. I sense she is human. Fully. The book should not respond to her,
He set his hands flat on the table and kept his face blank.
He looked at the woman beside him — flushed, bright-eyed, holding her hands carefully clear of a page of the Drakovich family’s most guarded secrets, smiling at him, uncertain and hopeful, an expert who for once had been truly listened to — and he understood three things in the cold clarity a crisis always brought him.
The first: he had been an absolute idiot to ever imagine he could hurt her.
The second: he was not going to let anyone else kill her, either.
The third: he could not — could not — leave her in this building one more night.
He turned in his chair. “Ms. Lin.”
Margaret stepped forward from the head of the mezzanine, silent and professional, every instinct she’d built over thirty years on quiet alert. “Mr. Vasiliev.”
“I’d like to make you an offer in two parts.”
“Of course.”
“The first is the one we discussed downstairs. I’m acquiring the entire Crowe lot at the premium I quoted, and I’ll require the inventory moved to a private facility on my estate immediately — by tomorrow morning, if your logistics allow.
I’ll cover every expense: overtime, insurance riders, any cost you incur on the expediency. ”
Margaret’s professional face didn’t move, though her eyes were calculating. “That can be arranged.”
“The second part is more delicate.” He laid a hand near the book, not touching it.
“I’d like to retain Ms. Sokolov as a private consultant to complete the cataloging on-site, at my estate.
The materials are unusually specialized, and her language skills make her uniquely qualified.
I’d expect the engagement to run six to nine months.
I’ll reimburse Whitfield, Marsh and Sampson for her time at twice her current salary, paid directly to the firm, and I’ll compensate her personally, separately, on a bonus structure we’d negotiate in private — once she’s had the chance to consider whether the assignment interests her. ”
Beside him, Nica had gone completely still.
He didn’t look at her. He looked at Margaret, and the calculation in her eyes brightened into the polite, incredulous wonder of a senior cataloger who’d just been handed the largest single acquisition in WMS’s quarterly cycle, plus an indefinite consulting reimbursement at double rate, plus a graceful arrangement that let her keep her best cataloger on her own roster.
She gathered herself. “Mr. Vasiliev, WMS does have a climate-controlled secure storage facility downtown. State of the art. The Crowe lot is catalogued under our highest-tier protocol. If your concern is security, I can assure you our facility —”
“I’m sure your facility is excellent, Ms. Lin.” He said it gently. He had no intention of arguing the point.
Their facility would not hold us for forty seconds, the dragon observed, almost amused.
Twenty, Demetri thought back. And we would not need to break anything. We would walk in through the front desk in a suit.
Less than twenty.
He kept his face neutral. “The materials in this lot are unusually sensitive,” he said aloud.
“Several items have provenances I’m not yet able to discuss publicly.
I’d prefer to consolidate the entire collection on my own grounds, under my own arrangements.
The acquisition price reflects that preference.
The consulting arrangement reflects my wish to ensure the cataloging continues with the only person on the western seaboard qualified to do it. ”
Margaret hadn’t, strictly speaking, been outmaneuvered — but Demetri knew she wouldn’t argue with a man handing her a quarter-million-dollar consulting reimbursement on top of her bonus. She inclined her head. “Of course, Mr. Vasiliev. The arrangement is entirely at your discretion.”
“Thank you.”
He turned, finally, to Nica. She was watching him with her lips parted and her hands frozen on the book, her cheeks flushed, and the dragon was making a sound that was almost a purr.
He let himself have the sight of her for one full second — the flush, the parted lips, the bright astonished eyes — and filed it away with the rest of what he’d already decided never to lose.
“Ms. Sokolov,” he said quietly. “I would not commit you to anything without your consent. The decision is yours. If the arrangement interests you, I’d be honored to host you on my estate for the length of the contract.
And if it doesn’t —” he smiled, slightly, for the first time since he’d walked into the warehouse “— I’ll respect that, of course, and Ms. Lin and I will find another way.
I’ll find a Russian scholar to finish it. ”