The Stars of Mithra: Hidden Star

It was after ten when they walked into his office. The cramped and dingy work space struck her as more than odd now that she’d seen how he lived. But she listened carefully as he tried to explain how to work the computer to type up his notes, how he thought the filing should be done, how to handle the phone and intercom systems.

When he left her alone to close himself in his office, Bailey surveyed the area. The philodendron lay on its side, spilling dirt. There was broken glass, sticky splotches from old coffee, and enough dust to shovel.

Typing would just have to wait, she decided. No one could possibly concentrate in such a mess.

From behind his desk, Cade used the phone to do his initial legwork. He tracked down his travel agent and, on the pretext of planning a vacation, asked her to locate any desert area where rockhounding was permitted. He told her he was exploring a new hobby.

From his research the night before, he’d learned quite a bit about the hobby of unearthing crystals and gems. The way Bailey had described her dream, he was certain that was just what she’d been up to.

Maybe she was from out west, or maybe she’d just visited there. Either way, it was another road to explore.

He considered calling in a gem expert to examine the diamond. But on the off chance that Bailey had indeed come into its possession by illegal means, he didn’t want to risk it.

He took the photographs he’d snapped the night before of the diamond and spread them out on his desk. Just how much would a gemologist be able to tell from pictures? he wondered.

It might be worth a try. Tuesday, when businesses were open again, he mused, he might take that road, as well.

But he had a couple of other ideas to pursue.

There was another road, an important one, that had to be traveled first. He picked up the phone again, began making calls. He pinned Detective Mick Marshall down at home.

“Damn it, Cade, it’s Saturday. I’ve got twenty starving people outside and burgers burning on the grill.”

“You’re having a party and didn’t invite me? I’m crushed.”

“I don’t have play cops at my barbecues.”

“Now you’ve really hurt my feelings. Did you earn that Scotch?”

“No match on those prints you sent me. Nothing popped.”

Cade felt twin tugs of relief and frustration. “Okay. Still no word on a missing rock?”

“Maybe if you told me what kind of rock.”

“A big glittery one. You’d know if it had been reported.”

“Nothing’s been reported, and I think the rocks are in your head, Parris. Now unless you’re going to share, I’ve got hungry mouths to feed.”

“I’ll get back to you on it. And the Scotch.”

He hung up, and spent some time thinking.

Lightning kept coming up in Bailey’s dreams. There’d been thunderstorms the night before she came into his office. It could be as simple as that—one of the last things she remembered was thunder and lightning. Maybe she had a phobia about storms.

She talked about the dark, too. There’d been some power outages downtown that night. He’d already checked on that. Maybe the dark was literal, rather than symbolic.

He guessed she’d been inside. She hadn’t spoken of rain, of getting wet. Inside a house? An office building? If whatever had happened to her had happened the night before she came to him, then it almost certainly had to have occurred in the D.C. area.

But no gem had been reported missing.

Three kept cropping up in her dreams, as well. Three stones. Three stars. Three women. A triangle.

Symbolic or real?

He began to take notes again, using two columns. In one he listed her dream memories as literal memories, in the other he explored the symbolism.

And the longer he worked, the more he leaned toward the notion that it was a combination of both.

He made one last call, and prepared to grovel. His sister Muffy had married into one of the oldest and most prestigious family businesses in the East. Westlake Jewelers.

When Cade stepped back into the outer office, his ears were still ringing and his nerves were shot. Those were the usual results of a conversation with his sister. But since he’d wangled what he wanted, he tried to take things in stride.

The shock of walking into a clean, ordered room and seeing Bailey efficiently rattling the keyboard on the computer went a long way toward brightening his mood.

“You’re a goddess.” He grabbed her hand, kissed it lavishly. “A worker of miracles.”

“This place was filthy. Disgusting.”

“Yeah, it probably was.”

Her brows lowered. “There was food molding in the file cabinets.”

“I don’t doubt it. You know how to work a computer.”

She frowned at the screen. “Apparently. It was like making the coffee this morning. No thought.”

“If you know how to work it, you know how to turn it off. Let’s go downtown. I’ll buy you an ice cream cone.”

“I’ve just gotten started.”

“It can wait.” He reached down to flick the switch, and she slapped his hand away.

“No. I haven’t saved it.” Muttering under her breath, she hit a series of keys with such panache, his heart swelled in admiration. “I’ll need several more hours to put things in order around here.”

“We’ll come back. We’ve got a couple hours to kick around, then we’ve got some serious work to do.”

“What kind of work?” she demanded as he hauled her to her feet.

“I’ve got you access to a refractometer.” He pulled her out the door. “What kind of ice cream do you want?”

Chapter 5

“Your brother-in-law owns Westlake Jewelers?”

“Not personally. It’s a family thing.”

“A family thing.” Bailey’s head was still spinning. Somehow she’d gone from cleaning molded sandwiches out of filing cabinets to eating strawberry ice cream on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. That was confusing enough, but the way Cade had whipped through traffic, zipping around circles and through yellow lights, had left her dizzy and disoriented.