It Takes a Psychic

Chapter One

The dust bunny chortled from underneath a nearby display stand.

Leona Griffin paused her examination of the curiously shaped crystal object she had just removed from one of the glass cases and looked around the heavily shadowed gallery.

It had been a long evening and the annual reception of the exclusive Antiquarian Society was far from over. In a desperate attempt to stave off boredom, she had left the crowded ballroom to check out the organization's impressive collection of paranormal antiquities. The realization that a dust bunny had found its way into the private museum was a lot more interesting than the small sculpture she had just plucked from the case.

She did not see any movement in the shadows, but the dust bunny chortled again, more insistently this time.

She put the crystal artifact back into the case. The label claimed it was Old World, circa the nineteenth century. The dating was accurate, in her professional opinion. She was never wrong when it came to authenticating artifacts and antiquities. It was one of her talents, the one she used to make a living as a para-archaeologist. There was a vibe of paranormal energy in the crystal. That was what had qualified it to be displayed in the gallery. Only artifacts of power were acquired by the Society's museum. Every object in the dimly lit space had a paranormal provenance. The result was that the atmosphere in the room was infused with a buzz of energy that lifted the hair on the back of her neck.

She was sure the object had been stolen, most likely from a private collector who had not reported the theft for fear of drawing attention to other objects of questionable provenance in their collection. The trade in illegal artifacts was a booming business, and it was accompanied by the equally profitable side hustle of collector-on-collector crime.

The dust bunny chortled again. Not a cheerful chortle, she decided. It sounded more like a plea. Maybe a cry for help.

"Where are you?" she asked. "I can hear you but I can't see you."

Sensing that she was paying attention, the dust bunny fluttered out from under a glass case.

"There you are," Leona whispered.

The dust bunny came to a stop directly in front of her and rose to its full height on its hind paws. She was not a tall woman but she was wearing very high heels tonight. The top of the dust bunny's head, with the tips of two ears poking through the gray fur, did not even reach her knee.

Dust bunnies were cute. Until they were not. As the saying went, By the time you see the teeth, it's too late. They were small, but they were omnivores-not vegetarians.

The good news was that the one in front of her was in what she thought of as adorable mode-fully fluffed with only its bright blue eyes open. It was not sleeked out, and the other two eyes-the ones used for hunting-were closed. If it weren't for the blue eyes and the six little paws peeping through its gray fur, it could have been mistaken for a large wad of dryer lint.

It chortled again. Leona whisked up the skirts of her ankle-length evening gown and crouched in front of the dust bunny. It was not an easy maneuver, given the four-inch heels. For some reason-there was no obvious physical evidence because of all the fur-she decided she was dealing with a female.

"What's wrong?" she asked. "You don't look like you're injured or sick. Are you trapped in here? I'll bet you want me to find a door and open it so you can leave. No problem. I wish I could go with you. Rarely have I been so bored."

Aiding and abetting the dust bunny's escape would be a trifle easier said than done, because the entire mansion was a fortress protected by sophisticated quartz-tech security and cameras. But she was good when it came to that sort of stuff. She had a talent for picking locks.

She stood and checked the time on her low-tech, amber-powered watch. Her work as a para-archaeologist took her into the Underworld, where high-tech devices, such as quartz-powered watches, did not function. The sturdy timepiece was not a stylish look with the formal evening gown, upswept hair, and heels, but she had refused to buy a more fashionable one for the evening.

The rest of her accessories were equally functional-amber earrings, a small amber-trimmed evening bag, and an amber-studded bracelet. All of the amber was tuned and could be used in an emergency to navigate the psi-heavy atmosphere of the Underworld. When your work took you down into the tunnels on a regular basis, you got into the habit of carrying plenty of nav amber.

The only other piece of jewelry was the small yellow crystal pendant she wore around her neck. But it was tucked out of sight beneath the draped bodice of the gown.

"I've got time," she said to the dust bunny. "I'm not due onstage for another fifteen minutes. I'm the entertainment, you see. That's because I'm temporarily famous."

The dust bunny did not appear interested in her status as the star attraction of the evening.

Leona glanced at the closed door of the gallery. The muffled rumble of voices and laughter infused with alcohol and the egos of a couple of hundred wealthy, obsessive, highly competitive collectors reverberated through it. The reception was in full swing. No one would miss her, not until it was time for her to go onstage. She was not a member of the Society. She was a lowly assistant professor in the Department of Para-Archaeology at Hollister University. In the eyes of the reception guests, she ranked a notch or two above the caterers and the valet parking staff but well below the elite people gathered in the mansion tonight.

She turned and started toward a hallway on the far side of the gallery. "Follow me. There's an emergency exit at the end of that corridor. Don't worry, I can override the alarm system."

The dust bunny growled. Startled, she looked back. The creature chortled approvingly and hustled off toward another darkened hallway.

The message was clear. Follow me.

She hesitated and then hurried after the dust bunny.

"Okay, I'm coming."

With one last glance over her shoulder, she followed the dust bunny into the shadowed hallway. There was a door at the far end. It proved to be secured with a high-tech psi-lock. There was also a sign emblazoned with the words Unauthorized Entry Prohibited. Alarm Will Sound. Violators Will Be Prosecuted.

The dust bunny stopped and chortled, pleading this time.

"Well, crap," Leona said. "This is probably not a good idea."

The dust bunny trembled. It took a lot to frighten a dust bunny.

"All right," Leona said. "I'll open the door, but I swear, if this is all about getting you inside that room so that you can find a shiny new toy, I'm going to be very annoyed. You do realize I will be arrested if I get caught, right?"

The dust bunny scratched at the door.

Leona took a deep breath. There was no point in dithering. She had made her decision a moment ago when she had followed the dust bunny into the hallway.

She touched the lock with her fingertips and focused her senses. The vibe of the paranormal mechanism registered immediately. She found the pattern and gently probed for the anchor vibe. It took only a few seconds to flatline it.

There was a faint click as the hidden bolt slid aside. The dust bunny bounced up and down, more agitated than ever.

"Shush," Leona said. "No noise. We don't want anyone to hear us."

She eased the door open. The dust bunny squeezed past her and fluttered into the darkened room. She heard muffled chortling-but not from her newfound companion. There were more dust bunnies inside the chamber.

She could make out only the shadowy outlines of what looked like a couple of laboratory benches. She took her phone out of her purse, rezzed the flashlight, and swung the beam around the room.

Her initial impressions were confirmed. She was in a laboratory stocked with state-of-the-art equipment and instruments. She recognized the various items immediately. She worked with similar devices in the lab at Hollister University.

It was not surprising that the Society possessed its own antiquities research lab. The shocking discovery was the large glass cage on one side of the room. There were three dust bunnies inside. They were sleeked out, all four eyes and a lot of teeth showing. When she went toward them, they immediately fluffed up and chortled hopefully.

"Keep it down, guys," she whispered. "Don't worry, I'll get you out."

The dust bunnies evidently got the message. They went silent, shivering with anticipation as she approached the cage.

"How in the world did they manage to catch you?" she asked. Then she saw the empty pizza carton on the bottom of the cage. "Okay, I guess that explains a few things."

The psi-lock was relatively simple. It had been designed to keep the dust bunnies inside, not to keep humans from opening it. She touched it with her fingertips, rezzed her senses, and unlocked the door.

The dust bunnies tumbled out. They bounced up and down in front of her-she got the feeling she was being thanked, and then all of them-including the one that had gotten her attention in the gallery and led her to the lab-dashed out the door and vanished into the dark hallway. Evidently they didn't need her help to escape the mansion.

"Guess my work here is done," she said under her breath.

But the discovery of the imprisoned dust bunnies put a new light on the Society. She had been well aware that the organization was one of the university's major donors-that was why she had been sent to the gala-and she'd suspected that several of the members dabbled in the gray market. Avid collectors were obsessive by nature. They rarely went out of their way to ensure the legal provenance of valuable artifacts.

But discovering that the Society was conducting research using dust bunnies as test subjects was too much. It could not be overlooked. She would report the news to the director of the para-archaeology department when she met with him in the morning. Morton Bullinger might be willing to ignore issues of sketchy provenances, but even he could not ignore this. He would have to take the information to the university's board of directors and they would be forced to confront the endowment fund people. There was no way the institution could continue to accept money from the Society.

She started toward the door. She was tempted to examine some of the more interesting artifacts on the workbenches, but she had taken enough risks. She could not afford to get caught inside the lab.

She changed her mind when the beam of her flashlight swept across a gracefully curved black crystal bowl in a glass case. She could feel the disturbing vibe of power in the object from across the room.

Curious, she went closer and rezzed her senses a little. The bowl was definitely Alien in origin and there was a lot of energy locked in the object. Fascinated, she put her fingertips on the lock of the glass case.

A sharp frisson of awareness sparked across her senses, rattling her already tense nerves. She was no longer alone. She whirled around, struggling to come up with a believable explanation for her obviously illicit presence in the lab. She was good at thinking on her feet but there were not a lot of options here. Something along the lines of the classic I was looking for the restroom would have to do. It was weak, but combined with her temporarily famous status and her connection to the university, it might work.

She opened her mouth to start talking very fast but she went blank when the beam of her flashlight illuminated the man in the slightly rumpled tux standing in the doorway. She recognized him immediately. She had picked him out of the crowd earlier in the evening when she realized she was being watched. Somehow she had known he was the one who had been keeping an eye on her. She had concluded that he was either undercover security or a professional antiquities thief. The one thing she had been certain of was that he was not the boring, harmless-looking collector he was pretending to be.

Oh, shit.

"Good evening, Dr. Griffin," he said. He adjusted his black-framed glasses. "I thought I'd lost you. Are you selecting a little souvenir to take with you when you leave tonight? I don't blame you. There are some very nice items in the Society's collection."

Chapter Two

He thought she was a thief.

Under the circumstances, that made sense-after all, she was not supposed to be in the lab. But that left his own status unclarified. Was he a security guard, or did he plan to steal one of the artifacts himself? If she were a betting woman, she would have put her money down on the latter possibility. She was quite sure she was dealing with a professional thief. He probably saw her as competition and, maybe, a threat.

There was nothing notable about him-nothing at all-and that was precisely what had given her goose bumps. A man like this one ought not be the sort who got overlooked in a crowd, yet that was exactly what had happened out there in the ballroom. He had moved through the throng of well-dressed guests as if he were a ghost.

Not that he went completely unnoticed. On a subconscious, psychic level, people were aware of him. She had watched, intrigued, as individuals moved out of his way when they sensed his aura. A powerful energy field had that effect on others.

As far as she could tell, she was the only one who had really paid attention to him. She was pretty sure there was only one explanation for his near-invisibility-he possessed some serious talent. Yet he was going out of his way to try to conceal it. His ability to do that was even more interesting.

At one point he had cruised past her while she sipped a glass of sparkling water and pretended to admire a statue of the Society's founder. She'd caught a glimpse of specter-cat eyes behind the lenses of the black-framed glasses and picked up the vibe of his powerful energy field. It would be very easy to underestimate this man. She would not make that mistake.