For a brief instant, Griffin’s eyes gleamed with something Cassie couldn’t quite define. It was gone before she could decide what it meant.
He smiled with relief. “I’m glad.” An awkward silence threatened to engulf them both until he rushed to add, “I really should let you get some rest.”
As he turned to let himself out, she patted his shoulder. “I care about you too, you know. Don’t ever forget that.”
He paused, without turning. “You’ll never know how much—” He broke off. “Well, good night.” He slipped out the door and was gone.
Cassie collapsed on the bed fully clothed, asleep before her head hit the pillow.
Chapter 20—Reason to Retrieve
Daniel felt his peaceful dream dissolve when someone rudely jostled his elbow.
“Daniel!” A voice whispered close to his ear.
“Just a few more minutes,” he grumbled.
“Wake up!” The voice was insistent.
The scion yawned and opened his eyes. Chris’s chiseled features came into focus. Daniel allowed himself a few seconds to furtively admire the view before raising his head. He wondered if his friend realized how handsome he was. Daniel frequently found himself so distracted by the librarian’s good looks that he could barely form a sentence. He’d recently read an article about something called the golden ratio—an exact mathematical proportion among facial features which the eye perceived as beauty. Chris’s face surely possessed that divine symmetry.
Daniel’s musings came to an abrupt end when his arm slipped off a pile of books, causing them to tumble to the floor. It was then he made the embarrassing discovery that he’d nodded off while slumped over a stack of reference works in the Ancient History section of the Chicago Public Library.
“You did it again.” The librarian’s tone was mildly reproachful. He bent down to retrieve the fallen volumes.
Daniel sat up and massaged the back of his neck to relieve the stiffness. Still disoriented, he asked, “Is it lunch time already?”
Chris chuckled mirthlessly. “Hardly. It’s only ten-thirty in the morning. Get up.”
The scion obediently rose, closing the volume on Minoan Crete which he’d been reading, and followed the librarian to the elevator. “Where are we going?”
“Out for a walk.” Chris punched the button for the lobby when the doors opened.
Daniel stepped into the elevator car after him. “But aren’t you on duty? Won’t your supervisor notice if you aren’t staffing the Reference Desk?”
“So full of questions today, aren’t we?” Chris shook his head in mock disapproval. “One of the new staffers agreed to cover for me. I did her a favor last week when she ducked out for a long lunch with her boyfriend.”
Still having difficulty processing the reason for their walk, Daniel balked. “But I don’t need any exercise.”
The librarian snorted derisively as they exited the elevator and moved toward the revolving doors. “No, what you need is an intervention.”
Once outside, Chris immediately headed east on Columbus Drive.
Daniel trailed him silently. As the stiff lake breeze hit him full in the face, the last of his sleepiness vanished. Turning up his jacket collar, he asked, “Intervention? What are you talking about?”
Chris paused at the next corner when the light turned red. “I’m talking about the fact that all you do these days is browse books and nap—mainly nap. What about your relic hunt? You’ve been back for almost five months without solving the next riddle. In fact, you haven’t even told me what the next riddle is.”
Daniel avoided his friend’s eyes. “I’m having some difficulty getting motivated.”
They crossed when the light turned green.
Chris’s tone became gentler. “Look, I get it. I understand that your wife’s death was a huge shock. It was bound to send you into a tailspin, but you have to pull out of it, buddy. You’re missing the big picture here.”
“What big picture?”
They ran across Michigan Avenue as the light turned yellow and entered Grant Park on the lakefront. It was too early in the season for Buckingham Fountain to be sending up jets of spray for the benefit of tourist photographers. In fact, there were no tourists at all. The two men had the plaza in front of the fountain all to themselves.
Chris didn’t even pause. He veered south. “Let’s keep walking.”
“What big picture?” Daniel persisted.
The librarian gave an exasperated sigh. “Danny Boy, there’s a lot more at stake here than finding another jewel-encrusted tchotchke for your dad’s mantelpiece.”
The comment brought Daniel up short. He’d never considered any other reason. “What do you mean?”
“Think about what might happen if you keep dragging your feet on this artifact quest.”
The scion shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Chris tried a new approach. “I met your father once. He didn’t strike me as a patient man.”
“He likes to see results,” Daniel agreed.
“And if you don’t produce those results fast enough, what’s he likely to do?”
The scion stared blankly at Chris, still at a loss.
“Don’t you get it? He’ll replace you with somebody who can give him what he wants.” Chris cast him a sidelong glance. “Since I know the backstory on all the major players in your world, I’m guessing your psycho bodyguard, Leroy Hunt, would be next in line for the job.”
Daniel stopped dead in his tracks. “My father would never do that! Hunt is incapable of rational thought.”
“So, he’d have to send somebody with brains along.” Chris smiled sardonically. “Maybe somebody like your shifty brother Joshua?”
The very sound of the name sent a chill down Daniel’s spine. “No!”
“No?” Chris ambled forward. “Then who else? Your father trusts him, doesn’t he?”
“But he’s never trusted him with this secret. He... he... wouldn’t!”
By this time, the pair had walked all the way to the Beaux Arts Garden at Eighth Street.
Chris abruptly took a seat on the low stone wall
