Desire Me (3 page)

“I don’t know what you’re trying to imply, but I can assure you, I take great offense. I am already the best general I can
be or most any other man could be.” He braced both arms on his desk. “I think it is time you should leave. Tomorrow I shall
send up a report of this event. Intruding into my home, insulting me, and then offering me some
sort of magical potion that
is probably nothing more than opium. I won’t have it,” he growled.

Spencer allowed the man to rant; in truth he found the whole display rather entertaining. Especially in light of what was
shortly to come.

“If that is the case, then I’m afraid your skills are no longer needed,” he told him. With one swift movement, he withdrew
the pistol from his waistband. “I believe I told you to sit down.”

Resignation showed clearly in the target’s face, and he slowly lowered himself into his chair. Despite the years the general
had spent in the upper reaches of the military, his battle instincts had not dulled. He had the sense to know when he faced
a superior opponent.

“I have plenty of money,” Lancer said. “And I can have my wife’s jewels brought down to you. Whatever you want, I can provide.”
He held out his hand. “Here, I accept your offer. I’ll take the vial.”

Briefly Spencer considered the general’s offer. His military skills could prove useful, but it was too late now. The man’s
loyalty would always be in question. Pity.

“If only it were that simple,” Spencer told the man. “I’m certain I could use a man of your stature and skills. But you should
have accepted my offer when you had the chance.” He swiped a decorative cushion from the chair behind him, then walked to
the desk and aimed the gun directly at the man. “But it was not to be.”

“All I have to do is call, and I’ll have a room full of men coming to my aid,” Lancer warned, though the deep swallow suggested
more fear than threat.

If that were true, the man would already have called for assistance. Spencer stepped around the desk to stand behind the man.
He slid the pistol against the thick, white
hair. “Go ahead.” Spencer shrugged. “Call for help if you must, but then I will
be forced to kill them as well. I would prefer not to do that.”

“Did she send you?” His voice wavered. Then he shook his head as if answering his own question. “Surely not.”

Enough playing. As much as he enjoyed the torment for his own personal enjoyment, he had a task to accomplish. “No more talking,”
he whispered. Then he placed the cushion between the pistol and the man’s temple and pulled the trigger.

Only four more to go.

Sabine Tobias turned over in bed and stared at the dark ceiling above her. She hadn’t been sleeping well since they moved
to London seven months before. After living in a country village for the first twenty-four years of her life, she hadn’t yet
grown accustomed to the sounds of the city. Tonight she would have sworn she’d heard something or rather someone rustling
down below her window. Inhaling, she held her breath and attuned her ears, listening. There, she heard it again. Perhaps merely
the wind, or an alley cat, but there was definitely a noise.

Her ears seemed to pick up every stray sound. It was probably nothing, but what if it was more? A thief, perhaps. Or a murderer?
Sweat beaded down the center of her back. Her stomach roiled with nerves.

She swung her legs to the floor and padded out of her tiny room and into the hallway. There she nearly ran into her eldest
aunt, Lydia.

“Did you hear it, too?” the older woman asked.

“I did,” Sabine whispered.

“I think someone is outside.” Lydia held her candle out
in front of her as she walked to the staircase, her pale yellow nightdress
billowing behind her.

They hadn’t even gotten halfway down the stairs before her other two aunts left their rooms, and together they all crept to
the first floor to investigate. Lydia stopped at the base of the stairs.

“The noise,” Lydia whispered. “It’s inside now.”

Sabine’s heart seized with panic. Slowly the four of them tiptoed into the storeroom at the back of their little shop. There,
sitting at a small table, was a man. It was an intruder!

“I’m sorry to wake you,” the man said, his voice wispy and full of breath.

“Madigan?” Lydia asked. She rushed forward.

Relief washed over Sabine so quickly she nearly fell over. At least her aunts knew this intruder.

“ ’Tis me,” he said.

“You scared the devil out of us,” Agnes said. Her fading red hair hung loose in a braid down her back. It flipped over her
shoulder as she chastised the man.

He shook his head, then coughed. “I don’t have much time. I’ve come to warn the child.”

Lydia placed her candle on the table, then lowered herself into the chair next to him. “Calliope,” she said to her youngest
sister. “Let us get some more light in here.”

Soft light spread through the room as Sabine helped Calliope light the wall sconces. They hadn’t yet been able to afford the
new electric lights, but the old lamps shone brightly.

Madigan, as Lydia had called him, crouched in the wooden chair, looking pale and in pain. At the first complete sight of him,
Sabine’s aunts gasped.

“What has happened to you?” Agnes asked, moving closer to him.

Calliope withdrew a bottle of homemade liquor from behind a cabinet and poured him a glass. “You don’t look well, old friend.”

All three of her aunts knew this man and yet she had never seen him, nor heard them speak of him. And she had lived with them
her entire life. Even when her parents were alive, her aunts had always been there. Sabine knew he was not from their village,
of that she was certain. Nor had she seen him here in London, and they had been here with their little shop for nearly a year.

He drank the whiskey, then nodded toward Sabine. “Come here, all of you.”

It was on her tongue to give him a tart reply, because she did not know this man, but Lydia shook her head. “Sabine, now is
not the time,” she said.

Sabine nodded, then drew closer and sat in the chair Lydia had abandoned. Agnes sat next to her, and Calliope hovered with
her bottle of whiskey.

Madigan was a tall man and nearly as broad. His thick, dark curly hair and full beard covered much of his face, but could
not disguise his kind brown eyes.

“I have much to tell you in very little time,” he said in a gravelly voice, then coughed again. He winced in pain.

“May I get you anything?” Sabine asked. “We are healers of sorts. Calliope”—she turned to her aunt—“could you fetch my kit?
It’s right behind you on that shelf.”

He reached a hand out and stilled Calliope. “There is nothing any of you can do to help me.” He took a ragged breath. “I came
to warn the guardian.”

Sabine’s stomach twisted. They had never, not once, revealed the identity of the guardian outside their village.
She eyed
her aunts, trying to gauge their reaction, but their expressions revealed nothing. She turned back to the man.

“There are three of us,” he said. He shifted in his seat and his face contorted with another wave of internal pain. He fell
into a coughing fit.

“Us,” he had said. So this was one of the other guardians. She, of course, knew of the existence of the other two guardians,
the Seer and the Sage. But as each of the three guardians lived separately in their own villages, she had never met either
of them. They kept to their own, as it were. She knew only that they were both men.

Historically all of the guardians had been men. Until her mother, then Agnes. And her aunts believed Sabine would be next.
Though Sabine knew that would not be the case. If she were meant to be guardian, she would have been selected when her mother
died. She used to argue that point with her aunts, but her protests had fallen on deaf ears, so now she didn’t bother.

It had been a shock to all of her people when her mother had been born. Every Atlantean family up until then had always had
at least one male child. Never before had an Atlantean fathered a female first and then three subsequent females. So when
Sabine’s grandfather had passed, the people had no choice but to accept her mother as the first female guardian. And the ancient
ceremony had confirmed that choice. They had all believed she would fail, and when she did, they had mocked her name.

“But very soon,” Madigan continued once his coughing eased, “only two will remain.” He placed a warm hand on Sabine’s shoulder.
“The prophecy has begun,” he said.

“Phinneas warned us months ago,” Agnes said quietly.

Madigan nodded. “Yes, Phinneas saw the signs sometime last year. Warning signs, but this—” He looked up at
them, his eyes
filled with such sorrow. “It has started. The Chosen One has arrived.”

“Are you certain?” Calliope asked.

Sabine knew that Agnes had received a warning, but she’d never known from whom. This must mean Phinneas was the Seer, which
meant Madigan was the Sage. The warning was why they had moved here to London, why they had opened this little shop in Piccadilly.

“The prophecy,” Sabine repeated. She’d been warned of the prophecy her entire life. What Atlantean hadn’t heard tell of it?
Though none had ever seen it, at least none that she knew. Perhaps this Phinneas knew the specifics, though everyone knew
that the prophecy had been torn from the Seer’s book.

All Sabine knew was there would be a battle and the guardians would protect the elixir from the Chosen One.

Agnes was in danger.

Fear took root in Sabine’s stomach. She took a steadying breath. She refused to get distracted by anxiety. She would not make
the same mistakes her mother had. Sabine had every intention of redeeming her family name by preventing the prophecy from
being fulfilled.

When she and her aunts had received that warning those months ago, they’d developed a plan.

“We’ve prepared ourselves as best we could,” she spoke up. “ ’Tis why we moved to London. We are on alert, but certainly we
should not live in fear.” She said it aloud to remind herself, to squelch the remnants of fear tingling inside her.

Madigan smiled. “She is a brave one.”

“Yes,” Agnes agreed.

“Tell me about this scheme of yours, child,” Madigan said.

“Since we know very little of the prophecy,” Sabine began, “it has been challenging to prepare. But we know the Chosen One
will rise and attempt to steal the elixir, thus destroying the guardians.” Sabine sat forward. “And, of course, we know the
dangers of misusing the elixir.”

Sabine paused while Madigan nearly collapsed in a coughing fit. He took a large gulp of whiskey, then nodded for her to continue.

“Are you certain there is nothing we can offer you?” Sabine asked. “Surely you must know that Agnes is the Healer.” Perhaps
he did not trust their abilities. No doubt word had spread about what had happened to Sabine’s father. It had taken years
before anyone in her village had trusted the Healer again.

“No, please continue,” he said.

“We know that the Chosen One has a way to detect our presence, somehow sensing those who have used the elixir. So as a precaution,
I came up with a way for us to hide in plain sight,” Sabine said. “Obviously, we can do nothing to hide ourselves or the fact
that we’re exposed to the elixir. But we can change those around us. We’re selling the elixir,” Sabine said.

Madigan straightened as best he could; a deep frown creased his brow. “Have you gone mad? That’s an invitation for danger,”
Madigan said, then turned to her aunts. “How could you let her do this? You’ll lead him right to your door.”

“We are not fools,” Sabine said. She reached over to Calliope, who handed her one of the glass jars. “It is no different than
the healing concoctions, and we are very careful with the measurements.” She set it on the table in front of him.

“‘Tobias Miracle Crème for the Face,’” Madigan read. “Are you quite serious?”

She said nothing more, but sat quietly while he thought on what she’d told him. So far her aunts had said nothing. This had
been her idea, a plan to protect Agnes. They had thought long and hard before agreeing and setting the plan in motion. Now,
several months later, their products were successful, and the elixir was slowly being spread across London.

He uncorked the lid, then held the jar of crème to his nose and inhaled. With the tip of one finger, he withdrew a small amount
and rubbed it onto his arm. “It absorbs into their skin,” he muttered. His brown gaze lifted to meet hers. “So to him, we
all look the same.”

She nodded. “We also have other products. In fact, we’ve become somewhat of a sensation in the last few weeks. Society, it
would seem, has taken notice.”

“How much elixir do you use in each jar?” Madigan asked.

“One single drop,” Agnes said.

“I suppose the women in town are loving how well it dispels their wrinkles,” Madigan said.

“Precisely,” Agnes said. “The more they use it, the more it throws him off our scent, so to speak.”

Madigan was quiet for a few moments, then he nodded. “That’s brilliant. I had wondered why you’d relocated to London. It’s
rather unorthodox for guardians to abandon their village.”

“For their protection,” Sabine said. She’d known it was a risk to move Agnes away from their people, but it would have been
an even greater risk to stay. They’d made arrangements for their people to come and retrieve the healing ointments and tonics
and bring them back to the village.

“Madigan, I don’t understand how you know the
prophecy has begun. Have you spoken with Phinneas recently?” Agnes asked. “He
has not mentioned it in his letters.”

“No, not in the last month or two,” he said.

Lydia stepped forward. “Did you find the map?”

Generations of their people had searched for the map of Atlantis, as it was the only remaining place to find the prophecy
in its entirety. But their hunts had been futile.

“Not precisely found it, but I have located it,” Madigan said, then he coughed, a chest-rattling, body-racking cough that
resulted in his wiping blood from his mouth.