“Well, Serena sounds like a peach,” I said finally, trying for lightness. “I hope you have fun at the pub.”

“Why don’t you join us?”

I touched her arm. “Thanks, but Derek and I are having an early dinner. After that, I have to prepare for my workshop.”

“Okay, but if you get free, come on by.”

“I will.” Not.

“So,” Derek said when she was gone. “Where are we having dinner? Do we have a reservation?”

“Okay, I lied. But you were a good excuse, so thanks.”

“I’ll bet you say that to all the commanders.”

We both watched Helen as she made her way down the wide aisle of book vendors.

“Derek,” I said after a moment, “have you ever noticed that women can be really stupid?”

He put his arm around my shoulders. “And yet, they’re generally smarter than men.”

“That’s a sad, sad statement.”

Derek had to run off to some royal business function at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, and tonight was the night Robin had planned to take Mom and Dad on the ghost tour.

I had wanted to study the Robert Burns book in depth, in hopes of gleaning some clue from it, and it seemed I now had the time to do so. I stopped at the front desk and the clerk led me to the small, secure safety-deposit room, inserted the hotel key in the box, then left me alone. I inserted my key in the second keyhole and pulled the box down. Alone in the secure cubicle, I felt a chill along my spine. I glanced around. I was indeed alone. There were no two-way mirrors where someone could see what I had in the box. I attributed my nerves to finding Perry’s body earlier and fought to shake off the feelings.

I pulled the book out of the long steel box and unwrapped it. I needed to see it, needed to touch the leather binding and assure myself that despite the furor circling around me and the book fair, the Robert Burns book was perfectly safe and unharmed. I hadn’t taken a good look at it since before the attack in the National Library, and that seemed like ages ago.

It had all started with this book. The murders, the attacks, the questions. Could it possibly hold the answers to any of them? Was that putting too much pressure on one little book? But books didn’t kill people. They didn’t steal tools from your hotel room or try to run you off the road.

Pulling away the parchment paper, I gazed at the book and marveled all over again at the beautiful condition of the leather. The deeply etched gilding shone like new. Thistle and heather, Solomon’s wheels, everything indicated that William Cathcart’s own hand had created this masterpiece. His bindery’s name was stamped on the leather lining of the inside back cover. So why was I suspicious of it?

Maybe because I was seeing it in the harsh light of the small room. In the bright light, I had to wonder, was it really a Cathcart? It would’ve been easy enough for a master bookbinder to duplicate Cathcart’s work.

I’d once copied a rare Dubuisson binding, right down to the one-o’clock birds the revered seventeenth-century French bookbinder was famous for. I’d done a good enough job that the head curator of the Covington Library was completely fooled. Of course, he was my fiancé at the time, so maybe he’d been a bit prejudiced.

Had someone pulled off the same trick with this William Cathcart edition? There were a few ways to tell if this book was made over two hundred years ago or within the last year. I’d given the class in forgery just two days ago, so if anyone could find out the truth about the book, it would be me. Right?

With a deep sigh, I wrapped the book up and slipped it into my bag. I was still nervous. Taking the book with me was probably dangerous. After all, someone had been able to gain access to my room as easily as if it had a revolving door to it. The book would be safer in the lockup, but then I might never have the chance to determine whether it was the real deal or an excellent forgery.

Earlier, knowing I’d made no plans for tonight, I’d felt at loose ends and a little sorry for myself. Now, the thought of spending the evening alone in my room with a good book, a rare steak and a decent bottle of wine was extremely appealing.

Especially if I uncovered a forgery.

“Hey!” someone yelled in my dreams.

Glass broke and footsteps pounded on the iron railing outside my window.

I sat up straight, threw off the covers and bolted from the bed. My hotel room was dark, but moonlit shadows flew around the walls from the curtains blowing and swaying across my window. Disoriented, I trembled in fear. Chills hit me in places I didn’t know existed.

Suddenly a man jumped in through my window. More glass shattered in his wake. He pushed me back on the bed as he raced to the door. I could hear him fumble with the locks. Then the door opened and slammed shut.

“What the-”

Stunned and frightened, I leaped up, switched on the light and looked around. My eyes were blurry with sleep, but I couldn’t see anything out of place. I focused on the clock next to the lamp. It was three fifteen.

What the hell?

Without warning, more heavy footsteps rattled the fire escape outside. I screamed and an instant later, another man jumped through my window. Taller, broader, dressed in black.

No. This couldn’t be real.

“Where’d he go?” he demanded.

“Out the door!” I shouted, then lost my balance and fell back on the bed. Again. Probably from shock.

He stormed to the door, whipped it open and ran out into the hall.

I followed him to the door. He was pacing up and down the hall, swearing sharply. What was he doing here, and where in the world had he come from?

Then he stalked back into my room. It took another few seconds of creative swearing before he seemed to notice me again.

“Hey, babe,” he said. “You’re looking good.” Then he bent over to catch his breath.

“Are you freaking kidding me?” I shouted. This wasn’t a dream. I was wide-awake now, but still bewildered and slightly discombobulated. And yeah, angry.

He straightened up and let out another heavy breath, then raked both hands through his thick black hair. Talk about looking good. The man was gorgeous, if you like them tall, tough and sexy, with hair long enough to tie back and eyes greener than a Sonoma hillside.

He laughed, still breathing heavily. “Haven’t climbed a fire escape in a few years. Call the police, would you?”

“Gabriel,” I said. “What the hell are you doing here?”

He studied me frankly, from my toes up to my hair. Then he grinned, causing his eyes to sparkle and two adorable dimples to appear in his cheeks. “Saving your ass again. Not that I mind. It’s a fine ass.”

I looked down. Yes, I was still wearing my baggy plaid flannel pajamas. On the bright side, at least I was wearing something.

He, on the other hand, wore a black leather bomber jacket over a black T-shirt, boots and worn black jeans that perfectly accented his equally fine ass.

Gabriel-no last name, apparently-and I had met a month or so ago when he helped save me from a psychopathic teenager who’d been hired by Abraham’s murderer to kill me. And if that didn’t make sense, welcome to my world.

After gaining my trust, Gabriel had later stolen an extremely rare copy of Plutarch’s Parallel Lives from my apartment and given it to Guru Bob. Heck, if I’d known Guru Bob wanted the book, I would’ve given it to him myself. I didn’t need some darkly handsome thief breaking into my place to do it for me.

And here he was. It was déjà vu all over again.

“Gabriel, what’s going on?”

He’d moved over to the window and was checking the broken glass. “Call the police first. We can shoot the breeze after.”

“Oh, yeah, we’ll shoot the breeze.” Not trusting him as far as I could throw him, I kept an eye on him as I picked up the phone and made the emergency call, asking the dispatcher to alert Detective Inspector MacLeod that there had been a break-in related to the recent murders.