Chapter 1
I dangled at the side of the cliff, my rope swaying me back & forth with the wind, as Ansel pulled the Zarus out of my hands and gave it to Christoff, who he then French kissed. He grinned down at me, pitching his voice so that only I could hear him. “Chrissy, my love, I don’t think it’s going to work out between us after all. Don’t worry, Christoff & I will take good care of the team...not that anyone will miss you.” He then switchbladed through my rope.
I fell screaming while Christoff turned up the “Heist Music.” I saw my original team—Mack, Bets, Talin, and Waters—come racing over to the cliffside screaming for me, and I saw Ansel coldly put bullets in each of them.
Mack & I had found the Zarus, an ancient Mesopotamian time-rewinding artifact. Talin & I did the research, and Waters had found a buyer...Ansel and his people had done nothing.
Which meant that he had no idea that the Zarus was actually the small ruby housed within the huge golden contraption that I had handed him...the ruby that currently resided in the locket hanging around my neck.
As I fell, I prayed that it worked the way all of the legends said and held onto a time in my mind.
I fell deeper and deeper into the canyon. It got darker and darker...but it was the cold that hit. It went from blistering desert heat and dust to cool air, then cool like a fall day...then freezing, so cold that I felt the ice crystals form on my skin and break apart. Frost coated my eyelashes, and my breath came out in an icy plume. Then a strange greenish light, appletini green, speared through the dark and cold...on instinct, I tried to follow it. I kept going toward that strange green ray of light. I don’t know when consciousness left me.
I woke up with ice crystals on my skin. My heart felt like it had restarted, and I gasped for breath. I scrambled up and looked around me. The late morning light streamed in through the beige curtains, and I heard the traffic from the street below my room. I was back in my hotel bed in Zurich.
My hands went to my mouth involuntarily, and a small sob escaped me. The whole team, he had killed them all!
I ran my hands through my hair, ice crystals crunching and dropping off as they melted in Zurich’s warmth. I’d left the window open to enjoy the air here. The smell of the flowers from the shop down the street floated on the light morning breeze and grounded me in the present. Was I truly back? Had it all been some nightmare?
I snatched my phone off of the nightstand and searched for the date. It was June 14th...2 days before I found the Zarus.
I sat staring at my phone....They wouldn’t have to die. I could still save them.
I needed to work fast.
I knew Ansel wouldn’t be back for at least a day. He had headed out to contact new buyers to supposedly get a higher bid or, at the very least, get them to fight each other for it. A bidding war, he had said while planting a kiss on my forehead.
Hah!
I checked his location on the tracker on his phone. All of the team’s phones had them for safety, and sure enough, he was in Christoff’s room at the Horizon Hotel across the street...he had been there all night.
I breathed a sigh of relief. I was past the shock and hurt...the anger was still there but had a different reason. Ansel was a mistake that I wouldn’t make again.
My fingers went for my locket. It was Dad’s gift to me when I decided to try and figure my life out on my own, and I traced the compass engraved on it.
My brain ran wild with what-ifs until I bucked up the courage to open it and see if the Zarus was still inside. I prayed that it was.
It opened with a click, and the ruby pebble dropped out onto the soft white sheets of the bed. I picked it up with shaking fingers. So it was true...it was said to bond with a person, and that person was the only one who could use it for the span of their life.
The myths told of Zarian priests who acted as time couriers. A choosing ceremony, and the bonded priest would have ultimate authority over all workings of the Zarus.
Apparently, the Zarus could be used by others, but the bonded priest would gain access to more of the Zarus’s gifts.
Waters, being the consummate gamer that he was, referred to them as bonus levels. He hadn’t worked it all out yet, but apparently, if you were bonded to it, the Zarus became some sort of portal.
And the Zarus ALWAYS returned to its bond partner.
It would never leave me.
Which made me relax.
I pulled up the rest of the team’s whereabouts and breathed a sigh of relief. They were all exactly where I thought they would be...now I needed to figure out how to keep them breathing. I gnawed at my thumbnail. Bad habits die hard.
I contemplated telling them...and immediately discarded it. Too much time. I needed something fast...something irrefutable...something even Ansel couldn’t slip around.
Not for the first time, I wished Lance was still here. He was a born strategist, borderline genius. He could read a room without trying and effortlessly dance around problems to get to his goal...I was one of the few who knew just how much planning and effort went into him getting his goals. Lance never let people too close...except for those that he trusted. And those were very few.
I was one of those few. I still felt his absence keenly.
