Chapter 1 - THE WOMAN WHO CAME FOR THE CODEX
I entered James Thornton’s secret auction wearing a borrowed black dress, a forged appraiser’s badge, and enough fear to make every breath hurt.
I had only one reason for risking it.
The Blackwell Codex.
The fifteenth-century manuscript had been stolen from my grandmother’s estate three months earlier, shortly after a stroke robbed her of speech. Hidden somewhere inside its illuminated pages was a family record proving our ownership of land worth millions.
Without the manuscript, distant relatives could challenge my grandmother’s will.
With it, I could protect everything she had spent her life trying to preserve.
I found the codex inside a storage vault behind the auction floor.
Unfortunately, I also found James Thornton.
To newspapers, James was a shipping magnate, real-estate investor, and philanthropist.
To everyone who understood what happened in the city after midnight, he was something else entirely.
A mafia boss.
A man people feared enough to lie carefully around.
James immediately knew I was not one of his appraisers.
Before he could decide what to do with me, his greatest enemy, Patrick Sullivan, entered the vault.
Sullivan noticed me immediately.
“What an irresistible little discovery.”
James’s reaction was instant.
He pulled me against his side.
“She’s mine.”
I should have been terrified.
Instead, I challenged both men for speaking about me like property.
James seemed almost amused.
Then he took me into a private alcove and demanded the truth.
I told him everything.
My grandmother.
The stolen collection.
The inheritance dispute.
The hidden family record.
And the relatives willing to steal the only evidence capable of defeating them.
James listened without interrupting.
When I finished, his gray eyes remained fixed on mine.
“You broke into my auction to steal from me.”
“To reclaim what was stolen first.”
“Courageous.”
“Stupid?”
“Also that.”
He glanced toward the auction floor.
Patrick Sullivan was still watching us.
Then James looked back at me.
His expression changed.
Not softer.
More dangerous.
“You have a bigger problem than Sullivan.”
My stomach tightened.
“What?”
James leaned closer.
“The Blackwell Codex was never supposed to be sold tonight.”
I stared at him.
“Then why is it here?”
His gaze returned to the velvet curtain.
“Because somebody wanted to know who would come looking for it.”
And suddenly I understood.
The codex wasn't merchandise.
May you like
It was bait.
And I had just walked straight into the trap.
