The receptionist at Channing Pharmaceuticals in San Francisco confirmed Cassius’ worst fears.

“Ms. Demeris left the company two weeks ago,” she intoned in a nasal voice. “There is no forwarding address, but if you are a rep—”

“I’m not a rep,” Cassius interjected. “Thank you.”

He left the towering building, his mind whirling with confusion as he pushed his way toward the curb through the revolving doors. The cab waited for him, and he slid inside the vehicle. Did Cassius have something to do with Brooklyn’s departure? Had he scared her so badly that she had moved to escape the mere memory of it? It seemed insane, but he could think of no other reason that she would do something so abrupt, so reckless.

Had she run back to that cheating bastard because of Cassius, too?

Maybe she’s not the woman I imagined her to be, he thought. Then he realized that was entirely the issue: he knew nothing about Brooklyn. Not really. He had been drawn to her by some lust or heady feeling, but the truth was, he had no idea who she was or what she was like. A sick feeling washed through his gut as the taxi pulled away.

Perhaps he’d had Brooklyn all wrong this whole time.

“Where to, sir?” the cab driver chirped.

“San Francisco International Airport,” Cassius replied gruffly.

If what the elderly woman had said was true, Brooklyn had gone to Los Angeles with Ryan… What was his last name? Cassius wracked his mind to recall what Ryan had told him in the restaurant the night he had met Brooklyn. How had he introduced himself?

Elena’s last name was Roy, because Cassius remembered thinking of the drink Rob Roy. He had also thought something about Ryan’s last name, but he couldn’t recall what it had been. Something to do with Ryan’s worth, was it?

Shilling! Cassius thought triumphantly. Ryan Shilling, because I remember thinking he was not worth one.

He exhaled sharply, happy that he at least had something with which to start his search. Ryan Shilling, a police officer in LA, and Brooklyn Demeris, his… fiancée. It was a start. As little information as it was, Cassius could still find her with it. At least, that’s what he hoped.

“Where are you from?” the driver asked conversationally, obviously hoping for a big tip as they drove through downtown. They had been together for almost two hours, and it was the first time the man had made any effort to know the first thing about him.

“Overseas,” Cassius answered shortly, hoping the driver would get the hint. Instead of falling silent, the man lapsed into a tale about his own adventures in Iraq when he was in the service. Cassius allowed him to ramble, reasoning that it was easier than driving in tension if he told the veteran to shut up. The driver wasn’t expecting a response to his soliloquy, and Cassius was more or less permitted to lose himself in his own thoughts.

Did she just see me as a transition? he wondered. Did she intend to go back to him all along?

He could not believe that anyone but him had been in Brooklyn’s thoughts that night. Had she even thought about him since that night in an affectionate matter, or had her impression of him been ruined when she had seen the real him?

Twenty minutes into the drive, the cab driver peered back at him.

“Girl troubles?” he asked, and Cassius felt his face stain red.

“Excuse me?” he asked, his back tensing.

“You look a little frazzled,” the driver answered, “and I know people pretty well. I’m guessing you’re chasing after a woman. The one that got away?”

“Keep your eyes on the road,” Cassius barked. “I’d like to get to the airport in one piece.” The man jerked his head back around, apparently stung by the rebuke.

“No wonder she doesn’t want you,” Cassius heard him mutter under his breath. “She probably dodged a bullet.”

Cassius’ hazel eyes locked on the back of the driver’s head, the wheels of his own mind turning. Shame flooded him, and he glanced down at his lap. What the hell was he doing? He couldn’t go darting all over the world looking for this woman! She may have been trying to run away from him. Couldn’t he see that she wanted to be left alone? Couldn’t he see that she had purposely not left any way for him to find her? Moreover, Cassius had a multi-billion-dollar business to run. He could not chase after a woman with whom he had spent one magical night.

I would blame this on a mid-life crisis if I wasn’t immortal, he thought, exasperated with himself as the ridiculousness of his impulsive actions smacked him in the face.

“What terminal?” the cab driver snapped back at him, any remnants of his jovial mood gone entirely.

“International.”

There was no way he could endure another world flight that day. He needed at least twenty-four hours of rest after a flight that long, but Cassius could not bear the thought of staying in California for one more night. He knew if he did, he would do something he regretted.

Cassius paid the rate on the meter, adding two hundred more dollars to the already one hundred fifty-dollar tab he had created. Without a word, he jumped from the taxi, ignoring the driver’s grateful but perplexed look as he slammed the door in his wake. He strode purposefully toward the United counter.

“I need a flight to Sydney,” he informed the attendant.

She smiled broadly, her fingers working on the screen. Slowly, her smile faded. “I’m sorry, sir, but there are no flights until tomorrow at seven a.m.”

“Anywhere in Australia tonight?” Cassius asked, his heart starting to pound. If he could make it back to the continent, at least he could manage to fly himself home without overexerting himself. Something in his head excitedly called that this was a sign to stay and keep looking for Brooklyn, but he shushed that little voice, even as the attendant shook her head again.

“I’m very sorry, sir, the flight to Sydney is the next one anywhere on our radar at this moment. I would be happy to recommend a hotel for you if you like,” she suggested pleasantly.

No! Cassius wanted to yell. Can’t you see I have to get out of here now? Before I do something I regret?

“Sir?”

“When is your next flight to New York?” he asked suddenly, and her face seemed to relax.

“In two hours,” she replied. “American Airlines, flight—”

“Book it,” Cassius told her, slapping his credit card onto the counter. If he was going to be stuck in America, he was not going to suffer on the west coast, trying to convince himself not to hunt down the one-night stand who had struck a match in his soul. No, he would go to Anders and spend the day with his brother in New York. If that didn’t make him want to run home screaming, never to return to the Americas, nothing would.

“You should have called first,” Anders said as soon as he opened the door, looking behind him nervously. “This isn’t a good time.” Cassius arched his brow and chuckled.

“You devil, you,” he chided, but Anders shook his head.

“It’s not like that,” he muttered, reluctantly stepping aside to let his brother inside the penthouse. “How did you get up here, anyway? The concierge didn’t ring.”

Cassius flippantly waved his hand. “What kind of question is that? You of all people should know I don’t wait to be rung—”

His words died on his lips as Maximus stood up from his spot in the sunken living room.

“What are you doing here?” Cassius demanded. He debated whether to turn around and leave, but he knew that he would only be walking back into his own confused thoughts if he left his brother’s condo.

“It’s probably good that you’re here, after all,” Anders sighed, closing the door to the hallway and following Cassius across the marble floor.

“Why are you in New York?” Cassius asked again, and his brother hung his head.

“I am just visiting,” Maximus mumbled.

Cassius did not believe a word of what he’d said. “Does this have something to do with Father?”

“No,” Maximus started, “I am just—”

Anders cut him off before he could keep lying. “He is going to find out in a fortnight anyway, Maximus. Just save him the game of twenty questions and tell him what is going on.”

Cassius had a feeling he did not want to actually know what was going on. But as he darted looks between his older and younger brothers, he knew there was no way to escape what he was about to learn.

“Father wants to tell us when we’re all together,” Maximus complained.

“And yet you are here telling Anders,” Cassius reminded him. “What is the issue now? What harebrained scheme has Father plotted this time?” It was not a disrespectful question, and anyone who knew King Rui knew that he was not renowned for his mental stability.

In the feudal days, the king’s power had been unyielding, and he had been deemed a fearsome, unforgiving force. All were terrified of him, especially after the strange way in which the Northmen had perished. When the smoke had cleared that morning, there was not one Northman left—only the king and his six sons, standing on the drawbridge with fire in their eyes and the charred remains of the enemy laying at their feet.

It was clear to anyone who saw them that very morning that something had changed in the Williams Clan; something inexplicable, the world around them much darker and heavier. No one understood the spell that had fallen over Misty Woods. No one except, of course, those who had remained in the castle that night, entranced by the words Opal had spoken.

King Rui was affected the most: his temper started exploding at random, his curses heard loudly across the dale. The people were scared and wanted an uprising, but they were not foolish enough to try, sensing danger around every corner. Everyone could agree that if they wished their crops to be spared and their livestock left unharmed, they would tend to the king’s lands and not ask questions.

That had been a long time ago, and with that unsurpassable power came a massive ego, one that filled the castle walls and suffocated everyone within it.

Their father’s feeling of invincibility had become unbearable. In time, the princes had learned that their safest place was away from the king, a man who fought relentlessly to regain the control and dictatorship he had once so freely possessed over the commoners. He had never come to terms with the fact that he was now king of absolutely nothing: an old man in a refurbished castle in Northern England with nothing to look forward to but his own unbalanced ideas.

There had been many. So many, in fact, that they had become bemused anecdotes when the boys got together out of Rui’s prying ears.

He had married off his sons to various royal families, hoping to ally his failing kingdom to those that were thriving, but few successful kings wanted their names associated with a family losing face. When that scheme had failed, the tireless king had tried extortion and blackmail, hoping to play a political game to ensure his position in the world. The result had been disastrous, forcing Rui to murder several princes and two kings to keep his treason and identity secret.

There had been legitimate money-making ventures, pyramid schemes, and investments, but in his own mind, Rui was still the great king of a prosperous land. The old man had never truly caught up with the centuries, and despite his basic knowledge of the outside world, he was still very much the man he had been seven hundred years in the past.

“Well?” Cassius groaned. “What stupidity has he concocted now? And moreover, why haven’t you stopped him?”

Maximus and Anders exchanged a long look.

“It’s not so simple this time,” Maximus muttered in a voice so low, Cassius almost did not hear him.

“What is it?” A peculiar feeling inched its way up his spine as both brothers stared at him, their eyes a mishmash of blue and green steel.

“Father wants to go to war,” Maximus announced. The words were ridiculous, and Cassius began to laugh for the first time in weeks.

“War?” he snorted. “With whom? He’s already in a constant battle with himself.”

“This is serious, Cass,” Anders murmured.

“Someone needs to bring him to the twenty-first century. There is no one to fight. And why? What does he want? He still owns lands, and—”

“He wants the entire world,” Maximus interrupted sharply. “He wants to wipe out mankind.”

Cassius gaped at him, unable to say anything. When he finally collected himself, he managed to speak. “What are you talking about? What does that even mean?”

Maximus inhaled sharply and stared at him, his eyes locking on Cassius.

“He wants to expose his secret and cause the world to yield.”