Free Time Without End (The Black Rose Chronicles) by Linda Lael Miller Page B

with gentle impudence, “is poorer than I am.”
    Timothy nodded sadly and left my cell, returning minutes later with a stack of colorless, somewhat ragged garments, neatly laundered and folded. He said nothing as he held them out to me, and I confess that I snatched them from his hands.
    I was eager to be gone from that place and those people.
    I left the following day, wearing the ill-fitting tatters Timothy had brought to my cell. I also had two coins, of very modest value, that he had provided.
    Thus began seventeen years of searching, not for Brenna now, but for that vanished part of myself that had enabled me to love, to laugh, to weep, to mourn.
    All hope of that soon perished, and I sought only to meet a merciful death. I was, like the Prodigal, a libertine, a liar, a heretic, and a thief. I wandered, and I committed every sin I could think of without compunction, and a few that were suggested to me. I consumed what wine I could beg or steal, and awakened in pigsties and gaols and the beds of strangers. I cared for nothing and for no one, least of all myself.
    Then one momentous gloomy night, when I was five and thirty, and the most devout of derelicts, my old tutor, Challes, quite literally stumbled across me where I lay sprawled, stuporous with drink, upon the filthy floor of a stable.
    It was soon after that the dark miracle occurred, and I was forever changed.
    Daisy
    Las Vegas, 1995
    Daisy was not the whimsical type, but it seemed to her that a faint echo of magic lingered in the silence of that empty auditorium. When Jerry Grover flipped on some of the interior lights, the multicolored tinsel curtain threw off a blinding dazzle, and Daisy winced.
    Grover smiled, obviously pleased by her discomfort. “You won’t find Valerian here,” he said with a combination of indulgence and condescension in his tone. “As I told you, he never appears during the daylight hours.” He paused to smirk, then added, “Perhaps he’s a vampire.”
    Daisy thought of Jillie Fairfield and her bloodless body and felt a quiver of fear. She quickly squelched it. “No doubt,” she answered dryly, widening her eyes, “he’s tucked up in a coffin somewhere, fast asleep.”
    Grover sighed. “Where Valerian is concerned,” he said, “nothing would surprise me.” He paused to consult his watch, a sporty Rolex, and Daisy didn’t miss the point of the gesture.
    She folded her arms. “I won’t keep you—I can find the dressing rooms on my own,” she told him. “In the meantime, I suggest you take another look at your computer files. For a start, I’d like to know where you send this guy’s paychecks.”
    Color seeped up Grover’s tanned neck, and he spoke with exaggerated slowness, as though addressing an idiot. “That’s easy, Officer Chandler. Like most performers, Valerian has an agent. There are contracts.”
    ‘That’s Detective Chandler,” Daisy said, undaunted. “What’s this agent’s name?”
    A pulse pounded in Grover’s temple. “I haven’t the vaguest idea.”
    “Then I’d suggest you find out,” she answered, turning to start down the nearest aisle. “I’ll stop by your office for the information before I leave.”
    Grover spared her a slight nod, whirled on the heel of one Italian loafer, and strode away.
    Daisy lingered for a moment, recalling the events of the night before. She’d never seen a trick that even remotely rivaled the carriage bit, and the mystery of it both intrigued and frustrated her. And there was something else, she admitted to herself, walking toward the door at the right of the stage.
    Valerian had touched her, not with his hands, but with his mind. She’d been downright mesmerized by him, and the realization was profoundly irritating. If for no other reason, she wanted to face the magician again and prove to herself, as well as to him, that he had no power over her.
    Very little light reached backstage, and the ornate carriage Valerian used in his act loomed in the