The mind was an amazing thing, Summer thought, staring out the window as the sprawling southern California landscape sped by. Her sister was in the clutches of a messianic sociopath, people were dying and yet Summer was able to sit in the car beside her betrayer and not scream. Amazing.

She still didn’t know why he’d done it. He’d found out what he needed to know; after, there was nothing to be gained by stripping her down to such an elemental level. Maybe just to prove he could.

And maybe if she survived this she’d eventually have Takashi O’Brien’s head on a pike.

If it were up to her she’d give up. But she wasn’t going to let anything happen to her baby sister. He’d told her the Shirosama had Jilly, and yet he didn’t seem to be interested in doing anything about it.

She refused to look at him. When she did so she was filled with such a stomach-twisting anger she couldn’t think clearly, and she needed to be cool and self-controlled. Sometime later she could let go, right now she needed to be as deadly calm as he was.

“My sister,” she said, staring out the window.

“What about her?”

“Aren’t you going to do anything to help? You kept rescuing me—it’s what you’re good at.”

“My orders were to keep you out of the Shirosama’s hands. Your sister isn’t my job.”

Summer closed her eyes for a moment, picturing Jilly’s dear, stubborn face, and tried to think of a plan. They’d traded the SUV for the plain-looking sedan parked in the garage, but beneath its modest exterior it had the engine of a race car.

And Taka had a penchant for fast driving.

At least they weren’t on the freeway. They were on a lesser road, heading out toward the countryside. Were she to bail out, she might stand a chance—she didn’t give a damn whether he survived. She just needed to get away from him and go after her sister. Give the Shirosama what he wanted, in return for Jilly’s freedom.

Summer glanced around her surreptitiously, looking for any kind of weapon. Her bare hands were useless against Taka. Her only chance was taking him by surprise, and he wasn’t a man who surprised easily.

“Don’t.” His voice was flat, cool.

She refused to turn and look at him, keeping her eyes focused on the passing landscape. “Don’t what?”

“Don’t even think it. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

“What if I have to go to the bathroom?”

“I’ll go with you.”

“The hell you will.”

He said nothing—he didn’t have to. He was like an eight hundred pound gorilla; he could do anything he wanted and there was nothing she could do about it.

And she would have accepted that, given up, if her sister’s safety wasn’t involved. Did he have a gun somewhere in the car? In the last two tumultuous days she realized she hadn’t seen him with one—he didn’t seem to need one when he killed. Her stomach twisted again at the thought. He hadn’t killed to protect her at all. He’d killed to protect the knowledge she held.

She wondered why he was bothering to keep her alive now that he knew where the urn was. Unless he very wisely didn’t trust her. She’d tricked him twice with the fakes. Maybe he wasn’t going to get rid of her until he was certain he had the real urn.

The one thing she couldn’t tell him was where it had come from. Hana had never said a word about its origins; if it had come from some mysterious hidden shrine in Japan that secret had died with her.

Summer glanced around her on the floor of the sedan. Nothing. Maybe if she suddenly slammed her elbow into his face she might distract him—except that he was taller and his face would be hard to reach, plus she was pinned down by the seat belt.

The only thing movable in the front seat of the car was his steel coffee mug and her empty Tab can. Neither would do much damage, but the coffee mug was larger and heavier. If she could just slam it into his face it might force him to take his eyes off the road and his foot off the accelerator, long enough for her to open the door and roll out, with less chance of being totally screwed.

The more she hesitated the worse it was going to get. She reached for the coffee mug, and his hand shot out. She wasn’t quite sure how he managed it, but he got both her wrists in his grasp, imprisoning her. It hurt. A lot. She remembered a few short hours ago, when he’d hurt her into telling him the truth…and what he’d done afterward.

“I told you, don’t even think about it,” he said. He hadn’t slowed his speed even the tiniest bit—they were going about eighty. Certain death.

“I just wanted some coffee.”

“You don’t like coffee.”

“Says who? Just because I drink soda in the morning doesn’t mean—”

“You had no coffee in your house.”

“You don’t know everything I had in my house.”

“Want to bet? I know everything, including where you stash your porn.”

“I don’t have porn….”

“Your erotica, then, if you’re going to be squeamish. You have a taste for sci-fi sex—interplanetary kinkiness. Tell me, is it better when I did it for you? Am I alien enough for you?”

“I suppose it would be a waste of time to tell you how much I hate you,” she said in a tight voice.

“At least you’re honest.” He let go of her hands, and she pulled away, rubbing her wrists.

He glanced over at her. “And if you’re trying to distract me, I can think of more effective ways. You could try going down on me and see if it makes me slow the car enough for you to jump out.”

“You are such a rat bastard,” she said, sick at the thought. Sick, because she felt his words between her legs, and she wanted to lean over and see exactly what he would do if she tried it. Sick, because that wasn’t the reason why she wanted to.

The houses were fewer and farther between, the wide, flat countryside was starting to look desolate. If she somehow managed to get away from him there’d be no place to go, no place to hide. Why was he taking her out to the middle of nowhere?

Silly question. She was now just as expendable as her sister. He was taking her someplace where he could kill her, where no one would hear her scream, where he could hide her body…

“Cut it out.”

He’d startled her enough to make her look at him. He was staring straight ahead, concentrating on the almost empty road. “What?” she asked.

“Stop thinking about death. I liked it better when you were thinking about sex.”

She didn’t bother asking him how he knew what she was thinking. She’d worked long and hard on masking her feelings—it was far too dangerous to be vulnerable when you had a mother like Lianne. But Taka seemed to have the ability to know her inside and out, even before he’d known her body.

“And your likes and dislikes are of primary importance to me because…? And don’t say it’s because you’re the only thing that stands between me and the Shirosama. Right now I’d welcome him with open arms.”

“I’m sure you would. It would be a mistake.”

“Oh, I forgot. You’re so much kinder than he is.”

“Kindness has nothing to do with it.”

“I noticed.”

He’d slowed down again, almost imperceptibly, and turned onto a dirt road. She was toast, she thought. If she jumped out of the car she’d die, saving him the trouble. But then, she wasn’t particularly interested in saving him from anything, and if he could look into her eyes and choke the life out of her, then she’d come back to haunt him.

“How are you planning to do it?”

“Planning to do what?” He was barely paying attention to her, concentrating on the barren landscape.

“Kill me. I’ve never actually seen you kill—just witnessed the aftermath. Are you going to strangle me? Break my neck? Stab me?”

She made the mistake of watching him to gauge his reaction. His eyes met hers, and a faint smile touched his mouth. His beautiful mouth, which she wanted to smash with a two-by-four. “I’ll probably cut you up in tiny pieces, boil you and eat you.”

“Very funny. Are you telling me you’re not planning to kill me?”

His eyes slid away. “Not if I can help it. Not unless you’re really annoying.”

“Then if you’re not driving me out into the middle of nowhere to kill me, why are we here?”

“Use your eyes, Summer.”

She didn’t like him using her name, but replying “Dr. Hawthorne to you” would be like something out of a Marx Brothers movie. She looked around as he slowed down, and realized the vast, empty field was exactly that. An airfield, and there were several small planes sitting over by a ramshackle metal building.

“I’m not getting on a plane,” she said in a tight voice.

“Afraid of flying?”

She was, but that had nothing to do with it. “I’m not leaving my sister. I’m not going anywhere until I know she’s safe.”

“You’re going to do what I tell you to do.” He pulled up beside the metal shack and turned off the car.

“You’re going to have to kill me first.”

He sighed, and for half a second she was certain he was going to do exactly that. “Someone’s taking care of your sister,” he said finally.

“Who? The Shirosama? I don’t think so.”

“A colleague is getting her out. You don’t need to worry.”

“A colleague? A member of the Yakuza is going to waltz right in there and snatch her away?”

“You’re forgetting that the True Realization Fellowship started in Japan, and almost a third of its worldwide membership is Japanese. I don’t imagine a Yakuza would have any trouble fitting in.”

“Unless they saw his tattoos.”

“A good proportion of the brethren are criminals from one country or another. A Japanese criminal wouldn’t be surprising. Now stop arguing with me. You’re still alive, and so is your sister. She’ll be fine.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this before? I would have been less trouble.”

“You and trouble are synonymous,” he said wearily, unfastening his seatbelt. “Get out of the car, and if you try to run I’ll shoot you.”

“You don’t carry a gun.”

“Yes,” he said, “I do. And I have no problem using it.”

And she didn’t doubt him for one minute.

Jilly Lovitz was proving to be a particularly difficult disciple. She refused to drink the sacred water they brought to her, she was somehow able to shut her mind to the True Word as it was piped into the barren little room she was kept in. He had some of the most brilliant young scientists working for him, following his path. Chemists, explosives experts, doctors, engineers, along with the disaffected youth who’d made their lives on the streets. He’d offered them all a path to salvation, and they’d taken it gladly. And yet Jilly Lovitz resisted.

It was hard to believe she’d come from Lianne Lovitz, who had barely a brain in her pretty blond head. She was much more like her older half sister, Summer. Too smart, too cynical, too distrusting. That latter was no doubt due to the mother—Lianne would make a saint doubtful. And there were few real saints in the True Realization Fellowship.

The girl wouldn’t eat, either. She’d laughed when they’d brought her chocolate, something he’d been told was her particular weakness. In fact, he’d known very few women anywhere who could resist the siren lure of chocolate, but sixteen-year-old Jilly Lovitz was confounding him on many levels.

In the end it didn’t matter. She was in one of the induction cells, with his devoted followers watching her every move, and while anything was possible, he doubted that a woman like Summer Hawthorne would have endangered her baby sister by sharing her secrets. No, the girl was only a bargaining chip. As soon as the woman realized her sister was in jeopardy she would show up with the urn and all her secrets. All he had to do was wait.

Except that the Yakuza was now involved, and he wasn’t sure whether to rejoice or lament. Takashi O’Brien was the great nephew of Hiro Matsumoto—his connections were impressive, and who else would have sent him? It didn’t matter the Yakuza had the same goals as he did—Japan as a world power once more. The world power, in the new order of things. But the Yakuza were more likely to think of the profit the world could provide, while the Shirosama knew the only real future was to wipe it clean.

They were a concern, but a minor one. Summer Hawthorne had been chosen for a reason. Hana Hayashi would never have entrusted such a treasure to someone who couldn’t keep it secure, nor would she have shared her knowledge. It was a great tragedy that he hadn’t been able to make the old woman talk, a sin that he’d let anger overtake him and he’d ended her life before he found out what he needed to know.

He’d been much younger then, and only beginning to understand his destiny. It had been ordained since the beginning of time that he would run his aunt over with an automobile before he found the family treasure he was searching for. The treasure that would assure his ascendance and transfiguration.

But it hadn’t been his time. At that point he had only a few hundred followers, and his path wasn’t as clear to him as it was now.

No, all was unfolding as it was meant to be, and each new hurdle was simply to test his readiness for the coming storm. He would handle each obstacle as he faced it.

The girl had thrown her sacred water at Brother Kenno, a crime of such blasphemy that his holiness was only glad that it hadn’t been Brother Heinrich. But then, he’d kept Brother Heinrich far away from the girl. The Shirosama’s tools were varied and well honed, but one didn’t need to use an ax when a dagger would suffice. At this point there was nothing to be gained from having Jilly Lovitz undergo Heinrich’s inventive ministrations.

Perhaps she would be a reward to his faithful follower when all finally came together. Though in fact he’d promised him the older sister. While Heinrich might prefer the softer virgin flesh of the young one, his rage toward the older one would feed his pleasure.

The Shirosama shook his head. Heinrich was still so young, so driven by fleeting gratification that he was unready for the higher purpose in store for him.

But that would change. Events were coming together. The Shirosama could feel the winds of power swirling around his head, and he knew his time as a mortal was short.

The time and day most suited for the reunification ceremony were almost upon them. The True Realization Fellowship would retrieve the true urn. They would find where the ruins of the old temple were. Summer Hawthorne was the only living human being who had the information, passed on by his distrusting aunt, though she seemed not to know she had it.

He would help her remember, once he got the Yakuza off his back and the younger sister to break. And then all would unfold accordingly, and the end of the world would be set in motion. He would ascend, chaos would follow, and then nothing but blessed emptiness.

He folded his hands over his belly, let his eyes drift closed, and meditated happily. All would be as it was written.

If only he could find the rest of the text.

The woman moved through the Spartan halls of the True Realization Fellowship with purposeful strides. She had been brought in from Germany, an acknowledged expert in the gift of eliciting information, with or without pain, and she’d been summoned to Los Angeles at great expense. She carried her Hermes bag with her, the silk-wrapped pouch of tools in the bottom.

The brethren ignored her, as they’d been trained, their belief in the Shirosama’s will absolute. Most female followers were devout and plainly dressed, their heads shaved. This one was wearing the requisite white, but if anyone had looked they would have known it was a designer suit, and the sleek chignon of dark hair, the perfectly made-up face, were an affront to their ways.

Even her shoes were an insult—the sharp tap of high heels on tile floors seemed to mock the barefoot followers. She was there for a reason, however, and she must follow the Shirosama’s teachings despite her flagrant disregard of modesty.

The brethren turned their heads away, moving on as the woman stopped by the cell that held the noisy girl. They knew better than to linger—his holiness tolerated no questions, and the girl might cry out. Some of the followers were weak in their resolve, and might instinctively respond to a cry for help. Better that they not be tested.

By the time the woman reached the cell the hallway was deserted. She reached down and unlocked the door. And then she stepped through, her purse at her side, and all was silent in the south wing of the True Realization headquarters.