His body moved sinuously, and the sleeveless shirt he wore revealed a defined muscle tone that could only come from intense workouts. The man was an extreme sports enthusiast, so the muscles were no surprise, but his attractiveness startled her. Of course, she had expected a rogue. His e-mails had not hidden the arrogant pride and underlying flirtatious manner.

Ascher was, she realized with a start, the epitome of what she imagined d'Artagnan must have looked like. He was a boundless adventurer with a devil-may-care att.i.tude and a charming glint to his pale blue eyes. A mere wink from him could be capable of dropping women in his wake.

"I am what, Annja? You think I am as you expected?" Ascher asked with a grin.

He moved to shake her hand, which relaxed her, and she shook off the weird schoolgirl reaction that had risen. She was no swooner.

"You are exactly as expected, Ascher. Friendly, athletic and handsome," she said, smiling.

"Ah, the American television star, she calls me handsome? What my buddies at the dig will think of that!"

"How many are there?" Annja asked, suddenly anxious.

"Two others I have worked with previously. You know I trust them. Oh." He dug something out of his pocket and handed it to her.

Annja accepted the item, loosely wrapped in a white handkerchief. Her enthusiasm ratcheted up the scale. "Is it-?"

"Just look," he urged. Crossing his arms high on his chest, he watched her, the gleam in his eyes rivaling any glittering treasure he had ever claimed, Annja felt sure.

She unwrapped a piece of wood about six by four inches. She ran her fingers over a design impressed into the end. Sniffing it, Annja scented the dirt and clay, or maybe limestone. Limestone was excellent for preserving artifacts.

Turning the wood, she decided the impression must be a coat of arms. It was divided into four quarters, and in the first and fourth quadrant were double towers. A bowing eagle was impressed in the second and third quarters.

"It is the end of the sword box that I removed accidentally." Literally bouncing on his feet, he gestured enthusiastically to the object in her hand. "It is real, Annja. The sword has been found."

"I'll believe it when I see it," Annja said, forcing herself to remain calm.

"Very well." He hooked an arm in hers and tugged her around the car. "Come, we must be off to the dig site before the sun sets. We will take your car. You rented?"

"Yes, in Paris."

"City of love!" He dashed ahead to open the driver's side door for her, and closed it behind her after she'd slid inside. "To a dashing good adventure," he said as he climbed in the pa.s.senger's side.

And Annja dialed into his enthusiasm. "To adventure!"

FIELDS OF GRAPEVINES LINED the narrow country road they traveled. A symphony of crickets demanded Annja switch off the radio-tuned to a news-and-weather channel-and take in the natural performance.

"Just ahead." Ascher gave directions to the dig site that once harbored an Augustine convent before it had been demolished by fire in 1690.

Charlotte-Anne de Chanlecy had initially moved into the convent following her husband's death, but quickly retired to a quiet family estate just off the convent grounds. Chalon was her hometown.

There was not a lot of doc.u.mentation on d'Artagnan's wife, she being a minor historical figure, but Annja guessed the convent might have been a bit too stifling for a woman who had once been married to an adventurous musketeer.

Window rolled down, the September air brushed a warm breeze across Annja's face and arm. It was a far cry from the ocean-kissed air that had buffeted Stonehenge, but not unpleasant. The countryside smelled like centuries of history, hobbled and roped and beaten into the ground by defiant hooves. Liberte, egalite, Fraternite. Liberte, egalite, Fraternite. She did love a French motto. She did love a French motto.

"I have to wonder why, when I studied doc.u.ments and files and researched dusty old archives for years," Annja said, "I was never led to Chalon-sur-Saone."

"Because it makes little sense." Ascher hooked a palm over the outside mirror. A bend of his fingers flexed his muscular forearm. "To find the sword in possession of the wife?"

"And the ex- ex-wife, at that," Annja returned.

"Such a cad! D'Artagnan had no true affection to any particular woman," Ascher said.

"Exactly," she agreed. "Dumas certainly got that part right. The musketeer basically married for money, got the wife pregnant and then went off to play shoot-'em-up with his military buddies. Though, part of me likes to believe he did love Charlotte. Initially."

"There is no doubt that he did. A Frenchman does not take love lightly," Ascher said. He spoke English, and it rang with a delightful accent. "But a soldier-especially a Gascon-was more devoted to military service than family."

"Yes, the Gascons. Born and bred to the fight. They served in great numbers in the French army. You mentioned you are originally from Gascony?"

"Oui! But I would not be so foolish had I a lovely wife at home," he said. But I would not be so foolish had I a lovely wife at home," he said.

Without turning her attention from the road, Annja could feel Ascher's glance heat the side of her face. The man was a charmer.

Nothing wrong with that, she thought.

"'A plague upon the Gascons!'" she said, quoting Rochefort's vehement frustration from the text of the Dumas story.

"'Monsieur, I love men of your kidney,'" Ascher quoted back. "'And I foresee plainly that if we do not kill each other, I shall hereafter find much pleasure in your conversation.'"

"Athos to d'Artagnan," Annja said. "But I see you more as the young Gascon."

"I am flattered. Then you shall be my Constance Bonacieux."

"I hope not. She was strangled by Milady de Winter while awaiting d'Artagnan's straying affections," Annja exclaimed.

"True, true. Very well, I will hold reservation on your fictional counterpart, Annja. For now."

She smiled and stepped on the brake lightly as they made a sharp curve that took them onto a narrow gravel road that edged a thick forest of colorful maple and leaf-stripped birch. If anyone approached from ahead, she'd have to pull into the shallow gra.s.sy ditch to pa.s.s.

"Back to the mystery of the sword." Annja flipped the inner vents closed to keep most of the gravel dust out of the car. "It's surprising to think our musketeer would gift a woman, who likely did not love him because of his obsessive call to duty, with a valuable sword."

"Maybe it was given to her with the intention his children would reap any reward found? He had two sons," Ascher said.

"Yes, Louis and Louis," Annja agreed.

"Both claim Louis XIII and Louis XIV as G.o.dfathers. Now, that is a family who loved their king."

"Charlotte-Anne must have been quite the woman," Annja said "Yes, she divorced her husband in a time when divorce was not considered. But they remained friends. I believe it was not just for their children, but that d'Artagnan was genuinely in love with his wife."

"He was more in love with adventure," Annja said.

She knew the feeling. Relationships took a back seat to her wanderl.u.s.t. And defending the world from evil tended to put a damper on romantic notions.

She noted that Ascher had not relaxed in the seat since getting in the car. He leaned forward, his eyes to the road and, often, on her.

"I think the seat is adjustable, if you're not comfortable?" she said.

"Ah, no worries." He smoothed a palm along his left side. "An injury that is yet stiff, you see."

"How'd it happen? Base jumping? Extreme running-what did you call it?"

"Parkour. Running all over building tops and jumping at high speeds. You use the architectural landscape as your obstacle course. Very exciting. Good for the quads, glutes and delts. You should give it a try." Running all over building tops and jumping at high speeds. You use the architectural landscape as your obstacle course. Very exciting. Good for the quads, glutes and delts. You should give it a try."

"I just may."

He tossed her an approving nod.

"But that was not how I came to this injury. It is of no importance. Up there, just around the corner, we'll find the dig site. Why are you stopping, Annja?"

In the rearview mirror, the sight of the big black SUV that had barreled up on them put Annja to caution. The pistol jutting out the pa.s.senger's side could not be ignored.

She couldn't outrun the monster truck in her little beater. While her gut prayed it was merely mistaken ident.i.ty, her intuition screamed that this vacation had suddenly taken a new yet familiar twist.

3.

Annja stopped the car on the country road. The sun had set, but the sky still glowed yellow. The SUV's headlights dimmed in the rearview mirror.

"For reasons that elude me, we've been followed," Annja said.

Tilting a glance across to her pa.s.senger, she was taken aback to spy him nervously swipe a palm down his face.

What had she stepped into?

Certainly she had jumped into the adventure with little more than antic.i.p.ation for a fun excursion. No parachute, that was for sure-parachutes were for wimps. Yet now that she had jumped, it had become apparent she should employ caution at all turns.

"Ascher, do you know the hulking, black-suited men who are currently getting out of an imposing SUV, tucking pistols into their inner pockets and marching toward us?"

The man's sudden lack of conversation struck her to the core. Annja sucked in a heavy breath.

"Ascher, my background check on you didn't turn up any jail time or criminal leanings."

"You checked me out?" he asked, sounding offended.

"Obviously not well enough. What have you involved me in? Have you enemies who feel the need to keep tabs on your every move?"

"Every man gains an enemy or two in his lifetime, no?"

"No-"

A thud against the window alerted them both. Annja twisted in the driver's seat to spy two palms pressed flat to her window. Ten fingers disappeared, and were replaced with the barrel of what looked like one of her favorite pistols, a 9 mm Glock. It wasn't her favorite at the moment.

From outside the car, a staunch French voice commanded they exit with their hands up.

"Be cool," Annja said. "And get out slowly."

"I am cool. You be cool, Annja."

"I'm cooler than-oh, for cripes sakes, what are we doing? Now is no time to act irrationally. Let's do this slowly and carefully and together."

"Exactly. We cannot allow them to divide and conquer us."

Holding back the retort, "Whatever you say, Napoleon" seemed wise.

Each slowly opened a car door, and before Annja could get her hands up, the gun barrel pressed into her rib cage. She wore a white, sleeveless T-shirt and khaki hiking shorts, and she was sweating.

A tall, brutish man dressed in nondescript dark pants and a short gray coat wielded the gun. A thick gold chain snaked about his tree-trunk neck. High-top sneakers rounded off the attire that was strange for only a drive in the countryside. He looked ready for a hike through an urban nightclub.

Pressing the backs of her thighs to the car door, Annja surrept.i.tiously glanced over the roof of the rental. Ascher stood with hands raised, and a gun about a foot from his nose.

"You had no intention to invite us to the dig?" the gunman beside Ascher asked in French.

She heard Ascher fumble for a reply. "And have you get your hands dirty? Of course not."

"Who is she?"

The gunman eyeing Annja lifted a blocky chin and eyed her down his nose. One crushing palm to the tip of that nose and he'd be snorting blood. But though she knew Ascher was athletic, she couldn't be sure he'd know to react defensively when she did. Just because he was an enthusiast for sports didn't make him a self-defense expert.

"A girlfriend," Ascher volunteered. "No one you know, or need to know. She can stay in the car while we go on to the dig."

She felt to her bones that Ascher knew these men, or at least wasn't as surprised to see them as she was. And while his efforts to protect her fell flat in the chivalry department, she wasn't about to stay behind when the situation could turn dangerous.

And did you just hear your own thoughts, Annja? You know it's going to be dangerous, so you intend to march right into the fray. You really buy into all this protect-the-innocent stuff the sword has brought into your life.

If she couldn't avoid danger, she figured might as well join it. That would grant her more control than if she simply surrendered. Besides, she was armed, but the sword wasn't exactly a weapon to win against bullets.

"She comes along." The gunman gripped her upper arm, hard, and poked the Glock into Annja's back. She hated unnecessary aggression focused through the barrel of a gun. "Vallois, you will take us to the sword," he ordered.

They knew about the sword? And they knew Ascher's name.

Good job on checking the online contact's history, Annja, she chided herself.

Once around the hood of the car and shoved to Ascher's side, Annja saw he had a pistol barrel stuck against his temple.

"Does she know where the sword is?" the thug with the gun stuck into her side asked.

"I-I'm not-" the safety on the pistol aimed at Ascher's skull clicked off, which made the truth flow easily from him. "No, but I have told her about it. The dig site is through the forest."

"Then lead us." Both of them were given a shove.