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  “That would be-yes, thank you,” Nick managed.

  “Excellent,” Sonnerfeld said, reaching out his hand. “Mr.-?”

  “Powell,” Nick said, reaching out and taking the proffered hand. “Nick Powell.”

  “Mr. Powell,” Sonnerfeld said, giving his hand a quick, firm shake. “That’s an interesting ring. Oh, and do bring your portfolio and trading record with you.” With a polite smile at Lydia, he returned to his waiting companion and they headed toward the exit.

  “I take it he’s someone important?” Lydia murmured.

  “One of the biggest brokerage men in the city,” Nick told her, his hands starting to shake with reaction. “And he’s interested in me.”

  “Or he’s just interested in your money.” Lydia dropped her gaze to his hand. “So you’re still wearing that thing?”

  “I happen to like it,” Nick said, hearing the defensiveness in his voice. He’d been too embarrassed at first to tell her he couldn’t get it off, and now he was stuck with the lie that he actually liked the damn thing.

  “It’s grotesque,” she insisted, peering at the Ring like it was a diseased animal. “Those leaves look half drowned. And the hands all look like they’re grabbing desperately for something.”

  Nick held the Ring up for a closer look. Now that she mentioned it, there did seem to be a sense of hopelessness in the arms and hands. “It’s old German,” he said. “Styles change over the centuries, you know.”

  “I don’t like it,” Lydia said, a quick shiver running through her.

  “I’m not asking you to wear it,” Nick growled, scooping up a bite of the crème brulee.

  But the flavor had gone out of the delicate dessert. “Come on, let’s get out of here,” he said, laying down his spoon. “You coming back to my place?”

  “That depends,” she said, gazing evenly at him. “Will you promise not to check on your money every ten minutes?”

  “What, you mean go into the vault and count it?” he scoffed.

  “I mean will you leave the computer off?”

  He sighed theatrically. “Fine,” he said. “I promise.”

  But later, an hour after she’d fallen asleep, he stole out of the bedroom and went online to check the foreign market predictions. What she didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her; and besides, his finger underneath the Ring was suddenly hurting too much for him to sleep.

  An hour later, his curiosity satisfied and the pain gone as inexplicably as it had appeared, he crept back into bed.

  And in his dreams he was the master of the world.

  The Monday meeting at Sonnerfeld Thompkins was every bit as impressive as Nick had expected it to be. Sonnerfeld pulled out all the stops, introducing him to the rest of the firm’s top people and studying Nick’s portfolio with amazement and praise.

  Midway through lunch, under Sonnerfeld’s polite but steady pressure, Nick agreed to join Sonnerfeld Thompkins on a trial basis.

  The first month was like a chapter from a financial success book. Nick’s Midas touch continued, with every stock or bond or commodity he picked turning to gold with a perfect sense of timing. There were a few false starts, but every time he tried to buy a property that he would later find was irretrievably on its way down, his finger started hurting so badly he could hardly type. Eventually, he learned how to read the telltale twinges that came before the actual pain started.

  Pain or not, though, his purchases made money for himself and the firm and its clients, and that was the important thing. By the end of the month Sonnerfeld was talking-just theoretically, of course-of putting Nick on the fast track to full partner and wondering aloud about the flow of the name Sonnerfeld Thompkins Powell. Everything was going perfectly.

  Everything, that is, except Lydia. In the midst of all the success she continued her self-appointed role as rainmaker to Nick’s private parade. Before the Ring had come to him, Nick had been ready to ask her to marry him, his lack of strong finances the only thing holding him back. But now, just when he was gaining the sort of wealth and power that would attract most women, Lydia was instead growing more distant. While she still permitted him to spend money on her for dinners and modest gifts, her disapproval of what she called his obsession was never far below the surface. He couldn’t pause in the middle of an evening to check the international funds without getting a lecture, and she went nearly ballistic when he tried to give her a simple little thirty-thousand-dollar necklace.

  Nothing he did seemed to make any difference. He set up a charity distribution trust fund with direct access from one of his accounts to fulfill his promise to share the wealth; she applauded it as a good first step but thought the five percent he routinely sent to it was far too small for a man of his means. He bought a new cell phone with internet trading capabilities programmed in so that he could make any last-minute trades on the way home from work. He put Sonnerfeld and the rest of his staff on a special vibration mode on his cell phone and a special flashing-light code on his home phone so that he could let any late-night calls go to voice mail if Lydia was around to disapprove.

  None of it helped. Lydia seemed bound and determined to make him feel guilty about his success.

  And finally, midway through the last weekend of that otherwise glorious first month, Nick decided he’d had enough of her complaining.

  He was still brooding over it Monday morning when the runaway bus slammed into a line of pedestrians twenty feet in front of him.

  “I’m surprised you even came in,” Sonnerfeld said, sitting on the corner of his desk as he handed Nick a cup of coffee. Or rather, tried to hand it to him. Nick’s hands were shaking so much that he couldn’t even hold it. Eventually Sonnerfeld gave up and instead set it down on the desk. “Why don’t you just go home?”

  “I’m okay,” Nick said, gazing out Sonnerfeld’s floor-to-ceiling windows at the brooding clouds hanging over the New York cityscape. “It was just a freak accident.”

  “Still had to be pretty unnerving,” Sonnerfeld said. “But if you think you’re okay…?”

  “I’m fine,” Nick said, getting up and heading for the door. “Time and tide, and all that.”

  Sonnerfeld gave him a thumb’s up. “Good man.”

  It was midafternoon, and Nick had finally managed to put the bus crash mostly out of his mind when he heard that one of the firm’s up-and-coming young brokers had been mugged and beaten while returning from lunch. Returning, in fact, from the very restaurant Nick had been planning to go to until he’d been pulled into a last-minute emergency meeting.

  Ten minutes later Nick was in a cab, heading for the bank. Ten minutes after that, he was on his way to the shop where he’d gotten the Ring.

  The old shopkeeper was waiting. “I’ve been expecting you,” he said gravely. “How are you enjoying your new success?”

  “I’ve got your money,” Nick said, pulling out a certified check. “You said ten percent-I’ve made it twenty.”

  “Very generous of you,” the old man said approvingly, his hand darting out like a striking rattlesnake to pluck the check from Nick’s fingers.

  “So we’re square, right?” Nick said, wincing again at the unpleasant touch of the other’s skin. “So call them off.”

  “Call who off?”

  “Whoever it was tried to run me down with a bus this morning and then mugged Caprizano at lunch,” Nick said. “I got the message, and you’ve got your money. Okay?”

  The other shook his head. “I had nothing to do with any of that, Mr. Powell,” he said. “It’s the curse working.”

  “No, but look, I got you the-” Nick broke off. “The what?”

  “The curse,” the old man said softly. “You didn’t think all that money was just going to fall into your lap without any consequences, did you?”

  Nick’s skin began tingling. The whole idea of a curse was absurd… but then, so was a ring that could make you rich. “What kind of curse are we talking about?” he asked carefully.

  “Death an
d destruction, of course,” the old man said, his eyes taking on a faraway look. “The Rhinemaidens laid it on the gold when Alberich stole it from them.” His eyes came back and he smiled tightly. “That’s the one part Wagner got wrong. He said it was Alberich who cursed it.”

  “Never mind who cursed it,” Nick snapped. “Are you saying it’s coming after me?”

  “Of course,” the old man said, sounding surprised that Nick would even have to ask. “You have the Ring.”

  “So that’s why you let me have the damn thing instead of using it yourself,” Nick bit out, twisting at the Ring.

  The old man shook his head. “It won’t come off, Mr. Powell,” he said. “It likes you. More than that, it likes the money you’re making.” He cocked his head to the side. “I don’t suppose you’d consider turning your assets into gold? It especially likes gold.”

  “In a minute I’m going to get on the phone and convert it to Rwanda francs,” Nick growled. “Now tell me how I get it off.”

  “You don’t,” the old man said softly. “Not while you’re alive.”

  Nick stared at him. “How do you know so much about this?”

  “Because I was there from the beginning.” The old man lifted his hand to the side of his head and tugged at something.

  And abruptly shrank into a short, wide, bearded man holding a sort of metal cap in his hand. “I am Alberich,” he said.

  Nick looked at the metal cap. “The Tarnhelm,” Alberich answered his unspoken question, wiggling the cap between his fingers. “It gives its owner the power to change shape at will.” He smiled. “Wagner did get that one right.”

  And with that, the reality of magic Rings and their curses suddenly came sharply into focus. “This curse,” Nick said between dry lips. “If it’s coming after me, why did Caprizano and those people just walking down the street get hurt?”

  “The Ring’s trying to protect you,” Alberich said. “It will succeed, too, for awhile. And I can also help.”

  “For a price, I suppose?”

  “Of course,” Alberich said.

  “Why am I not surprised?” Nick growled. “And if I refuse, or you miss one? The curse nails me, I die, and the Ring moves on to someone else?”

  “Basically,” Alberich said casually. “But at least your heirs will still have your money.” He shrugged. “If any of them are still alive.”

  And right on cue, Nick’s cell phone vibrated.

  He snatched it from his pocket, his heart suddenly pounding. “Powell.”

  “Nick, its Amy,” the choked voice of Sonnerfeld’s assistant said. “There’s been a terrible accident. Mr. Sonnerfeld’s fallen down an elevator shaft.”

  Nick looked at Alberich. How many times, he wondered, had the dwarf watched this same scenario play itself out, losing victim after victim to the Ring’s curse while he grew rich on his ten percent?

  Amy was still talking. “I’m sorry-what was that?” Nick asked.

  “I said you need to get back here right away,” she said. “The whole board’s coming in for emergency session-oh, God-”

  “I understand,” Nick cut in. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Your boss?” Alberich asked as he closed the phone. “Yes, that’s the usual pattern. From the edges of your life inward-strangers, co-workers, boss. Fortunately, you don’t have a wife or children, or they’d be next.”

  Nick’s stomach twisted into a hard knot. Lydia … “I’ve got to go,” he said, his voice sounding hollow in his ears as he headed for the door.

  “Remember what I said,” Alberich called after him. “For an extra forty percent I can help protect you from the curse.”

  “I’ll think about it,” Nick called over his shoulder.

  To his relief, Lydia was sitting safe and sound at her desk when he barged into her office. “Come on,” he said, without preamble, grabbing her wrist and all but hauling her out of her chair. “We’re going on a trip.”

  “Nick, what in the world do you think you’re doing?” she demanded as she tried to pull from his grip.

  “I’ve got a cab waiting,” he said, ignoring her struggles as he pulled her across the room under the astonished stares of her colleagues. “You’ve got ten minutes to pack, and you’ll need your passport. We’ve got just three hours until the next flight to Frankfurt.”

  “To Frankfurt?” she echoed as he got her out the door. “You mean… Germany ?”

  “I don’t mean Kentucky,” Nick said. “Come on.”

  A moment later they were in the cab, weaving their way through the city’s streets. Nick could feel Lydia ’s puzzled and hostile glare on him, but he ignored it. As long as he kept her close, maybe the Ring’s protection would extend to her, too.

  Meanwhile, he had to find a permanent solution to the problem. It was these damn Rhinemaidens who had put the damn curse on the damn Ring. Maybe they could take it off.

  The sky had been clouding over as they landed at Frankfurt International Airport. The commuter flight to Stuttgart had run into some more serious weather, and as Nick got them on the road in their rental car, the rain was starting in earnest.

  By the time he pulled off the road beside the slope leading down to the Rhine River the full fury of the storm had broken.

  “This is the place?” Lydia shouted over the wind as they picked their way carefully through the trees and rocks toward the surging water below.

  “Assuming Wagner knew what he was talking about,” Nick called back. “This is definitely the place he described for the scenery in the first Bayreuth production of Gotterdammerung. We’ll just have to see if he got it right.”

  They fell silent, concentrating on the climb, and Nick found himself marveling once again at the remarkable woman beside him. He’d told her the whole story on the way to the airport from her apartment, fully expecting her to order the cabby to forget Kennedy and take them straight to Bellevue. But to his surprise, she’d not only taken it calmly but had actually believed the story.

  Or at least she’d pretended to believe it. Still, that was more than he would have gotten from anyone else he knew.

  The rain had moderated a little by the time they reached the bottom of the slope, but the winds had become more turbulent. Carefully, Nick moved to the edge of the river, wiping at the sheet of water streaming down his face as he peered across the roiling whitecaps spilling over the treacherous rocks. “Rhinemaidens!” he shouted. “I’ve brought you your Ring. Come and get it.”

  There was no answer but the whistling of the wind. “What if they’re not here?” Lydia asked.

  Nick shook his head wordlessly, looking back and forth down the shoreline.

  And frowned.

  There, about fifty yards downriver, he could see a squat figure standing with the stillness of a rock, facing their direction.

  It was Alberich.

  “I knew you’d come,” the dwarf said as Nick and Lydia slogged through the wet grass to him. “They all do, sooner or later. Hoping to bribe or beg or threaten their way out of the curse.”

  “News flash-I’m not here to beg,” Nick told him. “I’m here to give them back their Ring.”

  Alberich snorted in disgust. “Fool. You really think you’re the first one to think of that?”

  “They won’t take it back?” Lydia asked.

  Alberich looked her up and down. “You must be the one he was going to buy the Ring for.” He snorted. “Waste of effort. You’re not nearly ambitious enough.”

  “You mean I’m not greedy enough,” Lydia shot back. “Why won’t they take it back?”

  “Of course they’ll take it back,” the dwarf said maliciously. “The problem is, the Ring won’t leave him. That means the Rhinemaidens will have to take a bit more than just the gold.”

  Lydia inhaled sharply. “You mean… his finger?”

  “Or his hand,” Alberich said. “Possibly his whole arm.”

  Lydia looked at Nick in horror. “No! They can’t.”

  “They will.
” Alberich pointed to a jagged rock in the middle of the river, barely visible above the surging water. “That’s their rock, and they’re already on their way. But there is an alternative.”

  “What is it?” Lydia asked.

  “Forget it,” Nick snarled. “He’s just playing another angle.”

  “I’m as strong as they are,” Alberich told her. “For another twenty percent I can keep them away from him.”

  “I said forget it,” Nick said again. He could see something in the water now, moving toward him just below the surface. “Even if it costs my whole arm, it’ll be worth it.”

  “Nick, that’s insane,” Lydia said urgently. “We’re in the middle of nowhere, with our car fifty feet up a hill. You’ll bleed to death before we can get you to a hospital.”

  And then, abruptly, three slender bodies surged out of the water onto the shore, and six hands grabbed at his clothing.

  “Back!” Alberich snapped, leaping to Nick’s side and pulling his right arm away from the grasping hands.

  “The Ring!” the Rhinemaidens called in unison, their voices thin and ancient and terrifying. One of them shoved her way beneath Alberich’s grip, and suddenly there was a tug-of-war going on for Nick’s right arm.

  “Give us the Ring,” one of the Maidens said, her hand wrapping like a vise around Nick’s ankle and tugging him toward the river. “You retain it at your peril.”

  “I know,” Nick said. “I want to give it to you-really I do.”

  “Only the waters of the Rhine can wash away the curse,” the third Maiden said, her hands on Nick’s jacket, her face up close to his. Over the smell of fish he caught a glimpse of sharp barracuda teeth.

  “It won’t let go,” Nick pleaded.

  “It likes him,” Alberich said, pushing the first Maiden’s hands off Nick’s arm. “Don’t be a fool, Nick. I can still save you.”

  Nick blinked. It likes you. Alberich had said the same thing the first time Nick had set eyes on the Ring.