New York City
Nina stood before her office windows, staring out across Manhattan. Despite the December cold, it was a clear day, sunlight glinting dazzlingly off the skyscrapers. But her mood was anything but bright.
Eddie stood beside her. ‘If you’re not feeling up to it . . .’ he said quietly.
‘No, I’ll be okay,’ she insisted. ‘I have to see him. I need to see him.’ More loudly, to the open intercom: ‘Bring him through, please, Lola.’
Eddie squeezed her hand in reassurance, then stepped back at a tap on the door. Nina took a breath. ‘Come in.’
Desmond Sharpe entered.
Nina felt a resurgence of the feelings that had stricken her at Rowan’s death. Desmond was shorter and stockier, hair grey rather than black, but his eyes were just like his son’s. She tried to greet him, but the words froze in her mouth.
He saw her distress, and spoke first. ‘Hello, Nina,’ he said softly.
‘Hello . . . Desmond.’ Nina hesitated before using his first name, almost falling back on a formal ‘Mr Sharpe’. But she had been on familiar terms with him while dating Rowan, and afterwards.
She introduced him to her husband, who shook his hand. ‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ Eddie said simply. Desmond thanked him. ‘I’ll be outside, give you some privacy.’
He left the room. Nina tried to assemble her thoughts before speaking, but found herself only able to begin with a superficial pleasantry. ‘Thank you for coming. Although you didn’t have to come all the way from Bridgeport. I wanted to see you at home. And - and I’m so sorry that I wasn’t able to be at Rowan’s funeral. I should have been. I’m sorry.’ Her eyes turned down to the carpet between them.
‘Nina, it’s okay,’ Desmond replied, stepping to her. ‘I know you’ve been . . . busy. I still keep up with the news.’
She lifted her head, seeing his small, sad smile. ‘I’m still sorry. I should have seen you, or at least called you, much sooner. I didn’t because . . .’ He gaze dropped again, as did her voice. ‘Because I was afraid to.’
‘Why?’
‘I thought you’d blame me.’
‘Oh, Nina.’ He put a hand on her shoulder. ‘Why on earth would I blame you? You tried to help him; you . . .’ His voice became choked, hoarse. ‘You were there with him. At the end. And, do you know, of all the people he could have been with, I think Rowan would have been happy that it was you.’
Nina looked back up at Desmond, hot lines of tears trickling down her cheeks. ‘Thank you,’ she whispered.
Desmond left Nina’s office several minutes later. Eddie was waiting outside; the older man paused to speak to him. ‘Thank you.’ ‘For what?’ Eddie asked.
‘For dealing with the people who killed my son. I didn’t say this to Nina, and I hope you won’t tell her I said it, but you gave them what they deserved. I call that justice. The world needs more people like you.’
Eddie wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that, settling for a non-committal nod as he shook his hand again. He re-entered the office as Lola escorted Desmond out, finding Nina back at the window. ‘You okay?’ he asked, moving behind her and putting his arms round her waist.
‘Yeah,’ she sighed. ‘Desmond and I talked about Rowan, how much we’re both going to miss him. But it’s going to be so much harder for him.’ She leaned against him, wiping her eyes. ‘I heard you talking to him - what did he say?’
‘Just . . . saying thanks,’ he said, honouring Desmond’s request to keep his bitter outburst private. ‘Sure you’re all right?’
‘I will be. Thanks.’ She put her hands on his. They stood in silence, looking out across New York together.
The moment was broken by the trill of the intercom. ‘Nina?’ said Lola. ‘Mac and Mr Jindal are here.’
Nina extricated herself from Eddie’s arms, surprised. ‘I didn’t know they were in town.’
‘Mac was with Alderley down in Washington for some intelligence debrief - he told me he’d see us before he flew back home. No idea Kit was here, though.’
The familiar Scottish and Indian voices reached them before the visitors themselves: ‘. . . with both of them on the team, they would easily be able to stand up to India,’ said Mac.
‘But how can you know? Scotland have never played in a Test match,’ Kit replied. He tapped on the open door, entering as Nina waved them in. ‘Hello! Good to see you both again.’
‘And you,’ said Nina. She noticed he was limping. ‘How’s the leg?’
‘Better, thank you. I can walk without a crutch now, which is a great relief! It still hurts, but it will heal completely soon.’
‘Already back at work at Interpol, are you?’ Eddie asked him as he shook hands with his old friend and mentor.
‘Yes - which is why I am here. But I will tell you in a minute. After Mac admits that I am right about Sachin Tendulkar being the greatest cricketer of all time.’ He grinned at the Scot.
Eddie shook his head. ‘Not more bloody cricket.’
‘You should learn from this lad, Eddie,’ said Mac. ‘He’s very sharp and capable. And polite and respectful, too. Even if his grasp of the facts about sport is somewhat tenuous.’ Now it was Kit’s turn to shake his head.
‘So what brings you here, Kit?’ asked Nina.
‘Well, the first thing is that I wanted to tell you I have been promoted! I am now the Chief Investigator of the Cultural Property Crime Unit.’
Eddie patted him on the back. ‘Nice one, mate. Congratulations!’
‘Well deserved, I think,’ Nina added.
Kit smiled. ‘Thank you. But the other thing is that I will be working with you again in the future. I have been appointed Interpol’s official liaison with the IHA in matters of cultural property crime. I just came from a meeting with the UN’s Mr Penrose - he will give you all the details, but I wanted to tell you in person. And I also wanted to bring you our first new joint case.’
He took a box from the briefcase he was carrying and opened it - to reveal the purple statuette Nina had seen amongst the Khoil’s collection of stolen treasures. ‘Interpol has not been able to identify its true owner, and so far we have found nothing in the Khoils’ records about it either. It’s possible Fernandez’s gang killed its owner, so its theft was never reported.’
‘Or,’ Eddie suggested, ‘maybe it wasn’t reported because whoever they nicked it from didn’t want anyone to know they had it in the first place.’
‘Why would anyone want to keep it a secret?’ asked Nina. ‘Nobody knows anything about it.’
‘The Khoils must have known, otherwise why would they have stolen it?’ said Kit. He looked across the room to the statuette’s not-quite-twin in the display case. ‘But now that you have two of them to examine, perhaps you will know too. I persuaded Interpol that you and the IHA were the best hope of identifying it.’ He handed the box to Nina and closed his briefcase.
‘Uh, thanks,’ she said, slightly taken aback by the unexpected ‘gift’.
‘Are you staying in New York?’ Eddie asked. ‘I’m afraid I can’t,’ Kit told him. ‘I have to fly back to Lyon right away - my new job somehow has a large pile of paperwork waiting for me already!’
‘I know how that feels,’ said Nina, putting the box on her desk. ‘Well, congratulations on the promotion, Kit. Hope we see you again soon. Okay, not too soon, as that’d mean some archaeological treasure’s been stolen . . . but you know what I mean.’
‘I think I do,’ he said with a grin. ‘Goodbye, my friends.’ He shook everyone’s hand, then departed.
‘What about you, Mac?’ said Nina. ‘Do you have to rush off too?’
Mac gestured towards 44th Street beyond the window. ‘Only as far as the Delacourt Hotel.’ He gave Eddie a wry look. ‘I thought after the trouble last time I was there, I should give them the custom as compensation. But after that, I’d rather hoped you’d both join me for dinner tonight.’