“We’re working on different purposes, Mrs. Lloyd.” A silent housemaid drifted past the open door. “My first concern is locating the child.”
Evelyn Lloyd was dressed in daywear of ivory crepe de chine. “You realize my husband has cancer.”
“Yes. I’m very sorry.”
“You are also aware that we could not have children.”
The French parlor clock ticked down elegant seconds as Kirsten balanced a bone china cup on her knees. “No. I had not heard that.”
“It was a blow to my husband, I don’t mind saying. We were married almost eight years before the doctors finally stopped pretending they could spend my fortune and give us what Kedrick longed for above all else. An heir.”
Kirsten set her cup on the table between them. She directed her eyes to her hands. Not to avoid Evelyn’s gaze, but rather to focus more intently upon what was being said. “Your fortune.”
“Kedrick came into our marriage with little more than a title, a crumbling palace in Wiltshire, and the vast ego of ancient power voided by time.”
Kirsten tasted the air, hunting for what she was missing, what Evelyn wished her to hear. A woman of this moneyed clan did not share such confidences. It was not done. Ever. Particularly with a stranger. “It must have been hard, not being able to give him what he wanted.”
“Far harder for my husband,” Evelyn responded, rising to her feet. “As it happens, Kedrick is at the Met now. Let me call and tell him you are on your way over.”
She had no choice but to gather her remaining questions and be led from the room. “Thank you.”
At the door, Evelyn Lloyd offered her a cool hand and the words “Erin Brandt had the gift of drawing the audience over to her side, even when they didn’t want to come. Even when she was the villain of the piece. It made her a star, but it also made every other woman in the world her enemy.”
Kirsten kept hold of the long-fingered hand. “Why every woman?”
“Did I say that? Forgive me. I meant every singer.” She opened the door. “Thank you so much for stopping by.”
Kirsten was coming down the apartment house’s front stairs when she was struck by the stench. The all-too-familiar mixture of body odor and bad cologne pushed her away from the street and back inside.
The uniformed doorman lounged just inside the second set of doors. “Can you please call me a cab?”
The blank stare said she was not paying his salary. “Lady, there’s a hundred of them going by every minute.”
Kirsten fished in her purse and came up with a ten. “I’d really be grateful. I think I’m being followed.”
The doorman pushed himself off the wall and sauntered outside. A whistle, a wave, and the man was holding the door open for her. She powered forward, slipped the note into his waiting palm, and tumbled inside. The doorman paused long enough to grin and ask, “Old flames die hard, don’t they.”
“What?”
“The stalker. He’s after one more bite from the apple, right?” The doorman’s gaze swept down her frame. “Can’t blame a guy for trying.”
Kirsten ripped the cab door from his hands and said through the plastic divider, “Go, please.”
“Where to?”
“Just go.”
Only when they had pulled away and lost themselves in the sullen stream of city traffic did the gasping hit her. The sweats. The feeling of just how close she had come. Her purse became a vault with a tricky lock she had to struggle over. The cell phone almost defeated her. But she finally managed the number and said as soon as Marcus came on, “He’s here.”
“Who?”
“The guy who attacked me in Düsseldorf.”
“You saw him?”
“Smelled.” Despite the morning and the fact that she was coming to trust this man, she could not halt the sudden suspicion. That he would patronize her. Play down her fears and her imagination. Tell her something disparaging, like how she needed to put the past behind her, something utterly natural and completely despised. “I smelled him.”
“Where are you, Kirsten?”
“A cab. I’m okay.”
“Tell me how he smelled.”
“Body odor and some old guy’s cologne. Like Old Spice but different.” It sounded lame to her own ears. “I’ll never forget that smell. He was wearing this heavy coat when he grabbed me, and when I bit his arm it felt like I had swallowed a gallon of the stuff.”
“English Leather.”
“What?”
“The cologne he was wearing. English Leather. You never told me you bit him.”
“Bit and kicked both.” But her mind was clutched by what she had just heard. “How do you know the smell?”
“Because I’ve been a fool. Everybody’s been half expecting an attack against me. Fay and Netty are camped out at the house, Darren sweeps by four or five times a day, Deacon baby-sits me. And all the while, I wasn’t the threat. It wasn’t just Düsseldorf, and it wasn’t just Erin.”
“Who are they?”
“I only know one name. Sephus Jones. The guy must bathe in that stuff.”
She leaned her head against the glass. “When did you see him?”
“Never mind. Go back to the hotel. Forget all the other things you were going to do.”
“I can’t do that.”
“Kirsten-”
“No, Marcus. You can tell me to be careful. You can tell me to limit myself to the absolute essentials. But we’re in the middle of something big, and the clock is ticking. I can’t hide myself away and pretend the world is going to be all right without us.”
He acquiesced by not objecting further. A pair of breaths, then, “Who could be behind this?”
The name came to her, but not a reason. “Let me call you back.”
Kirsten cut the connection, leaned forward, and tapped on the glass. “Please take me back to where you picked me up.”
The doorman called upstairs, then directed her to the penthouse’s private elevator. Evelyn Lloyd herself stood in the doorway, coiling her pearls around two fingers. “That was quick.”
Kirsten realized the woman was not going to invite her inside. “Mrs. Lloyd, I need to ask you something that is going to be difficult for us both.”
“More difficult than watching my husband expire from cancer?”
Again there was the sense of hearing one thing, but being told another. “What kind of cancer does your husband have?”
She showed a slight widening of the eyes. “What a remarkable query to draw you back off the street.”
Kirsten waited.
“My husband has chronic myeloid leukemia, or CML. I am told it is quite rare.” A brittle smile. “For once, Kedrick was not pleased with exclusivity.”
“Could you think of any possible reason,” Kirsten asked softly, “why your husband would wish to do Dale Steadman harm?”
“What an utterly remarkable thought.” The pearls twirled more swiftly. “Dale is Kedrick’s best friend. He saved Dale’s business when he was ready to go under.” A minute hesitation, little more than a silent press for emphasis. “Of course, there was an ulterior motive. I decided Kedrick would be happier if he had his own income, rather than simply living from my funds. So everything he did in North Carolina was his own. When Dale sold his business, Kedrick made a rather tidy profit, and reinvested that sum in a group of hotels.”
Evelyn dropped her hand to her side, terminating the conversation. “That is all, I assume.”
“Yes. Thank you.”
But as Kirsten pressed the button and the elevator door swept open, the woman added, “A harsh thing, is it not. Being forced to ask a woman about her own husband.”
“I’m very sorry, Mrs. Lloyd.”
“Don’t be. Handling a spouse’s death and departure generates discretion, but never a dishonest blindness.”
Kirsten pressed the button to keep the elevator doors open. “Excuse me?”
“Leukemia is actually a family of diseases. They affect blood cell production in the bone marrow. About two years ago Kedrick started becoming increasingly tired. This left him more furious than worried. Kedrick has no patience with anything that hints at mortal weakness, including his own body. Then he was struck by one of those horrid bicycle messengers, and the blow was enough to rupture his spleen, which had become weakened by the disease. Then the doctors discovered both the cancer and the fact that Kedrick has a very rare type of blood.”