“I know everyone in Knights Bridge.” She spoke lightly but the way she averted her eyes told a different story. “I’d have to go looking out of town.”
Noah saw that she wasn’t going any deeper, not here, not now. He smiled. “You could always wait for a rich, good-looking swashbuckler to turn up.”
He noticed her immediate relief at his teasing tone. “My perfect fantasy,” she said with a laugh. “What’s yours?”
“Maybe it’s a redheaded small-town librarian.”
As they walked back to the house, Noah received a text message from Brandon Sloan that Julius Hartley had just taken a booth at Knights Bridge’s one and only restaurant. Brandon was all set to meet Noah there, but Noah texted him back that he’d go alone.
He debated whether to tell Phoebe about the message from her brother-in-law and finally did.
“You can’t move a muscle in Knights Bridge without a Sloan knowing,” she said, then nodded up toward the driveway where he’d parked. “Go on. I’ll stay and help with the tomatoes. My mother or one of my sisters will give me a ride back to town. Smith’s is the name of the restaurant. It’s just down the street next to the country store.”
“I’ll find it.”
She hesitated. “Are you sure you want to meet Hartley on your own?”
“I’m the one who brought him here,” Noah said. “I’ll deal with him.”
Phoebe gave him the slightest of smiles. “Then I recommend the turkey club,” she said, heading off to her mother’s vegetable garden.
*
Julius Hartley didn’t seem surprised or nervous when Noah sat across from him at a dark-wood booth at Smith’s, a small, family restaurant located in a 1920s house around the corner from the country store. Framed color photographs of the Quabbin Reservoir and wilderness hung on the walls. Noah studied a photograph of a bald eagle soaring above blue reservoir waters as he collected his thoughts.
“I’m having the turkey club,” Hartley said. “I hear it’s an O’Dunn favorite.”
Noah knew it was meant as a provocative statement, a way to tell him that he was dealing with a private investigator, a man who was good at his job. Noah shifted his gaze from the eagle. Hartley already had a tall glass of iced tea on the table in front of him
“The meatloaf is supposed to be good, too,” Hartley added. “Homemade. Have you ever had meatloaf, Kendrick?”
“Not in a while.”
“Since the first million or the first billion?”
Noah didn’t respond. “What did you want with Elly O’Dunn?”
“What, you don’t believe I’m interested in buying goats, either?” Hartley grinned and slung an arm over the back of the booth. “I’m taking that as a positive. I assume you’ve been out to the O’Dunn place.”
“I just came from there.”
“With your princess?” Hartley waited a half beat for a response and when he didn’t get one, lowered his arm and helped himself to his tea. “How much do you know about these people?”
“That’s not why I’m here.”
Hartley raised his eyes. “Here to kick my ass? No problem. I get that. Elly O’Dunn works in the town offices. She and your librarian princess are probably putting a dossier together on me.”
“Good,” Noah said.
“And if they aren’t, you and your friend Loretta Wrentham are.”
“You showed up in Loretta’s office. Why? How do you know her?”
Hartley shrugged, clearly unconcerned. “It’s my job. As you well know by now, I’m a private investigator in Los Angeles. I had a few questions, I got them answered and now I’m going home. It’s all you need to know.”
Noah shook his head. “I’ll decide what I need to know.”
Hartley was clearly not intimidated. “Knock yourself out.”
“Who are you working for?”
“You know better than to ask.” Hartley leaned back, glanced around the quiet restaurant. “If you think what comes after NAK is here in Sleepy Hollow, you’re kidding yourself.”
Noah said nothing. A waitress took his order, and he asked just for iced tea. He wasn’t having dinner with Julius Hartley, L.A. private investigator. Noah was aware he could be naive about people and oblivious to obvious rogues and scoundrels, but he wasn’t that naive and oblivious.
Hartley swirled the tea and ice in his glass. “You like the action, the pressure of the work you do. Solving problems. Building something from scratch. Getting other people involved, like your hockey-player friend.”
“Dylan was invaluable in building NAK.”
“Invaluable is one of those words that sounds like it means the opposite of what it means. It doesn’t matter to me what comes next for you. I’m not working for your board of directors, in case that’s what you’re thinking.”
“It’s not my board. It’s the shareholders’ board.”
“Right. Things have changed for you.”
“Is that why you’re on my tail? To find out what I’m up to?”
“I just told you I don’t care what you’re up to.”