“I see,” the woman said. “And how do you find Knightsbury?”
“It’s better than Colgan,” Kat said, knowing that all good lies have their roots in the truth.
“That’s what Scooter says.” The woman looked at Hale. “Scooter, your father needs us in the study. It’s almost time. Say good-bye to your friend.”
“Yes, Mother,” Hale said, and the woman walked away. He watched her go, and seemed utterly lost in thought until Kat slapped his arm.
“Mother?” Kat gasped. “That was your mother!”
He took her arm and whispered, “You’ve got to go, Kat.”
“I just got here. I thought that I should…you know…be here for you.”
“They’re going to read the will.”
“They do that at the memorial service?”
“When control of Hale Industries hangs in the balance they do. The business is…complicated.”
“I see.”
“You don’t want to be here when all these vultures start circling.” He looked out at the people in the room—at his family. “Go on, Kat. I’ll be fine,” Hale said, but something in his words rang false to Kat; she wondered exactly who he was trying to con.
“It sounds like your grandmother was an amazing woman, Hale.” She thought about Silas Foster and Hazel’s fake Monet. “I wish I’d known her. I’m sure everyone just really wants to say good-bye. Hale”—she took his hand—“it’s not about the money.”
Then for the first time Kat could remember, Hale looked at her like she was a fool.
“It’s always about the money.”
Even before he moved, Kat could feel him slipping away. “Why didn’t you tell me she was sick, Hale? I could have—”
“What, Kat?” Hale snapped, then lowered his voice. “What could we have done? Stolen something? Conned someone? Trust me, there was nothing anyone could do. She didn’t even want to live anymore.”
“I’m sure that’s not true.”
“Of course it’s true. The doctors said she could have recovered, but she had a Do Not Resuscitate order. She could have hung on for years, but she wanted to…leave.”
“Hey, Scooter,” Natalie said, reappearing. “Dad told me to find you. They’re getting ready to start.”
“Okay,” Hale said. “Thanks again for coming, Kat,” he told her.
“Hale,” Kat said, stopping him. “I’m very sorry for your loss.”
She meant it. She really did. But watching him walk away, Kat felt like maybe she was the person who had lost something. Hale was always well groomed and well dressed, but that day his hair was parted just so. His cuff links bore the family crest. He didn’t look like the Hale who helped himself to heaping bowls of soup in Uncle Eddie’s kitchen. He looked like the Hale who belonged to that room, that house.
Natalie draped her arm through his when they walked.
That girl.
For the first time, Kat truly understood why gates and guards had to stand between his world and hers. Never before had she regretted breaking her way into someplace she didn’t belong.
“Did he just run off with that redhead?” Gabrielle said, sidling up to Kat and taking a big bite of shrimp. “And answer to the name of Scooter?”
“Come on, Gabs. It’s time for us to leave.”
The woods seemed different on the long walk back to the car, and Kat couldn’t shake the feeling that she was forgetting something. Then she stopped and looked at the house.
Someone.
“Hello, miss.”
Kat couldn’t help but smile when she saw the uniformed man who stood at attention beside a long black limousine.
“Marcus!” Kat cried. “I haven’t seen you since—”
“I was very sorry about Buenos Aires. It was most unfortunate timing.” He looked at Gabrielle, tipped his hat. “Miss Gabrielle, it’s nice to see you. If you don’t mind, I have a favor to ask.”
“Anything,” Gabrielle said.
“Well, I was wondering if I could perhaps drive your cousin back to the city myself.”
“You don’t have to do that, Marcus,” Kat said. “I know it’s probably a difficult time for you.”
“Please,” Marcus said, reaching for the limo’s rear door. “It would be a relief to do something.”
Kat understood. For a girl who was used to adrenaline and fear, there was no feeling in the world she hated more than being helpless, so she asked her cousin, “Gab, you mind?”
“Oh, please.” Gabrielle rolled her eyes, then looked at Marcus. “You can have her.”
A second later, her cousin was climbing into her car and driving away without as much as a tire mark to prove she’d been there at all. Uncle Eddie would have been incredibly proud.
“If you will, miss…” Kat turned to see Marcus holding open the limo door. For a second, Kat considered sitting in the front, but Marcus was a man for whom tradition and decorum mattered. And so Kat slid into the backseat without another word.
Sitting on the soft leather, Kat couldn’t help but wonder how many hours she’d spent staring at the back of the valet’s head. He was always there. Never far from Hale’s side. And then Kat knew what had been missing from the big house.
“I didn’t see you inside, Marcus.”
“Yes. I wasn’t able to attend, but I was hoping to see you.”
“You were?”
“Yes,” he said, but didn’t offer anything more.
“Did you know Hale’s grandmother well?”
“I did. She was a great, great woman.”
“Was Hale close to her?”
Marcus nodded. “He was.”
“I didn’t know.” Kat stared out the window. “He never mentioned her to me. Why doesn’t he talk about her?”
“The things that are the most precious to us are sometimes the most secret.”
Kat nodded and considered the thought. Her family was loud and cranky, a force of nature, moving around the globe like a storm. Hale’s family was quiet and fractured, their issues simmering under the surface like a sleeping volcano.
“Marcus,” she said, bolting upright when the car steered off the main road and onto a narrow path. “Marcus, I don’t think this goes to the highway.”
“No, miss. It doesn’t.”
Marcus wasn’t forgetful. He wasn’t the sort of man to make mistakes, and so whatever had brought them to that narrow, winding lane, Kat knew it was absolutely not an error.
“We’re not going to Brooklyn, are we, Marcus?”
“No, miss.” He gripped the wheel and kept on driving. “We aren’t.”
They didn’t go far. By Kat’s estimation they weren’t more than a half a mile from the main road when the car stopped. She could still see the smoke rising from the chimney of the big house hidden behind the trees, and yet it felt a world away from the tiny cottage with the white picket fence and perfectly pruned roses that stood before her. There were black shutters and flower boxes on every window. An ornate railing ran along a cozy porch, and the whole place looked almost like it had been made from gingerbread.
“Marcus, where are we? Who lives here?”
He turned off the car and reached for the door. “I do.”
“I never knew you had a house.”
Kat crawled from the backseat of the car and looked up at the man who held her door. Maybe it was her imagination, but she could have sworn he didn’t stand quite as straight, there in his own driveway. He looked at her a little more squarely. He wasn’t a servant then, she realized. He was a man, welcoming her into his home.
“Oh, it’s not entirely mine. I share it with—”
“Marcus? Marcus, is that…”
A woman was standing in the doorway, a dish towel in her hands. She had steel gray hair and the same piercing eyes that Kat had seen reflected in the rearview mirror for years.
“Miss Katarina Bishop,” Marcus said, “please allow me to introduce my sister, Marianne.”
“You’re Marianne?” Kat thought about the way Hale’s mother had said the name, almost with a snarl. “It’s nice to meet you.” Kat extended her hand. But Marianne just gaped at Marcus.
“Oh, brother. What have you done?”