Four Days Before the Auction

 

Near the Scottish Border

 

If Katarina Bishop’s home was Uncle Eddie’s kitchen table, then her home-away-from-home probably had to be the back seat of Hale’s Bentley. Whichever Bentley Marcus happened to be driving at the time.

Outside, the sky was a cool, steel gray and the wind was cold and strong as they drove over the steep hills that marked the border between England and Scotland. Once upon a time, it was a land of bloody raids and massive fortresses, of violent men and uncertain futures, and Kat had to marvel at the realization that, in a way, some things never change.

And yet, Kat couldn’t help but think, there are some things that probably should.

“Are you sure about this?” she asked the boy beside her.

Even with the Bentley’s tinted windows and the cold gray day outside, Hale’s eyes were hidden behind dark glasses. It was like he didn’t want her to see whatever thoughts might be visible in his eyes.

“I’m sure.”

“Because we don’t have to do it this way,” she said. “We could always Avon Lady or Three Blind Mice our way in. I mean, it is Christmas. The Away in a Manger always works at Christmas.”

Hale laughed. “Do you honestly think we could get Angus into that fake maternity belly after what happened in Belize?”

“No,” Kat conceded. “But I think Hamish would do it.”

“Oh, Hamish would totally do it, but it’s not the best play and you know it.”

“I know. But Hale, we don’t have to—”

He cut her off with a kiss. “We do.”

Kat forced herself to pull away. “Greymore Castle is six hundred years old, Hale. It used to have a moat.”

“We’ve dealt with moats before. As memory serves, moats can be incredibly convenient.”

“The place is lousy with secret passages, and the blueprints are on file with the Society for Historical Preservation. Plus, they filmed that BBC series here last year, so we know what the inside looks like. We could get in, is what I’m saying, Hale. Easy.”

The road curved and Kat couldn’t help herself; she swayed, leaning into his broad shoulders and his strength.

“We are getting in,” he told her.

“Yeah, but there are a dozen back doors we could use.”

Hale looked at her. “Why should we do that when we can go through the front door?” he asked and even Katarina Bishop couldn’t argue as the car crested a ridge and she saw it—sitting in the valley below: a gray stone castle with massive towers and ornate grounds, sprawling wings that had no doubt been added over the centuries.

Greymore Castle wasn’t just a house, Kat realized. It was more than a fortress. It was over five centuries of history and power and privilege. It was also a ghost of another time, and it was crumbling.

“No wonder the earl is running out of money,” Hale said, reading Kat’s mind as they drove toward the doors that stood open, two lines of uniformed servants standing at attention on either side.

When the car stopped, she looked at him. “Hale—”

“Kiss me, Kat,” he said. “For luck.”

He pulled her closer and held her tighter, and yet Kat could feel him slipping away. One moment, he was the boy who had teased her and kissed her and followed her across six continents; the next he was slipping into his most dangerous and least favorite cover: the head of Hale Industries and heir to one of the greatest fortunes in the world.

When the back door of the Bentley opened, Kat recognized Marcus’s calm, cool demeanor as he held open the door for Hale who slid from the warm back seat and into the cold winter air.

“Thank you, Marcus,” Hale said.

Marcus nodded. “Of course, sir.”

In a lower voice, Hale asked, “I trust you know what to do?”

“Indeed, sir.” Marcus stood a little straighter. “I shall endear myself to the staff and find out where all the skeletons are buried. Both literally and figuratively.”

“We can probably do without the literal skeletons, but I like the enthusiasm,” Hale said with a slap on Marcus’s arm, but he didn’t look back at Kat. He didn’t offer a hand and help her from the car. She was utterly on her own—almost forgotten—as he moved to the long line of people who stood, waiting. He didn’t even pause as he made his way to the old man in the wheelchair with the heavy plaid draped across his legs.

There were a number of other guests ahead of Hale. They made their bows and dropped into curtsies. Kat slid from the back seat with Marcus’s help and mentally reviewed what she knew about the Earl of Greymore’s guests.

Most wouldn’t arrive until Christmas Eve, but his man of business was already there, as well as some family and a dowager duchess who had been close with the earl’s late wife. There were supposed to be a few business associates and distant relatives, but Kat couldn’t help but notice that none of these people seemed particularly filled with the Christmas spirit.

She was aware, faintly, of the sight of a pair of uniformed footmen coming to assist Marcus with the bags. A tall, thin maid in a too-short uniform spoke briefly with the pair, then followed Marcus to the other side of the car, but Kat kept her gaze on the man in the chair.

Perhaps that’s why she was surprised to hear another man speak.

“Scooter Hale!” The voice was thin but loud. The accent sounded like Oxford and money, but the man it belonged to looked more like an overgrown boy, walking toward Hale, hand outstretched, like a puppy who had just been asked if he wanted to go play.

“Scooter!” the guy said, gripping Hale’s hand too tightly in his own.

If Kat didn’t know Hale so well, she might not have been able to read the look that crossed his face, the brief hesitation as he met the man’s gaze. W. W. Hale V was perhaps the most natural inside man that Kat had ever known. And Kat was Bobby Bishop’s daughter.

But this wasn’t a new identity he was slipping into, a questionable con. Hale was wearing the face and the name he’d been born with, and if there’s something all great inside men have trouble being it’s themselves.

But the man with the death grip on Hale’s hand didn’t know that. If anything, he gripped harder.

“Well met, ol’ chap,” he said as Hale cocked his head. “Well met!”

Hale almost laughed. His most roguish grin filled his face. “I don’t believe we have met,” Hale said, but his smile never dimmed, even as the other man laughed.

“Oh, I’m Viscount Marley,” he said, just as the earl huffed.

“He’s no viscount!” The old man seemed healthier when he was shouting.

The younger man cocked his head, a can you believe what I have to live with expression if ever Kat saw one. “Fletcher Fitzsimmons is the name,” he said. “Viscount Marley’s just a courtesy title, you see. My uncle has three titles in total, and he’s not using that one. I’m the heir.”

“Heir presumptive!” the earl spat. “I may get a son on my new wife yet.”

“Yes, of course, Uncle. We all await that day with bated breath.”

Kat watched the play between the old man and his heir, between one generation and the next. She knew well what it was like to be born into a powerful family. And she couldn’t help but pity the person who ever spoke to Uncle Eddie the way the viscount was speaking to the earl right then. In her experience, that would be an excellent way to find oneself banished to the old country, cleaning cast iron pots until the end of the decade.

Fletcher Fitzsimmons was either very brave or very, very stupid. Judging by the grin he was giving Hale, Kat didn’t wonder long.

The earl, however, barely gave his heir a second thought as he looked up at Hale who stood in the cold wind, blue eyes shielded behind dark glasses.

“You’re the Hale.”

When the earl spoke, it wasn’t a question. More like an accusation, and Kat could tell it wasn’t the first time Hale had heard it.

“That is correct, my lord.” Hale bent into a bow. “It is an honor to meet you.”

“You’re supposed to be older,” the old man said, and Hale couldn’t hide his smile.

“I hear that a lot.”

“Played golf with the Hale heir once. He was older.”

Hale removed his dark glasses and slid them into the pocket of his coat. “I’m the fifth, my lord. Four is, in fact, older. One through three are dead.”

For a moment, the earl looked like he was going to spit and demand that this impudent pup be dragged from his estate and from his presence. But then the old man laughed, a quick, hard bark that echoed through the cold air and off the hills. And just like that, the tension was broken.

“My lord, may I present my assistant, Katarina Clark?” Hale slid an arm around Kat’s waist and pulled her closer.

“The servants’ stairs are to the left,” the old man said with barely a glance in Kat’s direction.

Hale just pulled her tighter. He looked down into her eyes. “I’m sorry, my lord, but I’d prefer she stay with me. You see, Kat is my personal assistant.”

Kat wanted to slap him just for principle, but she was too used to the feel of Hale’s arm around her, and it was too cold and there was too much to be gained by letting the old man leer.

“Ha!” the earl laughed again. “I see.”

Even the heir was looking at her, and Kat made a mental note to repay Hale for this favor.

“I hope you can forgive me for practically inviting myself, my lord,” he was telling the earl. “I simply had to come thank you in person for your generous donation. One of the Eggs of the Magi… I can’t imagine a better tribute to my grandmother or a better gift to her legacy.”

With that, the earl seemed to shrink beneath his heavy plaid blanket. Kat watched him wither. Age. “Ah yes. Sorry to hear about Hazel, my boy. Great lady. So it must be true that she left you the keys to the kingdom, eh?”

Hale nodded slowly, and his grip on Kat’s waist never wavered. “Hale Industries is mine now, yes.”

When the earl eyed his nephew it was not with a little bit of envy. His laugh was as cold as the wind.

“Disinherited the heir apparent, did she? Ha! Did you hear that, Allaway?” the earl asked a man in a dark suit who stood not far away. “Allaway’s my man of business,” the earl explained. “Hazel had the right of it. I always liked the old gal. She had gumption!” the earl said, then whispered loudly to Hale. “Took a page out of her book myself.”

“Is that so?” Hale said.

“That’s right.” The earl slapped his plaid-covered leg, a new surge of energy going through him. “Of course, the title, the house, the properties, most of that has to pass to the earl’s heir, no matter how undeserving the little lecher might happen to be.”

Kat couldn’t help but glance at the so-called viscount who was still standing there, listening to every word. But these were old insults and even older wounds. Fletcher Fitzsimmons was immune to whatever his uncle had to say.

“Now, Uncle. You must not get overexcited.”

“Don’t touch me, boy!”

The earl’s shout was loud enough to drown out the crunch of gravel and delicate footsteps behind them. Only the sound of a woman asking, “Father, is everything okay?” could break the spell that held the old earl. At the sound of that voice, he smiled.

“Georgie, get over here. There’s someone I want you to meet.”

Georgie was young and lovely and decidedly more female than her name might indicate. She was dressed for riding and had a faint horsey smell that spoke of someone who was coming in from the stables.

When she approached she looked at Hale and Kat both, smiled at them equally. And for the first time in the earl’s presence Kat felt like more than just the girl the Hale heir brought to the party.

“Hello,” she said and her father reached for her hand.

“W. W. Hale the Fifth, I’d like you to meet my daughter, Lady Georgette.”

Georgette dropped into a curtsy as if she’d been doing it all of her life and, Kat supposed, she had.

“Lady Georgette.” Hale gave a bow. “It’s an honor to meet you. May I present my assistant, Kat?”

Georgette smiled in Kat’s direction. “How do you do? My father has told me of your grandmother and her charity, Mr. Hale. Tell me, how go the plans for the auction?”

Hale looked at Kat who turned to Lady Georgette and answer-ed. “Very well, my lady. The press release went out yesterday and all the prominent collectors were notified by phone the night before last. So far, the response has been tremendous.”

“Has it?” the viscount said.

“Are they still planning on doing it so close to Christmas?” Lady Georgette asked. “I know I’m no expert on these things, but surely you could get more interest with a little time?”

“True.” Kat smiled. “But interests can also wane. Especially with collectors who never thought an Egg of the Magi would become available during their lifetimes. Best to act before that fact fully sinks in. We’d hate for them to get immune to the thought. We’re hoping that it will give people a sort of rush. Plus, we think the Christmas spirit will help people to be even more generous than usual. It’s for a good cause, after all. Many of the children and families who benefit from the charity are being photographed with the egg today, in fact.”

Beside her, Kat could feel the viscount bristle. “Surely that’s not necessary.”

Kat glanced up at him. “The publicists assure us that it is.”

“But…” the man stammered. “It could break.”

Kat could feel everyone looking at her, waiting. A maid was helping Marcus with the last of the bags. The rest of the guests were already inside, warming up with fresh scones and hot cups of tea. But Kat just looked down at the old man.

“Don’t worry, my lord. The Magi Miracle Network will make sure that the egg stays in the exact condition that it was in when you entrusted it to us.”

This, at last, seemed to appease him. “Very well. But do me a favor and don’t mention the egg to my new lady. Won’t set too well, my giving it away. She likes the shiny, you see.”

Kat felt Hale’s hand shift at her waist, a physical sign that something about these words might matter.

Kat thought about what Gabrielle had said. When the earl died, his personal wealth would pass to whatever wife he might leave behind. And the egg was personal wealth.

“My lord,” Hale said, “I hadn’t realized you’d remarried. Congratulations.”

“He’s engaged,” the viscount rushed to correct.

“I’ll be married soon enough, boy. And then you’ll be out of the picture as soon as my son and rightful heir comes along. Isn’t that right, Allaway?”

“It is, my lord,” the lawyer agreed.

“Would have had an heir already if Georgie hadn’t been a…” He gestured wildly, as if the word girl was one he couldn’t bring himself to say. “But don’t you worry. The real Viscount Marley will be here within the year. Just you wait.”

Hale’s smile looked natural. Calm. Only Kat could see him force it.

“Of course, my lord. Congratulations on the happy event,” Hale said, but Kat couldn’t keep from glancing at Lady Georgette—the “Georgie” who would always be too small, too frail, too female to ever fully have her place at the family table. And Kat’s heart broke for her.

“Who is the lucky lady?” Hale asked the earl.

“Ah,” the old man beamed. “I’m the lucky one, my boy. See for yourself. She’s right behind you.”

Kat felt herself turn. The wind blew her hair from her face with a cold slap, but nothing compared to the sound of the voice that said, “Is someone talking about me?”

But the words were almost lost amid the crash of luggage hitting the gravel drive and the spinning of the maid in the too-short skirt. Kat hoped she was the only one who heard Gabrielle’s shocked whisper. “Mom?”

 

 

Kat remembered her mother. Not everything—she’d been too young for that. But memories would come back to her occasionally, even after all these years. A smell of baking bread. The sound of pigeons when they scatter. Old haunting folk songs sung in Russian in the middle of the night. These things came to Kat in waves and fits and starts. But never did her mother seem so close and quite so far as when she was in the same room with her Aunt Irina.

That was what Kat thought when she heard the sitting room door slam behind her.

“Oh, don’t be silly. I’d love to show our guests to their chambers!” Irina had called down the long hall, her words bouncing off of polished floors and three-hundred-year-old family portraits.

The earl had smiled and nodded, as if all men should be so lucky as to find such a natural hostess to marry. The viscount had scowled, as if his uncle’s new paramour lacked the good sense to know exactly which tasks should be left to the help.

But none of that mattered to Kat.

Hale spun and Gabrielle dropped the luggage she’d been carrying, letting it bounce on the soft sofa and tumble to the floor.

Kat could only look at the woman who, in the right light and the right clothes and the right circumstances could almost be her mother’s twin. “Is it you?” Kat asked.

Irina scanned Kat from head to toe, and for a moment she seemed more like Gabrielle than her lost sister.

“Of course it’s me. I would have thought that obvious, Katarina. Or have you lost your mind as well as your heart.” Smoothly, she turned to Hale. “Hello, darling.” She leaned up and offered her check for a kiss. “It is so good to see you, dear. Let me look at you. Oh, Gabrielle, why didn’t you see him first? For that matter, why didn’t I see him first?”

“Mother! Listen to us,” Gabrielle was shouting, crossing the room. Even in the maid’s uniform with her gorgeous hair pulled back in a tight bun at the back of her neck, she moved like a swan, like a ballerina, ready to leap from the stage at any moment. “Are you running the Bird in the Hand or aren’t you?” Gabrielle asked and, at last, Irina stopped smiling.

“Of course not. Why would I do something silly like that? I’m going to be the next Countess of Greymore, or haven’t you heard?”

“Mother!” Gabrielle exclaimed and Irina whirled on her.

“Don’t give me that look, Gabrielle. You should be so lucky as to land a man like the earl when you’re my age.”

“He’s forty years older than you!”

“I know.” Irina practically squealed. “Isn’t it perfect?”

“So what con are you running?” Hale leaned against the door that separated the sitting room from the bedroom of the huge suite that the Hale heir had been given. He kept his arms crossed and his voice even, but Kat could feel his patience running out.

“Why should there be a con?” Irina said as she walked to one of the gilt-framed mirrors and fingered her already perfect hair. “The man is going to marry me. And then he’s going to die, and I’m going to be the Countess of Greymore until that little slimeball Fletcher marries, and makes me the Dowager Countess, but, then, the countess is all that matters, isn’t it?”

“Mother, I—”

“Oh, Gabrielle! You should marry Fletcher! It’s perfect. Of course, we can’t let on that you’re my daughter. I’m certainly not old enough to have a daughter your age, but it is perfect! But we have to get you out of that dreadful uniform first. If a future earl is drawn to a maid, then it’s always for the wrong reasons.”

“Mother!”

Gabrielle was ice and steel—all that was cool and calm and beautiful. She did not yell. She froze. And even Irina could see that something wasn’t quite right with her daughter.

“Who is running the Bird in the Hand?” Gabrielle asked.

Irina shook her head. “No one. There’s no one here except us. I’d know, you know. I’ve been working this job for months.”

“Did you know the earl is nearly bankrupt?” Hale asked, but Irina waved the fact aside.

“Of course. He’s draining the estate dry before he dies. It’s no secret. He thinks that will punish his nephew and drive his daughter to the altar.”

“Why are you here, Mother? If the money is running out.”

Irina’s look was bemused and maybe a little disappointed. Clearly, she hadn’t trained Gabrielle as well as she’d thought.

“Money comes and goes, darling. Tiaras are forever. So are titles.”

Gabrielle practically rolled her eyes. “You’ve been a countess, a duchess; I seem to remember a six-month period when I was twelve where you were known exclusively as Princess Mariah. You can be a countess any time you want.”

“Oh, Gabrielle. The best lie is the truth. Surely you know that. Kat knows that. Otherwise why would W. W. Hale the Fifth have just walked through these doors? This one job can set me up for the rest of my life. And it will set you up too if you play your cards right. It’s a shame Fletcher is so fond of redheads. Maybe if we—”

“Who stole the egg, Irina?” Hale pushed away from the doorframe and crossed the room in three long strides. He wasn’t the cool, calm inside man, the flirt, the playboy. Not even the heir. He was a boy who had lost his grandmother too soon and wasn’t going to stop until he had this one small piece of her back where it belonged. “The Egg of the Magi, who stole it?”

Irina could have acted confused, could have lied. But she didn’t. Kat could see it in her eyes as she said, “What are you kids talking about? Did Uncle Eddie put you up to this?”

“The Egg of the Magi is missing, Aunt Irina,” Kat said. “Someone’s running the Bird in the Hand, and we need that egg before it’s sold on the black market and lost forever.”

Irina’s eyebrow went up. For the first time, she looked at her sister’s daughter as if she might be a fool.

“The Egg of the Magi is not missing.”

“Do you know where it is?” Kat asked.

“It’s downstairs!” Irina snapped.

Kat looked at Hale, who said, “Show us.”

 

 

If the servants thought it strange to see their future mistress, the young American billionaire, his assistant, and the new maid traipsing through the manor house, all in a row, while the rest of the guests were gathering in the blue parlor for tea, no one said so. It was the kind of house—the kind of world—where the help learned early on to see everything and say nothing.

When the future countess threw open the doors to the library, there wasn’t a soul inside. The room was long and stretched the width of one of the newer wings of the house, and she walked like a queen across the rich red carpet until she reached the glass case that sat framed by a bay of floor-to-ceiling windows.

Perhaps it was the late afternoon sun, the cool clear glass of the case, but the object on the pedestal seemed to have its own light—to glow from within.

“Here,” Irina said, gesturing toward it. “Here is your precious egg.”

Gabrielle and Hale looked at each other, as if to say well, do you want to steal it or should I?

Gabrielle was actually reaching for a fireplace poker, preparing to strike the glass and have done with it, when Kat backed away from the case and said, “Fake.”

“No, Kat, dear. The earl assured me that this is the Egg of the Magi. It can’t be a fake.”

“Oh, it’s a fake,” Kat said. “A good one. Good enough to be one of Uncle Charlie’s, in fact, but it’s a fake for sure.”

“How do you know?” Irina asked.

She raised an eyebrow. “I have an Egg of the Magi. A real one, remember?”

Kat could feel Hale at her elbow, easing closer for a better look.

Irina and Gabrielle flanked them on either side, four sets of eyes staring at the glistening gems and polished gold. Perhaps that’s why no one heard the library doors open until a familiar voice rang out.

“Found it!”

As soon as Kat turned she recognized the pristine uniform of an earl’s footman and the boy inside it. Hamish was every bit a Bagshaw as he strolled through the main door of the room, a delicate bundle in his outstretched hands.

“Old fella had this in with his skivvies, but—”

“I’ve got it!” a nearly identical voice rang out from the doors that led onto the mansion’s back patio. Angus Bagshaw was slightly shorter and slightly heavier than his brother, but in their matching livery they looked almost like twins, especially when they met in the center of the room, their hands holding nearly identical eggs.

“Fakes,” Kat said with a single glance.

“Your fiancé is crazy,” Gabrielle told her mother. “You can still pick ’em.”

But Irina merely shrugged. “Older men have their merits, dear. Older rich men have many of them.”

“Where is it?” Hale was asking, turning to Kat.

“We’re going to find it, Hale.”

“Are we? Or are we going to spend who-knows-how-long scouring this place, finding nothing but more and more proof that the Earl of Greymore is crazy?”

“We’ll find it!” Kat said again. She was no longer sure if the words were for him or for herself. She wasn’t even sure if there was a difference.

Kat was aware of the room. It was one of the byproducts of being Uncle Eddie’s niece and Bobby Bishop’s daughter. Some part of her brain was always calculating angles and measuring time, and so as the Bagshaws fought and Gabrielle scolded and Irina argued, a part of Kat was walking the perimeter of the large room, whispering in her ear that all was not as it seemed.

“Kat?”

She heard Hale’s voice. She felt his presence at her shoulder, large and warm and comforting. But it was that other Kat—the one that was encoded deep inside her DNA that was already inching toward the fireplace along the west wall of the massive room. She was already reaching, twisting, turning and pushing until she heard the inevitable…click.

“What do we have…” Kat started slowly as the bookshelf beside the fireplace began to move and shift, swinging open like a pair of great double doors to reveal a room that was long and narrow. Overhead, lights sputtered to life, filling the space with a harsh glare that bounced off of what looked to be a sea of gold and rubies and sapphires. There were mirrors on the walls, and the image reflected back and forth in what appeared to be a never-ending hallway. Eggs of the Magi—thousands of them—stretching out as far as the eye could see.

She glanced at Hale who looked as if he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.