Chapter Twenty-Five
Quinn squeezed the hand that gripped hers during most of the train ride. “I’ve got it, James.” They shared the carriage with several other passengers, so she spoke in a hushed tone. “We’ve been over this five times already. I go into Fitzhugh’s house, have tea, give him the manuscript, and tell him where the agency said they stashed the letter for Paul to find. Once he has what he wants, he lets us go and we’re out of there.”
“Good. And remember, you’re not alone.” James leaned closer and kept his voice equally low. “I’ll be able to hear everything that happens through your earwig. I won’t be free to talk to you; I’ll keep the mic on my comm muted so whatever is going on with me won’t distract you. But I’ll be listening no matter what. Okay?”
“Okay.” She unhooked a strand of hair from behind her ear and let it fall loosely over the inserted communication device. “You’re sure he won’t know it’s there?”
“Positive. It won’t be picked up even if he’s paranoid enough to sweep you for bugs or recording devices. But I don’t think he’ll do that. He thinks we’re a bunch of thieves, no more, no less.”
“Right.”
“There are officers on standby not far from the estate. Fitzhugh won’t know they’re there; we have backup if needed.”
“Okay.”
“And don’t try to get him to say anything incriminating. We’ll go after him another time. This is only about rescuing Ben.”
“I know.”
“Just be yourself. Quinn Ellington, not Riordan.” The lack of rings on her finger reminded her of that. “You got this.” James’s knee bounced, a bundle of jittery, nervous energy. He turned and peered out the rain-streaked window. “You’ll be great.” He’d uttered those three words so many times in the last half hour, they had turned into his own personal mantra.
She checked her watch and noted they were scheduled to arrive at the train station in about five minutes. The butterflies that had been fluttering around in her stomach since they’d boarded the train turned into the Blue Angels zooming around in F/A-18 Hornets.
A few minutes later, the train pulled into the station and came to a stop. Quinn rubbed her clammy hands up and down her thighs, psyching herself up and drying her hands on her jeans. With her mind focused, she stood and shouldered her bag with the manuscript in it.
James stood when she did. “You’ll be . . .”
Her gaze rose to meet his when he stopped.
Looking her dead in the eye, he said, “You are great.”
The conviction she heard in his voice bolstered her confidence. She flashed a smile and gave him a sharp nod.
After he responded in kind, they disembarked. It wasn’t long before a hulking man and an equally intimidating woman approached them. The man towered over Quinn like a redwood tree. The thick wool of his coat was drawn taut across his shoulders and strained against his bulk. There was no doubt in Quinn’s mind he could snap her in half with his giant, meaty hands.
The woman, while not as physically imposing as her partner, was just as menacing in her own way. Her expression remained neutral as she approached, but Quinn knew the dark eyes were assessing the threat level they posed. Quinn threw her shoulders back in a posture of confidence. She couldn’t intimidate the other woman even if she tried; this looked like a woman who knew two hundred different ways to put someone on the ground while not dislodging a hair from her tight ponytail.
“Ms. Ellington, Mr. Lockwood?” the woman asked. When they nodded she said, “Mr. Fitzhugh sent us to collect you.” Her gaze flicked from Quinn to James and back. “Before we go any further, I need to ensure you have the item.”
Quinn complied by opening her purse and holding it out for inspection.
The woman peered into the bag. “Very good. This way, please.”
They strode toward the exit, with Quinn flanked by the woman on one side and James on the other. The giant man walked on the other side of James.
Once outside, they headed directly toward a grand, stately car. With one glance at the winged hood ornament atop the iconic grill, Quinn knew it was a Rolls-Royce.
“Is that a Phantom VI?” James asked in his James Lockwood accent. Quinn suppressed a smile at the mixture of excitement and awe she heard in his voice.
“It is,” the woman answered. She opened the back door and looked at Quinn. “Ms. Ellington.”
Quinn slid into the backseat as directed while the man she’d dubbed “Bruiser” in her head opened the front passenger door for James. In quick succession, the doors closed. Bruiser strode around the front of the Rolls and took his place behind the steering wheel. “Ms. Badass” sat in the back with Quinn.
She hardly heard the engine turn on and didn’t feel a bump or bounce as the dark car glided out of the parking lot and onto the road.
As they drove through Northampton, James peppered Bruiser and Ms. Badass with questions about the car. They obliged and went on to compare the V-8 engine with the 6.75 liter engine. When Quinn ran her hand over the soft leather seat and mentioned she thought the car was fit for the queen, she was informed that Her Majesty had two in her fleet. Of that, Quinn was not surprised.
James managed to turn what could have been an unbearably tense and awkward car ride into an amiable drive to the country. Quinn didn’t know if it was due to his innate enthusiasm for exotic cars, if he was attempting to disarm the guards, or if it was all for her benefit to keep her distracted and relaxed. Knowing James, it was probably all of the above. The reasons didn’t matter. His easy manner had indeed calmed her nerves. Her admiration and affection for him deepened.
It grew silent inside the car as Bruiser turned off the two-lane road and stopped in front of a tall, black wrought-iron gate. After a few seconds, it swung open and the car slowly passed between two stone guardhouses. The Rolls cruised along a narrow lane that cut through a sprawling expanse of green grass dotted with copses of tall, leafless trees. A mile later, they entered a large, gravel-covered courtyard. Pebbles crunched under the tires as the car slowly approached the house.
It had stopped raining, but the air was still cold and damp when they exited the Rolls, which did nothing to help the chill of nerves that shot through Quinn. When the massive front door swung open, her knees nearly buckled.
James kissed her cheek and gave her an encouraging smile. “I’ll be here when you come out.” His smile turned wistful. “You’ll be great.”
With a fleeting smile, she said, “See you soon.” She left James to wait outside with Bruiser and was escorted by Ms. Badass to the entrance of the house.
Standing just inside the doorway was an older gentleman in worn brown corduroy slacks and a wool sweater. “Ms. Ellington. Roderick Fitzhugh. I’m so pleased you agreed to meet with me.” She shook his soft, warm hand in greeting. He then swept it toward the house, inviting her inside.
“I do hope the inclement weather didn’t hamper your travels,” he said, as he closed the door behind them.
“No, it was fine, thank you.” Her first impression of him was that he looked more like an emeritus professor than a nefarious weapons dealer. She’d expected him to be more like a smug, soulless James Bond villain with a nasty scar over one eye, not a genteel country squire who reminded her of her grandfather. “Rain is what I’d expect in England in December.”
“Indeed.”
Directly in front of them was a central staircase that split and turned both left and right at the first landing. On either side of the staircase were hallways that went farther back into the house. He led her, with Ms. Badass following at a discreet distance, down the left hall. At the first open doorway, they turned into a large family room. The walls were tan with white wainscoting and crown molding. Rustic paintings of bulls and horses decorated the walls. The furniture was homey, comfortable-looking, the exact opposite of his house in Pacific Palisades. Quinn detected the faint scent of evergreen in the air and immediately spotted a tall Christmas tree in one corner of the room. It was all very cozy and frankly, disconcerting.
“I hope you don’t mind, but since you are a librarian . . .” After a brief pause, he asked, “You are a librarian, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Very good. As I was saying, since you are a librarian, I thought you might enjoy taking tea in the library.”
“That sounds lovely, thank you.”
They walked through another door in the back corner of the family room and into the library. Quinn almost gasped at its size and beauty. Dark wood shelves packed with books covered one entire wall from floor to ceiling. Although it was dusk outside, Quinn could imagine the natural daylight streaming into the room through the two windows in the adjacent wall.
“From the admiration shining on your face, I see you approve of my humble reading nook.”
“I do. I could see spending days in here, curled up with a book and a cup of tea.”
“Something I myself have done on many occasions.” Fitzhugh motioned to two burgundy leather wingback chairs situated in front of the fireplace. “Please, sit.”
She sat on the edge of one of the chairs, slipped off her coat, and set her bag on the floor next to her feet. “Is it wrong to admit one of my life’s goals is to one day own a library that needs a rolling ladder to get to the top shelves—like the one you have over there?”
“Not at all,” he said with a chuckle. He picked up the silver teapot from the small round table between them and filled two porcelain teacups. “Feel free to fix your tea as you like,” he said, indicating the milk and sugar. Crumbs tumbled down his sweater when he picked up a biscuit from a plate and took a bite. “This yearning for a large library of your own. Did you plan to use my manuscript as the cornerstone upon which to build your collection?”
“Absolutely not.”
“I must confess, you don’t look the part of a hardened criminal.” Fitzhugh settled back in his chair, crossed his legs, and sipped his tea, a signal to her things would move along according to his terms. “Tell me, Ms. Ellington. How does a young librarian come to be a part of a syndicate of thieves?”
How she got mixed up with James was a perfectly believable story, so she decided to tell the truth, minus the part about the CIA. “I work at a library in Los Angeles. A couple of weeks ago, a man came in with a picture of a brooch and asked me to help him find out more about it. As my reference interview moved along, he told me he worked for a company that insured an art collection. He wanted to make sure the valuations the appraisers gave him matched up with his independent research.” She shrugged and brushed at a strand of hair falling across her forehead. “What he said made sense. I didn’t question it and helped him.”
Fitzhugh nodded thoughtfully. “Yes. It was about that time my business associate, Paul Shelton, mentioned to me Mr. Lockwood was spending a lot of time at a library.”
“James and I enjoyed working together. The research was challenging, and great fun for me. Then he asked me to go to your house in the Palisades with him on Saturday morning to examine some pieces there. That’s when I stumbled across the ring and the letter hidden in the drawer in the clock.”
“You didn’t know he’d taken them when you left my house that day?”
“No. I didn’t know anything about any of this until we got back to my apartment after dinner that night and found two men rifling through my stuff. One tried to steal my laptop and the other had my great-grandmother’s cameo shoved in his pocket.”
Fitzhugh’s nose wrinkled, like he’d just caught a whiff of rotting fish. “Contractors.” After another sip of tea, he said, “I suppose you wanted to ring the authorities and James stopped you?”
She nodded. “That’s when he told me the truth.”
“So you ran. With him.”
“Yes.”
“Aren’t you furious with James, that you’re now involved in criminal activity?”
“I was.” The memory of her anger at the cabin flared in her mind. Her scowl was very real.
“And now you’re not,” he stated.
“No.”
Fitzhugh smiled and picked off a piece of lint from his pants. “No, it’s clear your feelings toward Mr. Lockwood are anything but negative.”
Quinn dropped her gaze and stared into the fire.
“Now you find yourself here, more deeply entrenched than ever in this plot gone wrong.”
“I’m hoping once everything gets straightened out, I can go back to my normal life.”
“With James?”
“I don’t know.” She turned her face away from the fire and looked at Fitzhugh. “Perhaps.”
He gave her a look of sympathy, or pity. “Oh, my poor dear girl. I hate to be the one to tell you, but I don’t think that will happen.”
“What? Why?” This genuinely surprised her. A rock lodged in the pit of her stomach.
“Because he continues to lie to you. He’s not a thief.” Fitzhugh waved a hand dismissively and said, “Well, yes, he is a thief. He is also a member of a black market weapons organization.”
Tea sloshed over the rim of her cup and splashed on her jeans when she bolted upright in her chair. “What? What are you talking about?”
“I’m British Intelligence. MI6.”
She stared openmouthed at Fitzhugh and the hand holding her half-empty teacup began to shake. Had James been playing her? She set the cup down, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. No. James had a badge. She spoke to his boss. They got her a fake passport in just a few hours. But a large criminal syndicate could probably do the same thing. Was she the most gullible person on the planet? She blinked and gazed at Fitzhugh, her eyes blurred with tears. “I don’t understand.”
“I’m very sorry to be the one to tell you this, but it’s true. James and Ben are looking for a rumored secret weapon of some kind. If it exists, information about its location is believed to be hidden somewhere in the art collection I recently purchased. That’s why they didn’t steal something infinitely more valuable, like my Fabergé egg.”
“They think something is in the manuscript, or the letter,” she finished for him. She slumped back in her chair, dropped her chin to her chest, and rubbed her fingers over her forehead. It couldn’t be. Had her feelings for James blinded her to the truth all along?
Then it hit her. MI6 would never allow items with such valuable intelligence out of their control. They’d be kept under lock and key in London with a cadre of analysts studying them. No, it was Fitzhugh who was lying to her. The fact she’d doubted James’s veracity for a split second compelled her to say, “I’m an idiot.”
“No, you were dazzled,” Fitzhugh said, clearly believing she bought his load of crap. The burning logs in the fireplace crackled in the silence. Finally, he said, “Tell me, do you think James learned anything after your meeting with the professor last night? Once you were alone, did he ask you to find any hidden meanings in the manuscript?”
She’d play the naïve girl he thought her to be. Her cheeks pinked and she dropped her gaze to her hands. “We didn’t discuss it at all. Once we got back to our hotel, we were, um, busy with other things all night.”
“Ah, I see,” he said with a perceptive smile. “Well, you can set things right by helping me find this weapon. Tell me everything you may have learned about the manuscript during your time with James.”
“I want to know what will happen to him.”
“He’s a criminal. He is currently being detained by my associate, Joseph, and will later be handed over to the authorities.”
“Detained. A nice way of saying he’s tied up somewhere?”
“Yes.”
Her stomach dropped to her shoes. It was clear if they were going to get out of this alive, it was up to her. What she was about to do was gutsy, but it was her only play. “From what I heard from the professor last night, I’m pretty sure what you’re looking for is in the manuscript.” She shifted in her chair to look at him dead-on. “I’ll help you under one condition.”
“I don’t have to meet any conditions. If you don’t help me, I’ll charge you with the same crimes as James—or worse.”
She thought back to Ben’s weak voice on the phone and Fitzhugh’s promise to hurt him further if they didn’t give up the manuscript. She knew he was fully prepared to follow through with his threat. “Killing me won’t get you answers.”
“Perhaps, but you witnessing Joseph breaking James’s fingers, one by one, should be sufficient motivation.”
Her stomach churned. “Look, you don’t have to hurt him. I’m willing to help you. All I want in return is for James, Ben, and me to walk out of here, free and clear. No arrests. No charges. No physical damage.”
“You’re willing to put your freedom, your very life on the line for a blackguard? You do realize you are doing this for a man who has lied to you and used you.”
“Yeah, I know. And the stupid thing is I still love him anyway.”
She stared back at him impassively as he considered her for a moment. The affable Roderick Fitzhugh returned. “The things we do for love,” he said with a mock sigh of defeat. “Agreed. Now, tell me what you learned.”
Quinn removed the manuscript from her bag and handed it to Fitzhugh. He eagerly took it and immediately began to turn through the pages. “It’s the story of a man, a knight, who goes to war, is captured, escapes and then has adventures on his way back to his home kingdom. The places he traveled to aren’t mentioned specifically, though. For instance, one is called, ‘Blizzard Village.’ Last night at the pub, we thought maybe the knight was a Crusader. Now I wonder.”
Fitzhugh leaned forward. “You wonder what?”
She had to make it seem to Fitzhugh she didn’t already know the answer, but she also wanted to tell him what he wanted to know as soon as possible so they could get out of there. Her gut told her it probably wasn’t going to be that easy. “Could the locations mentioned in the text be some kind of secret code as to where these weapons are hidden?”
His eyes flashed with interest. “Where are these places?”
“See, that’s the problem. Everything is in medieval Latin. I don’t know what country it’s talking about.” She stopped and thought for a moment, trying to figure the best way to lead Fitzhugh to the answer. “Like, if I knew the knight in the story was in California and the text said he was at ‘the beach of the king,’ I’d know it meant Playa del Rey. It’s right by LAX.”
Fitzhugh sat so far forward in his chair, literally on the edge of his seat, Quinn thought he might slide off and end up on the floor.
He wasn’t there yet, so she fed him another line. “The other thing is, I don’t think we’re talking about a stash of trebuchets. So it must be the manuscript is referring to something and someplace modern. We haven’t been able to date the manuscript, so we could be completely wrong, but it’s just a hunch.”
His eyes widened, apparently putting everything she’d been saying together. “It might be the former Soviet Union. The man who owned the art collection before me was Russian.”
Finally. “Hmmm. That might be a good place to start.”
Quinn jerked when James’s voice came through her earwig. “Try not to react,” he said. Too late, she thought when Fitzhugh shot her an odd look. Trying to cover for her jump, she said, “I just thought of something. If you could find me a piece of paper and a pen, I’ll write down the names of the places Professor Dudley told us about. We can go from there.”
Fitzhugh stood and went to the large desk in front of the windows.
As Fitzhugh searched for her requested items, James said, barely above a whisper, “I’m not tied up and I found Ben. There’s no way Fitzhugh’s gonna let us go once he gets the locations. We have to make a break for it. Clear your throat if you copy.”
A noise rumbled from the back of her throat.
“Good. We’re on our way to get you. Just hang tight until we get there.”
She cleared her throat again as Fitzhugh returned with paper and pen. She took a sip of tea, and patted her chest. Pen in hand, she wrote the location names as slowly as possible, pretending it was hard for her to remember them all.
“Do you speak Russian?” she asked Fitzhugh.
“No, but I believe I have a Russian-English dictionary.”
He doesn’t speak Russian? MI6, my ass, she thought.
They both rose and she followed him to the wall of books. She tipped her head back and stared openmouthed at the hundreds of books before her. “Do you have them organized at all?”
“Not really. Most of these books came with the estate when I purchased it from an impoverished earl.”
The librarian in her wanted to cry.
“We’ll have to hunt about,” Fitzhugh said. When they’d first entered the library, Ms. Badass had crossed the room and taken her post at a second door that led to the hallway. She’d stood there during the entire confab, stone-faced and motionless. Now, Fitzhugh addressed her. “Lucy, if you could assist us. We need to locate a Russian-English dictionary.”
“Yes, sir.” Lucy moved to the section of the bookcase closest to the door. Quinn took the middle, next to where the rolling ladder stood while Fitzhugh, his hands clasped behind him, scanned the books at the far end.
Quinn was about to check to see if the four volumes in the set of Winston Churchill’s A History of the English-Speaking Peoples were first editions when she heard shouts and the crack of a gunshot.
In her earwig, she heard James yell, “Run, Quinn! Run!”