by Ally Carter
The sound of Bobby clearing his throat cut her off. He cut a warning glance in Agent Bennett’s direction.
Slowly, Gabrielle continued. “Semester at MIT,” she said and practically rolled her eyes at her uncle. She seemed insulted that Bobby wouldn’t trust her, but she finished anyway. “He has finals.”
Part of Kat wanted to laugh at the exchange. And a part of her wanted to cry with the knowledge that there are normal kids in the world who go to normal schools and do normal things like take finals. The kids in Kat’s family had the kinds of tests that come with potential prison sentences if you failed. She was proud of Simon for stealing just a little piece of normal for himself.
Agent Bennett, however, did not sound convinced. “Simon is sixteen years old.”
“Yes,” Kat said. “He’s a sixteen-year-old genius. Trust me. If Simon’s there, then the average IQ at MIT is up this semester.” She turned her attention back to Gabrielle. “What else?”
“Not much on the earl. We haven’t been able to hack any hospital records. Or, at least, we haven’t. If Interpol were to…”
“Interpol is not yet involved in this…operation,” Amelia Bennett said. “Which is why none of you are in handcuffs.”
“Oh, Agent Bennett, you say the sweetest things,” Bobby said, and Gabrielle talked on.
“The earl is sick. That’s the moral of the story. And he’s broke. And…” As Gabrielle stretched the moment out, Kat could tell that she was building to something: that this was her big scene. She looked around the group until, finally, her gaze came to rest on the charity’s director. “The Egg of the Magi is very heavily insured.”
Something clicked inside of Kat, like the final tumbler of a lock falling into place. Suddenly, the world made sense.
“Of course it is,” Hale said.
Only Elizabeth seemed to breathe easier with this know-ledge.
“Oh, thank goodness,” she said. She seemed ten years younger and a thousand pounds lighter, as if the weight of this terrible mistake had finally been taken from her shoulders. “Finally, some good news, I’d say. Now we just have to admit to the earl what happened and then…” She seemed to finally see the faces that were looking back at her, to feel that the temperature in the room was not changing for the better.
“What is it? What aren’t you telling me?”
Gabrielle shifted, then looked at Agent Bennett and cocked an eyebrow. “Do you want to take this one or should I?” Gabrielle asked, and Amelia Bennett nodded.
“Oh, by all means, continue. I’m learning so much.”
Gabrielle flashed her best smile at the Interpol agent, then turned to her friend.
“The insurance policy on the egg is solid,” Gabrielle said. “Old. The earl took it out almost forty years ago, right after he acquired the egg for Countess Number One—there have been four, by the way. Countesses. Not eggs. The policy is pretty typical. It covers the cost of the egg if it should be stolen or destroyed by an act of God—fire, accident, building collapse…I don’t know. The usuals. But here’s where it gets interesting. Back in the day, the earl used to loan the egg out a lot to museums, universities, that kind of stuff. And somehow he got someone to give him a policy that paid double if the egg were ever stolen or destroyed on someone else’s watch.”
Kat’s voice was cold. “Of course he did.”
Amelia looked at her friend. “Did the earl sign the egg over to the charity before you picked it up?”
“No.” Elizabeth seemed numb as she slowly shook her head. “There were complicated tax laws, but for some reason the earl’s man of business insisted that the egg stay in the earl’s name until the auction.”
Kat could feel Hale beside her, his anger beating and pounding like a pulse. But his voice was like ice when he said, “So if it’s stolen, the earl gets paid twice what the egg is worth and the Magi Miracle Network gets a bad rep and not a single dime.”
Gabrielle nodded slowly. “So long, bankrupt estate. Hello, big fat insurance check.”
But Elizabeth still seemed a little lost. “How big and fat?” she asked.
This time, Agent Bennett answered the question. “My sources say it will be something north of twenty-five million.”
“Pounds?” Elizabeth exclaimed. Her friend nodded.
“The good news, Ms. Evans, is I think we now know who wanted the egg to be stolen,” Kat said. “And we know why.”
But the woman was shaking her head. Kat knew that look, that reaction. It was like someone had just told her that magic was real, that vampires were everywhere, that a whole other world lived beneath the streets of London; Elizabeth Evans had just gone through the portal and the looking glass and she was never going to be the same again.
“I just can’t believe it. Amelia?”
But Amelia Bennett’s job was on those other streets, in that other world. She had a foot on each side of the line and Kat could tell she hated to ruin what was left of her friend’s very sweet illusions. “It’s true, Lizzie. I’m sorry. I came to the same conclusions myself.”
“But…” Elizabeth was shaking her head. “The earl is an old man.”
Kat couldn’t help herself. She thought about Uncle Eddie…about Elizabeth Evans’s first reaction when Kat and Hale had come through her door, and she had to laugh. “Never underestimate old men and teenage girls, Ms. Evans. That was your first mistake.”
“But…” She started, then trailed off, so confused and out of her depths she might as well have been adrift on the Thames, floating out to sea. “Why give us a fake egg if he just wanted…him”—she glared at Bobby—“to turn around and steal it?”
“The Bird in the Hand,” they all told her in unison.
The response was in stereo and it stunned her. “The what?”
“Sorry,” Kat said, leaning closer. “It’s one of the oldest cons in the world. I forgot you were a good person and wouldn’t know what it is. You see, this way the earl can claim the insurance and sell the real egg on the black market—as soon as word of the robbery gets out, of course, and people know the real egg is up for grabs. That way, with a double indemnity policy, he’d get close to three times the egg’s actual value.”
“It’s…genius.” Gabrielle didn’t try to disguise the reverence in her voice. “Evil. But genius.”
The words, the reality, seemed to sink in. Outside, people shopped for presents and Santas sat in department stores. People were ice skating on the rink around the Tower of London, but in that tiny café, it was a million years from Christmas. It probably felt to Elizabeth Evans like Christmas might never come again.
“So you think the earl still has the real egg?” she asked.
“There’s one way to find out,” Kat told her.
“What’s that?” Elizabeth asked, not letting herself hope.
Kat grinned. The ice was gone from beneath her feet; it felt like she was finally back on solid ground. “We steal it.”
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.
