Becoming the Talbot Sisters

by Rachel Linden

  “They all specialize in meat. It’s the Balkans,” Charlie muttered, scrutinizing the menu board to see what was on special for the day. Garlic cream soup and a pork schnitzel.

  “And Arben has an aunt in Kosovo who can show me how to make a traditional dish called adjvar,” Waverly said happily. “Apparently you make it over a wood fire and roast peppers for hours. It sounds so rustic. This is going to be wonderful. I have such a good feeling about all of this.”

  While they waited for their soup at the café, Waverly’s phone beeped with a text message. She checked it, frowning as she read.

  “Is there a problem?” Charlie asked.

  Waverly shook her head. “No. It’s just Andrew. He’s heading up to the cabin tomorrow.” A brief troubled look slipped across her face before she schooled her features into a pleasant smile and slid her phone back into her purse without responding to the text. “Now, how about that soup?”

  When they returned from lunch, it was to a very subdued office environment.

  “The bear is in the house.” Kate muttered the warning as she sailed by on her way to the copy machine.

  Charlie stopped. Ursula was back early from her meetings. Charlie turned toward the entrance, intent on sending Waverly out the door before her boss saw she’d brought a family member into the office, but it was too late.

  “Charlie, do you have a guest?” Ursula was standing at the door to her office, watching them in disapproval. Technically they were not supposed to bring guests into the office, but when Ursula was away, the staff tended to be very loose with this rule.

  Charlie reluctantly turned back. “My sister, Waverly Talbot,” she said, deciding to make the best of it. She’d told Waverly that the pregnancy was a secret at work and had made her promise to keep mum, but she hadn’t explained about her tenuous employment position.

  She stuck out her chin, aware that the entire office was watching the unfolding drama, and chose a white lie. “Waverly was interested in knowing more about our work here. She and her husband generously support many charities and are considering a donation to Care Network.”

  Waverly looked surprised by this unexpected news of her altruism, but Charlie shot her a warning look and her sister stepped forward and extended her hand, smoothly covering her initial reaction.

  “Waverly Talbot. Thank you for all your hard work. It’s a marvelous organization, such useful services to the public.”

  Ursula looked disgruntled for a moment but shook her hand. “Thank you for your interest in our organization,” she said stiffly and then, with a stern look at Charlie, said, “but we don’t allow guests in the office. It is a policy to protect the clients’ sensitive information.”

  “Of course, I understand,” Waverly agreed, widening her eyes just a little. “I begged Charlie to let me tag along and see the important work you do here. I’m just going now. Would you care for a cinnamon roll?” She pulled the container from her bag and offered Ursula one of the last ones.

  “I don’t eat white sugar,” Ursula said, eyeing the cinnamon rolls. “It poisons the body.”

  “Of course,” Waverly reassured her cheerfully. “No matter. Since Charlie’s eating for two now it certainly won’t go to waste.”

  Charlie gaped at her sister, then glanced at Ursula, who was looking at her and frowning.

  “Eating for two?” the boss said slowly, puzzled. “What do you mean?”

  Too late Waverly realized her mistake. “Oh, Charlie’s always had a big appetite,” she said, backpedaling. “Even when we were kids. She eats like a grown man.”

  For a moment Charlie thought they might get away with it, but then Ursula’s gaze sharpened, zeroing in on her stomach, camouflaged as usual in a baggy man’s dress shirt.

  “Charlie, are you pregnant?” she asked sharply. “I thought you were just getting fat.”

  Charlie opened her mouth, realized she couldn’t lie, especially when it was soon going to be very obvious that she was indeed very pregnant. “Yes, I’m pregnant.”

  She glanced over her shoulder and saw the look of shock registering on the faces of her colleagues. Duncan raised his eyebrows and mouthed, What? Who? She ignored him and turned back to her boss.

  Ursula’s mouth compressed into a thin line. “I think it is best if you leave now with your sister. I will see you tomorrow morning at ten o’clock in my office to talk about this.”

  Charlie nodded, feeling a mixture of resignation and chagrin. This had not gone at all as she had wanted it to. Ursula turned on her heel and disappeared into her office with a click of the closing door.

  Waverly caught her eye and said, “Sorry,” with a guilt-stricken expression.

  Charlie scrubbed a hand over her face, suddenly very weary. She wanted a hot bath, a nap, and another cinnamon roll. Make that two cinnamon rolls. She was probably going to be unemployed by noon tomorrow. When she thought about the possibility of being fired, she wondered more and more if she’d even really mind. Perhaps it would be for the best.

  “Come on,” she said to Waverly, not looking at her colleagues, who she was certain were riveted on the dramatic scene. “And don’t even think about putting that container away. Just hand all the cinnamon rolls over to me right now. It’s the least you can do.”

  CHAPTER 19

  All in all the meeting with Ursula could have gone worse, Charlie reflected, walking home in a heavy drizzle before noon the following day. She had not been fired on the spot, although she cringed, imagining the number of black marks now beside her name in Ursula’s ledger of employee misdeeds. The boss was leaving for a series of seminars in Germany for two weeks, and they had agreed to discuss the matter further once she was back. Until then Charlie would be taking an unpaid leave of absence, since, “We can’t have an unmarried pregnant woman teaching school sexual education classes,” as Ursula so bluntly put it.

  Charlie had readily agreed to Ursula’s conditions. Maybe in those two weeks she could come up with a strong case to keep her job, if she still even wanted to. Or perhaps she should use the time to figure out what it was she actually wanted to do. At the very least she would have more time to make a contingency plan in the very likely event that she found herself unemployed in a few weeks’ time.

  “Well, pal,” she sighed, putting her hands over her belly and talking to the baby as she waited at a crosswalk, “I think we’d better start preparing for a change in employment status.” The light turned green, and she crossed hastily. Thinking of making a change was disconcerting, but at the same time she felt a stirring of excitement. Perhaps it was time to start looking for something new, something that allowed her to engage in a bigger way, something that related the zeal and indignation she felt every time she thought of Kinga and Simona and that bleak winter night in Serbia.

  Free for the rest of the day, Charlie dropped by the final Budapest filming of Simply Perfect; it was taking place near Vigadó Tér, a small but lovely park situated along the Danube, with curved stone benches ringing a beautiful fountain. The show was being filmed in the home of a pair of Hungarian sisters in their twenties. Their family had owned an esteemed cake and coffeehouse in the Sixth District for four generations before it was confiscated under the Communist regime. Their grandmother passed on all the family recipes to the sisters, and they had recently reopened the coffeehouse to carry on their family’s tradition.

  Charlie rang the buzzer for the apartment and a moment later was buzzed in. It was a small but airy third-floor space with a balcony and a lovely view of the park and the river. The open kitchen/dining room area was humming with activity as the crew arranged the finished desserts. The sisters, both petite with dark hair the color of chestnuts, flanked Waverly as she tasted their finished creations at the sleek, modern IKEA kitchen island.

  “Oh, these are delicious,” she exclaimed. Waverly saw Charlie out of the corner of her eye and gave a little wave, gesturing and mouthing, Almost done.

  Beau motioned for Charlie to keep quiet, and sh
e nodded, tucking herself into a corner of the dining room as Waverly wrapped up the show. It was centered on a famous Hungarian dessert—dobostorta—a decadent chocolate buttercream-layered sponge cake topped with crystallized caramel.

  On camera Waverly took a fork and cut the tip off a slice of dobostorta, then put the morsel in her mouth, savoring it for a long moment. She smiled and delivered her signature line.

  “Aaaand cut,” Beau yelled just as Charlie’s cell phone rang. He shot her an annoyed glance, and she ducked out the door leading from the dining room to a small wrought-iron balcony. It was raining steadily, fat, cold drops falling from the eaves of the building, and she pressed back against the door, trying to avoid getting soaked. The sky was a leaden gray with clouds so low they almost seemed to touch the rooftops. Far below, a taxi splashed through puddles, narrowly avoiding a pedestrian walking a black puli. Vigadó Tér was empty, the stone benches glistening in the rain.

  “Hello?” She bent her head, trying to hear against the dull patter of rain on stone and the distant sounds of traffic.

  “Ms. Talbot, this is Sandra Ling.”

  Charlie’s heart skipped a beat. “Yes?” She clutched the phone tighter and glanced behind her, through the glass door and across the dining room to the kitchen, where Waverly was laughing and chatting with the camera crew, handing out slices of cake all around. In the hustle and bustle surrounding her sister’s visit, Charlie had almost managed to forget about the trial and the constant looming threat of someone discovering her participation. Almost. She was always alert, always watching people around her from the corner of her eye, but she’d begun to relax a little, to believe that perhaps nothing would happen after all. Now it all came back to her in a rush. Nothing sinister had happened since Monica had left, but she wasn’t naïve enough to assume that was the end of it. She glanced around uneasily. The balconies on either side of her were empty.

  “We have a date for the first trial,” Sandra informed her. “It’s Kinga’s. The judge has set it for the seventeenth of April, a little more than two weeks from now. Will you be able to come to Belgrade to testify on such short notice?”

  Charlie hesitated, frozen to the spot with sudden indecision. All her rhetoric and bravado was well and good, but now she actually had to do something. Could she? She thought of that last cataclysmic night in Johannesburg and swallowed hard, her heart speeding up in her chest. Would she give what she had in her hand? Was she brave enough to risk again?

  “Ms. Talbot, can we count on you to testify at the trial?” Sandra asked again.

  Charlie took a deep breath. She touched the medal of St. George, hidden under her shirt, weighty and warm against her skin, and her fingers brushed the words emblazoned there. St. George, pray for us. She shut her eyes and offered up a quick but fervent prayer. Let me be strong enough. Let it make a difference. She opened her eyes. Nothing had changed, but she felt stronger, ready.

  “Yes,” she said finally, firmly. “I’ll be there.”

  The next day Charlie arrived home after running a few errands. It was suppertime and already growing dark, the sunny afternoon giving way to the lengthening shadows of early evening.

  Waverly was in the shower singing the theme song from Titanic in a high soprano. “My heart will go on . . . ,” she warbled over the sound of the running water. Waverly and her crew were leaving the next day for a two-week Simply Perfect gastro tour of the Balkans.

  Charlie shrugged out of her leather jacket and was just slipping her feet into her house shoes when the door buzzer rang. She picked up the receiver. “Hello? Szia?”

  There was no one there. She could hear the background noise from the street below through the receiver, but no one spoke. She hung up, and a moment later it buzzed again.

  “Hello? Who is this?” Charlie asked, but again there was no answer. Feeling a prickle of unease, she hung up and quickly put on her slippers, padding to the tall windows in the living room that overlooked Liszt Tér and the front of the building. There was no one standing at the door on the street below.

  Charlie scanned the square, her gaze following a couple of students hurrying home, a few tourists standing in front of the vibrant, oversize bronze statue of composer Franz Liszt, his mane of hair flying, his hands poised midchord. There. Over by the café next door, a man was leaning against a metal support for the café awning. Dark-haired and scowling, he had his hands in the pockets of his heavy wool coat, but he did not look relaxed. He was staring up at her building intently. It seemed almost as though he were looking at her window.

  Charlie gasped and backed away, her heart skipping a beat. Was this it? Had they found her? She sat down hard in a chair and forced herself to take a few deep breaths. Stress was bad for the baby. Of course, so was being targeted by human traffickers. Maybe it was just a fluke. Perhaps he was simply standing outside waiting to meet someone. Charlie waited a few moments and then sidled close to the window and peeked out from the side. The man was still there, waiting, watching her building. He lifted a cell phone in her direction, and it looked as though he took a picture. Charlie hastily scooted away from the window again, heart pounding. She needed to call Sandra Ling.

  Dimly she heard the water in the shower turn off. Waverly would be out any minute. Charlie couldn’t let her know about any of this or she’d be on a plane to Connecticut before she knew what hit her. She fumbled for her cell phone and punched in Sandra’s number.

  The lawyer answered on the second ring. “Charlie, is everything all right?”

  Her calm voice was reassuring, and Charlie took a deep breath. “I think I’m in trouble,” she said, straining to sound logical and not panicked. “I think they’ve found me.” Her words tumbled over themselves as she described the man.

  “Okay,” Sandra said when Charlie finished. “Whether it’s a coincidence or not, I think it’s best you don’t stay in the city until the trial. Is there anywhere you can go for a while, just to lie low?”

  “I’ll find somewhere,” Charlie said, her mind racing with possibilities.

  “Good,” Sandra said. “I would recommend that you not leave your apartment while the man is outside, but I think it’s a good idea if you leave the city as soon as possible. Be careful, and call me if you see anything else suspicious.”

  After Sandra hung up, Charlie thought for a moment. Where could she safely hide out until she could testify at the trial? She could go to one of Care Network’s field locations in Serbia or Romania, or perhaps Slovakia. But if the traffickers knew she was affiliated with Care Network, they could easily track her down at any of their locations. And then she had a brilliant idea.

  When Waverly came out of the bathroom, wafting the scent of French rose soap and Dior perfume after her, Charlie was ensconced in her favorite armchair eating a huge slice of leftover dobostorta. She wasn’t sure if the man was still out there. She had drawn the curtains and double-bolted the door.

  Waverly glanced pointedly at the cake. “Giving the baby a sugar high, are we?”

  “And hopefully me too,” Charlie said unrepentantly. She took a big bite of cake. Waverly disappeared into the kitchen and emerged a moment later with a Swiss Miss creamy vanilla pudding cup and a silver spoon. She sat down on the sofa and peeled the top off the pudding cup.

  “What would you think if I came with you on tour?” Charlie asked around a mouthful of cake.

  “You want to come with us?” Waverly looked surprised. She scooped up a spoonful of pudding. “Well, that would be lovely. Would you really like to?” She slid the spoon into her mouth and closed her eyes.

  “Sure. I haven’t been to Sarajevo in a couple of years. I can just bum around with you for a while. I have a meeting in Belgrade in about two weeks anyway.” Charlie spoke with a nonchalance she did not feel. Her palms were sweaty as she gripped the fork, and she had to fight the urge to run immediately, run fast and far away until she knew the danger was past. She was determined to do it differently this time around. She would be brave.
She’d take care to keep a low profile until she could testify, but she would not run away from the fight. Not this time.

  She took another large bite of cake. Joining the Simply Perfect gastro tour, surrounded by the glitter of a camera crew, was the best option she could think of. No one would notice her if Waverly was around. All she needed was a couple of weeks before she could testify. Surely she could hide in plain view until then.

  CHAPTER 20

  April

  Sarajevo, Bosnia

  What a picturesque city,” Waverly observed, twirling to take in Sarajevo’s old city center. Beau and the film crew were setting up the shoot for the next morning and didn’t need her for the evening, so Charlie had offered to play tour guide. Waverly followed Charlie down a cobblestone street and then through a narrow alley lined with shops selling mounds of ornately decorated engraved copper and silver platters, boxes, spoons, and bullet shells.

  “It’s one of my favorite cities in Europe,” Charlie said. She agreed with her sister. Sarajevo was charming, a city with a vibrant soul and a tragic history, a little cousin of Istanbul with strong ties to its Ottoman past. She slowed her pace, pointing out the beautiful old green-roofed mosque behind a tall stone wall overhung with spindly rose canes.

  “Here.” She stopped beside two pipes jutting out from the high wall surrounding the mosque. Water poured from the pipes into a grate set in the street. “Try this.” Charlie cupped her hand under the pipe and took a deep drink of the sweet spring water.

  Waverly looked skeptical. “Is it safe?”

  “It’s perfect,” Charlie replied, taking another draft. Waverly hesitated, then stepped forward and copied Charlie, tentatively trying a sip.

  “Legend has it that if you drink from this fountain you’ll always return to Sarajevo,” Charlie said. She dried her hands on her jeans and gazed around them at the contented hubbub, a mixture of tourists clutching shopping bags and taking photos with iPads, Bosnian families with dark-haired children in snowsuits, and old men strolling with their hands behind their backs. It was difficult to believe that less than twenty-five years before, Sarajevo had been under a brutal and extended siege by the Army of Republika Srpska, with almost every building damaged and thousands of civilians killed by shelling and sniper fire. The citizens of Sarajevo had rebuilt their beloved city in the aftermath of the war, determined to carry on despite the pervasive wounds from the past. Some buildings still had holes, but the city had done a remarkable job of picking up the pieces and remaking itself. Bosnians were tremendously resilient.