Masterful Truth

by Mari Carr

  “You know, I keep thinking this might mean something too.” Isaiah pointed to the page opposite the poem in the journal.

  Caden came to loom over them, studying the image, but didn’t appear impressed. “It’s a sketch of a lady’s fan. The journal is full of all kinds of nonsense. Poems, song lyrics, doodles, personal reflections. All this tells us is Adams liked to think of himself as a poet and an artist.”

  Tess leaned closer to the book. She’d been so captivated by the poem, she hadn’t even noticed the opposite page. She studied the drawing, recognition dawning. “Another fan. Oh my God. I’ve seen this one.”

  Caden briefly glanced at the sketch again, then gave her a sardonic look. “Pretty sure everyone in the world has seen that fan. They all look like that.”

  “They all have the Hamilton crest on them?” she asked, not bothering to mask her sarcasm. Two could play the smart-ass game, and considering her lack of sleep—thanks to Caden’s grumpiness—she was running perilously low on steam.

  “Seriously?” Isaiah said, peering more closely at the book. “Are you sure?”

  Tess rolled her eyes. “Do I need to remind you that my last name is Hamilton?”

  Isaiah chuckled, and for the first time, she noticed the dark circles under his eyes.

  So he’d had a rough night too. She took comfort in knowing that and was instantly sorry for her tone.

  “There’s no way it’s a coincidence that the poem talks about Adams calling the founding fathers, including Hamilton, then sketches that fan.”

  Tess agreed with Isaiah’s assessment.

  “It’s a pretty flimsy connection. Just like the damn Culper Ring one. What the hell are we supposed to surmise from a drawing of a fan with the Hamilton crest?” Caden dropped down into the chair across from them at the table, leaning back with his arms crossed. He wasn’t bothering to lower his voice, which had the librarian glancing their way with a scowl, despite the fact they were the only people in the room.

  Tess continued to study the drawing. “I told you. I’ve seen this particular fan before. The decoration gives it away, as do the sticks and handle.” She pointed at the base. “See? These were mother-of-pearl inlaid with gold.”

  “There’s no way you can tell that from the drawing,” Caden said.

  “I’m not deducing that from this drawing. I saw this fan in real life. I spent a great deal of time looking at it because it was so beautiful. Adams really outdid himself on the details here. Pleated fans were very popular in the eighteenth century. It wasn’t unusual in Europe for fans to serve all sorts of different purposes. Some were decorated with social or political images, some with riddles or puzzles or even maps. This one depicts Washington riding into Boston, just after the end of the Revolutionary War, accepting a flower from a young woman. I remember thinking the painting on the vellum was worthy of being in an art museum.”

  Tess picked up the book, looking more closely. Then she frowned. “You know this almost looks like a rough sketch the artist would have done prior to doing a painting.”

  “Who painted the fan you saw?” Caden asked.

  Tess’ bright eyes were wide with excitement. “No one knows. But I’m seriously starting to think Adams did, which has some crazy historical implications because Adams and Hamilton were political adversaries.”

  “Oh man,” Isaiah muttered. “I think I’ve just seen into the future. The wheels in your head are spinning a million miles a minute. Is this going to turn into an article or an exhibit?”

  Tess grinned. “Both.”

  “Changed my mind. I’m going to go ahead and say it. Nerds. Where have you seen the fan?” Caden asked. “The Smithsonian?”

  Tess shook her head. “I wish. If it were there, I’d have easy access to it. Unfortunately, it’s under the control of the National Park Service.”

  Caden shot her a puzzled look. “Why the hell does the Park Service have it?”

  She gave them a slightly embarrassed grin. “I sort of got bitten by Hamilton fever—along with pretty much every other Broadway fan in the world—a few years ago. Took a long weekend trip to see the play—”

  “Was Lin-Manuel still playing the lead?” Isaiah asked, interrupting her.

  She nodded. “Oh yeah.”

  She laughed when Isaiah muttered the word, “Lucky.”

  Tess shot Caden a victorious look. “You’re outnumbered nerd-wise.”

  Isaiah chuckled. “I’m jealous as hell. Tried to score tickets, but I jumped on the bandwagon too late, and they were hard as hell to get during that last year he was playing the role.”

  Caden cleared his throat, and if she weren’t so annoyed with him, Tess could almost feel sorry for him. She was starting to see a bit of what the future held for Caden. She and Isaiah had a tendency to see “squirrels” everywhere, their attention easily distracted by shiny baubles.

  “Anyway,” she continued, getting them back on track, “in addition to the play, I traveled to Hamilton Grange in St. Nicholas Park, then I drove up to see the Schuyler Mansion in Albany. It was a great trip.”

  “And the fan?” Caden pressed.

  Tess narrowed her eyes at Caden. The man needed to seriously work on his patience.

  “It was part of an exhibit at the Grange, which belongs to the National Park Service. The fan belonged to Alexander’s wife, Eliza. In addition to the painting and the placement of the Hamilton crest woven into the artwork, there’s this…” She pointed to something else on the sketch. “Her initials are at the base. See?”

  Caden turned the journal around, lifting it up until it was just a few inches from his face. “How the hell did you see that? I thought it was a blob.”

  She grinned, secretly pleased to have impressed him. “It’s my job to notice the details.”

  “So this was Eliza’s fan?” Isaiah took the book, clearly also surprised to see she was right about the initials.

  “Yes,” she said, though her tone gave her away.

  Isaiah put the journal down and looked at her. “You suddenly don’t seem convinced.”

  “There’s a slight difference between the drawing and Eliza’s fan. It’s those letters on the top of each fold. They aren’t on the original.”

  “You think it’s a code?” Isaiah asked.

  She hadn’t thought that at all until he said it. “Oh my God. It might be.”

  “If it is, how the hell are we supposed to crack it? The letters are meaningless without some sort of cipher, and the fan is under glass in Manhattan.”

  She opened her mouth to call Caden out for his constant pessimism, but Isaiah must have noticed. He gave her hand a quick squeeze.

  Unlike Tess, his lack of sleep didn’t appear to be affecting his mood. The affable man simply grinned at their humorless partner and chuckled. “That’s the beauty of this mystery, Caden. We’ve been tasked with cracking codes set in place by men who lived hundreds of years ago. If it were easy, it would have already been solved. Where’s your sense of adventure? Your determination to rise to the challenge?”

  Caden sighed, and then the sullen façade cracked slightly. “Sense of adventure? You have no idea who you’re talking to.”

  “Here.” Tess took out her phone and quickly snapped a picture of the fan drawing, then one of the poem.

  Caden glanced over his shoulder. “Pretty sure that’s not going to be good enough.”

  “What do you mean?” Tess asked, her face aghast as Caden slipped the journal into his jacket pocket when the librarian had her back turned.

  “You can’t do that,” she mouthed more than spoke.

  “Stop me,” Caden mouthed back.

  He stood and walked out of the rare books room without a backwards glance.

  Tess didn’t move, mortified by Caden’s actions.

  Isaiah gripped her elbow and guided her to the exit, even though her feet suddenly felt sunk in concrete. She kept waiting for the librarian to call out to them, to demand that they stop, but she didn’t even glan
ce their way, too engrossed in whatever she was reading on her computer screen.

  Caden was halfway through the arts section of the library when they emerged from the rare books room, and he was clearly not planning to wait for them. The large room that housed the art and architecture collections was probably the dingiest, least inviting part of the Boston Public Library. A fact that made sense when Tess considered that it led to the covert entrance to the Trinity Masters’ headquarters.

  Few tourists gave the room more than an unimpressed cursory glance before heading back to the grander, more ornate, beautiful rooms on the floor below.

  “What the hell did you just do?” Tess asked, when she finally caught up to Caden on the sidewalk outside.

  “I borrowed a library book. It’s a pretty common practice, Tess.”

  She put her hands on her hips. “Don’t even try to make a joke, Caden. You’ve been a gigantic pain in the ass since the binding ceremony and if you suddenly show me you have a sense of humor, I might start to like you. Something I don’t really want to do because you’re pissing me off!”

  Her lack-of-sleep tirade caught both Caden and Isaiah by surprise, given the way the men stared at her with their mouths agape for a very long, uncomfortable minute.

  “Very few people use that tone with me,” Caden said. The words could have been almost threatening, but he sounded genuinely startled.

  Tess was in no mood to figure out what that meant. Once she snapped, it took her a few minutes to rein things back in.

  “Give me the book.” She reached into this coat pocket and grabbed it out, intent on returning it.

  Caden captured her wrist in a firm grip and took it back. “No. We might need it later.”

  “We have what we need from it,” she insisted.

  “Children,” Isaiah said, clearly trying to break the tension and get them back on firmer ground.

  Caden lifted the book above his head, out of her reach. He blinked—then smiled when she tried to jump up for it, which didn’t help Tess hang on to her anger. He had a surprisingly sweet smile. When he wasn’t being a dick. Which was pretty much never.

  “Dammit, Caden. Stop being adorable. It’s annoying.”

  “Adorable?”

  Tess thought for a moment she’d insulted him. However, the tension was broken for real when both men started laughing.

  “What’s so funny?” she asked, even as the edges of her own lips started to turn up in amusement. She’d lost her shit. And oddly enough, it seemed to have broken through some of Caden’s chilliness.

  Before either man could answer, an older woman approached them.

  “Caden?” she said, walking closer. “Caden Anderson? It can’t be.”

  The tension Tess had just managed to lessen was back in an instant.

  “Mrs. Hancock,” Caden said, trying to tuck the journal back into his pocket discreetly. Tess thought the lady looked familiar. Then she remembered why. She’d met the woman at one of the Trinity Masters’ Winter Galas.

  Tess started to speak, but Mrs. Hancock only had eyes for Caden.

  “You died.”

  The older woman’s assertion caught Tess by surprise. “What? Died?”

  Caden didn’t bother to respond to Tess, but she noticed his discomfort. Whoever Mrs. Hancock was, she didn’t appear to be someone he was happy to see. “Obviously, I didn’t.”

  “But…I heard…” Mrs. Hancock stopped talking as if realizing where they were. She glanced up at the library and then, for the first time, she let her gaze travel around their circle. “It would seem congratulations are in order. This is your new trinity, correct?”

  Caden hesitated just long enough that Tess felt a twinge of hurt feelings. He didn’t want to acknowledge it? Finally, he gave the woman a terse, “Yes.”

  Mrs. Hancock looked directly at her. “Ms. Hamilton, isn’t it?”

  Tess nodded. “Yes, ma’am. We met two years ago, I believe, at the Winter Gala. Priscilla Hancock, yes?”

  Mrs. Hancock didn’t respond, but instead turned her attention to Isaiah. The almost imperceptible narrowing of her eyes had Tess’ hackles rising. “And you’re the mystery writer.”

  Isaiah, who’d been consistently easygoing, must have felt the same disdain from Mrs. Hancock that Tess sensed. His demeanor changed.

  “Isaiah Jefferson.”

  Priscilla Hancock’s lips pursed as if she’d eaten something bitter, but she quickly schooled her features. “Of course. Your pen name, right? Not your true one.”

  Isaiah bristled. “A nod to my ancestral roots.”

  “Roots is certainly an interesting word to describe the history. Although it worked well for Alex Haley, so I suppose we’ll just chalk it up to creative license.”

  Tess’ temper piqued at the woman’s racist comment.

  Isaiah opened his mouth to say something, but apparently, that was the limit of the older woman’s tolerance for social niceties.

  Her gaze returned to Caden. “I was terribly sorry to hear about your parents. Such a tragedy. I hear the police still don’t have any leads about their murder. A bomb, of all things.”

  Caden gave her an almost imperceptible nod, but didn’t speak. Tess wasn’t sure he could. Given the tightness in his jaw, she feared he’d break the teeth he was grinding together. His parents were killed by a bomb?

  “I assume Rose knows you’re back from…wherever you were.”

  Caden’s poker face faltered slightly. “She knows.”

  “I’m delighted by the Grand Master’s choice of partners for her. Rose always had a soft spot for your brother, Weston.”

  “She did.”

  “Must be hard for you though. To step aside and let someone else take care of her.”

  While most of the words spoken seemed innocuous enough, Tess couldn’t help but think there was an entirely different level of meaning behind it all. This conversation had layers. Lots of them. Which annoyed her because it was all flying over her head.

  “Weston will be good to her,” Caden said, though the words seemed hard for him to speak. “For her.”

  “Yes. And how is dear Tabby? I understand she was moved to a different facility. One in Switzerland. My husband and I were just talking about her the other day.”

  Tess didn’t think Caden would hit the older woman, but she couldn’t be sure. Isaiah must have had the same fear, because he took the slightest step closer to Caden, probably positioning himself so he could pull Caden off Priscilla Hancock if necessary.

  Caden didn’t hit her, didn’t snap at her. Instead his eyes went hard and cold, even as his posture seemed to relax. In a flash of insight, she realized he wanted to seem relaxed, as if nothing Mrs. Hancock said mattered, but his eyes gave him away. “Tabitha is well cared for.”

  Mrs. Hancock gave Caden an assessing look.

  “Now that you’re back, I assume you’ll be taking over your family’s home and businesses. You were the heir, after all.”

  Tess had to hand it to Caden. Nothing this woman, who seemed polite on the surface but was clearly nasty to the core, said broke his calm, faux casual demeanor. “The home will be sold. All liquid assets will be split into thirds.” He paused and then smiled—or at least his lips curved. It wasn’t really a smile, not like what she’d seen before. “I will take over my family’s…other business assets.”

  Mrs. Hancock nodded, and her eyes gleamed with what looked like satisfaction. “I thought that might be the case. I always liked you, Caden.” She glanced at Tess and Isaiah then back to Caden. “Though there’s no need for you to deprive yourself by dividing the liquid assets. Your parents had written Weston out of the will, and Tabitha, the poor thing, doesn’t need money where she is. Just someone to pay the doctor’s bills.”

  “They wrote Wes out because they believed he was dead.”

  How in the hell could two brothers both be mistaken for dead, only to return very alive and well? A quick glance at Isaiah proved he was just as fascinated by the conversa
tion.

  Mrs. Hancock took a moment before saying, “You and I both know they wrote him out of the will before that. He was never like you…like them.” Mrs. Hancock smiled and it was not a pleasant expression. “Although I’m hardly one to quibble with your wishes, now that Weston is married to Rose. I have no objection to keeping all that money in the family.”

  “Are we family?” Caden asked coolly.

  Mrs. Hancock laughed lightly. “Of course we are. Through marriage,” she paused briefly before adding, “and history.” She paused again, as if done, and then said, “Your fathers were helping me with a few things. I expect that you’ll help me in their place.”

  Caden’s face went horribly, horrifically blank.

  “No, Priscilla,” he said in a voice deeper than normal. “I do not serve you. Or take orders from you.”

  Her eyes widened. “We have so much in common, Caden.”

  “We have nothing in common.”

  She raised her chin. “We’ll see about that. I’ll be in touch, Caden.”

  The woman turned without a second glance in Tess and Isaiah’s direction, confirming she didn’t think them worthy of her notice.

  Isaiah didn’t even bother to wait until she was out of earshot before he spoke. “That woman is a stone-cold bitch.”

  “All I could come up with to describe her was nasty,” Tess commented. “Stone-cold bitch fits her perfectly. Clearly explains why you’re the writer and I’m not.”

  A too-quick smile touched Caden’s lips, but it vanished the second he glanced at Priscilla Hancock’s retreating form disappearing into the back of a Rolls-Royce, the windows tinted too dark to allow Tess to see if anyone else was in the back with her. The driver closed the door behind Priscilla, then looked in their direction before walking around the vehicle, climbing in, and driving off.

  “Fancy wheels,” Isaiah said. “Baseline on a Phantom is close to half a mill.”

  “It is.”

  Caden’s answer was short and left no doubt he wasn’t continuing any conversation about Priscilla Hancock.

  One step forward, twenty-seven back.

  “So…” Isaiah said. “Where to? Late lunch or back to the hotel to regroup?”