Almost a Lady

by Heidi Betts

  "Is that so?"

  "I believe so."

  "And have I got you nearly won over?” His hand moved higher on her waist. His fingers brushed beneath the swell of her breast. “Shall I swoop in for the kill?"

  "You can try,” she said, neither putting a halt to his caress nor encouraging it. “But you won't succeed."

  "Why is that?"

  "Because I've got you figured out. Your ploy of honor and chivalry can't work if the prey is wise to the trap."

  "We'll see,” was his only response. He ran the back of his hand across her temple, leaning close enough to smell the rose-scented shampoo she must surely use to wash her hair. His lips grazed her cheekbone, the lobe of her ear.

  "Care to invite me in?” he whispered.

  She turned away so quickly that he stumbled.

  "If we're going to begin our investigation first thing in the morning, I'll need my rest.” Her key turned in the lock. “Good night, Mr. Donovan. Sleep well."

  With that, she disappeared into the room, leaving a disappointed Brandt in the deserted hallway.

  Chapter Eleven

  Willow pulled the black knit cap farther down around her ears. With the back of her jacket stuffed with old rags to produce an artificial hump, she stumbled across Broadway, incorporating a rattling, hacking cough to her guise as an excuse to cover her face with gloved hands.

  By the time she reached the Pinkerton offices, the streets were empty. Her fear of being discovered lessened considerably, but still she continued with her hunched, irregular gait and an occasional rumble from her chest. She fell against the side of the building, staggering drunkenly up the few steps to the front stoop.

  Fumbling around in her pocket, she removed one of the lock-picking devices from her collection. To conceal it from the view of anyone who might glance in her direction, she lifted a half-empty bottle of rum to her lips, at the same time working a tiny gadget into the keyhole. Just as she felt the lock begin to give, the pick slipped. She let loose with a sailor's curse.

  Bringing the bottle to her lips once again, she dug into her pocket for an older, more reliable tool. A hairpin.

  With the skill of an experienced craftsman, she slipped the pin inside and wiggled it around. Seconds later, she felt the lock loosen. Leaving the rum on the doorstep, she turned the knob and sneaked inside the dark building. From memory, she moved through the outer office, using her hands to avoid running into Mrs. Girard's desk.

  Once she reached Robert's office, her trepidation eased. This room had only one small window with a view of the alley and the brick building next door. With the curtains drawn, no one would ever notice the low glow of lamplight inside an establishment supposedly abandoned for the night.

  She struck a match and held it to the wick of the crystal-domed lamp on the corner of Robert's desk. Soft yellow illuminated the center of the room, casting only the slightest glimmer of light into the corners.

  Willow moved to the file cabinets, searching for the employee file on Charles Barker. Seated behind the desk, she began scanning the information found there. At first she saw nothing of significance. Employment history, personal facts—all information she had already been given. Nothing that would have gotten him killed.

  She wondered if Robert had already gutted Charlie's file. It was a well-known fact within the Agency that case information remained in the file of the assigned agent until the situation was resolved. Then, it was all moved to a separate file under the case name and identification number.

  Had Robert already transferred the paperwork? If so, she would never find out what Charlie was working on. She could spend a week's worth of evenings going through case files and she still might never stumble across the one that got Charlie killed. It would be like searching for a rat in a rattler's nest.

  She was about to give up when a thought hit her: What if Superintendent Warner was keeping the paperwork on his desk? Willow balked at the idea of rifling through his possessions. At least if she got caught in Robert's office, she was pretty sure she could talk her way out of it. But Francis Warner was not known for his tolerant nature. He would not only pepper her with a harsh reprimand, but she would probably find herself without a job by morning.

  Which, if the Ambassador clock hanging on the wall next to the door could be relied upon, was fewer than seven hours away. It had seemed like forever before she was sure Brandt would stay in his room and she could sneak out of the hotel. And she would have to be back in her room, in her nightdress, before sunup. Brandt would arrive at her door not long after, expecting her to be rested and ready to get to work.

  She sifted through the rest of Charlie's file and found nothing. Disappointed but determined, she tried to think of where else Robert might be keeping the information.

  Probably under lock and key, she thought.

  Of course. Under lock and key. Hadn't Robert once confided in her that there was a secret wall safe in his office? Behind a painting of some kind?

  She whirled around. There were pictures on every wall.

  Starting with the one closest to her, she began tilting them sideways to look beneath. Finally she found the safe, tucked away behind a large painting of men and women playing croquet. She lifted the frame from its hook and set it aside, climbing onto the sofa to get a better look at the numbered dial.

  She had never broken into a safe before. She had no idea how to figure out the combination. But, she reminded herself, it's easier to break into the safe of someone you know than of someone you don't. She had to think like Robert.

  Robert was protective. He always kept an eye out for his friends and family. He was predictable. She could always tell what he was thinking, how he would react.

  So what would Robert do with the combination to his office safe? He would take it home with him. But he would also leave a copy at work, just in case.

  She went to his desk, rooting around in the drawers. Then she began pulling them out and feeling underneath for hidden slips of paper. She looked under the desk blotter, inside his cup of pencils. She even upended the chair to search around the heel base.

  Nothing.

  The Ambassador clock chimed one. If she didn't find the combination soon, she would have to give up and try another night. Muttering to herself, she set the place to rights and turned down the wick of the lamp. Robert would notice immediately if even one thing was out of order. Cursing him for being so damn secretive, she started out of the office, giving the floor plant by the door a swift kick of frustration.

  She adjusted the hump of rags in her jacket, replaced the knit cap, and slowly opened the front door, checking for observers before stepping out of the building. She had one foot on the front step when it dawned on her.

  Robert hated plants.

  Mrs. Girard filled the outer office with flowerpots of every shape and size, pruned and watered them like they were her children. But she wasn't allowed to give the shrub in Robert's office so much as a sip of water. He took care of it himself, complaining every time a leaf turned brown and died.

  Willow ducked back through the door and ran to his office. On her knees beside the less-than-healthy plant, she began turning over each huge, oval-shaped leaf. When that failed to turn up anything new, she tore off her gloves and sank her hands wrist-deep into the soil. She ignored the moist stickiness, turning the dirt over and over in her hands, letting it sift through her fingers. Finally her nails ran into something solid and cool.

  She brushed it off, feeling its shape. A key.

  That sneaky bastard.

  It made sense now. Robert memorized the safe's combination, but left the master key in the office in case something ever happened.

  She took down the painting again and felt the cool metal until she found a small keyhole just below the combination dial. It turned smoothly. The safe popped open. She piled the safe's contents in the middle of the desk and lit the lamp.

  The top file was marked XAVIER, YVONNE in bold black letters. Below, in a lighter,
penciled scrawl was the name of the investigator assigned to the case: Charles W. Barker.

  She browsed through the file, taking in pages upon pages of a murder report, as well as several photographs of the crime scene and a woman's body.

  Knowing that Robert would notice if anything was missing from the file, she pulled a stack of Pinkerton stationery from the desk drawer and began copying the information, word for word.

  When she finished, she sat staring at the pictures for several long minutes. They weren't gruesome photographs. She'd seen bodies far more mutilated. This victim was clean except for the blood on her chest. Whoever killed her had taken the time to arrange the body just so, to place a flower—what looked to be a pale-colored rose—in her hands.

  If only she could take the photos with her. She needed to study them. There could be a clue somewhere in the pictures that she wouldn't catch in only a second-long glance.

  Duplicates. This file was probably Charlie's, recovered after his murder.

  Willow went to the file cabinets, opening the bottom drawer marked X. Her eyes were drawn to the large letters at the top of the second, matching file. She couldn't take the entire portfolio, but she had already copied the information, so she didn't need the whole thing. She only needed the photographs. If anyone noticed the pictures were missing from this file, they would probably just think them misplaced.

  She returned the contents of the safe, replaced the picture on the wall, reburied the key into the soil of the plant, and extinguished the lamp. Confident that Robert would never know someone had been in his office, she hurried from the building, heading back to the Astor House with the information she'd gathered tucked securely beneath her shirt and into the waistband of her trousers.

  When she arrived, she slipped in through the back of the hotel: the same rear entrance she'd used to get out, and that Robert had used the night he came to her room. It wouldn't do to have people witness a man visiting a lone woman.

  Willow breathed a sigh of relief as she ducked into her well-lit room and turned to close and lock the door. Now all she had to do was get a couple hours of sleep to convince Brandt that she'd been in her room all night. She would hide her newly found facts somewhere safe until she got the chance to look them over more thoroughly.

  "How nice of you to drop by."

  Willow whirled around. And came face-to-face with her nemesis. Anger and frustration warred within her. She felt like a delinquent toddler, followed every step by a hawkish nanny.

  "What are you doing in my room?” Her voice was deceptively even, white-hot fury bubbling just below the surface.

  Brandt sat reclining on the settee, feet propped in front of him, the epitome of nonchalance. Shimmers of light danced against a crystal tumbler as he raised it to his lips and drank before answering. “I'm just sitting here waiting for you,” he replied easily. “Mind telling me where you've been? I assume you weren't at the theater, given your less-than-ladylike attire."

  She resisted the urge to tug at her man clothes. “Where I go and what I do is none of your concern. Now get out of my room.” She opened the door, leaving him more than enough space to make his exit.

  But he didn't move. He stayed seated, took another sip of brandy, and pinned her with a steady gaze. His eyes shone with emerald clarity, cool and determined. He wasn't any more likely to leave of his own volition than she was to sprout wings and fly across City Hall Park.

  She slammed the door shut. The sound reverberated through the room and, she was sure, down the hall. Giving him a withering glare, she crossed her arms over her chest, hitching one hip to the side in annoyance. She felt the file, warm and stiff against the bare skin of her torso.

  "You seem to have forgotten that we're partners,” Brandt observed.

  "I forgot nothing."

  "Then where were you?"

  "That is none of your business,” she told him, enunciating carefully so there was no chance that he would mistake her meaning.

  "But we're partners,” he said again. There was a sharp edge to his tone now, a steely glint in his eyes. “Therefore, your whereabouts most certainly are my business."

  "I told you that we would start on the case in the morning. Tomorrow we become partners. At eight o'clock, and not a minute before.” She moved toward the bedroom entrance with as much nonchalance as she could muster, considering she was dressed in ratty male clothing, clutching the stolen information to her breast like a hulk of driftwood on a raging sea.

  "Don't you want to know what brought me to your room so late at night?"

  The question stopped her in her tracks. Before, she had been too preoccupied with getting him out of the room to think about his reason for being there in the first place. But now that he brought it up . . . f

  He didn't wait for her to respond. Her pause a yard from the bedroom was answer enough.

  "I was lying in bed, struggling to fall asleep, when an image formed in my mind. Can you guess what that image was?"

  She shot him a frosty glare to convey that if he didn't hurry with this little anecdote, she wouldn't stick around to hear the ending.

  His mouth lifted in a slight smile as he continued. “It was you,” he informed her.

  She managed to hide her surprise.

  "Standing in front of the door, just as I last saw you. Your hair swept up in that flower-sprigged coronet, your dark violet eyes shining up at me.” He rose from the sofa, moving to the bar to refill his glass. “A thought

  I'd had earlier floated through my brain. That I had seen eyes that shade only once before in my life."

  Tipping back his drink, he emptied it in one swallow and set the glass aside. He walked forward but stopped short of touching her.

  "A very unique color, amethyst. It occurred to me that there are probably very few people in the world with eyes just that shade of purple. That I would happen to cross paths with two of them seems beyond belief.

  "And then I thought, what if I didn't meet two different women with eyes that sparkled with amethyst fire? What if those magnificent orbs belonged to only one woman?"

  His hand came up to cup her chin, tilting her head back so that he could look more deeply into her eyes. “Is it possible that, without realizing it, I've met the same woman twice? First in Missouri, now here in New York?"

  Willow pulled away from his grasp, taking a step back to put more space between them. “I don't know what you're rambling on about, Donovan, but I'm tired. If you don't mind, I'm going to bed."

  He shrugged a shoulder carelessly. “I was just wondering if maybe we had met somewhere before. Maybe in Missouri."

  "Have you completely lost your senses? Of course we met in Missouri. You came there to check on me for Lucas and Megan, remember?” She rolled her eyes at him, then turned and took another step toward the bedroom door.

  "Oh, I remember,” Brandt answered. “I also remember getting into a slight scrape in an alleyway just inside Jefferson City."

  Willow halted with her hand on the doorknob. She swallowed convulsively.

  "You see,” Brandt continued, “I thought I could help when I spotted two men in the alley, one being held at gunpoint. Imagine my surprise when the man with the gun got the drop on me. I was standing with my back to the wall, a knife at my groin. That's when I noticed the eyes. Bright, vibrant violet eyes. Now, when was the last time you saw a man with violet eyes?” he mocked.

  His arms came up on either side of Willow's still form, imprisoning her against the door. She felt his chest brush her back but refused to turn around. Felt his hot breath on her neck but refused to respond.

  "I didn't get a very good look at the woman in the alley. She was wearing a knit cap.” His finger traced the thick band around her ears. “Kind of like the one you have on right now."

  She shook her head, trying to dislodge his finger.

  "She was dressed all in black. Much like you are. What a coincidence.” He straightened, dropping his arms from her sides.

  "It's a sh
ame that I didn't get a better look,” he sighed. “But all I really saw were her eyes.” With two fingers against her cheek, he slanted her face toward his. Pointing directly at them, he said, “Eyes just that shade of purple."

  Turning up his palms, he shrugged dramatically, then moved back to the settee. “Quite a coincidence, wouldn't you agree?” he asked, dropping onto the brocade cushion.

  She didn't answer. Her mouth felt like she'd been chewing on sawdust. Her heart pounded in her breast. Her blood drummed through her veins in silent panic.

  He knew. She had been lucky until now, but he'd finally put two and two together.

  He knew. And he was sitting there, supremely pleased with himself. Playing with her like a cat after a mouse.

  He knew. He was simply waiting her out. Letting it sink in. Giving her time to walk into the trap of her own volition.

  Well, she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction. If he wanted her to panic and admit to being in that alley, then she would remain calm and keep her mouth shut.

  Besides, maybe he really didn't know anything. Maybe he was grabbing at straws, trying to draw her into confessing something he only suspected.

  "Good night,” she said shortly and pushed open the bedroom door.

  "Good night,” he called after her. Then, before she closed the door behind her, “Oh, Willow, you wouldn't happen to own an ivory-handled revolver, would you? With a matching stiletto blade?"

  Chapter Twelve

  Willow leaned weakly against the bedroom door, covering her ears to block out the demonic sound of his mocking laughter.

  So he knew. So what?

  Brandt already knew she was a Pinkerton agent, so what did it matter if he also knew she'd been the one to accost him in that Jefferson City alleyway? If he hadn't been so blasted nosy in the first place, he wouldn't have gotten a knife put to his groin.

  Willow was beginning to wish she'd done as threatened and cut it off.