by Carmen Green
Chris grinned. “Did anybody hear you?”
“No. I was alone.” Her face grew redder.
He waited until she looked at him. “What did you say?”
Her mouth dropped for a few seconds. “I’m not…I’m not…” she sputtered, pursed her lips, then straightened her shoulders. “No.”
“How about if I guess?”
The elevator doors opened and she walked down the hall without answering him. He knew what he would have said if he’d been in her situation, and he wouldn’t have stopped at two words, but now he burned with curiosity to know what she’d said.
She stopped in front of a brown door. To the right was a speaker panel with the number 323, and a glowing doorbell. She pressed the button.
Gertrude Alma Lee Mitchell wore her silver-gray hair in short curls that framed her dark brown skin. Her dark brown eyes were filled with curiosity and intelligence. She looked sixty but his file listed her age as eighty-eight.
“Come on in.” Her voice was strong and she spoke with a slow, melodious rhythm.
“Aunt Gert,” Renee said, “this is Christopher Foster, Marc’s younger brother. Chris, this is my great-aunt, Ms. Gertrude Mitchell.”
Chris let go of the handle and shook the older woman’s hand. “Nice to meet you, Ms. Mitchell.” She wore a plain blue dress with pearl earrings and a watch with a thin black band, its geometric face set in diamonds.
“Nice to meet you, as well, and please, call me Miss Gert. Renee, put those bags in the kitchen. Mr. Foster, you can leave that—” she pointed to the rolling bag “—over in the corner.”
“Chris, please,” he said.
Renee gave the bag a furtive glance and walked to the other side of the room to the kitchen area. A half wall screened the kitchen from view. He looked down at the bag. What’s in the bag?
“Please, have a seat.” Ms. Mitchell touched his arm and motioned toward the seating area.
The place reminded him of an old black and white Hollywood movie with its sophisticated art deco style. Gertrude Mitchell was a wealthy woman and it showed in her jewelry and furniture. He sat down in a curved leather armchair.
“Dinner will be ready in a few minutes.” She sat on the sofa in front of him. “Have you been to Birmingham before, Chris?”
“Only once,” he replied.
“Aunt Gert, I’m going to put your mouthwash in the hall pantry.” Renee held one of the bags in her hand and grabbed the handle of the rolling bag. “I’ll take this to the extra bedroom.” She raced out of the room. What the hell was going on with the bag? He remembered the man searching her bag but he never looked in the rolling bag and then it came to him. Chris grinned. She was smuggling in alcohol in a scrapbook case.
“So you’re Marc’s brother,” Miss Gert said.
“I am,” he said as Renee joined her great-aunt on the sofa, looking a little anxious.
“Well,” Miss Gert said. “He didn’t mention a word about you. Why is that?”
Chris studied the woman in front of him. She had a mildly curious look on her face, but the look in her eyes had him thinking that he wasn’t getting out of here without answering her question.
“Marc and I haven’t been close for many years. Did you get a chance to know him?”
“Somewhat. He traveled a lot, but he did make time to see me when he was home. If you weren’t close, why did he make you executor? It seems to me that he would have made Renee the executor?”
“Aunt Gert, really,” Renee said with some distress.
“No. She’s got a point,” he said. “I think he made me the executor because he knew I would make sure that everything was done right.”
She raised her brows. “Oh, are you a lawyer?”
“No. I’m with law enforcement.”
“Which branch?”
“Aunt Gert,” Renee gasped. “Did you invite us to dinner so you could pump him for information?” Renee looked aghast.
“Of course.”
He laughed. He had to admire a woman who wasn’t shy about getting what she wanted. “It’s all right, Renee. I’m with the FBI, Miss Gert.”
“Oh. Well, I must confess. I was concerned when Renee told me about you. Marc never mentioned you and suddenly there you are. But you’re with the FBI so he must have reason to trust you.”
“So it would seem,” he replied. “The last time I saw Marc, I realized that I really didn’t know him. I’ve talked to Renee about him but I’d like to hear what you thought of Marc.”
“Marc was such a charming man. He didn’t say much about his people, though.” She looked at him. “Who are your people? Are they all from California?”
“I really don’t know much about my family. My father didn’t have family and my mother’s family died before I was born. That’s probably why Marc didn’t talk about them,” he said. He believed the real reason Marc didn’t talk about his family was that he didn’t want people to know too much about him. If they knew too much then he could be caught in his lies.
“So California is your home,” Miss Gert said.
“No, California is where I was born. I live in Atlanta for now.”
“For now,” Renee said. “Are you moving?”
“Yes. Probably to Washington, D.C.”
“You don’t like Atlanta?” Miss Gert asked.
“It’s fine. I move about every two years for my job. Which is one of the reasons why Marc and I didn’t keep in touch.”
“The two of you have that in common. Marc traveled for his job a lot. He could talk to anyone. I guess you’d need that talent to be a good salesman. And he was always willing to help. He would run little errands for me. I keep a running list of things I need to do. I don’t remember things like I used to.”
“That’s not true,” Renee said with a laugh. “You remember everything.”
“No. I write things down and keep good records. It surprises people when I repeat what they told me months ago. It keeps them on their toes and honest. Marc told me he was going to follow my example and write everything down.”
“Did he?” Chris prompted. He hoped Marc had written down where he’d taken the necklace.
“I’m sure he did. He always had file folders in his briefcase. He even showed me the folder he had on me.”
“He had a folder on you?” Renee asked in surprise.
“Yes, and he probably had one on you, too,” she said and patted Renee’s hand. “He gave me a copy of my file. He wanted to make sure he hadn’t forgotten anything.”
“Forgotten what?”
“All kinds of things.” She stopped at the sound of a timer and stood. “We can talk about this over dinner.”
“I’ll get it.” Renee jumped out of her seat before either of them could, and went to the kitchen.
“Do you want help with that?” he offered.
“Save your breath, young man,” Miss Gert told him. “Renee’s not letting either of us in there.”
“That’s right,” Renee said, bringing out a large covered dish. “I can handle this.” She walked back to the kitchen.
“Renee won’t let me lift a finger to do anything if she’s here. It’s sweet.” She smiled then whispered, “I sneak and do stuff anyway.”
He chuckled at the mischievous expression on her face. “I won’t tell her,” he said softly.
Renee set another dish on the table. “Dinner’s ready.”
Dinner consisted of smothered pork chops, real homemade mashed potatoes, fat string beans that Miss Gert called pole beans, fried corn, homemade dinner rolls and a drink called Arnold Palmer, which was half sweet tea and half lemonade. The small dinette table barely had enough room for all the food, which was excellent.
“Renee was right,” he said after the first bite of his pork chop. “You are a great cook.”
“Why, thank you. Save room for dessert. It’s Renee’s favorite—peach cobbler.”
“I will.” He took a few more bites of his meal and turned the conversation
back to Marc. “So did Marc have in his file that you were a good cook?”
She smiled. “No, nothing like that. It had my birthday, my favorite perfume, my favorite wine. You know, little things about me.”
“That must have been a very small file,” he said.
“Yes, it was. The biggest thing was the list of errands he’d done for me.”
“I would have run your errands for you,” Renee said.
Although she tried to disguise it, he recognized the underlying hurt in her tone. He wasn’t the only one who heard it.
“I know, sugar, but I think this was his way of getting to know you better.”
Renee frowned. “What do mean?”
“He used the errands as an excuse to talk to me about you. You don’t talk about your childhood. That part of your life you keep to yourself. We’d look at the pictures I had of you growing up and I’d tell him about you.”
Chris nodded. It was also a good way to get her to trust him. Marc wasn’t dumb. Anyone who’d been around the two women could see that they loved each other. Gertrude Mitchell may be Renee’s great-aunt, but she treated Renee like a treasured granddaughter.
“Do you have a lot of pictures of Renee?” he asked.
She smiled. “Of course, would you like to see them?”
“Oh, but…” Renee protested.
“I’d love to,” he said over her objections.
“But what about dessert?” Renee said.
“Dessert will still be here when we finish looking at the pictures,” her great-aunt said, getting to her feet. “I’ll get the file, too.”
They went back to the living room. He sat on the sofa next to the older woman. She’d retrieved three large photo albums from a small cabinet. She opened the first album. “This one is my favorite.”
Renee, sporting pigtails and bangs, sat next to Gertrude on a sofa. Renee’s lips turned up slightly at the corners and Gertrude had her arm around her small shoulders. In the background was a large Christmas tree decorated with glass ornaments and white lights, but it was the diamond necklace around Renee’s neck that caught his attention. “That’s quite a necklace,” he said.
“It’s very special to me. Renee’s the only person who I will allow to wear it. This was our first Christmas together. We were having our own private party. A girl can’t go to a party without her fine jewelry,” she said then smiled gently. “Now, we have a party every Christmas for just the two of us.”
He studied the photo closely. Gertrude’s smile was wide and bright. She wore the matching earrings and a diamond and pearl necklace. But it was Renee’s smile that drew his attention. There was an underlying sadness in her shy smile, and he wondered what had put it there.
“How old was she here?”
“Six, and just as cute as a button and as curious as three kittens.”
The age she’d started boarding school. Where the hell were her parents? He looked across the room at Renee who looked uncomfortable with the discussion. “Curious about what?” he asked.
“That year, she wanted to know all about mining for diamonds. She wanted to go to Africa so she could find diamonds for her own necklace, until she learned all the mines were privately owned. Then she started looking at designers. We must have checked out all the books in the library on jewels.”
“Has the necklace been in your family long?” he asked.
“No. It was a gift from the man I loved. He’d gone to New York and came back with the necklace and earrings. He said it was a bribe to get me to marry him.”
“You didn’t want to marry him?” Chris asked intrigued.
“Oh, I wanted to marry him, but things were complicated with him. I didn’t like complications. He did know how to impress a woman and he’d had it designed just for me.”
“I didn’t know that,” Renee said. “I always thought it was a Cartier.”
“No. Paul Laveau created my necklace. He was Creole and tried to make it as a designer in New York in the 1930s. For a time, he was the premiere designer for wealthy African-Americans. He moved to France after a few years. I wanted to have another piece of jewelry designed by him, but no one knew where to find him.”
“I could try to find information for you,” Renee offered.
She looked at Renee with surprise. “Well, I thought you had. Marc said the Laveau family is still making jewelry in France. He said you found the information for him.”
Chris felt his gut clench. This didn’t sound good.
“I don’t remember,” Renee said.
“Well, don’t worry about it. He said the jewelry they produce now looks nothing like my necklace. He went to their store in Paris early this year and showed them a picture of the necklace and earrings, but they told him they’d moved away from that type of design.” She sighed. “What a shame.”
“Aunt Gert, you let Marc take one of your pictures?”
“No, I had him get the negatives from the safe-deposit box. Oh, and I need you to get the necklace for me. I plan to wear it to the dance next week.”
CHAPTER 9
How in the world were they going to find the necklace in a week? Renee was startled when Chris answered. She hadn’t realized she’d spoken aloud.
“We can start by finding out why Marc was so interested in Laveau,” he said.
“I’ve been trying to remember if he asked me to research the name. It does sound familiar,” she said.
“He didn’t put that information in the folder he gave Miss Gert.”
She’d been surprised by the number of errands Marc had run for Aunt Gert. It was one more thing she hadn’t known about him. There was no reference to the necklace in the folder.
When they were back at her house, it didn’t take Renee long to find the jewelry store owned by the Laveau family.
“La Belle Fleur. I vaguely remember doing a search for jewelry stores in Paris, but Marc said it was for business. His company had developed some sort of plastic they were going to sell to jewelry makers for molds.” She sent the information to the printer, which immediately began spitting out pages. She watched Chris go to the printer and lift the pages as they rolled out.
It was hard to keep her mind on the task when she’d been distracted by the sight of his very fine behind. She couldn’t help it. He really turned her on with his sexy body and sharp mind. She’d been around more than her fair share of brilliant men, but Chris had something more. He had a casual assurance that made you believe he could do anything he put his mind to, and do it well. She wished he was as attracted to her as she was to him. He wasn’t and there was no use thinking about it. Think about the necklace.
Watching him with Aunt Gert had been an education. She knew he was fishing for information, but he’d done it with a light touch. He’d made it seem like he was just having conversation and she doubted if Aunt Gert noticed. He’d also kept his word and not told her the necklace was gone. She was grateful for that.
“Marc went to Paris three months before he took the necklace.” Chris collected the pages and brought the printout to her, then sat on the edge of the desk. “He didn’t go back to France before he died. I don’t see a strong enough connection between his trip to France and the designer.”
She kept her gaze on his face, trying to think of him as a coworker. It didn’t really work. “He went to a lot of trouble for nothing,” she said in frustration. They were no closer to finding the necklace now than before they spoke with Aunt Gert.
“It wasn’t a lot of trouble. Marc was looking for something. I don’t think he found it in Paris.” He looked at the large whiteboard where they’d added Marc’s trip to Paris to the list of places Marc had been within the last six months.
“Why not?”
“Miss Gert knew he was looking for information on Laveau. He was too cunning not to have covered his tracks.”
Renee remembered how well Marc had covered his tracks with three wives. Yeah, he was cunning all right. “So, we’ve got nothing.”
He looked at her. “No. When we talk to Bill Reynolds tomorrow, we’ll see what he knows about Laveau and the necklace. We know Marc was looking for something or else he would have taken the necklace sooner. Find out what he was looking for and find the necklace.” He looked so calm, so confident and so unbelievably sexy.
She looked at her laptop. Focus, Renee, focus. “You’re right. I just wish…” She shrugged her shoulders. “It doesn’t matter.”
“What is it that you wish?” His voice was smooth, rich like her favorite blend of coffee.
There were so many things she wished. She wished the necklace was in the safe-deposit box where it belonged. She wished she was the kind of woman he wanted. She wished she could change whatever it was about her that made her unlovable. Renee rubbed her eyes. Wishing didn’t change anything. She’d have to stop wishing for the impossible and concentrate on what she could do something about. “I wish Marc had taken something of mine instead of Aunt Gert’s.”
“I know. She really loves that necklace.” He leaned forward, bringing his face closer to hers.
She felt her pulse jump, then race. He was so close that all she had to do was lean forward to kiss his lips. She was not going to kiss him and she wasn’t going to blush. She wasn’t. She leaned back in her chair and…dang it, started blushing.
“I think you should tell her,” he said.
It took a few seconds for her to register what he’d said. She shook her head. “No. I’m…”
“Hear me out before you say no.” He interrupted. “Miss Gert is a strong woman and she loves you very much. I think she’ll be angry and hurt, but she’ll put the blame where it needs to be, which is on Marc.”
There was such certainty in his expression, but this was too important. “I can’t tell her.”
“At least tell her about the robbery before she finds out some other way,” he said.
She stared at him in horror. “Ohmygod! I forgot to tell her.” She grabbed the phone and quickly dialed Aunt Gert’s number. When the answering machine kicked on, she hung up and called the cell phone. She breathed a sigh of relief when she heard Aunt Gert’s voice.
Ten minutes later, Renee felt drained. She’d talked Aunt Gert out of driving over to see her. She’d danced around the truth several times during their conversation and she’d flat-out lied about the reason they were in the store. She hated to lie. It made her stomach hurt.
