Jude Deveraux (19 page)

'No,'
she said. 'Nothing. It was a long time ago. There's nothing that needs to be
done. I assume the man has grandchildren now and lives a normal life.' When
Jared started to speak, she raised her hand. 'No, and I mean it. It was a long
time ago and it's over. Maybe he had something bad happen to him that day and
he took his anger out on me. Maybe — '

'I can't
listen to this,' Jared said fiercely. 'I don't want to hear it. You should have
— '

'Done
what?' Eden said loudly. 'I was seventeen years old, pregnant, and totally
alone. I didn't even know how to earn money to feed myself, much less a child.
But Mrs. Farrington took me in and took care of me and my daughter. You know
what? I think that man did me a favor.'

'What?'

'If I'd
stayed with my parents I know they would have married me off to someone
dreadful. You can't imagine what they were like. I've had years to think about
this, and I'm glad that there was a reason for them to throw me out. It could
have gone wrong, and I could have ended up on the street, but I didn't. I was
taken in by a wonderful woman and given all the love and care I'd never had in
my life.'

'Then
why did you fight me?'

'What?'

'If
being attacked when you were a girl turned out to be good, then why did you
attack me?'

'Instinct,'
she said, not liking what he was saying.

'I
think that over the years you've told yourself some great big lies. As for not
wanting revenge, what would you do if some man raped your daughter?'

'Kill
him,' Eden said softly, then looked at him. 'Are you feeling sorry for me?'

They
were in front of her house, and he turned off the car engine. 'I think maybe I'd
feel sorry for anyone in the world before I gave
you
any sympathy. And I
mean that as a compliment.'

Eden
smiled at him. 'Thank you.' She looked out the windshield at her old house; she
didn't want to go inside. Her beautiful house now had cut cushions and broken
furniture. And, worse, it had memories of being unsafe.

'Come
on,' Jared said cheerfully. 'I think you'll like what you see.'

He got
out of the car, then waited for her to set out. When she was slow going up the
porch stairs, he took her arm in his and pulled her up to the front door. Jared
took a big new key from I lis pocket and unlocked the door.

'Where
did that come from?' she asked, wide-eyed. 'And how did you get it? You haven't
been out of my sight all day.'

He
smiled at her. 'I do have a few secrets of my own,' he said as he opened the
door and went inside.

'What's
that supposed to mean?' she asked, following him. 'That I have secrets? I
don't. I'm an open book. I — ' She broke off because she'd entered the hall and
was looking about her. The secretary was not only now standing upright, but had
also been repaired. 'Who — ? How — ? When — ?'

'I made
a few calls and the agency sent some people.'

She
narrowed her eyes at him. 'You gave them permission to search my house, didn't
you?'

'Saves
having to get a warrant.'

She
knew she should be angry at him, but just then she saw a little camera in the
corner of the ceiling. She whirled on him. 'What have you done? And don't lie
to me! I want to know all of it.'

'I had
some security put in, that's all. Cameras inside and out. An alarm system.
We're hooked up with my office.'

Eden
sat down on the little French couch against the wall. 'Your office? You mean
the FBI? I'm now directly connected to the FBI?'

'Yes,'
he said, not seeming to understand her problem.

Eden
looked as though she wanted to cry. 'You were on the phone most of the day and
I saw you get angry more than once. That this house has been fitted out with
security equipment, and that lots of money has been spent on my house is
important, isn't it? Why didn't the FBI send me away somewhere safe?' When she
looked at him, he didn't meet her eyes. 'They want to use me as bait, don't
they? Like that goat with the T. rex in that movie.'

'Jurassic
Park,'
Jared said, looking away and avoiding  her 
eyes,  'I   liked   that  
movie.   It   was exciting. In my world too often really
bad things happen to people, but in a movie you can make happy endings. It's
nice.' When she said nothing, he turned to look at her, then gave a sigh.
'Yeah. You're to be the bait. This guy Applegate seems to have been involved in
more than we thought he was. They just decoded his computer disks, and he was
taking in information as well as giving it out. He was a sort of satellite to a
lot of people, but we don't know who they were. There are no addresses, no
names. He seems to have memorized most of the vital information.'

'So the
only name you have is mine.'

'That's
right.'

'And
your 'office,' as you call it, thinks that someone might come to me to find out
what I know. Come here again, that is, like they came this morning. Of course
you thought they were your own people because you'd arranged for them to scare
me, but they turned out to be actual criminals, so now your office thinks I
really
do
know something.'

'You
really are clever, you know that?' When she didn't smile, he sat down beside
her. 'Ms. Palmer . . . Eden, if it makes you feel any better, I don't think you
know anything, and I said so today. I don't know why Applegate swallowed your
name, but it's the only clue we have. I know I haven't known you for very long,
but in this business if you don't learn to read people quickly, it could mean
your life. I think you're an innocent in all this, but no one else believes
that. I'm sorry for this, but you're going to have me inside the house
and  men on shifts outside. I don't think you'll ever see them, but
they'll be there. Whether we like it or not, you either know something or have
something that someone wants.'

When
she didn't say anything, he stood up. 'Come on, we both need sleep. Tomorrow
we'll start looking through this house to see what we can find.'

'I have
to meet Brad tomorrow.'

'That's
not until the afternoon.'

'I need
to research eighteenth-century gardens so I can start designing them. After I
see the land, that is. And I have to get to those manuscripts from my
publishing house. They have deadlines on them. And I need to call my daughter
to see how she's doing. And I — '

'Tomorrow,'
Jared said. 'Get a good night's sleep, then we'll take care of everything else,
starting tomorrow. Tomorrow we'll — ' He broke off when her phone rang.

'It's
probably Brad,' she said, just to annoy him, but it wasn't Brad. 'It's for you.
It's Minnie.'

She handed
McBride the phone, then started back up the stairs, but she couldn't help but
overhear him. He didn't say much, just answered questions with 'Yeah, sure' and
'I think so' and 'Love to,' but his voice had lowered and was as soft as a
kitten's. Eden couldn't control a tiny flash of jealousy that ran through her.

As she
went up the stairs, her legs were heavy with fatigue and the responsibility of
all that was going on around her. Tonight she'd had too much  wine 
to  be  able  to   think  clearly  about
anything, and that included McBride.

After
he put down the phone, Jared walked up the stairs behind her. She didn't see
him flash a tiny penlight off and on three times to signal the people outside. And
an hour later when she was in bed, she slept so soundly that she didn't hear
the footsteps in the attic above her head. All the records she'd filed so many
years ago, all the Farrington furniture and mementos of the family that hadn't
been sold, were being gone through slowly and carefully.

Eden
woke at five A.M. thinking, The sooner I solve this thing, the sooner it will
go away. She lay in bed for thirty minutes as she explored the idea. Since
McBride had appeared in her life, everything had been abnormal. Snakes in her
bedroom, locked in a cellar, men prowling around outside. The list seemed to be
endless. The worst part of it all was that, eventually, Brad was going to find
out the truth. While it was true that, so far, Brad seemed to be an all-round
great guy, she didn't relish the idea of telling him that she was being
investigated by the FBI. For spying. Or being connected to a spy. Any way she
told it, it sounded bad. Whatever happened between her and Brad, whether it
became romantic or it was merely a working relationship, nothing would be
helped by her being connected to the FBI.

Quietly,
she got out of bed and walked to the window. Below, in her garden, the one
she'd planned and installed, was a man. He was standing under the little arbor
that she'd covered in confederate jasmine. She couldn't see all of him, but she
could see enough to know he was there. She was being watched. Spied on.

Turning,
she went into her bathroom and took a long, hot shower. Sometimes she did her
best thinking while she was in the shower. McBride said   
that    it    was   
believed    that    she    knew
something. Or owned something. Since, until a few weeks ago, she'd owned next
to nothing, she didn't think that was the problem. On the other hand, McBride
said that an agent had been killed here in Arundel. It was a hit-and-run. Was
it an accident, or did someone know the woman was an FBI agent? If an FBI agent
was killed here in Arundel, maybe that meant this place had more to do with the
spy than she, Eden, did.

She got
out of the shower, dressed, partly blow-dried her hair, then stuck some fat
Velcro rollers in the top of it. She applied enough makeup to keep her from
looking as though her face had been erased (wasn't getting older wonderful?),
then went to the manuscripts in the corner of her bedroom. Only one of them was
urgent, meaning that it had a deadline to be copyedited. Eden opened it and
found two grammar errors on one page. Take and
bring,
she thought. Why
couldn't people get those right? She closed the manuscript box. Obviously, the
book was going to take some time.

Setting
that manuscript aside, she looked at the others. She was supposed to read them
and decide whether or not they were worth publishing. With these books, grammar
and punctuation didn't matter. Not even sentence structure mattered. Everything
was about the story. If it was a ripping good yarn, some person, maybe Eden,
would be told to fix the writing.

It took
her an hour to determine that none of the manuscripts were about spies. There
was only one murder mystery, but it was set in Victorian  England 
and  was  about  a man who surgically killed prostitutes.
'That's original,' she muttered to herself and closed the big box containing
the 612 pages.

Smells
coming from downstairs wafted up to her, so she uncurled her legs and went down
to the kitchen. McBride had his back to her and was cooking pancakes. Beside
him was a plate with a stack that had to be a foot and a half high.

'Expecting
company?' she asked as she sat on a stool.

He
didn't turn around but gave a nod toward the kitchen door.

'Oh,
them,' she said. 'I thought they were going to be here in shifts, one at a
time.'

He put
four pancakes on a plate, put it in front of her, then turned back to the
stove. 'Changing shifts, so there're two of them here right now.'

She put
her knife in the butter, then pulled it out. Funny how being around
good-looking men made you think about every bite you took. She put a small
amount of syrup on the pancakes and cut. They were good! 'Your own recipe?'

'Naw.
It was on the package. I just added water.'

'And
bananas and strawberries. And what's the lumpy stuff?'

'Oatmeal.'
When he glanced back at her he was smiling. 'Okay, so I added a little of this
and that. Living alone, you learn some things.'

She ate
three more bites before she spoke. 'Do you have a photo of the agent who was
killed? The hit-and-run?'

Jared
didn't say anything for a moment, then he turned to look at her, spatula in
hand. 'What do you have in mind? You wouldn't be thinking of helping me, would
you? I mean, give up being hostile and fighting me at every turn, and actually
helping
me?'

She
shook her head at him. 'What is it that women see in you?'

'It
would take me so long to tell you that we wouldn't have time to look for any
clues.'

'Spare
me,' Eden said, but she smiled. 'You want me to take those pancakes out to the
men?'

'No.
You're not supposed to know they're there.'

'Not
even the man under my jasmine arch?'

'Especially
not him.' His face changed to serious. 'I heard you up early. Did you think of
anything that might have a bearing on the case?'

'If you
mean, did I remember any spy meetings that I attended, no I didn't. I went
through the manuscripts on the floor and there's nothing that makes me think
any of them was written by an international spy. But then, what do you know
about the man personally? What did he do as a hobby? A lot of romance novels
are written by men so maybe he — '

'Wrote
a bodice ripper?'

'Hey!' Eden
said. 'Don't disparage those novels to anyone in the publishing industry.
They're our meat and potatoes. You know who's the most powerful person in
publishing?' She didn't wait for him to answer. 'It's the woman in the grocery
store who throws a book into her cart. She decides everything.'

Jared
blinked at her a couple of times. 'Two speeches in two days.'

Smiling,
Eden glanced down at her plate. 'The point is that I didn't see anything in the
manuscripts that might reveal the secrets of some spy. But maybe he didn't
write about that. Maybe he wrote something else and he wanted me to edit the
book.'

'I
don't think he wrote anything. And, no, I don't have any concrete reasons for
thinking that, except for being in this business nearly thirty years. The writer-editor
angle doesn't smell right to me.'

'Thirty
years. You're older than you look.'

Jared
started to defend himself, then smiled at her. She was teasing him. 'More
pancakes, or are you afraid Granville won't like you if you gain a pound or
two?'

Eden
ignored his jibe. 'This morning I decided that the sooner this mystery is
solved, the sooner you'll leave and I can fully participate in what is shaping
up to be an interesting life.'

Jared
put his hand to his heart. 'You've injured me, but, basically, I like that
idea.' He looked down at the pancakes on the griddle. 'You know, don't you,
that I could be thrown out of the bureau for telling you all this.'

That
statement made her angry. 'I guess they just want a helpless victim who gets
shot at, tied up, then rescued by the big strong hero.'

'It's
the way I usually work,' he said solemnly. 'I don't mind the rope burns but I
hate the duct tape.'

Eden
laughed. 'First of all,' she said, 'I want to know your theories on this. If you
think this has nothing to do with Applegate wanting to get a book published,
what do you think it does have to do with?'

'This
house,' he said quickly. 'Maybe it's about those sapphires that I don't think
were ever sold. Treasure hunters can be fanatical.'

'I
guess we can't very well show Applegate's photo around town, but maybe we could
show a picture of the agent who was killed. Or at least ask questions about
her.'

'We,'
Jared said, smiling and looking at her, his eyes soft.

'So
help me, McBride, if you start making passes at me, I'll . . . '

'You'll
what?' he asked, his eyes teasing.

She
grimaced. 'I'm not going to play word games with you. Take the pancakes out to
the men who aren't there, then come back in and we'll look at the documents you
have.'

For a
moment Jared stood there, looking as if he was trying to decide whether or not
to show her anything. 'You're certainly a bossy little thing, aren't you?'

'When
you're a single mother, you have to be. You can't say 'Wait until your father
gets home.' You have to be mother and father to your child, so you learn to be
the boss.'

Jared
looked at her for a moment, then turned away and picked up the pancakes. He put
the plate and the butter and syrup on a tray, added some big glasses of orange
juice, and went out the door.

As Eden
turned toward the stairs, she caught sight of herself in the black glass door
of the microwave. She still had rollers in her hair.

*   *   *

An hour
later, Eden was in the dining room, surrounded by gardening books and grid
paper. She'd told McBride that she thought that the best person to ask about
the agent was Minnie and she was sure she'd see her this afternoon when she met
with Brad. Between now and then, Eden planned to make some sketches for ideas
for eighteenth-century-style gardens. 'I don't need hours, I need days to do
this,' she said in a half whine.

'Good,'
McBride said, ignoring her plea for a pep talk. 'That'll give me time to do
some things.' He didn't elaborate.

He
helped her haul the books from the cabinet in her bedroom downstairs to the
dining room where she could spread out. When he saw her pad of twenty-year-old
paper, he smiled but said nothing. Once everything she had — but not all that
she needed — was in place, he went upstairs. She could hear him walking about
now and then, and a few times heard him on his cell phone. And Minnie called
him three times on Eden's house phone. The first two times, Eden answered the
phone, but the third time it rang, she yelled for McBride to get it. It was
Minnie.

Eden
went through books that were like old friends to her. When she opened them,
they vividly reminded her of the time when she'd lived there with Mrs.
Farrington and Melissa. It was odd to so clearly remember herself then and to
think of herself now, and to look at all that had happened to her in her life.
When she'd lived there she'd never thought much about the future. That's what
happiness did to a person, she thought. It made them content. If it had been
left to Eden, she would have stayed there forever.

She looked
up from her book at the ceiling molding. It had been repaired and now, except
for a couple hundred years of wear, was as good as new. She looked about the
room and could almost feel Mrs. Farrington there, could hear her voice, could
see her smile as she held Melissa on her lap and told her stories about the
Farrington family. Smiling, Eden looked about the room. As always, the
late-nineteenth-century paintings of Tyrrell Farrington were on the wall. They
weren't good, but they weren't bad either. Talent aside, Tyrrell had been as
fanatical about his family as Mrs. Farrington was. He had painted a history of
the family. There were ancestor portraits done from life and from the memories
of old relatives, as well as four paintings of the house itself, each from a
different angle. It was interesting to see how plants had grown. The pecan
trees were still there, only much bigger. Tyrrell had never married and had
lived in Farrington Manor all his life. When he was a young man he'd gone on a
Grand Tour that lasted over three years. Mrs. Farrington said that if his
mother hadn't faked a heart attack, and his father hadn't cut off his
allowance, Tyrrell would have spent the rest of his life in Paris. Instead,
he'd returned home, sulking and sullen, and had spent the rest of his
life  painting.  Now  the  walls  of the 
old  house were covered with his work.

Eden
looked back at her papers.

'How's
it coming?'

She
looked up at Jared. 'I don't know. I designed one garden over twenty years ago,
and since then I've done a thousand other jobs. It's hard for me to remember
everything that I knew.'

'It's
not like you're not used to using your brain. You got your college degree while
holding down a full-time job, remember?'

She
looked at him suspiciously. 'And what was my degree in?'

'American
history, minor in English lit.'

She
looked at the eraser on her pencil. 'I guess I have a file at the FBI.'

'It's
more like a whole cabinet.'

Eden
groaned.

'Come
on, it's not that bad,' Jared said, pulling out a dining-room chair and sitting
down across from her. 'I made a few calls and found out some things. Wanta
hear?'

'Maybe,'
she said cautiously. 'Is it bad?'

'Not to
me,' he said cheerfully.

She
narrowed her eyes at him. 'You found out something bad about Brad, didn't you?
So help me, McBride, if you — '

'Did
you know that McBride isn't my real name?'

'Whatever
your real name is, I don't want to hear it. What did you find out? Other than
everything there is to know about Minnie Norfleet, that is.'