The Royal Secret

by Lucinda Riley

  “Tore it to pieces more like,” he commented angrily.

  “Needs must, I’m afraid. Of course, we’ll make sure her insurance company is generous. Now, given it wasn’t there, I would suggest that if she does have it, it may well be on her person, possibly at your apartment. Rather than subject her to more unpleasantness, I thought I could leave it to you to retrieve it for us. Rather fortuitous, really, you being her . . . friend. She trusts you, I presume?”

  “Yes. It’s what most friendships are based on, sir.” Simon could not help the sarcasm that dripped unsolicited from his tongue.

  “Then for now I’ll leave it to you to sort out. Unfortunately, if you don’t, then others must. Warn her off, Warburton, for good and for all. It really would be in her best interests to desist from further investigation. Righto, that’s everything.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Simon left the office, angry and confused at being put in an impossible position. He walked back through the maze of corridors to his own section and sat down at his desk.

  “You’ve been to see Jenkins?” Ian, one of his colleagues, came and perched on the corner of it.

  “How did you know?”

  “It’s the glazed look in your eyes, the slightly slackened jaw.” Ian smirked. “I think you need a good stiff gin to help you recover. The boys are having a shindig over at the Lord George.”

  “I was wondering why it was deserted in here.”

  “It is Friday evening.” Ian shrugged on his coat.

  “I might join you later. I have some bits and pieces to tidy up.”

  “Okay. Night.”

  “Night.”

  Ian left, and Simon sighed, rubbing his face with his hands. Admittedly, the conversation had not been much of a surprise. He’d already been aware that there was something odd about Joanna’s burglary. Yesterday, at lunchtime, he’d gone to the car pool, smiled sweetly at the receptionist, and handed her the letters of the license plate he’d spotted outside Joanna’s apartment the night before.

  “Pranged it, I’m afraid. Only slightly, but it’s going to need some minor repairs, although it’s nothing urgent.”

  “Okay.” The receptionist looked up the registration number on her computer. “There we are. Gray Rover, yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “Right, I’ll just get you a form. Fill it in and bring it back to me, then we’ll process it.”

  “Will do. Thanks a lot.”

  The fact he’d known the license plate belonged to one of their fleet of cars was sheer coincidence. His own work car was N041 JMR. The number he’d seen on Wednesday night was N042 JMR. The chances were that the car pool had bought in quantity at the same time and that the license plates had been in numerical order.

  Simon stared at his computer screen blankly, and decided to go home. Pulling on his coat, he waved a goodbye to the stragglers in the office who hadn’t gone to the Lord George, then took the elevator down and exited Thames House through a side door. Deciding to take a stroll down the river before heading back to the apartment, he looked up at the austere gray building, many of the office windows lit up as agents completed paperwork. Long ago, he’d lost any guilt about lying to his friends and family about his job. Only Joanna took any interest in his work, and he made sure to make his tales of working at Whitehall as dreary as possible to dissuade her from asking further questions.

  Given what Jenkins had said, it would no longer be so easy to put her off the scent. If this was now being handled by his department, he knew whatever it was Joanna had stumbled on was major.

  And equally, that she was in danger as long as she had that letter.

  * * *

  As Joanna stirred the Bolognese sauce on Simon’s hob, she watched the snow fall in fat white flakes from the panoramic window of his apartment. She remembered how, when she was a child up on the moors, the farmers had dreaded the snow, knowing it would mean long, hard nights rounding up the flocks of sheep and taking them to the safety of the barns, then the sad job of digging out those they’d missed a couple of days later. For Joanna, snow had meant fun and no school, sometimes for days, until the narrow lanes around her farmhouse had been plowed and were once more passable. Tonight, she wished she was once again snuggled up in her cozy attic bedroom, safe and untroubled by adult pressures.

  When she had woken up on the morning after the burglary, Simon had insisted on calling Alec at the newspaper before he left for work. He had explained about the break-in as Joanna sat wrapped up in the duvet on the sofa bed, waiting for Alec to insist she turn up for work at the usual time. Instead, Simon had put down the receiver and said that Alec had been very sympathetic. He had even suggested that Joanna take the further three days that were owed to her from before Christmas, and use them to recover from the shock. And also set about the practical side of things, such as insurance, and the massive cleaning-up operation to make the apartment habitable again. A relieved Joanna had spent the rest of the day recuperating in bed.

  This morning, Simon had sat down on the sofa bed and pulled the duvet cover off her.

  “You sure you don’t want to go home for a few days to your mum and dad?” he’d asked.

  She’d groaned and rolled over. “No, I’m fine here. Sorry I’ve been moping.”

  “You’ve got every right to feel sorry for yourself, Jo, I just want to help you out. Going away might help.”

  “No, if I don’t go back to the apartment today, it’ll just haunt me.” She’d sighed. “It’s like falling off a horse. You have to get straight back on, or else you never do.”

  The apartment had looked no better in the light of day, when she’d eventually forced herself to walk down the hill after Simon had left for work. The police had given her the all-clear, and she had passed on their report for the insurance claim. Then she’d steeled herself for the task, beginning in the kitchen, and setting to work on the stinking mess covering the floor. By lunchtime, the kitchen was back to normal—minus the crockery. The bathroom was gleaming and the sitting room had everything broken stacked neatly on the slashed sofa, waiting for the insurance assessor. To her surprise, the telephone engineer had turned up without her even contacting the company, and had rewired the line where it had been brutally ripped out of the wall.

  Feeling too exhausted and miserable to contemplate the bedroom, Joanna had packed some clothes into a holdall. Simon had said he was happy for her to stay with him for as long as she felt she wanted to. And for now, she did. As she had reached down to stuff her underwear back into a drawer, Joanna had noticed something gleaming on the carpet, half hidden by a pair of jeans that had been wrenched from the wardrobe. She’d picked it up and seen it was a slim, gold fountain pen. On its side were the engraved initials I. C. S.

  “Some classy kind of a thief,” she’d muttered. Regretting having touched it and possibly disturbed the fingerprints, she’d wrapped it in tissue paper and carefully tucked it into her rucksack to hand on to the police.

  Hearing the key in the lock, she poured some wine into a glass.

  “Hi!” Simon walked through the door and Joanna thought how handsome he looked in his immaculate gray suit, shirt, and tie.

  “Hi. Glass of wine?”

  “Thanks,” he said as she handed it to him. “Blimey, are you sure you’re okay? You? Cooking?” he laughed.

  “Only spag Bol, I’m afraid. I’m not even going to start competing with you.”

  “How are you?” he asked, removing his coat.

  “Okay. I went to the apartment today . . .”

  “Oh, Joanna, not on your own!”

  “I know, but I had to sort things out for the insurance claim. And I actually feel much better having cleared it up now. Most of the mess was peripheral. Besides”—Joanna grinned and licked the wooden spoon—“at least I can get a new comfy sofa out of all this.”

  “That’s the spirit. I’m going to take a shower.”

  “Okay.”

  Twenty minutes later, they sat
down to eat the spaghetti Bolognese topped with generous amounts of Parmesan.

  “Not bad, for an amateur,” he quipped.

  “Cheers, big ears. Wow, it’s really bucketing down now,” she said, glancing out of the window. “I’ve never seen London in the snow.”

  “Just means the buses, tubes, and trains will come to a grinding halt.” Simon sighed. “Thank God it’s Saturday tomorrow.”

  “Yes.”

  “Jo, where is Rose’s letter?”

  “In my rucksack. Why?”

  “Can I see it?”

  “Come up with something, have you?”

  “No, but I have a mate who works in the forensics department at Scotland Yard. He might be able to analyze it and give us some information on the type of notepaper, the ink, and the approximate year in which it was written.”

  “Really?” Joanna looked surprised. “That’s a pretty impressive friend.”

  “I knew him at Cambridge, actually.”

  “Oh, I see.” She poured some more wine into her glass and sighed. “I don’t know, Simon. Rose specifically said to keep the letter close to me, not to let it or the program out of my sight.”

  “Are you saying you don’t trust me?”

  “Of course not. I’m torn, that’s all. I mean, it would be great to get some information on it, but what if it fell into the wrong hands?”

  “Mine, you mean?” Simon gave her an exaggerated pout.

  “Don’t be silly. Look, Simon, she was murdered, I’m absolutely positive about that.”

  “You have no proof. A mad old dear who fell down the stairs and you’re seeing Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.”

  “Hardly! You agreed with me that it sounded suspicious. What’s changed?”

  “Nothing . . . nothing. Okay, why don’t we leave it like this? You give me the letter and I’ll take it to my mate. If he comes up with anything, we’ll take it from there. If not, I think you should drop the whole thing and forget about it.”

  Joanna took a sip of her wine, pondering the situation. “The thing is, I just don’t think I can leave it. I mean, she trusted me. It would be a betrayal.”

  “You’d never met the woman before that day at the church. You’ve no idea who she is, where she’s from, or what she might have been involved with.”

  “You think she might have been Europe’s biggest crack-cocaine baron, do you?” Joanna giggled. “Maybe that’s what was in those tea chests.”

  “Possibly.” Simon smiled. “So, is that a deal? I’ll take the letter into work on Monday morning and give it to my mate. I’m away on a god-awful boring seminar from Monday afternoon, but when I get back next week I’ll pick the letter up and we’ll see what he’s had to say.”

  “Okay,” she agreed reluctantly. “This ‘mate’ you know is trustworthy, isn’t he?”

  “Of course! I’ll spin some story about a friend of mine wanting to trace her family heritage, that kind of thing. Do you want to go and get it, so neither of us forgets before Monday?”

  “Okay,” said Joanna, standing up. “It’s ice cream for dessert. Can you serve it out?”

  * * *

  The two of them spent most of Saturday doing the remainder of the clearing up in Joanna’s apartment. Her parents had sent her a check to help her buy a new computer and a bed while she waited for the insurance money to come in. She was touched by their thoughtfulness.

  As Simon was going to be away for the next week at a “pen-pushing” seminar, as he joked, they’d agreed she would stay on at his apartment in Highgate.

  “At least until you have a new bed to sleep in,” Simon had added.

  On Sunday evening, he locked himself in the bedroom, telling Joanna he had some paperwork to go through before the seminar. He dialed a number and the line was answered on the second ring.

  “I have it, sir.”

  “Good.”

  “I’m at Brize Norton tomorrow at eight a.m. Can someone collect it from me there?”

  “Of course.”

  “I’ll see them in the usual place. Good night, sir.”

  “Yes. Job well done, Warburton. I won’t forget it.”

  And neither will Joanna, Simon thought with a sigh. He would have to spin some excuse about the letter’s being so flimsy that it had disintegrated during the chemical-analysis process. He felt awful betraying her trust.

  Joanna was on the sofa watching Antiques Roadshow when Simon emerged from the bedroom.

  “Right. All done and dusted. And let me give you a telephone number, for emergency use only, just in case you get into trouble while I’m away. You seem to be attracting it at the moment.” He handed her a card.

  “Ian Simpson,” she read.

  “A pal of mine from work. Good chap. I’ve given you his work and mobile numbers just in case.”

  “Thanks. Can you put it down by the phone so I don’t lose it?”

  Simon did so and sat down on the sofa next to her. Joanna put her arms round his neck and hugged him.

  “Thanks, Simon, for everything.”

  “Don’t say thanks. You’re my best mate. I’ll always be there for you.”

  She nuzzled his nose with her own, enjoying the familiarity of him, then out of the blue, felt a sudden sharp stirring low inside her. Her lips moved toward his and she closed her eyes as they kissed lightly, then deeper as their mouths opened. It was Simon who stopped it. He pulled away and leapt off the sofa.

  “Jesus, Jo! What are we doing! I . . . Sarah . . . !”

  Joanna hung her head. “Sorry, I’m sorry. It’s not your fault, it’s mine.”

  “No. I was as much to blame.” He began to pace. “We’re best friends! This kind of thing shouldn’t happen, ever.”

  “No, I know. It’ll never happen again, promise.”

  “Good . . . I mean, not that I didn’t enjoy it”—he blushed—“but I’d hate to see our friendship ruined by a quick fling.”

  “So would I.”

  “Right then. I . . . I’ll go and do my packing.”

  Joanna nodded and he left the room. She gazed at the television, the screen a blur through her damp eyes. It was probably because she was still in shock, vulnerable, and missing Matthew. She’d known Simon since childhood and even though she’d always acknowledged his good looks, the thought of taking it further had never seriously crossed her mind.

  And, she promised herself, it never would.

  9

  On Saturday morning, Zoe lay in bed daydreaming. She glanced at the clock and saw it was half past ten. It was unheard of for her to be up later than half past eight—she usually left the badge of sloth to Jamie, who often required a forklift to get him out of bed during the holidays—but today was different.

  It dawned on her that she was entering a whole new phase in her life. Up until now, she had been first a child, with natural restrictions placed on her freedom. Then she’d become a mother, a state that necessitated complete selflessness. And lately she had been a carer, helping and comforting James through his final weeks. But this morning, she realized, apart from her never-ending role as mother, she was freer than she had ever been in all her twenty-nine years. Free to live as she wished, make her own decisions and live with the consequences . . .

  Although Art had left before eleven last night, and their lips had only met in a chaste kiss good night, she’d woken feeling wrapped up by love in the calm, contented way that one associated with a night of satisfying sex. They had barely touched, yet even the brush of his jacket against her side had sent desire tingling through her body.

  When he’d arrived, they’d sat down in the sitting room and talked—at first both shy and uncertain, but soon relaxing into the easy intimacy of two people who had once known each other well. It had always been that way with Art, from the very beginning. While others around him treated him with deferential uncertainty, Zoe had seen his vulnerability, his humanity.

  She remembered when they had first met, at a trendy smoke-filled club in Kensington, Mar
cus insisting they celebrate her eighteenth birthday with her first legal drink. Marcus had promised their grandfather that he would look out for Zoe, make sure she got home safe, but that had extended as far as Marcus’s buying her a gin and tonic, and pressing some cash into her hand—“For the cab home. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do!” And he’d melted into the crowd with a wink and a grin.

  At a loss, she’d sat down on a bar stool and looked around her at the gaggle of people on the dance floor, laughing loudly and wrapping their bodies drunkenly around each other. James had always taken care to shield her while she was growing up, so, unlike most of her boarding school friends, she didn’t have wild stories of nights out or experimenting with drugs in dimly lit toilets. Clutching the sweaty twenty-pound note Marcus had given her and feeling so uncomfortable that she decided she wanted to go home, she was just standing up from her stool when a voice stopped her.

  “Oh, are you leaving? I was just about to ask if you wanted a drink.”

  She’d turned around to look up into a pair of dark green eyes, framed by a fringe of straight blond hair that seemed incongruous alongside the fashionable longer hair sported by the other young men in the club. He looked vaguely familiar to her, but she couldn’t place him.

  “No thanks,” she’d said. “I’m not much of a drinker, really.”

  “Me neither.” He’d broken into a relieved grin. “I’ve just shaken off my . . . er, friends. They were more keen on this place than I was. I’m Art, by the way.”

  “Zoe,” she’d said, and had awkwardly stuck out her hand. He’d taken it in his and squeezed it briefly, sending a frisson of heat through her.

  Looking back now, Zoe wondered whether, if she had recognized him then for who he really was, she would have left well alone. Would she have refused him when he’d asked her to dance with him again and again—the feel of his body pressed against hers sending all sorts of strange and wonderful sensations through her own . . . ? Then, finally, as the club was closing, allowing him to kiss her, swapping numbers, and agreeing to meet again the following evening?