Claim the Crown

by Carla Neggers

  Then she was running through the foyer, not caring if she made any noise. She pushed open the door, leaped down the steps and across the lawn.

  In his hurry to get to her, Jeremy Carruthers had left his keys in his car. Mac was his friend, Ashley reasoned, and had stolen her Jaguar and—what the hell, turnabout is fair play. She hopped in.

  The Porsche started easily.

  Jeremy burst out the front door and yelled, “Goddammit!” as she backed out of the driveway. She rolled down the window and waved.

  At the airport, she called Carruthers and Stevens and told the receptionist where she had parked the Porsche. The first flight to the East Coast left in ten minutes, but it was to New York. Close enough, she thought, and bought a ticket.

  Orült szerzetes, she repeated to herself at thirty thousand feet, when she was safe in her seat, alone. The mad monk. What an alias for a jewel thief!

  But was the thief Mac Stevens?

  Or Bartholomew Wakefield?

  Or, somehow, both?

  Allan Carruthers calmly pinched dried leaves off the Swedish ivy that hung in the floor-to-ceiling window of his sparsely furnished office while his son paced, cursing. Allan was fairer in coloring than Jeremy, not as tall, and his eyes were an even lighter shade of green. At home in La Jolla, he and his wife were avid gardeners, and they often exchanged cuttings with Elaine Stevens. They had two sons. The younger, Matthew, had no interest in law and worked at a ski resort in Aspen. Sometimes Allan thought his elder son should have made a similar career choice.

  Without turning from his plant, Allan said, “Would you care to explain what the hell’s going on around here?”

  “I’m not sure I can.” Jeremy tried not to snap at his father, not to blame him because Ashley Wakefield had stolen his car and snuck off to God knew where and he had failed Mac. Nor to blame Allan Carruthers because he, Jeremy, had impulsively promised Elaine Stevens he would find her husband, no matter what.

  A knight on a white horse I’m not, he thought irritably.

  “Meaning?” his father asked.

  “Meaning I’ve made a lot of promises.”

  “It’s Mac, isn’t it?” Allan brushed a handful of dried leaves into his wastebasket. “Jeremy, Mac called me this morning.”

  “What? You, too? You know what’s going on?”

  “Hardly. He said he’d be in touch with me periodically to find out how you were doing with Ashley Wakefield, if her uncle’s tried to contact her. He wants you both out. It’s good advice.” Allan straightened up, his expression grave. “That’s all he said. Jeremy, he knew I wouldn’t ask any questions, and I didn’t.”

  Jeremy stood very still. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying there’s something I know about Mac his own wife doesn’t even know. I’ve known it for years, and I have no right to tell you, even now.” He paused, and Jeremy could see he had already come to a decision. “But I will. Jeremy, before Mac and I founded this firm, he worked for the State Department.”

  “Legal work,” Jeremy said, his voice hollow. “In Washington.”

  Allan shook his head, turning back to his plant. “Mac was in Eastern Europe, not Washington.”

  “In the fifties? Good God. Do you know what you’re saying?”

  “Of course I do. I’m saying MacGregor Stevens turned to private practice after he’d done intelligence work in one of the most sensitive areas in the world— and I’d keep that in mind, if I were you.”

  Jeremy tried to absorb this latest twist. “You mean he was a spy?”

  “I mean whatever he told me to do, I’d do it.”

  Chilled by his father’s words, Jeremy went rigid. And yet all he could think of was Ashley Wakefield. She was energetic, stubborn, intelligent. And absolutely relentless. She would go after Mac and her uncle, and she wouldn’t believe her uncle was anything but the salt of the earth unless she had tangible, irrevocable proof.

  Bartholomew Wakefield isn’t anything he says he is and never has been.

  Mac was right. Someone had to stop Ashley.

  As she pushed open the door to her co-op on Central Park South, Ashley could feel her eyes burning and the muscles in her neck and shoulders aching with fatigue and tension. She wanted to call David, take a long bubble bath and go to bed. She would tackle jewel thieves and such in the morning.

  She closed the door behind her and yawned. Ashley started and straightened up, alert once more, adrenaline rushing through her veins.

  The air smelled strange. Like stale pipe smoke, except she didn’t smoke.

  Someone had been there. Could still be here now.

  No. She wouldn’t get paranoid. She might simply have left something in the trash.

  She put down her suitcase and handbag, sniffing. It was definitely pipe, not cigarettes.

  She whirled around and quickly checked the locks for any sign of tampering. There was none. She tried to think. Who had keys? David. But he didn’t smoke. Barky.

  Her heart jumped.

  Barky smoked a pipe.

  Licking her lips with her dry tongue, she grabbed a Waterford vase off a table in the foyer and moved into the living room. The drapes were drawn. It was dark, silent. Her knees quaked, her head throbbed.

  “Barky?”

  She felt her hands grow clammy on the vase as she remembered the blond man who had brutalized her brother. She edged into the kitchen and flipped on a light.

  Again, nothing.

  She checked the bedroom, dining room, study, bathrooms. The stale air was strongest in her bedroom, and she stood in the middle of the floor, smelling. She looked under the bed, in the closets, in the dressing room.

  Whoever had been there had gone.

  She went around and opened all the drapes. Then she grabbed the phone and, sitting on her white couch and peering down at Central Park, she called her brother. “David? I’m in New York. I made it back alive. Thought you’d want to know.”

  “Good.” She could hear the relief in his voice. She thought she’d sounded lighthearted, carefree. “Your Jag showed up, Ash.”

  “It did? Are you all right—”

  “Yeah, yeah. Found it this afternoon in the turnaround down the road. I figure Stevens must have parked his own car around there somewhere, but because he was hurt he couldn’t get to it fast enough, so he stole yours. Borrowed, I guess. Anyway, it’s in good condition. What happened in San Diego?”

  He listened quietly, without interruption, while she told him.

  “Carruthers must be so pissed off at you,” he commented when she’d finished.

  “I don’t give a damn. David, someone’s been here, in my apartment. There’s no sign of a forced entry and nothing’s missing, but I can smell pipe smoke.”

  She sighed; it sounded so ridiculous now.

  But David took her seriously. Too much had happened already for him to accuse her of paranoia. “Missing any keys?”

  “I don’t know. David, could you check

  if the keys I gave Barky are still there? They should be hanging inside the closet in the kitchen. On a penguin key chain, I think.”

  “I’ll have a look.” In a few seconds he was back, and there was an undertone of near panic in his voice. “Ash, they’re gone.”

  “Then he was here, David.” She closed her eyes. “Barky was here.”

  12

  Ashley slept late the next morning—sheer exhaustion had overcome her—and took the noon shuttle back to Boston. It was a gray, drizzly day, but the forecasters promised clearing by nightfall. She didn’t mind the weather: the dankness fit her mood. To hell with it, she thought forcefully. I’m not going to let this get to me.

  But it was, in insidious ways. She’d had trouble falling asleep, and when she had, she’d had nightmares. When she was awake, she couldn’t call on her enormous ability to concentrate; her mind kept wandering to her conversations with Barky, MacGregor Stevens, Jeremy Carruthers, Elaine Stevens.

  She needed answers. An end to this
.

  At Logan Airport, she made her way out to the garage, her stomach lurching when she saw her uncle’s truck. Barky had always been there. Ashley could go to college, work in the city, buy expensive clothes, go to fancy parties, watch her investments make her richer by the hour. She could try on new identities, and she could change with the wind. But she could always count on Barky: he would never change.

  Now she’d been compelled to wonder if her uncle had ever been the man she’d thought he was. She didn’t know Bartholomew Wakefield.

  She didn’t know if she could still believe in him.

  The heavy door of the old truck creaked when she pulled it open and climbed inside. It smelled of greasy tools and grain and stale manure. Suddenly she felt overwhelmed. There was so much she didn’t know! So many options! And yet none at all, none that made sense.

  If only she had left the jewels in the vaults of Piccard Cie...had smashed Rob Gazelle’s camera into the dust...had caught Sybil Morgenstern’s reporter stealing the snapshot of Barky.

  But she hadn’t.

  As she fished the key out of her bag, she noticed a slip of paper tucked into the torn seat. It had almost disappeared into the stuffing, never to be seen again. Something she had missed earlier?

  Probably a grocery list, she told herself as she unfolded the paper.

  Her uncle’s precise handwriting was unmistakable.

  * * *

  Ashley: I must have the jewels. Leave them behind the rock where you and David played pirates. I will find them. No one must see you, Ashley, and you must not see me. Tell only David what you are doing. I will ask nothing else of you. I wish I didn’t have to ask this. Trust me.

  B.

  * * *

  So it is the jewels, she thought.

  How had Barky found his truck in the airport parking lot? Was he watching her?

  “Where the hell are you?”

  She shut the door. Locked it. Looked around the silent garage. “Trust me.” Hell. She read the note again. When had he written it? Had he already been to the rock, not found the jewels, decided she didn’t trust him?

  He wasn’t fishing. He had lied to David.

  Had he hit MacGregor Stevens on the head?

  She stomped on the clutch and turned the key. The truck roared to a start. She gunned the engine. Her head hurt, and her knuckles were turning white as she gripped the steering wheel.

  “Trust me.”

  “Oh, God,” she breathed, and let out the clutch, backing out of the narrow parking space. It clattered over grates. She was going too fast and took the downward curve too sharply. She slammed on the brakes, narrowly missing the rear end of a BMW.

  She had to keep a clear head.

  Why did Barky need the jewels?

  She paid her parking fee and headed out onto the highway, taking Sumner Tunnel under Boston Harbor, then making her way onto Storrow Drive, along the Charles River to the Cambridge Street exit. She turned up Charles Street and found a parking space a block from her building. No reporters. Thank God.

  Digging out her keys, she trotted up the front steps.

  A voice from behind her said, “Afternoon, Ashley.”

  She didn’t even need to turn around. “Carruthers.”

  He took the steps two at a time. Even in the drizzle, the highlights in his hair stood out, and she annoyed herself by staring at his eyes. They were truly magnificent eyes; she had to admit that much. He wore jeans that emphasized the slimness of his hips and the length of his legs. Or was she just suddenly attuned to these things? Shock, she supposed.

  “I hope you didn’t fly all the way out here just to see me,” she said.

  He crossed his arms and sat on the wrought-iron rail. “Now I see why you adopted an eel. You must get along famously.”

  She stuck her key in the door. “They remind me of most men I know, actually. If you’ll excuse me—”

  “Don’t you even want to know why I’m here?”

  “Tell only David what you are doing.” The question was, was she doing it? Was she going to get the tiara and the choker from her safe-deposit box and leave them for Barky? Even as her mind raced, she was remembering that the safe-deposit key was in the bottom of her handbag. She’d refused to go anywhere without it. Melodramatics, she’d told herself. Well, maybe not.

  She wondered what Jeremy Carruthers would do if he knew about the note—and the key. Did he want the jewels, too?

  “I wish I didn’t have to ask this,” Barky had written. How much trouble was he in? Had he written the note of his own free will? Had someone already gotten to him? Who? Why?

  “Trust me.”

  Of course. She had to. If she couldn’t trust the man who had raised her from infancy, she couldn’t trust herself.

  She had to trust him. And she had to help him.

  Which meant getting rid of Jeremy Carruthers.

  “All right,” she said. “Go ahead and tell me why you’re here.”

  “Over a cup of coffee?”

  She relented and took him upstairs. Again she noticed the faint smell of stale pipe smoke, but she made no comment and didn’t bother searching. Her uncle had been here, looking for the jewels.

  “Quaint,” Jeremy said as he walked through her living room. She saw him eyeing the Homer.

  “I guess it’s not bad for a city place.” She went into the kitchen and got a bag of Kenyan AA beans from her freezer.

  “Do you have a country house, too?”

  “I have land on the Cape, but I haven’t built on it yet. I go camping down there sometimes. Sleep in a pup tent, cook on a Sterno. Helps reduce life to the essentials.”

  He leaned against the doorway. “Takes you back to your youth?”

  “I suppose.”

  “What does your uncle think of this place?”

  She dumped three scoops into her electric coffee grinder. “He says I have too many appliances. Maybe he’s right. I hardly ever use them. It’s quicker to chop an onion with a paring knife than to dig out the Cuisinart.” She smiled. “The legacy of Bartholomew Wakefield.”

  “He likes being self-sufficient?”

  “Either that or he’s just cheap. He’s condescended to own a washing machine and an electric mixer—the most inexpensive models, of course—but that’s it.”

  “No clothes dryer?”

  “God forbid. I grew up hanging out laundry in thirty-degree weather. The towels would come in feeling like plywood, but you never could change Barky.”

  She turned abruptly and pressed the black button on the coffee grinder. The blade whirred noisily, the beans jumping and clattering as they were quickly reduced to a strong-smelling fine grind. She put a fresh filter in the coffee maker.

  “So.” She filled the clear glass pot with water and poured the water into the coffee maker; positioned the filter under the drip spout; pressed the button so the little red light came on. “What brings you back to Boston?”

  “Mac called.”

  “Ahh. And what extraordinary tale did you two fabricate this time?”

  “You know,” he said mildly, “you can be annoying as hell.”

  She grinned at him. “Didn’t say that in the You article, did it? ‘Ashley Wakefield, dolphin rescuer, mystery heiress and pain in the ass.”

  He sighed. “Mac thinks your uncle’s going to contact you.”

  “Does he now?” She was proud of herself for not falling on her face. “Isn’t that funny. The man who raised me might want to talk to me. That’s enough for you to fly back out here, huh?”

  “Has he?” Jeremy pressed.

  “No. He’s fishing.”

  Straightening, Jeremy walked into the kitchen and stood very close to her. “I think you’re in over your head, Ashley.”

  “I can swim.” She moved quickly past him and got down two mugs. “What else did your buddy Mac have to say?”

  “He doesn’t want to see you hurt.”

  “Which, I’m sure, is why he stole my Jaguar and is deeply
worried about my own uncle getting in touch with me. What’s Barky supposed to do? Suddenly grab all my money when for the past four years he wouldn’t even take a cent to buy new linoleum? You don’t seem to understand, Jeremy Carruthers. My uncle doesn’t like money.”

  His face was expressionless, but Ashley sensed an underlying determination, even fear. “Mac says he’ll want the tiara and the choker.”

  “So? He can have them.”

  “I don’t think that would be wise,” he said cautiously. “Mac says—”

  “I don’t give a damn what Mac says.” She slammed the cabinet door and thrust the mug at him, but she was more annoyed with herself for losing control than with him for being so tenacious. “Look,” she began reasonably, “it’s pretty obvious where your loyalties lie. That’s fine: Mac Stevens is your friend. Well, Barky’s my uncle.”

  His pale eyes shut briefly, and when they opened, the fire went out altogether in Ashley. He looked tired, honest, concerned. “Trust me,” Barky had said. She had to. But that didn’t mean Jeremy Carruthers was untrustworthy. Nevertheless, just because Stevens had no qualms about involving Jeremy didn’t mean that she could do the same. Or should. Whatever was going on between the lawyer and the farmer, it had nothing to do with Jeremy. She recalled how he’d looked yesterday morning answering his door. She could see again his tanned muscular calves. How strange, she thought.

  “I’m sorry,” she said suddenly. “I’m a jerk.”

  The corners of his mouth twitched slightly. “It’s all right—so am I.” But the good humor didn’t last, and in another second he was serious again, and he said quietly, “Tell me what happened to your brother.”

  “He’s a klutz. He fell—”

  “Don’t lie to me.” Jeremy didn’t raise his voice.

  She rested back against the counter. “Why not?”

  “Are you always this trying?”

  “Frankly, no. I sympathize with your frustration, Jeremy, but if David had wanted you to know, he’d have told you himself. Now. Coffee’s ready. Make yourself at home. Cream’s in the fridge and you’re welcome to go up to the deck. I have a few things to do at the office.”