by Jenna Black
Nate might be right. Mosely might be making empty threats. Not because he didn’t have the power to carry them out, or even because he would fear the consequences of doing so, but because if the situation escalated to that point, she wouldn’t be useful to him anymore. Once Mosely followed through on the ugliest of his threats, if he actually had Gerri arrested and sent to Riker’s Island or had someone hurt Corinne or Rory, the threat lost its power to control her.
But even if Nate was right, even if Mosely didn’t plan to follow through on his threats, how could she possibly risk her family’s safety on that assumption?
“Please, Nadia,” Nate said again. “You can tell him I told you I got beat up by Angel’s bouncers because I was asking stupid questions at her club. I was half expecting to end up in some kind of mess like that anyway. Walking around a Basement club asking questions isn’t a very good survival strategy, and it shouldn’t surprise anyone that it backfired on me. So tell him they beat me up and robbed me. It’s true, after all. The only part you have to leave out is the link between Angel and Kurt. And whatever you do, don’t tell him Kurt contacted you.”
Nate let out a heavy sigh and sat back in his chair, like he was trying to look relaxed. He didn’t have much success. “I understand why you did what you did,” he said, but that was a lie and they both knew it. “I’m not sure I can forgive you for it, but I’ll try. But only if you don’t tell Mosely about Kurt.”
She swallowed hard. “You want me to risk everything on the hope that you’ll try to forgive me?”
The coldness in his eyes chilled her. “How about if I try to forgive you and I don’t interfere with our engagement plans?”
She let out a humorless laugh. Of all the things she’d expected from Nate, this wasn’t one of them. “Taking a page from Mosely’s book?”
“You want to protect your family. I want to protect Kurt. Our marriage was always going to be a business arrangement anyway, so let’s make it official.”
Nadia’s throat ached, and there was a lump in it the size of a tennis ball. She’d confessed all under the understanding that it would destroy the engagement, that she would doom herself to a future marriage of convenience with a stranger she could never love. Nate was offering her hope where none had existed. So why did the offer hurt so much?
When the smoke cleared, it would look to all the world as if her life had returned to normal. She would marry the Chairman Heir, her father would be promoted to the board of directors, and all her immediate family members would become eligible to have periodic backups and even Replicas. She would have all the material trappings and powers she would have had if none of this had ever happened. The only thing she wouldn’t have was Nate’s friendship. The pain of that loss threatened to rise up and swallow her whole.
“Do we have a deal?” Nate prompted as she struggled with the pain.
Her chest and throat too tight to speak, Nadia could only nod.
CHAPTER TWELVE
When Nadia got home from Nate’s, she found that a courier had delivered a package to her from Gerri. She hurried to her bedroom, where she could open it unobserved. Inside was a pair of dangly earrings of gold filigree with a smattering of faceted pink stones. There was a handwritten note from Gerri informing her that there was a tiny toggle switch on the backing of one earring. When activated, the hidden transmitter would send whatever it picked up to a secret location.
“I’ve shared that location with someone I trust implicitly,” Gerri wrote. “Someone who knows what to do should anything happen to the two of us. It’s better you not know who, and that you don’t know where the data is being sent.” A postscript warned Nadia to destroy the note, but the warning wasn’t necessary.
Nadia put on the earrings, but even knowing she had a potential secret weapon didn’t give her the courage to contact Mosely yet, so she decided to investigate the mystery of how Bishop’s note had gotten onto her breakfast tray instead. Someone in this household must have put it there, and Nadia was determined to find out who.
Of course, Nadia couldn’t tell anyone she’d received a note from a known fugitive and suspected traitor and murderer. For all she knew, whoever had planted the note in her napkin had no idea what was in it, and, if so, it was best it stay that way. She decided the best way to play it was to pretend the envelope had contained a nasty note she suspected came from one of her Executive rivals, like Jewel. Certainly Jewel wouldn’t be above sending a nastygram just for the fun of it, and getting one of Nadia’s own servants to deliver it would add spice.
Since the tray had originated from the kitchen, Nadia started there, questioning the head cook, Mrs. Reeves. Mrs. Reeves was a grandmotherly little woman who’d been working for the Lake family since well before Nadia was born. As Nadia suspected, it was Mrs. Reeves herself who had put together the breakfast tray, but of course she hadn’t put the note in the napkin. She was outraged by the very idea that someone did such a thing, her cheeks turning a mottled red with indignation. Grandmotherly she might be, but she had a fiery temper.
“I don’t think whoever did it meant any harm,” Nadia said soothingly, and it was the truth. “They probably thought it was nothing more than some secret note passing between a couple of teenage girls acting like kids.”
Mrs. Reeves put her fists on her hips and scowled. “If anyone in my kitchen had anything to do with it, they’re going to rue the day they were born.”
So much for Nadia’s careful attempt to make sure no one got in trouble. “Please, Mrs. Reeves,” she said a little plaintively. “I really want to know who sent me that note, but no one’s going to talk to me if they’re afraid you’re going to take your meat tenderizer to them.”
Mrs. Reeves made a sound between a snort and a laugh. “Always favored the cleaver, myself. Gets the point across faster.” The hint of humor restored her mood, and the redness in her cheeks started to recede.
Nadia smiled a little. “Less of a mess with a meat tenderizer.”
Mrs. Reeves arched her eyebrows. “Clearly you’ve never seen what I can do with one.”
“Will you please ask around for me? Without terrorizing anyone?”
Mrs. Reeves frowned. “I can’t condone anyone being a sneak on my watch. I can promise I won’t fire anyone without running it by your parents first, but if I find out someone put a nasty letter on your tray, I’m going to let them know exactly what I think of them and don’t think you can stop me.”
Nadia had to concede. Mrs. Reeves was much more likely to find the answer than Nadia was, and whoever had put the note on her tray really shouldn’t have done it. It was an offense that would get someone fired in most households.
“Thanks, Mrs. Reeves. Let me know as soon as you find out something.”
“Of course.”
Nadia left Mrs. Reeves to her work and retreated to her room to freshen her makeup and firm up her resolve. She would need everything she could muster to face the inevitable specter of Dirk Mosely.
* * *
Nadia knew better than to hope Mosely would be willing to debrief her over the phone. Instinct told her he’d be in an uncommonly bad mood after having lost the tracker’s signal last night, and he would want to take it out on her. Maybe he’d even want her to come to the security station again for another more formal—and more intimidating, more reputation-damaging—interview. She circumvented him by talking to one of his underlings and making an appointment for Mosely to meet her at the apartment. He might ignore the appointment, or he might show up with a handful of officers in tow and “ask” her to come to the station, but she was pretty sure she could at least start their interview on her home turf.
The question then became, how could she lie to him without being found out?
Realizing that she had never been able to act normal around Mosely, Nadia decided her best chance of surviving the interview with him was to offer an alternative explanation for her inevitably unnatural behavior. So while she waited for him to arrive for their one o’c
lock appointment, she dipped into her parents’ liquor cabinet and sampled several of her favorite liqueurs. If she’d wanted to get truly drunk, she’d have gone for the vodka, but all she’d wanted to do was take in enough to make life a little fuzzy around the edges—and to make her breath smell like she’d been drinking.
By the time Mosely was announced, Nadia’s cheeks were nicely flushed from drink, and the alcohol had made her feel almost brave. The pretty little earrings with their secret transmitter helped. Just the thought that she might someday be able to make him pay for his abuses was heartening. She even managed to smile in greeting when Mosely was shown into the room, and he looked at her as if she’d gone mad. He was expecting her to cower after their last encounter, and the look on his face when she smiled at him was enough to make her want to laugh. So she did, letting the alcohol loosen her inhibitions and enjoying Mosely’s discomfort as a girlish giggle escaped her lips.
Nadia batted her eyelashes at him and made her way to the couch, making sure to look unsteady on her feet before collapsing ungracefully into the middle seat. Despite her smile and the giggle, her heart was fluttering like a trapped bird in her chest.
“Are you drunk?” Mosely asked incredulously.
Nadia giggled again, though this time the sound was a little more forced. She’d never been truly drunk in her life, but she’d seen enough people overindulge to feel like she had a handle on how to act. The more out of her mind she could make herself seem, the less likely Mosely would be able to see through her lies. At least, that was the theory.
“I might have had a little too much wine with lunch,” she said, licking her lips absently like she could still taste it. “I just wanted to … settle my nerves a bit before we talked.”
Mosely stalked over to the nearest chair, sitting on its very edge and glaring at her. “And why did you feel the need to do that?”
She arched an eyebrow. “You need to ask after our last meeting?”
He pushed to his feet, giving her a look of contempt. At least her impersonation of a drunken idiot seemed to be convincing. All she had to do was hope he’d buy the rest of the act.
“I’ll come back after you’ve had a chance to sober up,” he said. “Might I suggest a large quantity of black coffee?”
“Don’t you want to know what Nate told me about his trip to the Basement last night?” she asked, blinking up at him with wide, innocent eyes.
Mosely gave her one of his creepy stares, one that made her feel as if he could see right through her. If her head weren’t so cloudy with alcohol, she might have wilted, or at least looked nervous. Instead, she gave him a coy smile and hoped he wouldn’t insist on coming back later. Seeing him once in a day was more than enough already.
“So he actually told you something useful?” Mosely asked, and she couldn’t blame him for the skepticism in his voice. Up until now, she hadn’t exactly been a very effective spy.
“If he hadn’t, I would have at least tried to convey the information in a phone call rather than meeting with you personally.” She let a bit of her usually well-controlled resentment creep into her voice. “After the things you’ve threatened, I’d do anything I can to keep you as far away from me as possible.” She feigned a gasp, reaching up and covering her mouth with her hand as if the words had just slipped out. “Sorry,” she mumbled. “I didn’t mean to say that. Maybe I shouldn’t have had that wine.”
Nadia feared her act was completely transparent, but Mosely resumed his seat, watching her with an expression that would have frozen her marrow if she didn’t have enough alcohol running through her veins to keep her warm. Maybe she’d had a little more liqueur than she realized, because she felt uncommonly brave.
“Tell me what Nathaniel told you about his trip to the Basement last night,” Mosely demanded.
Nadia clasped her hands together in her lap and stared at them, tensing up her shoulder and neck muscles so she looked like she was internally resisting what she was about to say. She even started and stopped a couple of times before she began to speak, as if, even with the alcohol, it was taking all her willpower to get up the nerve to tell him what she’d heard.
“Nate went to the Basement last night. Went to a club called Angel’s.” Nadia frowned, realizing Nate had never told her why he’d gone to that particular club, although it was obvious that last night hadn’t been his only trip there. “I’m not sure why he was looking for Bishop there—I didn’t think to ask him, and he didn’t say. But anyway, he told me he was asking questions, trying to find someone who knew where Bishop was or who would take a message to him.”
Mosely was watching her with such intensity that Nadia had to fight the urge to examine her clothing and make sure she didn’t have a button gaping open or something. His face was almost perfectly expressionless except for the severity in his eyes, and he sat so still Nadia wondered if he was even breathing. The pressure of his scrutiny tightened her throat, and she squeezed her hands together more tightly in her lap.
“Nate told me he bribed someone to set up a meeting between him and the club’s owner, but apparently she didn’t like him asking questions in her club. When he wouldn’t stop, she lured him into a back room, then had her bouncers beat him up and rob him.” She was trying her best to keep her voice level, to keep the pace of her narrative smooth and uninterrupted so there would be no discernible change between her tone when she was telling the truth and her tone when she was lying. She couldn’t tell from Mosely’s closed-off expression whether she was having any success or not.
“They stole his locket,” she said. “That’s where I’d put the tracker.”
“And why would they do a thing like that?” Mosely asked. His face stayed expressionless, but there was a hint of something, maybe anger, in his voice.
She frowned at him as if completely puzzled by his question. “It was solid gold, and antique at that. Why wouldn’t they take it?”
Mosely’s eyes bored into her. “Very convenient for you, wouldn’t you say, Miss Lake?”
Nadia had drunk the liqueur in hopes it would give Mosely an alternative explanation for any inconsistencies in her story or awkwardness in its delivery, but she was now glad for its soothing warmth in her belly, and for its ability to keep her adrenaline from going wild. Even so, fear chilled her from the inside out. If Mosely thought she was lying to him, or thought she had arranged for the tracker to be stolen …
She shook her head, both to shake off her fears and in response to Mosely’s question. “I don’t see how it’s convenient,” she said. “Nate wore the tracker into the Basement just like you wanted him to. He says he was there for a couple of hours. And since you no doubt had someone following him, you know who he talked to. And you also know he got beaten up. How does his losing the tracker after all that translate into something convenient? Oh, and by the way, he’s not planning to go back to the Basement anyway.”
“Really,” Mosely said flatly, not even bothering to hide his disbelief.
Despite her fear, there was a part of Nadia that wanted to laugh again. She’d been afraid that Mosely would see through her lies and know that she and Nate had learned something—albeit, very little—about Bishop’s whereabouts; however, that didn’t seem to be the conclusion he was drawing. Instead, he seemed to think she’d arranged for some big cover-up to free Nate from the tracker.
Nadia looked at her hands again, remembering the stiff way Nate had moved this morning. “I didn’t see any bruises on him, but he was obviously in a lot of pain when I went to see him. He wants to find Bishop still, but I think last night proved to him that he was in over his head. Besides…”
“Yes?”
“Nate still doesn’t believe Bishop killed him, but he did tell me something this morning I thought you might want to know. Something I think makes even Nate have doubts now and then.”
“I’m intrigued. Please, continue.” More skepticism, but Nadia couldn’t allow herself to worry about it.
“Nate keep
s a stash of dollars in his apartment. He and Bishop were the only ones who knew where those dollars were. When Nate went to the Basement for the first time, he wanted to take dollars with him, but when he went to get them, they were all gone.”
For the first time, Mosely looked like he really was intrigued. Was he drawing the same conclusion Nate had when he’d found the dollars missing? She wasn’t sure exactly what the misdirection would buy them—after all, neither she nor Nate had any idea why Bishop was still in Paxco—but maybe it would at least throw Mosely off the scent for a while.
“Very interesting indeed,” Mosely said.
Now would be a good time to let Mosely draw his own conclusions, but since Nadia was still pretending to be at least a little tipsy, she didn’t think sitting quietly and letting Mosely think was the right thing to do.
“Nate keeps making excuses for why Bishop took the money, but he’s pretty upset about it. He thinks it means Bishop used the dollars to get out of Paxco. He wasn’t going to the Basement because he expected to actually find Bishop there. He was going because he hoped he’d find someone who could help him get in touch with Bishop wherever he’s hiding.
“I know you think Nate is reckless and naive, and you won’t get any argument from me. If he still thought he had a chance of finding Bishop in the Basement and helping him, I’m sure what happened last night wouldn’t stop him from trying again. But under the circumstances…” She let her voice trail off.
Mosely regarded her with those disturbingly cold eyes of his, and she felt like he was mentally taking her apart, peeling away layer after layer as he tried to figure out whether she was telling the truth or lying. Her stomach burbled unhappily, the noise loud enough to make her cheeks heat with a blush. She probably should have eaten a little more solid food to balance out the effects of the liqueur, but her meeting with Nate this morning had stolen her appetite. She hoped the booze was having the desired effect, confusing Mosely’s interpretations of her word choice or body language—or whatever it was that made him so good at figuring out when people were lying to him.