by It Girls
"In Eleanor Towers there is. Yes, sir," Aubrey said.
"Where's the access door?" Jack asked Aubrey, but Chloe answered. "In the hallway outside the master suite. I put a lock on it." She led him to it.
Everything looked fine from the floor, but Jack stood on a chair to get a better look at the lock. "It's broken."
Chloe's stomach crunched. Had that happened today? Or earlier and gone unnoticed? She wasn't sure, and that felt like the biggest violation of all.
"I want the surveillance tape," Jack told Aubrey.
"Sir, I appreciate your concern, but this is a matter best left to professionals."
"I am a professional," Jack said. "FBI."
Frowning, Aubrey glanced from Jack to Chloe. "We're dating," she said, explaining their connection.
"She could be a target," Jack added. "One of my cases has heated up. They might try to use her to get to me."
"All that Marcus Sterling business?" he asked Chloe. She nodded and protectiveness replaced his wariness. "Ed will dub you a copy of the tape. I'll put all the guards on high alert."
Jack hoisted himself through the opening, then disappeared. Standing below, craning her neck to look up, Chloe got nervous. "You okay up there?"
"I'm fine, honey."
Minutes later, Jack appeared at the opening. "Scoot back."
She did, and he grabbed the doorjamb and swung down. His feet hit the floor and he stepped to the sink to wash his hands. "Apartment 503 has a busted lock, too. I'm guessing the plumber wasn't a plumber." Jack snagged a paper towel.
For Chloe, that was the worst possible news. Their covers had been blown. Emma had been attacked. Chloe's home had been invaded. The mob wasn't involved because of Marcus. There was only one realistic explanation left.
The Duke wanted her neutralized. Whether by attack like Emma, or by abduction like Tatiana, he wanted Chloe neutralized.
Protecting herself took on a new urgency. Was Ryan Greene or Harrison Howell the Duke?
Chapter 11
By 9:00 p.m., the adrenaline surge abated and Chloe crashed.
Functioning on sheer grit, she called the hospital to check on Emma— no change— and then left Jack in the kitchen. He'd insisted on preparing dinner for them while she showered.
Someone violating her home made her feel as if everything in the apartment had been soiled, including her. This stranger had touched her things, and by extension had touched her. She hated it. No amount of soap could remove the slime, but Samantha was always talking about the healing power of prana— energy from flowing water— and Chloe was definitely going to give it a shot.
The hot water melted some of the tension from her muscles and the lack of sleep for the last two nights caught up with her. She was just too exhausted to think.
"Ten-minute warning," Jack called out from the door.
Chloe actually smiled. Jack cooking for her was extremely intimate and should worry her, considering they'd blown their chance for a magical relationship. But it didn't. It just felt comfortable and good. Maybe magical wasn't realistic, and comfortable and good was enough. Maybe. But magical had been stellar. She sighed longingly, missing it, mourning it.
She slipped on her favorite robe, a clean-lined Chantelle, then strode into her bedroom, skirted the king-size bed and walked on to the large walk-in closet. As soon as she opened the door, she noticed something horribly wrong that had escaped her earlier. "Son of a bitch!" she shouted in pure frustration, then stormed out to the kitchen.
"You roared?" Jack stood at the stove, stirring.
"I might just kill her this time." Outraged, Chloe snagged the phone, punched three on speed dial.
"Kill her whom?" he asked. "Over what?"
The phone at her ear, she parked her free hand on her hip. "Every fricking Vera Wang I own has been stolen from my closet."
"The intruder stole your clothes?" Jack added that information to the breakin mix, and it clearly wasn't computing.
How could he understand? Her mother hadn't raised him. "My home has been invaded twice today, Jack." She let out an exasperated huff. "Mother?" she said into the phone.
"Chloe, one in your position should begin a telephone conversation with a greeting."
Chloe ignored her. "Did you take my damn Vera Wangs?"
A slight hesitation and then she confessed, ignoring the outrage in Chloe's voice. "Yes, I did. Why? Oh, dear. Did you think you'd had an intruder?"
Chloe could choke her. "I did have an intruder." She'd had two because her mother certainly hadn't broken the access-door lock here or on 503. "Why did you take my clothes?"
"I'm saving you from yourself, Chloe. Vera's designs are beautiful, of course, but they're all wrong for you. They're too sexy, darling. Your look must always be regal."
"My look is mine, Mother. I want my damn clothes back."
Another hesitation, one that stretched twice as long as the first one. "All right," she finally said.
Too easy. Way too easy. "Did you take my Rose pin, too?"
"Your Rose pin?" Her mother sounded clueless. "Oh, do you mean the gold rose you wore at the date auction?"
"That's the one, Mother."
"No, I don't know anything about your pin."
So her mother had taken the clothes and the intruder had bypassed diamonds, emeralds and rubies for a gold rose? That sounded screwy, but what didn't sound screwy right now? "Fine." Chloe calmed her voice. "Send Gerard with my clothes first thing in the morning, Mother."
"If you promise to dress regally for formal functions."
"Fine." Chloe glared at the wall and put down the phone.
Jack looked and sounded stunned. "Your mother broke into your home and stole your clothes?"
Chloe sighed. "My mother knows no boundaries."
"Honey, I don't mean to be critical, but why should she? You haven't set any boundaries."
She heard the unspoken question as clearly as if he'd asked. Why hadn't she set boundaries and given her mother no choice but to live within them? "Old habits are hard to break, Jack. I've been swallowing anger at that woman my whole life."
He stirred the pot. "You've been trying to win her approval your whole life. I watched you in the Hamptons."
Year after year. And she'd always failed. "Pitiful."
"No." He turned down the fire and cupped her chin in his hands. "Normal," he said. "Kids always want their parents to be proud of them. Even royal kids."
She grunted. "I might be a coward, but I'm not living in fantasyland and that's the only place my mother would ever approve of me."
"Why is that?" Jack stroked her hair. "She should. You're an amazing woman, Chloe."
She snitched a sip of his iced tea, then leaned against him. "It doesn't have anything to do with me," she said. "I just get to feel the effects of it." She rubbed circles on his chest. "She's been failing to win approval her whole married life. So she's tried to make me perfect, and I am not."
"Whose approval does she want?" Holding her, Jack reached over and adjusted the burner, turning it down to Warm.
"The royals," Chloe said.
Jack wasn't getting it. He had that blank look men get when women talk about fashion or feelings or other topics only women seem to gravitate to and want to grasp.
"My father's family rejected my mother. Insufficient blue blood," Chloe said. "Since costing him his family and his crown, she's spent thirty years trying to please them, but they've never accepted her, much less approved of her."
"What about you and Erik?"
"We've never met them." Chloe shrugged. "Our inheritances were contingent on us never entering the country." Compassion softened Chloe's voice. "All of this eats at my mother— for my father, and for Erik and me. For herself, too, I expect, though she'd never admit it. Add my arrest— I'm already a huge disappointment to her because I'm not a perfect princess— and, well, I think that's more than enough disappointment for one person to have to live with in one lifetime, don't you?"
Jac
k didn't answer, just held her and kissed her temple.
Chloe lifted a shoulder. "Anyway, that's why she wants me to be perfect. The perfect princess," she explained. "To show the royals that they were wrong about her."
"I see." The look in his eyes turned tender.
He did see. Far too much. "Thanks for the hug."
"That's what partners are for." He winked. "Grab those plates, will you?"
"Sure." She looked down. "I should go throw on some clothes first."
"You're fine. Just sit down and let's eat."
Happiness lifted Chloe. This dinner was going to be like those in Lucas's kitchen: warm and cozy and comfortable. And after last night and today, and all that had happened between her and Jack, that was nothing short of amazing.
They were midway through a chicken casserole that her housekeeper had left in the freezer when Jack stared down at the floor. "What's that?" He stood up and walked over to a sleek bronze silk chair.
Something shiny was behind the rear left chair leg. Chloe shrugged. "I don't know."
He picked it up and brought it to her. From his expression, he knew exactly what he held in his hand.
Chloe looked down at it and gasped. "The royal crest."
"I'm guessing that the odds of it being your mother's are minuscule. It's clearly a man's ring."
Betrayal burrowed in and cut her deeply. "It's Erik's."
"What are the odds that it was here before today?"
Chloe sucked in air, trying hard to breathe past the heartbreak and disappointment choking her. "None." She forced herself to meet Jack's gaze. "He had it on last night. And he had it on today when I saw him and Brit Carouthers at lunch."
Jack pinched it between his forefinger and thumb. "Does Erik have more than one of them?"
"No, Jack," she explained, her fuse short. "It's an heirloom that passes from generation to generation, father to eldest son on his twenty-first birthday. There is only one."
"I'd better report this." Jack reached for his phone. "Chloe," he said while waiting for someone to answer. "There's something that's going to be hard for you to handle, especially with Emma and Renee on your mind."
She could feel it coming, pounding through her, hard and unrelenting. "I know, Jack."
He went on as if he hadn't heard her. "Your brother is in bad company. In the end, he might not be squeaky clean."
Chloe's heart hurt. She hurt all over, feeling fear in her every cell. "Do you think that Erik is the Duke?" She shook, and answered herself. "I don't believe it."
"Why not?" Jack asked, the phone still ringing in his ear.
"He's too young, for one thing."
Jack raised his eyebrows. "Is he, Chloe?"
She paused. They'd never been this close to the Duke. The evidence of his former activities suggested only he was male— and the Governess's consultants disagreed on that. "I don't know."
"Erik was at Hollow Hill."
Staring at the food on her plate, she felt her stomach get queasy and set down her fork. She couldn't possibly swallow another bite. This wasn't going to be a dinner like at Lucas's, after all. "Yes, he was at Hollow Hill."
The phone still rang, and Jack's expression tightened. Clearly worried, he closed the phone and pushed back his chair. "I have to go. I hate leaving you alone, but I have no choice."
"What's wrong?" She couldn't believe it. Since Marcus's death, there had been more crises than in Chloe's whole life.
"I can't reach the Governess." Worry lighted in his eyes. "I've been waiting for a callback and trying to get her all day. So has Renee."
"All day?"
"I've worked for her a long time and I've never been unable to reach her. Not once."
Chloe nodded. "What if the Duke discovered her identity, too?"
"Don't even think it," Jack said. "The consequences would be catastrophic."
That rattled her to the core. "Should I come with you?"
"You can't." He came around the table to her. "You know the rules." He planted a kiss to her temple. "But thank you."
"Does this mean you forgive me?" she asked.
"Do you forgive me— enough to trust me?"
"I think so," she said, being as honest as she could.
"When you know it, you tell me." He winked and moved away. "Lock the doors and turn on the alarm." He paused, then added. "Call one of the Roses to come stay with you."
"I will not." Chloe was insulted.
"I just meant the company would be good."
"I'm going to the hospital to see Emma." She shooed him out the door. "Find out what's happened to the Governess."
"Don't mention finding that ring to Erik," Jack said. "Or to anyone else."
"I won't." She walked out with him, determined to keep that promise for two reasons. She had to keep it, for the assignment, and she didn't want anyone to know that her brother had betrayed her again, much less twice in one day.
She mentally reviewed what she knew of the Duke, and though it rattled her to the bone, not one snippet of evidence on any case proved that he could not be Erik.
The daughter and sister in her battled against the Rose agent. Bias with objectivity. Her head with her heart. No part of her wanted to believe it was possible.
Jack waited for her to dress, walked down with her, then seated her in her car. "Lock your doors."
"I will." She looked up at him, knowing the pain of the last twenty-four hours was revealed in her eyes.
He cupped her face. "I'm sorry. Sometimes the job sucks. But even at its worst, it's better to know the truth."
"I know you're right. It's just going to take a little time for my heart to catch up to my head." She kissed him. Tender and sweet. "Thank you, Jack."
He stroked her face. "My privilege."
She keyed the engine, waved to Craig and then left the parking garage, doing her damnedest to blink back tears.
*
Frank met Chloe at the elevator and walked with her back to the ICU waiting room. "Miss Emma's still unconscious," Frank said. "Doc Scoffield put her parents in a room to get some rest."
"Can I see her?" Chloe asked.
"He said you could, and he's blocked out everyone else, like you said. Mrs. Dalton-Sinclair didn't much like it, but she don't know he put you on the list." Frank frowned, his weathered face wrinkling. "Why did you do that, Princess?"
"Because I don't know who hurt her," Chloe said without apology. "And until I do, no one is getting close to her except her mother, father, you and me. And no one includes Dayton."
"Her bodyguard?"
"Yes."
A little surprise ran through Frank's eyes, but he didn't utter a word or question Chloe further. "She's pretty banged up. Be prepared for that."
"I saw her at her worst, remember?"
"No, you didn't." His Adam's apple bobbed. "She's got a lot of tubes stuck in her now. She's real swollen and the bruises are big and dark." He blinked hard and fast.
Chloe patted him. "Don't worry, Frank. She'll be fine."
"I shouldn't have fussed at her about my damn coffee."
Frank had obviously been beating himself up over that. "She loved it. That's why she got Daniel to help her pull one over on you. And she loves you as much as you love her, too."
He sniffed, his eyes shining overly bright. "Damn right."
Chloe identified herself to Emma's guard, Mac Dayton, who was the size of a tank, then went into ICU. It was a large room, with the heads of the beds lining the walls. Glass walls separated some, and some were open bays. Three other patients were in the unit and hooked up to monitors. Chloe recognized some of the machines, and didn't have a clue about the others.
"She's over here, Princess Chloe," a round-faced nurse with springy black hair said, then led Chloe into a private area. "She's not in pain, okay?"
Chloe nodded. Still, the sight of Emma against blinding white sheets, looking so small and frail and battered, was almost more than Chloe could stand.
The nurse
positioned a chair beside her bed. "You're welcome to sit with her a few minutes. Talk to her, if you like. The experts say it helps." The nurse left the room.
Chloe sat down, scooted closer to Emma's bedside and touched her hand. "Hey, you," she said, her voice thick and husky. "I know it's easier for you to do this unconscious thing than to wake up and feel the pain, so I'm cutting you slack on that. But don't keep it up too long, okay?"
She stroked the back of Emma's hand, made sure no one else was within hearing distance. "I know it's been hard on you, Emma, not playing the piano, and I'm guessing you already know that playing professionally is in the past because of these new injuries. But I'll listen any time you want to play, and I want you to remember that there's a lot more to you than your music. You fake it 'til you make it, getting used to this."
Chloe checked again to make sure they were alone, then whispered, "I'm scared, Emma, and I need your help. My whole life, you've always been there to help me." Chloe felt a tear drop to her cheek. "What the hell were you doing with Brit Carouthers, anyway? Why didn't you buy him off at Perrini's? Why did you leave with him? Is he the Duke?"
That was doubtful, but possible. "I'm trying to find out, Emma," Chloe said. "The trouble is, the more things I check out, the more strange things I uncover. I verified Brit's alibi, so I don't think he beat you up. Do you know who did? What was Tatiana doing with you? Where did they take her? Did you guys find out where they're holding the Russian women?"
Chloe waited, knowing there would be no response. "Since you got hurt, everything's gone to hell. Renee's lying to me, Erik is betraying me, and I think he and my mother broke into my apartment. She stole every damn Vera Wang in my closet. And Harrison lied to me twice, and the Governess is missing. That's so not good. Ryan lied, too. He said Tatiana was at his office, but she's been missing since your injury. What if the Duke went after her and the Governess? God, Emma. I don't know what to do next."
Control. Get calm. Emma's voice sounded in Chloe's head.
Chloe tried hard. "Jack is helping me. I have to be very careful with him. He lied to me about London, but he's still in my heart, Emma. Like no one else has ever been in it. That terrifies me— and don't tell me to fake it 'til I make it. That won't work on this. I can't fake anything with Jack. He sees straight through me, and I don't want to fake with him, anyway. He broke my heart and he probably will again. The hell of it is, I think he might be worth it." She jerked her emotions back into line. "But, why bother? I'll just disappoint him. Hell, I've disappointed everyone my whole life." Chloe sat back.