Thanks to Bryan, she wasn’t stuck anymore. She could move on, live normally, leave the sackcloth and ashes behind.
Bryan tapped on the bathroom door. “You’re going to use up all the hot water.”
He was back from cleaning up the restaurant. “Then join me.” She’d been fantasizing about herself and Bryan in this decadent shower, with its acres of red glass tile and twin shower sprays, since she’d first seen it the day Scarlet came over for her makeover.
“Hey. You don’t have to ask me twice.”
Just when she thought she couldn’t possibly make love again, for she ached in places she hadn’t known existed, they did.
Eight
Lucy had mixed feelings about her computer work now. Yes, she wanted to solve the puzzle of who the embezzler was at Alliance Trust. But the sooner that person was arrested and all parties brought to justice, the sooner she and Bryan would part.
Duty won out, and she worked hard on her latest project, which was matching up log-in times with the times the illicit funds transfers had occurred.
By lunch, she’d eliminated several more candidates. She was closing in. Only five suspects. One of them was Omar Kalif, a loan officer of Iranian descent. She’d always liked Omar. He was funny and hardworking, and he would turn himself inside out to find a way to get a client qualified for a loan. He had a darling wife, two kids…
Well, she would let Bryan worry about that. Her job was to solve the puzzle.
Bryan had told her he would be tied up today and probably wouldn’t be home until late. He’d been vague about what he would be doing. She didn’t know if he was in the city or had jetted off some place, risking life and limb.
She tried not to think about it. She tried not to worry, to keep herself busy. But she had a vivid imagination. If anything ever happened to Bryan, would she be notified? What about his family? Would anyone explain to them that he was a spy, that he’d died defending their country? Or would he just disappear, leaving the family to wonder?
She couldn’t live like that long-term. Even if Bryan were willing to change his policy and make a commitment, she didn’t think she could. Yes, it was exciting working with and living with a spy. But it wasn’t a forever kind of arrangement.
Bryan had told her to go downstairs to the restaurant when she got hungry, that Stash would take care of her. He’d fixed the elevator so it would recognize her voice and had instructed her on passwords and “panic passwords”—in case she was ever in the elevator under duress. She’d laughed at the cloak-and-dagger antics, but he’d been serious.
She went down to Une Nuit to rustle up some lunch. She entered through the kitchen, and her face grew warm as she was reminded of what had gone on there the previous night.
“Lindsay!” Stash Martin greeted her with a double air-kiss. “Bryan said you’d be down for lunch. Scarlet’s in the Elliott booth if you want to sit with her.”
“I don’t want to intrude—”
“Nonsense. I am sure she would welcome your charming company.” Refusing to acknowledge any further protests, Stash led her into the dining room, where Scarlet, dressed in the most gorgeous teal dress with feathers all around the neck, shared a booth with another woman who had her back to Lucy.
Scarlet looked both surprised and pleased when she saw Lucy. “Oh, please join us,” she said. “We haven’t even ordered yet. This is Jessie. I don’t think you’ve met her.”
The other woman smiled warmly and shook Lucy’s hand. “Nice to meet you, Lindsay.”
“Same here. Scarlet, I didn’t realize you had another sister.”
“What?” both women said at the same time.
Lindsay looked at Scarlet, then Jessie, then Scarlet again. Though they weren’t as similar as Scarlet and Summer, the family resemblance was unmistakable.
“You’re sisters, right?”
Scarlet laughed, and Jessie just looked horrified.
“What in the world would make you think that?” Jessie said, a little more strongly than Lucy thought was called for.
“Sorry, I thought I saw a family resemblance,” Lucy said, trying to smooth over the awkward moment. “My mistake.”
Scarlet explained, “This is Jessie Clayton. She’s my intern at Charisma.”
“You know,” Jessie said, “I’ve really got an awful lot of work to do. I think I’ll skip lunch.” She tried to slide out of the booth, but Scarlet leaned over and put a hand on her arm to stop her.
“Oh, come on, Jessie, I’m not a slave driver. You can take time for lunch.”
“No, really, I have to go.” She stood and made good her escape despite both Lucy’s and Scarlet’s protests.
Lucy sat on the recently vacated leather banquette. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare her off.”
Scarlet looked perplexed. “That was strange. I wonder what got into her? Maybe she was distressed at the idea that she looks like me.”
“Oh, yes, you’re such an ogre,” Lucy said. “No one wants to look like you.”
“Do you really think there’s a resemblance? Because I thought so, too, when I first hired her, but then I decided I was imagining things.”
“Well, lots of people look similar,” Lucy said, downplaying the uncanny resemblance. “She’s probably got Irish in her, like you.”
Scarlet ordered mineral water and her favorite salad Niçoise, which came adorned with tiny eggrolls. Lucy, who continued to be delighted by the French/Asian blended menu, ordered an egg-drop soup Florentine.
“That’s all you’re having?” Scarlet asked.
“After that huge dinner last night, I haven’t been very hungry.” Not to mention the orange-chocolate-mint cake.
“So where’s Bryan today?”
“Out and about. I’m not sure.”
“So he doesn’t tell you any more about his business than he tells anyone else?”
“I don’t want to be nosy.”
“Well, I am. Honestly, the whole family is a little fed up with him. He’s been so secretive lately. We all thought maybe you were the secret, but apparently not, since he’s still doing his disappearing act.”
“He’ll be back tonight,” Lucy said, trying to mask her reaction. She wondered if Bryan knew just how worried his family had become about him. That was something he’d tried to avoid at all costs.
Scarlet asked about Lucy’s clothes, how everything was working out and whether she needed anything else. “We’re doing a shoot tomorrow with the most gorgeous Givenchy eveningwear. One of the dresses would look perfect on you. Hey, maybe you could model it. We pay well.”
Lucy laughed. That was all she needed, her picture in a national magazine. She might as well send a map to the embezzler with a dotted line leading straight to her.
“No, I don’t think so. I have work to do.”
“Oh, your novel! I’m so glad you decided to give it another try. How’s it going? I know an agent at William Morris. I could probably get you a read.”
“I’m a long way from having anything to show.” And, boy, wasn’t that the truth. “But thank you. You’re awfully nice to me.”
“That’s because I want you to stick around. Bryan clearly needs you in his life. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him quite as happy as he was last night. He couldn’t stop staring at you.”
Lucy blushed. She wanted to reassure Scarlet that she would stick around. But, of course, she wouldn’t.
“Scarlet, hi!” A striking woman with the brightest red hair Lucy had ever seen stopped at their table. Scarlet stood to give the other woman a hug. The redhead towered over Scarlet, no easy feat. She had to be well over six feet tall. Then Lucy realized her face was familiar. She was a supermodel. She went by Redd.
“Redd,” Scarlet said, “this is Lindsay Morgan, Bryan’s girlfriend.”
Lucy had never quite gotten over her awe of celebrities, even after the Cruz disaster. She babbled something to Redd, who eventually left to find her own table.
“It must be fun, seeing ce
lebrities all the time,” she said.
“You’ll get used to it.”
Lucy only wished she would have the opportunity to get used to it.
Bryan didn’t get home until close to nine that night. Lucy couldn’t help herself. She launched herself into his arms the moment he got off the elevator.
“Hey, hey,” he said, returning her hug, rubbing her back. “Is something wrong?”
“I was just worried about you.”
“Why? I told you I’d be late.”
“I know. But I didn’t know what you were doing, and I have a vivid imagination. I saw you getting shot, stabbed, poisoned—”
“Oh, Lucy.” He kissed her tenderly. “I wasn’t doing anything dangerous. Just boring legwork. Checking in with snitches, trying to get a lead on Stungun. I met with Siberia.”
“Does he know Stungun’s true identity?”
“No. Only the head of the agency knows. But he’s going to find out. He’s making a case to the director tomorrow. We’ve got to find him.”
“I’ve made some progress on my end.”
“Really?”
“Do you want something to eat? Stash delivered a huge dinner. I didn’t eat a third of it.”
He didn’t let her go. “I’m starved, but not for food.”
“Hmm. I think you tend to confuse your appetites.” She slid out of his grasp. “Sit. I’ll warm up a plate and explain what I’ve found.”
As she heated up the coq au vin tempura, she told him what her research had led her to that afternoon. And she didn’t like it one bit.
“I’ve eliminated everybody but one person. I’ve double- and triple-checked, and she is the only one who has been logged in every single time there was an illegal withdrawal.”
“She?”
“Peggy Holmes, Mr. Vargov’s personal secretary. She’s a mild-mannered grandmother who’s been working at the bank for more than twenty years. I don’t really see how she could be a terrorist sympathizer.”
“You’d be surprised. One of her children is married to a man who travels frequently to the Middle East with his business. Nothing wrong with that in itself—”
“You already know that?”
“I’ve done background checks on everyone at that bank. Now that you’ve identified Peggy as a viable suspect, I’ll zero in on the son-in-law.”
“But Peggy Holmes? I just don’t see it. Of course, she does enjoy helping others and being of service. She lives to please Mr. Vargov. So maybe if someone approached her, made it sound like she’d be doing a great service…”
“What about Mr. Vargov? As the bank president, he’d be in a position of authority and power. You haven’t said much about him. He has relatives in former Soviet republics—”
She shook her head. “It couldn’t be him. I was able to eliminate him as a suspect first thing. He was in a meeting during every single transaction.”
“Every single one?”
“Well, the first few that I looked at. I stopped checking after I was able to eliminate him.” When Bryan still looked skeptical, she added, “Mr. Vargov does attend a lot of meetings.”
“Just for fun, let’s see where he was during all of the transactions.”
“All of them? There are dozens.”
“All of them.”
Three hours later Bryan had the answer he was looking for. Mr. Vargov had been in some type of meeting on the bank premises during every single illicit transaction. During the two weeks he was on vacation, not a single withdrawal took place.
“But he wasn’t even logged onto the computer during most of the transactions,” Lucy objected. “He couldn’t have performed those withdrawals without logging in and using a password.”
“And how hard do you think it would be to figure out his trusty secretary’s password? She probably has it written down someplace.”
“But how could he have—”
“On his PDA. Your conference room has wireless capability. He could carry on a conversation, casually tapping on his Palm Pilot as if recording lunch plans, log on to the bank’s system using Peggy’s password, and move money around. Easy as pie.”
“I can’t believe I didn’t see it. It’s so obvious! Oh, but Mr. Vargov is so nice. He’s like a father to me. He’s always been kind, gave me a job when he didn’t know me at all, paid me more than I was worth, gave me a really nice office.”
“Think about it. If you were going to raid pension funds, who would you want doing the audits?”
Now Lucy got it. “Someone inexperienced. Underqualified. Stupid.”
“You would want to pay that person handsomely, keep them happy. A happy employee is much less likely to rock the boat than a dissatisfied one. But you were too smart for him. And too conscientious to forget what you saw just to hold on to your cushy job.”
“It all makes sense now.” She swiveled in her chair to face Bryan, who’d been sitting behind her looking over her shoulder. “That has to be the answer.”
“We are a good team, you and I,” Bryan said with a broad grin. “I never could have figured this out without you.” He pulled her into his lap and nuzzled her neck. “What do you say we celebrate?”
She kissed him hungrily. After her long day at the computer, and all her worrying about Bryan, she craved release—and she knew just how to get it.
“You’ll never guess who I met today,” Lucy said later as they lay in bed. “Redd, the supermodel.”
“She comes in a lot. She likes the wasabi pate.”
“Don’t you love owning a restaurant? I think it would be so fun, like entertaining every day. Making up special dishes for special customers, recommending wine—Well, okay, I’d have to learn about wine. But you must enjoy it.”
“I do. I wish I could devote more time to it.”
Lucy hesitated, then decided she owed it to Bryan to be honest with him about what she’d heard from his relatives. “Your whole family is worried about you, you know. They’ve noticed your long absences—and your injuries at your brother’s wedding. What was that all about?”
“Car accident.”
“That’s what your father said, but he didn’t believe it.”
Bryan sighed. “It was actually a car bomb. In France. I realized something was wrong and got out just before the explosion. No one was seriously hurt, thank God.”
Lucy was horrified. The car bomb in Paris? “I read about that in the news. It was blamed on terrorists.”
“I was with Stungun, investigating the charity, the one our embezzler is sending his funds to. I must have gotten close to them—but not close enough.”
“You’re not ever allowed to go back to France, do you understand?” Lucy said fiercely. “My God, someone there tried to kill you!”
He shrugged. “It happens a lot.”
“Don’t tell me any more. I can’t stand it.”
“I won’t. But you have to reassure my family that everything’s fine. Can you do that?”
“No, Bryan, I can’t. I can’t tell them not to worry when you could get blown up at any time.”
“I’m not going to get blown up.”
“Someday, some bad guy is going to catch up with you,” she said in a small voice.
He kissed her cheek in an achingly tender gesture. “I’m not going anywhere. I promised I wouldn’t leave you, didn’t I?”
“You’ll be gone again tomorrow.”
“For a few hours only. I’ll be back. We’re having a big party at the restaurant. The half-year profit margins have been calculated at EPH, and the company has broken all previous records. Apparently Granddad’s little game has produced the desired results.”
“Which magazine is winning?”
“Charisma. No one’s too surprised, the way Aunt Fin’s been working her tail off. But there are still six months to go.”
“Have you talked to your dad?”
“He doesn’t seem to care that Snap is in last place. I think he’s a little more broken up about his divorce
than anyone suspected.”
“Well, the breakup of any marriage is traumatic, even a bad marriage,” Lucy said pragmatically. “He’s got another six months to pull things together. Do you want him to get the CEO spot?”
Bryan shrugged. “I just want him to be happy. He hasn’t been happy in a long time.”
Lucy was bored out of her mind. Bryan had been gone longer than the “few hours” he’d promised, but she didn’t hold it against him. He was working hard to catch the embezzler, which was his job.
But she missed him, and she had no more computer puzzles to distract her. She’d gone about as far as she could with the data she’d downloaded from Alliance Trust. Now it was up to Bryan to confirm the theory they’d come up with.
He didn’t give her many details, but she gathered that he was having Mr. Vargov put under surveillance. Such operations were tricky, involving other arms of Homeland Security besides his own. And given that he had to protect his anonymity, even from other operatives, arrangements had to be made through intermediaries and other secure communications, all of which could take time.
Three hours before the EPH party, Bryan’s phone rang. Lucy checked the Caller ID and saw the call came from Une Nuit, so she answered happily, thinking Bryan must be back.
Instead, she found Stash Martin on the other end of the line. “Lindsay, I am glad I caught you at home.” Like, where else would she be? “Bryan just called and said he would be delayed. He wants you to finalize the menu for the party tonight.”
“Me? Why?”
“He said you have good taste.”
“Good taste in men, maybe,” she said, which made Stash laugh. “All right, I’ll be down in a minute.” She was grateful for any distraction, provided her magic key still worked on the elevator. She hadn’t asked Bryan about that.
Fifteen minutes later she and Stash were bent over an array of menus, some printed, some handwritten, that had been assembled for various parties over the years. Apparently, the regular menu didn’t include even a fraction of what the kitchen could do. Bryan regularly rotated dishes on and off, which kept things interesting for the clientele.
Dynasties:The Elliots, Books 7-12 Page 10