“Oh my god,” Freya said. “So he saw you on camera?”
“He saw Henry Finch’s private detective boss in Eudora’s office, using a fake name but a real code word,” Sam said. “He was right to be alarmed.”
Bernard’s picture remained on the wall.
“What are you thinking, Henry?” Abe asked.
Henry sighed. “Greed has always been Bernard’s vulnerability. And Arthur Conan Doyle his obsession. The combination of the two caused him to finally make a real, human mistake. Bernard’s fatal flaw will always be that he doesn’t believe he’s done anything wrong.”
Abe stared at the picture for a minute. “The best news is that based on the strength of the evidence against him, Bernard will spend the rest of his life in prison. And many, many of these other criminals will be joining him. Including several from the Sherlock Society.”
“What about Humphrey?” Delilah asked. “Any word on Bernard’s whimsical best friend?”
“Humphrey and Reggie are innocent of Bernard’s crimes,” I said. “And visiting Abe and me in Philly in a few months.”
Freya slammed her hands down on the table. “We are going out. All of us. And getting absolutely drunk.”
Four of us said, “In.”
Abe, with a friendly eye roll, finally said, “I’m sure I’ll make an appearance.”
“And the extra good news is that Humphrey is the new president of the Sherlock Society of Civilized Scholars,” I added. He’d called us afterward, thanked Abe and me again for opening his eyes to Bernard’s deceit. And promised that he remained an unstoppable force of valiant passion, even as he was still mending his broken heart.
“One last bit of news,” Sam said. “My father heard this from an Interpol source. Bernard has been engaged in serious letter writing with the one person who’s been contacting him regularly. Victoria Whitney.”
Delilah shook her head with a smirk on her face. “Unbelievable. You’ve got to hand it to Victoria. She’s never stopped being herself.”
“And she’s never stopped loving Bernard,” Henry said.
There was a long pause—everyone taking in the abundance of good news, sifting through it. A sense of peace settled over me. Happiness. Completeness.
“Welcome to the team, Sloane,” Freya said. “We got the worst guy yet. All the rest should be gravy.”
Abe chuckled. Straightened his tie. “I always told this team that Bernard wasn’t our purview. That our purview were the books, and books alone. And they are our main priority at the end of the day. Our main priority and the best one.” He paused, studied us. “But I’m so proud we caught him. And so proud to call you my family.”
Abe looked at me and I nodded, understanding him completely. Recognizing the strength it took him to reach out, be accepted, to expose himself to be a man with a big, open heart after all.
“Gone soft,” Freya teased. “Told ya.”
“It’s true,” he said.
“We can choose our own families,” I said. Held Abe’s gaze. “For me, that’s all of you.”
“Those Hawaiian shirts did help after all.” Freya sighed dreamily. “Because we got you, Sloane.”
I squeezed her hand, too overcome to say anything else.
“Every single one of us came to this place surviving a kind of betrayal,” Delilah said. “We were all searching for a place that would become a home.”
Home. I understood that word now. My parents had ripped it from me at an early age. And now another con artist—Bernard Allerton—had helped deliver me to Abe, this family, this new life. I stared at his mug shot one last time. Bernard was just a man who believed the world needed villains.
Codex was a team dedicated to the opposite.
Abe’s phone rang, which generally signaled a new case. Sam and Freya leaned forward in excitement. Delilah flipped open her notebook. Henry straightened his glasses with a knowing grin.
“What happens next?” I asked Abe.
His smile was full of promises. “We get the damn book back.”
Epilogue
ABE
My new priority in life was making my three-month-old daughter squeal with laughter.
Ruby and I had spent the better part of an hour on the rug, playing peek-a-boo, a game she never seemed to tire of. Every time I held my finger toward her, she gripped it, held tight, while staring at me with the same luminous eyes her mother had.
My heart had seen its last fortress. If Sloane had dismantled those bricks with her vulnerable beauty and endless charm, then Ruby was ensuring I was stripped bare for the world to see, every day. Soft didn’t even come close.
I scooped up my still-laughing daughter—whose curly hair was just like Sloane’s—and stretched out on the couch with her to nap. Ruby still fit perfectly on my chest, and as I rubbed circles into her small back, her steady, sleepy breathing calmed me.
As did the raven-haired goddess, strolling into our living room with a happy smile on her lovely face. She bent down, gave me a sweet, lingering kiss, and then curled up next to me. I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.
“What’s the source of this smile?” I asked.
“Your mother. And Jeanette,” she said. “We were planning their next trip up here to stay and help with Ruby. Your mother shared some very cute stories of you as a very serious little boy, Mr. Royal.”
“There’s work to be done, always,” I said.
She snorted because she knew that to be a lie. Sloane and I both worked incredibly hard at Codex—the whole team did—but the two of us had cheerfully handed in our workaholic membership cards to become a family. A real family. And that meant nights at home and weekends at the park and enjoying every single moment we had.
Our relationship had moved at warp speed, which aptly fit the unrestrained chaos of our love. Six months after meeting, I married Sloane on the beach in Miami. My mother was the proud officiant. Jeanette, Henry, and Sam stood next to me. Delilah and Freya stood with Debra, the incredible woman who had helped my wife secure her freedom.
Humphrey and Reggie walked Sloane down the aisle, of course.
My wedding ring was engraved with the words: I’m still here.
Sloane’s ring held the words: I’m not going anywhere.
One year later, we welcomed our daughter Ruby to the world. There had been not one moment of doubt or regret.
“It was a very nice phone call,” Sloane said, brow lifted. “In fact, she’s compiling additional adorable stories as we speak. Might even have Freya turn it into a video we can share at our next team meeting.”
“I’ll have to call in sick perhaps,” I mused.
She leaned down and pressed her face to Ruby’s back. “How is my favorite princess?”
“Still the world’s best princess,” I said, stroking Sloane’s hair. Holding these two precious beings to my chest gave me an unbelievable sense of tranquility. As had watching Sloane open her arms—slowly, but surely—to the love and trust available to her now. It had involved a lot of painful work, of shedding past fears and working through our vulnerabilities. We were doing it, every single day.
Thanks, in large part, to Ruby.
“Oh, Freya sent the pictures she framed for all of us,” Sloane said, reaching across the table for a package. “I want to hang them over the fireplace.”
I handed her the dozing Ruby, and she cuddled the baby sweetly against her chest while watching me flip through the pictures.
The first photo had been taken at Henry and Delilah’s wedding at the Long Room at the Trinity Library in Ireland. Delilah looks exquisite in her white gown, and she’s laughing as Henry hugs her close, flanked by the rest of us. We are grinning like fools, a little drunk, and a lot happy.
Only the six of us knew the significance of that location. It had been the venue where The Thornhills had gotten fake married. The wedding had taken place four months after Bernard’s final capture. Henry and Delilah had gone for their honeymoon after that, and I’d shut all o
f Codex down for two weeks. With strict orders for everyone to go on vacation.
A real one this time.
And with Sloane’s charming encouragement, the two of us had ended up in Belize for two weeks, where we’d done nothing but have passionate sex and lie on the hot sand.
I chuckled at the next picture. Freya and Sam had a newborn daughter named Zelda, and the frame held their birth announcement. Somehow, Freya had convinced Sam to dress up as Agents Mulder and Scully from The X-Files while Zelda was a tiny, baby alien. The card read: Freya and Sam are pleased to welcome the birth of their daughter. Please send tacos.
I continued to enjoy the pleasant, nostalgic sounds of Sam and Freya bickering in the office—although their verbal sparring was more good-natured than when they’d been my students. They still pushed each other, though. And continued to flagrantly disregard my PDA policies.
“Look, Ruby, it’s your cousin,” Sloane said, tapping the glass. Ruby waved her hands excitedly. “If she’s anything like her mom, she’ll be a fighter just like you.”
The next picture was of Henry and Delilah, smiling with all the love in the world on the day their adoption paperwork was finalized. They’d worked with the same adoption agency where Delilah had been adopted by her fathers. Henry and Delilah are hugging a beaming, three-year old boy named Milo. On lighter days at Codex, Milo sits at my desk and pretends to “work” with me—an image that always sends the rest of my team into glorious laughter.
“The last picture is my favorite,” Sloane said, rocking the baby.
I looked down at it. Looked up at my wife, the siren who still had me under her spell. Although she and I knew what it truly was.
“I love you so much, Sloane,” I said, voice rough as I stared into her eyes. Ruby gurgled against her chest, and Sloane smiled, patting her back. Stared at me with the warm sunshine at her back, lighting her like a true goddess.
“I love you, Abe,” she said. Leaned in for a flirtatious kiss. “Let’s hang this, shall we?”
And I did, placing the picture right above our mantelpiece. Because at the end of the day, Codex was about books. And justice. Righting wrongs and saving pieces of history.
But it was also about what was in this picture: Sloane and me in her hospital bed, holding Ruby, who had been born six hours earlier. Before that, I’d been at Codex, leading a meeting when Sloane had called. In her calm, smooth voice, she had said, “I believe I’m going into labor?”
Freya, Delilah, Sam, and Henry drove me to the hospital and watched me lose my fucking mind out of worry. All four had stayed in the waiting room for hours while I watched Sloane become a mother. And the moment my daughter was placed in my arms, and I became a father, was the moment my heart became permanently open.
In the picture, Sloane, Ruby, and I are surrounded by my team. Freya’s smile is incandescent. Sam is holding her tight, cheek pressed to the top of her head. Henry is clutching a grinning Delilah to his chest. They are both laughing. The six of us—seven, including baby Ruby—are frozen perfectly in time. More than a team of private detectives. Even more than a group of friends. We are a family.
Which is what Sloane and I had been searching for all along.
Want more from the Codex team?
As planned, Humphrey and Reggie do visit Philadelphia and take the entire Codex team out for drinks, leading to some adorable shots-related fun. And some sexy shenanigans between Abe and Sloane...
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A Note from the Author
Dear reader,
We got the damn book back.
These characters have been with me for more than two years now. Their voices, their thoughts, their donut preferences – all six members of the Codex team have taken up permanent residence in my heart and I hope they never budge. This series pushed me in the best way possible and I experienced tremendous growth as a writer while crafting each Codex book.
When I walk around Old City, in Philadelphia, it’s easy for me to picture Henry and Delilah, strolling hand-in-hand down a cobblestone street while talking about their dreams. Or Sam and Freya on a bench outside of Federal Donuts, laughing through one of their many endless competitions.
It’s extremely easy to picture Abe and Sloane, in glamorous attire, on their way to the opera – the dramatic skyline behind them as they both shine beneath the city lights.
I can see the six of them at used bookstores, at breweries and taco stands, in historic buildings and on front stoops. I feel their commitment to justice, their love of literature, and their devotion to each other. This series is as much a love letter to my hometown as it is to the magic of old books. Because all of us can attest to that feeling in your heart when you step inside a bookstore. There’s isn’t anything else like it in the world.
Before Codex was a series, it was a short story I’d written for KU Korner on Facebook – a short story that wouldn’t quit my imagination. A story that demanded to be told. When I look back at those old notebooks and scribbles, it’s overwhelming to understand that those scribbles became three novels, six characters and an entire world filled with secrets and code words, heroes and villains. Just a reminder that if a story is demanding to be told, don’t be afraid to tell it, to follow that voice on a creativity journey. Whatever comes of it could be magnificent and magical. And I promise you: the journey is always worth it.
In the course of writing this book, I had a lot of fun with Sherlock Holmes and London geography! Those from London will immediately recognize that I seriously shrunk the distances between some of the real locations: The Langham Hotel, The Sherlock Holmes Museum at 221B Baker Street, the Royal Opera House and Midnight Apothecary (which is a very real and very cute cocktail bar!) This was merely to make it faster for Abe and Sloane to get around.
The McMaster’s Library is not real, unfortunately, although Oxford University very much is! Mycroft’s Pub is based on the Sherlock Holmes Pub, also in London. Adler’s Bookshop and the Kensley Auction House are also creations from my imagination.
The fictionalized story of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s private papers being auctioned off was inspired by an article in The New Yorker called ‘Mysterious Circumstances’ – a long read but I highly recommend it. His children and relatives have been fictionalized for this story as well.
The Sherlock Society of Civilized Scholars was my invention – however, Sherlock Holmes societies are abundant and well-respected throughout the world. Many Doyle scholars do identify themselves as Doyleans or Sherlockians and the Baker Street Irregulars is a real international literary society.
My final send-off for Codex fans is a wish for your days to be filled with code words and clandestine tunnels, coincidences that are really clues, and an underground auction or two. May your bookshelves reveal mysterious passageways and your perfume bottles contain absinthe. I sincerely hope Victoria Whitney sends you a love letter and the Alexanders invite you to a secret dinner party (but don’t forget your mask). And if Humphrey Hatcher invites you to the pub, take him up on his offer.
As always, I hope to meet all of you at Reichenbach Falls one day.
Love,
Kathryn
Acknowledgments
All of my gratitude for the following people who helped shape Abe and Sloane’s love story:
Thank you always to my best friend (and genius developmental editor) Faith. You are a true gift in my life and these books wouldn’t be the same without your wise and thoughtful edits. I’m so happy we were able to go on this Codex journey together. Thank you for shepherding me through my first romantic suspense novels.
A big thank you to Jessica Snyder for her developmental edits and line edits and for catching all of those pesky plot holes. You are a story wizard!
To Bronwyn, Jules and Jodi: you are epic beta readers. Your work on the Codex series has helped me level up in every way and working with the three of you is a privilege. Thank you for holding my hand through the process and being my cheerleaders wh
en I needed the love.
A huge thank you to the lovely Alicia McKilligan for providing her wonderful expertise on the city of London and caught all of my dialogue mistakes from my British characters. I’m so grateful to you!
All of my love forever goes out to The Hippie Chicks. I know how long you’ve been waiting to worship Abe Royal and his stern heart. I hope this story did him justice. Thank you for your Codex love and for believing in this intrepid band of book-loving private detectives. I’d send Federal Donuts to you all if I could – you certainly deserve it!
All the tacos and hugs go to Joyce, Tammy, Lucy, Rick and Tim for being Team Kathryn and also awesome all the damn time. I’m so lucky to work with you beautiful geniuses!
For my Mom and Dad: thank you for believing in me! These books wouldn’t be here without your love and support!
For Walter: Are you a good boy? You are a good boy! The best boy.
To Rob: I’m currently typing this at a picnic table in our backyard in Vermont – just one adventure of many we have planned together. Your strength and kindness never cease to amaze me and I’m always, always lucky to call you my husband and partner and road-trip companion. I will love you forever.
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