Homeport

by Nora Roberts

  “The phone was ringing when I got into the house. God, my mind’s still fogged,” she complained, and rubbed at her temple. “I have to go to Florence tomorrow.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. You just got home and you’re hurt, you’re shaken. Christ, how can she ask you to get on a plane right after you’ve been mugged?”

  “I didn’t tell her.” She only shrugged. “I wasn’t thinking. In any case, the summons was loud and clear. I have to book a flight.”

  “Miranda, you’re going to bed.”

  “Oh yeah.” She smiled again. “Very soon now.”

  “I’ll call her.” He sucked in his breath as a man might when faced with an ugly chore. “I’ll explain.”

  “My hero.” Loving him, she kissed his cheek. “No, I’ll go. A hot bath, some aspirin, and I’ll be fine. And after this little adventure, I could use a distraction. It seems she has a bronze she wants me to test.” Because it had gone cold, she set the tea down again. “She wouldn’t summon me to Standjo if it wasn’t important. She wants an archeometrist, and she wants one quickly.”

  “She’s got archeometrists on staff at Standjo.”

  “Exactly.” This time Miranda’s smile was thin and bright. “Standjo” stood for Standford-Jones. Elizabeth had made certain that not only her name but everything else on her agenda came first in the Florence operation. “So if she’s sending for me, it’s big. She wants to keep it in the family. Elizabeth Standford-Jones, director of Standjo, Florence, is sending for an expert on Italian Renaissance bronzes, and she wants one with the Jones name. I don’t intend to disappoint her.”

  She didn’t have any luck booking a flight for the following morning and had to settle for a seat on the evening flight to Rome with a transfer to Florence.

  Nearly a full day’s delay.

  There would be hell to pay.

  As she tried to soak out the aches in a hot tub, Miranda calculated the time difference and decided there was no point in calling her mother. Elizabeth would be at home, very likely in bed by now.

  Nothing to be done about it tonight, she told herself. In the morning, she’d call Standjo. One day couldn’t make that much difference, even to Elizabeth.

  She’d hire a car to take her to the airport, because the way her knee was throbbing, driving could be a problem even if she could replace her tires quickly. All she had to do was . . .

  She sat straight up in the tub, sloshing water to the rim.

  Her passport. Her passport, her driver’s license, her company IDs. He’d taken her briefcase and her purse—he’d taken all her identification documents.

  “Oh hell,” was the best she could do as she rubbed her hands over her face. That just made it all perfect.

  She yanked the old-fashioned chain plug out of the drain of the claw-foot tub. She was steaming now, and the burst of angry energy had her getting to her feet, reaching for a towel, before her wrenched knee buckled under her. Biting back a yelp, she braced a hand against the wall and sat on the lip of the tub, the towel dropping in to slop in the water.

  The tears wanted to come, from frustration, from the pain, from the sudden sharp fear that came stabbing back. She sat naked and shivering, her breath trembling out on little hitching gasps until she’d controlled them.

  Tears wouldn’t help her get back her papers, or soothe her bruises or get her to Florence. She sniffled them back and wrung out the towel. Carefully now, she used her hands to lift her legs out of the tub, one at a time. She gained her feet as clammy sweat popped out on her skin, causing the tears to swim close again. But she stood, clutching the sink for support, and took stock of herself in the full-length mirror on the back of the door.

  There were bruises on her arms. She didn’t remember him grabbing her there, but the marks were dark gray, so logically he had. Her hip was black-and-blue and stunningly painful. That, she remembered, was a result of being rammed back against the car.

  Her knees were scraped and raw, the left one unattractively red and swollen. She must have taken the worst of the fall on it, twisted it. The heels of her hands burned from their rude meeting with the gravel of the drive.

  But it was the long, shallow slice on her throat that had her head going light, her stomach rolling with fresh nausea. Fascinated and appalled, she lifted her fingers to it. Just a breath from the jugular, she thought. Just a breath from death.

  If he’d wanted her to die, she would have died.

  And that was worse than the bruising, the sick throbbing aches. A stranger had held her life in his hands.

  “Never again.” She turned away from the mirror, hobbled over to take her robe from the brass hook by the door. “I’m never going to let it happen again.”

  She was freezing, and wrapped herself as quickly as she could in the robe. As she was struggling to belt it, a movement outside the window had her head jerking up, her heart thundering.

  He’d come back.

  She wanted to run, to hide, to scream for Andrew, to curl herself into a ball behind a locked door. And with her teeth gritted, she eased closer to the window, looked out.

  It was Andrew, she saw with a dizzying wave of relief. He was wearing the plaid lumberman’s jacket he used when he split wood or hiked on the cliffs. He’d turned the floodlights on, and she could see something glinting in his hand, something he swung as he strode along over the yard.

  Puzzled, she pressed her face against the window.

  A golf club? What in the world was he doing outside marching across the snowy lawn with a golf club?

  Then she knew, and love flooded into her, soothing her more than any painkiller.

  He was guarding her. The tears came back. One spilled over. Then she saw him stop, pull something from his pocket, lift it.

  And she watched him take a long swig from a bottle.

  Oh, Andrew, she thought, as her eyes closed and her heart sank. What a mess we are.

  • • •

  It was the pain that woke her, bright pops of it that banged out of her knee. Miranda fumbled on the light, shook out pills from the bottle she’d put on her bedside table. Even as she swallowed them she realized she should have taken Andrew’s advice and gone to the hospital, where some sympathetic doctor would have written her a prescription for some good, potent drugs.

  She glanced at the luminous dial of her clock, saw it was after three. At least the cocktail of ibuprofen and aspirin she’d taken at midnight had given her three hours of relief. But she was awake now, and chasing the pain. Might as well finish it off, she decided, and face the music.

  With the time difference, Elizabeth would be at her desk. Miranda picked up the phone and put the call through. Moaning a bit, she shifted her pillows against the curvy wrought-iron headboard and eased back against them.

  “Miranda, I was about to call to leave a message at your hotel for your arrival tomorrow.”

  “I’m going to be delayed. I—”

  “Delayed?” The word was like a single ice chip, frigid and sharp.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “I thought I made it clear this project is priority. I’ve guaranteed the government that we would begin tests today.”

  “I’m going to send John Carter. I—”

  “I didn’t send for John Carter, I sent for you. Whatever other work you have can be delegated. I believe I made that clear as well.”

  “Yes, you did.” No, she thought, the pills weren’t going to help this time. But the cold anger beginning to stir inside her was bound to outdistance a little pain. “I had every intention of being there, as instructed.”

  “Then why aren’t you?”

  “My passport and other identification were stolen yesterday. I’ll arrange to have them replaced as soon as possible and rebook my flight. This being Friday, I doubt I can have new documents before sometime next week.”

  She knew how bureaucracies worked, Miranda thought grimly. She’d been raised in one.

  “Even in a relatively quiet place like Jones Point
, it’s foolishly careless not to lock your car.”

  “The documents weren’t in my car, they were on me. I’ll let you know as soon as they’re replaced and I’ve rescheduled. I apologize for the delay. The project will have my full time and attention as soon as I arrive. Goodbye, Mother.”

  It gave her perverse satisfaction to hang up before Elizabeth could say another word.

  In her elegant and spacious office three thousand miles away, Elizabeth stared at the phone with a mixture of annoyance and confusion.

  “Is there a problem?”

  Distracted, Elizabeth glanced over at her former daughter-in-law. Elise Warfield sat, a clipboard resting on her knee, her big green eyes puzzled, her soft, lush mouth curved slightly in an attentive smile.

  The marriage between Elise and Andrew hadn’t worked, which was a disappointment to Elizabeth. But her professional and personal relationship with Elise hadn’t been damaged by the divorce.

  “Yes. Miranda’s been delayed.”

  “Delayed?” Elise lifted her brows so that they disappeared under the fringe of bangs that skimmed over her brow. “That’s not like Miranda.”

  “Her passport and other identification were stolen.”

  “Oh, that’s dreadful.” Elise got to her feet. She stood just over five-two. Her body had lush feminine curves that managed to look delicate. With her sleek cap of ebony hair, her large, heavily lashed eyes and milky white skin, the deep red of her mouth, she resembled an efficient and sexy fairy. “She was robbed?”

  “I didn’t get the details.” Elizabeth’s lips tightened briefly. “She’ll arrange to have them replaced and reschedule her flight. It may take several days.”

  Elise started to ask if Miranda had been hurt, then closed her mouth on the words. From the look in Elizabeth’s eyes, either she didn’t know, or it wasn’t her major concern. “I know you want to begin testing today. It can certainly be arranged. I can shift some of my work and start them myself.”

  Considering, Elizabeth rose and turned to her window. She always thought more clearly when she looked out over the city. Florence was her home, had been her home since the first time she’d seen it. She’d been eighteen, a young college student with a desperate love for art and a secret thirst for adventure.

  She’d fallen hopelessly in love with the city, with its red rooftops and majestic domes, its twisting streets and bustling piazzas.

  And she’d fallen in love with a young sculptor who had charmingly lured her to bed, fed her pasta, and shown her her own heart.

  Of course, he’d been unsuitable. Completely unsuitable. Poor and wildly passionate. Her parents had snapped her back to Boston the moment they’d learned of the affair.

  And that, of course, had been the end of that.

  She shook herself, annoyed that her mind had drifted there. She’d made her own choices, and they had been excellent ones.

  Now she was the head of one of the largest and most respected research facilities for art in the world. Standjo might have been one of the arms of the Jones organization, but it was hers. Her name came first, and here, so did she.

  She stood framed in the window, a trim, attractive woman of fifty-eight. Her hair was a quiet ash blond discreetly tinted by one of the top salons in Florence. Her impeccable taste was reflected in the perfectly cut Valentino suit she wore, the color a rich eggplant, with hammered-gold buttons. Her leather pumps matched the tone exactly.

  Her complexion was clear, with good New England bone structure overcoming the few lines that dared show themselves. Her eyes were a sharp and ruthlessly intelligent blue. The image was one of a cool, fashionable, professional woman of wealth and position.

  She would never have settled for less.

  No, she thought, she would never settle for less than the absolute best.

  “We’ll wait for her,” she said, and turned back to Elise. “It’s her field, her specialty. I’ll contact the minister personally and explain the short delay.”

  Elise smiled at her. “No one understands delays like the Italians.”

  “True enough. We’ll go over those reports later today, Elise. I want to make this call now.”

  “You’re the boss.”

  “Yes, I am. Oh, John Carter will be coming in tomorrow. He’ll be working on Miranda’s team. Feel free to assign him another project in the meantime. There’s no point in having him twiddle his thumbs.”

  “John’s coming? It’ll be good to see him. We can always use him in the lab. I’ll take care of it.”

  “Thank you, Elise.”

  When she was alone, Elizabeth sat at her desk again, studied the safe across the room. Considered what was inside.

  Miranda would head the project. Her decision had been made the moment she’d seen the bronze. It would be a Standjo operation, with a Jones at the helm. That was what she had planned, what she expected.

  And it was what she would have.

  two

  S he was five days late, so Miranda moved fast, pushing through the towering medieval doors of Standjo, Florence, and striding across the floor so that the clicks of her practical pumps were like rapid gunshots on the gleaming white marble.

  She clipped the Standjo ID Elizabeth’s assistant had overnighted her to the lapel of her jacket as she rounded an excellent bronze reproduction of Cellini’s figure of Perseus displaying Medusa’s severed head.

  Miranda had often wondered just what the choice of art in the entrance lobby said about her mother. Defeat all enemies, she supposed, with one swift stroke.

  She stopped at the lobby counter, swiveling the logbook around and dashing off her name, noting the time on her watch, then adding it.

  She’d dressed carefully, even strategically, for the day, selecting a suit of royal-blue silk that was military and trim in style. Miranda considered it both dashing and powerful.

  When you were to meet with the director of one of the top archeometry laboratories in the world, your appearance was vitally important. Even if that director was your mother.

  Especially, Miranda thought with the faintest of sneers, if that director was your mother.

  She punched the button on the elevator and waited, impatience shimmering. Nerves were jumping gleefully in her stomach, tickling in her throat, buzzing in her head. But she didn’t let them show.

  The minute she stepped into the elevator, she flipped open her compact and freshened her lipstick. A single tube of color could last her a year, sometimes more. She only bothered with such small annoyances when they couldn’t be avoided.

  Satisfied she’d done her best, she replaced the compact, and ran a hand over the sophisticated French twist that had taken her entirely too much time and trouble to create. She jammed a few loosened pins back firmly in place just as the doors opened again.

  She stepped out into the quiet, elegant lobby of what she thought of as the inner sanctum. The pearl-gray carpet and ivory walls, the stern-backed antique chairs, suited her mother, she thought. Lovely, tasteful, and detached. The sleek console where the receptionist worked with its top-grade computer and phone system was also all Elizabeth. Efficient, brisk, and state-of-the-art.

  “Buon giorno.” Miranda approached the desk and stated her business briefly and in flawless Italian. “Sono la Dottoressa Jones. Ho un appuntamento con la Signora Standford-Jones.”

  “Sì, Dottoressa. Un momento.”

  In her head, Miranda shifted her feet, tugged at her jacket, rolled her shoulders. It sometimes helped her keep her body still and calm if she imagined twitching and shuffling. She was just finishing up some imaginary pacing when the receptionist smiled and gave her the go-ahead.

  Miranda walked through the double glass doors to her left and down the cool white hallway that led to the office of the Signora Direttrice.

  She knocked. One was always expected to knock on any door of Elizabeth’s. The responding “Entri” came immediately.

  Elizabeth was at her desk, an elegant satinwood Hepplewhite that suited her
aristocratic New England looks perfectly. Framed in the window behind her was Florence, in all its sunny splendor.