The Collector
Page 69

“I figured out an answer to your question from this morning.”
“Oh, that. I was going to get in touch. That was just silly. I don’t know what got into me, and I’m—”
“I’ve loved you since the first day I saw you—first day of high school, first day of Mrs. Gottlieb’s deadly U.S. history class.”
It had been deadly, Julie thought, but pressed her lips together to hold in words, emotions, tears.
“It’s about half my life. Maybe we were too young, maybe we screwed it up.”
“We were.” Tears blurred her vision; she let them come. “We did.”
“But I never got over you. I’m never going to get over you. I did pretty well between then and now—damn well. But it’s now, and it’s still you. It’s always going to be you. That’s it.” He looked at her. “That’s what I’ve got.”
A ball of emotion rolled up from her heart into her throat. The tears could come, but they were warm, and sweet. Her hands trembled a little as she lifted them to frame his face. “It was you, that first day. It’s still you. It’s always going to be you.”
She laid her lips on his, warm and sweet, while New York rushed by, and thought of her mother’s hydrangeas, big balls of blue, beside the stoop where they’d sat in summers so long ago.
Some things came back to bloom.
“Let’s go inside.”
He laid his forehead on hers, let out a long, long breath. “Yeah, let’s go inside.”
Lila planned candles and wine, pretty plates and glasses on the terrace. Whatever the takeout meal, it could be romantic and lovely with the right accessories. And she considered New York on a summer night the best of them.
Then it started to rain.
She reassessed. A cozy meal in the dining room in front of the rain-lashed windows. Still romantic, especially since thunder began to roll.
She took time to fuss with herself as well, brushing her hair smooth into a low, loose tail, makeup that didn’t look like she fussed but took forever to perfect. Slim black pants and a sheer copper-colored top she liked to think brought out the gold in her eyes—over a lacy camisole.
It occurred to her if she and Ash continued to see each other, she’d have to reup her very tired wardrobe.
It also occurred to her he was late.
She lit candles, put on music, poured herself a glass of wine.
By eight, she was on the point of calling him when the house phone rang.
“Ms. Emerson, this is Dwayne on the door. You have a Mr. Archer in the lobby.”
“Oh, you can . . . put him on, would you, Dwayne?”
“Lila.”
“Just making sure. Give the phone to Dwayne, I’ll have him send you up.”
See, she thought after she’d cleared Ash, careful. Smart. Safe.
When she opened the door, Ash stood, hair dripping, holding a takeout bag.
“Your smile didn’t work as your umbrella. Come in, I’ll get you a towel.”
“I got steak.”
She poked her head out of the powder room. “Takeout steak?”
“I know a place, and I wanted a steak. I guessed on yours, went with medium. If you want rare, you can take mine.”
“Medium’s fine.” She came back with a towel, exchanged it for the bag. “I have wine open, but I picked up beer if you’d rather.”
“Beer would be perfect.” Scrubbing his hair with the towel, he followed her, and stopped at the dining room.
“You went to some trouble.”
“Nice plates and candles are never trouble for a girl.”
“You look great. I should’ve told you right off—and brought you flowers.”
“You’re telling me now, and you brought me steak.”
When she held out the beer, he took it, set it aside. And took her.
There it was, she thought, that buzz, that frisson in the blood, all highlighted by a throaty boom of thunder.
With his hands on her arms, he eased her back. “There’s a second egg.”
“What?” Those gold-rimmed eyes went huge. “There are two?”
“The translator Vinnie contacted called me just as I got home. He says there are documents describing another egg, the Nécessaire, and he thinks it can be tracked.” He pulled her back, kissed her again. “We just got more leverage. I’ve spent hours researching it. He’s coming back to New York tomorrow, and I’m meeting him here. We’re going to find the second egg.”
“Wait a minute. I need to take this in.” She pressed her hands to the sides of her head. “Did Oliver know? Does HAG know?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t think so. Why wouldn’t Oliver have used the second one? Have gone after it, or bargained with the documents? But I don’t know.”
Ash picked up the beer again. “I can only try to think the way Oliver would, and he’d have tried to find it. He couldn’t have resisted. Hell, I can’t resist, and I’m not anywhere near as impulsive. I should’ve asked about Kerinov coming here.”
“Kerinov’s the translator?”
“Yeah. I should’ve asked you. It seemed safer, and more efficient, for him to come straight here from the station.”
“It does, it’s fine. My head’s spinning. A second egg—Imperial egg?”
“Yes. I want to talk to the woman he bought the first one from. He must’ve gotten the documents from her. She couldn’t have known what she had, but she might be able to tell us something. She’s out of town, according to her housekeeper, and I couldn’t pull where out of her, but I left my name and number.”
“One was beyond, but two?” Trying to take it in, she sat on the arm of the tufted chair. “What does it look like? The second egg.”
“It was designed as an etui—a small, decorative case for women’s toiletries. It’s decorated with diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds—at least according to my research. The surprise is probably a manicure set, but there aren’t any known pictures of this one. I can follow it from the Gatchina Palace, to when it was seized in 1917, sent to the Kremlin, then in 1922 it was transferred to the Sovnarkom.”
“What’s that?”
“Lenin’s council—Bolshevik-dominated power. And after that transfer, there’s no record I could find.”