Perfect Scoundrels (5 page)

“H
ello, Marianne,” Kat said the following morning.

The tiny yard was wet with dew and the sun was still low, the house shrouded in the shadows of the woods. But as soon as the woman opened the door, Kat knew she hadn’t been sleeping. Marianne’s eyes were bright and clear as she regarded the two girls who stood on her stoop, mulling over the consequences of asking them inside.

“Marcus isn’t here,” she told them.

“That’s fine,” Kat said. “This is my cousin Gabrielle. If it’s okay, we’d like to talk to you.” But the woman didn’t speak or move. “Please, Marianne. We think that maybe Marcus is right. And we think maybe you’re not the only one who was affected.”

Kat watched her weigh the words, consider her options, then slowly push the door open and gesture for them to follow.

Kat and Gabrielle sat on the floral sofa while Marianne went to the kitchen and made tea. It was a simple house, but lovely. And Kat imagined that within those twelve hundred square feet, the brother and sister could pretend they’d never really left England.

“I’m sorry I’m such a mess,” Marianne said when she returned. She placed the tray on a low table in the center of the room. From where Kat sat, she couldn’t see a single hair out of place on the woman’s head, but Marianne patted at them just the same. “I’ve worked every day since I was fourteen. I’m not quite myself without a job to do.”

Kat nodded. “I know the feeling.”

“Yes, miss,” Marianne said. “I don’t doubt it.”

“Where is Marcus?” Gabrielle asked.

“He’s back with young Mr. Hale today. Marcus offered to stay with me, but I told him that he should go. That boy will be needing Marcus now more than ever.”

“So you know…” Kat said.

“That young Mr. Hale inherited the company?” the woman filled in. “Yes. I heard.” She smiled. “I was very happy to hear that. His grandmother loved him so.”

“Did that surprise you, Marianne?” Kat asked.

“Oh, I suppose I had just assumed it was going to be divided among her children, but…” She trailed off and brought a hand to her lips. “I just don’t know. He’s so young.”

Kat nodded. “There will have to be a trustee to oversee things until he turns twenty-five.”

The woman furrowed her brow and asked, “Who?”

“Garrett. The lawyer.”

Try as she might, Kat couldn’t quite decipher the look that crossed Marianne’s face. There was something there, though—a flash so fleeting that a normal person would have never seen it—and Kat thought for a moment that Marianne might have made a most excellent grifter.

“What is it, Marianne?” Kat asked.

“Nothing,” she said, pulling her shawl more tightly around her shoulders.

“Oh, I think there’s something,” Gabrielle said, her voice cold.

“Gab,” Kat warned, but Gabrielle had her sights set on the woman.

“Marianne, you worked for Hazel for half a century, and now you know something. Don’t try to deny it. You know something, don’t you?” Gabrielle asked. But the woman didn’t answer.

“Marianne?” Kat asked softly. “What is it?”

Marianne recoiled and shook her head. “It’s nothing. A crazy notion. You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

Kat and Gabrielle leaned closer and, in unison, said,
“Try us.”

“I just can’t imagine that Mrs. Hale would name Garrett as the trustee. That’s all.”

“Didn’t she like him?” Gabrielle asked.

“No.” Marianne laughed. “Hazel wasn’t one to gossip, but I could tell she couldn’t stand the man. In fact, I thought she was going to fire him.”

“Then why didn’t she?” Gabrielle asked.

Marianne’s eyes grew moist. When she spoke again, her voice was almost a whisper.
“She died.”

“It’s okay,” Gabrielle said. “Just tell us what happened.”

Marianne drew a deep breath and spoke softly. “A week or so ago, Mrs. Hale asked me to call the office and schedule a meeting with Mr. Garrett and a few members of the board. I did as she asked, but that night she grew ill, and then…well, she never made it.”

“Marcus said that he thought there was another will,” Kat said. “One that contradicts the one they read yesterday.”

“
He
thinks so,” Marianne said. “And maybe there is. I don’t know anything for certain.” For the first time, Marianne smiled. “Mrs. Hale
was
a bit of a pack rat. And a worrier. People who enter this world with nothing always are. If there was another will, she probably would have kept a file for herself.”

“Where?” Kat asked. “If it exists, where do you think it would be?”

“Did she have a safety deposit box?” Gabrielle tried. “A safe, somewhere? Maybe a—”

“It’s in her desk,” Marianne said suddenly, cutting Gabrielle off. “If she has another will, it would be in her desk in London.”

“Cheerio, Kitty Kat,” Gabrielle said in her best Cockney accent, but her smile faded as soon as she read the expression on her cousin’s face. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s just that…if we were running this con”—Kat cut her eyes at Marianne—“which we
aren’t
. But if we were, the first thing I’d do is destroy any copies of the old will. I want you to know that, odds are, whoever is behind this has already done just that.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t be so certain.”

“Why?” Kat prompted.

The woman smiled. “Because the desk where Mrs. Hale stored her most important papers was made by Alexander Petrovich.”

“It’s a Petrovich puzzle desk?” Kat asked.

Marianne gave a wide, knowing grin. “Someone could empty every drawer in it and still miss the hidden compartments. If the will exists, there’s a good chance a copy of it is still there.”

Neither girl spoke on the long drive back to Brooklyn. It was midday and the sun was bright. Spring flowers dotted green fields beneath a bright blue sky. It was almost like a painting. Kat was half tempted to steal it. But when they reached the brownstone’s stoop, their shadows fell across the door, and it was like a spell was broken. They could no longer pretend that nothing was wrong—that they didn’t have work to do. And when Kat opened the door, she wasn’t surprised to hear her uncle’s deep voice echoing through the house.

“Katarina! Gabrielle! Come in here.”

For a moment, Kat was certain she was in trouble. She glanced at Gabrielle, and together the two said, “Yes, Uncle Eddie?”

“Sit down,” he said, pointing toward the old mismatched chairs. “We need to talk about Katarina’s young man.”

“I’m sorry about the window, Uncle Eddie. I’ll get it—”

“The window can be fixed, Katarina. I’m far more concerned about him.”

“I know.” Kat nodded solemnly. “Me too.”

“So…” There was a pile of potatoes on the counter, and Eddie took a knife and began to peel. “It seems there is a great deal of mystery surrounding why the late Mrs. Hale would leave a billion-dollar corporation to a teenager and nothing to her oldest, dearest friend.”

“How did you know that?” Kat asked.

“I hear things,” Eddie told her.

But Kat knew better. Kat knew Eddie heard everything.

“If the butler is correct, then this is a most impressive con.”

“We know,” Gabrielle said, and Eddie talked on.

“It would have to be an inside job. Simple, but not easy.”

“We know,” Gab said again, but Eddie acted like he hadn’t even heard her. Kat couldn’t tell if he was frightened or impressed, and she felt a little bit of both as she sat silently watching her uncle peel potatoes, stripping away the skins.

“What did the maid say?” Eddie asked.

“There might be another will in London. Maybe.” Gabrielle gave a shrug.

“You will try to retrieve it?” Eddie looked directly at Kat, but she felt anything but certain.

A thousand doubts swarmed inside her mind. What if Hale found out? What if Marianne was wrong? And, worse, what if Marianne was right? And what if Hale never forgave her for proving it?

So Kat twisted her hands and told her uncle, “It might be a wild-goose chase.”

“I’ve chased more for less,” her uncle said.

“Marcus could be wrong about everything.”

“He is not the sort of man who makes mistakes.”

“But—”

Her uncle’s hand came down, cutting her off, as he asked, “You do a great many things for strangers, Katarina. What are you willing to do for your friends?”

T
he best-kept secret in London had to be City Airport, Kat had always thought. Smaller than Heathrow and more central than Gatwick, it was like flying into a small town until you looked out the window and saw Big Ben and the Tower of London below. It was as good a place as any for a teenage thief to go through customs and descend into the very place where she’d pulled off the biggest job of her career only a few months before.

But that didn’t mean Kat had to like it.

Stepping through the airport’s sliding doors and out into the dreary London day, Kat sensed a nagging doubt in the back of her head, a tiny voice that kept telling her something wasn’t quite right. Or maybe it was just Gabrielle.

“Commercial, Kitty?” Gabrielle asked, annoyed. “Really? We just
had
to fly commercial.…” Gabrielle shifted on the tall boots that descended from beneath a very short skirt printed with the Union Jack, and moved her head from side to side, popping her neck—the universal gesture for
long flight
. “For the girlfriend of a gazillionaire, you really don’t know how to travel.”

“We weren’t exactly traveling on official gazillionaire business.”

“We could have been,” Gabrielle said, “if we’d told Hale where we were going. And why.”

“Don’t start, Gabs,” Kat said.

“What?” Her cousin gave an innocent shrug, slid her dark glasses on, and walked toward a waiting cab. “Come on. This is our ride.” Gabrielle opened the door and crawled into the black car. Kat followed. She sat her bag at her feet and spoke to the driver.

“Hi, we’re going to—”

But before she could finish, the car zoomed off, throwing her against the seat back. Her suitcase toppled over, smashing against her foot.

“Ouch!”

“Sorry about that, Kitty,” the driver said.

“Hamish?” Kat cried.

“Should have warned you to… Hold on!” said Angus, Hamish’s brother, from the passenger seat as Hamish spun the wheel and sent the cab careening into traffic.

Kat sat breathless while the car swerved around big red double-decker buses and in front of men in suits riding bicycles with briefcases tied to handlebars. Outside, it started to rain, and Kat heard the water pelting against the car as Hamish turned down a narrow cobblestone alley—entirely too fast, in Kat’s opinion.

“So, guys,” she said, leery and glaring at Gabrielle, “I wasn’t expecting to see you on this trip.”

“What?” Gabrielle asked. “I can’t make an executive decision? Besides, everything is better with Bagshaws.”

Kat was beginning to seriously question her cousin’s definition of “better” when Angus looked over the front seat. “So, between you and me…”

“And me,” Hamish added.

“How rich is ol’ Hale these days?” Angus finished.

“Guys.” Kat gave an exasperated sigh. “He’s Hale. Hale is just the same as he was before, just—”

“Richer,” Gabrielle said. “About a million times richer.”

In the front seat, Angus gave a long sigh. “I always did like that boy.”

“So true,” his brother said. “So, so true.”

Then Hamish spun the wheel again. Dark alley gave way to the glow of neon through the foggy windows, and Kat knew immediately where they were. She couldn’t help herself: she thought about the last time she’d been in Trafalgar Square—the long ride in the back of a mobster’s car. Blackmail photos and death threats. She was beginning to question why she’d thought it was so important to come back to England.

“What’s wrong, Kitty?” Angus asked.

Kat reached out to touch the window. “London makes me nervous.”

“Don’t worry, Kat,” Hamish said. “You’re about to feel much, much worse.”

The skyscraper was new, right next to the Thames. Someone said something about it being the tallest building in Europe, but Kat wasn’t really in the mood to care. She just stood quietly in the elevator, and when they finally reached the penthouse apartment, Kat was more than a little relieved to see that Gabrielle had a key.

“Who owns this apartment?” Kat asked.

“Carlos,” her cousin said, pushing open the door and stepping inside. A staircase ascended into a second story. A modern kitchen covered the right side of the space. It was all steel and chrome and glass. Even though Kat was back in London, it felt like a different hemisphere—different century—from the country estate where they’d stayed when planning the Henley job.

“And Carlos is…”

“About to be step-daddy number five,” Gabrielle told her. She cocked a hip. “He’s Cuban.”

“How nice for him,” Kat said, and followed her cousin into the towering, frigid room.

Rain ran down the tall glass windows, and the flames from the long sleek fireplace didn’t even begin to fight the chill. Suddenly, Kat craved soup and a warm kitchen. She felt a long, long way from home.

“So tell me.” Kat dropped her bags and spun on the Bagshaws. “What exactly is wrong?”

“There’s a bathroom down there,” Gabrielle said. “If you want to try to do something about…this.” She gestured to Kat’s hair. Kat ignored her.

“Guys, what’s going—”

“Oh good, you’re here.”

“Simon,” Kat said, looking up at the boy descending the stairs, a laptop under each arm. As happy as she was to see him, another emotion boiled to the surface. “What are you doing here? What are all of you doing here? Gabrielle—”

“Don’t be mad at dear, sweet Gabrielle, Kitty,” Angus said, even though Kat was fairly certain that Gabrielle had never been
dear
or
sweet
a day in her life. “It’s hard out there for a couple of lads trying to find honest work.”

“Honest?” Kat asked.

“Or honestly dishonest, as the case may be,” Hamish said.

Kat turned to Simon. “I thought you were doing a PhD program at Cambridge.”

“Oxford.” Simon blushed. “And I didn’t find the academic setting as challenging as I’d hoped.”

“University girls don’t date teenage geniuses,” Hamish translated.

“Okay. Great. So Simon’s a dropout and you two are…here.” She pointed at the Bagshaws. “But guys, it’s not a big job. I mean, we just need to get into Hale’s grandmother’s flat. That’s not exactly—”

“Oh, the flat is nothing.” Angus pulled an apple from a bowl on the marble counter and took a big bite as he said, “Hale’s aunt inherited the place, and she’s kind of…”

“Unpleasant,” Hamish filled in while Angus provided his own (far less flattering) word.

Simon talked on. “So the whole staff is turning over. Getting in and out with all the chaos would be a cakewalk.”

Kat studied the solemn faces that were looking back at her. “So that means the problem is…”

“The desk is an original Petrovich.” When Simon spoke, he began to subtly vibrate in excitement. “I mean, a
real
Petrovich. Did you know that Catherine the Great herself discovered him and—”

“Simon,” Gabrielle said. “Focus.”

“Sorry.” He pulled his thoughts back together. “It’s just, I’ve always wanted a Petrovich,” Simon said. “Those desks are like works of art.”

“And
that
, dear cousin, is the problem, because there is going to be an exhibition of Petrovich’s finest work at…” Gabrielle let the words drag out long enough for Kat to guess.

“The Henley.”

“Yep,” Hamish said. “Welcome to London.”

“Can’t we get in before the museum takes possession?” Kat asked.

Angus gave an exaggerated sigh. “The Henley picked up the desk three days ago.”

Gabrielle nodded, then hopped onto the counter and crossed her long legs. “And so that means…”

“We have to rob the Henley,” Simon said.

Kat sank onto a truly uncomfortable sofa. “Again.”