“He’s still out there,” Kat said. “This man who calls himself Romani—whoever he is—he’s still out there, and he sent me these people because I can help them. He thinks I can do this. I can—”
“Not you, Kat. We.” Hale dropped into a seat at the head of the table. He didn’t look at her. “If you do this, then we do this.”
“Of course. Yeah. We. But it’s not like it matters anyway,” Kat told them with a shake of her head. “The Cleopatra is supposed to be locked up somewhere in Switzerland. And even if we could find it…What? What are you staring at?”
Gabrielle looked at Hale, who shook his head, leaving Gabrielle to shuffle through the stack of mail that sat unopened on the end of the table.
“You’ve been gone, Kitty Kat.” Gabrielle slid the newspaper across the table, the headline blaring out for all to see that the Kelly Corporation was finally going to bring its most prized possession home.
Home.
New York.
Kat felt her heart beat faster as she looked first at Gabrielle and then at Hale.
“So…what?” Hale asked slowly. “I guess now we steal an emerald?”
There was a room at the top of the stairs that had white eyelet curtains and two twin beds with matching quilts. There was a small dresser, a wicker hamper, and a bookshelf full of dusty, fraying Nancy Drews. That room had never belonged with the rest of the house, Kat had always thought. Stepping inside was like walking into another world—one with a pink rotary telephone and a music box. A tiny alcove in a man’s world, a place made entirely for girls.
Someone, sometime had embroidered the name Nadia on a pillow, and Kat held it in her arms as she lay, staring up at the ceiling but not sleeping. She felt too small, lying on her mother’s bed, still trying to fit inside her footsteps.
“So, Hale…”
Kat turned and saw Gabrielle silhouetted in the door, watched her walk to the other bed and lie down atop a pillow with the willowy script that spelled the name Irina.
“What about him?”
“What’s going on with you two?”
“Nothing,” Kat said, a little too quickly.
“Yeah, and why is that exactly? I thought you two were getting all relationshipy. But now you’re gone half of the time and he’s…angry.”
“No, he’s not.”
“Yes, he is.” Gabrielle gave a short laugh. “He doesn’t like you going off, doing these jobs on your own.” Kat drew a breath to protest, but not before her cousin lowered her voice and added, “And he’s not the only one.”
Kat honestly didn’t know what to say, so she turned onto her side and closed her eyes. She didn’t even know that Gabrielle had crossed the room until she felt her cousin’s weight plop down on the mattress beside her. “So why are you doing it?”
“I…” Kat stumbled, looking for the words in the dark. “They’re easy jobs, Gabrielle.”
“Maybe in the beginning, but Rio wasn’t easy.”
“How do you know about Rio?”
“Everyone knows about Rio. Everyone would have helped.”
Kat’s throat was suddenly too dry. “I didn’t need any help.”
“And what about Moscow?” her cousin went on. “Maybe you didn’t need help, but whenever you start going up against the KGB, you should probably get some—just in case. So the question is…why didn’t you?” Gabrielle rested her elbows on her knees and tapped her chin, thinking.
“Gabrielle, I’m—”
“Drunk!” Gabrielle exclaimed, bolting upright with the realization.
“I’ve never been drunk in my life,” Kat shot back, but her cousin only laughed.
“Oh, you’re heist-drunk, Kitty Kat. And you have been since the Henley.”