The Lady Has a Past (Burning Cove #5) - Amanda Quick Page 0,21

At the bottom of the stairs Lyra remembered the notepad next to the phone on the kitchen wall.

“Hang on,” she said. “I want to check one thing.”

The men watched her walk quickly across the living room, through the dining room, and into the kitchen. After a moment they followed, stopping in the doorway.

“What are you looking for?” Simon asked.

“I don’t think these are doodles,” Lyra said. “Raina was a professionally trained secretary in New York. She knows shorthand. She uses it routinely to keep her investigative notes. We need to find someone who can translate these squiggles for us.”

She started to tear off the top page of the notepad but changed her mind and took the whole pad instead. There might be earlier entries that could prove helpful.

“I know a professional secretary who is proficient in shorthand,” Luther said. “Elena Torres manages the head office at the Burning Cove Hotel. Oliver Ward, the owner, says Mrs. Torres runs the entire hotel. Says he just tries to stay out of her way.”

“He sounds like a very smart man,” Lyra said. “A good secretary is the key to a successful business. My father often says he couldn’t run Brazier Shipping without his secretary, Mrs. Lee. Unfortunately, Father never made the leap to the obvious conclusion.”

Simon and Luther looked at her.

“What conclusion is that?” Simon asked.

He had the expression of a man who is unwillingly fascinated by the sight of a slow-moving train wreck, Lyra thought. Or maybe it was the look of a man who is standing on the tracks watching the train come toward him.

She smiled the smile she reserved for people who assumed she was not very bright. It was a smile that never failed to dazzle.

“What my father failed to realize is that a woman is fully capable of running Brazier Shipping,” she said.

“You?” Simon asked.

“Me.” She turned to Luther. “Let’s ask Mrs. Torres to consult for us.”

Chapter 10

Lyra Brazier was the woman he had hoped to find in Burning Cove. Damn near perfect, Simon decided. Sophisticated, modern—an interesting, spirited woman who was free to get involved in a short-term, no-strings-attached affair.

Perfect. Except she wasn’t, and he could not figure out why.

In theory she was exactly what he was looking for, but the reality was that she was proving to be complicated and unpredictable. He did not need a complicated and unpredictable woman in his life. On top of that obvious fact, it was clear she had concluded he was going to be a problem she would just as soon have done without.

Okay, he wasn’t the most diplomatic person in the world, but it wasn’t his fault that she stood out as the glaring new element in Raina Kirk’s life, the anomaly that disrupted the pattern. Facts were facts.

She was inexperienced in her new profession—she had been on the job at Kirk Investigations for a mere four days—but this afternoon she had displayed some insightful detective skills. She was the one who had picked up what might prove to be the first solid lead in the disappearance of Raina Kirk. It was the reason they were gathered in the inner office of Oliver Ward, the owner of the Burning Cove Hotel.

“Miss Kirk was obviously taught the Gregg method in secretarial school.” Elena Torres examined the marks on the top sheet of the notepad Lyra had given her. “And I must say she has a very fine hand. But you need to understand that, over time, every professional develops a personal style of shorthand, one that incorporates her own shortcuts.”

“I know,” Lyra said. “My father’s secretary explained that to me when she showed me how she transcribes dictation. It was like reading and writing another language. Amazing. It was thanks to her that I realized the marks on that paper might be shorthand. Do you think you can make anything of them?”

“Yes, I’m sure I can,” Elena said. She picked up a secretarial pad and a pencil. “I’m a Gregg secretary, too.”

Simon stood quietly in the back of the room, arms folded, his briefcase at his feet. Oliver had given his chair to his secretary to use while she studied the notepad. He now had one shoulder propped against the wall. He gripped the handle of a cane in his left hand. Simon recognized the stance of a man who has dealt with pain for a long time.

Oliver had once been a famous magician who had nearly been killed onstage. Simon had never seen his act but he was well