Author: Tiffany Reisz

“He is kind of gay for the Bible,” Nora agreed. “So what?”

“So, I watched him one night opening his Bible. He turned to a page and smiled. I’d never seen him smile like that. I know he didn’t see me watching him. I know he wouldn’t have smiled like that for me to see.”

“Smiling at the Bible? Must have been reading Song of Solomon.”

“Not quite.”

Marie-Laure opened her Bible and took out a scrap of paper, yellowed slightly with age.

“He’d stepped out for a moment. Father Henry came for him. Alone with his Bible, I told myself I simply wanted to see if he’d written our names and the date of our marriage in it. He hadn’t, of course. My heart broke but still I turned the pages. Perhaps I’d find some comfort in this book he read so much. I found no comfort, but I did find this.”

She handed the note to Nora. The bodyguard made no move as Nora reached out and took it from her. Carefully she unfolded it and read the words.

You Blond Monster, I’d give my right arm for another night like last night. Knowing you, you’d take it.

At the bottom of the note were two more words.

Je t’aime.

French for I love you.

Kingsley had left Søren a love note in his Bible, and Søren had kept it.

“There were dozens of them,” Marie-Laure continued, the mad smile now gone from her face. “Dozens of notes from my brother to my husband. Most were like that—a mix of hate and love. Some were only love. Some only hate. One note...” Marie-Laure paused to laugh. “One note simply said, ‘Bad news—I’m pregnant. It’s yours.’ My brother and his sense of humor.” She shook her head like an older sister would at the stupid joke of her younger brother.

Nora wanted to laugh, too, at young Kingsley’s thirty-year-old dirty joke, but at the sweetness of it, the silliness, the absolute intimacy implied by the stupid crack that Kingsley felt the need to write down and tuck into Søren’s Bible for him to find and laugh over later. No one finding those notes could have missed the meaning of them. Kingsley and Søren—it wasn’t sex or lust that brought them together again and again. They’d been in love. Nora knew it. She’d known it for years. But Marie-Laure hadn’t known it until that moment.

“I kept this one note as evidence if I needed it,” Marie-Laure said, her voice now cold and emotionless again. “I left the rest where I found them. My husband...I’d never met anyone so intelligent. And yet, love made him so weak and so foolish that he left two dozen pieces of evidence of his affair with my brother inside his Bible. Oh, yes, my husband was weak. Love made him weak. And I realized then love had made me weak, too. I didn’t want to be weak anymore.”

“I know they would have told you in time about them. Kingsley doesn’t like talking about that part of himself. But he would have. Eventually I know he would have.”

“Doesn’t matter. They lied by omission. They used me.”

“Used you? Søren told you that he wasn’t in love with you. You knew that before you married him. He thought you wanted the money, thought you needed it.”

“I wanted him, loved him. And he didn’t love me. My own brother didn’t even love me. Kingsley loved my husband more than his own flesh and blood. My husband loved my brother more than his own wife. I didn’t know what to do. The notes I’d read...the words were burned into my mind. I prayed all the time. Days and days of walking alone in the woods trying to clear my head, trying to find an answer. Instead, I found the hermitage...their hermitage. And I got the miracle I’d prayed for.”

“What miracle?”

“A girl, a runaway, hiding out in the hermitage. Long dark hair, almost my height. It was meant to be. Destiny. She was perfect.”

“Perfect for what?”

“I’d given all the options so much thought. I could tell Christian what was happening. He loved me, worshipped me, thought my husband insane for never touching me. If I’d asked him he would kill my husband for me...kill my brother. But then I thought of those notes and how much they must love each other. And I did love Kingsley even though he’d stolen my husband’s affections from me. So I knew what I would do. I would kill myself.”

“But you didn’t. You killed that poor girl.”

“She had nothing. Nothing at all. She thought she’d find a new life in America. I merely saved her the heartache of disappointment.”

“By murdering her? Yeah, you’re all heart.”

“She was a gift. She made it so easy to disappear. No one even looked for me. I found the road, hitchhiked into Canada, found someone to take care of me...so easy to die.”

“You didn’t die. You murdered someone.”

Marie-Laure only shrugged as she sat her white Bible back on the bedside table.

“Someone had to die for their sins, their lies. But I’m starting to think...”

Her voice trailed off and she tapped her chin.

Fear shivered over Nora’s skin.

“Think what?” she whispered.

“That one death was not enough.”

12

THE PAWN

Laila watched as her uncle and Kingsley spoke to each other in hushed French. She ached to know what the note said that she’d delivered. As the carrier, she felt she deserved to be told what it said. The anguish on her uncle’s face, his naked fear, however, kept her from demanding more answers. He’d tell her in time if she needed to know. No matter how scared she was, she trusted him.

“Hey,” came Wes’s soft voice at her shoulder. “Let’s go get your face cleaned up. Okay?”

She let him take her by the hand as she stood up on shaking legs. He led her to a bathroom at the end of the hall. While Wes dug through drawers she sat on the countertop by the sink.

“Wow.”

“Wow what?” she asked, keeping her back to the mirror behind her. She didn’t even want to see how bad she looked.

“There is, like, an entire hospital full of first-aid supplies in this bathroom. I’m not even going to think about why.”

Laila smiled. “I can probably guess.”

Wes washed his hands in the sink for a solid two minutes. He scrubbed his nails, used tons of soap and scalding water and dried them on a new clean towel.

“You wash your hands like a surgeon,” she said.

He smiled ear to ear, a smile so bright it was like a sunbeam breaking through the clouds. But the cloud came back in an instant and both sun and smile were gone again.

“I work in a hospital. Part-time orderly stuff. I want to be a doctor someday, though.” Wes tossed the towel aside.

“I work in an animal clinic. I’d be too scared to work with people. They talk back.”

“That’s my problem with working with animals. They can’t tell me where it hurts.” He stood directly in front of her so that her knees almost touched his hips. “Can you tell me where it hurts?”

“I think I’m okay. I’m sore all over.”

“You must have put up a fight. I’m going to touch your face now.”

He took her gently by the chin and turned her face toward the light.

“I tried. He was too strong.”

“Don’t feel bad. They got me, too.” He pointed to the bandage on his temple. “Whoever it was did a good job knocking me out without actually hurting me. I think these people are professionals. That scares me more than anything.”

“Did they take you, too?”

He shook his head and she sensed his regret.

“I wish they had. We were at my house in Kentucky. I got hit or something and when I came to a few seconds later, she was gone.”

“She was with you?”

He nodded as he raised a wet cotton ball and started to stroke her cheek with it. From the corner of her eye she saw the cotton ball turning pink with blood.

“Yeah. We’re...friends. She was visiting me. We went horseback riding and came back to the stables. We talked about something and then...it all went black. When I came to, she was gone.”

“That’s awful. Are you okay?”

“As okay as anyone would be, I guess.”

“You don’t look okay.” He didn’t. He might be the most gorgeous guy she’d ever seen in her life, but he also happened to be the most gorgeous guy she’d ever seen in her life who looked like he would pass out any minute. “You look bad.”

“Your English is really good. Too good.”

She laughed as he tossed the cotton ball and picked up a clean one.

“I’m sorry. Everyone in Denmark learns English. My uncle’s been making me speak it to him all my life so I would get better at it. I didn’t mean you look ugly. You look sick.”

“Don’t apologize,” he said, rubbing her cheek with antibiotic ointment. “I haven’t eaten or slept since this all happened. At least they left me alive. And you. You sure you’re okay?”

“I’m okay. Are you?”

“No. I mean, yes. I mean, I won’t be okay until Nora’s safe.”

“Me, too. I can’t... If something happens to her...” Tears started to run down her face again. Wes handed her a tissue and kept working on her cheek.

“Nora’s the toughest woman alive. I keep telling myself that,” Wes said as he applied a pad of gauze to her cheek.

“She is. I believe in her. I know he’ll do whatever he can to get her back.”

“So will I.”

He taped the gauze to her cheek and smoothed it down.

“I’ll check it in a few hours.”

“Thank you.” She raised her hand and touched her face. She felt better already.

“Are you hurt anywhere else? I can get Grace. She’s really nice. If you think, you know, you’re hurt somewhere else...” His words were plain and simple but she could see the concern in his eyes, the searching look.

“I wasn’t raped.”

He stared at her as if trying to discern whether or not she was lying to him. No wonder he’d been so careful with her, not even touching her without warning her of his every move first.

“I work the E.R. a lot. I’ve seen women come in for sprained wrists and broken noses and stitches—they say the same thing. If you were, we need to get you checked out. You don’t want to wait. If it happened, it’s not your fault at all. But you have to tell somebody.”

“I was conscious the whole time.”

“Are you sure? It only takes a minute sometimes.”

“I’m sure.” She looked him in the eyes so he would believe her.

“Okay, I believe you.”

“I promise, if that happened I would tell you.”

“Good.”

Wes put his arm around her and helped her down off the countertop. She took advantage of their proximity to smell his hair. He smelled like summer, like warm, clean towels drying in the sun. She wanted to stretch out in the warmth of him like a cat lying in the sun.

He bent over the sink and started washing the blood off his hands. Laila wondered if she should give him some privacy in the bathroom, but before she could go, he paused in his hand-washing and put his hands on the counter and closed his eyes.

“What’s wrong?” She watched his face, the pained set to his mouth.

“I should eat something.” She saw sweat break out on his face. His hands shook. Not eating for a day should only make him hungry. This was something more.

“You’re...” She tried to remember the English word for it. “Diabetisk?” she said, recognizing the symptoms of a blood sugar crash.

“Yeah. How did you—”

“Even dogs have it. Sit down.” She put an arm around his waist and helped lower him to the floor. Better get him on the floor now before he ended up there by fainting. “My turn to be the doctor.”