Authors: Sandra Marton
Thurston gave a long, sorrowful sigh. He rose from the table, retrieved two bottles of ale, set one in front of Conor and sat down again.
"There's no mistake. And before you ask, no, Moreau is not bisexual. He goes one way and one way only. He likes men."
Conor let out a soundless whistle.
"Unbelievable," he said softly.
"Eva and Hoyt are concerned."
"You told them about Moreau?"
Harry laughed. "Of course not. They're worried about how casually Miranda's been dealing with the situation."
"Which situation? Dammit, Harry..."
"That first note to Eva, the threats the girl received in Paris. They find her rather relaxed attitude disturbing."
Conor smiled grimly. "Eva's exhibiting maternal instincts, is she?"
Harry shook his head. If Eva had any maternal instincts, he'd yet to notice.
"The Winthrops are simply waiting for the other shoe to drop. For that matter, so am I. It would be irresponsible to assume the worst is over. And then there's Hoyt's appointment. The President can't keep it on hold much longer."
"Poor Hoyt."
"You can take as sarcastic a tone as you like, Conor. The fact remains that there is cause for concern."
Conor shoved back his chair and stood up. "Okay, let's stop jerking each other around. What do you want from me? You've got Breverman on this and he's been around long enough to know what he's doing."
A muscle flexed in Harry Thurston's jaw.
"By the time he does," he said quietly, "it may be too late."
Conor's eyes locked on Thurston's face. "Have there been more notes?"
"No."
"What, then? Has somebody tried a break-in at the Winthrop place?"
"No. Not there, or at the duplex the girl's taken on the East Side."
"Maybe I'm missing something here. She's not getting any more notes, there's been no break-in..." His eyes darkened. "Has she been hurt?"
"She's fine. Breverman's been keeping tabs on her—when he can."
"What do you mean, when he can?"
Harry sighed. "I mean just that. The Beckman girl manages to disappear on him whenever it suits her fancy."
"She..." Conor laughed and sat down again. "Are you telling me that a babe who knows more about shadowing her eyelids than shadowing someone has figured out a way to lose Breverman?"
"That's what I said. She's completely uncooperative. He wants to talk to her, you know, ask some questions, she won't let him. He wants to go inside, check out her apartment, she won't permit it. It's as if she's playing a game where she gets points for being stupid."
"She isn't stupid," Conor said sharply.
"I didn't say she was stupid, I said she was
being
stupid. There's a difference."
Conor thought of how he'd let himself get carried away that last night he'd spent with Miranda. Tell me about being stupid, he thought, and he kicked back his chair, picked up his plate and carried it to the trash can.
"I still fail to see what any of this has to do with me," he said, scraping his meal into the garbage.
Thurston rose, too. "Did you have a relationship with her?"
Conor's fork clattered to the floor. He bent down and picked it up.
"If you mean, did she show as much contempt for me as she's showing for Breverman—"
"I mean just what I said." There was nothing friendly or casual in Thurston's voice or face. "Did you have a relationship with Miranda Beckman?"
Conor turned and faced him. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"
"You slept with her. Or you wanted to sleep with her. I don't know which, O'Neil, but sure as God grows little green apples, something happened between the two of you, in Paris."
Conor's smile seemed pasted to his face as he strode to the cabin door.
"Good-bye, Harry," he said, reaching for the denim jacket he'd left hanging on a wall peg. "Thanks for the fishing and the recipe."
"I'm right," Thurston said, his voice rising, "something did happen, something you can use to work your way into her life again and get you close enough to her to keep her alive."
"Shove it, Harry." Conor reached for the door. "You and I both know you're full of—"
"Breverman intercepted a package sent to her yesterday. It was a carton. A small one. Came sealed, delivered by messenger."
Conor stopped, his hand on the doorknob. Don't ask any questions, he told himself fiercely, for God's sake, don't!
"You want to know what was in that box, O'Neil?"
Conor turned slowly, his eyes meeting Thurston's.
"A pair of very dead cats," the older man said softly. "One was a Siamese, like the girl's. The other had coal-black fur and green eyes." His mouth twisted. "You'll forgive me if I leave the details until after I've digested my lunch."
Conor nodded. It was bad, but it wasn't over yet; he could see it in Thurston's eyes.
"And?"
"And, there was a note." Thurston reached into his shirt pocket and drew out a folded piece of paper. "Perhaps you should read it for yourself."
Conor stared at his boss's outstretched hand. Slowly, he reached for the note. His brain registered that it was different from the others. This wasn't handwritten. The words were made up of letters that had been clipped from newspapers, then pasted on a sheet of plain white paper so that they looked lopsided and seemed, at first, to make no sense... and then, all at once, they did.
Miranda, darling Miranda
, the note said.
Soon you'll agree that a dead pussy is the only kind that's worth fucking.
Conor heard a roaring in his ears. He forced himself to take a deep, deep breath. Then he read the note again.
"Well?" Thurston asked, when the men's eyes met.
"I'm going to kill the piece of shit who wrote this," Conor said. His voice was calm, as if they were discussing nothing more urgent than the weather, but a vein had risen in his forehead and pulsed visibly just beneath his skin.
Thurston's lips curved in what might have been a smile.
"I take it you're back on board, then?"
"Call Langley. I want a plane waiting at Charlottesville to fly me to New York."
Thurston pulled a cell phone from his pocket. "Done. What else?"
"I get
carte blanche.
No idiocy with filling out forms in triplicate, no wasting time getting court orders if I need to do something that's not quite kosher."
"Of course."
"And you'd better make sure the Committee understands that I'll do whatever it takes to protect the girl, even if it means the President ends up with dirt on his shoes."
"My dear boy, presidents never end up with dirt on anything."
"Nixon did."
Thurston's smile flickered on again. "Ah, but Nixon didn't have the Committee. Do whatever you must. Just clean up this mess, once and for all."
Conor pulled on his jacket. "You're all heart, Harry, did anybody ever tell you that?"
"Having a heart never meant a thing in this business, O'Neil. When you come down to it, having one's a liability. You, of all people, should know that."
Conor nodded. He had not only known it, he had lived by it. And he would, again, when this was over.
* * *
Boring, Miranda thought, bor-ing!
Why had she let herself be talked into attending this party?
Eva had told her it was a charity function. Papillon, she'd said, believed in supporting good works. What she'd neglected to mention was that the purpose of this particular good work was to raise monies to provide works of art for homeless shelters around the city.
Art? For people who needed roofs over their heads and, probably, food in their bellies?
It was a concept that was totally Eva. There she was now, holding court across the room, her hairdo impeccable, her makeup perfect, her gown the latest creation from Donna Karan. Hoyt was beside her, resplendent in his tuxedo, looking for all the world like the perfect ambassador though he wasn't an ambassador. Not yet.
To hear Eva tell it, that was her fault.
"Those dreadful notes surely originated with someone of your acquaintance," she'd said at dinner the first night Miranda was back in the States. "Please be sure you keep better friends, so long as you remain in this city—which we shall help you do, by having you live here, with us."
Miranda had sat there, smiling politely. The next morning, she'd gone apartment-hunting, subletting the first place that was acceptable. Then she'd made some phone calls to people she knew. Hi, she'd said, wasn't it cool? She was in town and hey, where did people go to have fun?
The next day, she was living in her new apartment and the day after that, she'd made both
The Huffington Post
and
Page Six,
her name splashed in heavy black print beneath photos of her snapped on the dance floor at a hot little club in the meatpacking district where she'd probably been the only person in the place who didn't have a tongue full of gold studs.
Eva had phoned, voice icy with disapproval.
"The Papillon image is not well-served by such publicity," she'd snapped, and Miranda had said that if Eva preferred, she could find someone else to be the Chrysalis girl.
Eva had made it clear that personal preference had little to do with the situation. Using Miranda as the Chrysalis model was the story she and Hoyt had concocted to explain her return. Miranda had almost laughed. She'd thought of pointing out that people who knew them also knew that mother and daughter had barely spoken to each other in the past eight years, but she'd simply repeated, politely, that the choice was Eva's.
She would conduct her personal life as she saw fit.
"As you always have," Eva had snarled, and hung up.
A couple of hours later Hoyt had called and asked, pleasantly enough, if Miranda could please try to keep a low profile until things calmed down.
"Meaning what?" Miranda had asked, just as pleasantly. "Meaning, stay low until Eva sells a billion new lipsticks? Or until you get your precious appointment?"
Why, until it was certain no harm would come to her. Or to Eva, Hoyt had said in a wounded tone.
"I've never wanted anything but the best for you both, Miranda," he'd said. "You know that."
Tonight, Hoyt seemed to hear Miranda's thoughts. He looked around, caught her eye, and smiled. Miranda didn't smile back. His charm was wasted on her. She didn't like him. She never had, though Eva insisted that wasn't true, that she'd adored him, when she was little.
"Miss Beckman?"
A tall man with a bristling mustache and a shiny bald head had appeared at her elbow.
"It is such a pleasure to have you here, Miss Beckman."
Miranda smiled dutifully. "It's a pleasure to be here."
"Such a fine, charitable event, don't you think?"
What she thought was that the event was stupid and anybody who didn't realize that was even stupider. Not that she was much better. Here she was, back where she'd sworn she'd never be, at Eva's beck and call.
At least she'd had the sense to look up Brian Stone and ask him to represent her.
"...so many organizations raising money for food and clothing and shelter that we asked ourselves, why should we duplicate..."
Brian hadn't turned a hair at the thought of getting as much money as possible out of Miranda's own flesh and blood. Thanks to him, Papillon was paying a fortune so it could plaster her face everywhere. Even Jean-Phillipe was impressed. Nita was, too. The last time they'd spoken on the phone, she'd laughed and gone straight to the nitty-gritty.
"This is so great, girlfriend! That mama of yours, paying through the nose to have you in her ads after she once dumped you like a load of dirty laundry!"
Trust Nita to put the right spin on things. Viewed that way, being in New York wasn't so bad. Eva was eating crow, Miranda was getting terrific exposure, the notes had stopped coming—and Conor, the meddling son of a bitch, was out of her life.
But the news wasn't all good. O'Neil had been replaced by a jerk named Breverman. He'd come straight to her door, rung the bell and introduced himself.
"How do you do, Miss Beckman," he'd said. "My name is Robert Breverman but please, call me Bob." Then he'd flashed a government ID at her.
A private detective peering over her shoulder had been bad enough but to have Big Brother breathing down her neck was ridiculous, especially since the nut who'd sent the awful notes and the picture had faded back into the woodwork.
She'd asked Eva to call the guy off but Eva had shrugged her shoulders and said it wasn't up to her, that the government was doing what it had to do to safeguard Hoyt. So Miranda had swallowed her pride and asked Hoyt to see about getting rid of Breverman but Hoyt had only given her that phony, elder-statesman smile and launched into a speech about the importance of patience and tolerance.
Finally, she'd taken things into her own hands and figured out ways to give Call-Me-Bob the slip. It was almost painfully easy, considering that she could pick him out of a crowd at a hundred yards. Hadn't ever occurred to him that not that many guys hung around the Papillon offices on Fifth Avenue or the building on Madison, where Brian Stone had his agency, wearing black suits that had a shine and black wing-tips that didn't?