Page 21 of The Queen (Masterpiece Duet 2)
“Are you saying he lied?”
“Of course not,” Damon says, his voice light. “I’m a monster. An animal with sharp claws and no cage whatsoever. Isn’t that right, Penny?”
I startle in the shadows of the lower step, ashamed that he caught me listening. In two steps I’m standing in the dining room, where Damon faces off with a beautiful young woman in a business suit. Her dark hair falls straight past her shoulders. Her ebony eyes glitter with challenge.
Two cups of coffee are between them, the scent potent.
Whether they’re weapons or shields, I’m not sure.
“He’s worried about her,” I say because it’s true. They can argue about whether Damon Scott is a good man or a bad man, but I know he cares what happens to Avery.
The woman doesn’t turn her head when she addresses me. “Pack your things.”
“She’s not going anywhere,” Damon says.
“We have reason to believe she’s being held against her will.”
Damon barks a laugh. “A spy? How much does Gabriel pay him to take it up the ass?”
Someone here last night reported to Gabriel? Is that why this woman came—to rescue me? If she’s the white knight, that casts Damon Scott as the dragon. An appropriate metaphor considering he looks ready to breathe fire. It occurs to me that the more he laughs, the more furious he is.
“I don’t want to leave,” I say quickly, trying to avert disaster.
“Don’t be afraid,” the woman says, sounding imperious. “He can’t touch you.”
Damon’s dark eyes flash. “I can do whatever I want to her, but that’s nothing compared to what I’ll do to someone who tries to take her away from me. That includes you, Nina.”
Nina opens her mouth to say something, but I beat her to it. “I said I don’t want to leave. This is my life, and I make the decisions for me. I’m not going anywhere until Avery is found. I’m not going anywhere until I solve the cipher.”
A clink of silver on china as Nina drops her spoon into the cup.
Too late I realize she doesn’t know about the code.
Sometimes I pretend that people walk around with numbers flashing above their heads—the number of words they say a minute, the amount of money they make a month. The percentage of time they lie when they open their mouths. It helps me get through the world, surrounded by unknowns.
The number above Damon Scott’s head is a four, the place where all numbers converge. He gives a resigned sigh. “There was a note sent to me the night Avery disappeared.”
Nina sucks in a breath. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“How would I have known?” he asks, his voice lethal in its softness. “I had no idea what it was about until Penny showed up last night. Even now I’m not certain it’s related.”
“Let me see it,” she says.
He looks ready to refuse, but I’m not going to hold back something that could help Avery. “I’ll show it to you, and what I’ve tried so far.”
Damon stands with Nina in old-world courtesy, but he makes no move to follow us upstairs. I hesitate, uncertain whether I should let someone invade his space—especially without him being present.
He gives me a wry smile. “Go on upstairs. Show her whatever you want, Penny. But when she leaves, she leaves the note here. She leaves you, too.”
Chapter Fourteen
Nina studies my work with a sharp eye. Her questions are smart and methodical. “Do you have a background in mathematics?” I ask, almost too eager to find a colleague.
“Computer science,” she says. “We need to get this plugged into some decryption algorithms as soon as possible. A brute force attack by hand would take forever.”
“That’s a good idea,” I say, and I mean that.
Nina’s eyebrows rise. “But?”
“No, I mean it is a good idea.” Sometimes people write their computer passwords on paper. It could be a lot of different electronic things. But I have a feeling it isn’t. A feeling isn’t logic. It isn’t anything I can verify or back up, but it’s there nonetheless. “The medium. It could be part of the message.”
“Telling us what?”
“How to decode it,” I say, unable to say more. Strangely unwilling.
“Is this her handwriting?” she asks, sounding dubious.
“I’m not sure,” I admit. “Is Gabriel still at the Emerald? We can ask for a sample.”
“We can do a lot more than that. We can get a handwriting expert. He has a lot of resources, and he’s willing to use every last one to find her.” She reaches for the note, and I pull it back in time. “It will help to have the original.”
“Not if you’re going to plug the numbers into a computer. Handwriting analysis can work off the picture, too.”
She smiles. “Are you on Damon’s side?”
“I’m on whatever side gets Avery back safely,” I say in total honesty.
Her expression reveals nothing. She would be brilliant at poker, if she played. And that’s exactly what she’s doing—playing a game, this one with far higher stakes than clay chips on green velvet. “Are you in Damon’s bed?”
