The Property of a Lady - Elizabeth Adler [50]
“Oh, all right!” She flung it back on the plate. “Solovsky wanted me to help him.”
“And?”
“I said I would, if he would help me.”
Cal stared at her but she was avoiding his eyes. “This is serious, Genie,” he said quietly. “I’m a friend, I’m on your side, but you can’t go around making promises to guys like Solovsky and not keeping them.”
She shrugged. “What’s so serious? He’s just a man, like you.”
“Not quite. First Solovsky is Russian, then he’s a man.”
She glanced up defensively. “I’m only doing what you asked—for our country, remember? Besides, he only asked me to do what you did—and he told me even less. But he did tell me about the billions.”
“Did he?” Cal looked thoughtful. “But you still decided to skip out of Geneva without telling me?”
“I was just impatient to get started, that’s all. I had some personal things to consider … I had to rearrange my schedule. I meant to call you as soon as I arrived.”
“So? What’s your next move?”
“I … I haven’t thought it out yet. I’ll let you know.”
He nodded and glanced at his watch. “Fine,” he said. “Remember to do just that. I’ve got one or two things of my own to take care of. You must be tired; after all, you had no sleep last night. Why don’t you give me a call in the morning and we can discuss how to proceed?”
Suddenly he was all business and she found herself on her feet and on her way out of the door. The meeting was over! “But—” she exclaimed.
“But what, Genie Reese?”
His reddish-brown eyes were gentle again as he looked at her and she sighed with relief. “I thought you were really mad at me. I’m doing my best. I’m just not used to accounting to other people, I’m used to working on my own.”
“No problem,” he said abruptly. “Just don’t disappear again without telling me. You got me worried.”
She walked slowly back to her room feeling the pull of fatigue in her spine, wishing he had asked her to have dinner with him again tonight. But she told herself that anyway she would never have made it, she was just too exhausted. Too much had happened in too short a space of time and her whole life had been turned upside down. All she wanted was sleep—and tomorrow, somehow, she would get to meet the man who had bought the Ivanoff emerald. Though she wasn’t about to tell Cal Warrender that yet.
Maryland
Missie pinned the brooch with the five diamond plumes at the neck of her blue dress, holding up the mirror to admire it. She touched the golden wolf’s head, remembering when Misha had given it to her and the awful time when she thought she had lost it forever. The brooch and his photograph were her most precious possessions, along with Azaylee’s childhood photographs and those of her beloved Anna.
Of course she had had other jewels, but this one piece had signified both her love for Misha and the end of an era, because when they had left Russia she had been plunged into a world she had not known existed.
She glanced around at her calm, luxurious suite, with its pale peach walls and silk curtains, the soft cream carpets and her beautiful antique Turkish rugs. Her familiar paintings hung on the walls and a fire glowed comfortably in the elegant marble fireplace. And outside, beyond the swagged peach taffeta curtains drawn against the cold night, were green lawns and shade trees and the lake with the swans and the mallards. Fairlawns was light-years away from Constantinople at the end of 1917.
Constantinople
They had arrived with only the few rubles Tariq had given them. Those had soon disappeared in payment for their room and board at a small wooden house high in the hills overlooking the Golden Horn.
Sofia had unpicked the jewels from Missie’s skirt and Azaylee’s pinafore and taken them to a Chinese merchant, who, after inspecting them for a long time, had said that the beautiful settings were worthless to him and he would pay only for the gems themselves. For a bagful of jewels worth a fortune, he offered the equivalent of two hundred American dollars. They had no choice but to accept.