The Mist

Chapter 13

Dublin, Ireland

1:05 a.m., IST

August 26

Lizzie welcomed the lights and activity of Dublin late at night. Her cab dropped her in front of her family’s boutique hotel, located on a side street off St. Stephen’s Square. Two uniformed bellmen, one of them her twenty-two-year-old cousin Justin, greeted her at the brass-trimmed main door with a bow that always made her feel like a princess, which she decidedly was not, especially tonight. She was too stiff, too scraped and felt too hunted to be anything but what she was-a woman who needed a hot bath and a friendly face. Although the flight from Kerry to Dublin was less than an hour, she finally felt her fatigue, dragging down her spirits, making her even more aware of her isolation-of what she’d done.

Fresh out of college, Justin was the youngest of the Rush brothers, working in Dublin for at least the next six months. His sensitive mouth and dreamy navy-blue eyes were from his mother, but his tawny-hair and square jaw were all Rush.

He eyed Lizzie’s backpack, her walking shoes tied to the strap by their laces. She’d brushed the mud and dung off them as best she could, but he wasn’t impressed. “Those shoes, Lizzie. Do you want me to toss them?”

He hadn’t had Rush frugality drilled into him by their Whitcomb-Rush grandmother the way she had. “You don’t think they can be salvaged?”

He peered at them. “What did you do, tramp through a pasture? They’re filthy inside and out, and, no, I don’t think they can be salvaged.” He shifted his gaze to her. “Where have you been?”

“A stone circle in West Cork.”

“In a gale?”

“The best time.”

She smiled and started up the half-dozen steps to the lobby, but he grabbed her muddy pack from her. “Excuse me, ma’am, but carrying luggage, even luggage that smells like a barn, is my job.”

“You’re not supposed to comment on whether a guest’s luggage is old, ripped, cheap-”

“Covered in sheep manure?”

“I think it’s cow manure.”

“Terrific,” he said without enthusiasm.

When they reached the lobby, quiet and softly lit this late, Lizzie felt herself start to relax. She was back on familiar ground and just wanted to sink into one of the comfortable chairs angled in front of the fireplace.

Justin was staring at her bloodied knuckles now. “What did you do, get into a brawl in your stone circle?”

“I discovered that Beware of Bull signs are posted for a reason.”

Technically it wasn’t a lie. Her cousin looked skeptical, but there was no need to involve him or anyone at the hotel in her problems, or to give them any information that the garda or the FBI might decide they wanted.

She retrieved her room key from the front desk and turned to Justin. “I’ll take my bag upstairs myself. If anyone asks about me, say I’m in Las Vegas. No. Not Vegas. My father’s there. Rome. Tell them I’m in Rome.”

“How is Uncle Harlan?”

“Losing at poker last I spoke with him.”

“He wouldn’t know what to do with a winning hand,” Justin said. “I can have your shoes cleaned overnight. Try, anyway.”

“Thanks, Justin, but I’ll hang on to them.” Lizzie pushed a hand through her hair, still tangled from the wind and her fight with Michael Murphy. “Do you happen to know if a Brit named Will Davenport is scheduled for a late check-in?”

“Lizzie…”

She could see from her cousin’s expression she’d guessed right. Justin would be on top of all guest arrivals. “When he gets here, call me, okay? He’s British. Tall, blond.”

“We’re talking about Lord Davenport, right?”

“You know him?”

“We’ve never met. His younger sister’s a wedding dress designer in London. Lady Arabella Davenport.”

“How do you know these things?”

He grinned. “I’m the bellman. I know everything. Lady Davenport designed the dresses for a wedding here this summer. Mum was visiting then, and you know how she is.”

Lizzie did, indeed. Her aunt loved anything connected with fabrics and design, especially if it involved hotels or weddings. Preferably both. “She put you through an analysis of every stitch?”

Justin gave a long-suffering nod. “It would help if you’d hang out with her once in a while and let her talk to you about these things.”

“I adore Aunt Henrietta, but talking wedding dresses-”

“Better than taking on an Irish bull.”

Lizzie pictured Arabella Davenport’s older brother walking into the quiet pub before her fight in the stone circle. Whatever his sister’s talents, Lizzie was certain that his didn’t involve weddings. As controlled and polite as he’d been, he’d clearly arrived in the little village on Kenmare Bay prepared to do battle. But she suspected he arrived everywhere prepared to do battle.

She shook off the image. “I’m wiped out, Justin. I’ll see you in the morning.”

She got two steps before her cousin spoke again. “Did Lord Davenport have a role in muddying your shoes?”

She glanced back at him. Perhaps because he was the youngest, or so much his mother’s son, Justin had a tendency to see more than most people in a similar position would see. “It’s a long story.”

“With you, Lizzie, it always is.” He sighed. “I’ll call when your Brit gets here.”

Should her circumstances call for a quick exit, Lizzie’s one-bedroom suite was conveniently located on the second floor near the stairs. She brought her backpack into the bathroom and set it on the tile floor, where any crusts of dried mud and manure that fell off would do the least damage. As she stripped to her skin, she fought back images of whipping her pack against Michael Murphy’s assault knife…of the drooling, snarling black dog…of the swirling fog and mist.

Instinct and training had taken over the moment she’d realized she wasn’t alone in the stone circle, but now, in the familiar surroundings of her favorite hotel, she could finally let down her guard-at least until Lord Davenport arrived. But she and Keira Sullivan had come close to being killed a few hours ago. Would Will have arrived in time to save them if she’d failed?

A moot question, Lizzie told herself as she pulled on a cuddly hotel robe and tied it tightly around her waist.

She went into the beautifully appointed living room of the suite and ordered a full Irish breakfast from room service. Her blackberry crumble was long gone, and she was starving. But she resisted ordering brandy, or a martini.

She sank onto the sofa and grabbed a deck of cards off the coffee table, an antique she and her aunt had bought two years ago at an estate sale in County Clare. Each of the hotel’s thirty-seven rooms was individually decorated, as much as possible, with furnishings and objets d’art from Ireland.

Against her father’s objections, Lizzie had spent eighteen months working at their Dublin hotel, loving every minute. She and her aunt had crawled through countless Irish galleries, choosing Irish paintings, pottery, sculpture, glasswork, throws and whatever else caught their fancy. Lizzie recognized a copper vase they’d found at a gallery in Kenmare. It was fashioned by a contemporary Irish metalworker but reminded her of the old mines where Keira’s story of the stone angel had originated.

Lizzie moved the copper vase and a stack of books on Ireland aside, creating space on the table, and dealt the cards into four piles of thirteen each for a game of bridge. She sorted the hands and counted up the points, then silently bid each one as if she didn’t know what was in the others. She produced an offense and defense and played the game. Flipping one card after another, keeping track of aces and kings and trump cards, scooping up winners and losers. The process anchored her mind while allowing it the freedom to roam.

She had to have her thoughts in order before she made the call she knew she had to make.

The offense won. She dealt another hand.

Her breakfast was delivered by a longtime employee of the hotel, an older woman who didn’t ask why Lizzie was having breakfast at such an hour. She set the tray on the coffee table, and when she left, Lizzie debated eating her meal, taking her bath and going to bed. She could postpone her call and tell Justin to never mind and not to let her know after all when Will Davenport arrived.

Instead she buttered a chunk of brown bread and took a bite as she got out her disposable cell phone and dialed a number she’d received in a terse e-mail last summer. She’d called it only twice before, preferring to stick to e-mail whenever possible.

It was just after 9:00 p.m. on the U.S. East Coast, but John March picked up after the first ring. “Where are you?”

“ Ireland.” No reason not to tell him that much. “ Norman didn’t go on a joy ride this morning. He didn’t crash into a mountain or run into mechanical problems and make an emergency landing somewhere. You know that, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry about what happened today. I wish I’d known sooner. Are Scoop Wisdom and your daughter-”

“You’re the one who needs to do the talking.”

Lizzie’s heart jumped painfully. “The bomb was a diversion, wasn’t it?” Her father had taught her about bombs, diversionary tactics. “ Norman had your daughter kidnapped, didn’t he?”

“Talk.”

She picked up her fork. If she let John March intimidate her now, she’d be of no help to him or anyone else-especially Abigail Browning. “I’m debating whether to try black pudding,” she said, poking it on her plate. “What do you think?”

“It’s made with pig’s blood. Tastes like sausage.”

She could hear anguish in his voice. “White pudding?”

“No pig’s blood. Suet, oatmeal. This and that.”

“Doesn’t sound very appetizing. I guess some things I just don’t want to know.”

“That’s true for any of us.”

Under the strength and determination that had characterized the FBI director in her dealings with him, Lizzie now heard the terror of a father for his missing daughter.

“Are you still in Boston?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Simon?”

“He’s still here, too.”

Lizzie stared at the warm brown bread, butter, eggs, bacon, grilled tomatoes-the black and white pudding-on her simple white china plate, all a reminder of normalcy. She’d led a relatively normal life of family, work, travel and the occasional romance and adventure before she’d let her curiosity-her sense of duty-ask questions and see things others might ignore. Once she’d found herself in a room of violent drug traffickers, what was she supposed to have done? She’d started by e-mailing names and surreptitious photos to John March.

But hadn’t she been looking for an excuse to contact the detective who’d looked into her mother’s death thirty years ago?

It didn’t matter. Instead of dropping out of Norman ’s circle of friends as she otherwise would have, Lizzie had dived in and hung on for the next year.

“ Norman will never look at himself and understand he was arrested because he did wrong.” She spoke calmly, despite her own fatigue and fear. “He’ll blame you and Simon. And me, if he ever finds out what I’ve done.”

March didn’t soften. “You’re the woman who saved Keira Sullivan and warned Bob O’Reilly about the bomb.”

“I’m not sure Keira needed my help. An Irish gale, an ancient stone circle, a black dog out of nowhere. Spooky.” Not to mention an aristocratic British spy. Lizzie stabbed her fork into the black pudding and cut off a small piece. “For all the time I’ve spent in Ireland, I’ve never tried black or white pudding. I suppose you have Michael Murphy’s file on your desk by now?”

“The Irish authorities are cooperating in the investigation.”

An oblique response. “He’s Norman ’s doing.”

“No one’s leaping to any conclusions.”

“I am,” Lizzie said.

“Estabrook has no reason to take this risk.”

“Did he have any reason to circumnavigate the world in a hot-air balloon?”

“That’s an adventure.”

“You’re articulating a professional point of view. I understand that, but you don’t believe it. You know as well as I do that Norman is responsible for what happened today. Yesterday here in Ireland, actually. It’s after midnight.” She eyed the bit of pudding on the end of her fork. “Maybe you have to grow up eating black pudding to appreciate it.”

“You’re exhausted. I can hear it in your voice.”

“Maybe a full Irish breakfast will help. I’ve been banged up before, but I was in my first real fight for my life tonight.” She felt herself sinking deeper into the soft cushions of the sofa. “For someone else’s life, too.”

“You won,” March said.

“I could have killed Murphy. I had his own knife at his throat.”

“Did you want to kill him?”

Lizzie let her mind drift back to the moment in the stone circle when she’d first became aware of the shadows by the cluster of trees. “No. I didn’t want to kill him.”

“Why are you in Ireland?”

“I was reading about Irish fairies and decided-”

“You wanted to talk to Simon,” March said.

“It doesn’t matter now. I was almost too late to help Keira. I was too late to warn your daughter.”

“Bob O’Reilly’s daughter and Scoop Wisdom are alive because of you.”

Lizzie felt no satisfaction at March’s statement. “ Norman has virtually limitless resources.”

“The U.S. federal government can match them.”

“He could be anywhere by now. Trust me. He has a plan. He’s not anyone’s victim. He’s compulsive, and he’s a thrill seeker. Be sure your profilers understand what that really means. Be sure you understand. I didn’t see it myself at first, but Norman is a dangerous, violent man.”

She heard March take in a sharp breath. “You let me believe you’re a professional. You’re not, are you?”

She didn’t answer.

“I want to know who you are,” he said.

“You’ll find out on your own soon enough. Please listen to me, Director March. You can’t tell a soul about me or what I’ve done. You can’t come after me. You’ll be risking my life and my ability to help find your daughter if you do.”

“I can have an agent meet you tonight, wherever you are. Let me help you. I don’t want you to endanger yourself or this investigation by taking unnecessary risks.”

“There is one thing.” Lizzie hesitated, wondering if she was going too far-if she’d gone too far already. But she didn’t stop herself. “I have a tall, handsome, patrician Brit on my tail. Will Davenport. He and Simon are friends. He came to Ireland to see about Keira. Can I trust him?”

“Even if you can, would you? Do you trust anyone?”

It wasn’t a question she wanted to answer tonight. “ Norman doesn’t know I’ve been helping you. I want to keep it that way.” She tried a bite of the black pudding. “You didn’t steer me wrong. Black pudding does take like sausage.”

She shut her phone before he could respond.

Would March figure out who she was and have her hotel stormed by armed agents at sunrise? He could make it happen, even in Ireland.

But he wouldn’t. John March was a hard man who often faced only bad choices, and right now, she was safe and his daughter wasn’t. And he’d made his choice. He would let his anonymous source have room to maneuver and give her a chance to find Norman Estabrook-and save her own skin as well as his daughter’s.

Lizzie ate a few more bites of her meal before she gave up and headed for the bathroom, turning on the water in the tub as hot as she could stand. She added a scoop of lavender bath salts and, as they melted, shed her robe and dipped slowly into the steaming water. The heat eased the ache and stiffness in her muscles and the scent of lavender soothed her soul. Images washed over her-Simon and Norman in Montana going over plans for a Patagonia hike…the enigmatic Brit winking at her in Las Vegas…Scoop Wisdom walking out to the street with his colander of beans…Keira Sullivan and the black dog in the stone circle.

Will Davenport eyeing her over his brandy.

Lowering herself deeper into the tub, an image came to her of John March at her family’s hotel in Boston last August. It was the anniversary of her mother’s death, and he was drinking Irish whiskey alone at a table in the pub named in her honor. Lizzie had been in Boston, making one of her strategic appearances at the hotel offices, and had stopped at the Whitcomb.

She hadn’t approached the FBI director and former Boston detective and doubted he’d been aware of her presence. Now she couldn’t help but wonder where they’d all be if she’d identified herself as the anonymous source who’d been supplying him information on Norman Estabrook and his drug-trafficking friends.

But she hadn’t.

She got out of the tub, dried off with a giant towel and slipped back into her robe. She returned to the living room and, no longer in the mood for a chat, set her tray in the hall and called down for its removal. When she sat back on the sofa, she managed to deal another hand of bridge, but she didn’t sort the cards and instead curled up under a throw made of soft Irish wool and gave in to her fatigue.

When the telephone rang, she bolted upright, instantly awake. She glanced at the clock as she answered. It was almost 4:00 a.m.

“He’s here,” Justin said. “What should I do now?”

“Send him up.”

“Lizzie? Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“All right, I won’t tell anyone.”

She felt a surge of heat. “It’s not like that.” But she couldn’t tell him the truth. “I’ll explain one day, Justin, I promise.”

“I imagine it’ll be a tale.”

“Let Davenport think he’s checking into his own room and I’ll take it from there.”

“You lead a complicated life,” her cousin said.

As Lizzie hung up, her bathrobe fell open, the cool night air hitting her exposed skin.

This won’t do, she thought. She’d come to Ireland to talk to an FBI agent about a man she was convinced would commit murder, not to greet a British lord in nothing but a hotel bathrobe.

Best to jump into some clothes before Will Davenport got to the door.