Page 6 of Final Cost

“This is crazy,”I say, my badly jangled nerves making my voice shaky as I buckle up and we pull away from the curb and merge with a steady flow of traffic. The heavy-duty SUV, complete with blackout windows and, knowing Lucien, bulletproof armor, feels like being safely ensconced in the tallest tower of the castle on the highest hill afterthatunexpected frenzy.

I’m grateful to be out of it. Really grateful.

“Are you okay, Ms. Scott?” Hank asks, now buckling his own seatbelt in the front passenger seat.

“I’m fine,” I say, and I mean it. “Call me, Tamsyn. I just don’t get why the press was even there. Why would they want to talk to me? I’m nobody.”

He twists at the waist and gives me an incredulous look over his shoulder. The question seems to amuse him. “You’re Lucien Winter’s girlfriend —”

“Not anymore,” I remind him.

“— And a man in his position is always going to attract enormous press attention. If your name gets tied to someone with that kind of fame and wealth?” He trails off, shrugging. “Your life is changed. You’d better start getting used to it.”

I don’t like the sound of that. At all. “Yeah, but how does the press even know anything about me?”

Another shrug. “Probably someone on the staff tipped them off for a few bucks. Most of his employees have been with him and his family for decades and are very loyal. But his staff is so extensive you can’t account for everyone all the time.”

“Yeah, but he has them all sign NDA’s, right?” I say, shocked to discover this kind of treachery.

“The lower ranking folks — the maids and gardeners and probably the kitchen and laundry staff — make a decent living, but they’ll never get rich. They’re happy to line their pockets if they think they can get away with it.”

“I see,” I say, my attention, snapping back to the real issue at hand. “It’s really true then? Ravenna is dead?”

A grim nod. “Yes.”

“What happened to her?”

He shrugs. “No one knows yet. The police are on it.”

This confirmation sinks in with the weight of a couple of bull elephants resting across my shoulders. I hear him saying the words and it’s not that I don’t believe him. I just find it impossible to believe that Ravenna’s malevolent presence has been erased from all our lives, just like that.

But she’s not gone, of course. There’s an investigation casting a shadow over Lucien and Ackerley now. I could almost laugh. It’s so easy to imagine a ghostly Ravenna orchestrating all kinds of chaos from the other side of the veil. Hell, she’s probably lingering around the halls of Ackerley right now, getting ready to rattle chains, smash lamps and knock over tables in the darkest part of the night.

How’s Lucien?

The words are right there, sitting on the tip of my tongue and demanding to be set free.

Is he okay? How is he holding up?

But Lucien is no longer any of my business. That’s the one thing I need to remember here if I want to stay sane. Which I do. So I clear my throat, double check that there’s no one following us and do my best to sound crisp and intelligent as a new thought hits me.

“Hang on,” I say. “Why were you even here outside Mrs. Hooper’s brownstone just now?”

There’s an awkward silence while the two men exchange a swift and uncomfortable look.

“Lucien wanted someone to have eyes on you,” Hank says reluctantly. “In case, ah, anything popped off.”

I frown. Something about thatanythingdoesn’t sound quite right.“Anything? He knew the paparazzi would show up, you mean?”

“Or any sort of problem,” he says, but he’s way too airy suddenly. I can almost see him waving his fingers at me and telling me there’s nothing to see here the way Obi-Wan Kenobi did to the nosy storm troopers inStar Wars.

“So…How long have you been out there?” A new thought hits me. “Not since I left Ackerley the other day? You haven’t been guarding the brownstone this whole time, have you?”

Hank’s face now remains resolutely facing forward as he clears his throat. I lean sideways to make sure I don’t miss any change in his expression. And, sure enough, bright color rises over his cheeks. He clears his throat again.

“Lucien wants to make sure nothing happens to you. That’s how he is. You didn’t think he’d send you out into the world with Ravenna on the loose without protection, did you? You know him better than that by now.”

I slump back against my seat, stunned, because that’s exactly what I’d just begun to suspect. And here’s further proof — as if I needed any — that I don’t know a damn thing about Lucien Winter.

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