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Sophie whistled and shook her head. “You’re in deep, Bennett.”
“Kyle worried he was in danger a few weeks before his car accident. He left me clues, and the trail starts here.” She spotted the historic hotel outside the window and signaled the taxi driver, a sixty-something man with white hair tucked under a navy wool hat. “Driver, stop here, please.”
Bright spotlights shone upon the iconic green letters G-E-O-R-G-E, highlighting the hotel entrance like a theatre marquee. The taxi left them in front of the renowned landmark hotel, famous for its Georgian architecture, luxurious accommodations, and gourmet dining.
“If we’re not having tea, what are we doing?” Sophie asked.
“Kyle’s puzzle starts with our third date. We fell in love here.” She gazed up at the façade of the building, admiring the hotel’s entrance as memories of her past with Kyle came alive.
“Back then, how’d you know Kyle was the one?”
“One moment, he gazed at me, and everything around us fell away. All I could see was our future and the journey we’d have together.” The heady blend of nostalgia laced with narcotics made her yearn for the past. Kyle had given her a joyful smile on the balmy summer evening in question, and his green-eyed gaze had gleamed with affection. Something unspoken and ethereal passed between them, and the moment crystallized in her memory.
“The grief must tear you to pieces,” Sophie said in a low voice and shoved her hands in her pockets.
“Every day.” Pictures of Kyle flashed in Tess’s mind, flying past like a slide show running too fast, but at unexpected intervals, images of Mark appeared, too. The juxtaposition of the two men unsettled her, and to avoid crumbling, she focused on the tourists clustered outside the taxi stand at Charing Cross.
“Where to?”
“Next, the treasure hunt continues with a one-kilometer walk, if I can make it that far.” She turned away from the hotel and gestured toward the bustling thoroughfare of the Strand. Exhaust fumes laced the air, and she coughed. “How’s your art gallery?”
“You rescued me from a boring afternoon. Ugh. I was stuck near Parliament, getting lectured about budget regulations by some bureaucratic gasbag. Hours of administrivia before I fly out tomorrow to, um, an undisclosed location.” Sophie winked and steered Tess around two dogs yelping and barking on the sidewalk.
“I know the drill—be safe and avoid trouble.” Tess used air quotes intended to goad her friend. “Don’t lecture me about being safe, little Miss Pot calling the kettle black. You can’t reveal which intelligence agency you work for, let alone what your real job is.”
“Touché.” Sophie returned the smirk.
“Not only that, but any sexy women you meet will be quite disappointed to learn you’re not an actual London art dealer. You’re scattering broken hearts everywhere.”
“True. A known peril of being an international woman of mystery.”
She and Sophie stopped at the next crosswalk to wait for the traffic light to change. Tourists queued in front of a booth piled high with stacks of London T-shirts and thong underwear emblazoned Mind the Gap. A kiosk beside them sold Cornish pasties, and the smell of buttery pastry and meat sparked her hunger. The streetlight transitioned to green.
“You know, you could still enter the service—CIA, NSA, the State Department, any of them. You’d be a shoo-in, given your cybersecurity network and family connections.” Sophie raised her voice over the cacophony of honking horns and passing trucks.
“I can’t even think about another job. Kingsley Tech is in crisis, and I’m David’s number two. Since I became vice president, I’ve been too busy to breathe most days.”
“Whatever, you workaholic. You never breathed before your promotion, either. I’m saying doors would swing wide open, should you want a change.”
Tess stopped abruptly on the sidewalk and stared. “Are you serious? Risk ending up like my dad, shot in the line of duty, and bleeding out on a highway in Colombia? Reduced from leading the diplomatic security circuit to a sorry painkiller addict? No, thank you. Corporate life’s not perfect, but it’s safer.”
Sophie stopped and leaned forward until only inches separated their faces. “Is it? Your safe corporate job almost got you killed in Canada. Have you contacted your dad?”
“Don’t start with me. You know we’re not in contact.” Sophie’s retort cut deep through her, like jagged glass shards, and heat infused her cheeks. Talking to her father would only increase her stress level, and she had too many crises to handle already.
“Call him, Bennett. He’s your dad, and you almost died.”
“No.”
“All I’m saying is you can’t shut him out forever. It’s awfully rich of you to reject him, given you’re the one high on pain meds. Right. Bloody. Now.” Sophie scowled and bent to pick up an empty soda can from the sidewalk and crushed it in her fist. “Damn litterers.”
“Bugger off and help me find this clue, all right?” The last thing Tess wanted was a family reunion.
“Fine.”
“Let’s focus here, shall we? Kingsley Tech is under siege, and I need to find out what Kyle was hiding.” In a silent détente, she resumed the search. Double-decker buses clogged the street while throngs of businesspeople and tourists crowded the sidewalks. Tess speculated what the brass key might open. A mailbox? A flat? Proceeding down the Strand, past the Royal Courts of Justice and the Tea Museum, the Strand merged into Fleet Street, the banking district. Her phone beeped to indicate she’d traveled one kilometer, and she stopped on the sidewalk, making a three-hundred-sixty-degree turn to scan the nearby buildings and forcing Londoners to scatter.
“Kyle said to watch for dragons.” She tipped her head skyward and lifted a hand to shade her eyes from the filtered afternoon sunlight. The Temple Bar Monument honoring Queen Victoria stood in a traffic circle, like a royal island in the center of the street. With a satisfied smile, she pointed upward. A fearsome, roaring dragon crowned the top of the memorial. “We’re getting warmer.”
