Chapter Fourteen #3
“What are you doing?” she hissed, turning to him. “Was that on purpose, you cow?”
She mopped furiously at the spill that had darkened through her uniform. She could feel it soak through her undergarments, and her skin tingled.
“Again, I apologize,” he said. His mouth took on a wry glimmer of amusement. “And—did you just call me a cow?”
He disappeared into the bathhouse, emerging with a white towel that smelled faintly of lavender. “We weren’t finished last night,” he said. He handed it to her. “There are still things you need to know.”
She glowered at him, mopping the stain.
Three years ago, she had wound through a blue-collar neighborhood with crammed streets of wooden triple-decker houses.
She had taken the train up from New York to Boston and found herself standing outside a chipped front door, green as the color of moss.
An Althea Yates in Dorchester did exist. Cora had looked her up, summoned her courage, and rang the doorbell.
Cora had made up a story, said she had the wrong address.
And just before Althea Yates closed the door, the light hit her face.
Her expression changed, and it was like seeing an echoing reflection of Jack.
Cora didn’t know what had compelled her to go there that day.
She supposed she just needed to know whether it had all been a lie, or whether anything Jack had ever told her was actually the truth.
Now she took the towel from Jack and, as she stepped back, the branches of a bush caught in her hair. It made her feel like an awkward young girl again. And that made her want to be cruel.
“You told a nice story last night. But Rusty is still dead.” The twinkle in Jack’s eye dimmed as Cora found the place to hurt him and pressed in.
“You can’t explain away what happened on that island.
You use people for your own purposes and leave carnage in your wake. Why would I ever help you again?”
He stiffened, and she knew her words had hit home.
“Right,” he said. “I thought we might be able to help each other out. I’m in a little better position to repay my debt this time.
But if that’s the way you want to play it—” He opened his palms in a frustrated surrender.
“I’ll stay out of your way, and you stay out of mine. ”
He tipped his hat to her firmly, like a gentleman, and turned away from her.
She whispered: “Jack.”
He stopped.
“What would you want?” she asked warily. She swallowed. “From me?”
He looked both ways, then took a step toward her. He leaned forward, so that she could feel his breath on her ear. “I need to find those files. You can be places I can’t. But I can do the same for you. So … maybe we could help each other.”
She handed the towel back to him, and he clutched it.
The sense around him was eager, and almost disarmingly boyish. And Cora was struck by a recognition of that same part of him that she had known at Pelican.
But perhaps that disarming sense was what made him most dangerous of all.
“What are the files?” she asked reluctantly.
His eyes darkened. He leaned forward. “They’re documenting a horrific scheme called frame-ups.
Men who want a divorce pay off the police to frame their wives for prostitution.
They’ll be lured to a hotel room to be ‘caught’ with a man, arrested, then shipped off to a reformatory.
They lose their children, their freedom.
Sometimes they can get out if they pay an exorbitant amount of money for bail that’s split among those running the scheme.
Innocent women have been framed for years, and everybody’s in on it.
The cops, the lawyers, the judges, the politicians.
If that story broke, it could take down the city. ”
Cora thought back to the pages she had seen hidden in his book, full of names and dates, and her stomach curled in disgust.
“How is this possible?” she whispered angrily.
“Truman has a list of every woman who has been framed by the entire system. It’s a huge farce, but the mob depends on keeping these crooked politicians and judges in power so that all their other illegal dealings can carry on without interference.
They will stop at nothing to prevent that information from getting out. ”
“And if you deliver those files back to the mob, they’ll tell you who really stole the Bastion paintings all those years ago?”
“Yes,” Jack whispered. “Or I’ll blackmail Truman with his own blackmail.”
“And what of all those wronged women?” Cora asked, her jaw flaring. “And the ones still to come?”
“Perhaps I’ll make my own copy of the intel,” Jack said, meeting her eyes. “Perhaps it will still make its way to the newspapers after all, once I have what I need.”
He glanced over his shoulder. “But for now, I’m going to need to search Byrd’s office.”
“I’ve already done that,” Cora said automatically. “I combed through it head to toe when I was first here. Those files aren’t there.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Why were you searching Truman’s office?”
She hesitated. “Because Mabel’s the one who hired me,” she said. A crumb of truth, if not the whole story. She hedged her bets and, thinking quickly, steered him away from the real story. “She wants Clem gone. And I’m going to help her with that.”
“Everett, what are you doing over there?” Rita called coyly.
“You should go,” Cora said. “Before you raise suspicions for both of us.”
“Can we agree to strike a deal? Help each other, just for a few days?” he asked urgently. He looked at her with something like a very cautious hope.
Cora gritted her teeth. As much as she hated it, she needed help. Her future was slipping out of her grasp.
“Fine,” she said curtly. “I’ll keep an eye out for your files if you’ll help engineer some sparks between Clem and Beau.”
“Deal,” Jack said. His face broke into a rare true smile.
“Now go,” she said.
“Wait. You have a little something—” He reached out and pulled a twig from her hair.
She felt a dip in her stomach at his gentle touch. A warning, stirring within her. But what other choice did she have? He walked away and she watched him uneasily. Wondering if she had just made a deal with the devil himself.
Twice.