Chapter 18
CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN
I’m mulling over the details Ximena messaged me this morning as we slide into the car Klaus and Manon sent for us.
Their time together at Trinity College in Dublin sparked a decade-long, on-and-off romance.
While Manon was busy investing in privately owned art galleries across the globe, Klaus dropped off the map, using his trust fund and his family’s connections to disappear into a life of crime. He only has one minor arrest on his record—a mistake he never repeated.
The chunky, light greenish colored diamond on my left hand glints in the sunlight. I wouldn’t know that it’s two-hundred years old if it weren’t for my faux husband.
My eyes flick to Graham, seated beside me in one of his many impeccably tailored suits. He’s fidgeting with his silver watch, clasping and unclasping it, too distracted by the view outside to notice me staring.
ISA agents are only given information pertinent to our mission and day-to-day objectives. Nothing more. It’s not our responsibility to put the pieces together, or even do much investigating beyond what’s need-to-know. Probing a mystery isn’t our line of expertise. We’re doers, not thinkers.
Graham was correct. We are tools.
I pull my shoulders back and shake the thought away. Ruminating on the agency right now won’t get me anywhere. I need to focus on my cover and the task at hand.
Ximena didn’t sound pleased when I informed her of our invitation to Klaus von Schwerin’s estate. She tried to hide it, of course, but it’s impossible for me not to pick up on the minor changes in inflection and pauses where there usually are none.
My fingers drum against my knee as the driver meets my gaze in the rear-view mirror for the sixth time in five minutes.
He’s a towering beast of a man who’s stuffed himself into an expensive black suit, no doubt in an attempt to look like a normal chauffeur instead of private security.
Too bad every time he turns his head to the left, the top half of the Czech Special Forces emblem tattooed on his neck peeks out from under his shirt collar.
Couldn’t be more obvious if he put it on his face.
Klaus has expensive taste. That doesn’t bode well for the caliber of his operation.
Graham’s hand presses onto my own, cementing my fingers in place.
I fight my initial instinct to break his thumb and send him a curious raised eyebrow.
He responds with his signature smile and what can only be described as a comforting hand squeeze, the same glint in his eyes as when he asked me if I trusted him.
I’ve been trained to follow the information I’m given, not my gut. Sloane from two weeks ago would be convinced I’m about to walk into an ambush. Sloane from two days ago would think the same.
If I were to listen to my gut, though, I’d say we might be transforming into a team.
And that’s how good Graham Baudelaire is—I can’t even put my finger on the moment he started to manipulate me.
Villa Montmorency stands tucked away in the 16th arrondissement, a paragon of the European elite. Towering walls draped in ivy, armed guards at the gates, and wide streets with sidewalks that almost make you expect to see happy families and dogs on leashes strolling by.
That couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s the unofficial Billionaires’ Row of Paris, a sequestered neighborhood with part-time residents and villas teeming with household staff like it's a real life 21st-century Downton Abbey.
We come to a halt in front of a massive estate with black shutters and an obnoxiously green front garden.
“Get out,” the driver mutters.
My muscles coil as Graham reaches over to pat him on the arm, his other hand stretching to slap his chest as if they’re old friends. “Sparkling conversation, chap, truly.”
The driver’s shoulders go rigid.
A tense second passes before I hiss, “Just get out, Graham,” and follow it with a shove from my knee. That’s when I notice the small, rectangular lump in his pocket and mentally file it away.
Deposited on the front garden walkway, we watch the car zip away in silence.
The sun’s particularly warm today, and I’m already regretting my choice to wear my newly favorite leather pants.
I start to roll up my sleeves when the long tail of raised, lightened flesh catches my eye, and I yank them down before he can notice.
Too late. Graham’s brows are drawn together, stuck on the part of my forearm that’s now covered in sweater. The mental calculations unfolding behind his eyes makes me squirm. I can’t believe I let myself forget.
“I don’t know how you’re still alive,” I say in an attempt to divert his attention.
He looks up. “Why’s that?”
“Czech Special Forces,” I reply, jutting my chin toward where the car disappeared moments prior. “I’m surprised you walked away without a broken hand.”
“You truly think I didn’t know?”
I don’t respond.
Graham smiles, his gaze drifting to the estate before us as he straightens the lapels of his suit jacket. I can’t help but admire—take note—of the nervous tick in his jaw. “You must stop underestimating me at every corner, dear wife. This is a partnership after all, isn’t it?”
We regard each other for a suspended moment.
The door swings open, and a gangly older man dressed in a sharp livery suit steps out into the sun. His severe stare falls on us, white-gloved hands clasped before him, which I take to be the most welcome we’re going to receive.
Graham holds his arm out, so I slip my fingers through the crook of his elbow and let him direct us down the path. “Are you ready for the show, Agent?” he whispers through a dazzling smile.
“This is what I’m trained for… thief.”
A low rumbling sounds from his chest, like he’s enjoying this ruse, with no concern over the tank of box jellyfish we’re about to dive into.
I catch my confused frown and say, “Now I’m the one worried about your sanity.”
“I assure you, my judgement is sound—it’s only that I quite like us being on a nickname basis.”
“That wasn’t a nickname.”
Graham sends me a sidelong glance as we draw closer to the door. “You become more and more fascinating every day, Sloane.”
“My name is Poppy,” I snap under my breath and plaster on a small smile for the butler’s sake.
Right as we begin climbing the front steps, the butler offers a curt greeting and directs us swiftly inside, like we might change our minds. As if we even have a choice.
“Weapons?” the butler asks, sweeping his beak-nosed stare from me to Graham. I begin to shake my head, but he extends a handheld metal detector, motioning for us each to widen our stances and lift our arms.
Quite the welcome.
This is why Graham told me to leave my phone and my gun, I’m thinking as the butler meticulously scans every inch of us. If it was an ambush, he wouldn’t have said anything.
Graham watches me all the way through the tour of the gargantuan foyer, the von Schwerin family portraits, and a hall of locked rooms. I’m trying to focus on the task at hand—my name is Poppy Ashcroft, my name is Poppy Ashcroft—but I’m alarmingly unsettled by his curious gaze and his casual use of my real name.
It’s usually easy to keep everything in their separate compartments when I’m on an assignment.
Sometimes it can even take a while to remember who I am after a long-term mission.
But Graham seems intent on poking beneath my skin, peeling back the layers and getting a look at parts of myself I’m not even sure are there anymore.
Unnerving at best.
Catastrophic at worst.
Maybe it’s a manipulation tactic. Or maybe he’s the first person in over a decade to see me as anything other than Sloane Walker, ISA agent.
Myself included.
I want it to be a lie. I need it to be a simple manipulation tactic—because if it’s not, then I’ll have been right all along, and this assignment will turn out to be as doomed as I worried in the beginning. If I’m thrown off my game, one of us is going to end up dead.
And, as much as I love being right, I’m beginning to realize that I’d rather not die with a fake identity in my wallet.