New York Times bestselling author Carla Neggers returns with this absorbing, twisting tale of suspense, romance and fast-paced action, the latest in her popular Sharpe & Donovan series.

Emma Sharpe and Colin Donovan, two of the FBI’s most valuable agents, are preparing for their next big assignment—their wedding—when Colin’s brother Mike alerts them that onetime friends from his military past are on Sharpe and Donovan home turf on the Maine coast. Now private security contractors, they want to meet with Mike. One of them, an FBI agent named Kavanagh, is supposed to be on leave. What is he investigating—or does he have his own agenda?

Mike zeroes in on Naomi MacBride, a freelance civilian intelligence analyst who, aside from a few hot nights, has never brought him anything but trouble. Newly returned from England, Naomi clearly isn’t telling Mike everything about why she’s snooping around his hometown, but he has no choice but to work with her if he wants to uncover what’s really going on.

But the case soon takes a drastic turn—Emma is targeted, and a connection surfaces between Naomi and Kavanagh and a recently solved international art theft case. Not every connection is a conspiracy, but as the tangled web of secrets unravels, Emma and Colin face their greatest danger yet. With everyone they know involved, they must decide who they can trust…or lose everything for good.

Keeper’s Reach

Carla Neggers

www.mirabooks.co.uk

To Jim, Maureen, Martha and Todd

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Title Page

Dedication

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Author’s Note

Extract

Copyright

1

Near Stow-on-the-Wold, the Cotswolds, England Wednesday, 4:00 p.m., BST

Martin Hambly had expected additional visits from the FBI, but this agent was new to him. Rangy, sandy-haired, early forties. He conveyed an unsettling mix of suspicion and arrogance, with none of the humor of the agents Martin had encountered last fall.

Kavanagh. Special Agent Ted Kavanagh. That was his name.

Martin supposed it could be the case.

The American flashed his FBI credentials as he gave his name, but Martin, carrying clay pots planted with amaryllis bulbs in each arm, didn’t examine them.

Kavanagh tucked his credentials back into his overcoat, a sturdy but inexpensive dark gray wool. He had intercepted Martin on the narrow lane in front of the small village church, an oft-photographed favorite with the few tourists who ventured this deep into the Cotswolds countryside.

“Mr. York isn’t here,” Martin said.

“‘Here’ meaning his farm, the village or England?”

“He’s in England.”

Martin shifted the amaryllis pots in his arms. He had picked them up from friends who ran a flower shop in nearby Stow-on-the-Wold. His decades-old Barbour jacket, wool cap and waterproof walking shoes were adequate for the twenty-minute walk to and from the York farm on a chilly February afternoon, but not for standing still for a long, awkward chat.

“I will tell Mr. York you were asking for him,” Martin said with a deliberate note of finality.

“Okay. Thanks.”

The FBI agent—if, indeed, that was what he was—made no move to continue on his way. Martin didn’t notice a car that could have belonged to him, or a partner lurking down the lane or in the churchyard. In the fall, three FBI agents had arrived at the York apartment in London. Matt Yankowski, Colin Donovan and Emma Sharpe. Martin had expected Oliver to refuse to let them in, but he had instructed Martin to have the agents join him in the library. It was the same library where, twenty-nine years ago, eight-year-old Oliver, an only child, had witnessed the murder of his parents.

Martin decided not to mention the previous agents to this new agent.

“Quiet village,” Kavanagh said.

“Yes, it is. Stow-on-the-Wold isn’t far. It’s a market town with shops and restaurants, if you need anything. Are you staying in the area?”

“Off to Heathrow and home tomorrow.”

It wasn’t an answer, was it?

Martin felt the weight of the pots and now regretted not bringing the car. After two days of rain, he had looked forward to a good walk.

“Why do you suppose they buried people in the churchyard?” Kavanagh asked, nodding to the age-worn gravestones, many standing crookedly, covered in white lichens. The church itself was constructed of the yellow limestone characteristic of countless structures in the rolling Cotswolds countryside west of London. It dated as far back as the twelfth century, but, of course, had been added to and reworked over the ensuing centuries.

“It was the thing to do, I imagine. I’ve never thought about it.”

Kavanagh grinned. “Stupid question from an annoying American?”

“I didn’t say that, sir.”

“You didn’t look surprised when I recognized you. Then again, you’re obviously a man of great self-control. How long have you worked for Oliver York?”

Martin saw no reason not to answer. “I was twenty when Mr. York’s grandparents hired me.”

“You’re what—a valet? A manservant?”

“Agent Kavanagh, if you have a card with your contact information, I can give it to Mr. York.”

“I don’t, in fact.” The American smiled. “Long story.”

Martin doubted that. “I should get cracking. Enjoy your stay, and have a good flight tomorrow.”

“Thanks.” He made no move to go on his way. “You met a few of my colleagues in November. Agents Yankowski, Sharpe and Donovan. Any contact with them since then?”

So, Agent Kavanagh knew about the November visit. “We exchanged Christmas cards,” Martin said, immediately regretting his sarcasm.

Kavanagh laughed. “A smart-ass under all that English formality, aren’t you, Martin?” He nodded at the pots. “What color amaryllises?”

“Both are bloodred.”

“Surprised I know an amaryllis bulb from a tulip bulb, aren’t you? In fact, I don’t. It says so on the little stick in the dirt.”

Chuckling to himself, the American resumed course down the lane, back toward the village, away from the church. Martin debated finding out whether Special Agent Kavanagh was booked at the village pub, which also let rooms.

“Best not,” he said under his breath.

Restless now and decidedly ill at ease, he set the pots on the low wall in front of the church. He was sixty-three and in excellent shape, but the pots were heavier than he had anticipated. A short break was in order before he continued on to the farm. He stretched his arms as he walked in the opposite direction of the FBI agent. The lane ended at the entrance to a cemetery, which adjoined the churchyard but was separate from its scatter of gravestones.

A breeze stirred, and he noticed the sun, a welcome sight earlier in the day, was giving way to a gray, still dusk. Martin watched a lone bird—he couldn’t say what species it was—float above a barren field past the cemetery and disappear over the horizon, as if it wanted to get away from the dead.

His imagination, of course.

He veered off the paved walk, slowing his pace as he cut down a muddy footpath, past bare-branched trees and more graves. He had grown up in the village and had family buried here, but it wasn’t their graves that drew him.

He came to a far corner of the cemetery and paused at a low stone wall that bordered the field. He pulled off his cap and felt the breeze in his graying hair as he breathed in the cool air and tried not to let emotion overcome him.

Finally, he leaned forward and touched the name carved on a cold, gray stone.

Priscilla Farley York.

He shut his eyes, his fingertips on the letters. He could feel Priscilla’s bony, aged hand as she clutched his wrist, and he could see the pain in her dying eyes. She had been frail then, a ghost of the woman who had put him to work. Yet undiminished were the will, the determination and the faith that had seen her through more than any mother and grandmother should have had to bear.

Look after Oliver, won’t you, Martin? He’s suffered so much. Promise me you’ll look after him.

Martin hadn’t hesitated, although he had known, even then, it wouldn’t be an easy promise to keep. He could hear his certainty and sincerity as he answered her. I will look after Oliver. I promise.

Priscilla had died a few hours later.

The next day, Oliver had dropped out of Oxford.

Opening his eyes, Martin touched his fingers to the names on three more York gravestones.

Nicholas York

Charles York

Deborah Summerhill York

Martin had known them all. Nicholas, Oliver’s grandfather, had preceded Priscilla into the grave by eighteen months. He had loved the Cotswolds. The York farm had been in his family for generations, and he and Priscilla had relished retiring there and turning over their London apartment to Charles, their only son, and Deborah, his lovely wife.

Who could have imagined that Charles and Deborah would be murdered?

Who could have imagined Oliver, their eight-year-old son, would be snatched and taken to Scotland, then held alone in a church ruin? Shivering and hungry, the traumatized boy had escaped. No one could say how long he had wandered in the cold Scottish countryside before a priest, on a walk to the ruins, had discovered him.

Oliver’s kidnappers—his parents’ killers—had yet to be captured, convicted and sentenced for their heinous crimes. They’d been identified as groundskeepers the Yorks had hired, briefly, shortly before their murder, but no trace of them had ever been discovered.

When the police had arrived at the farm with the terrible news, Martin had gone to find Nicholas and Priscilla, out with the dogs on the farm. The searing trauma of those days had undoubtedly shortened their lives. Despite their own grief, they had done their best to raise Oliver and get him whatever help he needed.

His throat tight with emotion, Martin turned back through the cemetery. He had dedicated himself to the welfare of the last of the Yorks—Priscilla, Nicholas and Oliver.

Now there was just Oliver.

Martin heard the distant cry of a bird, but otherwise the cemetery was quiet. As the church came into view again, he could see young Charles and Deborah on their wedding day, laughing as they greeted guests. There had been no question they would have the ceremony here in the village.

Martin scooped up the amaryllis pots from the wall. He needed to put aside loyalty, grief, pity and sympathy and see clearly what options were available—especially now with the bloody FBI popping into town for a visit.

He had made a promise. He couldn’t falter, and he couldn’t fail.

He glanced down the lane toward the village center, but he didn’t see the American.

Should he call Emma Sharpe or Colin Donovan and ask them about Special Agent Kavanagh and this strange visit?

Let Oliver make that decision.

A pot in each arm, Martin set off down the lane, cutting onto a public footpath that paralleled the main thoroughfare. It was part of the Oxfordshire Way, one of the many marked walking routes in the picturesque Cotswolds. On his free days, he liked nothing better than to don his walking shoes, choose a loop and set off for the day. Oliver was fit as a fiddle, but he hated to “ramble,” as he put it, preferring endless hours of solitary martial arts practice. Martin suspected his employer and friend’s distaste for country leisure walking harkened back to his kidnapping, but he had never asked—and he never would. Heart-to-hearts would only make them both uncomfortable, and Martin had decided years ago that some things he was best not knowing for certain. Guessing was enough for him.

Oliver would be in from London tomorrow. Martin would have the morning to see to errands and deliveries and get the house prepared for Oliver’s arrival. He was inviting a friend, he had said. An Irish priest Martin had yet to meet.

You’ll like him, Hambly. He’s a whiskey expert. He and his twin brother own an Irish distillery.

It was a marginal recommendation. Martin preferred Scotch.

Nonetheless, he appreciated that Oliver was making an attempt to turn over a new leaf and have real friends. Martin would be sure the guest suite was immaculate and fires were lit throughout the house, ready for their arrival.

* * *

Converting the small dovecote on the edge of the farm’s main grounds into a potting shed had been Priscilla York’s idea. Although the family employed a gardener, she had loved to putter with her pots and seeds. Martin had spent many hours helping her, although he didn’t pretend to have her knowledge, expertise or interest in gardening.

Adding a stonework studio to the dovecote twelve years ago, long after his grandmother’s death, had been Oliver’s idea. He hadn’t asked Martin for help, opinions or approval and went about stocking the studio with lapidary saws, heat guns, polishing wheels, hammers, chisels and various kinds of glue. Stone-carving became another of Oliver’s solitary hobbies. Martin had thought no harm could come of it.

One of his more spectacular miscalculations.

He set the pots on a rough-wood worktable. Deep red amaryllis blossoms would provide welcome color before spring returned. He felt his tension and melancholy lifting after meeting the FBI agent and visiting the graves. He envisioned hillsides of daffodils, fields of bright yellow rapeseed, lambs prancing with their mothers. Truly, was there anything more glorious than springtime in the Cotswolds?

He helped himself to a bottle of water he kept on the worktable and groaned when he noticed a package by the door. He had forgotten about it. Oliver had packed it himself before departing for London late Monday. Martin had no idea what was inside and wasn’t about to rip it open to find out. Surely it couldn’t contain anything provocative, since it was addressed to Emma Sharpe, one of the FBI agents from November.

Martin noticed Oliver hadn’t used Agent Sharpe’s Boston home or office address, which, to the consternation of the FBI, were in his possession. Instead, he had addressed the package to her in care of Father Finian Bracken at the St. Patrick’s Holy Roman Catholic Church rectory in Rock Point, Maine.

Oliver’s new friend, the Irish priest.

Father Bracken was also Emma Sharpe and Colin Donovan’s friend, an awkward and potentially incendiary situation in Martin’s estimation.

He rang the courier service, catching them in time to pick up the package for overnight service to the United States. He wasn’t surprised to discover Oliver had done a perfunctory, inadequate packing job. He added more tape before setting the package outside on the doorstep. He would wait for the courier. Then an early supper and some well-placed acupressure on his sore arms were in order.

He heard a rustling sound behind the dovecote, which sat atop a wooded hillside above a stream.

“Not the bloody ram again,” he muttered.

The stubborn beast refused to stay within the fence. He liked to escape the confines of his carefully maintained pasture and romp through forbidden territory. Farm animals weren’t Martin’s responsibility, but he couldn’t leave the sheep to his own devices. At the least, he could assess the situation and then call for help if necessary. If it was the ram and he wasn’t in too big a fix, Martin could manage to get him back into his pen on his own—if grumbling the entire way.

He went around to the back of the dovecote. The ground was soft and wet, no surprise given the two days of rain. At least it hadn’t been snow. He noticed with pleasure that snowdrops were in bloom, blanketing the grass around an oak tree with their tiny white flowers, a welcome harbinger of spring.

The hillside was darkened with dusk and shadows, but not so much so Martin would be unable to see a wandering sheep. Still, he saw nothing. He paused, listening, but he couldn’t make out any bleating.

Perhaps it had been a fox or pheasant he had heard, stirring with the warmer weather and now on its way.

“Well, good, then,” Martin said aloud, turning back toward the dovecote.

Then came a scraping sound...metal on metal...as distinct and unmistakable as his own breathing.

Now what?

It had to be the ram. He must have caught on something.

Martin decided to have another look then get a farmworker out here.

Then came a grunt, distinctly human and close.

“No!”

Martin heard panic and fear in his voice. His heart jumped, adrenaline surging painfully through him as he tried, instinctively, to dodge what he knew was an oncoming blow.

He was too late.

The blow came quickly, hard, to the back of his head, sending him sprawling down the hill. He couldn’t get his footing and crashed against winter-denuded trees and brush, until finally landing facedown in wet grass and dead leaves.

He was vaguely aware of the taste of mud and the stab of a twig in his cheek as pain exploded in his head.

Bastard.

Unable to breathe, he gasped in agony, fighting to stay conscious as he sank into the cold ground and the inevitable blackness.

2

Boston, Massachusetts Wednesday, 3:00 p.m., EST

Emma Sharpe was in love with her wedding gown. Totally, absolutely in love. It was silky, simple, flattering and exactly what she had envisioned. She took a selfie in the fitting room of the Newbury Street shop and texted it to her mother in London, who responded immediately.

It’s perfect. I’m sorry I’m not there.

Emma didn’t mind. Her father was recovering from his latest procedure to help ease his chronic back pain due to a long-ago fall on the ice, and her mother was at his side. For most of the past year, they had been living and working abroad, away from reminders of the past, and of the future they had once envisioned for themselves. Their hometown of Heron’s Cove, Maine, had become a trigger for emotional and physical pain.

Her parents had promised to return for Emma’s spring wedding. That was enough, she thought as she eased out of the dress. It was pinned for alterations. She smiled at her reflection, her fair hair a bit flyaway from the dress and the dry winter air. From her late teens into her early twenties, she had believed she would never marry. She had been Sister Brigid then.

She thought of Colin, a hardheaded Maine Donovan, an FBI undercover agent and her fiancé since he had proposed on bended knee in early November in a Dublin pub.

She was Sister Brigid no more.

She slipped back into her jeans, sweater and boots and grabbed her three-quarter-length wool coat, hat and gloves as she exited the dressing room. She’d left work early for the fitting but had stopped at her Boston waterfront apartment to change out of her work clothes. Around the same time her parents had left for London, she had moved to Boston to join HIT, a small FBI team started and led by the senior agent who had recruited her out of the convent. Matt Yankowski had never doubted his conviction that Emma wasn’t meant to profess her final vows and become a full-fledged member of the Sisters of the Joyful Heart.

We can use your expertise in art and art crimes, Yank had told her when he had visited her at her Maine convent four years ago. Give it some thought, Emma.

He hadn’t called her Sister Brigid.

Her early expertise in art crimes hadn’t come from her time at the convent. She was the granddaughter of Wendell Sharpe, founder of Sharpe Fine Art Recovery and one of the foremost private art detectives in the world.

As she ducked out onto the Back Bay street, her phone dinged with another text. Although it was from London, it wasn’t from her mother. It was from Oliver York, aka Oliver Fairbairn, a British aristocrat, self-educated mythologist and international serial art thief.

Who is the FBI agent following me?

Emma stared at the screen. There was no FBI agent following Oliver. She would know if there were. She typed a quick response.

I’ll call you in an hour.

Oliver responded immediately.

I’ll be waiting.

* * *

Lucy Yankowski buzzed Emma into the third-floor apartment she had just rented on Marlborough Street, two blocks from the Newbury Street wedding shop in Boston’s Back Bay. “Matt hasn’t seen it yet,” she said as she led Emma into the living room. “He’ll love it, don’t you think?”

“From what I can gather, he’ll love anything that isn’t infested with cockroaches.”

Lucy shuddered. She was a small woman with dark hair cut short and edgy, something of a new look for her as she reinvented herself in Boston. She hadn’t wanted to move from northern Virginia. It had taken her a year to decide saving her marriage was worth giving up her life in suburban Washington, DC. Her reconciliation with Yank—Matt, as she called her husband of fifteen years—hadn’t been without drama or peril, and it didn’t mean her new life in Boston was settled. For one, she was a clinical psychologist and was talking about giving it up to open a knitting shop.

First order of business, however, had been to find the “perfect apartment.” As far as Emma could see, there was no question Lucy had done just that.

“I insisted on a washer and dryer in the unit, and I wanted a decent view—I didn’t want to drink my morning coffee looking out at trash cans. I swear I manifested this place, but I’m not sure I believe in that stuff.”

She gave Emma the grand tour, starting with the living room and moving into the bedrooms—there were two—and dining room. Although small given its upscale location, the apartment was a far cry from the cheap, roach-infested one-bedroom Yank had rented, thinking he would be there for a couple of months at most. Like the rest of Back Bay, Marlborough, one of Emma’s favorite streets in Boston, had been underwater before the massive nineteenth-century project that had created the gracious neighborhood, now known for its tree-lined streets and Victorian brownstones.

“Look,” Lucy said, smiling as she raised a shade when they returned to the living room. “We have a tree outside the window. Imagine it in the summer. When do you get leaves on the trees up here?”

“May for sure,” Emma said. “I count on full leaf bloom by Memorial Day at home in Maine.”

“Gad. It’s too late to change my mind. We’ve already signed the lease.” She sighed, gazing out at the bare-limbed tree. “I’m sure there are quirks, but I couldn’t be happier with this place. Matt will freak out if he sees a roach, but it’s the city. There are bound to be roaches. We sleep with a can of Raid and a flyswatter next to the bed in our current apartment.”

“I can see why you’re eager to move,” Emma said.

She lowered the shade again. “I’m giddy. It’s fun to show the place off. Thank you for indulging me.”

“I love checking out Boston apartments.”

“Will you and Colin stay where you are once you’re married?”

“For now.”

“Boston rents are insane. I’m sleeping here tonight. I brought over a few basics from Matt’s place. He won’t be back for a couple more days, and a sleeping bag on the floor here is more appealing than another night on my own with the roaches.”

Emma laughed. “I can’t say I blame you.”

“Do you ever miss convent life?”

Ah, Emma thought. The real reason for her presence here. “I miss the gardens and the scenery. It’s a beautiful place.”

“Matt says you’re heading up there for a couple of nights.”

“Tomorrow after work, yes. It’s a mini retreat.”

“I’ve always loved the name of your order. Sisters of the Joyful Heart. Are they a joyful lot?”

“Most of the time,” Emma said.

“Matt says your time with the sisters has served you well in the FBI. You strike me as centered, Emma. You have good command of your emotions and the ability to stay fully present. I can see how you and Colin do well together. He operates on gut instinct honed by training and experience.” Lucy moved away from the window. “I’m aware Matt was Colin’s contact agent on at least one undercover mission.”

Emma followed Lucy to the entrance, making no comment on her assertion.

The older woman smiled. “Not going to confirm anything, are you? That’s all right. I wouldn’t expect you to. One learns to ferret out tidbits when one is married to a senior federal agent. The isolation, constant danger and pretending to be someone else as an undercover agent can take a toll after a while. Some personalities are more suited to that sort of work than others. There must be a high burnout rate.”

“You have to know when you’ve had enough in any line of work,” Emma said.

“Ah, how true. Here I am thinking about opening a knitting shop. I’m eyeing a spot on Charles Street. I could walk to work. That would be a first for me. A knitting shop might be a fantasy to help me with the transition to life in Boston, but if it is, it’s working. I haven’t been this excited in a long time.”

“Maybe you needed something new.”

“I wonder if that’s part of why I resisted moving for so long. I didn’t want to face my own boredom. Psychology is a relatively portable career, but maybe it’s run its course. I thought maybe my marriage had, too. I’m glad I was wrong about that.”

Emma wasn’t going there. “I can see Yank taking up knitting.”

“My husband’s idea of a hobby is cleaning his gun.”

Lucy thanked Emma again as she left, taking the stairs down to the small lobby and heading out into the February cold. What Lucy Yankowski hadn’t brought up—and clearly hadn’t had any intention of bringing up—was that her husband and Emma’s fiancé were both in Washington, DC, likely meeting with the new FBI director about an undercover mission.

With Oliver York waiting for her, Emma grabbed a cab back to her waterfront apartment. After a quiet winter fitting himself into HIT, Colin had been summoned to FBI headquarters in Washington in late January. He’d returned several times the past month, so far managing to fly back to Boston for weekends.

Wedding or no wedding, he had a job to do.

And so do I, Emma thought, reading Oliver’s text again. Wealthy, solitary and very smart, he might be a man haunted by his past, but he was firmly anchored in the present. It helped, no doubt, that he didn’t fear arrest, by the FBI, Scotland Yard or any of the law enforcement agencies in the other countries where he had helped himself to valuable art over the past decade.

Oliver York was, in a word, untouchable.

* * *

When she reached her tiny apartment, Emma heaped her coat, hat and gloves on a chair and kicked off her boots. She sat on her couch in the living room and dialed up Oliver York on her laptop on her coffee table.

“Sorry I’m late,” she said.

Oliver peered at her from across the Atlantic. A thick, dark blond curl flopped onto his forehead as he leaned closer to his screen. “What happened to your hair, Emma?”

“Hat head.” She had no intention of telling him about trying on wedding dresses.

“It’s cold in Boston?”

“Yes. Where are you?”

“My London flat.”

It was a room she didn’t recognize from her one visit last November to his sprawling Mayfair apartment overlooking St. James’s Park. Colin and Yank had accompanied her. Oliver had met them in the library, where his parents had been murdered almost thirty years ago. Now he sat in a tall-backed red-leather chair in front of a draped window and a painting of porpoises in Ardmore Bay on the south Irish coast. Emma knew the painting, an early work by well-known Irish artist Aoife O’Byrne.

“A video chat is more intimate than a phone call, at least. How are you, Emma? It is all right if I call you Emma, isn’t it? It’s more informal than Special Agent Sharpe, but this is an official chat, I assume?”

“I’m an FBI agent. You’re a thief. Yes, it’s an official chat. But Emma is fine.”

He pointed at her. “You’re testier than when I saw you here in November.”

That was when she had figured out that Oliver Fairbairn, a tweedy British mythologist caught in the middle of a murder investigation in Boston, was also Oliver York, a cheeky, wealthy British aristocrat with a tragic past. That Oliver Fairbairn and Oliver York were one and the same wasn’t widely known. He preferred to keep the two identities separate, and Emma had no reason to announce it to the world. In fact, the opposite.

“Tell me about this FBI agent you believe is following you.”

He gave an audible sigh. “Testy. Definitely testy.”

She tried to resist a smile.

“I have reliable radar for FBI agents, and it went off like crazy when I spotted this man. He was in the park outside my apartment. I had just returned from an art gallery. I wouldn’t be surprised if he followed me.”

“Was this today?”

“Around noon, yes.”

“Is the gallery the one holding the show for Aoife O’Byrne?”

“Mmm.”

The Irish O’Byrne family was one of Oliver’s victims—his first, ten years ago. He had made off with two Jack Butler Yeats landscape paintings of western Ireland, a fifteenth-century silver wall cross depicting Saint Declan and an unsigned landscape of a local scene, probably by a young Aoife O’Byrne herself. Her Yeats phase, Oliver called it. The porpoises had come after that, as well as a few crosses of her own, but she was known now for her moody seascapes.

At least Oliver had bought the porpoise painting instead of stealing it.

“What’s the name of this agent you ran into in the park?” Emma asked.

Oliver looked surprised. “I only saw him. I didn’t speak with him.”

“How do you know he’s an FBI agent if you didn’t speak with him?”

“The suit. The look. He’s one of yours. I’ve no doubt.”

“Did you take his picture?”

He sniffed. “Of course not. I’m a mild-mannered mythologist, not Scotland Yard or MI6. This man is tall, lean, medium coloring, perhaps early forties—but that describes a lot of your colleagues, doesn’t it? Not you, of course.”

“Of course.”

Oliver sat back, amusement lighting up his face. He was good-looking and surprisingly affable for a man so solitary, so haunted by his past. “I’m many things, Emma, but paranoid isn’t one of them. I’m convinced this man is one of yours. Consider yourself alerted.”

“Fair enough. Anything else?”

“I’ve sent you a package. Martin has, actually.”

On her November trip to London, Emma had also met Martin Hambly, Oliver’s longtime personal assistant. It was unclear to her whether Martin was aware of his boss’s alter ego as an art thief. “What’s in the package, Oliver?”

“A present for you. A surprise. You’ll love it. I packed it myself when I was at the farm over the weekend. I returned to London on Monday. Then today...” He grimaced. “Today, I saw the FBI outside my apartment.”

“Where did you send the package?”

“I addressed it to you at Father Bracken’s rectory in Rock Point. I thought that would be simpler, but, as luck would have it, our Irish priest friend is here in London.”

Emma frowned at that bit of news. “I thought he was in Ireland visiting his family.”

“He joined his brother on a business trip on behalf of Bracken Distillers. I ran into Finian at the gallery. He, Declan and I are all about to have a drink together. Declan has to return to Ireland tomorrow, but I plan to invite Father Bracken to the family farm in the Cotswolds.”

“I wish you wouldn’t do that, Oliver.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re a thief and Father Bracken is a friend of mine.”

“That’s plain enough.” Oliver paused. “How is your family, Emma? Everyone’s well?”

“Doing fine, thank you.”

“Did your grandfather come home to Heron’s Cove for Christmas?”

“You know he didn’t. You two rang in the New Year together at Claridge’s.”

“Ah, so Wendell did tell you. I wasn’t sure he would. He told me he’d expected to fly home to Maine for Christmas, but he didn’t feel comfortable going so far with your parents here in London. The experimental procedure to help relieve your father’s chronic back pain went well, but it’s taken some time to recover.”

Emma made no comment. She wasn’t discussing her family with Oliver York.

“Chronic pain takes a toll,” he added.

“Yes, it does,” Emma said. Although there was a psychological component to her father’s physical pain given its impact on his life, it was different from the chronic psychological pain Oliver York endured. She was convinced he’d turned to planning and executing solitary, daring art heists to provide relief. It must have worked, at least temporarily, since he’d been at it for a decade. Of course, catching him sooner would have put a stop to it.

“I gather you and my grandfather are on a first-name basis now,” she said.

“I haven’t seen him since New Year’s. He came out to the farm for a couple of days, then went back to Dublin to pretend he wants to retire.”

“You harassed him for ten years. He wants to see you arrested before he retires.”

Oliver waved a hand. “Nonsense. Wendell said you spent Christmas with the Donovans in Rock Point, that gloomy yet oddly charming Maine fishing village of theirs. You two haven’t been to Ireland or London since November. Perhaps I should have had you come to the farm and collect the package yourself.”

“It would have to contain the last of your stolen art for me to come to your farm.”

“Emma, Emma.”

“We’re still missing the two Dutch landscapes you stole in Amsterdam.” She kept her tone even, without any hint of hostility, sarcasm or cajoling. “I would fly to England to get those works back to their rightful owner.”

“I wish I could help.”

“That’s a start. We’re also missing the unsigned landscape you stole in Declan’s Cross, but I doubt you’ll ever return it since it’s a fair guess it’s an early work by Aoife O’Byrne. You’re familiar with Declan’s Cross, Oliver. It’s the tiny village on the south Irish coast where you launched your stint as an art thief.”

“I’m familiar with Declan’s Cross. It’s quite a charming hamlet.”

“Aoife’s missing landscape depicts the three crosses on the headland in Declan’s Cross where you hid after stealing from her uncle. The painting has personal value for you, but you still should return it.”

Oliver peered at her. “You look happy but preoccupied, Emma. I can understand you have much on your mind. When you do come to England again, you must bring Special Agent Donovan with you. Are you two inviting me to your wedding?”

Emma smiled. “No.”

“Pity. Your Colin isn’t hovering in the background, is he?”

“No, he isn’t. Anything else, Oliver?”

“I’m reading a new book on the early Irish saints. Would you like me to send it to you when I finish? Did you study Saint Patrick, Saint Declan and the like when you were a nun? You must have studied Saint Brigid since that was your name as a novice.”

Her grandfather must have told him. She knew she hadn’t. “Good night, Oliver.”

“The farm is stunning in the spring, which, happily, comes to the Cotswolds earlier than it does in your part of the world. You and Colin can walk in the countryside to your hearts’ content. We can all have English tea and scones together.”

“Only if there’s clotted cream to go with them.”

“Absolutely. It will be homemade, whipped from cream from our own dairy cows. We’ll have our gooseberry jam, made with wild berries picked on the farm, although not by me. Monotonous, repetitive tasks like berry-picking tend to make my mind go to other things.”

“Like plotting your next art heist?”

“By all means, cling to your theory that I’m your art thief. I won’t try to dissuade you.” He waggled a finger at her. “Your nose is red, too, Emma.” He sat back with a mysterious smile. “As cold as it is there, you’ll enjoy my present all the more.”

She didn’t want any presents from Oliver York, but she wasn’t arguing with him.

“Enjoy the rest of your evening,” he said. “Shall I give Father Bracken your best?”

Emma wasn’t enthusiastic about Oliver meeting the Bracken brothers for a drink, much less inviting Finian to the Cotswolds, but there was nothing she could do about it. “Please do,” she said.

Oliver clicked off and the screen went blank.

He wouldn’t send valuable stolen art from England to Maine, and he wouldn’t send it to her.

Would he?

Emma opened a file on her laptop and brought up photographs of art stolen over the past decade by the same unidentified thief—from homes, businesses and museums in Ireland, Amsterdam, Brussels, London, Venice, Prague, Oslo, San Francisco and Dallas. After each heist, the thief sent Wendell Sharpe a small, polished stone inscribed with a Celtic cross. Emma had worked on the case even before she became an FBI agent.

There was no proof Oliver York was their thief, but there also was no doubt.

Emma wasn’t unsympathetic to the torment he’d endured as a young boy and undoubtedly still carried with him, but she was careful not to get sucked into it as rationalization for his stealing and taunting—for his crimes. After she and her grandfather had figured out Oliver was their thief in November, the stolen artwork started turning up, each piece back in the hands of its rightful owner, with nothing to trace its theft or its return to Oliver York.

What, Emma wondered, was returning the art costing Oliver?

What would he do now to relieve the sense of helplessness and the terrible pain he had suffered as a child?

She let her gaze linger on the photos of the two missing Dutch landscapes, small oil paintings done by lesser-known seventeenth-century artists. They were valuable but not as valuable as a Rembrandt or a Van Gogh would have been. Oliver tended to stay away from art that would have attracted worldwide headlines. The Amsterdam museum that owned the landscapes had left the spaces empty where they had hung for decades.

Oliver needed to return them. Then Emma could think about his pain.

She shut her laptop and went into her tiny kitchen. She didn’t want to go out again, but she had little in her refrigerator. She was digging out vegetables and hummus when her phone dinged.

Oliver again.

I forgot to tell you. Our agent spoke to a woman in the park.

They knew each other?

I’m certain. They looked like they were arguing.

Did you speak with her?

No. Is she FBI?

Emma resisted getting him back on the phone.

Go enjoy a whiskey with Fr. Bracken and forget about FBI agents.

Ah, Emma. I never forget about you lot.

She responded with a smile icon and resumed collecting her dinner. As she took her plate into the living room, her gaze settled on a photo of her and Colin together in Ireland last fall. Framing it had been her idea. He didn’t think of such things. She set her plate on the coffee table and eased onto the couch as she touched a finger to his chin, as if he were with her. He was solid and confident, a man who relied on his instincts and his training. On Monday, he had packed his duffel bag and headed to the airport, saying he had meetings in Washington and would be in touch.

All very sudden and mysterious.

Colin wasn’t a natural fit for HIT, but he’d managed to make a place for himself once Yank had shoehorned him onto his team in October. Colin contributed to complex investigations with the eye of a seasoned undercover agent and the gut instincts of someone who had faced sustained, real danger in the field.

Emma hadn’t thought his meetings involved HIT until that morning, when Yank had left for Washington with no explanation beyond “meetings.” It was possible his trip had nothing to do with Colin’s trip, but what were the odds?

Given Colin’s absence, she supposed she didn’t need to spend two nights on her own at the convent. She could stay here in Boston and contemplate her life. But her current life wasn’t the reason she had arranged for her mini retreat with the Sisters of the Joyful Heart.

It was her past that was driving her to return, briefly, to the sisters.

Ever since the first of the year, she kept seeing herself walking through the convent gates as a teenager, thinking she would never have another home. It was as if she were looking at a stranger, someone outside herself—a different person altogether from the woman she was now, or even the child she had been before the thought of becoming “Sister Brigid” had gripped her.

Emma wiggled the diamond engagement ring Colin had placed on her finger in Dublin. Was he even in Washington? For four years, he had told his family he worked at a desk at FBI headquarters.

Such was not the case.

While tempting and inevitable, speculating, she knew, wouldn’t answer any of her questions. She’d waited for Colin before. She would now, for however long was necessary. She had her work, and her retreat.

Not to mention lunch on Saturday in Maine with his mother.

Emma smiled and pulled out her phone again, flipping to her photo of her wedding dress.

It was a great dress. Perfect for an early June wedding on the Maine coast.

“Not any wedding,” she said. “My wedding.”

To Colin Donovan.

She slipped her phone back into her coat pocket. She would call him later about Oliver York. If he could talk to her, he would. If he couldn’t, they would talk later.

And wherever he was—whatever he was up to—he would come back to her.

3

The Bold Coast, Maine Wednesday, 7:00 p.m., EST

It took Mike Donovan a full three seconds before he realized the buzzing he heard was his cell phone. He wasn’t used to having a phone. He picked it up from the counter where he’d left it while he chopped garlic. He’d been up since five, when he had pulled on jeans, a heavy flannel shirt, a vest, wool socks and L.L.Bean boots and headed outside. The temperature was in the double digits. He could get work done.

He answered his phone without checking the screen to see who was calling. Before he could get in a word, his mother spoke. “No one’s hurt or been arrested,” she said.

“That’s good. What’s up?”

She launched into something about a visitor. Some guy. Mike couldn’t make it all out. The connection was weak. It was dark at his cabin on a remote stretch of the Maine coast down east of Acadia National Park. The Bold Coast, it was called, named for its dramatic cliffs and tides. His mother was in Rock Point, his hometown in southern Maine.

“You run an inn,” he said. “What’s wrong with visitors?”

“This wasn’t a guest. It was one of your army buddies.”

He heard the urgency in her voice. Married to a police officer, now retired, and the mother of four adult sons, Rosemary Donovan wasn’t prone to overstating her case.

Mike stood at his front window. The evening air was still and dark, stars glittering on waves of undisturbed snow and the ocean, quiet and starlit past the marsh across from his cabin. He’d worked outside most of the day and had planned to spend the evening alone by the fire, reading a book. He owned a television but didn’t watch it much. He liked his life but it was new to him compared to the army. Three years into it instead of ten.

“What army buddy?” he asked finally.

“Jamie Mason. Do you know him?”

Retired army, none better at logistics support. “I know him. When did he stop by?”

“Just now. I offered him coffee, but he said no, he had things to do.”

“Pop’s there?”

“No. I’m here alone. Your father’s at Hurley’s having a drink with your brothers.”

Andy and Kevin, Mike thought. Not Colin. Colin had told them he was in Washington, but he could be anywhere. Their folks would like all four sons in town having a drink at Hurley’s.

Mike turned from the window back to his kitchen area. “You let this guy in?”

“Of course. It’s cold outside.”

It wasn’t that cold for Maine in February. “Just because he said he’s a friend doesn’t mean he is one.”

“Oh, stop, Mike. I didn’t call you for a lecture. He left a message for you. I wrote it down. I have it right here. Hang on a sec.” She paused, and Mike could hear her shuffling through papers. He pictured her in the old sea captain’s house that she and his father had converted into an inn in Rock Point, four hours by car down the coast. “Got it. He said to tell you that Reed Cooper is on his way to Maine from London. He’s meeting with a small group at the Plum Tree Inn. He wants you to join them. You know the Plum Tree, don’t you, Mike? It’s just up the road from here. I thought it was closed for the season.”

“I know it.”

“What do these men want with you, Mike?” his mother asked, as if suddenly realizing she had reason to be suspicious.

“Reed has started his own private contract security firm. Cooper Global Security.”

“Oh.”

Mike heard the apprehension in her voice. He scooped up chopped garlic and tossed it into his frying pan. Jamie Mason wouldn’t be one of Reed’s operators. More likely Mason would be running the office, probably with his wife, Serena, also retired army.

“Did Mason say anything else?” Mike asked.

“He gave me a few more names. I wrote them down, too. My mind’s a sieve these days. Let me see. One’s a woman’s name, I remember that.” Another long pause, more paper shuffling. “Here we go. Buddy Whidmore, Ted Kavanagh and Naomi MacBride. Mr. Mason says he expects them to be at the Plum Tree in addition to Reed Cooper.”

Mike absorbed the silence of his isolated stretch of the Atlantic coast. The snow blanketing the evergreens that dominated the woods on three sides of his cabin muffled any sounds. He could hear, faintly, the wash of the incoming tide. Sixty years ago, his grandfather, his mother’s father, a Rock Point harbormaster, had built the cabin as a getaway. He had never lived up here full-time. Mike had since leaving the army.

“Mike? Are you still there?”

“Still here.”

“Who are these people?”

“I knew them when I was in the army.”

“Were any of them with the Special Forces?” his mother asked.

“Reed and Jamie. Kavanagh was with the FBI. At least he was then. I don’t know if he’s retired or quit.”

“Does Colin know him?”

“I’ve never mentioned Kavanagh to Colin. No reason to.”

A moment’s silence. “What about the other two?” his mother asked finally.

Mike set his paring knife in the scratched stainless-steel sink, but he was seeing Naomi’s smile. “Civilian.” He tried to keep any tension out of his voice. “Buddy’s a tech guy. Naomi was with the State Department.”

“A diplomat?”

“I guess you could say that.”

“I don’t understand why they would come to Maine in February. The Plum Tree must have given them a good deal or something.”

“If I knew what was going on, I’d tell you.”

She didn’t respond at once. He wasn’t sure how well she could hear him, but he figured she wasn’t going to gripe about the lousy connection. It was better than nothing. She had been after him for months to get a cell phone rather than to rely on the landline at the general store.

“I hope these people aren’t a problem for you,” she said.

“They’re not. I’m glad you called. What are you and Pop up to this weekend?”

“Emma is heading up here tomorrow afternoon. She’s staying at the convent for two nights, and I’m taking her to lunch on Saturday. She’ll be on her own. I’m looking forward to spending some time with her. I’ve never had a daughter, and Emma will be my first daughter-in-law.”

Mike smiled, despite his tension. His mother’s tone said “it’s about time” even if she would never utter those words out loud. He doubted she’d ever imagined one of her sons marrying a woman like Emma Sharpe. An FBI agent, maybe. But an FBI agent who was also a member of a family of renowned art detectives? An ex-nun? Mike, the eldest, had put aside his own doubts about Emma in the months since Colin, the second-born Donovan, had met her, fallen for her and asked her to marry him.

“Mike...” His mother hesitated. “This Reed Cooper...”

“It’ll be fine. Don’t worry. Have a good time with Emma.”

When she disconnected, Mike could tell she wasn’t satisfied. She might not be able to put her finger on exactly why, but she had well-honed instincts after all this time. Her four sons had been in plenty of jams—and she was well aware she didn’t know about all of them and there were likely more to come. Mike was ex-army living out on the Bold Coast as a wilderness guide and outfitter. Colin was an FBI agent based in Boston. Andy was a lobsterman. Kevin was a Maine state marine patrol officer.

Frank Donovan, their father, would just tell his wife, “The boys know what they’re doing.”

Sometimes it was true. Not always.

Mike stepped outside onto the porch. He had his grandfather’s old wooden canoe turned over on a rack. It needed work. Winter was a good time to fix things that the busy warm-weather months didn’t allow time for. He had the occasional backcountry skier or snowshoe group request his skills as a wilderness guide and outfitter, but not many people were interested in a trek along the icebound cliffs of the Bold Coast in the dead of winter.

Even in summer, he seldom had company. On a cold February night, he might see a white-tailed deer or a moose, but otherwise he had his spot in paradise to himself. His clients never came to his place, winter or summer. He would meet them at the general store in the village a few miles down the road. Some of them would ask, “Hey, Mike, where do you live?” He would say, “On the coast,” as if it could be anywhere on Maine’s more than three thousand miles of coastline.

The sun first hit the Continental United States on the Bold Coast, and he liked to be up for it, no matter what time. It was noticeably earlier now that it was late February. That morning the ocean had glowed with shades of deep orange, red and purple. Now it reflected the night sky of sparkling stars and a quarter moon.

He breathed in the salt-tinged air and listened to the tide wash over ice, rocks and sand. He liked to tell himself this place wasn’t an escape, as it had been for his grandfather. He lived here.

His mother wanted him to get a dog. Dogs are good company, she would tell him.

His father had been more direct: There must be women up there.

If his parents guessed there had been a woman during their firstborn’s time in the army, they didn’t say.

Mike had no photos of Naomi MacBride.

He didn’t need any. Every inch of her was etched in his mind forever. He could see her wide smile and dark, wild, curly hair. He could hear her laughter—she had an indomitable sense of humor—and he could feel her skin, hot and smooth, under his hands.

He turned away from the water and walked back to his cabin.

* * *

An ancient Vermont Castings woodstove served as the cabin’s sole source of heat. It had to be tended, but Mike had people who could do that for him when he was away. He might like his solitude but that didn’t mean he was without friends.

He checked his phone. No texts or emails.

He put another log on the fire and went back to cooking his dinner. He sautéed garlic, ginger, green beans, ground beef, soy sauce and rice vinegar and made brown rice. The kind of meal he could eat for a couple of days.

He dumped his dinner on a plate and sat by the fire.

Should he tell his FBI brother about another FBI agent coming to Maine this weekend for a get-together with private security contractors?

Probably, but Mike didn’t see any big rush. He’d call Colin in the morning.

He felt the heat of the fire and tried to remember the last time he had allowed himself to think about Naomi. Months, anyway. A year? Longer?

Not longer.

He didn’t know what he would do about Reed Cooper and the gathering at the Plum Tree. He did know that nothing good ever happened when Naomi MacBride was anywhere near his life.

It was something he couldn’t let himself forget.

4

Near Stow-on-the-Wold, the Cotswolds, England Thursday, 8:00 a.m., BST

The insistent crow of a rooster and the smell of rain roused Naomi MacBride from a not-so-dead sleep. She rolled onto her back and opened her eyes, trying to shake off dreams of a life and a man she had left behind years ago. She was in England, in a quiet Cotswolds village two hours west of London. It was February, and from the crowing rooster, she would guess it was morning, although it was still quite dark. She was in a double four-poster bed in a cute room in a small building located across the courtyard of a classic English pub complete with low, beamed ceilings and a huge open fireplace. She’d had a pint there last night before venturing into her room and falling into bed. It had been a long week.

Her room also had a low ceiling. She could feel its looming presence. She had never been one for squirrely places. Hence, the cracked window and her natural wake-up call.

The rooster crowed again.

He didn’t sound as if he planned to give up anytime soon.

With a groan, Naomi sat up, keeping the duvet tucked around her. She could hear more chickens now, warbling outside her window. Probably hens. If she were one of them, she would organize a revolt against the rooster.

Chickens.

She sighed. “Of course the place has chickens.”

She threw off the duvet and stood on a soft hooked rug that, she recalled, depicted a sheep. It was too dark to see it now. She shivered, rubbing her bare arms, wishing she had resisted the impulse to take this side trip and instead had spent her last night in England in London, where she’d had a room in a proper hotel with five-star service, a bustling lobby, a great location and no chickens. But here she was in the English countryside after a week of intense meetings.

She fumbled with the lamp on the nightstand, found the switch and turned it on. The worst part of her constant travel, Naomi decided, was locating light switches.

Nightmares about an ex-lover weren’t that great, either.

It wasn’t her fault she had dreamed about Mike Donovan. As much as she wanted to find someone to blame and could pick a name or two, she knew it wasn’t anyone’s fault. Not really.

She seldom had nightmares anymore about the dangers she’d faced in the past decade, maybe because she’d found healthy ways to process them. Post-trauma therapy had helped—or debriefing, or whatever one wanted to call it. Naomi, you’ve been through hell, her mother, blunt as ever, had told her. You need to talk to someone.

Naomi hadn’t mentioned Mike in her sessions—or to her mother. What was the point? By then, he was just another Special Forces soldier she would never see again.

She felt the cool air from the cracked window. Her room really was adorable with its English-country-chic decor. When she’d arrived last night, the woman at the reception desk in the pub had handed her a real key and reminded her that this was a pub that let rooms—meaning she could expect noise from the patrons late into the evening.

No mention of early-morning roosters.

Not that early, Naomi thought as she noted the time on her phone, faceup on the nightstand. Eight twenty. She had been in England long enough to adjust to the time change but not so long that it didn’t still feel like the middle of the night. It was, after all, only 2:00 a.m. at home in Nashville.

She went to the window and pulled back the curtains, letting in more of the gray light. Her rooster was parading on the edge of a stone fountain in the middle of the courtyard. He was black with white spots, or at least appeared to be. Sunlight would help. He threw back his head and belted out another crow, letting the world know he was awake and ready to take on the day.

“Well, good for you,” Naomi muttered, remembering her granny describing how she would have to catch a chicken and wring its neck for Sunday dinner. That prospect didn’t seem as horrifying at the moment as it had at six years old.

She noticed a handful of brown-feathered hens pecking and warbling in the herb gardens that flanked the pretty courtyard. She doubted they or the rooster were in any danger of becoming dinner. She envisioned the courtyard in spring and summer, when the dripping, winter-browned vines that trailed the trellises and the tall fence would be blossoming with clematis, roses and wisteria. The smattering of tables were all empty now, the cold, gray, drizzly morning not exactly a draw for breakfast outdoors.

With a yawn, Naomi ducked into the bathroom, stifling a yelp when her bare feet hit the cold tile floor. She spread a bath mat in front of the tub and turned on the water, letting it get good and hot while she pulled off her yoga pants and tank top, her standard sleepwear on the road—which meant her standard sleepwear, period. She opened the bottles of luxurious, locally made shampoo, conditioner and body wash. She wondered what it would be like to stay in this place for a few days for a break. A real getaway. It was appealing even now, in midwinter, with its soothing blend of English charm and sophistication and its perfect location in the heart of a small, traditional Cotswolds village.

A getaway would have to wait. She had a late-afternoon flight back to Nashville via Atlanta. She would gain six hours and be home in time to sleep in her own bed tonight.

“Preferably without nightmares.”

And definitely without chickens, she thought, smiling as she stepped into the tub and eased under the steamy shower.

When she stepped out of the tub again and wrapped up in a fluffy towel, she was much warmer and smelled faintly of herbs and citrus. She dried off, combed out her hair, basic brown and ridiculously curly, and got dressed. Since she had expected to stay in London for the duration of her trip, she hadn’t packed any serious country clothes. The slim, stretchy pants and wine-colored cashmere sweater she planned to wear on her flight would have to do for her morning in the Cotswolds. She did have an authentic Barbour jacket, an indulgence she had succumbed to on a long, drizzly walk in London. She never remembered to bring an umbrella with her, and that day she had bolted out of her hotel without so much as a jacket. Too much on her mind. She was good at assembling information and making sense of it, analyzing it and seeing where it pointed, but it was often a messy process that completely absorbed her.

It certainly had been that afternoon in London. She had found herself cold and wet, standing in front of a store that sold Barbour jackets. Her jacket’s waxed dark green cotton and English-country look would do nicely today. Her slip-on ankle boots, at least, were good for walking, if not for a full-blown trek on one of the network of walking trails that zigzagged throughout the region. Before dozing off last night, she had flipped through a bedside notebook filled with “guest information” and had noticed mention of a medieval church in Stow-on-the-Wold whose arched door had reportedly inspired J.R.R. Tolkien when he created the door to Moria.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to prowl through an English churchyard and then relax in an English tea shop?

It wouldn’t happen on this trip.

Naomi ignored a tug of regret mixed with nostalgia and loneliness, as if she had lost something that, of course, she’d never had. Love, trust, understanding.

Someone to wander through churchyards and have tea with her.

It was the nightmare, she knew. It still had her in its grip.

What are your plans for after the army, Mike?

She could see his enigmatic smile, at the same time self-deprecating and confident—and annoyingly fatalistic. Without saying anything, he had managed to tell her that he didn’t think past the army. If he got home to Maine, he got home to Maine. He wasn’t a pessimist, he would say. He was a realist who lived in the moment.

Did Mike Donovan ever imagine himself wandering through old English churchyards and having tea and scones with the woman he loved?

“Not a chance,” Naomi said, grabbing her jacket as she headed out to the courtyard and the chickens.

* * *

The same man who had poured her pint last night showed Naomi into the breakfast room in the pub building across the courtyard. He offered her tea or coffee. “Coffee, please,” she said, not quite choking on her words when she recognized the only other diner, a man seated on a cushioned bench, watching her, his back to the wall. It was all she could do not to turn around and walk out of there. She forced herself to smile at the waiter. “Thanks.”

He retreated, and she pushed back her dismay, frustration and mad curiosity as she walked over to the table where Ted Kavanagh sat with a pot of tea. “I didn’t take you for a tea drinker, T.K.,” she said.

“I’ve been here for an hour. I’ve already had coffee and a full English breakfast.” He motioned to the chair across from him. “Have a seat, Naomi.”

She didn’t want to but if she sat at another table, he’d still be here, a few feet away, annoyed and annoying. She sat, not much distance across the little blond-wood table. “First we run into each other in St. James’s Park in London. Now here we are in the Cotswolds.” She unfurled a cloth napkin. “Honestly, T.K., I don’t need a crazy FBI agent bird-dogging me.”

“Sure you’re not following me?”

“Yes. Positive. I need to get better at spotting a tail.”

“A good skill to have. What’s with the T.K.?”

“We’re in a foreign country. I figure it’s okay to be informal. Don’t your friends call you T.K.?”

“No.”

Probably true. Kavanagh wasn’t wearing a suit this morning, but he had a buttoned-down, perpetually suspicious look about him that she had come to know working with him in Afghanistan. She hadn’t expected to see him again after she left the State Department as an intelligence analyst, and then—poof—there he was in London.

Except there was no poof about it. Ted Kavanagh was a deliberate, calculating, experienced federal agent.

That didn’t mean he wasn’t crazy.

Naomi pulled off her jacket and hung it on the back of her chair. Kavanagh was a decade older than she was, and he had been married when she knew him in Kabul. Since he wasn’t wearing a wedding ring, she guessed he wasn’t married any longer. She supposed he could have developed an allergy to metals. She didn’t plan to ask.

“In a perfect world, T.K.,” she said, “it would be spring, and I’d be having breakfast outside with the chickens and the scent of wisteria.”

“Wisteria’s a flower, right?”

“It’s a climbing flowering shrub. It’s all over the Cotswolds but it’s not in bloom this time of year. The flowers are typically purple.”

“I guess that’s good. People like purple.”

“You don’t care about wisteria. Did you stay here last night?”

He pointed at the ceiling. “Room above the pub. I rented a car and drove in from London.”

“Not me. I hired a car. Driving in London is a nightmare. A shame I didn’t know you were following me here. I could have bummed a ride off you and saved myself the money.”

“Traffic was terrible. I’ll never get used to driving on the left.” He didn’t sound as if he expected her to believe him. “You’re staying in the building across the courtyard. What is it, an old pigsty?”

“I don’t know. It’s charming. I wish I could stay longer.” She gave a slightly fake yawn. “I’m not a good conversationalist before coffee. What are my choices for breakfast?”

“Cold buffet and a choice of hot breakfast. English, grilled kippers, porridge.”

“As many times as I’ve been to England, I still don’t know what a kipper is.”

“Fish.”

“I know that much. Have you ever tried kippers?”

“Yes. They’re good grilled. Not the most attractive food.”

He was clearly not there to talk about kippers, either. The waiter returned with her coffee press. Naomi settled on porridge for her hot breakfast, and he again withdrew, giving no indication he sensed she wasn’t that happy with her breakfast mate.

She poured coffee into the mug already on the table and added cream from a small pitcher. Kavanagh eyed her without comment. He didn’t look tired or distracted or as if he’d had nightmares. He looked alert and impatient, a know-it-all who figured he could tell what she was thinking before she thought it. A good FBI agent, maybe, but not her favorite. She had tolerated him in Afghanistan because she’d had no choice.

Without comment, she got up and helped herself to the buffet. She filled a bowl with natural yogurt and added a couple of scoops of chopped fresh fruit, then put a croissant, still warm from the oven, on a small plate.

“I’m disappointed,” she said as she returned to her seat. “I wanted scones.”

Kavanagh frowned at her. “A croissant and porridge? That’s a lot of carbs, Naomi.”

“I’m flying later today.” She figured he already knew that. “Carbs will help me sleep. I have to tell you, T.K., it creeps me out that you’re here.”

He poured the last few drops of his tea. It was the color of coffee by now. “You should feel well protected.”

Naomi dipped a spoon into her yogurt and fruit. “Why is it that I don’t?”

“Because you have a habit of placing your trust in the wrong people.”

“If that were true, I’d be dead by now.” She leveled her gaze at him. “So would you.”

“Maybe so.”

There was no maybe about it, but Naomi didn’t argue with him. Kavanagh wanted her to have a habit of trusting the wrong people because it would help him somehow, if only to throw her off balance and get in her head.

He glanced at a row of framed botanical prints on the side wall. Local grasses, wildflowers and herbs. “What are you up to, Naomi?” he asked, shifting back to her.

She tried the yogurt. It was smooth and creamy, made without added pectin. With the fruit, it was perfection. “Are you following me because you think I’m up to something? As I told you in London, you’re wasting your time. I’m a crisis management consultant who met with a group of medical volunteers who are planning their deployment to a hot spot in Africa. I’m helping them assess their security needs and then take appropriate steps to meet them. That’s all I’m up to.”

Kavanagh smirked at her. “It’s not all.”

“I’m not arguing with you, T.K.”

“Why this particular twee English village?”

Naomi ate more of her yogurt and drank some of her coffee. What she wanted to do was to eat six croissants and go back to bed. She made herself smile at the FBI agent across from her. “Twee. I love that word. I’ve wanted to visit the Cotswolds but never could find the time. Now I have, if only for one night.”

“That doesn’t explain why you chose this village,” Kavanagh said.

“This place comes highly recommended by an internet travel site I trust.” It was true, as far as it went. “What about you? Did you follow my car, or did you overhear me when I told the bellman where I was going? It wasn’t a secret, but the only person I actually told is my mother.”

“How is your mother, Naomi?”

“Great. Sewing up a storm. Think where I could be now if I’d paid attention and let her teach me how to sew drapes and beauty-pageant dresses.”

“Or if your father hadn’t been killed by an IED when you were a freshman at Vanderbilt,” Kavanagh said quietly.

Naomi finished the last of her yogurt. “Yes, that, too.” She refused to let him distract her, even if she had given him the opening. “This is a good place, don’t you think? I’d love to relax here for a few nights.”

Kavanagh leaned forward, his pale green eyes narrowed on her. “You’re giving me careful answers, Naomi.”

“Why wouldn’t I, seeing how you’re an FBI agent?”

Her porridge arrived. The waiter didn’t linger. Naomi didn’t blame him. Kavanagh wasn’t in full-blown FBI interrogation mode, but it was close enough.

She decided to lighten her tone and change the subject. “Did the rooster wake you up this morning? He did me.”

“I didn’t notice a rooster. I sleep soundly.”

She broke off a piece of croissant and popped it in her mouth as she noticed a drizzle of the promised blackberry compote in her porridge. Breakfast was delightful, she decided, refusing to let her companion spoil the moment. “Do you know what kind of rooster has white-spotted black feathers?”

“I’m not here to talk about roosters. Neither are you.”

She picked up the fresh spoon that came with her porridge. It was a lot of porridge. “I’ll look it up. I’m dying to know.”

“You’re playing with fire, Naomi. You know that, don’t you?”

“By having yogurt and porridge with you, you mean?”

Kavanagh’s eyes flared with anger, but he quickly got himself under control. All that FBI discipline and training, she supposed.

Assuming he still was an FBI agent.

She thought about asking to see his credentials to check if they were current, but she wouldn’t be able to identify a good forgery—and Ted Kavanagh would only have a good forgery.

“You know how to get on people’s nerves when it suits you,” he said.

“Sometimes it just works out that way.”

“It’s not on purpose, you mean?”

She didn’t respond. She started on her porridge. It was the chewy pinhead kind, and the trickle of warm blackberry compote turned out to be a sweet, delicious pool. In another life, she would do things like make compotes. In this life—her life now, at this moment—she did things like get through surprise breakfasts with FBI agents she didn’t trust and who didn’t trust her.

“I appreciate that it’s your business to find out things,” he said. “It’s how you make your living. It’s also who you are, though, isn’t it? It’s a control issue. This need to know things.”

“Psychoanalyzing me? It won’t get you far.” She held up her spoon. “This porridge is incredible, T.K. I never would have thought to add blackberry compote, but it’s a stroke of genius. I’m happy I chose the porridge instead of a full English breakfast, since I don’t like black pudding and have trouble with the idea of baked beans before noon. There’s not much you can do to a blackberry that I wouldn’t like. Without the compote, I can’t imagine how annoyed I’d be with you right now. You can’t just make up stuff about me.”

“I’m not making up anything, and I don’t care if you’re annoyed.”

“I’m getting that picture.”

He fingered a bit of loose-leaf tea that had fallen on the table next to his mug. “I need you to be straight with me, Naomi.”

“That’s a two-way street.”

He shook his head. “No, it isn’t.”

“Now I remember. You never did have a sense of humor. I’m here enjoying a decadent breakfast before my long flight across the Atlantic. I’ll take a good walk, too. I don’t care if it’s cold and rainy.”

“Rain’s ending. Where will you walk?”

“Not sure yet.” It wasn’t a flat-out lie but it was close. She knew where she was going. She just hadn’t figured out the route. “What about you? What are your plans for the day, T.K.?”

“Leaving you to your own devices if you won’t talk to me.”

“Good.”

He sucked in a breath and tapped the table with his fingertips, as though he wanted to let her know he was practicing self-restraint. He clearly wanted to throw the table aside and throttle her. “You know you can get into trouble lying to a federal agent, don’t you?”

“I’m not lying. I do think it’s good for you to leave me to my own devices. I don’t want an FBI agent to waste his time on my account.” Naomi set her spoon next to her porridge bowl. “Anything else I can do for you, Agent Kavanagh?”

“Why do you have doubts about me, Naomi?”

She glanced past him at the windows above the buffet table. Sunlight broke through the gray, at least for the moment, shining on puddles and brown, dripping vines. She hadn’t mentioned—and wouldn’t—that before she ventured into St. James’s Park she’d visited an art gallery to have a look at a show by Aoife O’Byrne, an Irish artist. She knew damn well Kavanagh had followed her there and then into the park. Let him admit it.

She did know how to spot tails, but she hadn’t been thinking about having one when she’d walked from her hotel to the gallery—and she wasn’t sure she’d have spotted an FBI tail. Ted Kavanagh might be on her nerves right now, but he was good.

The sun seemed to be fading already. Naomi turned back to the FBI agent. “Well, T.K., for one thing, you were in London on your own and now you’re here on your own. Most FBI agents work in pairs. Where’s your partner?”

He settled back against the cushioned bench. “Feel free to call any FBI office if you want to check up on me.”

“No, thanks. If you’re on the level, I’d only heap scrutiny on myself. Not that I have anything to hide, but who needs the aggravation? And if you’ve gone rogue, you are most definitely not my problem.”

“You’re right. I’m not your problem.”

“If you really are still an FBI agent, you’re breaking a lot of rules. That sweater for one. Gad, T.K. That is not your shade of brown.”

“My ex-wife gave it to me for my birthday.”

“Mmm. Last birthday you were together?”

“As a matter of fact, yes.”

Naomi broke off another piece of croissant. “Not surprised.”

He grinned. “I should have known. She has passive-aggressive behavior down to an art form. Oh, well. At least it’s a warm sweater. I’ll appreciate it today, even if it’s a bad shade of brown.” He got to his feet, eyeing Naomi a moment before he spoke. “It’s good to see you. Enjoy your day in the Cotswolds.”

“I will, thanks. You, too.”

“I have a flight to catch myself. Do you ever worry about your safety, Naomi? You’re a one-woman show. Who’s your backup? Who helps you when things get scary? Who picks you up when you fall?”

“I can always call 911.”

“When you’re at home. Out here...” He shrugged. “You can call 999, I guess. If you realize you’re over your head and need help, you know how to reach me. Don’t hesitate, okay?”

His comment caught her off guard. The knowledge behind it, the absence of any hint of cockiness, frustration and impatience, the softness of his voice, as if he could see into her heart—cared about her feelings. Her safety.

A ploy.

Ted Kavanagh didn’t not care about her, but if he was still a legit FBI agent, he had a job to do.

Whatever he was up to, she would let the FBI figure him out.

“Thanks,” she said, trying to sound matter-of-fact.

She expected him to walk away, but he didn’t. “Be careful, Naomi. You have a risk-taking streak that borders on reckless.”

He turned abruptly and left the breakfast room.

Once he was out of sight, Naomi exhaled, then poured herself more coffee. She wondered if Ted Kavanagh ever fantasized about taking a break for a few days and playing tourist. He looked as if he could use a break.

But she found herself fighting off another touch of melancholy. She drank her coffee as the waiter led a middle-aged couple to a table. They spoke English to him—they asked for tea—and German to each other. Naomi understood German and could speak enough to get through a dinner, but it wasn’t one of her better languages. The couple was discussing their plans for the day, which centered on celebrating their wedding anniversary with a long winter walk in the countryside.

The quaint English breakfast room fell away, thrusting Naomi back to a dusty night in Afghanistan. Federal agents, soldiers and civilian intelligence officers were often an uneasy combination at the best of times, and that hadn’t been the best of times.

It certainly hadn’t been a good time to fall in love.

But when was a good time to fall in love with Mike Donovan?

She set her mug on the table. No wonder she’d had nightmares about him.

She silently congratulated the German couple and wished them well, then frowned at the rest of her croissant. There was a small jar of gooseberry jam and a dish of butter on her table.

Well, why not?

She noted the jam was from the nearby farm owned by Oliver York, a wealthy Brit and, very possibly, an incomparable art thief.

Not coincidentally, he knew the Irish painter Aoife O’Byrne, whose uncle had been a victim of an art thief, and he also owned an apartment on St. James’s Park in London.

What did Ted Kavanagh want with York?

The York farm was at least a brisk twenty-minute walk from the inn. Naomi figured she could burn off her breakfast and, at the same time, consider what Kavanagh’s interest was in both her and Oliver York. She had her suspicions, but she put them aside as she opened the jar of the York farm’s gooseberry jam.

5

The few rays of sunshine at breakfast seemed to be it for the day. Naomi didn’t mind. She set off through the village, past a row of attached houses, a post office, a small school and a few cottages, then onto a lane that wound through well-marked fields, patches of woods and farmhouses. The York farm should be out the lane to her left, with Stow-on-the-Wold to the northwest, Chipping Norton to the northeast and Burford to the south. Cotswolds villages had sprung up during the Middle Ages, when the area had prospered around the sheep industry. With its proximity to London, the graceful landscape of rolling hills, pastures and quaint honey-colored stone houses drew tourists and wealthy second-home owners alike. The ubiquitous yellow limestone—Oolitic Jurassic limestone, technically—occurred naturally in the region and had been quarried there for centuries.

Naomi smiled, remembering when she thought something built in 1900 was old. Other than wishing she had brought a hat and gloves, she enjoyed the walk and tried to take in her surroundings without letting her thoughts intrude.

She crossed a bridge over a shallow stream, feeling the cold of the water below her, its trickle the only sound in the still, gray late morning. On the other side of the bridge, a sloping, tree-dotted lawn rose to an elegant house. The scene reminded her of a Jane Austen novel. According to her research, however, this was the York farm. Its owner would make an interesting Regency hero. Naomi couldn’t picture the heroine for him. A prideful Elizabeth Bennett, or a trustworthy Anne Elliot?

A low stone wall hugged a curve. She followed it about thirty yards to an open gate on a dirt track. She noticed tire marks, footprints, horseshoe prints and a small sign indicating the track was public, although not part of the Oxfordshire Way. If her map and the guest information in her room were correct, the track would take her along the southern edge of the York property to an historic dovecote.

It would also take her through mud, she noted with a grimace. She would have to clean her boots before she ventured to Heathrow, given the rules about trekking through farms before boarding flights. Or she could just toss them in the trash. They weren’t expensive. She could wear her flats on the flight.

She didn’t want to think about the long flight later today.

She went through the gate. Within a few yards, she saw the dovecote up ahead, on the left side of the track. Pleased with herself, she picked up her pace. What a change the Cotswolds were from London, she thought. Despite her misgivings about her reasons for being here, it was a welcome break from the intensity of the past week.

Flat stones set into a dirt path created a rudimentary walkway to the dovecote entrance. Naomi stepped onto the path for a closer look. She supposed leaving the track meant she was trespassing, but no one seemed to be around. A quick peek and she would be off. From her cursory research, she had learned that dovecotes were once widespread throughout the area, typically on wealthy manor or ecclesiastic properties. As their name suggested, they housed pigeons, in past times considered a delicacy. Only a fraction of the thousands of dovecotes built between the Middle Ages and the eighteenth century, when they fell out of favor, remained.

Naomi could see holes just below the steeply gabled roof that the pigeons must have used.

“Quaint.”

Clay and ceramic pots were stacked by the entrance, as if awaiting spring and plantings. An ancient—by her standards—wheelbarrow was leaned up against the stone front of the building. She stepped into the soft ground in front of a window and peered inside. Two clay pots that looked as if they were planted with some kind of large bulb sat atop a thick wood worktable. Tools were lined up on hooks and nails on the wall above it. Shears, clippers, diggers, scratchers. She had never been much of a gardener but could guess the dovecote was now a potting shed.

At least the front half. At the far end of the workbench was an interior door.

Padlocked.

Wouldn’t one padlock the main entrance and not bother with an interior door?

Naomi continued from the window along the soft ground—a mix of wet grass, sodden moss and dead leaves—to the back of the dovecote. She could hear water babbling in the stream down a tree-covered hillside.

There were no windows on the back of the dovecote. Too bad, she thought, ready to turn back and resume her walk on the track. She didn’t know if Oliver York was at the farm. What if he caught her snooping? Nothing in what she’d learned about him so far indicated he was violent. Weird, maybe. Troubled. Haunted. Smart. All that, yes—and ultra-fit. He had to be to pull off at least a half-dozen brazen art heists over the past decade.

She heard a sound behind her and nearly jumped out of her damn skin. Her knees buckled under her, and she clutched her jacket at her chest, even as she scanned the hillside, saw nothing amiss and told herself to calm down.

Woods, a stream, a farm. There would be animals about. Farmers had dogs, didn’t they?

She liked dogs.

She couldn’t let her imagination get carried away.

Perspiration sprang up at the back of her neck, never mind the chilly air. She lowered her hand from her chest. Small white flowers spread across the ground below a gnarled oak tree right out of Tolkien. She smiled, her heart rate slowing.

She wondered if she would ever not startle easily.

She did a few deep, calming breaths. She promised herself she would come back here one day in the spring. Maybe not to the York farm. The Cotswolds, though.

A groan came from the woods down toward the stream.

Distinct. Human. Probably male.

This time Naomi wasn’t startled. Someone was in clear distress.

“Bloody hell.”

The voice was definitely male, and almost certainly British.

She stood by a thin tree and looked down the hill. About ten yards below her, a gray-haired man was on all fours, struggling to get to his feet. He reached for a tree trunk, missed, fell and cursed again.

“Are you all right?” Naomi called to him. “Do you need help?”

He looked up at her, squinted as if he couldn’t focus or wasn’t sure if he had conjured her up. He started to speak, then slumped facedown into the ground.

Naomi ran down the hill, deceptively steep. She slipped in the wet leaves and grass but managed not to fall. When she reached the man, she squatted next to him but didn’t touch him. He was already pushing himself back up onto his hands and knees, grunting, clearly disoriented and in pain.

“Let me help you,” she said.

“I just need to get on my feet.”

It wasn’t a clear yes or no, but he didn’t protest when she hooked an arm around his middle. He was at least in his sixties, with only a bit of extra weight on him. He was a few inches taller than she was—nothing she wasn’t used to—and cold and muddy, shivering and shuddering as she anchored herself and helped him to his feet. He slung one arm over her shoulder, then with his other hand grabbed onto the tree trunk he had missed on the first try. He was able to hold on this time.

“Thank you,” he said, lowering his arm from her shoulders.

Naomi stood back, noticing he had on a Barbour jacket, too. From the looks of him, he had been out in the elements awhile. The jacket probably had helped save him from exposure. “Shall I call an ambulance?” she asked him.

“No, no. I’m all right. I took a nasty tumble.”

“When?”

He blinked at her. “When?” he repeated.

“It’s Thursday morning,” she said. “Do you remember when you fell? Did you lose consciousness?”

“I was out overnight.” He swallowed, licked his lips. “Thank you for your help.”

His tone was formal, almost embarrassed. He started up the hill, his gait practiced if not steady. Naomi spotted him from behind but had no idea what she would do if he fell back against her. They would probably both end up plunging into the stream.

He didn’t move fast, but he did make it to the top of the hill and the strip of grass behind the dovecote. He placed a hand at his right temple, his face ashen.

“Headache?” Naomi asked.

“Blistering.”

Only then did she see the blood caked on his neck. “You’re hurt,” she said.

“I must have hit my head on a rock or a tree root when I fell.”

“You’ve been bleeding. Do you want me to take a look?”

“I tore a chunk out of the back of my neck. Blood dribbled down my front. I landed facedown when I fell.” He grimaced, sinking against the dovecote. “Sorry to be such trouble.”

“You’re no trouble at all. Is there someone I can call?”

He stood straight, looking steadier, then motioned toward the front of the dovecote. He started walking, stiffly and unsteadily. Naomi fell in next to him, but she couldn’t tell how badly he was hurt. He could be acting out of stubbornness, disorientation, pain or, for all she knew, fear. How did she know his fall was an accident?

She also was guessing—was almost certain—the injured man was Martin Hambly, Oliver York’s longtime personal assistant.

He stumbled once but shook off her help and instead balanced himself with a hand on the exterior of the dovecote. When he reached the entrance, he pushed open the door and collapsed onto a wood chair against the wall by the worktable. He looked as if he was about to pass out, or maybe vomit—or both. Although obviously cold, he didn’t seem to be suffering from hypothermia. At the very least he had to be dehydrated if he had been out all night.

Naomi grabbed a bottle of water off the worktable, opened it and handed it to him.

He took a long drink and seemed to rally. “Thank you,” he said. “You’re American?”

“Mmm. Out for a walk.” She tried to get a look at his head injury, but it was difficult to see with his coat collar. “I can hail someone.”

“I’ll do it.”

He pointed at a cell phone on the worktable. She handed it to him, and he held it in his palm, trembling. He took in an audible breath, then managed to hit a few numbers.

“It’s Hambly,” he said when someone picked up on the other end. “I’m at the dovecote. I took a fall and need assistance. Not an ambulance. Thank you.” He slipped the phone into his jacket pocket. “I feel better already getting off that wet ground.”

“What happened?”

He seemed confused. “What do you mean, what happened?”

“How did you fall?”

“There are a thousand ways to fall in these conditions. I appreciate your coming to my aid, but you mustn’t let me keep you from your walk. I’m fine, honestly.”

“Head injuries can be dangerous, Mr. Hambly. If you lost consciousness—”

“I’ll check with my doctor. Thank you again.”

Naomi had no more desire to deal with the authorities than he did. Once she gave them her name, her situation could unravel fast from there. She wouldn’t even have to mention the FBI agent who had joined her for breakfast a twenty-minute walk away. Then if Kavanagh found out what she had been up to that morning...

An elderly farmworker arrived, identifying himself merely as Johnny as he took over Martin Hambly’s care.

Relieved and reassured, Naomi left them and headed to the track, turning back toward the village. She had resisted glancing at the locked door inside the dovecote, but she didn’t want to make too much of it. Oliver York was a wealthy man. If he was in fact an art thief, he had plenty of places to conceal his misdeeds.

* * *

Naomi wasted no time on enjoying the bucolic scenery on her walk back to the pub. She ducked through the courtyard—not a chicken in sight now—into her room. Her wet, muddy pants and socks were definitely not appropriate for Heathrow. She peeled them off and dumped the pants and socks in the trash. She didn’t have time to rinse them off and find a plastic bag to stuff them in for her flight. She cleaned the mud splatters off her jacket and boots as best she could. She had planned to wear her jacket on the plane but decided to pack it instead. She didn’t want to risk anything interfering with her getting home to Nashville tonight.

She wished she had time for another shower but washed up at the sink, making sure there wasn’t so much as a speck of mud on her. She didn’t know if the dovecote counted as being on a farm—a definite red flag at customs—but better safe than having to explain.

Did Hambly really not remember what had happened to him? Should she have rung the police?

Her reaction had been normal, nothing any other tourist out for a walk wouldn’t have done. Probably countless people had a peek at the dovecote. Nothing provocative in doing that, and, in any case, the injured Hambly might think she’d ventured off the public track because she’d heard him.

Her new clothes weren’t as comfortable as the ones heaped in the trash, but they would do. She zipped up her suitcase, scanned the room for anything she might have missed and headed out, shutting the door behind her.

She debated mentioning her encounter at the York farm at checkout but only for a fleeting moment. It was madness, really, to say a word about it.

She was fast coming to regret her detour to the Cotswolds.

When she emerged from the pub and saw Reed Cooper leaning against the hood of a sleek, dove-gray car, there was no question anymore. Kavanagh, Hambly and now Cooper?

She should have stayed in London.

“Hello, Naomi,” Reed said, his middle Tennessee accent not as pronounced as hers. “I’m your ride to Heathrow.”

“You canceled my car?”

“I didn’t think you’d mind.”

That was Reed. “You’re presumptuous,” she said.

He stood straight, wearing an expensive suit with no overcoat despite the cool temperature. “Hop in or you’ll miss your flight.”

He went around to the passenger side of the car and opened the door. Naomi eased past him. He took her suitcase, and she slid into the car. What other choice did she have? The bus? Hitchhiking?

Reed shoved the suitcase into the backseat. She watched him circle around to the driver’s side. She had bonded with him in Afghanistan because they were both Tennesseans and Vanderbilt graduates. He was from a prominent old-money Nashville family who had expected him to go into business, and she was from a small town east of Nashville, the older daughter of an army reservist killed in Iraq her freshman year in college and a seamstress who had loved and hated him and still missed him terribly. Reed was seven years older than Naomi—he had graduated by the time she stepped onto the beautiful Vanderbilt campus, dreaming of a life very different from the one she was leading.

She wondered what Reed’s hopes and dreams had been as a college freshman, but she had never asked. He had risen to captain in the army and now was launching his own small team of private operators to provide security for people like her volunteer medical professionals.

On paper, maybe, she and Reed should have been romantically involved, but they never had been—despite Mike Donovan’s suspicions. Mike wasn’t jealous and possessive. To the contrary. He’d just drawn the same erroneous conclusions about her and Reed that others had.

She needed to put that out of her mind.

“You’re still presumptuous,” she told Reed.

“You left a trail.”

“I haven’t been trying to cover my tracks.”

“That’s good. Relax, Naomi. I’m saving you money.”

“You’re not here to save me money.”

“That’s true.” Reed leveled his gray eyes on her. “We need to talk.”

“About what? English chickens?”

He didn’t look amused. “About your plans for the weekend.”

“Barbecue and bourbon at my favorite Nashville bar. Beyond that, I don’t know yet. It’s been a busy couple weeks.”

“How would you like to come to Maine?”

She wasn’t as taken aback as she could have been. “Maine is Donovan country,” she said, as if he didn’t know.

Reed smiled now. “So it is,” he said, starting the car.

6

Washington, DC Thursday, 8:00 a.m., EST

Colin Donovan hated meetings, but a meeting at FBI headquarters first thing in the morning with his immediate boss and the director was its own special hell. He knew Matt Yankowski well, but he was just getting to know Mina Van Buren, newly confirmed and not necessarily a fan. Van Buren and Yank had a history. Not a good one, from what Colin had been able to gather.

He was in a suit—his Washington suit, he called it. Dark gray wool, white shirt, red tie. The small meeting room was devoid of anything that would remind him he was in Washington. He could have been anywhere, except for the company he was keeping. He sat between Yank at one end of the table and Van Buren at the other. They both had just gotten in and looked cold, although by Colin’s standards, it was a mild morning.

Last night’s call from Emma and this morning’s call from Mike were on his mind. His fiancée and his older brother. FBI agent. Former Special Forces soldier. Emma had an art thief worried about an unauthorized FBI tail in London. Mike had guys he knew in the military coming in from London.

It didn’t help that Oliver York was inviting Finian Bracken, Colin’s Irish priest friend, out to the Cotswolds.

What the hell was Finian doing in England, anyway?

Not calls Colin had needed before talking about a deep-cover mission with his superiors.

He grinned at the two of them. “Washington’s supposed to get a couple inches of snow this weekend. Would you like some tips on snowshoeing?”

“I don’t want to know how to snowshoe,” Yank said, with barely a trace of a smile.

“I already know how, but I don’t like cold weather,” Van Buren said. “I tolerate snow only when I have no other choice.”

Yank looked like central casting’s stereotypical pick for a senior FBI agent—tall, gray-streaked dark hair, handsome, born in a well-pressed coat and tie. He had flown down to Washington yesterday and was staying at his house in the Virginia suburbs, now, finally, up for sale.

Van Buren looked like Judy Dench, if a younger version. She was in her late fifties, a former federal prosecutor who made no secret she had differences with her predecessor as FBI director. So far, she wasn’t shutting down HIT, Yank’s special unit, and she wasn’t relegating Colin to former undercover agent. From what he had seen so far, she was an efficient, no-nonsense type who did what she had to do to get the job done, whether it was testifying before Congress or hauling him and Yank to Washington to discuss a possible future undercover mission.

“Snowshoeing,” Van Buren added, shaking her head. “I discovered a number of surprises when I came on board here. You’re one of them, Agent Donovan. I expected surprises. I didn’t expect you.”

“Agent Donovan was necessary,” Yank said.

Colin sat forward. “Was? You planning to feed me to the seagulls?”

Another thin smile from Yank. Van Buren snorted. “It’s too damn cold to feed you to the seagulls.”

“Pretty, though, isn’t it? The Washington skyline outlined against the clear blue sky. The cold sharpens things.”

Van Buren eyed him as if trying to decide if he was being serious or sarcastic.

Yank opened a folder on the table in front of him. “Donovan’s a wiseass, but he’s one of the best deep-cover agents you have.”

“Perhaps the cold also sharpens people’s sense of humor.” Van Buren settled back in her chair, as if she were about to take a nap, but her eyes were intense, focused on Colin. “How are your wedding plans coming along, Agent Donovan?”

Her question caught him by surprise, but he kept any reaction under wraps. Look scared, nervous, irritated or eager beaver, and these two would eat him alive. “Fine.”

“Have you settled on a date?”

“First Saturday in June.”

“A lovely time to get married. Agent Yankowski mentioned that the ceremony will be at the convent of the Sisters of the Joyful Heart. I understand they have beautiful gardens. The foundress, Mother Linden, was friends with Agent Sharpe’s grandfather.”

“So I’m told,” Colin said. He didn’t like the direction of this conversation.

“And your Irish priest friend is performing the ceremony? Father Bracken?”

Van Buren was asking him questions to which she already knew the answers, but Colin decided not to point that out to her. Being an experienced prosecutor, she would know exactly what she was doing. “That’s the plan,” he said.

“How nice. The priest he’s replacing for a year will return in June, won’t he?”

“Father Callaghan. Also the plan.”

“Presumably Father Bracken will return to Ireland once Father Callaghan resumes his post.” Van Buren sounded hopeful. “The whiskey distillery he owns with his twin brother, Declan, is doing well. My husband and I tried a Bracken whiskey over the holidays. Excellent.”

“Fin would be pleased to know you liked it.”

“He’s your family’s priest,” Van Buren said. “That means he’s your priest, too.”

“He’s my friend,” Colin said.

“Have you confided in him?”

“Confided what?”

“Anything.”

“I’ve been burdened by this time in sixth grade—”

Van Buren waved a hand. “I withdraw the question.”

“Why are we talking about Father Bracken?” Colin asked.

“Small talk.” She smiled. “I’ve never been good at it.”

It wasn’t small talk but Colin didn’t argue.

The FBI director folded her hands on top of the folder open in front of her. “An independent thinker is critical for undercover work, in my judgment, but it can have its downside. You don’t really know for sure how you will react until you’re under, do you? On a real assignment, with real people who would harm you. It can take a toll. That’s why we have rules—rules the independent-minded can sometimes chafe at in their desire to do the work.”

She waited but Colin didn’t fill the silence with commentary. What was there to say? He had done difficult assignments in the past four years. He’d come out alive. He hadn’t compromised investigations or prosecutions. The bad guys were in prison or on the way there.

Van Buren unfolded her hands and sat back in her chair, her gaze on him. “I’m told you’re the best, and I’ve read your file.”

But she hadn’t seen him in action, Colin thought. She didn’t know if the file was padded—if she could trust her predecessor’s last days at the desk she now occupied. Colin trusted his instincts, and his instincts told him if Mina Van Buren wasn’t sure about Yank, she sure as hell wasn’t sure about him.

“Your life is more complicated than it used to be, isn’t it, Agent Donovan?”

“Yours, too, Director.”

She cracked a smile. Colin was positive. It didn’t last, but it gave him hope. In his world, a serious mission required a judicious sense of humor, moments of levity that made everything else not just easier but possible.

Federal prosecutors and another agent or two would be joining them. The meeting was in relation to a new undercover mission, one that had arisen out of his previous mission—a dangerous, months-long investigation that had succeeded but also had created a vacuum in the world of illegal arms trafficking.

It wasn’t an unforeseen consequence.

Jokes and talk of weddings, priests and snowshoeing ended as the conference table filled up. Colin wondered if any of the people who had joined the meeting had sent an agent to London to check on Oliver York. Because of him. Because they wanted to know if his life was becoming too complicated to put him undercover again.

* * *

Seventy minutes later, Colin told Yank about the calls from Emma and Mike. Yank had joined him on the walk from FBI headquarters to the inexpensive hotel where he had spent far too many nights over the past few weeks.

The senior FBI agent visibly gritted his teeth as Colin finished relaying the latest Sharpe and Donovan goings-on. “The Plum Tree? I’m supposed to get worked up about Mike’s old army buddies showing up at a Maine country inn called the Plum Tree?”

“It has its own plum orchard,” Colin said.

“Of course it does.” Yank turned up the collar on his overcoat. “Think this Cooper sent his man to Rock Point to snoop on your family?”

“To get the lay of the land, anyway.”

“They left it to your mother to tell Mike. That would piss me off.”

“Mike wasn’t happy about it,” Colin said.

“Imagine that.”

Colin wasn’t happy about it, either. “Do you know Ted Kavanagh?”

Yank shook his head. “Not personally, no. Nothing says he can’t meet with these guys on his own time. Why, what else is going on?”

Colin slowed at a wide intersection. He hadn’t told Yank about Emma’s call. He did now, keeping his recap as succinct as he could. “I’m wondering if this guy York saw could be Kavanagh. York didn’t give much of a description.”

“He’s bound to be paranoid.”

“He strikes me as very observant. He’d have to be to get away with stealing art and taunting Wendell Sharpe for a decade.”

“Ten to one the guy he saw in the park is a London stockbroker. Even if we show him a photo of Kavanagh, there’s no guarantee he won’t say it’s his guy just to spin us in circles.”

“York says the guy he saw argued with a woman.”

“Naomi MacBride?” Yank was silent as they approached Colin’s hotel. “We have coincidences and conjecture. Not my two favorite things.”

They entered the hotel and sat in a quiet nook by a gaslit fire. Colin watched a blue flame. He preferred wood fires, but this wasn’t bad. “It occurred to me the director could have put someone on York without telling us.”

“We wouldn’t be here if she felt that was necessary. Either one of us.”

It was a fair point. “You didn’t do it, did you?”

“No. Same reasoning. You wouldn’t be here if I felt that was necessary.” Yank settled back in his chair. “While we’re in the world of coincidence and conjecture, what if this Reed Cooper asked Kavanagh to look into what Mike’s been up to since leaving the army? If Cooper wants to recruit him, it makes sense he would want to know about any issues that could blow back on his company. Figure out if Mike has any baggage that needs to get sorted.”

“Never thought of myself as baggage.”

“Never? Seriously?”

Colin appreciated the moment of levity, but it was short-lived. “Why would Oliver York turn up on a background check on Mike—even if it includes me? I know my name would pop up because of the murder in Boston in November, but it’s not widely known that the British mythologist Oliver Fairbairn who was caught up in the investigation is also Oliver York.”

“These are security types,” Yank said. “They could find out. Even if they did, it doesn’t mean they’ve figured out York is an international art thief. Being in the middle of a high-profile murder investigation that involved you and Emma could be enough to raise a red flag about Mike and get them digging a bit more.”

“What’s Kavanagh’s role, then?”

“He doesn’t have to be currying favor with Cooper over a future job. He could just be helping out an old friend.”

Colin loosened his tie. “I like the stockbroker idea better.”

“I don’t blame you. What about Finian Bracken? Think he accepted York’s invitation to visit his farm?”

“Knowing Fin? Yes. Without question.”

“I don’t like the idea of him and York getting together, even if it’s for a fox hunt in the English countryside.”

“I don’t see Fin on a fox hunt.”

“Drinking whiskey and checking out old tombstones, then. Are you going to get in touch with him? He’s your friend.”

“And do what—tell him to go back to Ireland?”

“It’s a start.”

Colin didn’t disagree. He’d considered his options after learning about York’s plan last night. He, too, would prefer his Irish priest friend and the British art thief keep their distance.

“I need to check out of my room,” he said. “I’m flying back to Boston this afternoon.”

“Emma’s leaving this afternoon for her long weekend in Maine,” Yank said, not as casually as he might have meant to. “Are you meeting her?”

“That’s not the plan.”

“What’s she doing in Maine? Wedding things?”

“She’s having lunch with my mother on Saturday.”

“That could be interesting,” Yank said, without elaboration.

Colin watched the fake burning logs. He had assumed Emma had told Yank about her plans for the weekend. But assuming anything with Emma was dangerous. “She’s staying at the convent tonight and tomorrow night,” he said, keeping his tone neutral.

Yank was clearly surprised. “For old times’ sake?”

“I guess.”

“Kind of like sleeping with an old boyfriend, isn’t it? Never mind.” Yank waved a hand. “Forget I said that. I should get moving, too.”

“You done for the day? Off to plaster nail holes?”

“One more meeting. Then I plaster nail holes. I’m looking forward to unloading this house.” Yank stood but made no move to head back to the revolving doors. “You hold your own with Van Buren. She’ll do right by you. She knows you’re not her private police force.”

“I have always adhered to the principles and procedures of the FBI,” Colin said. “I read the handbook cover-to-cover the other day.”

Yank’s eyes were flinty. “I’m serious, Donovan.”

“Me, too.”

“You’re on my team because I shoehorned you in to keep an eye on you while you got your head screwed on straight. My opinion, you did the bidding of the previous director without enough oversight.”

“Excuse me, I was a deep-cover operative on a sensitive mission to break up a network of dangerous international arms traffickers. I wasn’t doing anyone’s bidding. I’m an independent thinker. It comes in handy when you’re being chased by alligators.”

Yank sighed. “There were no alligators.”

“It was South Florida. I was in the water. There were alligators as well as guys who wanted to kill me.”

“Are we done here?”

Colin was half-serious. Maybe not even half. He got to his feet. “We’re done. Good luck with the house. Will you miss it?”

“More than I will miss my old apartment. It was a daily battle with the roaches.” Yank gave an exaggerated shudder. “Some of those bastards were the size of rats.”

Colin kept his mouth shut. Yank had no sense of humor where roaches were concerned. He hadn’t counted on his wife balking about moving to Boston. Lucy Yankowski’s reluctance to leave her home in northern Virginia had thrown their marriage into turmoil as well as kept her husband in his roach-infested apartment longer than he had planned. Colin had watched Yank slowly come to realize he had made assumptions that could cost him the woman he loved. Whatever he had done to win Lucy back, she was in Boston, getting the keys to their new Back Bay apartment.

“Lucy’s serious about opening a knitting shop,” Yank said.

“Knitting as therapy, maybe.”

“Whatever makes her happy. We don’t have kids. We can afford to live in Back Bay and for her to explore a career change.”

“Glad things worked out,” Colin said.

“Yeah. Any worries about Emma returning to the convent?”

“She’s sleeping in the quarters used for retreats, not in the novitiate.”

“I guess that’s something.” Yank waved a hand. “Never mind. It’s none of my business. Emma was a novice when I recruited her. It’s not news to me.”

“That’s right.” Colin started out of the nook, away from the fire. “You saw her in her sensible nun shoes.”

“I did.” Yank’s mood visibly lightened as they continued across the lobby. “I’ll see you back in Boston on Monday.”

“Good luck with your meeting. This morning’s meeting was fifty-seven minutes too long.”

“It was an hour,” Yank said.

“First three minutes we stirred our coffees.”

Yank made no comment and headed out through a revolving door. He was better at navigating the treacherous waters of Washington, but he had decided to base his new HIT team in Boston. Colin had never heard him explain why and doubted he ever would.

* * *

When Colin reached his room, he packed and texted Mike: Where are you?

The response wasn’t instant. Hurley’s.

A favorite Rock Point restaurant on the harbor. It meant Mike had left the Bold Coast early. Should I be worried about you?

No.

That was Mike. A man of few words. Kavanagh?

FBI.

Meaning, he was Colin’s headache. Reed Cooper?

My problem.

No argument from Colin. Not yet, anyway. Stay in touch.

This time, there was no response. He hadn’t expected one. Mike had always been taciturn but was more so since leaving the army and moving out to the Bold Coast.

Colin stared out his window at a gloomy alley. Emma would be at the HIT offices at least through lunch. He wouldn’t be interrupting her long weekend on her own if he called.

She answered on the first ring. “Hey, what have you been up to?”

“Just got out of another meeting.”

“Ah.”

He wasn’t sure she believed him. He told her about Mike’s call about the gathering at the Plum Tree. “He’s in Rock Point,” Colin added.

“If the man Oliver spotted in London was Ted Kavanagh, he has his own agenda. We can’t have him spooking Oliver if we want those two Dutch landscapes returned.”

“They’re his last leverage.”

“Exactly. He’ll hold on to them until he knows what’s next. He wants to keep Scotland Yard off his doorstep.”

“He’s never threatened to dump them in the Thames.”

“That’s a plus,” Emma said. “I don’t think he’s worried about getting arrested at this point. It’s more like MI5.”

“Our friends in the British Secret Service.” Colin knew a number of British agents, although not well enough to mention Oliver York. “With Oliver’s contacts and skills, he can maneuver in a wide variety of worlds. Think of the bad guys he could stop. Has MI5 been in touch with you?”

Emma didn’t answer right away. “Sort of.”

“I can see York as James Bond.”

“What are you doing now?”

“Packing. I’ll be back in Boston tonight. You?”

“Leaving for Maine as soon as I can get out of here.

“Say hi to the sisters for me.”

“I will.”

He heard a brightness in her voice—an eagerness to be at the convent again. Many of the current crop of religious sisters had been there when Emma had been Sister Brigid, young, eager, not so much confused as figuring things out. Specifically what things Colin didn’t know. At nineteen, he’d been figuring out how to keep himself in cash and women while he got through college. He’d majored in criminal justice, but he’d never been a deep thinker. He swore Emma had been born thinking deep thoughts.

As he disconnected, he noticed pigeons huddling on a trash can. They looked cold.

What would his life be like if he’d stayed in the Maine marine patrol, or if he had never volunteered for undercover work? Would he and Emma have ever met? They’d grown up a few miles apart from each other but hadn’t met until last September, despite both being with the FBI.

It didn’t matter, he thought. If he’d been a lobsterman, a Maine cop or a bartender at Hurley’s, somehow he and Emma would have met. He knew it in his gut.

They were meant to be together.

He would arrive in Boston after she’d left for Maine, probably while she was singing vespers with the sisters.

He wanted her to enjoy her time at the convent.

He finished packing and headed to the lobby. He had time for lunch, then he would take a cab to the airport and catch his flight.

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