Hearing her friend’s anguish, Charlie remained silent. There was nothing to say. All she could offer was the willingness to listen.
“If I tell him I know he was at the Rigbys’ bacchanal, he could still deny that anything happened. He could turn the tables, accuse me of not trusting him, and cast me in the role of the villain for having him followed.” Amara’s hands balled in her lap. “No, when I confront him, I will do so with proof of his infidelity. I want you to continue tracking him, Charlie. I know this is asking a lot. Whatever the cost, I will pay it.”
“Since you and that dangerous parasol of yours saved my life all those years ago, I would say the debt is mine.”
As Charlie hoped it would, the memory earned a faint smile from Amara. The two had met before Charlie had started the Angels, when the society was still a germ of an idea in her head. On that fateful night, she’d taken a wrong turn and found herself cornered by thieves. Even with her trusty pistol, there had been too many for her to fight off alone.
Like an avenging angel, Amara had waded into the fray, her weapon a parasol equipped with a retractable steel blade. Together, she and Charlie had dispatched the vermin and sent them scurrying back into the shadows. Afterward, Charlie had taken her rescuer to supper, and over a meal of meat pies and ale, their friendship had taken root.
When Amara had decided to open her shop, Charlie had been her primary investor. When Amara had met Gilbert not long after, Charlie had stood as her matron of honor and later became godmother to the couple’s newborn daughter. When Charlie had decided to stop her futile inquiry into Sebastian’s death and divert her skills toward establishing a female detective society, Amara had been a staunch supporter. She’d even designed clothing and tools to help Charlie’s Angels carry out their investigations.
Through thick and thin, Charlie and Amara had been there for each other. Kindred spirits who trusted one another with the secrets of the past and present.
“If it is your wish for me to continue following Gilbert, then I will,” Charlie said simply.
Amara’s nod was somber. “I want the truth. Even if it brings pain, not knowing is far worse.”
Eyes of fathomless midnight flashed in Charlie’s head, and her throat cinched. Unanswered questions surfaced to haunt her. After Sebastian’s death, she’d been besieged by grief…but also by what she could only term a niggling intuition. A sense that something about his death hadn’t been right.
Her doubts had begun with the note she’d found. Going through her dead husband’s belongings, she’d found the crumpled scrap in an inner pocket of his coat, the words written in a feminine hand. Eleni’s, she’d presumed.
We’re in danger. We need to meet.
What sort of danger? Was someone threatening them?
Despite Charlie’s anguish over Sebastian’s infidelity, she had loved him. He had smashed her heart to pieces, yes, but he had also rescued her. From those ruffians in Marseille and from her guardian. He had married her, giving her the protection of his name.
Before the fighting—and, presumably, the affair with Eleni—had begun, Sebastian had been adoring and passionate. Devoted, even. He’d showered Charlie with gifts and what she’d craved most of all: his attention. With him, she’d felt cherished for the first time. He’d been everything she could want in a husband…until he wasn’t.
Soon after, he was dead.
If his death hadn’t been an accident, Charlie owed it to him and herself to find out the truth.
Thus, she’d dedicated herself to finding out all she could about Eleni, her husband, and what had happened the night the taverna burned. This would turn out to be her very first investigation. In this case, each question she’d asked had led to more questions. What had started as a simple need to know whether her husband’s death had, indeed, been the accident the local authorities concluded it was became something else.
An obsession. An unrelenting desire to uncover the truth.
Ultimately, she hadn’t been successful. All her inquiries had led to dead ends. She finally recognized that her fixation on her husband’s death was doing more harm than good. It kept her mired in the past, spinning her wheels in the emotional muck of rage and despair. For her own good, she had to let him go. And she had, using the skills she’d acquired toward a more meaningful cause. She thought she had moved on…until last night.
Who was that dashed man I saw?
“Charlotte, what is the matter?”
She hastily returned her gaze to Amara’s. “It is nothing.”
“Let me be the judge of that.” Amara’s expression was shrewd. “You’re preoccupied, which is not like you. Either there is something about Gilbert that you are not telling me, which would be even more out of character…or something else happened. Whatever it is, it must be significant indeed to compromise your focus.”
“With your powers of observation, I always said that you would make a formidable Angel,” Charlie said ruefully.
“I prefer to deal with fashion rather than fiends. Although, between you and me, my ten o’clock appointment is a terror in her own right. She wants to murder my creation with an excess of flounces.”
Charlie smiled, glad that her friend’s sense of humor remained intact.
“Now what is going on, my dear?”
With a sigh, Charlie gave in. “You are going to think I’ve gone mad.”
Amara shrugged. “Did I blink an eye when you told me you wanted to recruit and train debutantes to become investigators?”
