She didn’t have much of a choice. Not if she wanted to find out what was going on. Not if she wanted to save her own skin.
Vivian closed the door behind her, watching as Honor, who was behind the desk and staring toward the room’s one window, stiffened at the quiet sound. She wasn’t admiring the view—the window faced the brick wall of the building next door, barely visible in the darkness. But she didn’t turn around.
“You sure you want to do this?” Honor asked. There was an emotion in that honey-and-smoke voice that made Vivian pause. It was the sound of pain. But that could mean a hell of a lot of things, and Vivian wasn’t the sort of girl to take anything for granted.
“I deserve answers, and you know it,” Vivian said firmly. “Why didn’t you tell me he was your dad?”
“We… weren’t close,” Honor said at last, each word sounding like it was carefully considered and turned over before being offered out loud. “How’d you find out?”
“Do I owe you anything here?” Vivian crossed her arms, glaring at Honor’s back.
“No.” Honor sighed as she turned around at last. She leaned back against the windowsill, her weight resting on her hands as she gave Vivian a regretful look. “You weren’t supposed to find out.” She shook her head. “Should have remembered you have a knack for digging up secrets.”
“I was at the house yesterday,” Vivian said quietly, almost resentfully. It was still hard for her to say no to Honor, even when she desperately wanted to. She didn’t want to make trouble for Bea, so she settled on the other explanation that Honor would believe. “Hattie Wilson set me up to listen in. Seemed like an interesting group.”
Honor had sucked in a sharp breath at Mrs. Wilson’s name, coming forward half a step, her casual posture gone. “Vivian, she’s not the sort of woman you want to be owing.”
“I know that,” Vivian snapped. “But right now, she’s not the one who’s lying to me.”
“I didn’t lie, pet. Not this time.”
“It was a lie of omission, and you know it.” Vivian clenched her hands into fists to steady herself. Lifting her chin, she met Honor’s eyes. Once, she had thought she could drown in those eyes. But Honor had made it clear she’d never choose Vivian over anything else in her life. “You should have told me.”
Honor didn’t answer, either to agree or argue. Instead, she sighed again and bent down to open a drawer in her desk. Two heavy-bottomed glasses landed in front of her, followed by the bottle of whisky that she always kept on hand. It was good stuff, too, direct from Canada, no chance of it being watered-down homebrew or dyed moonshine. That wasn’t how Honor did business.
Vivian accepted the glass Honor poured for her, glad to have something to do with her hands. But she didn’t say anything, letting the silence stretch while Honor poured her own glass and turned it in slow circles on the polished wood of the desk.
Vivian took a fortifying gulp of her drink. “Tell me about your father.” Then, a sudden thought occurring to her, she changed her question. “No, tell me about your sister first. Was he her father too?”
She could see the stillness that sank over Honor, shoulders tense beneath her crisp white shirt. “My sister?”
“You told me once that you had a sister,” Vivian said. She half wanted to take back the question; instead, she barreled on recklessly. “She mattered to you. And I’ve got a feeling she matters now.”
“She’s dead now,” Honor countered, her voice empty of emotion.
That bleakness tugged at Vivian’s heart. What would it be like to say those words about Florence? She wanted to reach out, to lay her head against Honor’s shoulder.
She steeled herself against the impulse. “So you mentioned,” she said. “I was sorry to hear it then, and I’m sorry to hear it now. But you owe me more than that.”
Honor took a drink from her own glass, her gaze going past Vivian. “Yes, Huxley Buchanan was her father too. And I’m sure you canguess he wasn’t there while we were growing up. Or after. He wasn’t interested in babies, so he didn’t hang around once we were on the way. My sister and I were raised by our mother. He did send us money sometimes. But it was never enough.”
“And your occasionally criminal childhood?”
The question surprised a short laugh out of Honor. “My what?”
“When you helped me break into the dressmaking shop last summer. You said you’d had an occasionally criminal childhood.”
“I did.” Honor stared into her glass as if she were seeing something else entirely. “Ma could never quite get by on her own, so she always had a fella around. They usually came and went like clockwork, but one of them stayed for a bit, and he took a shine to me. Got me to help on a job or two. Lookout, mostly. But he’d send me into a spot if they needed someone small. He was the one who taught me to pick locks.”
“You ever get arrested?”
“Twice,” Honor said, smiling wryly. “Second time, I was eighteen, and Ma couldn’t afford to get me out. So I had them call my father.”
Vivian sucked in a breath. “What did he do?”
“He bailed me out,” Honor said quietly. “Or, his lawyer did. He wouldn’t be seen coming down to a station in that part of town. But I think he’d softened toward us a bit by then.” She hesitated, then added, “He’d had more kids with his first wife. Two boys. Made him rethink a few things, though it didn’t change much.”
They were both quiet for a moment. “And your sister?” Vivian asked, still certain that there was some connection there. “Did she have childhood criminal tendencies, too?”
