“One day, sure.” He scowled at her, not noticing her wandering attention. “I’m not just hanging around for fun, you know. Not like the sort of fella you find here. I’m not in any rush, but I’m gonna plan for the future. Or I was planning. If you and Alba ruined things for me—”
“I’m not the one who made you drive Pearlie’s getaway car,” Vivian said coldly. “If anything’s ruined, you did it yourself.”
“Well, I gave it up, anyway,” Abraham said. “I got spooked when Pearlie crawled into my car bleeding all over the place, and I had to get him stitched up at three in the morning.”
That made Vivian give him a considering look. “How’d he get hurt?”
“He wouldn’t say, and I knew better than to ask,” Abraham sighed. “And when I had to spend half the next day scrubbing blood out of my back seat, I decided I wasn’t cut out for the criminal life. So that was that.” He gave her a narrow-eyed look. “What tipped you girls off?”
“The necklace,” Vivian said after a moment. Bea had talked to him about it already, so there was no point trying to keep it a secret. “Someone described a stolen necklace to me that was a little too much like the one Bea started wearing. And I knew she wasn’t the one sending those letters or robbing folks. So that left you.”
“Well, I didn’t do either of those things,” Abraham insisted. “I just drove the car, and I didn’t much like how that ended up, anyway.”
Vivian nodded slowly. “What do you think, Bea?” she asked, glancing over his shoulder again. “Do you believe him?”
A look of horror slowly crept across Abraham’s face, and he turned to where Bea was standing just behind him, listening to their whole conversation. “Bea…” he began, then trailed off. None of them moved.
“Got anything more to that sentence?” Bea asked, tilting her head as she eyed him.
“I just… I’d never do anything to hurt anyone, you know that, right?” He gave her a shaky smile, but it faded when her expression didn’t change.
“Then why did you lie to me?”
“I didn’t… I was just…” He grimaced, looking toward the ceiling before meeting her eyes again. “Look, neither of us are saints. So now we’ve both had jobs that skirt the line of legal. Is it really worth getting so upset over?”
“Are you trying to tell me you think serving folks a drink or two is the same thing as stealing from a family with kids to feed?” Bea asked, her voice icy as winter.
Abraham winced. “I didn’t know he was stealing. Not really,” he said, starting to sound a little desperate. “Sure, yes, I knew it wasn’t aboveboard, but I had no idea what was actually happening. I just drove the car. For all I knew, that necklace belonged to his mother. I just…” He sighed. “I didn’t ask questions. I never ask a question if I don’t want to know the answer.”
Vivian had thought before that his poker face was terrible, so she wanted to believe that he was telling the truth now. But there was no way to know whether any or all of the night had been an act for him. She glanced at Bea, who was watching him impassively as Alba joined them, her hands full of her and Bea’s things, glancing between the three faces.
“You finished having it out yet?” she asked, rubbing the small of her back. Her shoes were dangling from one hand. All around them, the last few customers were being shooed out to the street. “I’m dead on my feet, and Honor said I could skip cleanup tonight.”
The last dancer was gone, and the lights began to flicker on one by one so the staff could clean up. The harshness of the electric bulbs, the stark way they illuminated the room and stripped it of its magic, felt only too fitting.
“Abraham was just about to take us home,” Bea agreed at last. It was impossible to tell by her voice what she was thinking or whether she believed what he had told her.
“Yes, of course, absolutely,” Abraham said quickly, nodding. “Happy to. It’s why I’m here. You need a hand, Alba?” Taking their bags and shoes, he gave Bea a sad, hopeful smile. “I’m crazy about you, Bea. I’d do anything for you. You know that.”
“Anything except tell me the truth?”
Abraham’s smile crumpled. “I’d already decided I didn’t want tobe part of it anymore. The last thing I wanted was to put you in the middle of it, too.” He shrugged. “I got around to the truth eventually, anyway.”
“Eventually,” Bea agreed. There was no sign in her expression whether she was willing to forgive him—or even believe him. Reaching behind her neck, she unclasped the gold necklace and held it out to Vivian. “Any chance you could get this back to where it belongs?”
“Sure thing,” Vivian agreed, closing her hand around the locket and chain. She’d pop it in the mail or something—no sense letting anyone know she was more involved than they might already have guessed.
“You’re right about one thing, baby,” Bea said to Abraham, her smile sad. “It’s a bad idea to ask a question if you’re not sure you want to know the answer.” She glanced at Alba. “And here I thought I was the sort of girl who didn’t have any illusions left.”
Alba’s smile was somehow sympathetic and ruthless at the same time. “We all get there eventually.”
Vivian watched them leave until she felt someone at her elbow. She glanced over her shoulder to find Danny standing there, frowning.
“What was that about?” he asked.
Vivian looked at him, wondering if she was brave enough to ask him about Florence, not sure whether it would be worse if he said his flirting wasn’t serious or said that it was. “Nothing much,” Vivian lied. There were some questions she didn’t want to know the answer to either.
TWENTY-FIVE
