“Why?” Alice asked without thinking, and the man’s eyes widened. Alice imagined him writing a large red cross on his checklist of her character.
“I appreciate you have just spent time undercover, Agent A,” he said, “but I will remind you we are not ribald criminals here. We do not ask questions. Understood?”
She bit her lip, trying not to laugh. Behind her, a tight silence suggested Daniel struggled with the same impulse. Alice’s heart rose at the thought of it. She wanted to hug him (and kiss him, and perhaps bite him a little), but the valet was waiting, his eyes growing even larger, so she curtsied and said, “Understood.”
The valet huffed, then, without a further word, turned and marchedaway in the full expectation that Daniel would follow. Alice’s pulse began to shake inexplicably.
“We’ll talk later,” Daniel whispered as he passed her.
“Later,” she whispered in reply, extending a hand, her fingers glancing his in the lightest of touches before he moved out of reach.
Goodbye, she thought, watching part of her soul go with him.
“Alice?” Mrs. Kew called from inside the office. “Is that you? Come in, dear.”
Alice startled as she entered the room, although only someone with a microscope would have noted it on her countenance. Beside the Chief Servant on the plump, lacy sofa sat Hazel Coombley, the agency’s clinician. Pale-haired, dressed in flowing robes, and bedecked with such a plethora of jewelry she must live her life in dread of magnets, she did not look up from her teacup at Alice—but the sense of absolutely having her attention made Alice want to turn around and run screaming from the room.
“Welcome back, my dear!” Mrs. Kew trilled, gesturing with a lace-gloved hand for Alice to occupy the armchair opposite. “Sit down, sit down, come tell us all about it!”
“Thank you, ma’am,” Alice said as she crossed the room. “Please excuse my appearance.”
“Your appearance?” Hazel asked in the soft, stroking voice she employed to lull her patients while dissecting their psyches. Every nerve in Alice’s body immediately donned armor and helmet. In a state of perfect tranquility, she lowered herself into the chair, busily straightening her skirts and aligning her sleeve cuffs so as to have an excuse for not looking up. Meeting Hazel’s lush gray eyes would be like willingly diving into quicksand.
“My hair is rather windblown,” she explained, “and this dress was not quite so covered in brick dust when I began my journey home. Weencountered some lively pursuers who needed dissuading from shooting us out of the sky.”
Hazel leaned forward, long earrings clattering as she regarded Alice intently. “And how did that make you feel?”
Alice reached into her mind for an appropriate response but found only silence. She twisted the wedding ring on her finger, then became engrossed in getting it to an exact ninety-degree angle. Mrs. Kew chuckled.
“Really, Hazel dear, I don’t know why you bother. You know they don’t talk about their feelings. I’m not even sure they’re capable of it. Tea, dear?”
Alice glanced up for long enough to ascertain Mrs. Kew was asking her, not Hazel. “No, thank you, ma’am.”
Mrs. Kew poured a cupful anyway. “We have received a report of the week’s events from Agent V-2, who called us up on her hairbrush.”
That made Alice raise her head again. “V-2 had a communications device?”
“Indeed,” Mrs. Kew confirmed. “And luckily so, considering the urgency of her report. Remind me, dear, do you take one sugar or two?”
“None,” Alice said. “I fail to understand the urgency.”
“Failure is uncomfortable for you, isn’t it?” Hazel asked, and Alice glanced at her fleetingly in confusion.
“V-2 was concerned by some aspects of how the mission played out,” Mrs. Kew explained, handing Alice a cup. She took it numbly. Something was wrong here—very wrong. Trying to calm herself, she sipped the tea.
And almost spat it out.
“There is no sugar in this tea,” she said in a stark voice, staring into the black liquid. A faint, wavering reflection of her face stared back.
“That’s right, dear,” Mrs. Kew said with a bewilderment so delicate, so gentle, it was patently false. “You just told me you don’t take sugar.”
“Interesting,” Hazel murmured. “Can you share with me your thoughts on sugar, Agent A? Does it remind you of something from your childhood, perhaps?”
“I didn’t have a childhood,” Alice answered before she could stop herself—and then thought,Damn.
“Uh huh,” Hazel said slowly, significantly. “Tell me more.”
Fiddlesticks. Alice inhaled with deliberate calm, lowering the teacup and its saucer to her knee. “V-2 needn’t have been so concerned. The mission went exact—mostly as planned. Not only was Jane Fairweather’s trap thwarted and the safety of the Queen assured, but we uncovered Snodgrass as the true villain, disarmed his bomb, and have delivered him to the cells downstairs.”
