Shattered Mirror (Eve Duncan #23)(79)

“The night coach at midnight.”

“Then he might have been the last of Norwalk’s pieces to put in place. Building materials … Give me the address where he bought them, and I’ll try to gather info about what he was doing.”

“Home Depot. Canal Street.”

“And the liquor store?”

“Mardi Gras Pete’s on Magazine Street. I’ll e-mail you the rest.”

“Right. I’m on my way.” He paused. “Do you want me to tell Eve, or are you going to do it?”

“I’ll do it later. She phoned me last night and told me from where she was calling. Needless to say, I’m not pleased. And I’d just as soon she doesn’t try to tag along with you while you’re doing hunting and gathering. I don’t like the idea of her being with Kaskov, but she’s safer there than running around the French Quarter. I’m catching the next flight to New Orleans. I should be there by this afternoon.” He added dryly, “Tell Kaskov I’ll bunk with my wife. He won’t need to provide me with a room, too.” He hung up.

It was clear that Joe was as irritated with the situation as he was, Jock thought. Well they’d both have to live with it for the time being and just get on with business at hand.

And his particular business was to track down Norwalk’s men and the reason that they’d purchased all those building materials. He headed for the front door.

But his phone rang before he reached it.

Joe, again?

No, Jim Stanton. New York.

He accessed it. “I’m in a hurry. What do you have, Stanton?”





CHAPTER

14



“I’m here.” Darcy was sweeping gracefully down the grand staircase of the main house fifteen minutes later. “I feel as if I should be wearing hoops and corset, but I wasn’t prepared.” She stopped before Jock. “So why am I here? I know I’m irresistible, but I haven’t had breakfast, so the allure is fading away as we speak.”

“Come for a drive with me. I’m heading for New Orleans to do some checking on some purchases made by Macvey, but I’ll circle around and drop you back here.” He was heading for the door. “Ten minutes, Darcy.”

She hurried to catch up with him. “Why? And you told me not to tell Cara. I don’t like keeping things from Cara.”

“You can tell Cara when you get back. I just didn’t want you to have to keep up the wisecracks or stiff upper lip until you came to terms.” He opened the passenger door of the Mercedes rental car he’d parked in the driveway. “You’ll probably want to tell her since it concerns both of you.”

“Now I know I’m not going to like it. And I thought stiff upper lip was a British term, not a Scot’s.” She was silent as he drove down the driveway and out onto the road. “Bad, Jock?”

“You’ve gone through worse. It may be a relief. It’s just something you have to know.” He looked away from her. “I got a call from Jim Stanton this morning, the guard I hired to watch over Cara. You were told about him.”

She nodded. “You were furious that he didn’t stop that attack on Cara.”

“But he was still a good operative. So I told him to dig up as much as he could about everything concerning the circumstances of the attack and try to find who had done it. I’d already found out most of what I needed to know about the attack from Benoit and Kaskov by the time he called me this morning, but he fed me some additional info. He’d thought it was odd that Norwalk told Eve that he needed a twin, and Cara just happened to be rooming with one. I’ve always thought coincidences are very rare in this world, and so does Stanton.”

“No coincidence.” Darcy moistened her lips. “A setup?”

Jock nodded. “It was true there was a shortage in living accommodations, but there was a bribe put in place to the housing director to put you with Cara.”

“Why?” she whispered.

“Part of his master plan. He knew you were at the school in New York. He just made the next move.”

“How did he know I was at Carnegie Tech? How did he know anything about me?”

He was silent. “He had a very personal contact.”

“What the hell do you mean? Tell me.”

“Your mother and he were lovers.”

Her eyes widened in shock. “What?”

“For at least six months before his twin was killed, Rory Norwalk spent several nights with Felicity whenever he visited his brother in Nice.”

“My mother?” she whispered. “He slept with my mother.”

“From what you told Cara, it wasn’t unusual for her to sleep around.”

“But not him. He’s a monster. Why would she—” She closed her eyes. “But I can see it happening. She always got bored easily.” She shuddered. “He would be … different.” She opened her eyes. “And she wouldn’t even see what made him that way.”

“Stanton said that it was probably Sean Norwalk who introduced them. He knew how obsessed his brother was about the twin concept. Raoul Napier and Sean both worked for Manard, and Napier might have mentioned that his wife had twins by a former marriage. So it amused Sean to give Rory something he knew would please him. A beautiful woman who was also the mother of twins.”