Grim Shadows (Roaring Twenties #2)(22)

Segregated from the main crowd on the far side of two immeasurably long tables set for formal dinner service, Hadley chatted with a man. Behind her, three bowed windows looked out over the night-blackened Bay. A single pendant light chased slow-moving shadows across her face as she talked.

Her pale arms and neck were bared by a layered sleeveless gown: silver bullion beneath a net of black beadwork. The beaded web gradually wove tighter and tighter to make ripples of sparkling obsidian strands that eddied around her hips and thighs, like a black whirlpool.

She wore curved silver heels on her feet, white gloves to her elbows, and diamonds on her wrists. And then, when she turned her head, something caught his attention. Something that softened every hard line on her face, every sharp note of her personality.

Every toughened wall of his lying heart.

Pinned behind her left ear, swaddled by a ruffle of raven hair, was a single star-shaped white Siberia lily.

Such an ordinary thing. But it unlocked an undiscovered door in his head. And when it creaked open, the music and clinking glasses and the snobby conversation in the hall faded to a muffled hum.

She wasn’t skinny; she was elegant.

Her arms and legs weren’t long; they were endless.

She wasn’t pretty; she was knee-weakeningly, dazzlingly beautiful.

Lowe blinked several times and looked again. Not a dream. Still beautiful. She nodded her head in answer to her companion’s question while stealing a glance at the crowd, and her gaze found his.

They stared at each other. Or rather, she looked at him while he stood rooted to the marble floor like a small child who’d been asked a question in class and was too embarrassed to admit he didn’t know the answer. He became lost looking at her. For how long, he wasn’t sure. But one moment he was drowning, and in the next, he felt the stem of his champagne coupe slipping through his fingers.

In a panic, he fumbled and juggled the glass until he gripped it with both hands.

Nice. Smooth. Oh so debonair. Probably looked drunker than Satan on vacation. Her squinting eyes only confirmed his fears. He set the empty coupe on a nearby table and did his best to regain his lost bravado as he headed her way.

Her companion was about Lowe’s age, tall and lanky, dark hair. His formal tails were a little too long, his wing-tipped shirt a little too starched, and his face a lot too handsome. He was also alone with Hadley, so Lowe hated him on sight.

“Hello, Hadley.”

“Hello, Mr. Magnusson.”

No more first-name-basis, eh? Should’ve expected as much. “Hope I’m not interrupting an intimate conversation.”

“Mr. Oliver Ginn, this is Mr. Lowe Magnusson.” His own name fell off her tongue like a burden in that ridiculous posh accent.

“The treasure hunter,” Mr. Ginn replied, sizing him up with a cool look.

“I prefer treasure finder.”

“Mr. Ginn is a patron of the arts,” Hadley said, as if she were defending his good character in front of a jury. “He has financed several excavations in Mexico through his contributions to university research grants.”

“The Aztec program at Berkeley?” Lowe asked, trying to place the man’s name.

Ginn shook his head. “I only moved here recently. My family is from Oregon.”

Lowe honestly didn’t give a damn.

“Mr. Ginn’s the one who encouraged me to do more speaking engagements, so he’s indirectly responsible for me accepting that seminar in Salt Lake City.”

Oh, was he, now? “How kind,” Lowe said. “I suppose I owe you thanks, Mr. Ginn, because if you hadn’t encouraged her, then Hadley and I wouldn’t have met and had our little adventure on the rails in that cozy little—”

“May I have a word in private, Mr. Magnusson?” Hadley said in a rush.

“Why, yes, you most certainly may.”

Hadley excused herself from Moneypants and stormed off without a backward glance. Lowe guessed he was supposed to follow her like a dog, and he did—oh, he did. The spider web of black beads hugging her bountiful backside vibrated with every angry step she took. Mesmerizing. So much so, the great bronze door she opened nearly conked him in the head when it swung back.

Cool night air chilled his face as he trailed her into an Italian courtyard dotted with palm trees. A few stray partygoers mingled here. Servants smoked cigarettes in the shadows. Hadley strode to a marble gazing pool in the center of the cortile and stopped at the edge. Lowe heard her counting from several feet away.

• • •

Hadley focused on her watery reflection in the moonlit pool. Her specters gathered in the distance, hungry, waiting to be loosed. But somewhere between the count of eighteen and nineteen, another reflection floated over the water behind hers. It was enough of a distraction to send the specters scurrying away.

“I heard you doing that in your father’s office.” Lowe’s deep voice at the crown of her head sent chills down her neck. “Are you managing your anger?”

“That’s none of your business.” She crossed her arms over her breasts to ward off the chilly air. “Are you drunk?”

“I wondered that myself, actually. Because I can’t seem to stop staring at you, and that doesn’t make any sense.”

The two statements dueled in her head. She’d seen him staring at her in the hall—how could she not? He stared so intensely, she’d felt it. And for a moment, she’d almost believed, stupidly, that he was seeing her for the first time. That they were explorers on Mount Sinai, trapped on opposite rocky cliffs, and he’d thrown her a rope, and she wasn’t going to faint from starvation and lie there until vultures plucked her eyes out.