Brian stared at me through the gap.
“Oh,” I said. “Sorry. I forgot about earlier.” A lie, but I’d grown used to telling white lies in the past while. Not a good thing to do when it was your boyfriend, though. I sniffed. “Actually, if I’m honest, I didn’t want to talk to you today. I didn’t need the stress, and you looked angry.”
“That a gun under your robe?”
“I’ve the right to defend myself,” I said.
“No one said you don’t have that right, Charlie.” Smulder sighed and entered my bedroom, still dressed in his plaid work shoot and blue jeans. “We need to talk. Now.”
“OK, come in by all means.” I glared at the back of his head. Months had passed, yet he’d maintained that cookie cutter agent hairstyle. Brian rarely pushed his way into my room or got bossy with me. He knew better than that.
“Grandpa was going to give you a weapon,” Brian said.
“Oh really? Last I checked Grandpa thought it would be too dangerous for me to have a weapon.” Grant thought it would blow my cover. He didn’t trust that I wouldn’t do something irrational. Like solve another murder. Or save someone’s life. Both had happened in the past few months.
“We spoke yesterday morning,” Brian continued, stiffly, “and he mentioned wanting to give you a pistol. But when we spoke today, he’d changed his mind. Any idea why that is?”
I locked the bedroom door and removed my pistol, placing it and its strap and holster on top of my dressing table for now. No need to show Smulder where I kept it.
That’s silly. He’s your boyfriend.
But I’d learned that Brian always did the right thing. Even if it meant hurting me, he would tell the NSIB about my hidden stash, and that would start a cascade of interactions that led to the discovery of my grandmother’s secret armory.
I’d kept Brian from telling them about the armory by pleading. It was only a matter of time before he broke.
“What’s up?” I asked. “You look as if someone squeezed lemon juice into your milk.”
“Yeah, I’m not in the best mood. And I waited to talk to you all day, Charlie. All day. But you didn’t show up.”
“Like I said, I wasn’t in the headspace to get into it with you today.” And I wasn’t in the headspace to fight now, either. Unless it was with my ex and with hand-to-hand combat. “Brian, I don’t want to cut you off, but I don’t have the capacity for—”
“What did you do last night that made Grant change his mind?” Brian asked. “Don’t lie to me Charlie, I know it was something serious or he wouldn’t have changed his mind about equipping you with a weapon.”
Grant had asked his agent lackeys to check our pockets last night, and he’d found my grandmother’s grapple gun and length of cord. Thankfully, they hadn’t detected her state-of-the-art microphones and earpieces, but trust was at an all-time low.
“Brian.”
“Cut it out,” he grunted. “Just tell me. I’m your boyfriend. You’re meant to trust me with these things.”
“And you’re meant to respect my privacy.”
He recoiled. “I do. I respect your privacy but not when it comes to life-or-death situations. You endangered yourself and—”
“And you think coming up here and yelling about it will make things better? That it will pull me into line? In your experience, when has that ever worked with me? I’ll do what I think is right, Brian, just like you do.”
“Charlie—”
“I need a breath of fresh air,” I said, tightening my robe around my middle and walking for the bedroom door. “We can talk when you’ve calmed down.”
I ignored his calls and exited into the upstairs hallway. I made my way down to the ground floor. It was late, and the kitchen was dark, the only light from the antique chandelier in the foyer. Whenever I needed space to think, I’d go to the most peaceful place in the Gossip Inn. The library.
I entered it. The tall bookcases stocked with literature of every type welcomed me, and I plopped down in one of the velvet green chairs, gaze on the empty fireplace. I was too lazy to start a fire, and it was too warm of an evening for it, anyway.
This is ridiculous.
How had every decision I’d made in my life led up to this moment? Where had I gone wrong? Was it when I’d joined the NSIB? Or when I’d met Kyle for the first time and accepted his offer of a date?
Hot tears threatened, and I gulped, forcing down the emotion clogging my throat.
You’re not going to feel sorry for yourself. You’ve been through worse than this.
A heavy thump sounded above my head, and dustings of plaster drifted from the ceiling and landed in my lap.
“What the—?” I dusted off the plaster and stood up, staring at the ceiling. Triangulating the position of the noise.
There was nothing above the library except… a secret attic, only accessible by a passage hidden behind a bookcase in here. The Gossip Inn, once a museum, contained secret passages, entrances and exits, many of them unmapped.
I moved to the bookcase in front of the secret passageway and touched it. It drifted open.
Someone must’ve come this way.
My hand darted to my waist, but I’d left my pistol on my dressing table.
I could go back and get it.
What are the chances Kyle would enter the secret attic? It’s not connected to anything other than the library. No, most likely it’s a guest who has found it. That wasn’t an uncommon occurrence. Not too long ago, a little girl had found the attic when she’d been staying here.
I steeled myself and started up the twisting staircase that led to the attic, keeping close to the wall to prevent creaking of the boards. I lowered myself into a crouch, adrenaline coursing through my veins. My muscles tensed.
I reached the top of the stairs, and the air whooshed from my lungs.
A length of rope had been tied to
