used to spell out a name or words that didn’t have specific symbols. But it was those symbols that were hanging up her translation.
To make matters worse, she found a flash drive in the bottom of the box. Gemma worked all day yesterday and couldn’t even get the thing to open. She tried to think like Gia and tried to crack her password, but she had no luck.
“Oh, bless your heart. It’s not going well, is it,” Miss Lily stated more than asked. “I just came inside from taking Dinky a snack and thought you might want some iced tea and cookies to help you while you work.” Miss Lily set the tray down on the chest of drawers and smiled understandingly at her.
“No. It’s not. We grew up talking this language and then we made up this huge written language when she came home with this box. The trouble is, I haven’t used it in well over a decade. There were around seventy-five words we had symbols for—all the pronouns and so many adjectives. I just can’t finish translating without them.”
Gemma paused and took a deep breath. “See, this sentence.
“Tell me when you came up with these symbols. Was it at home? Did you do it all at once or over the course of the year?” Miss Lily asked as she handed Gemma a cookie.
“We were upstairs in our secret place. She sat down with this box and we agreed it would hold all our secrets. It was then that Gia suggested we make up a way to write in our secret language so we could pass notes at school. That way, if they were intercepted, no one could read them.”
“What then?”
Gemma thought back and envisioned the meeting. “We wrote down all the words we used frequently and then spent the whole night coming up with symbols for them.”
“Lordy! How did you remember all of that?”
“We didn’t . . .” Gemma paused and her heart started beating quickly. “We didn’t! I totally forgot about that. We had a master list that each of us looked over and practiced for weeks until we remembered everything. Then it became second nature. Gia learned it quickly but I had to use the cheat sheet. Once I didn’t need it, Gia told me to destroy it so our parents couldn’t find it.”
“But you didn’t, did you?” Miss Lily asked with a grin.
“No, I didn’t,” Gemma grinned back as she leapt off the bed. She grabbed the bag that Cy had packed with all the pictures from her apartment. “I put it behind a picture of Gia and me.”
“Here, let me help you. Which one?”
“I don’t know. I'm horrible about stacking pictures in frames. Instead of taking a picture out of the frame when I put a new one in, I just move it behind the new picture. It could be somewhere in any of these. The frame would have to be old, though, so probably a smaller one. Kids don’t enlarge photographs.” Gemma started prying off the backs of the frames as Miss Lily handed her all the smaller frames.
One after another, Gemma pulled off the backs and sorted through the years of pictures. But there was nothing. “There are three more, dear. Don’t lose hope,” Miss Lily said reassuringly.
Gemma didn’t feel too reassured, though. In fact, she was worried she had thrown out the frame a long time ago. She popped off the back of the silver frame in her hands and pulled out the thick stack of photos underneath. It must be an old frame to have that many photos in it. She turned them over—a picture of her and Gia at the Journalists Award Banquet where Gia won two honors that night was on top. Underneath was a picture of them in their dorm room in their senior year of college, followed by a picture of Gemma and one of her friends at a frat party in their freshman year. Gemma looked further back and found a picture of the two sisters and their friends in high school. Underneath that was an old scrap of white lined paper folded into a rectangle.
With shaking hands, Gemma dropped the remaining pictures and stared at the wrinkled piece of paper. “Well, go on,” Miss Lily gently urged.
Gemma opened the paper and stared down at the list written in her sister’s handwriting. She had found the key, all thanks to Miss Lily. Without saying a word, Gemma threw her arms around the older lady and hugged her.
“Oh,” Miss Lily exclaimed before returning the hug. “There, there. You have a lot of work to get done. Call if you need anything.” Miss Lily gave her a smile and headed back downstairs, promising to return with more snacks as the day went on.
Gemma picked up the first notebook again and, with renewed determination, went to work translating. It was time to discover what her sister had left for her to find.
* * *
Cy tossed the cards on the table and scooped in the pot. He enjoyed wiping that smug smile off Marshall’s face. His phone vibrated again and Pierce grabbed it before he could.
“Really? A socialite? So boring compared to the America’s Sweetheart who called you an hour ago,” Pierce complained as he tossed the phone back to the table, ignoring the dark look Cy tossed him.
“Sorry to be late,” Ahmed said as he walked into Mo’s study and took a seat next to Mo. “What did I miss?”
“Besides the who’s who of Hollywood calling my brother wanting to know where he is and offering to send planes to Kentucky to rescue him from the boredom of retirement?” Cade sniped.
Ahmed simply raised an eyebrow at Cade and then looked at Cy.
“I’ve gotten through about half of the unknown pictures and have been able to identify them. They’re mostly arms dealers, some higher-level foreign politicians, and known operators on the black market,” Cy snapped as he dealt the next hand. He tried to take a deep breath, but it felt as if his undercover life was smothering him. He was lost in the lies of his job.
His phone vibrated again and Cy bit back a curse as Pierce grabbed it again. “Oh, this one I bet he takes,” Pierce teased as Cy yanked the phone out of his brother’s hand.
“Gemma? Is everything okay?”
“I’m sorry to interrupt poker night, but I found something,” Gemma squealed. She sounded so excited and proud that Cy couldn’t help but smile. The tension coiling around his heart eased slightly. Immediately his brothers snickered.
“No problem at all. I’ll be right there.” Cy hung up and glared at his brothers and his friends. “Really? You’re a prince and you’re laughing at me?”
“I am sorry, but it’s so obvious you’re completely out of your element,” Mo said while sounding not at all apologetic.
“Did you hear his voice?” Cole asked.
“I did. He’s a goner,” Miles said as he tossed a chip onto the table.
“I noticed whose phone call he didn’t take while he leapt to get Gemma’s call,” Cade teased as he placed his bet.
“Please. She has nothing on Gemma,” Cy folded and stood up from the table.
“Except she’s the highest-paid actress in the world,” Pierce snickered.
“Gemma’s real; she’s not. Gemma’s also funny and braver than her any day. Miss Actress threw such a hissy fit when she had to pick up a snake for a scene, but Gemma . . . Gemma didn’t even scream when she was being chased and shot at by those thugs,” Cy told them. He respected Gemma and he trusted her. That’s more than he could say for any of the other women in Hollywood.
“Let’s cut to the chase here,” Miles said as he won the hand, “you like her. Why aren’t you with her?”
Cy looked down at his feet. It was embarrassing. “I don’t think she likes me. She doesn’t find ways to touch me. She doesn’t bat her eyes at me. She doesn’t try to find ways to spend time together,” Cy shrugged. “Doesn’t that just beat all? I finally find someone I like and she’s not interested.” The tightness returned around his heart and Cy felt his jaw tighten. He was lost again to the smothering feeling of his life.
“Well, she called you, didn’t she?” Marshall offered.
“Yeah, to tell me she found something. She’s been locked in her room for the past three days. I’m glad she sounded so excited. She’s been too hard on herself for not being able to contribute more.”
“Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s see what’s she found.” Cole stood up and the rest of the table followed.
