He was speaking to Jerome. They had made a plan? There was a promise?
His eyes darted toward Julia. “Julia, you blessed little fool.” Was it surprise in his voice or only dismay? “You’re bleeding, my dear.”
Julia glanced down. Blood trailed into the remains of her broken shoe. She swiped carelessly at the gash, smearing her stocking. She wiped her hand on her ruined dress, annoyed with the distraction.
“You little fool,” he repeated. “Why couldn’t you believe me? If you’d just been patient, trusted me for another few days, she could have been safe forever. Now you’ve brought a madman into my home.” The rebuke fell like lead on her shoulders, crumpling her resolve.
It was an unbearable thought: Had she made a spectacular botch of things? Was Jerome a madman? Maybe he’d fed her nothing but lies, using her to penetrate Wallace’s stronghold. If so, she’d played into his hand, led him straight to Eva. Had Julia done what she most wanted to prevent: put Eva’s life in danger?
But no, she’d swear Jerome’s urgent wish to come along sprang from love, not revenge. And Eva’s scratched initial seemed meant to drive attention to that long-ago rape, as if it were the key to her present dilemma. Jerome had had no part in the Harlem cabaret scene until a few months ago. Wallace, on the other hand, had known Eva from her earliest days in the city.
His gaze settled on Jerome. He said again, “Put down your gun.”
Eva craned her neck to see over Wallace’s shoulder. The tendons in her neck bulged with the strain. Her face rose close beside his. Emotions and understanding seemed to slide from one to the other as if the membrane separating their fates were porous or disintegrating. “I know you’re scared, sweetie. You think I betrayed you. But I swear I haven’t. I never said a word.”
“A word about what?” Jerome’s voice cracked. “What are you talking about?”
Julia felt her own muscles tighten in the effort to silently beg him to lower his arm. Didn’t he see that the gun ruined everything? He’d achieved his aim. They were paying attention, ready to listen to whatever he had to say. The only thing that gun could accomplish now was needless bloodshed. She wanted to be the wise and fearless one to step forward and break the murderous anger that gripped Jerome, but she couldn’t. Even if she could be that wise and unafraid person, she was locked on the periphery of this struggle. This was a fight, a story, that stretched beyond her understanding. She could feel the currents, swirling and treacherous, but could only guess at their depths.
“Oh, sweetie,” Eva began to whimper, but Wallace cut her off.
“You’re meddling with things you don’t understand, Crockett. Put down your gun, and we can explain everything.”
“Put it down, Jerome. Please put it down,” Julia urged, soft as a lullaby. Possibly it was only in her head.
“He hasn’t hurt her,” Austen said. “That’s what matters. Let’s hear what they have to say.”
Jerome widened his stance. The gun stayed pointed at Wallace’s chest. “Get away from her.”
On a soaring high note, the Mozart recording ended. It began to thump.
“Sweetie, he hasn’t hurt me. He’s helping me—us both.” Eva’s eyes gleamed with tears. “You just have to trust him a little longer. Like with the manuscript—and now, soon, he’s going to help us get away. Please, sugar.”
“Eva, baby! I never had that manuscript. Why don’t you believe me? Last I saw, Timson slammed it inside that safe. How the hell would I have it?”
The rhythmic scratch of the record seemed to count out the progress of his thoughts. “Christ. You don’t think I killed him?”
At his plaintive, almost incredulous words, the muscles in Eva’s cheeks sagged. Julia saw confusion there, sliding into doubt. Eva did think Jerome was the killer—or she had until that moment. It made sense. It had always made sense. He had every reason to despise Timson, and every reason to want to retrieve that manuscript at any cost. So why had her certainty just wavered?
“Don’t give us that crap. She knows, Crockett,” Wallace said sharply. “I’ll do what I can to get you kids out of this mess, because Timson was a snake and he deserved that bullet, but I won’t keep lying for you. I told her what I saw. I told her about the loot I saw in that satchel—”
“But I only saw—” Julia blurted out, remembering that blessed letter from Eliot. Her words shriveled to ash when Wallace shot her a venomous look. Shock flared in her brain.
“In that sorry satchel of yours,” Wallace continued. “The stuff you took from the safe.”
Jerome swallowed. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“I saw it, son.”
“Don’t call me son! And get your hands off her.”
“Do what he says, sweetie,” Eva begged, a new fear edging into her voice. “It’ll all be jake. Please don’t hurt me.”
Jerome’s shoulders heaved. “I don’t want to hurt you,” he said. “God, no. I want to get you out of here. It’s him I want to hurt.” The gun rolled and then righted again.
“Put your gun away, Crockett,” Wallace said softly.
Julia saw nothing but Eva’s mobile, eloquent face. It cowered at Jerome’s next words.
“It’s not my gun! Stop saying that. You don’t think—? Eva! You know I’ve never even held a gun before, not until your pal there gave me this one.”
Eva’s eyes slid to the gun now wobbling in Jerome’s hands. He shifted it like a hot coal from right to left and back again. She followed its jerky path as if she could fling it aside with the sheer power of her gaze, and then her beautiful face melted into pure and utter grief. Her eyes rose, enormous pools of it.
What had she seen? What did she know? Julia struggled to understand.
With a cry Eva seized Wallace’s elbow. Their arms and
