Forbidden Dreams (17 page)

She spared Jase one more glance of outright condemnation, then continued. “I must say, Shirley Elizabeth, when you called and asked to see me alone, I believed you were heartbroken at having been taken in by a false charmer and were seeking solace from me. Never did I expect you to arrive with the enemy himself at your side. I trust you can explain yourself adequately?”

“Grandma, please. Jase isn’t the false charmer.”

Evelyn’s fine, fair brows rose toward her lightly tinted hair. “Oh? Your intonation suggests that there is a false charmer in our midst. Who might that be?”

“Sterling, Grandma.” Shell took her grandmother’s hand and led her into the living room. “Please, sit down and listen to us. You have to hear this, as much as I hate to be the one to tell you. Sterling is a con-artist. He will hurt you if we let him. In fact, he’s not Sterling Graves at all. Jase hasn’t learned yet what name he was born with, but he can prove to you that he isn’t Sterling Graves. It’s Sterling Jase is after, not Dad—that was just a blind.”

Evelyn sat erect on her rose brocade love seat. Only a faint tremor in her loosely linked hands betrayed that she was not as serene as she seemed to be. Shell sat beside her, covering Evelyn’s hands with one of her own. “Please, Grandma? Will you listen? It’s for your own—”

Evelyn sighed. “For my own good, dear? When you’ve lived as long as I, you learn that things given us for our own ‘good’ normally taste vile.”

“No, ma’am,” Jase said, speaking for the first time. “Not for your own good. For your own safety is the way I’d put it. And the safety of others. May I sit down?”

Evelyn assented with a regal inclination of her head.

Jase took the matching chair opposite the love seat and set his laptop computer on the coffee table. He opened its lid and switched it on. It hummed to life. Luckily, only the battery connection had suffered from getting damp, and after it had dried out, it worked perfectly. He wished he could say the same for his briefcase. Being in the front seat, it had been completely immersed, and most of the paper inside had been reduced to a sodden mass of illegible ink on useless paper.

One item that had survived, however, was his grandmother’s photo of Martin Francis. While his computer went through its initial warm-up phases, he pulled the snapshot from its new plastic case and handed it to Evelyn. “This man lived in Miami two years ago. Before that, he was in Boston and likely many other places as well. His name, as you can see written on the back, was not Sterling Graves when he was in Boston. I didn’t actually get a name for him from his time in Miami.”

Evelyn looked, turned the photo over, and stared at the picture again. “This man has no mustache.” She lifted her eyes to Jase’s. “But I must say he does bear a striking resemblance to Sterling.”

Jase nodded and withdrew two folded sheets of paper from his pocket. They had arrived at his hotel early that morning. He passed her one. “This is an enlarged photograph of the prints from the right index finger and the right thumb of the man in that photograph.” He handed her the other sheet. “And these are the prints I lifted last night off a glass Sterling Graves had handled. I took digital photographs of them and sent the results to a … friend in California. He made the comparisons and declared a match. He’s an expert, but I believe the similarities are enough for even the untrained eye to see. With this degree of magnification.”

He showed several points of similarity, and Evelyn sighed almost inaudibly as she set the papers on the coffee table.

“I went to school with Sterling’s sister,” she said, but her voice lacked strength. “I knew him, although he was somewhat younger. He—” She frowned and waved her hand over the photo, not looking at it. “That man knows many details of my girlhood.”

Jase nodded. “Yes, ma’am. I know he does. He’s very thorough.” He turned the computer to face her, then knelt on the floor so he could show her different pieces of information as they came up on the screen at his command.

“Sterling Graves, the real one, passed away more than thirty years ago. This is an outline of his life, taken from documents I was able to obtain. He never married, fathered no children.”

Jase clicked his wireless mouse and the screen was filled with a new file. “His sister, the one who was your high school and college friend, also died young—of cancer when she was in her early forties.” That information was given in greater detail. Evelyn stared at it for several moments, then looked up.

“I see,” she said. “Then he knew he was quite safe in using that name.” She sighed again. “Why did he lie to me? What is his purpose?”

“He’s a con-man, Grandma,” Shell said. “He wants your money.”

“Yes. What else would a man want from someone of my age?”

“Grandma, you’re a—”

Evelyn patted Shell’s hand. “Hush, dear. Forgive me my moment of self-pity. It was foolish of me.”

She straightened her spine and addressed Jase. “What do you want from me? You said the man could harm me. And others.”

“I want help from you, Mrs. Landry, if you can bring yourself to do it. I suspect that Sterling—we’ll continue to call him that, if you have no objections—will be asking you to withdraw securities and hand them over to him, temporarily, of course, so that he can gain enough evidence to convict an officer of the bank that employs him. That seems to be one of the stories he uses most often. Or perhaps he’ll want you to invest in some sure-fire resort property he plans to buy to expand his own empire. What has he claimed to be?”

“A hotelier with many properties in Europe. He intends to enter the North and South American markets and—” She gave her head a quick shake. Her hands trembled in her lap as she twisted a dainty lawn hankie in her fingers. Shell rose swiftly and went to a sideboard where she poured her grandmother a small glass of sherry. Evelyn downed it then held out the glass. “Another, if you don’t mind, dear. Shall I ring for coffee for you and Mr. … er, I’m sorry.” She pressed the fingers and thumb of her left hand to her temples for a second.

“O’Keefe,” Jase said, and caught Shell’s glance as she returned with another sherry. She nodded. “And yes, please, I’m sure Shell and I could both do with coffee.”

After the maid had served coffee in thin, almost transparent bone china cups, and passed around warm, buttered scones with raspberry jam on the side, Evelyn said “So I’m not the first.” She seemed to take some comfort in that.

“No, ma’am. What I’d like to see is that you’re the last. I’m hoping you’ll go along with him when he asks you to help him, or asks you for money on any pretext, and will let me know so we can catch him in the act.”

Evelyn sat even straighter. “He’s already asked. Naturally, I said that I would speak to my son first. He asked me not to do that. He made it sound very … plausible, the need for secrecy.”

“Oh, Grandma,” Shell whispered, sliding her arm around her grandmother’s rigid back. “I’m so sorry. But don’t worry. Jase can … I’m sure the authorities can get back what you’ve lost.” She gazed appealingly at Jase. “You see, he works for the FBI and they need proof before they can go after—”

“Shirley Elizabeth Landry!” Evelyn shook off her arm and rounded on her. “What do you think I am, a stupid old woman? I merely said that Sterling
asked
me for financial assistance while he waited for his funds to arrive from Europe, not that I had given it to him. For goodness’ sake! Your grandfather taught me much better than that.”

She snorted in a very genteel and ladylike manner. “The idea that I’d sign over anything without a great deal more than the say-so of one charming man! I told him we’d discuss it after the holiday season, that business, even the hotel business, could wait until I’d properly celebrated the birth of Jesus.”

Jase laughed aloud, and she turned to look at him. “What do you want me to do, young man?” she asked briskly. “And shouldn’t the Mounties be in on this? I’m sure your FBI has no jurisdiction in Canada.”

“No, Mrs. Landry. It doesn’t. But what Shell forgot to tell you is that I’m on leave of absence from the FBI, not carrying a badge. My being here is strictly unofficial.”

She raised her elegant eyebrows again, and Jase had a glimpse of what Shell might look like in fifty years. He wasted a moment regretting that he would not be around to see her then, then told himself he had no time for regrets. He had to live for the hour, the day, and snatch what happiness he could along the way.

“Indeed?” Evelyn’s manner frosted up again. “Then if this is not an official investigation, why are we having this discussion?” She reached for the telephone. “If what you say is true, then the authorities must be brought in at once.”

“Please.” His single word stayed her hand. “I have the backing of my superiors, and I promise you, if and when I have enough evidence to show the RCMP, assuming a crime has been committed in this country, they will have it. I’m doing this on my own because my grandmother was the one who took that photograph in Boston and wrote the name Martin Francis on the back of it.”

He paused to control his voice, then added, “She took it a few months before he relieved her of her life’s savings and left her to die alone.”

“Ahh …” Understanding flooded Evelyn’s face. “I see. I’m very sorry, er, Jase. And of course I’ll help.”

“Thank you. But I want it clearly understood right up front that if things go wrong, you risk losing a good deal of money. As long as this is not an official investigation, I can make no guarantees.”

He smiled at Shell. “Even though your granddaughter seems to think of me as an invincible hero.”

“That,” Evelyn said, “is the way it should be.” She patted Shell’s hand again, then leaned forward. “All right, Jase. Where do we start? How do we perform this … I believe it’s called a ‘sting’?”

Jase stood, then bent down and kissed her on the cheek. “Mrs. Landry, you are a hero.”

“Of course I am, young man. I only hope my acting is as good as Sterling’s has been.” For just a moment she faltered and looked elderly, frail, and stricken. I did truly believe he—” She swallowed. “Cared for me.”

Shell hugged her tightly. There were no words of comfort she could give. She was only grateful that Jase had come before her grandmother was put through the same kind of hurt and humiliation his had suffered.

It was good to have a hero on their side.

“I
HAVE NEVER HAD
a better New Year’s Eve in my life,” Jase said as he kissed Lil on the cheek. “Or Christmas, for that matter, even if Shell burned the turkey to a crisp and had lumps in both the mashed potatoes and the gravy.”

“You lie!” Nola said. “I, myself, taught that girl to cook and her dinner was exquisite.”

“Well, I didn’t want her getting a swelled head over it.”

Lilianne laughed. “I think you have a dizzy head from drinking at least half that case of wine you brought tonight.”

“You’re probably right. A lot of things, like your daughter, for instance, have been going to my head lately. But now I think we should wander off back to her house.” It was half-past midnight, thirty minutes into the new year, and he was stuffed with good food, high on great conversation, and hoarse from singing. “Thank you, all of you, for letting me be part of your family, and for the most wonderful holiday season I’ve ever spent.” He included Shell, Kathleen, Nola—and even Ned—in his smile as he slid an arm around Shell’s shoulders.

“It’s been a good day for me too,” Lil said, reluctantly letting Kathleen help her off the piano bench and into her chair. Then, in a flurry of hugs, kisses, and “good-nights,” he and Shell were out of the house and on the path, the flashlight beam bouncing between them as they ran through the silver rain toward her cabin.

It held that same wonderful, welcoming warmth Jase had learned to associate with Shell’s home. Inside, he swept her into his arms and hummed one of the love songs they’d been singing with Lil and Kathleen. Dipping and swaying, drunk on wine and joy, they danced around the kitchen. When Skeena jealously thrust her head between them, they fell, laughing, onto a chair never meant to hold more than one.

Jase adjusted Shell on his lap, shoved the dog’s wet, cold nose away, and concentrated on wishing Shell a thorough happy New Year. “Happy New Year, ear,” he said, and kissed that. “Happy New Year, nose.” He slid her down until she lay across his legs and undid her jacket, then her blouse. “Oh, what have we here? Happy … Happy … Happy New Year, nipples, and ribs, and tummy, and … skirt? I don’t want to wish your skirt a happy New Year,” he complained. “I want to—”

“I want to go to bed,” she interrupted in an urgent whisper. Pulling his head away from her belly, she sat up, then held him still for her kisses, angling her mouth across his, speaking against his lips. “I more than want to go to bed. I need to, Jase.”

His eyes filled with mirth. “With me?”

“Of course with you!” She giggled. “What did you think I meant, alone? I’ve forgotten what it’s like to sleep alone.”

“Complaining?”

“Never.” She nestled close. She hadn’t been to bed alone in nearly two weeks. And if she had her way, she’d never go to bed without Jase at her side for as long as she lived.

“Oh, well. If I have to, I have to.” He picked her up and carried her to her room, kicking the door shut on the dog who would have joined them.

“You mean ‘A man’s gotta do,’ etc.?”

He let out a long-suffering sigh. “Being a man isn’t easy, you know. Especially with you around. You deliberately make things hard for me.”

She giggled again and made things harder.

He looked into her eyes, and she saw something so deep and dark and mysterious, it half frightened her. “I love you, Shell.” He set her down on the bed and knelt beside her.

“I love you, Jase.”

“I want to do things to you that have never been done before, make you feel things you’ve never even dreamed you could feel, show you ecstasy you never imagined existed.”

“You have done all that.”

“But there’s more. I’m sure of it. I think, together, we can find it.”

She lay back and stretched her arms high over her head. “Show me, then,” she said. “Ah … yes. Yes!”