Golden Lies (38 page)

"Just tell me one thing—did my mother's affair with David Hathaway have anything to do with your relationship, whatever it was, with Wallace Hathaway?" she asked. "I know why my mother wanted David, but I don't know why he wanted her. And I can't help thinking, that maybe getting my mother was some sort of revenge or payback or a way of getting in someone's face, maybe even yours."

Her grandfather's face tightened. "You talk crazy. He pulled out his wallet and tossed some money on the table.

"I'm sorry if I upset you," she said as he got to his feet.

"You go home, work hard, forget about this. It was over a long time ago."

That was the problem. It wasn't over, not by a long shot.

* * *

"What do you think are the odds that we're actually going to find something in here?" Paige asked as she and Riley entered her grandfather's study. She turned on the small lamp over his desk. "I've been here before. In fact, I was here yesterday. And I didn't see a dragon or anything else suspicious."

"He wouldn't have it sitting out on his desk," Riley replied, glancing around the room. "This is nice. A man's room." He nodded approvingly at the dark wood, the heavy furniture. "Is this where your grandfather spends his time?"

"Yes. He considers these rooms his private sanctuary. Which is why we shouldn't be doing this. We have no right to be in here."

"Paige, get a grip. We're not stealing anything. We're just looking. You know your grandfather is hiding something. Asking him straight out didn't get you anywhere."

"That's true," she conceded.

"Don't forget, this missing dragon almost sent your father to the morgue."

Riley had a way of cutting to the chase that was really effective. "All right. You've convinced me. But be careful. I don't want him to know anyone was here." She glanced around the neat room. "Where do we start?"

"You check out the desk. I'll look through the filing cabinet."

Paige did as he asked, and for a few moments there was nothing but quiet rustling in the room. The desk revealed common business items, stationery, paper clips, pens. Everything was organized, nothing out of place. She closed the desk and waited for Riley to finish with the filing cabinet.

"Nothing," he said. "Where would your grandfather hide something incriminating?"

"I don't think he has anything incriminating." She couldn't stop the automatic defense. It was second nature to protect the family name.

"Let's go into his bedroom," he said, ignoring that comment. He walked through an adjoining door. She hastily followed. If there was anything to, find, she wanted to be with him when he found it. She stood in the middle of the room as Riley went through the drawers of the bureau with a quiet efficiency that scared her. He looked very at home in this role of burglar. It reminded her of how different they were, where they'd come from, the lives that they'd led up until this point.

Maybe Riley was right. Maybe they were too different to belong together. Her head told her he might have a point. Her heart told her the differences didn't matter. And weren't those differences in the past? They were together in this. She might be hesitating, but if she were really honest with herself, she'd have to admit that he hadn't dragged her into it. She wanted to find the answers as much as he did. She was just letting him be the one to do it.

Wasn't that cowardly? As if not helping in the search made her actual participation seem less. But it wasn't less. They were a team, a partnership. And she'd come into this room with her eyes open. She couldn't pretend Riley was making her do it. He wasn't.

She turned and deliberately opened the door to her grandfather's walk-in closet. It was lined with suits on one side, shirts and pants on another, everything from formal to casual wear, dozens of shoes on racks, ties, hats, sweaters. It was the closet of a very rich man. She looked to the shelves that ran around the top of the closet. Her gaze caught on a square plastic container in which there appeared to be several books. She looked around for a step stool but couldn't find one.

"Anything in here?" Riley asked, moving into the closet.

"I don't know yet. But that plastic container looks interesting."

Riley reached up and pulled it off the shelf, setting it on the ground between them. She squatted down, putting her hand on the lid, but she stopped when Riley covered her hand with his. She met his eyes. "What?"

"You don't have to do this. At least, you don't have to do this with me here."

"Why wouldn't I?"

"If I find anything to incriminate your grandfather, I'll use it," he said with his usual brutal honesty.

She drew in a tight, worried breath. Maybe she should be doing this alone. But she didn't want to do it alone. She wanted to do it with him. Gazing into his passionate blue eyes, she knew she could no more send him out of the room than she could send herself. They'd already crossed that line, and there was no turning back.

"We're in this together," she murmured. "And if I find anything incriminating against your grandfather, I'll use it, too."

"Then we know where we stand."

"Not really. But let's at least open this box and find out if it's anything at all."

She pulled off the lid and realized the box was indeed something. There were three photo albums inside and a manila envelope. She grabbed one album. Riley took another. Her album showed her grandfather's childhood, black-and-white photographs of her grandfather and his parents. She flipped through it, wishing she had more time to really think about where her grandfather had come from, what kind of life he had lived as a young man.

"What did you get?" she asked Riley.

"Your grandparents' wedding pictures. Your grandmother was a beautiful woman. Looks a little like you in the eyes."

"Yes," she murmured, gazing at the page he had turned. "I wish I could have met her. Anything else?"

"Doesn't look like it."

Paige reached for the third album, wondering where this book would take them. The first page of photographs sent goose bumps down her arm. "Hathaway's," she muttered. "Look, this is the store way back when."

"In the 1920s?" Riley guessed, coming around so he could sit next to her on the floor.

"It looks that way. My great-great-grandfather started the store in the late 1800s. The Hathaways were part of the gold rush, only we weren't digging for gold; we were outfitting the miners and selling dry goods."

"When did the focus turn to antiques and art?"

"After World War Two when my grandfather took over," she said, wondering if there was any significance to that. "I remember him saying that his own father never had much vision, but after he'd seen the world, he realized that bringing the rest of the world to San Francisco would be a gold mine."

"It certainly was," Riley agreed.

Paige flipped through several more pages, noting the mix of photographs and yellowed newspaper clippings. There were a few pages devoted solely to the 1906 earthquake that had flattened the city and the fires that followed. Hathaway's had moved to Union Square with the rebuilding of the square after the quake. The clippings from the next few decades showed the Hathaways gaining importance as city leaders.

"This is amazing," she murmured, seeing her family history unfold before her. "I wonder why this has been hidden away. I would have loved to see it."

"Your family was really something. It looks like they built half the city."

She turned another page and stopped, the headline turning her blood cold: W
allace Hathaway Missing In Action.
"Oh, my God. What's this?" She skimmed through the article, knowing Riley was keeping pace along with her. "My grandfather's plane was shot down over mainland China," she exclaimed.

Riley met her gaze with an excited gleam in his eyes. "We just hit pay dirt. Turn the page."

She was almost afraid to do that. Her grandfather had never mentioned being shot down over China during the war. In fact, she only vaguely knew that he'd been in the war, but that was it. No one had ever spoken about that time in his life.

Riley grew impatient and turned the page for her. "Damn," he said. "Would you look at that."

It was a newspaper photograph of two men dressed in ragged uniforms, their arms around each other:
Hometown Heroes Found Alive

"Our grandfathers," Paige said in amazement, recognizing both men.

"Two of San Francisco's finest, shot down over China almost three months ago, were found alive," Riley read. " 'They credit their survival to a young Chinese man named Lee Chen, who gave them food and shelter and kept them hidden from the enemy.' "

"Lee Chen?" Paige could hardly believe it. "The same Lee Chen who is Alyssa's grandfather?"

"The third connection," Riley said, meeting her gaze. "This is amazing, Paige. It's all coming together. Our grandfathers flew together in the war. Wallace must have been the Wally my grandfather talked about."

"And Alyssa's grandfather was the one who saved their lives in China."

"When they returned from the war, they all went to work at Hathaway's with a new focus, Asian art. Imagine that," Riley continued.

"The three of them worked together until a fire destroyed the store," she continued. "They went their separate ways, nothing connecting them to each other until now."

"Until a dragon statue in my grandfather's possession came to light."

"The dragon set that was lost in China during the war."

They both came to the same conclusion at the same time.

"You think they brought it back from China?" she asked.

"It sure looks that way to me."

"But that would mean they stole it. Not just my grandfather, Riley, but yours, too. Is that what you're saying?"

He ran a frustrated hand through his hair. "Someone stole it. I'm just not sure who."

"You can't still be trying to pin this all on my grandfather?"

"He did end up with the most money."

"He had the most money to start with."

"Okay. Let's back up a little."

"Good idea, because I don't think it would be that easy to smuggle national art treasures out of a foreign country. In fact, I wonder how Lee Chen got out of China so quickly."

"Probably courtesy of your grandfather, Paige. He came from a powerful family. He had political connections, didn't he?"

"I'm sure my great-grandfather did."

"There you go. Your grandfather was grateful for the rescue, and in return he got Lee Chen to the States."

"I suppose it could have happened that way. But that still doesn't explain the dragon."

"It was wartime. I have a feeling a lot of things were smuggled out of China."

"You can't just steal ancient artifacts and sell them without anyone noticing," she argued.

"The black market has been around forever. Who says you can't do exactly that?"

"I don't know, but we still don't have real proof of any of this. It's all speculation. The only person we know who had a dragon was your grandfather. I'm not accusing him of anything," she said hastily as the storm clouds gathered in his eyes. "Like you said, he could have gotten it anywhere. He could have come across it at a flea market. The possibilities are endless."

"The possibilities are not that endless, Paige, not when we now know that the three of them were in China together during the war, the same time these art pieces were being shipped around the country." He paused. "Let's go over it again. When they came back to the States, Wallace returned to work in the family business. My grandfather was hired as a security guard, and Lee Chen went to work in some capacity in the storeroom."

"Then there was a fire," Paige continued.

"Discovered by Lee Chen."

"After the fire, neither your grandfather nor Lee Chen returned to the store."

"There was speculation that the fire was arson, but no conclusions. The Hathaways didn't press for an investigation."

"How do you know that?" she asked.

"Simple. If they had pressed for an investigation, it would have happened. They had too much clout to be ignored. Which leads me to believe that Wallace, for whatever reason, didn't want to pursue the arsonist. Hell, maybe it was him."

"He wouldn't have burned down his own store."

"Maybe for the insurance money? Things couldn't have been that good after the war."

"They weren't that bad, either," she replied. "It's just as likely that Lee Chen or your grandfather was responsible. And if you're going to accuse my grandfather, then you can take some heat yourself. Because everything you're implying, including getting national treasures out of China, involves all three of them."

Riley thought about that for a moment, and she could see he wasn't too pleased by the idea. Which was tough. Because she didn't want to believe her grandfather would have done any of the things they were talking about, either.

"Is there anything else in the album?" Riley asked. She checked the next page, but it was empty.