“What is it you want?”
“She doesn’t know I’m here or that I’ve spoken to your sister. I’d like to talk to you about what happened after Paris. There are things you should know. Things I think you’d want to know.”
“There’s nothing you can say that I want to hear, Miss Grant. Good night.”
“No! Wait! Please let me talk to you in person. What I have to say won’t take long, but it’s not the kind of thing that should be said over the phone.”
Another yawning silence. But he hadn’t hung up.
“Please, Mr. Purcell. It’s important. I’m here at the hotel, but I’ll meet you wherever you say. Whenever you say.” She bit her lip, breath held as she waited.
“The bar downstairs. Thirty minutes.”
Rory arrived early and took a table in the corner. It was a small bar connected to the hotel restaurant, subdued yet elegant, with creamy lighting, creamy carpeting, and creamy marble pillars framing the doorways. Piano music tinkled over the low hum of conversation, Cole Porter’s “Night and Day.” It was soothing and pleasant, but she couldn’t relax. Her eyes were trained on the door.
She was glad to see that most of the tables were full. Less chance of a scene. She ordered a glass of chardonnay. Not because she wanted it but because she needed something to occupy her hands. She was about to take her first sip when Anson appeared. She knew him instantly. Tall and square-shouldered, with a head full of silver-blond waves, a handsome man despite his sixty-some years.
Her grandfather.
The realization brought an unexpected lump to her throat. Not now, Aurora. Don’t start blubbering, or you’ll never get through this. But the sight of him, just a few yards away, made it hard to breathe. She gulped a mouthful of wine, her hands suddenly clammy. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but it wasn’t this gut-tightening reaction.
He was still hovering in the doorway, running his eyes around the tables. She held her breath, waiting for his eyes to connect with hers, then lifted a hand. He made no attempt to smile as he approached, his face set in what Rory suspected was a perpetual grimace. He had a noticeable limp, but walked like a man who’d lived with it a good many years and had learned to compensate.
He avoided her gaze as he pulled out the chair across from her and sat. Before a word was spoken, a waitress appeared with a highball glass that looked to be a gin and tonic with two lime wedges. He nodded his thanks. She eyed Rory with a measure of curiosity, then turned back to Anson. “Will you be needing menus, Mr. Purcell?”
“No, thank you, Ellie. We won’t be here that long.”
A regular at the hotel, then, with a regular drink order. And he’d just made it crystal clear that her window of opportunity was a narrow one.
When Ellie was gone, he picked up his glass and leaned back in his chair, eyeing her coldly. If there was even a flicker of recognition, he gave no sign. “All right. Why am I here?”
“I’m a friend of Soline’s.”
“You said that on the phone.”
His icy tone was intimidating, and he knew it. “She speaks of you often.”
“Does she?”
“About how you met at the hospital and the work you did there—the work you both did—for the Resistance. And how you made her leave to keep her safe. Because you loved her.”
He stared at her, unblinking. “Did I? It’s all so fuzzy now.”
There it was. The bitterness Thia had talked about. Pain hardened into hostility and sarcasm. And yet there was an edge to his nonchalance, a sullenness that told her Anson Purcell wasn’t nearly as detached from his memories as he pretended.
“She told me about your last night together,” Rory said, watching him closely. “How you asked her to marry you, and how she watched you through the back window of the ambulance until it turned the corner and you disappeared.”
“You’re quite the storyteller.”
“It didn’t happen that way?”
Anson stared down into his drink. “I don’t remember.”
“I think you do. So does your sister.”
“What is it you want from me, Miss Grant?”
“I want you to remember how much you loved her and how much she loved you. Before you came home and your father poisoned you against her. There are things you don’t know.”
He took a sip from his glass, swallowing hard. “Here’s what I do know. I know I pulled every string there was to pull to get her to the States. I greased every palm, called in every IOU, and when none of that worked, I threw my father’s name around to keep her safe. I also know that when she found out I was laid up in Switzerland with a hole in my gut and a pair of legs that might be hacked off any day, she bolted for greener pastures. I’ve got to hand it to her, though, most women would have hung around for the money. I guess she let me off easy.”