Keeper's Reach. Carla Neggers
That was enough, she thought as she eased out of the dress. It was pinned for alterations. She smiled at her reflection, her fair hair a bit flyaway from the dress and the dry winter air. From her late teens into her early twenties, she had believed she would never marry. She had been Sister Brigid then.
She thought of Colin, a hardheaded Maine Donovan, an FBI undercover agent and her fiancé since he had proposed on bended knee in early November in a Dublin pub.
She was Sister Brigid no more.
She slipped back into her jeans, sweater and boots and grabbed her three-quarter-length wool coat, hat and gloves as she exited the dressing room. She’d left work early for the fitting but had stopped at her Boston waterfront apartment to change out of her work clothes. Around the same time her parents had left for London, she had moved to Boston to join HIT, a small FBI team started and led by the senior agent who had recruited her out of the convent. Matt Yankowski had never doubted his conviction that Emma wasn’t meant to profess her final vows and become a full-fledged member of the Sisters of the Joyful Heart.
We can use your expertise in art and art crimes, Yank had told her when he had visited her at her Maine convent four years ago. Give it some thought, Emma.
He hadn’t called her Sister Brigid.
Her early expertise in art crimes hadn’t come from her time at the convent. She was the granddaughter of Wendell Sharpe, founder of Sharpe Fine Art Recovery and one of the foremost private art detectives in the world.
As she ducked out onto the Back Bay street, her phone dinged with another text. Although it was from London, it wasn’t from her mother. It was from Oliver York, aka Oliver Fairbairn, a British aristocrat, self-educated mythologist and international serial art thief.
Who is the FBI agent following me?
Emma stared at the screen. There was no FBI agent following Oliver. She would know if there were. She typed a quick response.
I’ll call you in an hour.
Oliver responded immediately.
I’ll be waiting.
* * *
Lucy Yankowski buzzed Emma into the third-floor apartment she had just rented on Marlborough Street, two blocks from the Newbury Street wedding shop in Boston’s Back Bay. “Matt hasn’t seen it yet,” she said as she led Emma into the living room. “He’ll love it, don’t you think?”
“From what I can gather, he’ll love anything that isn’t infested with cockroaches.”
Lucy shuddered. She was a small woman with dark hair cut short and edgy, something of a new look for her as she reinvented herself in Boston. She hadn’t wanted to move from northern Virginia. It had taken her a year to decide saving her marriage was worth giving up her life in suburban Washington, DC. Her reconciliation with Yank—Matt, as she called her husband of fifteen years—hadn’t been without drama or peril, and it didn’t mean her new life in Boston was settled. For one, she was a clinical psychologist and was talking about giving it up to open a knitting shop.
First order of business, however, had been to find the “perfect apartment.” As far as Emma could see, there was no question Lucy had done just that.
“I insisted on a washer and dryer in the unit, and I wanted a decent view—I didn’t want to drink my morning coffee looking out at trash cans. I swear I manifested this place, but I’m not sure I believe in that stuff.”
She gave Emma the grand tour, starting with the living room and moving into the bedrooms—there were two—and dining room. Although small given its upscale location, the apartment was a far cry from the cheap, roach-infested one-bedroom Yank had rented, thinking he would be there for a couple of months at most. Like the rest of Back Bay, Marlborough, one of Emma’s favorite streets in Boston, had been underwater before the massive nineteenth-century project that had created the gracious neighborhood, now known for its tree-lined streets and Victorian brownstones.
“Look,” Lucy said, smiling as she raised a shade when they returned to the living room. “We have a tree outside the window. Imagine it in the summer. When do you get leaves on the trees up here?”
“May for sure,” Emma said. “I count on full leaf bloom by Memorial Day at home in Maine.”
“Gad. It’s too late to change my mind. We’ve already signed the lease.” She sighed, gazing out at the bare-limbed tree. “I’m sure there are quirks, but I couldn’t be happier with this place. Matt will freak out if he sees a roach, but it’s the city. There are bound to be roaches. We sleep with a can of Raid and a flyswatter next to the bed in our current apartment.”
“I can see why you’re eager to move,” Emma said.
She lowered the shade again. “I’m giddy. It’s fun to show the place off. Thank you for indulging me.”
“I love checking out Boston apartments.”
“Will you and Colin stay where you are once you’re married?”
“For now.”
“Boston rents are insane. I’m sleeping here tonight. I brought over a few basics from Matt’s place. He won’t be back for a couple more days, and a sleeping bag on the floor here is more appealing than another night on my own with the roaches.”
Emma laughed. “I can’t say I blame you.”
“Do you ever miss convent life?”
Ah, Emma thought. The real reason for her presence here. “I miss the gardens and the scenery. It’s a beautiful place.”
“Matt says you’re heading up there for a couple of nights.”
“Tomorrow after work, yes. It’s a mini retreat.”
“I’ve always loved the name of your order. Sisters of the Joyful Heart. Are they a joyful lot?”
“Most of the time,” Emma said.
“Matt says your time with the sisters has served you well in the FBI. You strike me as centered, Emma. You have good command of your emotions and the ability to stay fully present. I can see how you and Colin do well together. He operates on gut instinct honed by training and experience.” Lucy moved away from the window. “I’m aware Matt was Colin’s contact agent on at least one undercover mission.”
Emma followed Lucy to the entrance, making no comment on her assertion.
The older woman smiled. “Not going to confirm anything, are you? That’s all right. I wouldn’t expect you to. One learns to ferret out tidbits when one is married to a senior federal agent. The isolation, constant danger and pretending to be someone else as an undercover agent can take a toll after a while. Some personalities are more suited to that sort of work than others. There must be a high burnout rate.”
“You have to know when you’ve had enough in any line of work,” Emma said.
“Ah, how true. Here I am thinking about opening a knitting shop. I’m eyeing a spot on Charles Street. I could walk to work. That would be a first for me. A knitting shop might be a fantasy to help me with the transition to life in Boston, but if it is, it’s working. I haven’t been this excited in a long time.”
“Maybe you needed something new.”
“I wonder if that’s part of why I resisted moving for so long. I didn’t want to face my own boredom. Psychology is a relatively portable career, but maybe it’s run its course. I thought maybe my marriage had, too. I’m glad I was wrong about that.”
Emma wasn’t going there. “I can see Yank taking up knitting.”
“My husband’s idea of a hobby is cleaning his gun.”
Lucy thanked Emma again as she left, taking the stairs down to the small lobby and heading out into the February cold. What Lucy Yankowski hadn’t brought up—and clearly hadn’t had