Copy Cap Murder Read Free Page B

I would be something much more daring like a spy.”
    â€œA spy?” I goggled at him. “Like 007? A womanizer?”
    â€œWith the babes but without the misogyny,” he clarified. “Yes. In my defense, I was a teenager.”
    I laughed, enjoying his look of chagrin.
    â€œWhat stopped you?” I asked.
    â€œThe family needed me to take up my uncle’s clients, and I wasn’t sure I was cut out for a life of espionage,” he said. “I still love a good thriller, though.”
    â€œMe, too,” I said. I grinned at him. I couldn’t help it. Never in a million years would I have pegged Harry as a wannabe spy. I found it thoroughly charming.
    â€œOy, Harrison! Scarlett! You missed the turn, yeah?”
    I glanced over my shoulder at our party, who were all clustered around Notting Hill Gate. Caught up in our conversation, we’d missed the entrance to the underground.
    â€œOh, sorry!” Harrison shouted back. He took my elbow and guided me back to our group.
    â€œWe were discussing the history of Guy Fawkes, fascinating stuff,” I said. “My fault.”
    â€œNo, it was me,” Harrison said. “I was distracted.”
    â€œThat’s one word for it,” Nick said and gave us a broad wink. “Come along, loves, we’re off to the Boltons, second wealthiest street in all of London according to the
Daily Mail
.”
    â€œNick, how can you stand that rag?” Fee asked.
    â€œAre you kidding?” he asked. “It’s the highlight of my day. Now come along, I don’t want to miss a moment of our time living like the other half or the upper tenth, more accurately.”
    He brandished his walking stick like a drum major’s baton and led the way down the steps. As everyone fell in behind him, I glanced at Harrison and found him looking at me. It made me too aware of him, of us, of whatever was happening between us, so I did what I always do, I made a joke of it.
    I forced a laugh and rolled my eyes and said, “I wonderhow far we would have walked before we realized we’d missed our gate.”
    Harrison reached between us and straightened my beanie although it didn’t need it.
    â€œI have a feeling, Ginger, that I could have walked all the way across Merry Old England with you by my side and never have realized we’d left the city.”
    The man charmed me stupid. There was no other explanation for why I suddenly couldn’t remember how to make my legs move in an alternating motion that would propel me forward, you know, that thing called walking.
    â€œCome on,” he said and grabbed my hand. “We’re going to miss the train.”
    I let the man lead me to the platform to meet our friends with the sneaky suspicion that I would pretty much let this guy drag me anywhere. Uh-oh.

Chapter 3

    When we arrived at Harrison’s boss’s house, Nick’s comment about the other half hit me like a frying pan upside the head.
    Viv and I do pretty well in the hat shop. We’re on one of the main tourist thoroughfares in London; Mim bought the building outright forty years ago, so we’re not mortgaged up to our eyeballs. Viv is brilliant and has a lot of high-society clients, who are more than happy to pay four to eight hundred pounds for a hat. Yeah, chew on that conversion for a bit. So we’re doing well, better than most, in fact, especially since Harrison is in charge of the money and is much more fiscally responsible than we are.
    But there’s doing well and then there’s doing spec-freaking-tacular. As we stood on the sidewalk looking up at the glowing white monstrous colossus that loomed overus, I felt small, like ant under boot small. It occurred to me that the ant’s perspective on things stinks.
    Harrison led the way into the courtyard. It was festively decorated with twinkling lights and glass lanterns, which made the entire front of the house glow. Large dried