In Their Footsteps & Thief of Hearts by Tess Gerritsen Read Free Book Online

missed jolly old England, where food was boiled as it should be, not sautéed in all that ghastly butter, where people lined up in proper queues, where crowds didn’t reek of garlic and onions. He’d lived too many years in Paris now—surely it was time to retire from the bank and go home? He’d put in many years at the Bank of London’s Paris branch. Now that there were so many clever young V.P.s ready to step into his place, why not let them?
    Lady Helena, who appeared to be just as fed up with her husband as Anthony was, simply said, “Shut up, Reggie,” and ordered him a third whiskey sour.
    Anthony didn’t much care for Helena, either. She reminded him of some sort of nasty rodent. Such a contrast to his mother! The two women sat across the aisle from each other, Helena drab and proper in her houndstooth skirt and jacket, Nina so striking in her whitest-white silk pantsuit. Only a woman with true confidence could wear white silk, and his mother was one who could. Even at fifty-three, Nina was stunning, her dark, upswept hair showing scarcely a trace of gray, her figure the envy of any twenty-year-old. But of course, thought Anthony, she’s my mother.
    And, as usual, she was getting in her digs at Helena.
    “If you and Reggie hate it so much in Paris,” sniffed Nina, “why do you stay? If you ask me, people who don’t adore the city don’t deserve to live there.”
    “Of course, you would love Paris,” said Helena.

    In Their Footsteps
    53
    “It’s all in the attitude. If you’d kept an open mind…”
    “Oh, no, we’re much too stuffy,” muttered Helena.
    “I didn’t say that. But there is a certain British attitude.
    God is an Englishman, that sort of thing.”
    “You mean He isn’t?” Reggie interjected.
    Helena didn’t laugh. “I just think,” she said, “that a certain amount of order and discipline is needed for the world to function properly.”
    Nina glanced at Reggie, who was noisily slurping his whiskey. “Yes, I can see you both believe in discipline. No wonder the evening was such a disaster.”
    “We weren’t the ones who blurted out the truth,” snapped Helena.
    “At least I was sober enough to know what I was saying!” Nina declared. “They would have found out in any event. After Reggie there let the cat out of the bag, I just decided it was time to be straight with them about Bernard and Madeline.”
    “And look at the result,” moaned Helena. “Hugh says Beryl and Jordan are flying to Paris this afternoon. Now they’ll be mucking around in things.” Nina shrugged. “Well, it was a long time ago.”
    “I don’t see why you’re so nonchalant. If anyone could be hurt, it’s you,” muttered Helena.
    Nina frowned at her. “What do you mean by that?”
    “Oh, nothing.”
    “No, really! What do you mean by that?”
    “Nothing,” Helena snapped.
    Their conversation came to an abrupt halt. But Anthony could tell his mother was fuming. She sat with her hands balled up in her lap. She even ordered a second martini.
    When she rose from her seat and headed down the aisle for 54
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    a bit of exercise, he followed her. They met at the rear of the plane.
    “Are you all right, Mother?” he asked.
    Nina glanced in agitation toward first class. “It’s all Reggie’s bloody fault,” she whispered. “And Helena’s right, you know. I am the one who could be hurt.”
    “After all these years?”
    “They’ll be asking questions again. Digging. Lord, what if those Tavistock brats find something?” Anthony said quietly, “They won’t.” Nina’s gaze met his. In that one look they saw, in each other’s eyes, the bond of twenty years. “You and me against the world,” she used to sing to him. And that’s how it had felt—just the two of them in their Paris flat. There’d been her lovers, of course, insignificant men, scarcely worth noting. But mother and son—what love could be stronger?
    He said, “You’ve nothing to worry about,