“Are you inviting me to move in as a permanent houseguest?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“No,” she said. “It’s not what I want.”
His eyes turned bleak. “I see.”
“Was it what you wanted?” she asked.
“No.” His voice hardened with pain. “What I want is for you to move in as my wife. But I figured it was too soon to ask you to marry me.”
“It’s not,” she said.
He looked startled. “It’s not too soon to ask you to marry me?”
“Not if you love me.”
“Why in hell would I ask you to marry me if I didn’t love you?”
“I have no idea. But I need to be sure. Because I love you.”
“Irene—”
She gave him a tremulous smile. “Actually, it’s Anna. Anna Harris.”
“Irene—Anna—call yourself whatever you want. I love you and I will keep on loving you, whether you move in with me or not.”
Joy blossomed deep inside her. A moment ago she had been feeling giddy with success and the promise of a job that gave her an excuse to stay in Burning Cove. But now she was beyond delighted. She was thrilled. Intoxicated with happiness. Lighter than air.
She tightened her arms around his neck. “I would like very much to marry you and move in with you on a permanent basis.”
He tightened his hold on her. “It will be permanent. Forever.”
“That sounds very good. Perfect, in fact.”
“Just one question.”
“Yes?”
“Do I call you Anna or Irene?”
She smiled. “I found a new life here in California as Irene. I’ll stick with her.”
“Sounds good to me.”
“Besides, it’s the name on my byline.”
Oliver laughed. He sounded like the happiest man on earth. He kissed her there in the golden light of a California day, and for the first time since she was fourteen years old, she knew she could plan a future filled with love and a family of her own.
Chapter 67
Raina Kirk put the updated files relating to the contract for the murder of Helen Spencer into a large envelope. She wrote the address with a neat hand. She would drop it off at the post office later.
She removed the remaining files from a locked cabinet and put them into her briefcase.
The files weren’t the only items in the case. There was also several thousand dollars in cash.
She closed the briefcase and locked it. She left it sitting on her desk while she crossed the room to put on her coat and the adorable little felt hat that she had bought the day before. With its upturned brim and high crown trimmed with a jaunty feather, it was currently the height of fashion. The instant she had spotted it in the department store window she knew it was exactly the hat for her.
She glanced at the telegram on her desk. It had been delivered early the previous morning before Graham Enright had arrived at the office. Fortunately she had been there to receive it.
REGRET TO INFORM YOU THAT JULIAN ENRIGHT DIED IN A CAR CRASH IN BURNING COVE, CALIF. THE REMAINS ARE BEING HELD IN A LOCAL MORGUE. FOR DETAILS CONTACT DET. BRANDON, BURNING COVE POLICE DEPARTMENT. CONDOLENCES.
She picked up the telegram and took one last look around the office. All was in order. The plant in the corner had been watered. The desktop was clear. The typewriter was covered. It was an office that any secretary could be proud to call her own.
It was time to leave.
She crossed the room and opened the door of her employer’s inner sanctum. Graham Enright was in the same position he had been in when she last peeked into the office—slumped over his desk. The delicate china cup from which he had taken his last swallow of coffee lay in pieces on the polished oak floor.
Graham Enright had been dead since yesterday morning. The body was quite cold.
She put the telegram on the desk.
Satisfied, she left the inner office, closing the door very quietly, as she always did. A well-trained secretary never slammed doors. She pulled on her gloves, picked up the briefcase, her handbag, and the envelope, and let herself out into the hall.
With luck it would be quite some time before Graham Enright’s body was discovered—days, perhaps. The janitors were called in only to clean when authorized to do so by Graham Enright himself, who always supervised the process.
When someone eventually did find the corpse, the assumption would be that a grief-stricken Enright had taken his own life after learning of the death of his only son and heir.
Anyone who thought to check the secretary’s calendar would learn that, shortly before his death, Graham, a generous employer, had sent her off for a monthlong visit to relatives in Pennsylvania.
There were no relatives in Pennsylvania or anywhere else for that matter, but no one would think to question that tiny, insignificant fact, Raina thought.