even have realized he was startled, but Darcy wasn’t fooled. Dave’s client was lying, and Dave knew it.
Of course, who wouldn’t be suspicious? Smith… Honestly, couldn’t the man come up with a better alias than that?
“Nice to meet you, Mr. Smith,” Darcy said dryly. “We get so many of those among our clientele, I hope you won’t mind if I have trouble keeping you straight from all the others. And Mrs. Smith, I presume?”
“Come on, Trey,” Dave said. “This is my sister Darcy. She’s helping out on short notice today because my secretary’s sick.”
Mr. Elegance—or Smith—looked Darcy over from head to toe.
She’d never felt more like a dust mop in her life. Which was a ridiculous reaction, she told herself. Just because he was beautifully attired in a hand-tailored suit didn’t give him any right to judge her costume. “Actually,” she confided, “I dress this way because it makes the criminal element among our clients feel right at home. I was going to wear my Property Of Cook County Jail jumpsuit today, but I’m afraid it’s in the laundry. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go get the cream.”
The cream was at the back of the refrigerator, still in the big plastic supermarket jug, and of course, she couldn’t find anything to serve it in. If Dave had ever owned a cream and sugar set, she couldn’t remember seeing it, and the only alternative was yet another of the ubiquitous foam cups. And of course she couldn’t find a tray. So she put the cream jug and the sugar canister on a pizza pan, along with a couple of spoons and the last of a package of paper napkins she found crumpled in the back of a drawer.
She was just starting through the cottage toward the office when Dave called, “Darcy! Bring some ice, too!”
Ice? What next? With any luck, Darcy decided, she might manage to get upstairs to dress sometime before noon.
At least there was an ice bucket—which she supposed said something about Dave’s priorities, or perhaps those of his clients. She tipped out the receipts which had collected in the bucket onto the kitchen counter, rinsed it out and froze her fingers dipping cubes from the ice maker.
“Isn’t it a little early for cocktails?” she asked as she backed into the office.
Then she saw why Dave had wanted ice, and she almost dropped the pizza pan.
The mysterious woman in the picture hat was mysterious no longer. At least, she wasn’t hiding her identity anymore, though Darcy would bet there was quite a story behind the blackened eye, the bruised jaw, and the angry-looking cut on her upper lip. No wonder the woman had said she couldn’t drink her coffee hot.
Darcy set the pizza pan atop Dave’s desk, pushed the cream and sugar off the dish towel she’d used to cover up the discolored surface of the pan, dumped the ice into the towel, and held it out to the blonde. “Car accident?” she said. “Or—something else?”
“Something else,” the blonde said. “Thanks.” She cradled the towel against her cheek.
Mr. Elegance held out a hand. “I’m Trey Kent,” he said gruffly. “This is my sister Caroline. Dave assures me you’re able to keep a secret—and now you know why I was concerned about that.”
“Yes,” Darcy said. “If I can help in any way—”
“That’s what we’re here to discuss with Dave,” Trey said.
Dismissed. Darcy felt like saluting.
They were still behind closed doors when she came back downstairs a few minutes later, dressed in heather tweed slacks and a short-sleeved sweater. She was leaning over Mrs. Cusack’s desk, reviewing the day’s calendar, when she heard the doorknob of Dave’s office give its characteristic groan, and she pushed the calendar aside and hurried toward the kitchen to make another pot of coffee.
Not, she told herself, to avoid coming face to face with Mr. Elegance again. She couldn’t possibly care less what he thought about her.
The telltale loose board in the hallway creaked, and a moment later Trey Kent was standing in the kitchen doorway, the sopping-wet towel in his hand. He was holding it gingerly, as if afraid it would drip on his perfectly creased trousers. “I think we’re finished with this, Ms. Malone.”
Darcy took the towel, wrung it out, and hung it over the faucet. “I hope it helped.”
“You were very kind.”
She waited for him to go back to Dave’s office, but instead he leaned against the front of the cabinets and folded his arms across his chest. “My sister’s wedding is scheduled for the middle of December.”
And why are you telling me about it? “Really? Now that just goes to show why Dave’s the lawyer and I’m the part-time secretary, because I’d have guessed she was here for a restraining order, not a prenuptial contract. Unless of course it wasn’t the fiancé who did this to her.”
“It was. And she won’t be marrying him.”
“Well, that’s good news. Most battered women are so off balance about the whole thing that they blame themselves for getting beaten—and they don’t even consider filing charges.”
“Can you blame them? Taking the whole thing to court is complicated, inconvenient, unpleasant and time-consuming.”
Darcy looked at him thoughtfully. “Don’t forget embarrassing,” she said coolly. “Especially for the family.”
“Not to mention risky for the victim who stands up against an abuser.”
“So is that why she’s talking to Dave instead of the district attorney—because you’d rather handle it all quietly?”
“Not quite. We have an appointment with the district attorney later this morning, but I brought Caroline to see Dave first so he could tell her why it’s absolutely necessary she not back down and let Corbin go free to do it again to someone else. But I’m sure you don’t need the legal process explained to you.”
Darcy bit her lip. “Oh. I thought—”
“It was quite clear what you thought, Ms. Malone. In the meantime, however, this whole thing has left us with a problem.”
“Us?” Darcy asked. “I assume you’re speaking generically, because I don’t feel that this is exactly a personal difficulty for me.”
“A problem for Caroline and for me. And for the Kentwells chain.”
Darcy snapped her fingers. “Of course. Kentwells—the department store group. No wonder your name sounded familiar. Trey Kent…let me think. You’re not actually named Trey, are you? You’re Something, Something Kent the Third—that’s where they got the Trey.”
“It’s better than being called Junior as my father sometimes was.”
“No contest there. So what is your name, really?”
“Andrew Patrick Kent.” He added, sounding reluctant, “The Third.”
“All those nice first names and you don’t use a single one of them. Such a shame.”
“Has
