her portmanteau to the hackney cab driver, Kirstin gave the address of the hotel where Cameron Dunbar had taken up residence. It was by no means the grandest establishment in London but it was, she knew, formidably expensive, not least because it had a reputation for offering the utmost discretion, which suited certain well-heeled guests. She wondered how Cameron had come to know of it. The friend he had mentioned, Max, who had recommended The Procurer’s services, no doubt. She remembered Max. A difficult, but ultimately satisfying case, and the first one in which Marianne had been involved.
The cab rattled through the crowded streets and Kirstin’s heart raced along with it. It was not too late to turn back, but she knew she would not. Her farewells had been said.
‘We’ll be fine,’ Marianne had told her with a reassuring smile, and Kirstin hadn’t doubted it, having come to trust her completely over the years in both business and personal terms. But it had been a painful parting all the same, astonishingly difficult to pin a smile to her face, to keep the tears from her eyes. ‘Go,’ Marianne had said, shooing her out through the door, ‘and don’t fret. Concentrate on completing this case, which sounds as if it will require all of even your considerable powers. It will be good for me to have the opportunity to be in charge, stand on my own two feet.’
Marianne, discreet as ever, had refrained from asking why Kirstin was taking on this case personally, something she had never done before, though it was Marianne who had, albeit inadvertently, put the idea into Kirstin’s head, when she had pointed out that Kirstin possessed exactly the attributes the client had specified.
As The Procurer, Kirstin could have found another suitable female, she always did, but it would have taken time, and Cameron had none to spare. It therefore made perfect, logical sense for her to make the momentous decision to step into the breach, she told herself as the cab neared her destination. It was clear to her, from the sketchy information Cameron had provided, that the situation, though not necessarily a matter of life and death at present, could, if unresolved, easily become one.
Though had it been any man other than Cameron Dunbar who had come seeking her help would she have acted in a similar fashion? No. Kirstin’s habit of being brutally honest with everyone, including herself, was ingrained. She would have moved heaven and earth to find a suitable female candidate, but she would not have dreamed of offering her own services. She was here to help Cameron Dunbar resolve his terrible predicament, but she was also here for her own reasons.
It meant depriving another woman of the opportunity to make a fresh start for herself, but after their wholly unsatisfactory meeting the day before yesterday, Kirstin had been forced to acknowledge that she too needed a fresh start. Far from letting her close the door on the man, it had merely served to let him stride through. She had to know more about him, and she had a very legitimate reason for needing to do so. The time would come when she could no longer field questions with feigned ignorance, and it was not in her nature to lie.
More than six years ago she had taken the decision to be true to herself, to live her life in her chosen way, independent of everyone, answerable to no one. In order to continue to do so she must reassure herself that her decision was the correct one, which meant excising Cameron Dunbar from the equation.
And keeping him completely in the dark while she did so.
Kirstin smiled grimly to herself. It was hardly a difficult task for one who made a living from extracting information while offering none in exchange. She must assume that Cameron would remember Kirstin Blair, but he would have no idea that she and The Procurer were one and the same. The Procurer’s own unbreakable rules that no questions could be asked, no personal history need be revealed, would protect her, and the notion that she would ever confide in him of her own free will—it was ludicrous. Kirstin, as Marianne had once said, could give lessons in discretion to clams.
Reassured, confident in her decision, as the cab came to a halt and the hotel porter rushed to open the door, she turned her mind to the coming reunion, telling herself that her nerves were everything to do with her determination to prevent the matter becoming one of life and death, and nothing at all to do with the man she was going to be working with in close proximity.
* * *
In accordance with the letter from The Procurer, which had arrived yesterday, Cameron had reserved a suite of rooms in the name of Mrs Collins. He had instructed the Head Porter to inform him when this lady, whom he was to claim as an old acquaintance, arrived, and to issue her with an invitation to take tea with him.
His own suite overlooked the front of the hotel. Unable to concentrate on the stack of business letters which had been forwarded from his Glasgow office, Cameron had spent the last two hours gazing out of the window, monitoring every arrival.
He had no idea what to expect of Mrs Collins, though he had formed a picture in his head of a smart, middle-aged woman with faded hair, a high brow, intelligent eyes. The relic of a man of the church, perhaps, who had worked in London’s slums, or with London’s fallen women, and was therefore no stranger to the city’s seamy underbelly, but who had also solicited London’s society for alms. At ease with the full gamut of society, Mrs Collins would be tough but compassionate, not easily shocked. The type of woman who could be trusted with confidences and who would not judge. Since her husband had died, she would have been continuing with his good works, saving lost souls, but she’d be finding her widowed state confining, he reckoned, and since she’d always had a penchant for charades, which they’d played in the vicarage every Christmas, the need to assume various disguises would appeal to her.
Cameron nodded with satisfaction. An unusual combination of skills, no doubt about it, which made it all the more surprising that The Procurer had found someone to suit his requirements so quickly.
He leant his head against the glass of the tall window, impatient for her to arrive. The ancient female dressed in a sickly shade of green matching the parrot she carried in a cage, whom he had watched half an hour ago emerge from a post-chaise, could not be her. Nor could this fashionable young lady arriving with her maid, one of those ridiculous little dogs that looked like a powder puff clutched in her arms. A hackney cab pulled up next, and a slim female figure emerged, dressed in a white gown with a red spencer. She had her back to him as she waited for her luggage to be removed, yet he had the impression of elegance, could see from the respect she commanded from the driver and from the porter rushing to meet her, the assurance with which she walked, that she was a woman of consequence.
Intriguing, but clearly not his Mrs Collins.
Cameron turned his back on the window, inspecting his pocket watch, debating with himself on whether to order a pot of coffee. A rap on the door made him throw it open impatiently, thinking it was the arrival of yet more business papers.
‘I’ve been sent to tell you that your acquaintance has arrived,’ the messenger boy said. ‘She’s happy to hear that you are staying in the hotel, she says, and she would be delighted to join you for tea.’
‘Are you sure? When did she get here?’
But the boy shook his head. ‘Nobody tells me nuffin’, save me message. Head Porter says to expect her with the tea directly,’ he said. ‘If there’s nuffin’ else…?’ He waited expectantly.
Cameron sighed and handed over a shilling. He must have missed Mrs Collins’s arrival. Or perhaps there was a side entrance.
A few minutes later there was another soft tap on the door. He opened the door to be confronted with the elegant woman who had emerged from the hackney cab.
His jaw dropped, his stomach flipped, for he recognised her immediately.
‘Kirstin.’
