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6
THE QUEEN
A smiling woman stood before Nora. She wore an elegant black-and-purple dress, understated
lipstick and a maleficent gleam in her dark eyes. Nora’s chair faced a large window. The sun had
already set; the diaphanous curtains moved in the evening breeze like green smoke surrounding her.
The woman, whoever she was, looked about forty-five years old and had long dark hair classically
coiffed. And for some reason something about the set of her lips, the line of her jaw, reminded her of
Kingsley.
“Who are you?” Nora said, her voice groggy with pain. She didn’t follow up with “Where am I?”
because she didn’t want to know.
“You don’t know?”
“If I knew, why would I ask?”
Nora pulled on the handcuffs behind her back. She had small hands and could sometimes squeeze
out of handcuffs if she had enough wiggle room. But they were clapped on tight, too tight, and no lock
pick set or hairpins were to be found. Her heart thundered in newfound panic.
“I’ll give you a hint,” the woman said with a smile that held no friendliness at all. “You’ve slept
with my husband.”
“That doesn’t winnow the field down as much as you think it would.”
The woman narrowed her eyes at Nora and something in that look seemed so familiar, she suddenly
knew exactly who it was who faced her. Terror, real terror, gripped Nora’s heart with hooked talons.
“You’re supposed to be dead,” Nora whispered.
“You’re Catholic. Haven’t you ever heard of resurrection?”
“Marie-Laure.” Of course she was. She looked so much like Kingsley it was as if she was a house
he haunted.
“Marie-Laure Constance Stearns. Comment ça va?”
Nora swallowed.
“I’ve been better,” she said in answer to Marie-Laure’s question. “Usually when I’m handcuffed
it’s consensual.”
“Only usually?”
“I get arrested a lot.”
Marie-Laure came toward her and bent over. She stood so close and studied her with such scrutiny
that Nora could smell her perfume—cypress—and see the crow’s feet mostly hidden by an
impressive makeup job under her eyes.
“See something you like?” Nora asked as she leaned back in the chair trying to move her head as
far from Marie-Laure’s as possible.
“Simply trying to see what he sees in you. My husband, I mean. I’m not finding it yet.”