“That’s not true. I wanted you to have the Hale heir.”
“I don’t want some wealthy husband. I want what I deserve. And I deserve this.”
“No.” Kat eased forward. “You don’t.”
“Give me the egg, Lady Georgette,” Agent Bennett said from the shadows, and Georgette spun.
Kat could see her calculating angles, wondering if it was too late to run.
Then “Director Hoyt” appeared on Georgette’s other side. Except he didn’t look like Director Hoyt. In fact, he looked remarkably like the sketch of the thief her contact in London had hired to steal the fake egg in the first place.
“Hi, nice working with you,” Bobby said to Georgette, but the girl just shook her head, as if trying to find her way out of this nightmare.
“It’s no use,” Agent Bennett said. “We’ve tracked the sales, you know. You’ve promised that egg to some very bad men, Georgette—three of them if our sources are correct. It’s genius, really, when you have this many fakes lying around. Were you going to give the real egg to any of your buyers?” Amelia asked, and Kat could see the answer in the girl’s eyes: of course not. That was her mother’s egg, and Kat knew better than anyone she’d never sell it to the highest bidder.
“Run, and Interpol will be the least of your problems,” Amelia finished, but Georgette was long past caring. About her father. About her family’s pride. And maybe even about her egg.
Maybe the only thing she cared about was her life.
She looked like a queen when she turned to her father and said, “You want your precious egg, my lord. Fine.” She dropped her bag and pulled a bundle from among her clothes. Black cloth was wrapped around it.
Around and around like a shroud.
Kat watched the dark fabric pool on the snow-covered ground at her feet. It looked like a black hole that was getting ready to swallow her up. But then there it was, in her hands.
Spotlights shone down upon gold and emeralds and rubies and it looked like someone had shrunk Christmas and put it inside one glistening, glimmering orb.
Even Kat had to gasp at its beauty. At long last, their search for the missing Egg of the Magi was over, but Kat didn’t feel victorious.
“Merry Christmas,” Lady Georgette said. Her voice was as cold as the ice on the ground and her arm was as steady and strong as Kat had ever seen as she pulled back and hurled the Gold Egg of the Magi into the ice and the snow.
She was running, Kat knew. The Bagshaws were giving chase and Agent Bennett would lock her in handcuffs and throw away the key. But Kat could do nothing about that.
So she watched the egg fly through the air, tumbling end over end, rubies and emeralds catching the light, making the sky look like a kaleidoscope of moving color against the backdrop of wintry white.
Inside the mansion, the music must have come back on with the electricity because carols filled the night, a haunting sound.
And yet the world seemed to be in slow motion. Kat only knew that she was moving.
She was running and sliding and…falling.
And she wasn’t quite fast enough, Kat realized as the egg landed on the ice two feet away.
And shattered.
*
“Hale?”
Kat saw her breath fog in the chilly air. There really was a storm coming—that part hadn’t been a lie. She had simply asked Simon to move up the timeline a bit. And if it came with a side of chaos and isolation, all the better.
They were never going to find the real egg—not in that massive castle. Not in time. And their plan had worked, in a way. It just hadn’t worked well enough.
She should have put Angus and Hamish to following Lady Georgette sooner. She should have known the girl would rather see the egg shatter than see anyone else benefit from the gift her father had purchased for her late mother.
Kat should have known that pain better than anyone, recognized it for what it was. But Kat was too blinded by jealousy, too worried about losing the boy to pay too much attention to the girl who might have been her rival.
“Hale, are you okay?”
She saw him stop moving. Even though the electricity was back on throughout the castle, the lights were off in Hale’s room. He moved by the light of the fire to the bed and Kat noticed the suitcase that lay open there, waiting and half-full.
“Going somewhere?” she asked, trying to tease.
“London,” was his answer. “Someone will have to talk to the press. The auction will have to be canceled. The charity isn’t to blame, but that’s the thing about blame: it doesn’t always land where it belongs. Ms. Evans shouldn’t have to face it, so I… I have to go to London.”
“There’s a storm coming,” she told him.
“I know,” he said, shutting the suitcase with a snap, then jerking it off the bed. “I had Marcus call in a helicopter. We’ll be in London before it hits.”
He started past her.
“Okay,” she said. “I’ll get the gang, grab my stuff. It might take Simon a little while to pack up, but—”
“Stay.” Hale stopped in the doorway and turned to her. There was mistletoe overhead, but he didn’t look up. He didn’t smile or tease or seem in any way Hale-like as he looked at her, almost like he didn’t see her at all. “You should stay with your family. It’s Christmas.”
“Hale.” She took his arm before he could leave.
You’re my family, she thought but the words just didn’t come.