Once Alex had seated herself on her favorite couch in Tony’s breakfast room and swung her legs up, he pulled a striped armchair close. The moment the front door opened, the dogs had taken off and thundered upstairs.
‘First question,’ he said. ‘Where the hell is Harry Stroud? When and where will he pop up and is he a killer? That seems to cover our immediate issues.’
‘And I can’t answer any of that,’ Alex said. ‘But we have to know why he was fired. Does that make sense to you? He was fired. Not a soul knew, or if they did they kept quiet. But he’s never short of funds as far as I know.’
‘Bet Venetia knew, you can bet on that. She probably keeps him in the ready.’
‘I didn’t know what you’d think when I didn’t immediately tell you about Pamela’s will. Radhika’s scared, terrified of something. If she’s not, her behavior makes no sense. I was hoping she might open up to me – since she’s appointed me her confidante.’
‘Let’s hope for that,’ Tony said, not commenting on the way she’d guarded information. ‘She’s going to be watched by the police and our budding lady detectives, so I think she’s as safe as possible.’
‘I was thinking,’ Alex said.
‘Wish you wouldn’t, at least for tonight.’
She plucked the afghan from the back of the couch and spread it over her legs. ‘Do you think you could pass for someone in Harry’s business, or something similar?’
Tony’s eyebrows rose in the middle – the picture of confusion.
‘If I find out where all the sharp young movers in the world of wealth management hang out after work, could you go in there – after the booze has flowed a bit – and see if some pretty lady feels like talking about him.’
‘I can’t just—’
‘No,’ she said, leaning to thread their fingers together. ‘You can’t just but if I call Lark Major in the morning and pretend I’m a breathless young thing looking to meet up with a guy from the firm who invited me for a drink, I could get lucky. ‘Y’see, I can’t remember the name of the place we were supposed to meet and I don’t want to make a fool of myself by calling him up to ask.’ They may or may not give me a name, or even a name or two of local drinking holes. Who knows, if I say I used to go out with Harry Stroud, she might feel like sharing some dirt.’
‘Good grief, Alex. Don’t you ever slow down? You do know you’d have to use a burner phone in case someone ever tries to trace you.’
She smirked. ‘Listen to you. Yes, I intend to get a one-time use phone and toss it. You could wear a suit in the good of the cause, couldn’t you?’
He didn’t quite hide a smile.
‘I’d like to see that. Sounds sexy.’
‘In that case I’ll go up and put one on right now.’ His blue eyes glittered with mock lasciviousness. At least, she thought it must be mock given how tired they were.
‘I’d like to duck out on talking to O’Reilly until we’ve given this idea a try.’ She pulled on his hand just a little, but he immediately slid to his knees beside the couch. ‘If I make the call early and we can get up to London and stake out any leads I find, we might have some interesting answers.’
‘Or we might have nothing but an angry chief inspector.’ He sat back on his heels and regarded her through narrowed eyes.
‘I do have a theory,’ she told him, looking at the ceiling where sounds of racing dog feet beat a tattoo. ‘And I want to know if he was advising Pamela Gibbon on what to do with her wealth.’
Tony said, ‘We should look into that later.’