Читать книгу Keeper's Reach - Carla Neggers - Страница 10

5

The few rays of sunshine at breakfast seemed to be it for the day. Naomi didn’t mind. She set off through the village, past a row of attached houses, a post office, a small school and a few cottages, then onto a lane that wound through well-marked fields, patches of woods and farmhouses. The York farm should be out the lane to her left, with Stow-on-the-Wold to the northwest, Chipping Norton to the northeast and Burford to the south. Cotswolds villages had sprung up during the Middle Ages, when the area had prospered around the sheep industry. With its proximity to London, the graceful landscape of rolling hills, pastures and quaint honey-colored stone houses drew tourists and wealthy second-home owners alike. The ubiquitous yellow limestone—Oolitic Jurassic limestone, technically—occurred naturally in the region and had been quarried there for centuries.

Naomi smiled, remembering when she thought something built in 1900 was old. Other than wishing she had brought a hat and gloves, she enjoyed the walk and tried to take in her surroundings without letting her thoughts intrude.

She crossed a bridge over a shallow stream, feeling the cold of the water below her, its trickle the only sound in the still, gray late morning. On the other side of the bridge, a sloping, tree-dotted lawn rose to an elegant house. The scene reminded her of a Jane Austen novel. According to her research, however, this was the York farm. Its owner would make an interesting Regency hero. Naomi couldn’t picture the heroine for him. A prideful Elizabeth Bennett, or a trustworthy Anne Elliot?

A low stone wall hugged a curve. She followed it about thirty yards to an open gate on a dirt track. She noticed tire marks, footprints, horseshoe prints and a small sign indicating the track was public, although not part of the Oxfordshire Way. If her map and the guest information in her room were correct, the track would take her along the southern edge of the York property to an historic dovecote.

It would also take her through mud, she noted with a grimace. She would have to clean her boots before she ventured to Heathrow, given the rules about trekking through farms before boarding flights. Or she could just toss them in the trash. They weren’t expensive. She could wear her flats on the flight.

She didn’t want to think about the long flight later today.

She went through the gate. Within a few yards, she saw the dovecote up ahead, on the left side of the track. Pleased with herself, she picked up her pace. What a change the Cotswolds were from London, she thought. Despite her misgivings about her reasons for being here, it was a welcome break from the intensity of the past week.

Flat stones set into a dirt path created a rudimentary walkway to the dovecote entrance. Naomi stepped onto the path for a closer look. She supposed leaving the track meant she was trespassing, but no one seemed to be around. A quick peek and she would be off. From her cursory research, she had learned that dovecotes were once widespread throughout the area, typically on wealthy manor or ecclesiastic properties. As their name suggested, they housed pigeons, in past times considered a delicacy. Only a fraction of the thousands of dovecotes built between the Middle Ages and the eighteenth century, when they fell out of favor, remained.

Naomi could see holes just below the steeply gabled roof that the pigeons must have used.

“Quaint.”

Clay and ceramic pots were stacked by the entrance, as if awaiting spring and plantings. An ancient—by her standards—wheelbarrow was leaned up against the stone front of the building. She stepped into the soft ground in front of a window and peered inside. Two clay pots that looked as if they were planted with some kind of large bulb sat atop a thick wood worktable. Tools were lined up on hooks and nails on the wall above it. Shears, clippers, diggers, scratchers. She had never been much of a gardener but could guess the dovecote was now a potting shed.

At least the front half. At the far end of the workbench was an interior door.

Padlocked.

Wouldn’t one padlock the main entrance and not bother with an interior door?

Naomi continued from the window along the soft ground—a mix of wet grass, sodden moss and dead leaves—to the back of the dovecote. She could hear water babbling in the stream down a tree-covered hillside.

There were no windows on the back of the dovecote. Too bad, she thought, ready to turn back and resume her walk on the track. She didn’t know if Oliver York was at the farm. What if he caught her snooping? Nothing in what she’d learned about him so far indicated he was violent. Weird, maybe. Troubled. Haunted. Smart. All that, yes—and ultra-fit. He had to be to pull off at least a half-dozen brazen art heists over the past decade.

She heard a sound behind her and nearly jumped out of her damn skin. Her knees buckled under her, and she clutched her jacket at her chest, even as she scanned the hillside, saw nothing amiss and told herself to calm down.

Woods, a stream, a farm. There would be animals about. Farmers had dogs, didn’t they?

She liked dogs.

She couldn’t let her imagination get carried away.

Perspiration sprang up at the back of her neck, never mind the chilly air. She lowered her hand from her chest. Small white flowers spread across the ground below a gnarled oak tree right out of Tolkien. She smiled, her heart rate slowing.

She wondered if she would ever not startle easily.

She did a few deep, calming breaths. She promised herself she would come back here one day in the spring. Maybe not to the York farm. The Cotswolds, though.

A groan came from the woods down toward the stream.

Distinct. Human. Probably male.

This time Naomi wasn’t startled. Someone was in clear distress.

“Bloody hell.”

The voice was definitely male, and almost certainly British.

She stood by a thin tree and looked down the hill. About ten yards below her, a gray-haired man was on all fours, struggling to get to his feet. He reached for a tree trunk, missed, fell and cursed again.

“Are you all right?” Naomi called to him. “Do you need help?”

He looked up at her, squinted as if he couldn’t focus or wasn’t sure if he had conjured her up. He started to speak, then slumped facedown into the ground.

Naomi ran down the hill, deceptively steep. She slipped in the wet leaves and grass but managed not to fall. When she reached the man, she squatted next to him but didn’t touch him. He was already pushing himself back up onto his hands and knees, grunting, clearly disoriented and in pain.

“Let me help you,” she said.

“I just need to get on my feet.”

It wasn’t a clear yes or no, but he didn’t protest when she hooked an arm around his middle. He was at least in his sixties, with only a bit of extra weight on him. He was a few inches taller than she was—nothing she wasn’t used to—and cold and muddy, shivering and shuddering as she anchored herself and helped him to his feet. He slung one arm over her shoulder, then with his other hand grabbed onto the tree trunk he had missed on the first try. He was able to hold on this time.

“Thank you,” he said, lowering his arm from her shoulders.

Naomi stood back, noticing he had on a Barbour jacket, too. From the looks of him, he had been out in the elements awhile. The jacket probably had helped save him from exposure. “Shall I call an ambulance?” she asked him.

“No, no. I’m all right. I took a nasty tumble.”

“When?”

He blinked at her. “When?” he repeated.

“It’s Thursday morning,” she said. “Do you remember when you fell? Did you lose consciousness?”

“I was out overnight.” He swallowed, licked his lips. “Thank you for your help.”

His tone was formal, almost embarrassed. He started up the hill, his gait practiced if not steady. Naomi spotted him from behind but had no idea what she would do if he fell back against her. They would probably both end up plunging into the stream.

He didn’t move fast, but he did make it to the top of the hill and the strip of grass behind the dovecote. He placed a hand at his right temple, his face ashen.

“Headache?” Naomi asked.

“Blistering.”

Only then did she see the blood caked on his neck. “You’re hurt,” she said.

“I must have hit my head on a rock or a tree root when I fell.”

“You’ve been bleeding. Do you want me to take a look?”

“I tore a chunk out of the back of my neck. Blood dribbled down my front. I landed facedown when I fell.” He grimaced, sinking against the dovecote. “Sorry to be such trouble.”

“You’re no trouble at all. Is there someone I can call?”

He stood straight, looking steadier, then motioned toward the front of the dovecote. He started walking, stiffly and unsteadily. Naomi fell in next to him, but she couldn’t tell how badly he was hurt. He could be acting out of stubbornness, disorientation, pain or, for all she knew, fear. How did she know his fall was an accident?

She also was guessing—was almost certain—the injured man was Martin Hambly, Oliver York’s longtime personal assistant.

He stumbled once but shook off her help and instead balanced himself with a hand on the exterior of the dovecote. When he reached the entrance, he pushed open the door and collapsed onto a wood chair against the wall by the worktable. He looked as if he was about to pass out, or maybe vomit—or both. Although obviously cold, he didn’t seem to be suffering from hypothermia. At the very least he had to be dehydrated if he had been out all night.

Naomi grabbed a bottle of water off the worktable, opened it and handed it to him.

He took a long drink and seemed to rally. “Thank you,” he said. “You’re American?”

“Mmm. Out for a walk.” She tried to get a look at his head injury, but it was difficult to see with his coat collar. “I can hail someone.”

“I’ll do it.”

He pointed at a cell phone on the worktable. She handed it to him, and he held it in his palm, trembling. He took in an audible breath, then managed to hit a few numbers.

“It’s Hambly,” he said when someone picked up on the other end. “I’m at the dovecote. I took a fall and need assistance. Not an ambulance. Thank you.” He slipped the phone into his jacket pocket. “I feel better already getting off that wet ground.”

“What happened?”

He seemed confused. “What do you mean, what happened?”

“How did you fall?”

“There are a thousand ways to fall in these conditions. I appreciate your coming to my aid, but you mustn’t let me keep you from your walk. I’m fine, honestly.”

“Head injuries can be dangerous, Mr. Hambly. If you lost consciousness—”

“I’ll check with my doctor. Thank you again.”

Naomi had no more desire to deal with the authorities than he did. Once she gave them her name, her situation could unravel fast from there. She wouldn’t even have to mention the FBI agent who had joined her for breakfast a twenty-minute walk away. Then if Kavanagh found out what she had been up to that morning...

An elderly farmworker arrived, identifying himself merely as Johnny as he took over Martin Hambly’s care.

Relieved and reassured, Naomi left them and headed to the track, turning back toward the village. She had resisted glancing at the locked door inside the dovecote, but she didn’t want to make too much of it. Oliver York was a wealthy man. If he was in fact an art thief, he had plenty of places to conceal his misdeeds.

* * *

Naomi wasted no time on enjoying the bucolic scenery on her walk back to the pub. She ducked through the courtyard—not a chicken in sight now—into her room. Her wet, muddy pants and socks were definitely not appropriate for Heathrow. She peeled them off and dumped the pants and socks in the trash. She didn’t have time to rinse them off and find a plastic bag to stuff them in for her flight. She cleaned the mud splatters off her jacket and boots as best she could. She had planned to wear her jacket on the plane but decided to pack it instead. She didn’t want to risk anything interfering with her getting home to Nashville tonight.

She wished she had time for another shower but washed up at the sink, making sure there wasn’t so much as a speck of mud on her. She didn’t know if the dovecote counted as being on a farm—a definite red flag at customs—but better safe than having to explain.

Did Hambly really not remember what had happened to him? Should she have rung the police?

Her reaction had been normal, nothing any other tourist out for a walk wouldn’t have done. Probably countless people had a peek at the dovecote. Nothing provocative in doing that, and, in any case, the injured Hambly might think she’d ventured off the public track because she’d heard him.

Her new clothes weren’t as comfortable as the ones heaped in the trash, but they would do. She zipped up her suitcase, scanned the room for anything she might have missed and headed out, shutting the door behind her.

She debated mentioning her encounter at the York farm at checkout but only for a fleeting moment. It was madness, really, to say a word about it.

She was fast coming to regret her detour to the Cotswolds.

When she emerged from the pub and saw Reed Cooper leaning against the hood of a sleek, dove-gray car, there was no question anymore. Kavanagh, Hambly and now Cooper?

She should have stayed in London.

“Hello, Naomi,” Reed said, his middle Tennessee accent not as pronounced as hers. “I’m your ride to Heathrow.”

“You canceled my car?”

“I didn’t think you’d mind.”

That was Reed. “You’re presumptuous,” she said.

He stood straight, wearing an expensive suit with no overcoat despite the cool temperature. “Hop in or you’ll miss your flight.”

He went around to the passenger side of the car and opened the door. Naomi eased past him. He took her suitcase, and she slid into the car. What other choice did she have? The bus? Hitchhiking?

Reed shoved the suitcase into the backseat. She watched him circle around to the driver’s side. She had bonded with him in Afghanistan because they were both Tennesseans and Vanderbilt graduates. He was from a prominent old-money Nashville family who had expected him to go into business, and she was from a small town east of Nashville, the older daughter of an army reservist killed in Iraq her freshman year in college and a seamstress who had loved and hated him and still missed him terribly. Reed was seven years older than Naomi—he had graduated by the time she stepped onto the beautiful Vanderbilt campus, dreaming of a life very different from the one she was leading.

She wondered what Reed’s hopes and dreams had been as a college freshman, but she had never asked. He had risen to captain in the army and now was launching his own small team of private operators to provide security for people like her volunteer medical professionals.

On paper, maybe, she and Reed should have been romantically involved, but they never had been—despite Mike Donovan’s suspicions. Mike wasn’t jealous and possessive. To the contrary. He’d just drawn the same erroneous conclusions about her and Reed that others had.

She needed to put that out of her mind.

“You’re still presumptuous,” she told Reed.

“You left a trail.”

“I haven’t been trying to cover my tracks.”

“That’s good. Relax, Naomi. I’m saving you money.”

“You’re not here to save me money.”

“That’s true.” Reed leveled his gray eyes on her. “We need to talk.”

“About what? English chickens?”

He didn’t look amused. “About your plans for the weekend.”

“Barbecue and bourbon at my favorite Nashville bar. Beyond that, I don’t know yet. It’s been a busy couple weeks.”

“How would you like to come to Maine?”

She wasn’t as taken aback as she could have been. “Maine is Donovan country,” she said, as if he didn’t know.

Reed smiled now. “So it is,” he said, starting the car.