The London Deception by Addison Fox Page A

Bethany have been able to talk about.”
    “That’s funny. Bethany’s father said they’ve been quiet about the acquisition. Didn’t want such valuable knowledge getting out.”
    Rowan forced a bored note into her voice. “They should probably tell Bethany that. She was parading it around like it was a gift from a new boyfriend.”
    The word boyfriend stuck in her throat, and Rowan swallowed the last word, images of a broken and twisted body taking root in her mind’s eye. She fought the tightening in her throat and willed the tears away. She’d vowed to take the night at the Warringtons’ to her grave, and she wasn’t going to break forty-eight hours into a lifetime of silence.
    Even if her grandfather’s gaze was preternaturally sharp.
    That gaze shifted toward his paper and he picked it up, his tone casual. “You sure there’s nothing else you’d like to tell me?”
    “No, Grandfather.”
    Rowan was unaccustomed to blatant lies—she much preferred her subterfuge on the down low—but she had to see this through. She had no idea the bracelet was such a secret but she’d already pointed the finger toward Bethany.
    All she needed to do was play it out.
    “That’s fine, then. You should probably run along to bed now. It’s a school day tomorrow.”
    She nodded, the lump in her throat like a boulder. “Good night.”
    It was only when she’d reached the door of his study, her hand on the knob, that his deep, cultured voice—full of the lofty strains of Britain—rang out once more. “Taking things from others won’t bring your parents back, Rowan.”
    Early-morning light framed the edges of her windows as Rowan pulled herself from the memory of that night in her grandfather’s study. A long night that saw them still there as the sun came up, the paneled walls absorbing her confession of an endless litany of stolen items.
    She’d never taken another thing from an innocent person after her conversation with her grandfather. When she did steal, it was a recovery and only because someone was paying for it.
    Her days of assuaging her grief with the treasures of others had ended with the life of a young man.
    Her grandfather insisted on therapy, which had ensured she stayed on the right path, but crawling up over the rooftops of Knightsbridge, a young man likely dead because of her, had stifled any and all urges to steal again.
    With a resigned sigh, she threw back the covers and headed for the shower. It was strange how the past had shaped her future, even as she now understood some of that past was wrong. She’d spent twelve years living with guilt based on false assumptions.
    Finn was alive. Alive and in possession of an identity. For so many years he’d simply been the young man in the mask, but now he had a name. A face.
    A life.
    She wanted to be angry. Knew she had a right to it, but she also knew enough about herself to know her path had turned that night. It was only the horror of a shooting and nearly getting caught as they had that made her finally understand the risks she was taking.
    Risks that she still took, but ones that held vastly different consequences, for both herself and her family.
    She was still thinking about those risks an hour later as Finn greeted her in the lobby of the Savoy, once again gifting her with a kiss on both cheeks. The greeting was elegant and somewhat at odds with the man she knew him to be by his actions. The thought left her off-kilter, and for the briefest moment she couldn’t help but wonder who was the real Finn Gallagher.
    And then she pushed it aside, well aware she showed the real Rowan Steele to very few.
    “Good morning. Where’s the three-headed dragon you led me to believe would be greeting me, deprived of caffeine and sustenance?”
    She grinned at that, those strange thoughts fading away in the glare of his bright gaze. “He already went a few rounds with my grandfather at 6:00 a.m. and ordered an espresso from room service.”
    “Let me guess.