“Wait here—we have one more surprise for you.” David flashed his impish grin and tugged Freddie away.
Maggie caught sight of Sarah again, now in the doorway, and waved. Once upon a time, she and Sarah had been flatmates in this house, when she’d first worked for Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Sarah had danced with the Vic-Wells Ballet. So much has changed, Maggie realized, and yet Sarah’s as beautiful as ever. Her friend was dark-haired and olive-skinned, tall, and slender, the sharp points of her hip bones jutting through the flowered silk of her dress. The ballet dancer made her way over.
“Sarah!” Maggie cried over the din, giving her friend a hug, feeling the hard, ropy muscles of her back.
“Hello, kitten!” Sarah’s voice, too, was unchanged: low, raspy, and quite sexy.
“How are you? Did you end up staying in Arisaig?” The last time Maggie had seen Sarah was at the SOE paramilitary training camp.
“Made it through, believe it or not.” Sarah took a sip from her glass of beer. “And I have a meeting with some people at an office on Baker Street tomorrow.”
“Ah, the Baker Street Irregulars. I’m working there now—a little job while I wait for my sister to arrive. We’ll have to pretend not to know each other, you and I, if we should bump into one another.”
Sarah laughed. “Oh, I know the drill now,” she assured Maggie. “And I’m sorry, but did you say—your sister?”
“Half sister. From Berlin.” Maggie sipped her gin. “It’s, well—it’s a long story.”
“It always is, isn’t it?”
“That’s another reason we had the place fixed up,” Freddie interjected, catching the last bit. “David told me about your sister. We wanted you two to have a place of your own—while you get reacquainted.”
Maggie blinked back prickly, hot tears and swallowed the rest of her gin, her throat burning. “Acquainted is more like it. We don’t exactly know each other yet.” She looked around at the party guests, who were now rolling up the rug for dancing. “My word, it’s been quite a while since we were all here together!”
“So much has changed—and not only the décor.” Sarah gave a coquettish smile. “By the way, I too have something new in my life.”
Maggie was desperate for some good news. “Really? Do tell!”
“I met someone. At Arisaig. After you left for London.”
“Instructor? Or fellow trainee?”
“Trainee.” Sarah’s face glowed. “He’s quite the bee’s knees.”
“Why, Sarah Sanderson!” Maggie exclaimed. She’d known Sarah to have relationships with men over the years, but no one she’d spoken about like this. “I do believe you’re positively radiant!”
When Sarah blushed prettily and refused to say more, Maggie scrutinized the faces of the party guests. “I don’t see Chuck,” she said, referring to another of their old flatmates: Charlotte McCaffrey, always and forever known by her nickname, Chuck. She’d married Nigel Ludlow and they’d had a son, Griffin, who was now six months old. While Nigel was serving in the RAF, Chuck was taking care of their son at their flat in Pimlico.
“Chuck’s coming,” David insisted. “Invited her myself. She promised she’d be here, and you know she’s always true to her word. But she’s a mother now—and time and space seem to work in mysterious ways for new mums.”
“I can’t believe John isn’t here with us,” Sarah added. “And living in Los Angeles of all places!” She leaned in toward Maggie and lowered her voice. “Did you two ever—you know—sort things out?”
“Alas, not really,” Maggie admitted. A pang of loss echoed through her. “Our time in Washington was, shall we say, chaotic. And then, when he had the offer to work for Mr. Disney in L.A.—”
“—it was too good to pass up,” David finished. “He’s living at the Beverly Hills Hotel, can you believe? Eating oranges and taking telephone calls poolside.” He made a face. “Prat.”
“Flirting with horse-faced American divorcées,” Maggie added, not without bitterness.
“Nothing happened there,” David protested. “I told you—that was a misunderstanding—”
Freddie called out, “And here’s your other surprise!” A broad-shouldered young man appeared at her elbow, holding a ball of squirming fur. David took the animal from the man’s arms and pressed him to Maggie. “And here we have His Eminence—”
“K! Mr. K!” Maggie squealed, handing her glass to Sarah and holding the squirming marmalade cat close.
“—back safe and sound from his tenure at Number Ten. I’m sorry to say he absolutely terrified Nelson while he was there—Rufus, too,” David added, referring to Mr. and Mrs. Churchill’s black cat and standard poodle. “They’re not exactly sad to see him go. But now he can live here, too, with you and Elise.”
“Darling K,” Maggie exclaimed, rubbing the top of his head. She’d adopted K—Mr. K for special occasions—during her time in Scotland. The cat had stayed at Number 10 while she was in Washington, D.C., as Freddie was allergic. She pressed him even closer.
“Meh,” he meowed in his peculiar way, then bumped her forehead with his and rubbed his cheek on her face. She cuddled him close and stroked him, her nose in his soft fur, inhaling his warm, sweet scent.
“Yes, I missed you, too,” she murmured as he jumped out of her arms to groom his fur on a reupholstered wing chair.
“We’ll take you on a tour of the upstairs later. It’s completely rebuilt. I do hope Elise likes yellow—it’s what we decided on for her room.”
“I’m sure she’ll love it. And she’ll adore you.”
“Well, that goes without saying,” David concurred. When Freddie elbowed him, he protested, “Well, you know it’s true!”
The man who’d appeared carrying the cat was short, but built on muscular lines, with chiseled features and sleek dark hair—with a tense jaw, darting eyes, and a cigarette dangling from his lips. He cleared his throat pointedly, and David looked over.
“By the way, Maggie, meet Maximilian Thornton,” David said. “Max, this is Maggie Hope.”
“The infamous Maggie Hope,” Max articulated through his cigarette, crushing her hand as he shook it. “I’ve heard a lot about you at Number Ten.”
Maggie extricated her fingers. “Really?”
“He’s the new John Sterling,” David explained. “While John’s away.”
Maggie saw a flicker of annoyance in Max’s eyes. “I’m my own man,” he corrected, his English public school boy features hardening. “Did you hear about the big explosion?”
“Hear about it? I felt it,” Maggie replied. “We figured it was another buried, undetonated bomb going off.”
“They say it was a gas pipe explosion.” Max’s eyes were more vacant than horrified. “Landlord or someone working for him was trying to siphon off some for himself, it leaked and—boom.”
“Where?”
“Somewhere in Pimlico.”
“Oh my goodness—” Maggie looked to David with wide eyes. “Chuck—Chuck and the baby are in Pimlico….”
David patted her hand. “Oh, they’re fine. They’re practically in Westminster, after all.”
“She’s coming tonight, right? Do you think we should telephone now? Just to make sure?”
“Stop worrying, Mags! Shouldn’t you go make the rounds, darling? Say hello to all your guests?”
As Maggie left, Freddie whispered to David, “I still don’t understand why she let this place out and came to live with us for so long.”
“Well, there were some—shall we say—‘issues,’?” David admitted, “with one of the flatmates. A woman named Paige. It’s…complicated.”
“So you’ve said. I mean, I didn’t always get along with my suitemates at Trinity, but…”
David glanced to Sarah, who’d been involved with all of the contretemps that had happened in the house almost two years ago. “No, not simply roommate squabbles,” Sarah clarified. Then realization hit. “Oh, David. You mean—you haven’t told him?”
“Not the full story.” David shrugged. “You tell him.”
“No, you!”
“Tell me what?” Freddie insisted. “In the name of King and Country, spill!”
Sarah rolled her eyes at David, then slipped her arm through Freddie’s. “Take a turn around the room with me, love, and I’ll fill you in on all the gory details.”