The Dahlia Trilogy (The Gilded Flower Series) Read online

  “You’re loyal to a fault, Dahlia—to your sister, and to Vi. Lily wouldn’t have slept with me. I know that. But you are,” Gustavo pauses, searching for the right word, “A bit more flexible.”

  “Watch it, Gustavo. Whatever it is, this game that you’re playing, I won’t let you win. I don’t care what it takes.”

  “Oh, I seriously doubt it, Dahlia. But don’t worry, none of this is about you anyway.”

  “Hope it was all worth it,” Dahlia spits out as she makes her way to the door.

  “To claim the two Baron sisters. Absolutely.”

  Dahlia stops short, her hand on the doorknob. “Why do men like you think that having sex with a woman automatically means he possesses her? And why do women choose to believe the lie?”

  She slams the door, not bothering to wait for his answer.

  Chapter 37

  “I got your message,” Thomas says, sitting in the seat across from Dahlia. “You didn’t want a ride from the hotel?”

  She stares out the window, not bothering to look at him. Tossing a large envelope onto the seat next to him she says, “I hope it was worth it, you prick.”

  “Dahlia, I’m sorry,” he stammers. “I couldn’t think of any other . . . .”

  Dahlia holds up a hand and says, “Stop. You set me up, asshole. I don’t care what your motivations were, it was a shit thing to do. I didn’t deserve it.”

  Thomas shakes his head and fumbles for a cigarette. He puts it in his mouth and takes it out again. “Fuck, Dahlia, I’m really sorry. The shit he has on Vi is so damning, I didn’t know what else to do.”

  “You played into his hands is what you did.” She turns her head and looks him squarely in the eyes. “Vi would’ve never done that.”

  He sighs and hesitates. “No, perhaps not. But she’s made a mess of things, and she’s in no position to clean it up on her own.”

  Dahlia returns to staring out on the train platform, watching people go by. “Was this whole trip to Paris just for this?”

  Thomas shrugs. “Mostly, but I did have to go to Geneva.”

  “And?”

  “I’m sorry Dahlia. It was a dead end.”

  “Of course it was,” Dahlia pounds her fist on the window. “Are you at all interested in helping me find my daughter?”

  Thomas’s green eyes go wide. “Of course. I made a promise to Vi and to you.”

  “After this little detour, I’m not sure if I could trust you. Does Vi know about this?” Dahlia points to the envelope.

  “No, not yet.” Thomas drums his fingers on his thigh. “I was planning on telling her when she gets to London next week.”

  “You really love her don’t you,” Dahlia’s voice softens. Of course she’s angrier with herself than Thomas. Gustavo put her in an impossible situation. She can’t allow herself regret over what she did. In the end, she can only hope it was worth it.

  Thomas looks at Dahlia, his stoic manner giving way a little. “We’re good friends, that’s all.”

  “That’s not very convincing.”

  “It will have to do because that’s all I got.”

  Dahlia looks down at an incoming text. “Well, Sherlock, she’s landing as we speak, so you should get ready because you’ll be seeing her in a few short hours.”

  Chapter 38

  They pull up to a traditional brick townhome in a quiet square of Chelsea. Thomas pays the fare then walks Dahlia to a large black door. He fishes out a set of keys.

  “You have keys to her place?” She asks.

  Thomas gives her a no nonsense look. He opens the door and holds it open for Dahlia.

  “There you are love,” Vi says, coming down the stairwell to greet them.

  She pulls Dahlia into a big hug. “I’ve been so worried about you. I hope Thomas has been good to you.”

  Dahlia snorts. “Something like that.”

  “Come,” Vi says, taking her arm. “Let me show you around.” She leads Dahlia upstairs to a large open-plan kitchen with an adjoining lounge space.

  “You recall this place needed a bit of work.”

  Dahlia nods, recalling how often Vi flew back and forth to London. She had assumed that Vi was just living off her trust fund, or the interest alone which is certainly enough to live comfortably. But now she knows Vi had another source of income.

  “Whenever I’m here,” Vi says, pouring out a martini that she must have been preparing when they arrived, “I think I should just make the move.”

  Dahlia notices Thomas’s eyes brighten at the suggestion.

  “But I’m like you, Thomas. I can only take so much of this place. Too many moneyed people with their ridiculous private clubs. After a few days, I can’t wait to get back to New York.”

  “Where work’s been keeping you busy?” Dahlia asks, accepting a drink from Vi.

  “Yeah,” she replies. “And where you are, for the time being. Although I’m beginning to think you’re going to end up somewhere else.”

  Vi leads them out of the kitchen and up another flight of stairs to a large dining and entertainment space. Dahlia walks over to the windows to take in the view of the private garden. Rain clouds are beginning to move over the city.

  A phone ring breaks the silence. Thomas takes the call in the other room.

  “So tell me,” Vi prompts, “Paris yield anything?”

  Dahlia shakes her head. “It was more of a red herring.”

  “Oh hon, that’s too bad. Thomas have any other leads?”

  “Yeah, he said he has one, but it will take a few days to see where it leads. He’s been preoccupied with something else.”

  “That bastard. I told him to focus on you solely.”

  “But it involves you . . . ,” Dahlia pauses when Thomas comes back into the room. “And Gustavo.”

  Chapter 39

  “You have got to be kidding me?” Vi says incredulously, looking from Dahlia to Thomas. He grimaces, confirming what Dahlia just said. “Sit down, both of you and tell me everything.”

  Dahlia starts in, not leaving out a single detail, including how Thomas set her up with Gustavo. Vi shook her head at his betrayal and glared at Thomas during the rest of the story.

  As soon as Dahlia finishes, Vi stands up and paces the floor, running her hand through her thick, dark tresses.

  When she finally stops, she turns around and directs her anger at Thomas. “I can’t believe Dahlia is still here after what you did to her! You should’ve known better. What in the hell were you thinking?”

  “I was thinking about you,” he yells back, standing up and getting within inches of her face.

  Dahlia suddenly feels uncomfortable, the tide of their obvious unexpressed feelings rising.

  “That man has nothing on me,” Vi shouts.

  “But I saw it, Vi. The arrest report, the recording with your voice . . . ,” Dahlia’s voice trails off.

  Vi waves her hand dismissively. “I’ve taken care of it.”

  “You have not,” Thomas interjects, bringing a cigarette to his lips and lighting it. “You want to think you have. But your money can’t save you from this.”

  Dahlia watches Vi try to bring her rage under control. She knows her friend does not like to be challenged, especially by a man.

  “Nothing can be traced directly back to me. You promised me that you took care of all the bank deposits and that they’re safely tucked away.”

  “I did what I could, but I’m sure there’s a trail out there. If Gustavo was able to find out this shit, think about what other people may have.”

  “Did he swear this was everything?” Vi asks pointedly.

  Dahlia nods. “But he’s a liar. I’m sure there’s more. He’s probably waiting for just the right time to reveal it.”

  Vi downs her drink and pulls her phone out of her pocket. “If you’ll excuse me, I have a few phone calls to make.” She kisses Dahlia. “I’m so happy to see you. I’m sorry that Thomas was such a daft bastard. But I’m sure he’ll make it up to y
ou.” Vi glares at Thomas.

  Dahlia hugs her friend. “Please promise me that you’ll take care of yourself. I don’t want any of this to come out and hurt you.”

  “You don’t need to worry about me, love. Have you considered what you’ll say to Lily?” Vi asks.

  “It’s up to you. I’m not going to tell her if you don’t want me to.”

  “Let’s keep it between us for now. I don’t want to worry her. She has enough on her mind as it is.”

  Dahlia nods, “Of course.”

  Thomas looks exasperated as Vi disappears into her study.

  “Does she know how close to losing all of this she is?” Dahlia asks.

  He nods. “She’s not stupid. But knowing her, she’ll fight until the end.”

  Dahlia follows Thomas down the stairs. “I’ve decided to go back to New York.”

  “You sure?” He asks. “Look, Dahlia, I really am sorry about all this. I know you don’t believe me, but I promise to do my best to find Marissa.”

  She shrugs her shoulders. “I’ll give you a week. If I don’t hear from you, I will terminate our arrangement.”

  “You’ve got yourself a deal.”

  Chapter 40

  Two weeks pass without a word from Thomas. Dahlia roams her empty apartment trying to quell her restlessness by painting a mural on her wall, but inspiration escapes her. Maybe Vi is right, she thinks to herself. I should get the hell out of New York.

  She looks out onto her view of the brownstones that line the street across from her loft. Fall is nearing its end, most of the trees missing their leaves, the sky dull and muted. She sighs, wondering if it’s worth enduring another winter in this city, which holds nothing for her now.

  Last year, it was her sister, Lily, going through her drama with her ex-fiancé, then their father’s stroke, followed by Gustavo’s tumultuous presence in New York. The two sisters found their way back into each other’s lives through it all, and it seemed to seal their bond even more. But now, with Lily in Miami with Alejandro, what’s left for Dahlia? If it hadn’t been for meeting Rodrigo, she would have never looked for Shane. She will always regret hurting Rodrigo in the process, but she wouldn’t have found out about Marissa being alive if she hadn’t.

  Everything has a purpose, Kai used to tell her. Or maybe it was Vi. Her time in California and Indonesia healed so much within Dahlia that such details don’t really matter. She can face life with no regrets. So perhaps it’s really time to move on.

  A knock on the door snaps Dahlia out of her thoughts.

  She opens it, surprised to see Thomas standing before her.

  Chapter 41

  “So you do fly,” she says, closing the door behind her.

  Thomas steps into her brightly lit foyer. “When it’s important, yes.”

  “I just spoke to Vi this morning. She reassured me that she’s fine, whatever that means. Does she know you’re here?” Dahlia asks.

  He shakes his head, pointing to his chestnut leather Ghurka duffel. “Came straight here from the airport.”

  “Why? I thought our arrangement was finished.”

  “For you, maybe,” Thomas replies, a gleam in his eye. He makes his way to Dahlia’s kitchen and begins hunting for something.

  “The capsules are in the bottom drawer,” she says, presuming he needs coffee. She took to buying a machine since she no longer had someone to make her coffee. The sudden thought of him stirs a longing in her.

  “Listen, Dahlia,” he says over the hum of the machine. “I was never going to stop looking for Marissa. It was a promise to you and Vi, and I never break my promises.”

  “Are you ever going to tell her that you love her?” Dahlia asks, leaning over the marble island.

  “If she ever decides to stop what’s she’s doing and quit screwing little boys, then, maybe.”

  “I think you can convince her,” Dahlia winks.

  Thomas smiles shyly. She’s beginning to warm to his mercurial personality.

  “In any case, like I told you, there’s one family friend I was looking into. They only have on adult son who’s married. It was strange. Every time I’d do a search for him and his wife, I could find nothing over the past seven years. And this is a high-profile family. Occasionally, I could find an image of the son without his wife at fundraisers and the sort, but not more. It’s as if the couple’s public life ceased to exist in September of the year Marissa was born.”

  “Who is it?” Dahlia asks.

  “Edwin Archer,” Thomas replies, over the lip of his espresso cup.

  “You mean Senator Archer’s son adopted Marissa?”

  “There’s a good chance.” Thomas finishes every last drop of his espresso. “Let’s go for a drive.”

  Chapter 42

  “You feel like sharing where we’re going?” Dahlia asks, gripping the dashboard of the Range Rover as Thomas weaves through the traffic on the narrow-laned FDR.

  “You’ll see soon enough. Just relax.”

  “How can you tell me to relax?” Dahlia asks anxiously. “You say that you may have found Marissa, but I’m not sure if I’ll even make it there in one piece the way you drive.”

  Thomas chuckles and slows down a bit. “I thought you’d be in a hurry to get there.”

  “Perhaps I would,” Dahlia replies, “If you tell me where it is we’re going. Why all this cloak and dagger stuff?”

  Thomas shrugs. “Habit, I guess.” Then looking over at Dahlia says, “Besides, it’s more fun this way.” He smiles and speeds again toward the Hutch.

  Dahlia sits back and tries not to notice that he’s driving well over twice the speed limit.

  After a short while, Thomas asks, “So why don’t you tell me what you know about Edwin Archer?” Thomas asks.

  “Why? I’m sure you were able to find out quite a bit about him yourself.”

  He shakes his head. “Only what the public sees. Son of a U.S. Senator, privileged upbringing, graduated from Colgate with a useless degree in communications then happened to get a job at some top bank on Wall Street. After that, there’s a big blank.”

  Dahlia laughs. “He was already in college when I was a freshman at Dalton.”

  “No boarding school for you?”

  “My parents tried to ship me off to Miss Porter’s School, but I couldn’t handle more than a couple of months there. Looking back, I think I would’ve been happier there than staying in the city with a bunch of girls who only wanted to know me because of my name.”

  “What few friends I made were from Aiglon. I almost attended Eton, where my father went, but I didn’t like the idea of being some legacy.”

  “True, following some path laid out for me by my parents seemed uninspired. In any case, my mom tried to fix me up with Edwin at one of their many fundraisers for his dad who was running for State Senator at the time. The Senator gave me the creeps. He always seemed to be charming you like some cheap salesman.”

  Dahlia pauses and takes a sip of water as Thomas continues along the Hutch, the afternoon light beginning to give way to the dusk. “I was young, and I thought Edwin was really handsome, so I blew him in the coat closet.”

  “He didn’t take advantage of you, did he?”

  “No, not at all. I just kind of pitied the guy, being treated like a prop, paraded around for photo ops whenever the Senator needed to project a wholesome family image. And they were so far from it. Everyone in their circle knew the Senator and his wife had their own affairs.”

  “Did you know their family well?”

  Dahlia shakes her head. “I tried to avoid my parents’ friends as much as possible. His father was around my parents quite a bit during election years, always sucking up to them. Must be hard to live off the generosity of others. I think my parents bought them some house in the Hamptons one year, or maybe it was in Vermont.”

  “No man can respect his father when he allows his life to be paid for by other people.”

  “You feel that way about your dad?”
>
  Thomas laughs. “He made money the old fashioned way. He inherited it.”

  “Less messy that way,” Dahlia chuckles.

  “Good point. In any case,” Thomas says, “Did you have any other interaction with Edwin?”

  “He was back in New York, living some obnoxious banker’s life by the time I went to California. He became quite the playboy then.”

  Thomas nods. “Yeah, I noticed that.”

  “Come to think of it, Edwin wasn’t mean, he was just aloof. I think he didn’t want anyone to see how much being the son of a politician bothered him. God knows it bugged me to have all that pressure to appear to be someone I wasn’t. That’s why I couldn’t wait to get as far away as possible from my parents.”

  “That’s why you chose California?”

  Dahlia nods as Thomas follows the signs to the 684. “And it still wasn’t far enough. So what’s good old Edwin up to now?”

  “He started some hedge fund with a few of his former banking associates about five years ago. It’s done quite well.”

  “Married I take it?”

  “Wife’s a clever woman. Made partner at Wachtell at thirty-one. A bit older than Edwin. I’d say she’s in her late thirties now.”

  They drive another ten miles before Thomas takes the exit to Bedford. Could it be that Marissa was in Westchester this whole time? Dahlia wonders.

  Thomas is quiet as they drive through the winding country roads, finally pulling up to a gravel driveway. Dahlia follows him under the portico until they reach a small reception area.

  “My fiancé and I are checking in for a few nights. The name is Thomas Squires.”

  Chapter 43

  “You mind telling me why we’re here?” Dahlia asks, tossing her bag onto the large four-post bed. She takes in the stunning details of the room with its exposed beams and a marble bathroom with a steam shower and sunken tub. It’s not your ordinary bed and breakfast.

  “We can’t just show up to Edwin Archer’s home and say, ‘Hey, I think you may have adopted my daughter,’ Dahlia. I don’t think he’d take too kindly to that.”