“How
did that come about?”
“Your cousin, Dick Stone, was running him when he was still station chief in London, and when he left London he handed Hamish off to Kate, who kept him. I think she found it entertaining that she had her own asset that nobody else knew about.”
“I hope that relationship doesn’t come back to bite her on the ass,” Stone said.
“Funny, that’s what she said.”
A waiter brought them each a huge lobster salad.
“I hope you don’t mind my ordering for you,” Stone said.
“Not a bit if it’s lobster salad.”
“I understand the lobsters here are flown in from Ireland.”
“Ireland? Whatever happened to Maine?”
“The Irish lobsters have a very high reputation, but nearly all of them are sold to the French. It’s just one of those little touches that makes The Arrington The Arrington.”
Holly dug into her salad. “God, this is good. Maybe they have a point about the Irish lobsters.”
“Would you like a glass of wine?”
“I’d love that, but I have to remain stone-cold sober for the rest of the day. Iced tea will do nicely.”
Stone ordered her an iced tea. “Do you have any time off coming?” he asked.
“I’ve got about two years of vacation I haven’t used,” she replied.
“Tell you what, why don’t you fly back to New York with us and spend a few days there with me?”
“That’s very tempting,” Holly replied. “Let me talk to Kate—maybe we’ll have a bit of a lull when this business here is all over.”
“You do that.”
They finished lunch and chatted for a while. Holly checked her phone to be sure she hadn’t missed a call. “I’ve got to get back,” she said, “there’s too much going on.”
Stone signed the check and stood up with her. “Call me when you know if you can fly back with us.”
“I’ll do that.”
They headed off in different directions, Holly toward where she had parked her cart.
“Holly? Is that you?” a voice from a table behind her said. A familiar voice.
She turned and looked over her shoulder. He sat there, sipping an espresso, beautifully turned out in a white linen suit. “Hamish?!”
“Good afternoon,” Hamish said, rising to greet her.
“But I spoke to you in London yesterday. What are you doing here?”
“I caught a ride on a friend’s corporate jet. We landed this morning. I wanted to stay here, but of course that was impossible, so I’m at the Beverly Hills.”
Holly’s cell phone buzzed at her belt. She grabbed it. “Excuse me a moment,” she said to Hamish, then walked a few paces away for privacy. “Hello?”
“It’s Tom Riley: scramble.”