“What if she isn’t there?”
“Then I will try again tomorrow, and the day after that.”
He eyed her curiously. “What will you say when you find her?”
A trace of uncertainty lingered in her eyes as she met his gaze. “I will ask her why she quit so suddenly after my mother died and abandoned me in the process.” Her words were spoken plainly enough, yet beneath the surface, a tinge of sadness shone in them.
“I’m sorry,” Caleb murmured.
“For what?”
Caleb gave her a look that he hoped conveyed his compassion. “I can hear how much Lucy meant to you.”
“Well, I thought she cared about me, as well. But I was wrong,” Simone said. “I suppose it was just a job for her. Nothing more.”
“You don’t know that.”
Simone’s eyes roamed over the pavement where the vendors were hawking their goods. “It is not what we think or feel but it is what our actions are that define us,” she said.
“Then why find her?”
Simone brought her gaze back to meet his. “I need to know the reasons behind her decision to leave. It gnaws at me.”
“Perhaps she was dealing with her own grief, and had nothing left to give you,” he proposed.
“It can’t be as simple as that,” Simone argued.
Caleb took a step closer to her. “What do your ‘spy senses’ tell you?”
“‘Spy senses’?”
With a smile, he replied, “That is what Octavia and Anette have been calling it. But I would think it is more instinct.”
Simone bit her lower lip as she pondered his words. “I think there is more to the story with Lucy’s departure.”
“Then we need to find her.”
“You believe me?”
Caleb chuckled. “I do not know why you look so surprised. I trust you, and that means I trust your ‘spy senses.’”
A smile came to Simone’s lips. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet,” Caleb said. “We haven’t found Lucy. She could be anywhere.”
Simone turned her head and her eyes went wide. “Not anywhere,” she said. “Right over there in front of the cart.”
Caleb followed her gaze and saw Lucy as she accepted a loaf of bread from a vendor. “Follow me,” he ordered.
He headed over to Lucy and stopped in front of her. “Lucy?” he asked in a hushed voice.
Lucy gave him a baffled look. “Do I know you?”
“No, but you know my friend, Miss Delacourt,” he replied.
Lucy’s face grew pale. “Do not try to contact me again,” she declared as she went to brush past him. “I must go.”
Simone stepped out from behind him and blocked her path. “Where are you going?” she asked.
