Page 38 of The Librarian Spy

“Yes, I imagine you would be.”

“I am here for him,” Ava said. “To do what I can to end this war. He’s sacrificed so much for me. Too much.” She touched her hand to her brow and found it damp with perspiration. “He always wanted to go to college, to be an engineer, but he had to take on a job to care for me. I wanted to go to college too, and when I finished high school, he told me he had enough savings for both of us to enroll.”

Tears burned in her eyes. She didn’t know why she was telling James all of this, or why she was even putting words to the ache inside her after all these years. However, once started, she couldn’t seem to stop.

“When I left for Pratt, he joined the Army.” Ava sniffed, and a handkerchief appeared in front of her. “There wasn’t enough for the two of us. Only one.”

She accepted it from James and wiped her nose. The cloth was warm from his pocket and held the faint familiar scent of him. “My brother is in this war because he sent me to pursue the dream we both wanted.” She stared at the table, noting a small dark crack in one corner. “At that point, it was too late to undo any of it, so I continued on. Now I want to use everything I learned in college and after to help bring him home.” She released a shaky exhale. “That’s why I’m here.”

Someone dropped a dish in the background, splintering upon impact with the marble floor. Ava glanced around the busy café whose patrons had tripled in the time since she’d arrived. The realization of having lost control of her emotions in so public a place hit her.

She lowered her face. “I’m sorry for bringing this up here. It’s not the place, I know.”

“I wasn’t at all put out by it.” James made a point of glancing at the surrounding tables and standing customers putting in their orders. “Nor was anyone else. I’m grateful you told me, in fact.”

“I don’t know why I did.” Heat scorched her cheeks as she lifted her bica in the hopes its fortitude would bolster her own wits.

“Sometimes the things we hold inside of us need to be let out. No matter where you are or who you’re speaking with.” James smiled with a delicate understanding, then respectfully returned to his own seat and took up his cold coffee.

His finger tapped the side of the small cup, as if vacillating over something. “I have someone I’d like you to meet,” he said suddenly. “What are you doing tonight?”

Her plans included a meal of grilled fish and settling down with Wuthering Heights. “My evening can be rearranged if I have good reason,” she replied noncommittally.

“Perfect.” He sat back in his chair. “I want you to come to Estoril with me for a dinner party.”

Ava swallowed a mouthful of coffee and set her cup down, grateful to have been vague about her plans. “A dinner party? I haven’t a thing to wear.”

“Peggy can help you with that.”

“I couldn’t impose.”

James chuckled. “I assure you, she would jump at the chance.”

Ava cast him a skeptical look.

He put his arm over the back of the chair next to him. “You asked for something that might aid the refugees. The man I intend to introduce you to knows many people. And trust me, Peggy will be delighted.”

“All right.” Ava tilted her head, unconvinced and certainly determined not to beg if Peggy declined.

James, however, was right, Peggy did not say no. He was also correct when he said she would jump at the chance. She did so—quite literally—in a squeal of excitement that made Ava nervous at having asked.

Before Ava knew what was happening, she was hauled over to Peggy’s apartment where her friend studied her with a discerning eye as she pressed a finger to her lower lip in thought. Peggy’s place was small, like Ava’s with far more color splashed about. Persimmon-colored roses sat in a bright green vase on the counter, a splay of aubergine pillows propped on a sunshine yellow couch that matched the drapes layered over the open windows.

“It’s a shame we didn’t have the opportunity to put your hair in pin curls.” Peggy tsk-tsked. “But I’ll see what I can do.”

The next hour consisted of Ava’s tresses being brushed and tugged, her face being powdered, prodded, and painted until Peggy stepped back with a smile and a proud nod.

“This really wasn’t necessary,” Ava objected, feeling rather silly.

“Trust me, you’ll be glad once you’re in Estoril. Everyone there is filthy rich, and the rules are much stricter.”

“What do you mean?”

“I was nearly arrested once for wearing a two-piece bathing suit.” Peggy rolled her eyes. “It was when I first arrived and had no idea policemen would be crawling all over the beach with their little rulers.”

“Rulers?” The thought of policemen patrolling the beach to measure swimwear was far too ridiculous.

“Here’s the kicker—I bought the suit at one of the shops in Estoril.” Peggy threw her hands up in exasperation. “I had to practically threaten bodily harm for them to take it back.”