A Black Tie Affair Read online

  Her sisters’ eyes locked, and for once she could see they were in agreement. Even to her own ears, the note of passion in her voice had been clear.

  Deep inside her, fear took root. Yes, her passion to find Bertha’s dresses burned brighter than ever, but heaven help her, did it still rage as hot for Drew Clayworth?

  CHAPTER

  7

  On Monday morning at her office, fully recovered from telling the truth—at least, she hoped so, for everyone’s sake—she called Penelope Knowles, the best-known collector of Bertha Palmer gowns in the city.

  Her maid answered. “Knowles residence.”

  “Hi, Betty. It’s Athena Smith. Is Penelope in?”

  “Hello, Miss Smith. I’m sorry, Mrs. Knowles isn’t home. She has a Service Club luncheon in the Maple Room at Clayworth’s. May I take a message?”

  “Please ask her to call me at my office or on my cell as soon as possible. She knows the numbers. Thanks, Betty.”

  Athena glanced at the clock. Eleven-fifteen. Did she want to wait? Could she wait?

  She needed to find Bertha’s dresses. For her mother’s scholarship fund. For Makayla. For posterity. Find them to assuage her guilt for any part she may have played in getting them stolen in the first place.

  Outside the museum, she hailed a cab.

  Ten minutes later she walked into Chicago’s retail jewel, John Clayworth and Company. Ever since she was a little girl Athena had loved shopping here, but today she was a woman on a mission. Couture history and innocent lives are at stake here!

  She’d take up her position at the entrance to the Maple Room so Penelope couldn’t escape her. Every instinct screamed that Penelope would be the first collector contacted by any legitimate seller or thief. She had a reputation for paying top dollar for what she wanted.

  For an instant Athena thought she might be hallucinating again, but no, she did hear Penelope singing.

  Athena ran down the wide aisle toward the Shoe Salon, following Penelope’s loud, actually very melodious rendition of “The Lady Is a Tramp.”

  A crowd had formed in a tight circle, but she pushed through to the front to see a white, pleated Oscar de la Renta blouse sail past to land on a display of Brian Atwood stilettos.

  Shock rooted Athena to the Clayworth blue carpet as Penelope shimmied out of her beige skirt.

  “The… lady… ,” Penelope belted out, “is… a… tramp!”

  On the last note Penelope twirled around, right into Drew’s arms.

  Totally ignoring the gaping crowd, he held Penelope, clad in nothing but a nude demi-bra and matching boy shorts, while he stripped off his blue button-down shirt and draped it around her.

  Adrenaline rushing, Athena stumbled over shoes littering the carpet, forgotten by enthralled spectators, to fight her way to his side.

  Eyes blazing, he mumbled to her, “Stay right here.”

  Not a minute later, Bridget led in the paramedics.

  Penelope singing, “Jim, my wonderful Jim,” went willingly onto the stretcher and out the door.

  Drew glanced down at Athena, speechless, at his side. “I believe we have our first lead,” he drawled while shrugging into a fresh shirt brought by Bridget.

  Not a moment too soon. Most of the hordes of women still hovering in the shoe department were staring at his lightly golden chest and six-pack abs leading down to his low-slung jeans.

  So am I.

  She shook off the heady sensation of small, rippling waves of excitement to find her voice and her common sense. “We need to get to the hospital. Now.”

  Lewis Stemmer waited for them at the third-floor nurses’ station.

  “Mrs. Knowles is coherent, and her vitals are good. I explained what happened to her and asked if she’d been exposed to any of the missing Bertha Palmer dresses. She keeps insisting she bought the dress to conserve it and give it to the museum. I explained that you had suffered a similar illness from the same source. She’s demanding to see you. Are you willing?” Dr. Stemmer asked.

  Stricken with guilt for whatever part, even innocently, she’d played in making Penelope ill, Athena nodded. “Of course I will. Where is she?”

  Drew by her side, Athena followed Dr. Stemmer to the end of the hall, where he stopped in front of a closed door.

  “I believe Mrs. Knowles will be fine in a few hours.” A smile quirked Dr. Stemmer’s long mouth. “Physically. The rest I hope you can help her work out. Good luck.”

  Adjusting her dark glasses, Athena opened the door.

  Penelope Knowles lay prostrate in the bed, her arms flung out in abandonment, a cold compress across her eyes. Water leaked into her long chestnut hair, which hung limp around her face.

  “Penelope, it’s Athena Smith,” she called softly from the foot of the bed.

  “Thank God you’ve come,” Penelope groaned and flung the cloth to the floor. Tears hanging on her lashes, mascara smeared around her eyes, Penelope stared up from the pile of pillows. “I want you to know I purchased the Bertha Palmer gown to donate to the museum. You should also know I’ve never done anything so reckless before, but the gown was impossible to resist, so I wore it. I know you understand, since you did the same.”

  Confronted by every costume curator’s nightmare, Athena swallowed back her gasp of disbelief. “I didn’t exactly wear the gown,” she demurred.

  “No?” Penelope lifted one finely arched brow. “Dr. Stemmer told me you suffered a similar reaction. What happened? I must know.”

  She identified with the real distress in Penelope’s eyes and wanted to be as truthful as possible without adding to it. “After examining the gown, I began to hallucinate. I thought Bertha Palmer had come to life for a visit with me.”

  “Nothing else? You didn’t, shall we say, expose yourself in any scandalous way?” Penelope asked, an edge of panic in her voice.

  All she remembered was attacking Drew Clayworth and revealing feelings she’d planned to take to the grave. Obviously, the truth serum affected everyone slightly differently.

  But she knew what Penelope needed to hear. “I’m afraid I behaved rather foolishly.”

  “Foolish?” Penelope gasped. “I made a complete and utter ass out of myself in the middle of Clayworth’s. I’m mortified! I’ll never live this down.”

  Athena felt Penelope’s pain. They had both made fools out of themselves. Plus Athena had reopened a painful wound that had never fully healed.

  Wanting to comfort her, Athena patted Penelope’s shoulder. “We’re in this together.”

  “I knew you’d understand. I’m not totally ruined? When the gossip starts, you’ll make sure people know I was under the influence of a dangerous toxic matter?” Penelope’s voice caught in a sob.

  Worried about the truly stricken look on her face, Athena nodded and leaned closer. “I promise. Together we’ll make sure this doesn’t happen to anyone else. Did you purchase all four Bertha Palmer gowns?”

  Penelope’s eyes widened. “My dear, the one I purchased cost a fortune, even with the tax deduction I’ll receive once I donate it to the museum.”

  Disappointment burned a hole in Athena’s already heaving stomach. “Where is the gown now?”

  “In the dressing room at my condo. Dear God!” Penelope gasped. “It hasn’t infected my entire wardrobe, has it? I have a divine new Lanvin I plan to wear to the Lincoln Park Zoo Ball.”

  “Did the gown brush against any of your other clothes?”

  “No, thank God.” Penelope closed her eyes. An instant later she lifted her lids and her eyes had a little of their old steely glint. “What should we do about this horror?”

  “If you’ll allow Drew Clayworth and me to retrieve the gown, you can put this whole unfortunate episode behind you.”

  “I’ll call Betty immediately. She’ll let you into my condo. I won’t forget this, Athena,” Penelope declared with real feeling. “I’ll be away for a while. I’m going to Hawaii to visit my ex-husband, Jim. I plan to throw myself at his feet and be
g his forgiveness. I should never have left him. I wanted my career as a cabaret singer so desperately I couldn’t think of anything or anyone else. I couldn’t see the truth.”

  “You have a lovely voice,” Athena said, meaning it.

  “I know, but now I understand I can have a singing career and my husband. Which I plan to do,” she sighed, looking content for the first time in years.

  “Thank you, Penelope. Rest easy now, and safe travels.” Athena backed out of the room.

  In the hallway, Drew stood waiting for her. He reached out and then quickly dropped his hands back to his sides. She had the oddest feeling he wanted to rip off her glasses.

  She stuck them firmly back into place, high on her nose. “Penelope has only one of the gowns. It’s in her condo on Lake Shore Drive.”

  Drew nodded. “Lewis says she’s well enough for Connor to question her about the fence who sold it to her. That fence probably had all four dresses. What now?”

  I’m a lady on a mission.

  “We stop at my office for supplies, and then we go save Bertha’s gown.”

  Betty opened the door to Penelope’s condo, and the foyer light reflected off the marble floor to fall into the large rooms, decorated in black and white art deco, sprawling, quiet as the museum after hours.

  “Mrs. Knowles called to say I should let you in and then to leave immediately for health reasons.” Betty already had her coat on. “Should I stay, or will you lock up when you finish?”

  “I’ll take care of it. Thank you,” Athena smiled up at Betty, who almost ran out the door and slammed it shut behind her.

  “I’ve been here many times for parties. The master bedroom is this way.” She led Drew through the large white and gold bedroom into Penelope’s enviably spacious dressing room and closet.

  On a large brass hook next to the three-way mirror hung a pale yellow velvet gown with a natural-size design of tulips and leaves in yellow satin and trimmed with white satin bows tipped with rhinestone ornaments.

  I never examined this Worth evening gown.

  Disappointment rooted her to the thick, plush white carpet. “Oh, no! It’s not one of the two gowns I actually touched before I became ill.”

  Drew moved past her to the dress. “That must mean all four Bertha Palmer gowns are infected. We need to take this one back to the lab.” He reached out.

  “Don’t touch it!” She grabbed his hand away just as his fingers brushed the delicate velvet.

  He glanced over his shoulder at her. “This is Clayworth property. Clayworth responsibility.”

  “This isn’t all about you,” she declared, stepping between him and Bertha’s infected gown. “It’s about preserving pieces of Chicago’s heritage. Children need a sense of history. If we all studied the past, we wouldn’t keep making the same stupid mistakes. Stand over there and let me handle this.”

  She ignored him to slip on Playtex gloves and shake out a long, heavy plastic bag from her black tote.

  With exaggerated care, she adjusted the dress on the gold padded hanger and slowly zipped the bag. “There. Safe.”

  “All right. Now we take it to Lewis Stemmer’s lab,” Drew said matter-of-factly like the decision had been made.

  A vise squeezed Athena’s chest, like one of Bertha’s corsets. The gown looked forlorn in its clear, sterile bag. It was to be treated with the respect its workmanship deserved.

  “Oh, no, we don’t. The museum has the best resources for the gown—it needs to go into a proper cold-storage unit.”

  He narrowed his eyes, so she couldn’t read them. “I’ve let you do this much. No more. You could become ill again.”

  She thrust her chin toward the ten-foot ceiling. “I’ll risk it to save this dress.”

  His mouth set in a long line. “I’m not willing to let you risk it.”

  His arrogance made her even more determined. “Well, you’ll just have to get used to it if you want my help to find the rest of the dresses. We’re going to my lab whether you like it or not.”

  When Drew followed Athena into the pristine lab in the bowels of the museum, the same young girl who had been at the hospital gave him a long look.

  Do I look as agitated as I feel? This is too risky for Athena, and she damn well knows it.

  He rolled his shoulders, stress making him hot under the collar.

  “Makayla, we’ve found one of Bertha’s dresses. I’m sorry, but I must ask you to leave now. I don’t want to risk you getting infected.” Athena held open the door.

  Makayla had one of those faces that’s easy to read. Disappointment was written all over it.

  “Why can’t I stay? I’m willing to risk it, and think about how educational it will be for me to watch you at work on this. It may be an awesome, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for me. It kinda makes up for my not being able to go out to the Secret Closet with you.”

  He tried to read Athena’s eyes but couldn’t because of those damn tinted lens. But her lips curved in the familiar way he remembered. Loving. Like she looked at her sisters.

  And at me a lifetime ago.

  “You’re right, Makayla.” Athena shut the door and swept up gloves, lab coat, and mask. “But full gear. And you sit over there on the stool. Away from the dress. No arguments. You, too,” she muttered, thrusting a mask and gloves at Drew before putting on her own.

  He watched her slowly ease the dress out of the bag and hang it next to a table holding a long white box. “I’ll get the sample for Dr. Stemmer.”

  Drew hovered at her back while she scraped minute particles from the dress fabric into a vial. He’d swear she held her breath until she finished and stepped away.

  “All right,” she breathed. “I remember now what happened with the Dior dress that infected my friend T. A. Long. The warm climate in the vault speeded up the breakdown of the boning in Bertha’s dresses. The chemicals in the boning started to act up, and nasty bits pushed to the surface and came into contact with my skin. It became airborne, like a gas, which is what I also breathed in. Obviously, the same thing happened to Penelope.”

  Enthralled by her intensity and her long, delicate fingers, he couldn’t take his eyes off her as she slowly, almost sensually, arranged the dress in the white casket-like box, loosely wrapping it in a length of unbleached muslin.

  She looked up and appeared startled, like she’d forgotten everyone else in the room. “Come with me so you can give a full report to Dr. Stemmer.”

  He followed her to a huge walk-in refrigeration unit, where she placed the long casket on a metal shelf.

  “By placing the gown in cold storage, the degradation process is slowed down significantly. This unit is fitted with vents to filter any nasty airborne toxins.” She shut the refrigerator door and sighed. “Don’t worry, I’ll monitor it carefully.”

  He didn’t miss the thread of stress in her voice or the way her fine-boned shoulders slumped.

  She needs a backrub. Like I gave her on the beach when her broken ankle ached. Her skin felt like silk.

  “You need a backrub to relax.” His words stunned him. He’d been thinking them, and they came out.

  Athena’s head snapped up and she looked at him, glanced at the refrigerator door and back at his face.

  “Drew, how do you feel? Dizzy? A headache? Are you seeing things?”

  Yeah, he saw Athena, from her golden hair to her dainty feet. The embodiment of every adolescent boy’s dream of a goddess, like her namesake, the goddess Athena. She’d always been his.

  No, she was mine when I was a stupid kid, not now.

  “You’re looking kinda weird, Mr. Clayworth. Would you like to sit down?” Makayla called from the stool.

  Christ, he’d forgotten he and Athena weren’t alone in the room. He couldn’t seem to concentrate on anything except Athena and wishing she’d take off those damn glasses so he’d know what she felt right now, this minute, for him.

  Did everyone else know she was hiding behind them?

  Or only me,
because I know her so well?

  Knew her, he reminded himself.

  Athena stared at him so long, his gut clenched. Had he said the words out loud? He shook his head to clear it. Christ, I barely touched Bertha’s dress.

  “Drew, we need to take you to the hospital,” she said softly with a note of real concern in her voice that could melt an iceberg.

  But not me.

  He backed up two steps, putting some space between them. He needed to get out of here before he said or did something he’d regret.

  “No. I’m fine. I’m going home to sleep it off.”

  CHAPTER

  8

  Athena couldn’t sleep off her guilt.

  She rose at dawn to pace in front of her fireplace. She shouldn’t have let Drew leave on his own. He had looked flushed, and his eyes had blazed even bluer, if possible. She should have gone after him.

  She glanced at the mantel clock. In three hours she needed to be at Pandora’s Box to price gowns she’d bought at an estate weeks ago.

  Before I go, I’ll just try to call him once. Only once, to make sure he’s all right.

  Drew didn’t answer at his office at Clayworth’s the second time, or the third, or on his cell, so she did the only sensible thing she could under the circumstances.

  Bridget, head of security for John Clayworth and Company, answered on the first ring.

  “Drew was in the store bright and early this mornin’. He told me the happy news about the dress.”

  Athena heard the relief in Bridget’s voice.

  “How did he look?” Athena asked as casually as she could muster.

  “You know, now that you mention it, he did look flushed. But he must feel good. Told me he was goin’ sailin’ on the Skokie Lagoons off Tower Road like he usually does this time of year.”

  “Thanks, Bridget. I’ll talk to him later.”

  Really, she should be talking to him about the next step in their hunt.