I wasn’t surprised when I turned and saw that the hand belonged to Yuri.
“Ah, Miss Capshaw!” He smiled in a way that would make anyone watching us think we were old friends. “So good of you to take the time to stop by. You will join us for dinner?” He backed up a step and made a broad gesture, like a waiter showing a guest to table.
“No, thanks. I’m not very hungry.”
“But surely that is why you are here?” Yuri motioned toward the dining room again. I stayed put. “What else would bring you to Bucharest on such a rainy night?”
I peeked around Yuri’s shoulder toward the back dining room, picturing Beyla there.
“I might ask you the same thing,” I said.
Surprise flickered across his face. I couldn’t tell if it was because he didn’t expect me to come right out and ask why he was consorting with the enemy, or because of the nasty tone in my voice.
He lit a cigarette. Apparently the No Smoking sign above our heads (in English and Romanian) did not apply to him. As he slowly dragged in and let out a lungful of smoke, he narrowed his eyes just a bit, as if he’d never seen me clearly before and wanted to get a better look.
“What is that saying about the bees and the honey? You can catch more by being sweet, yes? You see what I mean? I am being sweet to Beyla so she does not think that I know what she has done. In the meantime, I try to find out what she knows. And what she doesn’t know.”
“Is it working?”
Yuri’s shrug was noncommittal. “It would be working better if I had all the evidence I need.” He raised his eyebrows. “Or perhaps that is why you are here? Perhaps you have been following me, and you saw me come into this place. You are here to give me the disc?”
I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. Not until I had the good guys and the bad guys straight on my scorecard. If Beyla and Yuri were in cahoots, it changed everything. Especially when it came to handing over the disc.
Yuri dragged in another lungful of smoke and blew it out in a stream in my direction. I held my breath. “I am sorry that I have not had a chance to return your kind phone call,” he said. “I should say, the call from your friend.” He peered out the front door to where Eve was looking at us, wide-eyed and curious. When she waved (ever the beauty pageant contestant), he waved back. “Miss DeCateur, she is very beautiful, but not very smart. I think you are not happy that she made that phone call. You are not thinking that you can get money for the disc, are you? That you will hold onto it until I pay you? That is your plan? I must tell you, that would not be smart. Not at all. Please, tell me you brought it with you. Then we can put an end to this business.”
I didn’t have the disc-I’d left it at home. In fact, before I left the apartment that morning, I’d switched the disc with a CD of Sinatra’s greatest hits that Ed Downing at the bank had once burned for me to thank me for saving him from the royal screwup that was his cash drawer.
Paranoid?
Maybe. But I wasn’t taking any chances.
I’m not sure exactly how I managed to return Yuri’s smile with one of my own. I sidestepped away from his grip.
“Eve was mistaken.” I backed up a step. Toward the door and away from Yuri. “You don’t know her. She gets a little carried away sometimes. We were talking about looking for the disc, I will admit that much. We talked about following Beyla, too, to see where she might lead us. And before you know it…” I snapped my fingers. “There’s Eve, jumping to conclusions.”
Yuri’s smile never faded. “I do not think so. I saved the message. Please, you will come to my home with me and I will replay it for you. Then you can hear for yourself what she said. She said you had it, not that you were looking for it. And I must tell you, I was so relieved to hear it. To hear that finally, we had proof of all that Beyla has done. Come. If you would come with me, you will hear the message for yourself. Then you will remember.”
He reached for my arm, but I wasn’t going to let him latch onto me. And I wasn’t going anywhere with him, either.
“I think I’ll stay right where I am.”
Yuri pulled his hand back to his side. Was it a trick of the light that made his eyes look hard? It must have been, because he was back to his old self in a moment. Suave and gracious in a very European sort of way. “But you never have said what you are doing here.”
Didn’t I? My mind raced, and I blurted out the first word that popped in my head. “Dinner.”
Yuri laughed. “But you said you were not hungry!”
“Hungry? Not yet. But cooking class was cut short. This seemed like a logical spot to stop. And I’ll tell you what…” I pulled in a long breath. “The more I smell the delicous aromas here, the hungrier I get.”
Yuri wasn’t convinced. “You will forgive me, but I do not think Romanian food is something a young American woman can appreciate and enjoy. But…” His eyes lit. “But perhaps I underestimate you. Perhaps your tastes are more sophisticated than most of the women I have met here in this country. You have been here before, yes? That is right.” He nodded, clearly satisfied with himself.
“If I am not mistaken, you showed me a receipt from this place. The one Drago wrote on the back of. You met him here, and this is where he gave you the address of the gallery, yes?”
The receipt was in my pocket, and I pulled it out. “That’s right,” I said, thanking my lucky stars. How often is there actual evidence to support a totally outrageous lie? I turned the receipt over, not to the side Drago had written on, but to the one that showed that there had been two for dinner that night, and what they ordered. “I have been here before. And it was the night I bumped into Drago and he told me to stop by the gallery. See, right here. My friend and I stopped by. We hadbors de -”
“Bors de berbec.” Yuri moved too quickly for me. Before I could pull my hand back, he plucked the receipt out of my fingers. “Who would think you would enjoy this sour soup with mutton. Such a pronounced flavor! Too strong for a girl like you. But Drago, he liked this soup very much. You knew he would order it that night, as he always did. You knew it has a strong taste, and that it would be easy to disguise the flavor of foxglove in it.”
I heard what Yuri said, but honestly, it was so outrageous, I was too shocked to respond. All I could manage was a couple of weak laughs.
Was Yuri really suggesting that I was the one who-
My laughter faded. The blood drained out of my face. I stared at him, stunned. “You don’t actually believe that, do you?”
Yuri took another drag on his cigarette.
“Have you taken the time to look carefully at this receipt?” Yuri held it up, careful to keep it far enough away that I couldn’t get it back from him. “Do you realize Drago was here? That night?”
“Thatnight?” I didn’t like the way Yuri said it, and it only took me a couple seconds to work out why. “You mean the night he was killed?”
“Look.” Yuri pointed to the date on the receipt, confirming my worst fears. He held the receipt toward the light to see it better. “I think it is just about right, don’t you? Twenty to thirty minutes, that is how long it takes for foxglove to take effect. You will know this, I think, because you carry that vial of foxglove with you. And if I am not mistaken…” He took another look at the receipt, drawing out the suspense. “This receipt proves that you and Drago paid for your dinners just about thirty minutes before he died.”
“That’s ridiculous.” I made a grab for the receipt, but I wasn’t quick enough. Yuri had already tucked it into the breast pocket of his polo shirt. “I didn’t have dinner with Drago that night. I’d never met Drago before that night. I’ve never been here before.”