Cover

Half Title Page

Books by Elizabeth Camden

HOPE AND GLORY SERIES

The Spice King

A Gilded Lady

The Lady of Bolton Hill

The Rose of Winslow Street

Against the Tide

Into the Whirlwind

With Every Breath

Beyond All Dreams

Toward the Sunrise: An Until the Dawn Novella

Until the Dawn

Summer of Dreams: A From This Moment Novella

From This Moment

To the Farthest Shores

A Dangerous Legacy

A Daring Venture

A Desperate Hope

Title Page

Dedication

This novel is dedicated to my mother,
Jane, the inspiration for Caroline.

Like Caroline, my mom is smart, classy,
and a lot tougher than she looks.
That’s always been a lot for me to live up to,
but I am forever grateful.

Thanks for everything, Mom!

One

JULY 30, 1900

There was no such thing as a typical day at the White House, but Caroline Delacroix’s morning took a particularly difficult turn the moment she walked into her crowded office.

“The king of Italy was assassinated last night,” George said from his desk. George Cortelyou was President McKinley’s personal secretary, while Caroline served in the same capacity for the first lady.

“What happened?” she asked in stunned disbelief.

George relayed the appalling details in his typically efficient manner. After awarding medals at a sporting event near the Italian city of Milan, King Umberto had boarded an open carriage. An anarchist rushed the carriage and fired four shots directly at the king, who died on the spot.

“He was the target of assassins for years, but they finally got him,” George said, his expression grim. With his graying hair, trim mustache, and flawless suit, George projected implacable confidence, but it was obvious the morning’s news had rattled him.

“I’ll arrange for the first lady to make a condolence call to the Italian embassy this morning,” Caroline said.

George sent her a grateful nod, for few people liked dealing with Mrs. McKinley. Ida McKinley was short-tempered, judgmental, and blunt to the point of rudeness. It was Caroline’s job to soften the first lady’s reputation. It hadn’t been easy, but Caroline was good at it. Her day began before breakfast and ended only after Mrs. McKinley turned in for the night. She worked seven days a week alongside George to coordinate schedules and manage the official business of the White House. The work was exhausting, but it was also an honor and a privilege.

Today her main task would be to orchestrate the condolence call to the Italian ambassador’s wife, the Baroness Vittozzi. Caroline would help Mrs. McKinley navigate the minutiae of diplomatic protocol with grace, for any misstep would reflect badly on both the president and the United States. Unfortunately, Mrs. McKinley was prone to veering off on ill-advised tangents, so Caroline needed to be on guard.

Two hours later, she boarded a carriage with Mrs. McKinley and set off for the Italian embassy.

“The baroness is addressed as Lady Vittozzi,” Caroline advised Mrs. McKinley. “She doesn’t speak English, so I will translate for you. Given the number of people calling on her today, our visit should last no longer than ten minutes.”

“Excellent,” the first lady said with a brief nod of her regal head. Mrs. McKinley’s steel-gray hair was woven like a coronet around her head. She’d once been a beautiful woman, but illness had marred her face into a permanently sour look.

Carriages lined the street for blocks near the ornate Italian embassy, where every window was already covered in black mourning crepe. A dozen visitors filled the lavish drawing room, all waiting their turn to offer their condolences to the baroness in her private receiving room. Caroline guided Mrs. McKinley to a padded sofa to await their turn. It wouldn’t be long, for protocol would move the first lady to the front of the line.

The gilt-encrusted door at the far end of the drawing room opened, and the archbishop of Washington left the baroness’s parlor, his audience concluded. He walked slowly, his black and scarlet robes swaying majestically as he moved through the crowd of mourners. The usher nodded to Caroline, and she leaned over to help Mrs. McKinley rise. Ida McKinley was only fifty-three, but her prematurely gray hair and the cane she used to compensate for a nerve-damaged leg made her seem older.

The baroness was dressed in full mourning, her black silk gown spread artfully across a bench and her face covered with a transparent black veil. She nodded in greeting.

“Avete le nostre più sentite condoglianze,” Caroline said with a deep curtsy as she entered.

The baroness murmured a response, and Caroline provided the translation for Mrs. McKinley.

“Lady Vittozzi appreciates your sympathy. All the people of the city have been so kind since the terrible news arrived last night.”

Mrs. McKinley nodded and took a seat. “Tell her that if there is anything our nation can do to assist during Italy’s time of need, she need only ask.”

Caroline translated as the first lady continued to offer perfectly appropriate generalities about the mysteries of God’s ways and praise for the fallen King Umberto. All was proceeding smoothly, something that could never be taken for granted with Mrs. McKinley.

Then the first lady began recounting the one time she had visited Italy during a grand tour of Europe several years earlier. “We enjoyed Rome, especially the ancient ruins and the opera house. Sicily, on the other hand, was terrible. No electricity, leaky roofs, and the only plumbing dated all the way back to the Renaissance. It was mind-boggling.”

Caroline froze, praying the baroness truly didn’t understand English, for the ambassador’s family came from Sicily. Behind her veil, the baroness swiveled to look at Caroline, her face perfectly blank as she awaited the translation. Caroline couldn’t tell an outright lie, but neither could she translate what Mrs. McKinley had just said. Both women looked at her with expectation, and Caroline chose her words carefully.

“Mrs. McKinley admired the architecture of Italy,” she said in Italian. “How clever the Italians are to have had modern conveniences like plumbing all the way back to the Renaissance. It was truly astounding.”

The baroness smiled and nodded, and the remaining few minutes proceeded without incident. Beneath her skirts, Caroline gently tapped Mrs. McKinley’s foot, signaling it was time to rise and end the call.

“That went quite well, didn’t it?” Mrs. McKinley pronounced once they were aboard the carriage and heading back to the White House. She didn’t wait for a reply before continuing her monologue. “Terrible tragedy about the king. Simply terrible. Nothing like that would ever happen to the Major, of course.”

Mrs. McKinley always referred to her husband as the Major, for they had met shortly after the Civil War, when Major William McKinley was still in uniform. Over the years he’d served as a congressman, a governor, and now the president, but his wife still called him the Major. Caroline thought it rather charming.

“The Major is too popular to ever arouse that sort of ire,” Mrs. McKinley continued. “Everyone likes him.”

“While it’s true that everyone likes him, that doesn’t mean they will vote for him,” Caroline said. She was veering into dangerous waters, but it had to be done. The presidential election was in four months, and despite William McKinley’s popularity, nothing could be taken for granted. He had been too busy with the duties of his office to campaign, and his wife never offered to help. She was the least popular first lady in history, and Caroline had been hired to help correct that image.

Working for Mrs. McKinley was like walking a tightrope. At any moment it could snap, but so far, Caroline had been able to support the infamously difficult first lady without allowing Ida to trample her. When in public, Caroline was the epitome of deferential respect, but in private their relationship shifted. They bickered, gossiped, laughed, and fought. The first lady even insisted Caroline call her Ida in private.

“I want to wear your sapphire earrings tonight,” Ida said.

“Why?” Caroline challenged. She and Ida regularly borrowed each other’s accessories, for they were both shamelessly vain when it came to fashion. Still, if Ida wanted a favor, she ought to ask nicely.

“Because the last time I wore them, the Major said they lit up my eyes.”

“Then buy your own sapphire earrings.”

Ida let out a bark of laughter. “You have no respect for your elders.”

“Why should I?” Caroline tossed out. “I’m the one with the sapphire earrings you want so badly.”

If she gave Ida an inch, the woman would take fifty miles. Still, Caroline had a grudging respect for the first lady because she saw a side of her few people did. Ida’s health was brutalized by epileptic seizures, a crippled leg, migraine headaches, and periodic spells of melancholy that robbed her of the ability to rise from bed. Mrs. McKinley was in danger of becoming a recluse due to her infirmities and often stayed locked in her bedroom, where she obsessively knitted baby booties.

Both the president and Mrs. McKinley’s doctor recommended more interaction with the world, so Caroline had begun arranging regular tea parties with charitable groups and the wives of government officials. If loaning Ida a pair of sparkly earrings made her feel better, Caroline would happily do so.

Especially after the kindness both McKinleys had shown her. Last month Caroline’s brother had been arrested for treason in Cuba. Caroline had immediately offered her resignation, but the president refused to take it. Luke hadn’t been found guilty yet, and the military was keeping the scandal quiet until his fate could be decided.

Luke had always been a reckless daredevil who tempted fate and got into one scrape after another. But a traitor? Caroline couldn’t believe it of him. Somehow Luke had stepped into a dangerous mystery down in Cuba, and she would do her best to unravel it.

But if that failed, she needed to nurture her connections in the White House in the hope of someday winning a presidential pardon for Luke. Treason was a hanging offense, and if Luke was found guilty, her connection to the McKinleys might be her only chance to save her brother’s life.

Two

Nathaniel Trask was a lucky man. Returning to Washington, DC, fresh off a major triumph and the assurance of a promotion, he vaulted up the steps of the Treasury Department. Exhilaration from his victory in Boston still pulsed in his veins, for he loved nothing better than solving complicated criminal schemes.

It was seven o’clock on a Thursday evening, but it went without saying that his boss would still be in his office, for Nathaniel and Wilkie were like-minded people. They shared a friendship that dated back to their Chicago days, when John Wilkie was a crusading journalist and Nathaniel a hard-boiled detective on the city’s south side. When John Wilkie became the unconventional choice to lead the US Secret Service, he brought Nathaniel along with him, and ever since they had worked side by side to restore the agency’s tattered reputation into one of faultless professionalism.

Nathaniel’s footsteps echoed in the empty corridors as he made his way toward the wing housing the Secret Service administrative offices, where Wilkie welcomed him with a broad grin. At forty, Wilkie was only two years older than Nathaniel and the youngest chief in the history of the Secret Service. He dressed in completely ordinary clothes and had nondescript hair. Only a reckless flash in his brown eyes hinted at his adventurous streak.

“There’s the man of the hour,” Wilkie said, giving Nathaniel a hearty handshake.

Nathaniel returned both the handshake and the grin, the tension from the five-month Boston assignment beginning to ease. Now that he was home, it was time to file the paperwork documenting how a gang of forgers had pulled off a million-dollar fraud by making counterfeit postage stamps. It had been a clever scheme. Fake paper money was under constant scrutiny, but who ever thought to look for fake postage stamps? The gang had made a healthy living off those counterfeit stamps for years before Nathaniel managed to track them down in Boston.

“News of the arrests has already made the local papers. Have a look at that,” Wilkie said as he tossed Nathaniel a newspaper folded open to the feature article.

Government Agent Foils Band of Scoundrels and Their Postal Depredations

“‘Postal depredations’?” Nathaniel asked. “Who writes this dreck?”

The slow smile that spread across his boss’s face was all the answer Nathaniel needed, for Wilkie had made a name for himself in the Wild West of yellow journalism in Chicago and knew how to spin the press. “I suggested a few colorful phrases to the reporter. I’m glad he took them. You’re a hero.”

“So long as they didn’t mention my name,” Nathaniel cautioned. The Secret Service was the wrong line of work for anyone craving fame or riches. While he loved the challenge of hunting down criminals and hauling them into a court of law, he’d never cared for attention.

“No names,” Wilkie assured him. “Still, it was brilliant work, and you’ve saved the government a mint. Literally. We should go out for a drink.”

“We should, except I don’t drink, and you never go out carousing this early in the evening.”

Wilkie snapped his fingers in mock dismay. “That’s right. Foiled again.”

Nathaniel and Wilkie were complete opposites, but it never hampered their friendship. Nathaniel was obsessively tidy, sober, and a rule-follower, while John Wilkie was freewheeling and hard-drinking, but they respected each other.

“Now,” Wilkie said as he returned to his desk, “about that promotion I mentioned.”

“Yes, about that.” It was hard to guess what Wilkie had in mind, for Nathaniel already occupied the top position in the counterfeit division.

“I know you hate the prospect of a management position,” Wilkie said.

Nathaniel stiffened. “Yes.”

“Which is why I have something completely different in mind. You’ll like it. A new challenge. You’ll meet interesting people and have loads of responsibility.”

Then why was Wilkie suddenly so eager to sell the position to him? Nathaniel had never balked at an assignment before. He’d sweltered in copper mines in New Mexico, ridden payroll trains through the desolate flatlands of the West, and once he’d lived for six months above a fish cannery to spy on international exports.

“What’s the job?” he asked softly.

“It’s the most important one in the agency. Pays well. Good housing.”

“What’s the job?”

“Guarding the president.”

Nathaniel bolted out of his chair. “Absolutely not. I’ll never work as a bodyguard. You know that.”

Wilkie held his hands out in a placating manner. “Calm down. President McKinley doesn’t want a bodyguard either. He thinks it smacks of European royalty and wants nothing to do with it.”

“Then why are we having this discussion?”

“Because I need a detective in the White House. One who never misses details, even if he’s been on duty around the clock. You don’t need to be plastered to the president’s side. He doesn’t want that any more than you do. But I need someone to monitor who has access to him. King Umberto of Italy was assassinated last night, and the man who shot him was a known anarchist. A system should have been in place to keep an eye on troublemakers like him. I need you to design such a plan for the White House.”

“Get someone else to do it.”

Wilkie shook his head. “You’re the best we have, and the problems are getting worse. In the past ten years, more heads of state have been assassinated than at any other time in history.”

Nathaniel stalked to the window, clenching his fists as he stared at the White House directly across the street. He didn’t want to be a bodyguard. He couldn’t be a bodyguard. The last time he’d been entrusted to protect someone, she ended up dead, and it still haunted him. The nightmares had finally eased, but the thought of being responsible for another life made his stomach clench.

“I track down counterfeit. I am trained as an engraver and got a degree in art history, all so that I could spot forgeries. I’m not going to be a bodyguard. Why don’t you assign Sullivan to the job?”

“Sullivan doesn’t have your eye, and you’re not going to be a bodyguard.”

As Wilkie outlined what the position would entail, Nathaniel had to admit that it didn’t sound like a bodyguard so much as a detective on the lookout for security flaws inside the White House, just as Wilkie claimed.

“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t know you were the best man for the job,” Wilkie said. “McKinley will be an easy man to work for. Everyone likes him. Spend the next four months observing activities in the White House and designing an improved security plan. After the election in November, I’ll find you an assignment more to your liking.”

“Only four months?”

“Four months,” Wilkie confirmed. “Design a new security plan, then you’re free.”

Nathaniel paced, thinking. Four months wouldn’t be too horrible, and it was true that presidential security was appalling. It was also true that he was the best man for the job, and it was impossible for him to turn his back on duty.

He would do it. The job meant living in a shared dormitory on the top floor of the White House. It meant almost constant vigilance during his waking hours, seven days a week, until the November elections. It would be a challenge, but perhaps it could also be a way to prove himself worthy and absolve himself of the failures in his past.

That night the old dream came back. Nathaniel picked up Molly’s body, sopping wet and broken by the rushing current, her eyes staring blankly at nothing.

“Please, Molly,” he sobbed, but she was already gone and her flesh was cold. He carried her home, riding the streetcar through downtown Chicago with a dead child draped across his lap. People stared, but he didn’t care. His soul was vacant.

Nathaniel snapped awake, the sheets soaked in sweat. It had been years since this nightmare tormented him, but it had come roaring back as vivid as ever. To this day he remembered the feel of Molly’s sodden gown dampening his shirt.

He shouldn’t have agreed to the White House assignment. With all his heart, he wished he could turn away from it, but he’d given his word.

He began the next morning on his knees at the chapel near his boardinghouse. It had been twenty years since Molly died, but her ghost haunted him still. The mistake he’d made at eighteen was a scar that would never fully heal, but he couldn’t let it cripple him for the rest of his life. It was time to let it go. He leaned his forehead against the pew in front of him.

“Oh, Molly, I’m so sorry,” he whispered. “I should have protected you better. I will honor your memory by carrying out this assignment with complete diligence, with no stone left unturned.”

For the thousandth time, he wondered why God had taken an innocent child. To punish him for putting his love of art above his duty to family? After two decades of wondering, he still had no satisfactory answer.

Jesus, I know there is a reason for this, but I don’t understand it. Can it be so that I won’t let my guard falter this time? Every day I will do my best to serve my country and honor Molly’s memory. I am praying for guidance. If you send me a sign, I will follow.

He listened, hoping for a sign that would let him escape the assignment, but he heard nothing.

And that was his sign. He had his marching orders, and it was time to go to work.

Three

Privacy was nonexistent for staff who lived at the White House. Caroline had never shared a bedroom before accepting this position, but now she slept in a dormitory alongside nine other women. Two cooks, two telephone operators, three maids, a seamstress, and a laundress all slept in this long, narrow room on the top floor of the building, with beds lined up like sardines in a tin.

It was two o’clock in the afternoon, so most of the women were downstairs, but Caroline had a rare moment of privacy with Ludmila Vuković, a young woman from Croatia who worked in the laundry. Ludmila was smart, ambitious, and only twenty-six. She wanted more from life than washing and ironing other people’s sheets, and Caroline wanted to help.

“The school is going to open in two months,” Caroline said, sitting on the end of her bed as Ludmila returned freshly laundered undergarments. There wasn’t even enough room for proper wardrobes or closets in the dormitory, only a long bank of open shelves for each woman to store basic belongings. Ludmila said nothing as she went about putting the clothes away, so Caroline kept talking. “We expect the school to fill up right away, but I can save a spot for you. There will be classes in typing and bookkeeping and translation work. You can have your choice.”

“I don’t have the time,” Ludmila said, reaching for another stack of laundry.

“The classes will be at night, and there’s no reason you can’t take a streetcar to the school three nights a week. It will be a challenge, but over time those three nights a week will change your entire world.”

How different Caroline’s own education had been. Fancy boarding schools in Boston, and then a year in Paris and a year in Rome for finishing school. She came back to Virginia when she was eighteen, but that hadn’t worked out so well. She and Luke had gotten into such trouble together, which prompted her father to send her to Switzerland, far enough away that her rebellious behavior couldn’t permanently tarnish her reputation in America. She resented the banishment at the time, but her father had been right. The two years in Switzerland tamed most of her wild streak, allowing her to step back into respectability in Virginia.

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