But now because of the ridiculous court order, she was not permitted to leave rainy, cold, damp London. Worse, the social climate in London had not been warm. She’d had such bad press for the past couple of months, with the accusations that she’d looted Mayan tombs, claimed to discover sites that had already been registered, and used a Mayan codex she wasn’t supposed to have.

Beginning a day ago, rumors about her had begun to circulate, and she was being associated with some huge drug bust in Central America. People had already canceled their RSVPs, so the welcome-home dinner party she was throwing for herself was dissolving. She could hear the fear in their voices. They had been scared their precious reputations would be tarnished if they shared hors d’oeuvres with mad, bad Sarah Allersby. A year ago, any of them would have come to her party even if they’d had to crawl to her house on their knees.

She stood in front of the big mirror by the door and inspected herself as she buttoned her navy blue coat. The buttons were gold, and the coat looked like a piece of an eighteenth-century naval officer’s uniform. She half turned to present her profile to the mirror, stepped to the door, and opened it. The .308 caliber bullet pierced her forehead and passed through the back of her skull, destroying her brain so fast that she never heard the report of the rifle, if there was one.

Through the rifle scope, Russell could see that she had fallen backward, and the heavy front door had begun to swing closed. It had been stopped by one of her feet, so it looked as though it had been partially opened by someone about to leave who had gone back in to get something.

Russell put down the rifle while Ruiz closed and locked the window and then drew the curtain. Russell quickly dismantled the rifle and placed it in his suitcase. He and Ruiz hurried down the back staircase, then into the kitchen and out the back door to the garden. It was midmorning, so there were cars and people on nearby streets, but nobody seemed to have noticed anything.

The house they had been in was for sale. It was only one number down and across the street from Sarah’s and it was the same kind of place. Four million pounds was what they’d been asking. Russell and Ruiz had spent only about an hour in the house and had worn rubber gloves.