“Well, if you put it that way…” Roland opened the door. Miriam tensed. “Thank you,” she heard him tell someone. “That’s great, if you could leave it just here.” A moment later, she heard the door close, then a squeaking of wheels. Roland appeared, pushing a trolley upon which sat an ice bucket with a bottle of something poking out of it.

“This is your surprise?” she asked, lowering the gun.

He nodded. “You are on edge,” he observed. “Listen, do you want me to chain the door and hang out a ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign?”

“I think that would be a good start.” She was shivering. Worse, she had no idea where it had come from. “I’m not used to people trying to shoot me, love. It’s not the kind of thing that normally happens to a journalist, unless you’re a war correspondent.”

She put the gun down on the bedside table.

“Listen, Château Rothschild ’98. Sound all right to you?” He brandished the bottle.

“Sounds perfect. Open it now, dammit, I need a drink!”

He peered at her. “You do, at that,” he said. “One moment…” He popped the cork carefully, then slowly filled two fluted glasses, taking care not to spray the champagne everywhere. He passed her a glass, then raised his own. “To your very good health.”

“To us—and the future.” She took a sip. “Whatever the hell that means.”

“You were telling me about Olga.”

“Olga and I had a little conversation at cross-purposes. She was raised to never unintentionally cause offense, so she gave me time to confess before she shot me. Luckily, I confessed to the wrong crime. Did you know that you’re an, uh, ‘dried-up prematurely middle-aged sack of mannered stupidity’? She doesn’t want to marry you—trust me on this.”

“Well, it’s mutual.” Roland sat in the chair opposite the end of the bed, looking disturbed. “Have you any idea how the man got into her apartments?”

“Yup. Through my own, by way of the roof. Turns out that the rooms Baron Oliver assigned me aren’t doppelgängered—or rather they are, but the location on this side is unprotected. And aren’t I supposed to have bodyguards or something? Anyway, that’s why I came here. I figured it was safer than spending the night in an apartment that has a neon sign on the door saying ASSASSINS THIS WAY, with cousins next door who seem to have opened a betting pool on my life expectancy.”

“Someone tried to rape Olga?” Roland shook his head. “That doesn’t make sense to me.”