A Date with Deception Read online

  George bit back a cry of surprise when Sasha came down the stairs. Grinning irrepressibly, Sasha threw her a cocky salute. Nancy rolled her eyes, astonished at him. Didn’t he realize how much danger he’d been in?

  “Let’s hurry,” she said, shepherding George and Sasha out the door before either of them could start talking. “We should get back before Yves starts wondering where I went. He looked at me pretty hard after he saw me sitting at his piano. I’m sure he’s asking himself what I saw.”

  “I overheard Yves on the phone,” Sasha told them, as they drove back to town. “It was the night before last, at the institute. I didn’t know who he was talking to, but I heard him say ‘Jetstream’ a couple of times. And he was very edgy.”

  “So you put two and two together?” George asked.

  “Of course!” Sasha proclaimed triumphantly. “Isn’t that what detective work is all about, Nancy?”

  “Sure,” Nancy said, her eyes on the road. “But it’s not about putting yourself in danger, at least, not if you can help it.” She glanced over at him. She was still relieved, but she was beginning to feel annoyed, too. “What did you do? Call Yves and ask to meet him or something?”

  Sasha nodded. “It was stupid, I agree. After Marina and Dmitri and I went back home last night, I called Yves. He suggested I come to his house so we could discuss things. I walked part of the way, and then he picked me up and drove me the rest of it.”

  “And?” George asked. “What did he do, knock you out? I can’t believe you walked into that one.”

  “I didn’t,” Sasha protested, but he didn’t sound terribly insulted by George’s comment. “I was prepared for him to attack me. Don’t forget, I am a dancer. I have very quick reflexes. Also, I have a little training in the martial arts.

  “However, Yves didn’t have to fight me.” Sasha twisted around and smiled at George. “He had a gun, so I decided to do exactly as he said.”

  “That was smart, at least,” Nancy remarked.

  “I refuse to be insulted,” Sasha said cheerfully. “And you will stop being disgusted with me once you hear this—Yves made a call from his house last night. I was upstairs, but he hadn’t shut the door.” He paused dramatically, his blue eyes sparkling with excitement. “There is going to be another Jetstream delivery. Tonight,” he added. “Right before the performance.”

  “No kidding!” George cried. “You’re sure?”

  “As sure as possible,” Sasha said. “I wasn’t able to tell who he was talking to, unfortunately. But I could tell he wasn’t happy. He kept saying he had to have them both this morning. But the person couldn’t do it, I guess. Finally, Yves said, ‘All right, all right. Tonight, before curtain. Same place. And be careful.’ ”

  “ ‘Same place,’ ” George said. “It must be the piano.”

  Sasha turned to Nancy, smiling. “Well, Detective. What do you think?”

  Nancy couldn’t help smiling back at him. “Tonight,” she said, “I think we’re going to set a trap. And it should be quite a performance!”

  Chapter

  Sixteen

  BY SEVEN O’CLOCK that night, an hour before the dance institute’s opening performance, the trap was set.

  From Yves’s house, Nancy and George had driven Sasha to Eloise’s. There, Nancy had made several phone calls. One was to the police. One was to Gary, to let him know he was almost in the clear. Another was to Dmitri, telling him Sasha was safe. Finally she called Susan Wexler, the reporter. “There’ll be a big story tonight,” she told her. “And it isn’t about the ballet.”

  After that, Nancy went back to the institute and told Bess and Dana Harding what had happened. Dana was horrified, but she had agreed to keep Yves busy the rest of the day working with Sasha’s understudy. That way, Yves would have no chance to go home and discover that Sasha was free. Sasha himself was going to sneak into the institute about half an hour before curtain time.

  Now, at seven o’clock, Nancy was standing backstage with Bess and George. They’d been helping with costumes and backdrops, but finally they’d stopped, too edgy to do anything but wait.

  “If it doesn’t happen soon,” Bess said, “I think I’m going to scream.”

  “I know how you feel,” George told her. “I just wish it was over.”

  “It will be soon,” Nancy said. Keeping her fingers crossed that nothing would go wrong, she looked around the backstage area. The piano was downstage right, just behind the curtain. After the first two dances, it would be rolled off, and the orchestra would take over. Yves had placed his music on the piano only a few minutes ago, and then had gone back to one of the dressing rooms to change into his formal clothes.

  Four police officers were in the auditorium—two backstage and two at the exits. Nancy knew who they were, but she was sure no one else could tell. The two backstage were wearing jeans and T-shirts and had been working on the lights. The other two were dressed as ushers.

  Dana had managed to find a substitute pianist, a thin young man named Russell, since Yves wouldn’t be playing if all went as planned. She had fretted that Russell wouldn’t play the cues the same way Yves did, but Nancy comforted her somewhat by suggesting that she make notes on Russell’s copies of the sheet music so that Yves’s replacement would know what to do.

  Now Russell was hovering nervously by the edge of the stage, studying the cues and tapping out chords on his knee. Then Dana appeared and whisked him away for a final run-through in one of the practice rooms.

  Another twenty minutes went by, and the girls could hear people starting to file into the auditorium. “We’d better go,” Nancy said. “We’re the only ones standing around doing nothing, and it looks weird.”

  She was right—the backstage area was a madhouse, with dancers warming up, technicians moving backdrops and working on lights, and several members of the Cultural Society milling around. The noise on the other side of the curtain was getting louder, too—the auditorium was filling up.

  “Okay,” Bess agreed. “But I’m not going very far. I don’t want to miss this!” She and George went over to talk to Eloise, and Nancy picked up a piece of rope someone had left in the middle of the stage.

  She was winding it up and looking for someplace to put it when she saw Yves Goulard walking toward his piano. Dark-haired and handsome in a formal black suit, the accompanist sat down on the bench and reached for the music. He shuffled through it, put it back, and then sat quietly. There were fifteen minutes left until the performance.

  Nancy stood still, the rope in her hands. It’s going to happen soon, she thought. She glanced around, making sure the police officers were watching. They were, and so were Bess, George, and Aunt Eloise, who’d been told everything. Nancy could almost feel the tension in the air, and she was afraid Goulard might feel it, too, and suspect something. But it was a gala night, she reminded herself. Tension was normal.

  A sudden burst of movement caught Nancy’s attention, and she looked away from Yves Goulard to see what had happened. A group of dancers had run onto the stage and started warming up. Nancy could tell they were nervous and jittery. They probably don’t need to warm up, she thought. They just need to blow off some steam.

  Only about fifteen seconds had passed, but when Nancy turned her eyes back to the piano, everything had changed. Yves Goulard was still there, but he wasn’t alone anymore. Someone was standing next to him, quietly chatting with him.

  As Nancy watched, every muscle tense, Eileen Martin reached out a hand toward the sheet music and slipped a sheet of paper in between its pages.

  The police officers closed in then, and the trap was sprung.

  • • •

  The gala was a tremendous success. Yves and Eileen had gone quietly, once they saw that they were surrounded. The whole arrest had taken place behind the curtain, so no one in the audience would even know it had happened until they read Susan Wexler’s scoop in the paper the next morning. A few of them may have wondered what sudden illness had made Yve
s Goulard miss his opening night, but Russell did so well that no one could have thought about it much.

  As the orchestra played the opening strains of Sasha and Marina’s pas de deux, Nancy settled back in her seat with a sense of anticipation. She knew how hard they’d worked the last few days. Now she would see how the work had paid off.

  Sasha soared into his grand jeté, and Nancy heard the other audience members gasp. He looks like he’s defying gravity, she thought with a prickle of wonder. In everyday life he’s great enough—but on stage he’s magical!

  The music crescendoed. Nancy felt a sharp pain in her arm. Startled, she looked down and saw that Bess was pinching her. “You’re staring like an idiot!” Bess told her in a loud whisper. “I think you have a problem. You’re really falling for Sasha!”

  Nancy shushed her friend and turned back to the stage, but she felt a blush mounting in her cheeks. Could Bess be right? Could she be falling for the Soviet dancer?

  The question continued to plague her once the performance was over and the reception had begun. When Nancy spotted a familiar head of golden brown hair and a pair of bright blue eyes coming toward her, she suddenly felt overwhelmed. She couldn’t face Sasha right then. Murmuring an excuse, she fled the party and drove home alone.

  • • •

  “I was totally shocked,” Bess said. “I mean, Eileen Martin, of all people!”

  It was the next morning. The three girls and Eloise were having a late breakfast on the deck off the kitchen.

  “She was so nice and friendly,” Bess went on, reaching for a slice of melon. “After all that stuff you said about Bill Fairgate, I really expected it to be him.”

  “I was surprised, too,” Nancy admitted, “and I shouldn’t have been. I saw her at the institute yesterday morning, delivering programs. That’s when she must have delivered the next-to-last blueprint, too, but I never suspected.” She took a roll and began buttering it. “But Eileen had a strong motive.”

  “You mean revenge?” George asked. “Getting back at Jetstream because of what happened to her son?”

  Nancy nodded. “She must not have stopped feeling bitter about it, or stopped blaming Jetstream, even though she pretended to. She told the police that Aviane contacted her two years ago, and she held out for a while, but finally she gave in. Yves was the latest contact they had sent her.”

  Eloise shook her head sadly. “Well, at least it’s over now,” she said, “and things can get back to normal. What about Gary?” she asked George. “He must be so relieved.”

  “He is,” George agreed. “He called just a little while ago, from Jetstream. Jetstream apologized and actually offered him a raise.”

  “Great!” Bess said.

  “What about the Jetstar?” Eloise asked.

  “Gary told me we were on the right track,” George said. “But we didn’t have the latest blueprints because Eileen had them. It was some kind of tricky wiring, because of where the engines were. You had the right idea, Bess.”

  “It was Nancy’s idea to get those blueprints,” Bess said. “And after the other night, I don’t care if I never see another one.”

  “I’m with you,” Nancy agreed. “It was worth it, though, since everything worked out for Gary.”

  “It sure was,” George said. “We’re going to spend the afternoon playing volleyball at the beach to celebrate.”

  “Volleyball?” Bess shook her head. “What kind of celebration is that?”

  “That’s just this afternoon,” George said, grinning. “Tonight, we’re going out for a candlelight dinner for two.”

  “Now that’s more like it!” Bess said approvingly.

  Not long after that, Gary came by for George. Bess had another crush—this time on one of the Canadian dancers—and the two of them went off bicycling together. Eloise had a meeting with the Cultural Society, and after she left, Nancy was alone in the house.

  Feeling restless, she decided to go for a walk on the beach. She pulled a loose white top over her green swimsuit and was almost at the back door when the front doorbell rang. Spinning around, Nancy walked through the house and opened it. She felt a strange little fluttering in her stomach. Sasha Petrov was standing there.

  “Nancy! Good morning.” Sasha was wearing a bathing suit himself and a T-shirt that matched his sparkling blue eyes.

  “Sasha, hi,” Nancy said. She glanced past him and saw Dmitri pulling away in his rented car. The chaperon gave her a friendly wave as he drove off. “Where’s Dmitri going?”

  “Oh, errands, I think,” Sasha said with a grin. “Actually, I persuaded him to drop me off here. I wanted to invite you for a walk on the beach.”

  “That’s just where I was going.”

  “You see?” Sasha said as they headed toward the dunes. “We think alike.”

  Nancy laughed. “It was just a coincidence.”

  “Oh, no, it wasn’t,” he protested. “After all, didn’t we think alike on this case? Admit it, Nancy, I would make a pretty good detective.”

  “Okay, okay,” Nancy said, feeling her worries slip away. He was so charming! “You helped me solve it, and I’m really grateful. Of course,” she added teasingly, “a really good detective wouldn’t have let himself get kidnapped.”

  “True.” Sasha waved his hand as if getting kidnapped were a minor problem. “Next time, I will be more careful.”

  “Next time?” Nancy stopped walking and looked at him. “You’re not serious, are you? I mean, you were spectacular last night, Sasha. The whole performance was great, but you were special. You really wouldn’t give up dancing, would you?”

  He threw back his head and laughed. “Of course not,” he told her. “I know I was meant to dance. But if a mystery comes along now and then, I will not ignore it, that’s for sure.”

  Walking to the water’s edge, Nancy and Sasha let the waves roll up over their feet and ankles. Then they walked along the wet sand, looking for shells. The beach was beginning to come alive and the air was filled with salt spray and the smell of suntan lotion.

  Suddenly Sasha stopped walking. “Nancy,” he said, and his eyes were serious. “I want to say how grateful I am to you for finding me yesterday.”

  “You don’t have to thank me,” Nancy said. “Really, Sasha. I’m just glad you’re all right.”

  “I will admit, now that it is over, that I was very frightened.”

  Nancy nodded. “I was, too.”

  “Nancy.” Sasha put his hands on her shoulders. “I know you asked me to back off, because of Ned. And I have, haven’t I?”

  Nancy nodded again. She felt his fingers tighten, but she couldn’t make herself pull away.

  “But, Nancy,” he went on, “I don’t want to back off anymore. I will, if you insist. But you must tell me again.”

  Nancy was quiet. How could she tell him to back off when she wasn’t sure she wanted him to?

  As if he could read her mind, Sasha pulled her closer, leaned down and gently brushed her lips with his. Then he stood back, smiling at her.

  Nancy suddenly realized that she was smiling, too. She had no idea what things would be like the next day, or a week from then. But right that minute, everything felt wonderful.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

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