Dearest Diary,
I am an irrational ninny. Peeta makes no claim on my past, so what right have I to his? I am no artist, but I am certain that I have written in the same vein. You must remember the pages upon pages I wrote about the vicar's nephew when I was fifteen.
And for those memories, I sincerely apologize.
Peeta hunched over the table as he worked, frowning in concentration as a ship emerged from the tip of his pen. Katniss watched his hands as he worked. His long, elegant fingers lost none of their appeal as they accumulated splotches of blue ink. She had to focus on his hands, for she couldn't look at his face. She had tried that earlier, and it only made her angry.
Come to think of it, his fingers weren't helping matters either. Katniss shouldn't care – didn't care – about Peeta's past lovers, but dear god, thinking about those fingers tracing over her portrait, tracing over her, made Katniss want to scream.
"I'm going to scout Crane's house again."
At her declaration, both men looked up from their work.
"Are you all right?" Peeta asked.
"Brilliant. My mother and sister have been kidnapped by a traitor and spy, and really, I've never felt better."
Hawthorne's brow rose, and for an instant, he seemed about to say something, but the words froze on his tongue. Instead, he lowered his head and went back to his calculations. Smart man.
Peeta didn't take the hint. "I'm sorry, that was a terrible question. It just seems that you're more, how do I want to say this, er, immediately upset than you have been. I'm simply trying to help."
"I don't need help; I need to find Prim. Sitting here doing nothing isn't helping anybody." Katniss tucked her pistol into the waistband of her breeches as she stood up. God help anyone who stood in her way. Right now, she almost wanted to shoot someone. "I shouldn't be long."
She had a hand on the doorknob before Peeta spoke again. "Please be careful."
"Always am." She pushed the door open and left.
She paused at the front door. It was one thing to eave the houe after dark, as she had the previous day, when shadows obscured everything and wealthy Londoners did their best to ignore the poor that emerged from their daytime hiding places. It was quite another to leave at noon. She did have some shreds of a reputation to uphold. Katniss turned and headed for the rear of the house.
A stone wall taller than Katniss enclosed Peeta's back garden. Here, Peeta's usual orange tulips were joined by yellow and pink flowers. Far from the structured gardens Katniss had come to know so well since coming to London, these flowers mixed with one another. From a distance their colors blended into a vibrant watercolor. Katniss could not resist skimming her hands over their silky petals as she made her way to the wall.
Scaling the garden wall was simple enough. Hopping lent her enough height to get a grip on the ledge, and though her muscles strained to pull her body up, they eventually managed.
Katniss' legs wobbled beneath her as she stood up on the narrow ledge provided by the garden wall. The roof seemed much higher from this vantage point. She stretched an arm up, trying to gauge the distance, and found the roof's edge at least a foot above her fingertips.
Gingerly, she inched backwards on the edge. Once she felt more or less steady, Katniss raced forward. One step, two steps, leap.
Pan shot up her leg as her knee collided with the stone exterior of the house. Her grip on the roof slipped, and rough shingles scraped her fingertips as they slid down the roof. Katniss dug in with her nails, fighting for purchase. Finally steady, she pulled herself up onto the roof. Keeping her body close to the shingles, she crawled up to the peak of the building, letting only her eyes and forehead peek out over the roof's high point. From here, she would be almost invisible from the street.
Crane's house was still. She hadn't expected to see anything too suspicious, for no competent traitor would broadcast their wrongdoings on the streets of London, but then again, Crane wasn't a particularly competent traitor. If he was, she wouldn't be here in the first place.
So she waited, patiently watching for life through the closed blinds of the opposite house.
One moment. Would Crane really keep every window and door shut in August? Surely they must be broiling in there.
Unless there was nobody home. She must have been up here for more than twenty minutes, but Katniss had observed no signs of movement. True, Crane might be away from the window, but with a house that size, he must employ half a dozen servants at least.
Once the idea set root in her mind, Katniss could hardly ignore it. She skittered down from the roof and tucked her braid down the back of her shirt. That and a bucket left in the yard did not make for the most convincing disguise, but nobody in the upper classes looked twice at servants. As long as she was quick about this, no one should notice.
She kept her head down as she shuffled down the street, rounding the corner to reach the back of Crane's property. Bucket in hand, Katniss knocked on the back door.
No response.
She knocked again, this time louder. Still nothing. Interesting.
Glancing around to see if she was being watched, Katniss moved towards a window. She shuffled into position and swung the heavy wooden bucket at the glass.
She pulled herself through the opening. Sounds of the street filtered in from outdoors, but they felt far removed from the stillness of Crane's house. Shards of glass glittered across the floor of the dining room. Strange to think she'd been seated at that very table only two days prior. It was even stranger to think that at that point, she thought the greatest threat was being poisoned.
"Prim? Mother?" Deep down, she knew they weren't here, but the lack of a reply cut all the same.
Katniss pulled the pistol from her breeches and went upstairs. She checked every room one by one, methodically searching for any hint of where Prim and Mother might be. Katniss searched through every drawer, pulled back blankets, and lifted rugs, but the bedrooms were devoid of clues.
That left Crane's study, which she knew from her earlier inspection was locked. To her surprise, when she tried the door, it opened. Either Crane thought the closed windows would be enough to dissuade her, or he believed her too intelligent to break into her enemy's house. She wasn't sure if she had been underestimated or overestimated.
From a cursory glance, it seemed Crane hadn't bothered to remove any of his papers either. Katniss sat at the desk and pulled a few important-looking documents from a cubby. She had her work cut out for her.
Peeta's voice greeted her the instant she opened the door. "You're back!"
"I was going to start searching if you hadn't returned in five minutes," Hawthorne said.
Katniss' pile of documents and account books made a satisfying thud as she dropped them on the heavy mahogany table. "I know where Crane is."
"Really?" She didn't like Hawthorne's tone. "How?"
"There's no one at the house, so I took the opportunity to go through his papers. Crane has five properties in total." She dug the map she had sketched out from the pile and set it in front of the two men. "One's in Scotland, two are in Durham, but the other two are within a day's ride of London." Katniss pointed to the two X's on the map. "It only makes sense for him to keep Prim and Mother in one of these. They definitely aren't in his house here – I've checked – and he needs to keep them close by for when we make our exchange."
"That's incredible." The admiration in Peeta's voice felt warm in her heart.
"You want to rescue them," Hawthorne surmised.
"Of course."
Hawthorne looked to Peeta. "Do you want to go with her, or should I?"
"You should." At Katniss' surprise, Peeta explained himself. "If Crane tries to make the exchange while you are gone and finds Hawthorne here, he'll know that we have violated his terms and involved another person. But if he finds me…"
"He'll think you're hiding me," Katniss finished.
Peeta nodded. "And fair enough, it's what I would do if I thought you would allow it."
"It's settled then." When spoken with Hawthorne's self-assuredness, any decision sounded final. "I'll gather supplies tonight. Will you be ready to leave at dawn?"
"Don't you still have figures to finish?"
"I've been finished for nearly an hour. You were gone for a long time."
She knew he was helping them, and she ought to feel grateful, but sometimes, Hawthorne grated on her nerves. "I apologize. It takes time to reconstruct every acquisition a person has made in their lifetime."
Peeta stepped in before she could say anything more. "I still have some drawing left to finish."
"Then I'll take my leave." Hawthorne stood. "Katniss, Mellark."
"Would you like to us to see you out?" She knew that was the polite response.
"No, I can find my own way." With a nod to each of them, he left.
Any tension in the air dissipated. Katniss slipped over to Peeta's chair and wrapped her arms around his seated figure. Looking over his shoulder, she could see the richly detailed copy he had spent the afternoon on.
"It looks close."
"It should only take another hour or so. Most of the drawings are finished, but I have most of the measurements still left to add. Copying the penmanship will be a challenge." She could hear exhaustion in his voice, but before she could remark on it, he changed his tone. "You know, I feel somewhat more qualified to build a ship than I did six hours ago." Peeta bent his fingers back one by one as he spoke, trying to relax his cramped hand.
"Entirely unqualified to mostly unqualified?"
He snorted. "Don't be too generous with your praise, Katniss. You'll make me blush."
"I might want to see you blush." What had come over her? Katniss felt heat rise in her own cheeks.
Peeta, noticing her discomfort, grinned. "Oh? And how do you plan on achieving this? I want details."
She kissed his forehead and sat down at the seat beside him. "After you're finished, Mellark."
"You need time to plan."
"I never said that."
"You didn't need to." Something wicked sparkled in his eyes, and she couldn't help but smile back.
"Be quiet and get back to work."
"I shall allow you plot in peace."