Chapter 1

London, England: March 27, 1911

Stealing from the famous Sherlock Holmes was rather simple, really, Althea Adler thought as she cracked open the safe behind the portrait in his study. It had taken her less than an hour to find the hidden safe the day before yesterday, when she’d first arrived at 221B Baker Street. The combination, admittedly, did take an additional two days to crack. Largely owing to the fact that his landlady, Mrs. Hudson, did not seem to trust her and did not leave Althea alone in any room besides Mr. Holmes’ guest room where she was sleeping.

Mrs. Hudson had raised her nose—already turned up at the end—to Althea when she arrived at the house on Baker Street with a forged letter invitation from Sherlock Holmes. Despite wearing a gown that was from the previous century and having hair as white as snow, Mrs. Hudson’s beady brown eyes were uncommonly sharp. She examined the letter as if it were a contested will for a fortune. Despite her smile, Althea’s nerves had been in shreds. But the landlady did ultimately receive Althea into the house thanks to the owner and headmistress of her ladies’ college, Miss Hinchey, forcing the issue. She’d accompanied Althea on the short train ride into town and then to Baker Street. Miss Hinchey was a middle-aged woman who was the granddaughter of a baron and had a hooked nose that could have cut cheese. She was not the sort of person who took no for an answer; particularly, when it involved her favorite student. Even if Althea’s origins were questionable at best.

Althea resembled her mother, Irene Adler—American opera singer, actress, international criminal, and presumed dead by most European governments. She’d inherited Irene’s rich brown

hair, bright blue eyes, and her flawless complexion. At twenty-two years old, her figure was curvaceous and her voice unmatched. She had little difficulty manipulating people. Even the formidable Miss Hinchey, whom she rather adored. Miss Hinchey was about the same age as Irene but they were in no other ways alike. She was orderly, dependable, strict but loving.

Irene had never been loving.

Nor dependable.

She liked to test Althea’s abilities and intelligence. Her mother would give her impossible tasks and expect her to complete them. Like breaking into the flat of the most famous detective in the world and cracking his safe.

Masquerading as Countess van der Waals, Irene had dropped Althea off on the doorstep of Miss Hinchey’s Ladies College just outside of London in September the previous year. Althea had already graduated with top honors from a select ladies’ academy in Berlin, but her mother had insisted that she attend college in England. Irene even paid the entire year of school fees with the proceeds from their last job. Althea wondered if perhaps Irene had finally washed her hands of her daughter after her jail stints in San Franscisco and New Jersey and then the mistake she made during the Prague heist. Her mother had never before used Althea’s real name at any of the schools or convents she’d left her at.

But on the first day of the Easter holidays Althea’s heart leapt when she received an anonymous postcard from Paris that had to be from her mother. Irene usually sent postcards from the city she was staying in with a day and time written on the back. Whatever building was pictured was where Althea was to meet her and perform a job. But never one as cryptic as this most recent—the illustration was that of a cozy study. On closer examination, there was a small safe in the corner. The opposite side had only four words: Holmes away from home.

At first, Althea had thought it was a misspelling, but Irene didn’t make mistakes. Her mother had often told Althea the story of how she outwitted the famous detective. Althea had wrongfully assumed that her mother was meeting her there but Althea had been disappointed to find only a locked safe—presumably her task. For a moment, she feared that Irene might be in trouble. But that seemed unlikely. Irene was very good at taking care of herself.

Her college’s Easter holidays were only a fortnight and Althea needed to crack the safe, find her mother, and discover what she needed before the next term started. Or before the internationally known detective returned from the case he was working somewhere in Europe. Althea wanted to make clear to her mother once and for all that she was retiring from the family criminal business. There were no warrants for her arrest in England, and Althea, with Miss Hinchey’s help, meant to make a home for herself and a new life here. She’d already secured a position in the summer with a London opera company.

Althea was tired of moving from city to city.

Country to country.

Continent to continent.

When Althea was small, it had seemed exciting and glamourous to live like Irene, but her first job had cured her of that notion. When she was eight, Irene had lifted her through the back window of a mansion in Berlin and told Althea not to come back until she had found and stolen a famous diamond necklace that was rumored to be hidden in the library. After an hour of searching through the books and shelves, the way that Irene had instructed her to, Althea came back to the window, but her mother refused to lift her down without the loot. Irene had told her to remember the instructions: look for the difficult-to-reach places (both high and low), for hollowed-out books or furniture, and for anything out of place.

Sniffling and scared, Althea returned to the dark library. She breathed in deeply. She had already checked all of the library shelves and paneled walls for secret passageways or hidden crannies.

There were not any.

Breathing heavily, young Althea searched the desk and then the thick back of a chair—it was there that she found the hidden safe. She pressed her left ear against the safe and closed her eyes. Irene always said that lock manipulation was a delicate art. Althea had to determine the contact points, discover the number of wheels, and calculate and graph the results in her head to find the numbers of the combination. Her fingers shook as she listened for the lock’s contact points. There were four. She reset the lock by turning the dial several times to the left. Then she let the dial rest for a few moments—a technique known as “parking the wheels.” And then praying that she’d found the right numbers for the combination, Althea slowly turned the dial. Her entire body trembled by the time she grabbed the diamond necklace and brought it to her mother.

Irene took the jewels first and then helped Althea down from the window. Her mother didn’t speak until they returned to their flat. “We don’t leave a job until we are successful and get everything that we came for. Is that clear, Althea?”

Her younger self nodded.

Althea couldn’t leave Sherlock’s flat until she found and stole what Irene wanted. Clearly Irene wasn’t going to reveal her whereabouts until Althea proved herself with this task. In the meantime, Althea was spending her Easter holiday installed in Sherlock’s spare bedroom above the kitchen, which smelled like stale pipe smoke, rotting tweed, and yesterday’s dinner. The sole window overlooked the dirty alley—hardly a cheery prospect.

Her rooms would undoubtedly smell much worse now—this morning Althea had stuffed all the feathers the kitchen maid had tirelessly plucked off the unfortunate turkey, placed them into the kitchen stove and lit a match. Fire was always the best distraction on a heist. It demanded immediate attention. Mrs. Hudson and all the other servants were currently putting the kitchen fire out, giving her the perfect opportunity to crack the safe.

Althea passed by the countless piles of stacked newspapers in several languages—at least half seemed to be in French—and documents that lined every single wall in the narrow private parlor of Sherlock’s rented rooms. The chambermaid told her that Mr. Holmes had a horror of destroying documents. Althea could readily believe it.

She pressed her ear close to the lock and turned the dial with her left hand to find the contact points—there were three. Althea needed only three numbers to manipulate this lock and open it without causing damage to the safe. No one would ever know that she’d been here. She let the dial rest after determining the areas of her contact points. The first number was twenty. She listened for the next click—the number three. With featherlight fingers she turned the lock, not breathing; she didn’t dare miss a single sound. Then she heard the delightful sound of a click on number eighty-eight. She opened the metal door and excitedly looked inside.

The only item in the safe was an old silver frame. As she pulled it out, her throat tightened and her pulse raced at the picture inside—it was her mother, Irene Adler.

This didn’t feel like a test, but a practical joke.

Althea peered closely at the photograph. The portrait was at least twenty years old—Irene’s clothes were completely old-fashioned, with a ridiculous bustle on the back. Althea had always been relieved that bustles had fallen out of style before she’d been forced to wear one.

Irene looked coldly beautiful as always, but without the hard lines age had etched around her eyes and mouth.

She heard the sound of approaching footsteps. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. Quickly, she closed the frame, put the picture back, and shut the safe door. Althea swung the portrait back into place and sprinted across the untidy room to an empty chair. She grabbed a book and opened it, pretending to be reading.

Mrs. Hudson burst into the study, her white hair coming out of its bun and her once-clean apron now covered in soot. “What did you do? You wretched girl!”

Althea gave the woman her most innocent of expressions. “Whatever is the matter, my dear Mrs. Hudson? What could have distressed you so?”

Mrs. Hudson pointed a charcoal-covered finger at Althea. “First the housekeeping money disappears into thin air and now this. I should toss you out into the cold, I should. I’m Mr. Holmes’ landlady, not his housekeeper. I don’t have to put up with you.”

Althea set down the book on a very cluttered table and said with an elegant sigh, “But Mr. Holmes has expressly invited me to stay for the Easter holidays. How disappointed he will be if I am not here when he returns.”

Mrs. Hudson took a step forward. “I’ll send him a telegram at once to let him know!”

“Do that,” Althea said blithely, and gambled as she added, “if you know where to find him—slippery fellow, isn’t he?”

Almost as slippery as Irene.

Althea picked up the book again, returning her attention to it as Mrs. Hudson left the room with an undignified huff. Althea got up, slowly shuffling through the stacks of papers and newspapers for anything useful, musing on the numbers twenty, three, and eighty-eight.

She wracked her brain. What could those numbers mean? They could not be a date. There was no twentieth month on the calendar.

Unless.

She remembered that when Americans wrote the date they penned the month first followed by the day. But the British did it the opposite way. Day first and then month. Could March 20, 1888, be important for some reason? But why? It was twenty-three years ago. She should know—her birthday was in December of that same year.

The book in her hand made a loud clunk when it hit the floor.

The same year I was born.

Barely breathing, Althea counted back nine months from her birthdate—March. Her mind whirled. If Holmes and Irene had known each other in 1888 and the safe code was truly a date—the twentieth of March, 1888 . . .

Althea sat down on the cluttered floor, too overwhelmed to walk to a chair.

Is Sherlock Holmes my father?