Chapter 15 #2
“Next question,” she said. “Where’s the ladder?”
“As soon as Mr. Alarie figured out we were sneaking onto the roof to hook up, he moved the ladder to a downstairs storage area.”
She raked her hands through her hair. “Lot of good that does us.”
“Joke’s on him. We didn’t need it.” He braced himself against the wall, then climbed onto the banister to fumble with the latch.
“Get down from there.” Her heart was in her throat. All she could picture was this ancient French carpentry crumbling under him. “We can stack boxes.”
“It’s fine. I did this all the time.”
“When you were a kid. You need a heating pad after soccer.”
“How dare you.” He popped the hatch on the ceiling. When he straightened, his upper third disappeared through it. With a slight grunt, he climbed up and through the hole.
“John?” she asked.
He popped his face back through, grinning. “Hey.”
Sparkles swirled through her at his smile. “That was dangerous and dumb.”
He reached his hands toward her. “Climb up.”
Once again grateful for her responsible footwear choice, she braced herself against the wall, then climbed up onto the railing.
She was not afraid of heights.
She glanced into the three flights of stairs’ dark maw.
But she was fucking terrified of falling.
“I can’t.” She edged her foot forward.
“You can,” John declared.
Bossy John was back. She didn’t mind. She needed his bossiness to beat back the vertigo nibbling at her sense of balance.
“I’m here, Vivian.” His arms were like oaks, had picked her up and twirled her easily more times than she could count. She trusted them. “Give me your hands and I’ll pull you up.”
Trembling, she reached for him.
“That’s it,” he said. “The strongest hold is by the wrists.”
She locked on and felt him clamp around her wrist, too. A week ago, she’d traced hearts on his pulse point, marveling at the solid feel of his flesh.
“Good. Now the other one,” he said.
Which meant letting go of the wall.
“C’mon, Gorgeous, you can do this.”
The nickname triggered her like it was her sleeper agent activation phrase. Deep breath, let go, then… Shit. She wobbled on the banister until the warm anchor of his hand caught her flailing arm.
“Gotcha. Count of three, push off the banister.”
Kink the knees. Get ready.
“Here we go. One, two, three.”
She was flying. Okay, not flying, but being yanked through the hatch with enough force that she and John tumbled backward onto the roof’s hard surface. Actually, John landed on the roof, whereas she landed mostly on John.
“Ow,” he said.
“Are you okay?” She tried not to revel in the close, blood-thrumming contact. Fuck the doubt she’d felt while talking to Gen. This intimacy was her normal, and she’d get it back.
“Fine.” He tucked her hair behind her ear. “You?”
“Peachy. How horny were you as a teenager to go through all that for some ass?”
“Very. I haven’t slowed down much since.”
“I’m aware,” she said.
Especially since his cock pressed against her hip. Interesting. Apparently a little danger turned him on. She should kiss him. Right here, right now, and damn the consequences. But the wailing siren that stopped in front of the café didn’t care what she wanted.
She scurried off him. “How do we get down?”
“You won’t like the next part.” John reached behind an air vent.
“I already don’t like this part.”
He laid a thick plank across the gap to the neighboring building. “It’s just three steps.”
“And a forty-foot death plunge to cobblestones.”
“You climbed the fire ladder at the riad.”
“That was like, twelve feet. Easily survivable.”
“Okay.” He shrugged. “I guess I win, then.”
The cold fear pumping through her veins slowed. “Appealing to my competitive nature isn’t fair when plummeting death is on the line.”
“Of course it’s fair. What’s that saying? All’s fair in love and war.” He glanced at the street as more sirens joined the first. “Look, I’ll show you.”
She reached for him. “Don’t!”
John crossed the plank with nary a wobble.
Easy for him to do. He spent half his life up ladders and on catwalks. Whereas she either hunched over a computer or swanned through fancy parties gathering intelligence. Okay, fine, and occasionally crawling through an air duct.
“You can still tie me,” he said. “For facing your fears, you get a hundred points.”
Her competitive spirit was a blessing and a curse.
“Fine.” She ventured toward the plank. “But if I die, you get minus a thousand.”
She put one foot on the plank to test it out. Solid.
“Will you hold it?” she asked.
“Yes.” He knelt like he had when he proposed and braced the board with his ropey forearms. “You’ve got this.”
She took a step forward. “People only say that when you don’t got this but they’re rooting for you anyway.”
Another step.
“What a dismal interpretation of support,” he said.
Almost there. A half step forward. The board wobbled a millimeter, causing her to do the stupidest thing possible—look down. The ground telescoped at her like she was falling.
Her skull would crack like a melon.
Warm arms belted around her, then swiveled her to a solid surface.
“I’ve got you,” he murmured as she pressed her face into his neck.
Her runaway breathing made it impossible to talk.
“You did great.”
“Liar. No points for me.”
“One hundred points, fair and square.” He kissed her temple. “You okay?”
“I will be.” She massaged the spot over her heart. “Please don’t tell me we need to leapfrog from roof to roof.”
He plucked the plank from the gap. “No, this building has a fire escape.”
The metal rattled under her feet as he climbed down the fire escape’s ladder. Clutching the handrails, she followed. On the last level, he lowered the vertical ladder to the street. Ever the gentleman, he held her waist as she leaped to the sidewalk.
Terra firma restored her confidence.
“We’re a couple out for a stroll, okay?” She reached for his hand. “Everything should be ready at the hotel, so we’ll get the car and go.”
“Got it.” John nodded.
Hand in hand, they twined back to the hotel, casually chatting as she scanned for followers.
None. As they approached the port area, seagulls’ low, piercing calls grew louder.
At their hotel’s valet stand, John handed their ticket over to the attendant, who quickly disappeared to retrieve their car.
“Excuse me,” she said to another attendant. “Do you have bottles of water?”
“Oui, madame.” He handed her a chilled bottle of Perrier.
Vive la France.
A shiny silver Ferrari Purosangue swooped under the portico. Hot damn, upgrade. She’d asked for a comfortable car for John’s sake, but this exceeded expectations. Guess the kind of blending MacColl wanted them to do in Monte Carlo involved luxury and money.
John whistled. “I’m not even a car guy, but can I drive?”
“Be my guest. I want to catch up on research based on what my boss told me.”
As John adjusted the seat and mirrors, she popped a Dramamine, half her normal dose.
This was her version of pregaming.
Yesterday, she passed out instead of delighting in sharing a bed with John. She’d make no such mistake today.
Full night’s sleep? Check.
Motion sickness pill consumed? Check.
Sexy clothes? She twisted to check out the rear interior. Thick garment bags hung on either side of the car. Probably check.
The house-priced SUV glided and growled as they merged on the highway.
“Let’s see what we’ve got.” She sifted through the glove box. “Tickets.”
Before tucking them into her bag, she scanned the QR code for the auction’s program. The cream-and-gold website opened, and she paged through the listing.
“Sonofabitch,” she muttered.
“What?” John asked.
“Amina’s painting—the one Lola bought from Mehdi—is being auctioned. I need to tell her. She’s not a name here. If it fetches a low price, charity or not, it’ll fuck up her bag.”
“What if it goes high?”
“That’d be great, but it’s unlikely. We haven’t built up any excitement around the auction.
” She continued swiping through pages to the auction’s fine print.
“Ooh, this is good. The organizers provide insured shipping to the winners. They’ll secure the artwork at the casino overnight. That buys us time to search them.”
“How?”
“Great question.” She drummed her fingers on her knee. “Might need to improvise.”
“Not a fan of improv.”
“I’m aware,” she said. “I’ve got the casino’s blueprints and a badge to get us into employee-only areas. Duct work might be our friend again.”
He gripped the steering wheel. “We almost died the last time we crawled through ducts.”
“Oh, we did not.” A fresh phone lay in the glove box. “Look over here for a second?”
She held the device up to his face and unlocked it.
“Jesus. What is that?”
“Jason Jones’s phone.” Yep, all his social media accounts were connected. “Didn’t make sense for an influencer not to have one.”
“They already had my face programmed into it?”
“Yep. It’s like I work for a place with advanced tech capabilities.” She connected the phone to the car’s Bluetooth. “Let’s give Jason Jones’s music library a spin.”
édith Piaf’s expressive voice filled the car.
John snorted. “A sixty-five-year-old song is an odd choice for an influencer.”
“Nah, it’s perfect. Everything old is new again.”