Chapter Twenty-Four
Sadie
T he expression on his face is one of disbelief, and I don’t blame him.
“What the fuck are you saying?”
“What I said.” I lean forward. “I mean, I don’t think it was stolen.”
“Then someone’s doing this deliberately. Playing games.” His hands clench like he wants to destroy something, and his jaw is set with steel. “I don’t care if it’s some game with me, but the company on the line? That’s taking it too far.”
I lick my lips, trying to sort my thoughts. And I place my hand on his arm. “I didn’t say this was the kind of game designed to destroy you. And I don’t even know what game it is, or whether—”
“It was something planned.”
He doesn’t say this to finish my thought as I was about to say ‘or whether I’m right in this’, but since Kingston’s drawing conclusions from the dangling strands, I follow them.
His father, he’s thinking his father might have set this out.
“At this point,” I say, “it doesn’t matter if there’s a game or not. We pushed and we got a result. Right now, getting this to them matters. On your birthday.”
“Fuck all that. I’m not playing.” He stands, moving away from me.
“I’m not sure that’s an option, Kingston.”
He glares, but the rage isn’t for me. It’s the kind with no target, not one he can reach and the frustration is palpable. Inexplicably, I want to soothe him. I don’t move from the sofa.
“Whether it’s a test or not, whoever is behind this, right now it doesn’t matter. And I don’t think you not playing is an option,” I say again. “Not if you want to make sure the family flagship company stays in your family’s hands. And not if you want the actual tiara.”
“Unless, of course, it is stolen.”
“Then we’ll get it back. In the meantime…” I spread my hand to take in the fake. “We have that.”
But Kingston isn’t really caring about that. And I should have known. He’s a man who won’t rest until he has answers. Until he’s satisfied. I shiver. It’s a shiver made of begrudging respect and not a little lust. A man like him, oh yeah, does turn me on.
I drag my head and libido away from that and focus on the issue at hand.
“Jenson said fake. He knows.” Kingston swipes a hand through his dark hair.
“There are two options here. Jenson knows because he has the tiara, or he knows there’s a fake out there—”
“Which is suspicious.”
“I never said it wasn’t. I’m looking only at what we have.”
“You said two options,” he says. “What’s two?”
“That he’s bluffing.” I shrug. “We won’t know until we do, but this could explain why we’ve heard about it but not seen it. Why it hasn’t shown up for sale or why someone hasn’t bragged they have it.”
“Of course they fucking brag.”
I look at him. “You know this from your vast experience?”
“I know a lot of rich people.” Kingston says this in the way others talk about crossing the road. “Collectors brag.”
He has a point, but these collectors…they don’t brag to all and sundry. It’s a small set, and I tell him so.
Kingston leans against the wall, his expression hard, bordering on brooding, but I know he’s sorting things in his head. I might not know the man, but I know him, at least, part of him. How his fascinating brain works and I wait.
“Thing is,” he says, finally, “if it’s not missing as in stolen, then Jenson—” he straightens “—or my mother, knows where it is. Otherwise, why the actual fuck are we waiting for word on some sale?”
“I said ‘think’. It’s the operative word.”
“We go ask them.”
“Cool, no really. You’ve got it all worked out.”
“Hey.” A small smile appears, even though his eyes remain dark and cold. “I’m the one with everything on the line. The one who should be getting frustrated, not you.”
At least he’s not flinging accusations at me like bullets. The type saying I’m behind it. Which I’m not. This shit wasn’t in the brief job description from Mama Sinclair.
I shift my head back into the game. “We both know that avenue will be met with a big fat nothing, otherwise we’d have it and we’d have parted ways. Something I’m behind, just like you.”
The smile still doesn’t go anywhere near his eyes.
“And I could be wrong with me thinking these things, Kingston.” I get up and start pacing to think. There’s something off, and we both know it. The same thing that’s been off for a while and now it’s starting to smell. “You’ve spoken to Jenson before, and he’s what? Been sounding like that?”
“No.”
“So far, both he and your mother have been cucumber cool.”
“My mother has.” The smile’s vanished now and he comes to stand in front of me, effectively stopping my pacing. “Jenson’s been Jenson. This is the first real time I’ve heard him flustered in this way, like he’s a step away from Jenson’s version of panic. If I’m saying I have it, then he’s involved.”
I nod, letting his words slide through me, trying to ignore the heat of him, the fact he’s so close and if I reached out, I’d touch him and then… “If he stole it, which is what you’re implying.”
“That’s what I’m saying, Sadie. No implied.”
Slowly, I let out a hiss of air. “If he did take it, then why not let you pretend you found it, or think you had?”
“You’re the one who came up with the theory it’s not stolen or missing.” He rocks on his feet a little. “What if he thought I was getting it evaluated?”
All my feelers I have out lead places that end up at dead ends. Which never happens to me. There’s something so off, and maybe I’m too close. I don’t know. “So, we say it has been. But not yet.”
“Sadie—”
“If he did, then that’s gonna light a fire. But first, I think we should also operate that it’s missing or in someone else’s hands.”
“What? They gave it away?”
“I don’t know. The more I think about this, the more what-ifs I have. What if they don’t know it’s gone? What if Jenson was in major financial strife and sneakily giving it away or selling it is the way out, but he doesn’t want two to turn up?” I shake my head. “Those are just a couple.”
“You’ve a point, Sadie,” he says in that quiet way I’ve come to realize holds so much, “Occam’s razor it, then. Simple. We explore the most likely and we treat it like it is actually going to be sold. So, with the latter we jump on that and then go from there. With the former, he took it or has it and is in financial trouble. I’ll get to the bottom of that. Money talks here.”
I don’t think it’s that, but right now all we have is a fake. “Okay, you do that, and I’ll explore other avenues. I keep meeting dead ends, but maybe I’m not looking in the right places or asking the right people.”
“And here I thought you knew all the scum of New York.”
I gaze at him, trying to ignore the sparks that sing inside from him. “Asshole.”
“Stop trying to turn me on, Sadie.”
“You wish.”
“Crazily, I very much do.”
Sucking in a deep breath, I say, “I still think something big is going to happen in regards to some kind of underground sale. I just don’t know where or what or with who.”
“If it’s not the tiara, how is that going to help?”
“I don’t know. Yet. But we now have options. We have the fake. And we know something has Jenson rattled. The fake is what it’s meant to be; both a fire under asses and your insurance if we don’t get it.”
I spin away from him and grab my coat and throw his at him.
He asks, “How? And where are we going?”
“How? Even if they have the real one, I say they because I’m bundling your mom in this, but if they have it, then it will appear that day, so you’ll fulfill your part of the quest.”
“I still want the damn real one.”
“I know.”
“So, where are we going?”
I pick up my bag and open the door as he pulls on his coat. “You’re doing whatever you’re doing, and I’m doing my thing. Alone.”
“No.”
Annoyance ticks through me, but I tamp it down. “I know you don’t trust me, but this time, you need to. I’m asking you, too.”
After a long moment, he nods. “This one time,” he says, and then he’s out the door and gone.
I lock up and am on the street and in a cab, heading to midtown when a text comes in from one Ryder Sinclair about security. Or else it’s an excuse to get information from me for Kingston.
He wants to meet, his offices, which are midtown. It might not even be his main one. These Sinclair brothers have businesses all over Manhattan. I agree to meet, and after a half-second thought I dismiss the whole information pumping.
That isn’t Kingston’s style.
If he wants to know, he’ll ask.
And I know I must be crazy because the whole in your face business of hard-edged Kingston gets me hot and bothered.
Crazy. Capital C.
Since traffic is utter shit, I send out feelers and then call Yia-yia.
She answers immediately.
“Give me a list of who you think would want the tiara,” I say.
“What’s wrong?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out.”
Ryder Sinclair is just as stylish, beautiful, and charming as he was when I met him. He asks me about security for his various businesses, dangles a carrot of hiring me because he wants information.
I play with the carrot a moment. And then a light switches on, bright. He wants information, all right. But not for Kingston.
In his way, he’s prodding me to protect his brother, in case he needs it. “You don’t want to hire me.”
“Actually,” he says, reclining in a chair in his office, “I do. My apartment buildings, businesses, need an overhaul. Something good. Crime, you know.”
“Uh huh.”
I stare at him, his easy, casually flirty smile doesn’t slip, though I get the feeling he can be as ruthless as his brother.
“So, you’re Kingston’s,” he says. “Not really his type, but I can definitely see why he’d want you. Smart, beautiful, and more than a handful.”
“Listen up, pretty boy, your charm might work on most females, but not me.”
He starts laughing. “You sound like Elliot.”
And he sounds like a man completely and utterly in love. It’s annoying. “I’m not working for you. And I’m not answering your questions about your brother. I’m helping him with his project. That’s all.”
“Hey, the job is actually for real.”
Yeah, I think it is. The strings here are short and obvious and designed that way. “I know,” I say, pulling Damon’s card from my bag and handing it to him, “but I do apartments. One on one. You want an actual security business. One that makes them. I use them, and refer business there. Call Damon. He’s the best.”
We look at each other and he says, “You know, Kingston’s a good guy.”
“I’ll call the papers.”
He ignores my sarcasm. “King, he… He doesn’t let himself get vulnerable, but I get the feeling neither do you. That said, he’s got a lot there beneath what you think you see.”
“This isn’t a personal visit.” I step away, towards the door, then turn back. “And I think your brother can take care of himself. He’d also probably kill you for this.”
He only smiles.
“Are we done, Ryder?”
“Let King in if you think he’s worthwhile. I only ask you don’t play with his emotions.”
I rub a hand over my eyes. “As I said, I think your brother can take care of himself.”
Why people think they know what’s going on when it’s just attraction—sizzling hot, but attraction and nothing more—I don’t know.
“Yeah,” he says, “you’d think so.”
“This has been nice. Call Damon if you want the best security.”
I leave, trying not to run, and not knowing why, because damn, what Ryder said shouldn’t make me want to run.
Just like Kingston shouldn’t make my heart beat so hard.
Annoyed with myself, I drop by Damon’s offices and barge in. He’s half in his coat and heading to the door.
“Some people knock.”
“Idiots?”
He laughs. “I was going to see you,” he says. “Something’s going on. I’ve got a lot of last-minute jobs. Security is being upped for tomorrow at various places. Particular places. People, it seems, are heading out of town.”
My senses start to sing. “Time to get out of dodge?” I ask, keeping my voice light.
“No, you know it’s not that. And…” He shrugs. “It’s certain people. Ones I know you’re interested in. My people have been out since five this morning.”
There’s only one type who’d be heading out and want a security upgrade.
I wait because I know there’s more.
“And this. One of my people got this.”
He hands me a photo and a slip of paper.
I suck in my breath.
I need to call Kingston.
Kingston is at my place in record time. I’ve barely got in the door when he buzzes and for some reason my knees go a little weak at that savage expression on his face.
“What have you got that I needed to be here?”
My heart thuds hard.
“People are heading out of town tonight and tomorrow. For an event.”
“Don’t play games. What people?”
“Collectors,” I say. “The big ones.”
I explain to him how Damon’s upgrading security.
“Okay.” He frowns. “But how does that mean something big?”
“They want their things protected. They’re being lured last minute and want to make sure no one takes advantage of them being away. Whatever it is, it’s big. It’s one of the things we’ve been waiting for. An auction. Masked. So…do you want to go to attend?”
“Try and stop me.”
I put my hand on his arm and electricity sparks up and into me from that touch. “Only thing is, it’s not in New York.”
“Where?”
“Near Wayne National Forest, Ohio. We’ll have to fly.”
And Kingston grins. “Good thing I’m a billionaire then.”