Chapter 11
He woke to the sound of the secure phone ringing and, on his way to answer it, Dane realized he was still alone in the house.
After his long nap, the sun had reached almost six o’clock in the still hot evening summer sky.
He grabbed the receiver from the old-fashioned cradle and put it to his ear with a mind trained to expect anything, trained to expect disaster and expecting to be called to fix it.
Acer spoke before Dane did more than breathe into the phone. “The connection between Angelique and Gabriele Tavares gave me trouble.”
“Go on.” Dane had patience with Acer because he knew no one who could come through more spectacularly with intel when he needed it.
“I had trouble because there were layers of encryption and protection traps getting past the false data. Someone has serious computer and hacking skills to set up all this information behind walls.”
“Good to know. What did you find?”
“I found out that one of the Gables’ stolen jewels is a Ruse family heirloom.”
“If you were here, I’d kiss you. That’s the kind of too-coincidental-to-be-a-coincidence kind of fact I can rely on. Go on.”
“I also found out your mark’s real name is Angelique Dubois Ruse.
She graduated from the Sorbonne with a degree in art history and worked as a museum guide for a while in Paris at the Louvre and since then she has no real record of employment.
But that was no problem for her, because when she wanted the insurance investigator gig, she set up a false background at Lloyd’s and then successfully got herself hired as a consultant on this theft.
She faked her background to include an MS in law enforcement from Boston University and a stint in security with a jewelry company in London. ”
“Sounds like she’s dangerously skilled at hacking,” Dane said.
“She did an admirable job for someone so young. She’s only 26.”
“The younger they are the better they are at crashing computer systems, Ace, that’s the way of the world these days,” Dane said. Acer swore at him.
“Do you want to hear the juiciest stuff?”
“Shoot.”
“She didn’t just attend boarding school in Switzerland at the very same time as Gabriele Tavares—they were roommates.”
“Shit.” Damn it to hell.
“Does this mean what I think it means?” Acer asked with steel in his voice. He’d been to Brazil with them to run down the Tavares cartel and knew firsthand of their treachery.
“Yes. Damn it.”
He hung up the phone after signing off with Acer and got himself ready for a date with disaster.
*****
“Come with me to the Tomkins’ party tonight,” Dane said.
“Do you want to know why I came here to Martha’s Vineyard?” Angelique had opened the door to her room at the Admiral’s Inn and invited Dane inside with no questions. “Not that I should be speaking to you after your horrible accusations.”
Her pure white skin glowed in the dim light. She wore a silky slip—it could have been a flimsy dress or a nightgown. Either way, it didn’t cover much. The shades were down and the air conditioning was cranked up, but a slight sheen covered her skin like dew on flower petals.
He closed the door behind him and leaned on it, offering her a half smile. He watched the playful twinkle in her eyes. She was young. She was twenty-six, younger even than Shana—in more ways than one in spite of her sophistication and her pretense at being hardened.
“Why?”
He stood watching her. He reached out and touched her hair. It was soft and fine like baby hair. He tamped down on the churn of guilt. He had nothing to be guilty about. He reached out and turned on the light switch.
“I came because the Dane Blaise who Jean Luc spoke of was the kind of man I was looking for. You were like that fairytale hero I’d always dreamed of as a girl—only you were real—or supposed to be real. I had to find out for myself if you were.”
She leaned forward, resting against his chest. Her heady perfume enveloped him like a drugging cloud.
Then she tilted her face to kiss his mouth with her soft cool lips, so different from Shana’s.
He closed his eyes and commanded himself to stop comparing, to reinforce his professional mantle.
This was all part of the job, doing what he needed to do.
Shana had given him her damn permission.
He scoffed at himself—this was about some missing jewels of a few rich people and at least partly for their amusement.
This wasn’t about the kinds of things he usually put aside his soul and his heart for—like life and death and the misery of human trafficking or torture by warlords or tyrannical governments.
This case hardly justified him lifting a finger, let alone pretending at romance with the likes of Angelique Dubois.
There was no cause for him to risk his integrity.
Assuming he had any when it came to romantic entanglements.
Except now the case was different. Now they were dealing with the specter of Tavares family involvement.
And that was a horse of a different color.
He pushed all the thoughts aside and pushed her.
“I know you’re young, but you didn’t come here because of some girlish notions put in your head by Jean Luc.”
“He also told me he couldn’t believe that you were the kind of man who would settle on this small island for long.
He said there was a rogue in your heart, that you were a renegade, not a true law-enforcement soul.
” She paused for a moment and then asked him with her brown eyes impossibly wide and innocent-looking.
Even though he knew it was an act for his benefit, his body responded.
“Is it true that you were once a gun for hire?”
“What if I said yes?”
“I would believe you. You have that delicious need to ‘save the damsel in distress’ and I can see you being drawn into all kinds of such missions.” She sighed. He raised one brow.
“You can see how I was drawn into this venture to meet you in the flesh, to see for myself,” she continued.
“Not really. What I see is that you’re not telling me far more than you are telling me.”
She laughed and stroked his face in that way she had.
It was a compelling habit. He waited for her to continue.
He had time. If there was an agenda in her back pocket, he doubted he was in any danger.
Not at the moment—not unless Gabriele Tavares was hiding in the closet with a knife or a gun.
There was no ticking clock or kidnap victims to save and Shana was getting her coveted serious money case. He shouldn’t feel this uncomfortable.
But the nagging thought that there was something more, something dangerous to her connection with Gabriele Tavares never left him, whether from the well-learned habits of self-preservation or some immediate need, he didn’t know. He took a long deep breath, too big to be called a sigh.
Over her shoulder, he spotted a guitar in the corner of the room. She turned to see what he was seeing and said, “You play?”
“You?”
She laughed. She went and took the acoustic guitar from its perch and sat on the bed. Then she sang. Something French and sweet as she strummed the chords. When she finished he clapped.
Then she held out the guitar to him. He told himself to forget about it, but the excitement of temptation, of a moment out of time, a time that didn’t count in his life, buzzed and built until he stepped forward and sat next to her on the bed.
She watched him and said nothing. No cajoling.
She knew. Somehow she knew it was a hard choice, and a mindless leap at the same time.
Because she didn’t force it, he took the guitar from her, putting aside the years of abstinence, pain and longing in one quick beat of his heart.
The instant he felt the weight and curve of the wood in his hands, skimmed his fingers down the strings, he felt the trench of loss.
All the lost songs, the lost time. The loss of his father who shared his music with Dane who gave Dane his first and only guitar.
He took a deep shaky breath and played. And sang.
“Yesterday…”
She listened and leaned into him and slipped her arms around him when he finished.
And it was all wrong. He put the guitar aside, took her arms from him and stood.
“So beautiful. Everything about you I learned was right,” she said.
“You were painted as an exciting man by my uncle, but I did my homework on you also. I went far beyond what Jean Luc told me. I know why you choose to sing this song about lost love.” She paused until he returned his attention to her.
“I found out about Elena.” She studied his face for a few beats.
He gave nothing away. None of the churning in his gut showed on his face or in his body, not even one drop of perspiration popped. He’d been steeling himself for many years against this assault weapon.
“I found out about her betrayal,” Angelique continued in her musical voice. “About how you left the Chicago police department after losing her. I know you must feel bitter. Whether or not Elena had been a bad cop and whether or not you’d been a bad cop—I don’t judge either of you.”
Hearing that left a bitter taste in his mouth and he turned from her as she rose and came to him and attempted a kiss.
He said, “Don’t talk about Elena.” He meant he didn’t want to hear any more from Angelique, that she knew nothing and had no right to talk about his private world.
But he knew she’d take it to mean that he didn’t want to think about bad times.
“We’re here now. Let’s make the most of it,” she said. She took his hand and skimmed it along the silky fabric covering her rib cage, placing it over her small taut breast, so that it cupped the tender curve.
“It’s late in the day.” He moved away from her.
“You have somewhere else to go? We have a date tonight, non?”
“What about your accomplice?”
She sighed. “I’ve dismissed him.” She turned her face away from him.