by Angie Martin
“You have a deal,” he said, tangling his hands in her hair. He pressed his mouth on hers, and took both of their minds off the job.
Chapter Forty-five
Rachel fought off another yawn, as she had all day. It was a seemingly losing battle, just like trying to hide the dark circles under her eyes with a bit of concealer. Donovan had stayed in her room too late, giving her only a few hours of sleep. She wouldn’t have minded so much, if she didn’t have the Stein job to finish.
Paul never scheduled her for rounds the same day of a job, and the time off provided her with a much needed break to align her thoughts. She spent the last few hours of her day alone in her room with Donovan. The time with him helped calm her nerves, even though they shot right back up when she left the estate for the job.
Getting into the house was easy enough. The Steins left for a three month trip to Canada two weeks earlier. Dennis Stein was an up-and-coming director who started filming a highly anticipated movie, one that was predicted to launch his career into Oscar territory. Rachel did not care much about the film or Dennis Stein’s directorial abilities. She only cared that the movie would take the Steins away from their home for an extended period of time.
Normally, Sylvia Stein would not go with her husband. The past several months, however, the tabloids took extreme interest in an exposed affair with a young actor that starred in her husband’s last film. The fallout was Dennis Stein now kept his wife close at bay, monitoring her every move rather than go through a messy Hollywood-style divorce.
Sylvia’s toy dogs went with them on the trip, so there were no animals with which to contend. Access into the home resulted from hard labor. Javier, one of Graham Wilkes’s best men, snagged a position with the gardening crew that worked at the home. He was in the position three months before the job, so as not to have fingers pointed at him when the painting disappeared from the safe.
Since the gardeners tended to the large mansion while the Steins were on the movie set in Canada, Javier set it up so Rachel and her crew could get onto the grounds. From there, Rachel disarmed the security alarm.
Rachel and Paul entered the home undetected, while Tony waited in the car to keep an eye on the outside. The only part of the job she couldn’t control was the security guard. With only thirty minutes in between each security check, they had to get in and out with no delays.
The hardest and most time consuming part of the job was the safe. While it should have been quick and easy to open, Donovan’s constant reminders of all the bidders he had lined up for the painting echoed in her mind while she worked. Gloves clinging to her moist palms, Rachel pushed Donovan out of her mind and turned the dial on the safe.
Paul stood in the doorway of the study, scanning the hallway as a safety precaution. Rachel had another member of Wilkes’s crew loop the security tape that monitored the interior and exterior of the home, so none of their movements were caught on camera. Still, she concerned herself with time and wanted to get into the safe so they could make a hasty exit and go back to the estate.
Rachel did her best to block out Paul’s presence. Through her stethoscope, she listened for the distinctive clicks that gave away the safe’s secrets. She counted each click as naturally as she could recite the alphabet.
The safe proved a bit more difficult than most, but Rachel assumed her nerves to be the reason. After a few amateur mistakes brought on by the immense pressure of the job, Rachel heard the last click in her stethoscope. She pulled on the safe’s handle and took the stethoscope out of her ears.
“Took you long enough,” Paul said from behind her. “I thought we’d be here all night.”
“I’d like to see you do it next time,” she said, opening the door. Expecting to see a twenty million dollar painting the Steins recently acquired, only darkness peered back at her. She blinked a few times, but the painting did not appear. She drew a sharp breath. “No.”
“What is it?”
“The safe.” She turned around, and panic set in. “The safe is empty.”
Paul laughed, and he walked into the study. “Very funny.” He moved behind Rachel and looked into the safe. His face sobered. “Where’s the painting?”
Rachel’s breathing sharpened. “It’s supposed to be here,” she said. “Where is it?”
“Is there another safe?” Paul asked.
“There’s only one safe, and the security tape showed they put the painting in there before they left for Canada.” She closed her eyes. “What are we going to do? We can’t go back empty handed.”
Paul didn’t respond.
Her radio gave off a series of beeps, letting her know it was time to leave. “We stopped taping two days ago to run the loop,” Rachel said. “Someone who knew we ran that loop must have come in during the last two days. We’ve been set up.”
“Rachel, we have to get out of here. If you’re right about a setup, cops could be here any minute.”
She continued staring into the safe. “No, there’s got to be something we’re missing here. We can’t leave without that painting.”
“Come on, Rachel.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her up. She shut the safe and spun the dial. They moved through the house, erasing all evidence of their intrusion on the way to their predetermined exit.
They reached the car less than three minutes later and right on schedule. Tony waited for them in the car with the engine running. “What happened?” he asked, as he jerked the car away from the curb. “Where is it?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Paul said, and fastened his seatbelt.
Rachel remained silent in the back seat. Her hands wrung the straps of the black duffel bag that carried her equipment. She ran the job through her mind to figure out who knew enough of their plan to get in the house after the tape was looped. All she could think was it didn’t matter who did it. Donovan would not be happy with her when they returned.
“What’s going on?” Tony asked. “Where the hell is the painting?”
“It wasn’t there,” Paul said. “Just shut up and get us the hell out of here.”
Tony dug his cellphone out of his jacket pocket. “We’ve got to call Donovan,” he said.
Paul grabbed Tony’s cellphone out of his hands. “Damn it, Tony, just drive! He’ll find out when we get back.” Paul twisted around in his seat to face her. “Don’t worry, kid. Everything’s okay. We’ll simply tell Donovan what happened and he’ll understand. This was out of our control.”
“No,” she said. “I’ll talk to Donovan by myself.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“I have to. It was my job and it’s my responsibility. I’ll talk to him.”
Chapter Forty-six
Rachel’s stomach dropped to the floor when Tony pulled the car through the estate’s front gates and down the long road leading to the circular driveway. The three hour drive back to the estate had flown by, and she still had no answers about what went wrong.
She remained planted in the backseat of the car after Tony turned off the engine. Paul opened her door and held his hand out to help her. Rachel waved off his gesture and climbed out of the car.
“Rach, it’s not your fault,” Paul said. “Any one of us could have headed up the job. You did everything right and you had it all planned down to the last detail.”
“Donovan won’t care about that,” she said. She handed him her duffel bag. “We don’t have the painting. That’s all that will matter to him.”
“Let me go with you to talk to him,” Paul said again, as he had several times on their drive home.
Rachel ignored him and walked up the stone steps to the front doors of the estate, with Paul and Tony on her heels.
Eric greeted her when she entered the house. His thin lips twisted into a smirk, he arched his eyebrows. “How did your first big job go?” he asked.
His sarcastic tone and haughty expression told her exactly what went wrong with her job. Eric was behind the missing painting. Every muscle in her b
ody tensed and rage took over. Her fist smashed into his jaw.
Paul wrapped his arms around a red-faced Eric before he could retaliate. Tony grabbed Rachel’s arm and shouted at her to calm down.
“You sabotaged my job!”
“Oh really?” Eric asked, as he continued leering at her. “How did I do that if I wasn’t there?”
“I don’t know how, but you did,” Rachel said. “We both know it was you.”
“Where’s your proof?” Eric laughed. “Of course you don’t have any. Maybe you’re not old enough to handle a job by yourself. You never would have taken the lead on this one if you weren’t King’s personal call girl.”
She lunged at him again, but Tony pulled her back. “That has nothing to do with it! I got this job on my own!”
“What is going on?”
Rachel turned toward the hard, angry voice. Donovan stood at the edge of the foyer, his hands shoved in his pockets, eyes narrowed toward Eric.
“Looks like your prodigy isn’t all she claims to be,” Eric said. “She returned sans painting.”
Rachel bit her lip to stop herself from saying something she would regret. She didn’t want to lose control in front of Donovan.
“Rachel?” Donovan’s cold stare went right through her. “Is this true?”
“The painting was missing when I opened the safe.” She couldn’t stop the words from leaving her tongue. “But Eric knew about it before we said the painting was gone. He must have had something to do with it.”
“Rachel, come to the library,” Donovan said.
Rachel kept her eyes on Eric, waiting for him to say something to give away his role in the botched job. But Eric only arched an eyebrow at her and pursed his lips in victory, incensing her all the more.
“Now, Rachel,” Donovan said.
Tony let go of her arm and she stormed into the library. Donovan shut the doors behind them. “What happened tonight?”
“The safe was empty.”
“And what does this have to do with Eric?”
“He sabotaged the job.”
“Do you have proof of that?”
His firm tone stopped her cold, and removed all confidence behind her suspicion of Eric. “No, but he—”
“Let me get this straight. You brought back nothing and you attacked him because you think he sabotaged the job, but you have no proof?”
“I don’t need proof, damn it,” she said. “I know he sabotaged me.”
Rachel barely registered Donovan’s hand flying out. One moment she was standing, the next she was sprawled out on the ground. The involuntary tears that jumped out of her eyes at the second of impact streaked down her face. She lifted a jittery hand to her burning cheek.
“You were in charge,” Donovan said from somewhere above her. “You are the one who is responsible for this twenty million dollar mess.”
Her voice was reduced to a whisper. “I swear I didn’t screw it up. The painting should have been there.”
“It should have been, but it wasn’t. An empty safe is your fault, not Eric’s. He wasn’t there, nor was he involved in the planning of the job, so he couldn’t have done anything to sabotage you.”
The pounding in her head raced against her heart and she covered her mouth with her hands. He had never been angry with her before, had never even raised his voice to her. Why would he hit her? Didn’t he love her?
“Stand up,” Donovan said.
Rachel forced herself to her feet and stood before him, her spine curved, shoulders slumped, head bowed. She rolled her eyes toward his face and the ice from his stare found its way into her veins.
“Not one of you has ever come back empty-handed,” he said. “Not one of you has ever screwed up a job. If it was anyone else, I would think they were stealing from me. This will never happen again. And you will never attack another person on this estate. Is that understood?”
Rachel’s chin quivered and she forced out the words. “Yes, Donovan. I understand.”
“I have to make some phone calls and explain why I don’t have that painting.” He stopped beside her on his way out. “I am very disappointed in you, Rachel.”
As soon as he shut the library door, Rachel collapsed to the floor and hid her face in her hands.
Chapter Forty-seven
Rachel sat under her favorite oak tree, her arms linked around her knees. Her sun-streaked hair fell loose around her shoulders, one side tucked behind her ear. She stuck out her lower lip and blew upward to get the hair out of her eyes once more.
She usually pulled her hair back to keep the wind from blowing it in her eyes while on rounds, but the past few days, she wore it down. The hair falling over her ear and cheek concealed the discoloration toward the back of her jaw. The bruise covered the same area of skin the first bruise did, the one that appeared after he struck her in the library four years earlier.
That night in the library still seemed like a bad dream. After a restless night of wondering what went wrong so fast, Donovan visited her while the rest of the estate dreamed about more pleasant things. His apologies had been sincere enough, his explanation more than plausible.
With the painting missing from the safe, Donovan spent the entire night doing damage control with his bidders. Promises had to be made to each of them, who had come to expect so much more from him. There was more than she realized riding on that painting, and the pressure overwhelmed him. When she snapped at him, he momentarily lost control, and he was sorry that he took it out on her.
Rachel forgave him, understanding she had caught him off-guard during a stressful moment in time, for which she took responsibility. As he apologized, she knew better than to bring up her running conspiracy theory about Eric sabotaging the job. Donovan hadn’t believed her the night before, and there was no reason to raise his blood pressure again.
For the next several months, they were back to being in love and eternally happy. And then, it happened again. Another stressful moment where she said the wrong thing at the wrong time. A couple months later, another punch, another plausible explanation, another sincere apology.
Instead of the violence being predictable, it turned sporadic, and she never knew what might send him into a fury. Sometimes months would go by without an incident, other times it was hours. Without warning, rage flashed in his eyes, and turned him into the monster that was taking over the man she loved. For the next few years, Rachel’s feet glided over eggshells, but it didn’t matter how carefully she stepped. She always managed to rouse the monster.
Footsteps caused her to look up, and she managed a smile as Paul approached her. She never spoke to Paul about the anger inside Donovan, and he never asked her about it. The bruises were as secretive as her initial relationship with Donovan.
After the first time Donovan hit her four years ago, she learned the importance of leaving her hair down, of placing a hand or a clump of hair over part of her face when someone passed by. Other times, when someone caught a glimpse of a bruise, she made up stories to explain it away. Learning to lie and hide was easier than facing the truth.
She would do anything to keep Paul in the dark, even if it meant dealing with her hair flying in her face during her rounds. As fearful as she was becoming of Donovan, Rachel was more afraid Paul would someday talk to her about the bruises.
Rachel pushed another cluster of renegade strands away from her eyes and greeted Paul. She lifted her fingers to make sure her hair was still in camouflage mode. As an additional safety measure, she propped her elbow up on her knee and hovered her hand over her bruised cheek like a shield.
Paul gestured at her black short sleeve shirt and black pants. Her radio was clipped on her belt, and her gun secured in a shoulder holster, the standard outfit she wore to patrol the grounds. “You don’t have rounds for another hour,” he said. “Are you enjoying this wonderful summer day, or are you out here for a reason?”
“Daydreaming, I guess.”
He lowered himself into the soft grass n
ext to her and leaned against the tree. “I hope it’s at least a good one.”
“Maybe.” She squinted her eyes and studied his hair. “What is this?” she asked. She put her hands in his hair and looked for the culprit.
“What?”
“Hold still.” She pinched a short hair between her fingertips and yanked it out of the side of his head.
“Ouch!”
“It didn’t hurt that bad.” She examined the thin strand of hair. “You have a grey hair.”
“I do not. Let me see.” He took the hair from her and threw it down after examining it. “Thank you. You’ve ruined my day.”
“Oh, it’s one little grey hair, old man,” Rachel said.
“Are there any other aging imperfections you’d like to point out?”
Rachel pressed her lips together to stop the smile as she took in his receding hairline. “Nope, just the grey hair.”
He looked off in the distance. “I guess we can’t stay young forever.”
“Tell me about it,” Rachel said, echoing Paul’s melancholy.
“What are you complaining about? You’re only twenty-three to my forty-six.”
“Yeah, but twenty-three feels pretty old to someone who’s never been that age before.”
Paul paused as he thought about it. “I guess I can understand that. So what are you doing out here, old maid?”
“I’m trying to figure out what it’s like out there.” She waved her hand in front of her.
“Well, there are lots of trees and the ground is still a little soft from that rain we got yesterday.”
She scowled. “That’s not what I’m talking about. I’ve been here for thirteen years. I don’t remember what life is like beyond the estate’s fences. Tell me something about that world.”
He smiled, caught in a memory. “It was a good one when Maria was alive.”