“Gemologist?” Swift asked, squinting at Rook.
“Someone who studies and identifies gems of all kinds. Apparently her knowledge is one of the most extensive regarding precious gems of anyone in the States.”
Sequence entered the app that held her client profile. One word floated through his head when he saw her profile picture.
Fancy.
Because fancy looking, she was. He thought it fitting that she was a gem expert considering her long hair was the color of rubies and her eyes were the color of sapphires. Her pearly whites were bared in a grin so wide and infectious, Sequence was vaguely surprised she hadn’t cracked the camera lens.
“She lives on the Upper East Side and commutes down to the diamond district every day where she’s employed by a Mr. Simon Ellsworth.” Rook spewed off her information, though it was staring up at all of them from the app.
Fancy with a capital F.
“She trained here in Manhattan, at the gem institute, but she’s been traveling internationally on behalf of Mr. Ellsworth for almost a decade. She’s worked in China, Japan, Italy, Paris, Africa, Sweden, and Norway.”
“A decade?” Swift asked. “She’s been fully employed as a gemologist since she was nineteen?”
“She didn’t graduate from the institute until she was twenty-two, but she was interning with Ellsworth since high school. Apparently she’s some kind of prodigy.” Rook switched the next page of the app. “Not to mention, her father was apparently a big-wig in the world of diamonds and jewels. His opinions and appraisals were universally sought, that is, until he was murdered fifteen years ago.”
Sequence flipped to the next page of the app, the family history section. Then, in a move extremely uncharacteristic of him, he flipped back to the first page, just to look at her picture for another moment.
“Shit,” Geo murmured as her eyes ran over the case files on this woman’s father’s murder, and Sequence immediately scrolled through the file to keep up with everyone else.
“Yeah. He was murdered on the job after he appraised, and ultimately recognized, some stolen gems. The thieves brought them to him, thinking he wouldn’t recognize them out of their settings. He did, attempted to call the cops, and was shot and killed in his shop.” Rook scrolled to another page. “Now, all of that is background information to let you all know that being a gemologist isn’t considered the safest job there ever was. And many of them employ personal security, especially when they have big shipments or new clients coming in.”
“So, what, she landed a new client and needs us to come in and hold her hand?” Atlas asked, not in an unfriendly way. He stretched his big arms over his head and his shirt came untucked, his too-long blonde hair flopping to one side.
Sequence rolled his eyes at his twin.
“It’s better if you don’t guess,” Rook said to Atlas, though his mouth pinched with humor. “No. Actually she wants our services for a meeting she has with an old client. One who scares her.”
“Why would she maintain a relationship with a client who scares her?” Sequence asked in his low, deep voice. It was likely the only words he would speak this entire meeting.
“This is her last meeting with him. As she explained it to me, she’s leaving Ellsworth and striking out on her own, freelancing. But Ellsworth is making her do this, under threat of trash-talking her reputation and deadening her business before it begins.”
“So obviously Ellsworth is scared of this client as well, if he’s too chicken shit to do it himself,” Geo guessed.
“My thoughts and Ms. Cutler’s thoughts exactly,” Rook replied. “Additionally, she wants to warn this client, gently, that this will be her last time working with him. If she just went cold turkey and left him in the lurch with whoever Ellsworth hires next, she’s scared that he’d come looking for her.”
“They have a relationship with one another?” Swift asked. “Ms. Cutler and her client?”
Rook debated one way or another how to say what he had to say and decided, as he often did when it was just him and his team, to just spit it out. “He’s hot for her. She wants to let him down gently and firmly on both business and personal fronts. And she wants some personal security there when she does it.”
Made sense to Rook. It also made nausea curl inside him to think that in this world, a woman needed a bodyguard to feel comfortable letting some douchebag down gently. But he certainly didn’t hate being a woman’s personal muscle when she needed it. After his childhood, Sequence tended to enjoy sticking up for the little guy.
“Who’s this client of hers?” Atlas asked, scrolling to the next page in the app. “Shit.”
Sequence did the same and he internally echoed his twin’s sentiments.
“Frank Bastone?” Geo asked in alarm. “Her client is Frank fucking Bastone? No wonder the girl’s got the creepy crawlies.”
Frank Bastone, though never formally convicted of any crime, was informally known in New York City as the Cockroach. He was a mobster that would never die. The cops couldn’t pin anything on him. Nothing stuck. Witnesses flipped or wound up dead. Evidence got miscataloged or went missing. His enemies disappeared or got thrown in jail. One by one.
He was not the kind of man you wanted to be hot for you.
Sucks for Fancy, Sequence thought and somehow found himself back on her profile picture. His eyes snagged on that joyful smile, her bottomless eyes.
“What’s the plan.” It wasn’t a question, really, that Sequence was asking. It was an unusual thing for him to say in this kind of meeting. Because what his words really meant were, let’s go. Let’s figure this out. How are we gonna keep this woman safe?
***
Naomi Cutler balanced against the wall of the hallway with one hand and wobbled as she wiggled into her 4-inch Louboutins. She jammed the elevator button with her free hand and quickly finished buttoning her blouse. Late again.
Naomi winced as she heard the apartment door behind her swing open.
Every single morning was a cosmic race between the elevator and Mrs. Wallace’s front door.
“Morning, Mrs. Wallace,” Naomi called over her shoulder, unmindful of the blueberry muffin she was still chewing.
Mrs. Wallace, clad in a light purple robe, house slippers, and a hairnet, frowned at the cascade of crumbs that flung from Naomi’s mouth and onto the carpet of the hallway.
“Sorry,” Naomi mumbled, quickly chewing and swallowing. She marveled, yet again, at how a woman with curlers in her hair could manage to look so damn imperious. Superiority was Mrs. Wallace’s superpower.
“Late again, Naomi?” Mrs. Wallace asked, bending down for her newspaper, which was always her excuse to harass Naomi in the mornings before work.
“You know me,” Naomi chirped, flashing a toothy smile at her nosy neighbor.
“Hmm.”
“How’s Ralph?” Naomi asked, trying not to be rude and glance at her watch.
“Oh, well, the vet has him on a round of anti-depressants again, but we can’t seem to get the dosage right. He barely got out of bed yesterday.”
Naomi frowned. Ralph was Mrs. Wallace’s Boston terrier and, in Naomi’s opinion, the cutest dog of all time. She personally did not think that Ralph needed anti-depressants. She thought the poor dog needed someone to throw a ball in the park for him. But considering that it had been at least nine years since Mrs. Wallace had crossed the threshold of her front door… well, fat chance.
“The offer always stands for me to take Ralph down to the park, Mrs. Wallace. Seriously, anytime!” Naomi waved and hitched her bag over her shoulder as she stepped backwards onto the elevator as the doors dinged open.
Mrs. Wallace’s face opened in surprise as she watched Naomi back onto the elevator and Naomi realized why the second she backed her ass directly into a brick wall. A warm brick wall covered in expensive fabric with stubble that scratched her temple and breath that cascaded down her throat.
“Eep!” Naomi flung herself away from the man beh
ind her just as the elevator doors closed. She spun around, one hand against her throat and her other hand clutching her bag to her side. It wasn’t just one man. It was three.
And the sheer size of them. Shoulder to shoulder, they barely fit in the roomy elevator. They towered over her.
This was it. These were the bruisers that Bastone had finally sent to collect her. She’d never thought he would have the audacity to actually remove her from her own building. But—
“Ms. Cutler, are you all right?”
Something about the man’s voice was familiar and Naomi did a double take. Wait. The one on the left wasn’t an unknown bruiser working for a mob boss. She knew that man. In fact…
“Mr. Rook,” Naomi breathed, sagging against the elevator doors for a moment. “Oh, thank God it’s you. I thought…”
She trailed off, unwilling to say out loud that she’d thought her number was up. That the man of her nightmares had finally decided that this cat and mouse thing had gotten old. She was not the kind of woman who scared easily, but forcibly becoming Frank Bastone’s mistress scared the crap out of her.
“It’s nice to see you again.” Rook held out his hand for a shake but Naomi wobbled forward, her breath quaking, and pulled Rook in for a hug.
“I’m so glad to see you. And so, so glad you’re not some bruiser here to drag me off to Bastone.”
If Naomi had looked up, she would have seen the surprised glee on Atlas and Sequence’s face at seeing their boss get cuddled by a client. And she would also have seen those smiles disappear at her reminder that she was in danger from one of the most reprehensible men in New York City. Sequence glanced up at the small, almost invisible cameras that he’d just installed in the elevator. Normally, on a client pickup, he would have waited in the car, as he was usually the driver. But he was also the IT guy, so here he was. In a rare show of fidgeting, Sequence rolled his shoulders back, stretching his body that was still zinging from where she’d bumped into him. He’d been ready to meet the Fancy Naomi Cutler. He hadn’t been ready for her to back that plush ass directly into his body. She was taller than he’d expected, though the sky-high stilts she was wearing probably had something to do with that. And she smelled like oranges. He wondered if she’d just eaten one or if it was perfume.
“We’re gonna keep you safe, Ms. Cutler.”
“Right,” she said, pulling away from Rook and stepping back. She smoothed her ruby hair back over her shoulders and took a deep breath. That pearly white smile, though a little wobbly, shined over all three men. “Please, it’s Naomi.”
“These are two of my men, Atlas and Sequence Bone.”
Naomi went for a handshake with the men. Both brothers were surprised at how firm her grip was. She looked them both dead in the eye with those sapphire eyes and her expression slid quickly into delight as she took in their faces.
“Twinsies!” she exclaimed, making Atlas break into a grin and Sequence purse his lips. He couldn’t think of a single word he hated more than the word twinsies.
“Totes,” Atlas replied and now Sequence couldn’t help but roll his eyes. He stood corrected. Apparently there was a word he hated more than twinsies.
“Well, it’s very nice to meet you two,” she grinned. But as the elevator alighted at the lobby a line appeared between her brows. “Um. Not to sound ungrateful, but why are you all here?”
Her meeting with Bastone wasn’t for another week. She’d been under the impression that she wouldn’t be needing any security until the day of the meeting.
Rook escorted her off the elevator and pulled her to a private corner of the lobby. “We were supposed to meet in the lobby at eight. When you didn’t come down, we thought we’d make sure everything was all right.”
“We were?”
“To install the security measures in your apartment?”
“Oh!” Naomi face-palmed. “Oh my gosh. I totally forgot about that. Of course! For some reason I had thought we’d do that next week. Of course. Of course. Okay.”
She opened up her bag and started rooting through it until she came up with a keyring that had about forty different keys on it. Sequence squinted at all of them. What could those possibly all be for? And if he wasn’t mistaken, he was pretty sure there was also a magnifying glass, a heavy glass ornament, nail clippers and a Swiss army knife. Worst came to worst, she could use her house keys as a medieval-style mace on Bastone.
She clipped off two keys and pressed them into Rook’s palm. “Here you go!”
Rook looked a little bemused at how nonchalantly she was handing over the keys to her apartment. “You’re not going to stay and oversee the installations?”
“No, I can’t. I’m super late for work. I trust ya!” She chucked him on the shoulder like he was a playground buddy. “Okay. Nice to meet you all!”
She gave the men a sunny wave and then started out through the lobby. All three men blinked after her.
“Sequence,” Rook said, nodding his head after her.
Sequence instantly understood what his boss was asking of him. “You’ll be all right with the installation of the system?”
“Don’t insult me,” Rook said with a bit of a smile on his face. Sequence wasn’t the only one who knew how to install a security system. But he was definitely the only one who didn’t mind fighting through Manhattan commuter traffic in their giant SUV.
Sequence nodded again and jogged after Naomi. He hadn’t gotten a good look at what she was wearing when she’d backed into him on the elevator. Now, he took a moment to really appreciate the view. She wore slim black trousers, a black silk blouse, and skyscrapers for heels. Though the outfit was professional and flattering, Sequence couldn’t help but feel that it didn’t quite match her sunny personality.
He took one more second to appreciate the way her ruby hair cascaded over her shoulders and her ass filled those trousers to the legal limit. She stepped out of the lobby and onto the sidewalk, a bike messenger nearly breaking his neck to get an eyeful of her. She didn’t seem to notice as she took a sharp turn and strode down the sidewalk.
Her long legs ate up the ground quickly, but Sequence didn’t have any trouble catching up to her. Mindful of the way they’d scared the hell out of her on the elevator, he didn’t touch her to get her attention.
“Ms. Cutler.”
She jumped anyway. “Oh! Oh. Hi. Naomi, please.”
“Naomi, we’re parked in the other direction.” He jerked his head down the block toward the SUV.
“Parked… Oh. I usually take the bus.”
Sequence just blinked at her.
“You’re offering me a ride, right?” she finally said, a confused smile on her face.
He stared down at her some more. Did this woman pay attention to Rook at all when he’d explained about their security measures? “I need to check out your workplace to ensure your safety.”
“But I’m only working there for another week anyway! And Bastone has never approached me there.”
Sequence didn’t wince but his expression tightened. “Maybe don’t scream his name on the street.”
Naomi shrunk down two sizes, her shoulders coming up around her ears. “Right. Sorry.”
Sequence sucked his teeth as he looked down at her. “I can meet you there or you can ride with me.”
Naomi looked like she was going to argue for a second but then she looked down the block and saw her bus pulling away, her bus stop now empty of people. Her original ride had just left. “Riding with you it is!” she chirped.
She snuck a few glances up at this blond giant as she followed him to the SUV. It seemed like he was pissed at her. But she couldn’t for the life of her figure out why. Sure, it was rude that she’d forgotten their meeting. And maybe she shouldn’t have initially argued about the ride, but his face was looking like he was one second away from karate chopping a phone book in half.
She bumped into him when he pulled up short next to the SUV.
“Oof. Sorry.” She stumbled
back and realized that he hadn’t pulled up short, he was holding the back door of the SUV open for her. He wanted her to sit in the back? Like he was her chauffeur? Awkward. “Um. Can I sit in the front? Please?” She flashed him her best smile, the one that usually got her out of trouble with Mr. Ellsworth when she was massively late for work. Apparently she was going to be using that smile a lot today.
But Sequence just stared down at her, looking even more pissed than he had a minute ago. Finally, he shrugged and opened up the passenger door for her. She slid in and shot him another smile through the window.
He ignored that one too.
He fired up the vehicle and smoothly pulled into traffic. He was aggressive enough and the SUV was big enough, that they glided through the usual stop and go. It seemed like the other cars were making way for them. There was silence in the car, but Naomi couldn’t help but crow gleefully when they passed her bus behind. When she turned back to Sequence, he looked almost like that had made him smile. But not quite.
“So, I still don’t understand why you have to come and case my place of work.”
Sequence frowned. “I’m not casing it. I’m making sure that it’s safe for you to be there for the next week.”
“Safe for me? Why wouldn’t it be safe? Have you ever been inside a jewelry store in the diamond district? They’ve got more security than the Pentagon.”
Sequence glanced dryly over at her, as if she didn’t know what the hell she was talking about. Which, yeah, she didn’t. But she couldn’t help but bristle at the expression on his face.
“We’re just covering our bases.”
As if that answered any of her questions. “And which bases might those be exactly?” she asked, with just a touch too much sugar in her tone to pretend she wasn’t being a smart ass.
Sequence was dead quiet for an entire stop light, and she was marveling at his rudeness when he finally responded.
“You had a security protocol briefing with Rook, yes?”
Naomi shifted as she watched Central Park roll past. Even at 8:15 am people were already dripping with sweat as they jogged with strollers and bought coffee from the stands. Late September and it was going to be another hot one. This was the summer that would never die. “Yes. Earlier this week.”
Rook Security Complete Series Page 26