She watched his eyes for a moment, looking for something, then took a deep breath. “I don’t know if you’ll believe it, but I think this is the first time I’ve ever said that I don’t have a TV without being treated as if I were retarded or eccentric beyond belief. To most people it’s too insane to even contemplate. But the thing is, I work all the time and TV would be a huge distraction for me. I’d rather read, anyway. But in the end I’m not always up on the latest news and that’s considered almost antisocial, like wearing mismatched shoes or—or going to an elegant restaurant in gym clothes. It’s just not done.”
He tightened his grip slightly, very carefully. His hands were immensely strong and he didn’t want to hurt her in any way. He just wanted to emphasize his words. “I don’t ever want to hear you call yourself stupid again. You’re an artist. How could you waste your time watching the idiocies on television rather than creating? And I’ll confess—I don’t have a television set, either.”
It was true. Drake’s business depended on accurate information. He’d learned through bitter experience that the last thing television and the major newspapers dealt in was hard news. He used the internet, hacking into company and police reports for a clear picture of what was happening in the world.
He also had dozens of paid informers who would probably make a mint in journalism if the papers would ever print what they found out.
“Really? You don’t have a TV either?” Her lips curved in a half smile. He found his own mouth instinctively moving and it took him a full second to realize he was smiling back. “Maybe we’re both misfits, then.”
Oh yeah. Though misfit wasn’t quite what would describe him. He was the born outsider, the predator prowling on the margins of society. He always had been.
But it was a slightly shocking thought, all the same. The idea that he and this gentle, beautiful woman might have a basic element of their lives in common made him pause. He was used to belonging to no one, and to no place. To being like no one else on the planet. It was the deepest, truest thing about himself he knew. He was a loner and an outsider and nothing would ever change that.
His thumb slowly stroked the soft skin of her hand. “Maybe we are,” he conceded, feeling a little shock go through him at the idea and at the feel of her. He looked down at her plate and frowned. She’d left half the dessert. She needed sugar to counter the shocks she’d had this afternoon and—and he wanted her to finish the dessert. It was delicious. She needed it, but more than that he found himself wanting her to eat food provided by him. Craving it.
“Here,” he said suddenly, letting go of her hand and spooning up a bite of the lemon tart. “Finish this. You need it. Open wide.”
She opened her mouth obediently. He fed her the morsel, watching as her full pink mouth closed over the spoon. He pulled the spoon out slowly, imagining very vividly that it was his cock pulling out of her mouth. The image just welled up, uncontrollable, unstoppable. A surge of blood rushed back between his thighs.
Oh God, everything about this was just so…delightful. The huge fire painted her skin a shifting pink glow, like the aurora borealis he’d seen in Vladivostock. The candles reflected in bright points of light in her blue-green eyes. He was close enough to smell her skin. There was complete silence in the room except for the crackle and pop of the flames and the occasional swoosh as one of the logs collapsed in the hearth.
Her eyes were fixed on his. He knew she was seeing his desire and he also knew she could see him curb it.
Sex was crackling between them. Her eyes were bright with it. They were also bright with alarm. Though the air pulsed with sexual energy, Drake knew enough to bank his fires, because he didn’t want to frighten her.
He’d have her. Oh yes.
Not tonight maybe, but soon.
Grace looked away, breaking the connection. “Do you think they’ll release the body anytime soon? He has a son out in LA. They’re not close, unfortunately. I think it was one of Harold’s greatest regrets, that he wasn’t close to his son. He never spoke much about him, but there was always a sad expression on his face when he did. I don’t know what kind of memorial service the son will organize. Harold was Jewish but he wasn’t religious. I hope I can find out when the service will be.”
Every hair on Drake’s body stood up.
“No,” he said, and Grace’s eyes widened. He had to clench his jaws against coldly ordering her to forget about even the thought of attending Harold Feinstein’s memorial service. And then widening the ban by telling her that from now on, she was his Siamese twin, joined at the hip to him and that she wasn’t to set foot outside his door without his express permission. And certainly never without him being a hand’s span from her.
The words strangled in his throat. That wouldn’t go over well for a woman who was used to being completely independent. At this stage, she’d rebel.
His mind whirred uselessly in the search for words to convince her, flailing. It was hard to concentrate on persuasive words when his head was filled with a very clear vision of her dead in a pool of her own blood, gunned down by Rutskoi or by one of Cordero’s thugs. Or worse, with elbows and knees blown out just like Leather Coat had promised. It was a Cordero trademark.
No. They would never get their hands on Grace. Not while he lived.
Drake tried to modulate his voice, put some convincing in it, but it wasn’t easy. He was used to commanding, not convincing.
“Grace, I’m afraid you won’t be able to be at your friend’s service.” He bit down hard on the words I won’t let you. “It’s way too dangerous to show up at a specific place at a specific time. My enemies would know exactly where to get you.”
Grace straightened in her chair. “If you believe that, then I can’t even go back to my apartment.”
Damn. He’d hoped it would take a day or two of stalling before she came to that conclusion. It was true. Like the title of an old American novel he’d seen in a bookstore, she could never go home again.
“I’m afraid that’s—” His cell rang and he held up a finger. Only his men had this particular number and no one called him unless it was absolutely necessary. He looked at the number and frowned. Boris, the head of the four-man team sent to guard Grace’s apartment.
“Yes, Boris?”
“Not Boris, boss.” Ivan’s image came on the small screen, voice grim. “He won’t be calling you again. We came late.” Ivan turned his cell around and the blood froze in Drake’s veins.
It was a scene of utter destruction. A door blown off the hinges, a bloody mass on the floor, identifiable as Boris only by his black boots, utter chaos inside the apartment visible beyond Boris’s bloody legs.
After an initial surge of rage at seeing his employee dead and Grace’s apartment trashed, Drake felt himself go into combat mode. The switch was immediate, complete. He became a machine for combat, unhampered by emotions. Emotion held no place in this chilly land of calculation and maneuvering.
“Go further into the apartment,” he said coolly, then turned the cell phone around so Grace could see it, too, see the wreckage of her apartment. She gasped, but he didn’t touch her to comfort her, didn’t shift his gaze from the screen. She didn’t need to be consoled. She needed to be frightened. She needed to see this to understand what she was up against. It was brutal, traumatizing, but far more effective than any words he could possibly say. His words might not convince her, but this would. What was on his screen was one big danger sign that only an insane woman wouldn’t heed.
Ivan walked slowly through the apartment, recording the destruction.
Interesting, Drake thought coolly. The wreckage was controlled and systematic, carried out with a knife. It wasn’t vandalism, destruction for destruction’s sake. There was an agenda here—pure intimidation. Whoever had done this wanted to terrify Grace, hit her in her most vulnerable points. All her artwork was destroyed, all her clothes, even her shoes. All personal things.
The message was clear. We’ll destroy yo
u next. So be scared, because we’re coming.
Her eyes were riveted on the small screen. “My God,” she breathed.
“Go into the kitchen,” Drake ordered Ivan, not surprised when he saw that her plates and glasses were intact. Whoever had done this hadn’t wanted to make any noise. Further proof that it wasn’t a mad rampage, but a carefully thought out campaign to smoke Grace out of hiding, rattle her badly.
Or rattle him.
Fools.
Drake wasn’t rattled, he was as cold as ice inside.
The attack outside Feinstein’s gallery had been an attack on him. This was nothing new. His life had been threatened before, many times. He’d survived all the attacks and lived to have his vengeance.
But this—this was an attack on Grace.
Someone had just made a huge, huge mistake.
Drake narrowed his eyes. Grace had gone completely white, down to her lips. Her hands were shaking.
“Why—” Her voice was barely above a whisper and she swallowed heavily. “Why would anyone do that to my apartment? Why destroy my paintings? Why?”
He got up and went to a sideboard, coming back with two glasses of Jack Daniel’s, a taste American officers had given him, his a double shot.
One thing the scene of destruction had done was make his hard-on disappear. Sex with Grace would come, and soon, but right now he had enemies prodding his defenses, representing a direct threat to her. She didn’t need his arousal, she needed his focus to keep her safe.
“Here,” he said, taking her hand and curling it around the cut crystal glass. Her hand was chilled and he held his hand around hers for a moment to warm it up. “Drink that down and I’ll answer your questions.”
She obeyed him, chugging the shot down in one long swallow. Good girl.
A touch of color came back to her face.
He drained his own glass and put it on the table, then moved his chair and sat down right across from her, their knees touching, holding her hands in his.
“Grace.” He waited a second, to make sure he had her full attention. By sheer willpower he managed not to wince at the expression on her face.
This was not her world. She was as lost as if she had just landed on an airless, lightless planet and been attacked by wolves. She watched his face carefully, instinctively understanding that he was at home on this planet.
“Something bad has happened and unfortunately, you are caught right in the middle of it. Some very dangerous and, above all, very ruthless men are gunning for me and are now gunning for you. You saw what was done to your house, right?”
She nodded, eyes locked on his. He knew she was seeing the coldness in him; he could only hope she was seeing the regret.
“They wouldn’t hesitate to do that to you. Slowly. As a way to get to me. I will keep you safe, I promise. But you must do as I say and you must stay in a fortified perimeter where I can protect you, which right now is this place. Access is by a code very few people know, and they are people I trust. Guards are posted outside at all times. The windows are bullet-resistant. No one can get to you here, trust me, but you’re going to have to stay put. You can’t go to Feinstein’s memorial service, you can’t go home, you can’t go to any friends. As a matter of fact, until I start straightening this situation out, you can’t leave this building. I wish with all my heart that things could be different, but they aren’t. All I can say is that I will try to make you as comfortable as possible. I have staff on call twenty-four/seven, and all you have to do is express a wish and it’s yours, as long as it doesn’t involve you going out.”
“I’m—I’m a prisoner?”
Damn. Yes, she was, but he didn’t want her to think of herself in that way.
He brought her hand to his mouth and planted a soft kiss on her palm. Shocked and scared as she was, the pulse in her throat speeded up a little.
Thank God. Just as soon as was humanly possible, he was going to start fucking her, binding her to him with sex. He was going to get into her and stay in her as long as he could, until they breathed the same air, until their hearts beat together, until it would be unthinkable for her to leave his side.
“I want you to think of the outside world as a prison, Grace. And in here you can do exactly as you please. In fact—” Drake reached out to the intercom and waited for Shota’s voice.
“Sir?”
“Shota, besides the other things I told you to buy tomorrow morning, I want to add art supplies.”
“Sir?” Shota sounded resigned.
Drake watched Grace. “Art supplies. Everything a painter might need.” Which was what? He floundered. “Ah, oil colors, watercolors, a complete range, ah—” Fuck, what were they called? “Canvases and the…thing they’re placed on.” He looked at Grace, eyebrows lifted.
“Easel,” she said softly.
“Easel. Listen, just ask the owner to give you something of everything. Find out who the best supplier in town is, only not—” He leaned forward to her. “Where do you regularly buy your supplies?”
“Cellini’s, on Broadway.”
“Not Cellini’s on Broadway. Stay away from there. Find out who is next best and go there. I want everything here by eleven tomorrow morning.”
“Yessir.”
Drake broke the connection.
Grace was sitting straighter in her chair, looking a little less like a truck had run over her. His respect for her went up another notch.
“I’ll pay you back, Drake. I don’t have my checkbook with me, it was in my purse, but I’ll—”
Drake put a finger over her lips, horrified. “Stop. Please stop. Don’t even think it. I’m the reason this is happening to you. All I’m trying to do is make you as comfortable here as possible.”
“Okay.” She drew in a deep breath. “I understand that I stepped into the middle of some kind of—hostile takeover.” She gave a little laugh that turned wobbly. She bit her lips and waited a second for control. “Very hostile. But I don’t understand why I’m involved. Why do they feel that somehow they can get to you through me? I’m nothing to you. I just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. So why trash my house? Slash my paintings? What difference could that possibly make to you?”
Okay.
Drake had been hoping to put this moment off to when she was feeling better, when the adrenaline had worked its way out of her system and she wasn’t shaking. To when she could be wearing clothes of her own and not his and was feeling less of a refugee from her own life.
But what you want and what must be are two entirely different things. Drake understood that down to the bone.
“Words aren’t enough,” he said, rising from the chair. He put a hand on her elbow and lifted her gently up. “I must show you. Come with me.”
They walked in silence down the long hall. Drake thought briefly about somehow preparing her, but dismissed the idea immediately. It wasn’t a moment for words.
His study was at the end of the long, wide hall, essentially across the entire footprint of the building. It took them minutes to get there. They walked in silence, Drake utterly conscious of her hand in his, of her presence at his side.
She was making no bones of her curiosity, twisting her head left and right, noting the furniture, the rugs, the tapestries.
Drake wondered what she thought of his home. It was as far from the current New York style as possible. He liked color, soft fabrics, fine antiques, rugs. He often thought that perhaps he had Mongol or Tartar blood in him, since he always set up households that looked like caravanserais.
He stopped outside the door to his study. His inner sanctum.
Drake looked down at Grace, standing quietly in front of the door. She seemed to understand that he needed a moment to gather himself, and though she must have been quivering with anxiety to discover what lay behind it, she stood and let him take his time.
He could see long lashes, the curve of a high cheekbone, lush mouth slightly downturned. Beauty and grace. Courage, even.
A woman of great worth. He’d never thought to see her outside this door.
Drake reached out to the door, a beautiful mahogany veneer over stainless steel, and touched a small glass panel. He pressed his thumb against it; a bright green light flashed, and with a soft whirring sound, the door slid into the wall.
Grace watched the door disappear and then looked up at him for permission to enter. The door framed darkness that had a cavernous feel to it. It was the largest room in the apartment and the darkness inside was dense and black.
It had to be done.
Drake pushed gently at her back and reaching to the side, flipped the light switch of the chandeliers. There were three of them, from Murano, and they made the room and its contents glow.
Beside him, Grace gasped. He tightened his grip on her elbow as her knees buckled.
Eight
Enrique Cordero lived in Crown Heights, home of the Bloods. Cordero had come up out of the gang to form his own, a professional organization a million miles above the heads of the street gangs, though he used some of the old gang members now and again.
He hadn’t used the excitable young punks forming the Bloods to get Drake, but he might as well have, for all the good they’d done.
Fucking amateurs.
Rutskoi had worked up a good head of steam by the time he made it to Cordero’s home. Compound, really. Thirty thousand square feet of what looked like a Mexican adobe hacienda plunked down five thousand miles north in a more unforgiving climate. The compound was surrounded by concrete walls two feet thick, with only one way in—a set of big featureless steel doors set in the wall farthest from the street. You had to drive all the way around, being tracked by surveillance cameras every inch of the way, and announce yourself to the monitor.
Cordero’s gatekeeper hesitated just long enough to be insulting, making Rutskoi wait a full five minutes. Finally, Rutskoi heard the loud metallic click of the gate’s electronic lock disengaging. The big steel gates slowly swung open and Rutskoi drove his rental straight in.
The Dangerous Boxed Set Page 40