Jade Island

by Elizabeth Lowell

  Three men stared at her with a combination of shock and automatic male lust.

  A red tube dress hugged Lianne like a hungry lover. Long sleeves and a V neck called attention to the shape of her breasts. The skirt cupped her rear and barely teased the top of her thighs. Smoky stockings made a long, sexy mystery of her legs. Faith’s deft touch with makeup turned Lianne’s eyes into a tawny challenge and gave an X-rated pout to her lips. She flipped back her curly, shoulder-length, frosted bronze hair, put one dagger-nailed hand on her hip, and said, “Ready when you are.”

  “Holy Christ,” Kyle murmured. “That’s the last time you go shopping with my sisters.”

  “You don’t like the color?” Lianne asked innocently. “It matches my nails.”

  “There’s more of it on your nails than on you! Where’s the rest of the outfit?”

  “What are you talking about? This is it.”

  “Wrong. You forgot the skirt.”

  “Quit bitching,” Archer said, smiling as he looked Lianne over thoroughly. “She’s supposed to be my date, not yours.”

  “That’s what worries me,” Kyle said sourly, glaring at his brother.

  “Ignore him,” Archer said, holding out his arm to Lianne. “I think you look good enough to eat. Twice.”

  “That’s it,” Kyle said flatly. “Lianne is sitting in the backseat with me.”

  “What are you complaining about?” Faith asked as she walked up with Honor. “You told us to make her over so that her own family wouldn’t recognize her. We did. So put a sock in the rant and get going.”

  “You tell him,” Honor said. And privately wished that Faith would show half as much sass with Tony. The man led her around like a poodle on a pink leash.

  “Is Johnny here?” Lianne asked.

  “Waiting in the lobby,” Archer said. “Let’s go.”

  As Archer’s Mercedes pulled up to the Tang compound, light the color of Lianne’s dress spilled across the sky. Johnny got out, spoke into the gate microphone, and climbed back in next to the driver. As he did, he glanced at the siren in the backseat and shook his head. Even at sixteen, Anna hadn’t looked like that.

  “Wen will see me in the family quarters,” Johnny said. “I told him that I was taking the Donovan brothers to dinner in Chinatown, that you were staying in Vancouver for a few days, and that you had made overtures on the subject of jade trading. Wen suggested a tour of the Tang vault, but it seems that Daniel is out on a date tonight. Wen’s hands aren’t up to opening the main vault door, and nobody else in the house knows the combination.”

  “That will make it easier,” Archer said. “Unless he wants to see us along with you?”

  “No. Daniel told me the exact truth. Wen hasn’t left his bed for three days.”

  “How ill is he?” Lianne asked tightly.

  “Not ill. Just old. Exhausted. This…all of it has been very hard on him.”

  Her chin lifted. “Go to him. I’ll take Kyle and Archer to the vault.”

  No servants hovered in the kitchen. None were in the long hall leading to the vault wing of the compound. Lianne hadn’t expected any. After five P.M., the servants went home to their rooms above Chinatown’s shops and restaurants, or to one of the old apartment buildings where three families lived in space designed for one.

  The men’s footsteps and the click of Lianne’s five-inch heels were the only sounds in the long hall. Kyle had a hard time taking his eyes off the twitch and sway of her butt. The short coat she wore left too much to the imagination.

  And not enough.

  Despite Lianne’s distracting costume, Kyle made a low sound of appreciation when he saw the elegant jade screen that concealed the vault door. “I know museums that would commit grand theft to get their hands on a piece like that.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time museums accepted stolen goods,” Lianne said dryly. She bent over the dial on the old vault door. “Every time another Old Master goes on display, some grandchild of World War Two claims that Hitler stole it from their family.”

  “Chances are he did,” Archer said, watching Lianne spin the dial once, twice.

  “Of course. But at what point do you say the statute has run out? One generation? Two? A century? Never? Pretty soon we’ll be in the position Hong Kong—damn,” she muttered and started over again on the combination. “We’ll be in the position Hong Kong was when it reverted to China. Businesses, collectors, owners of all kinds of Chinese artifacts simply packed them up and shipped them to Vancouver or Seattle, San Francisco or L.A. or New York. Anywhere the mainland Chinese and their new rules couldn’t confiscate them.”

  Frowning, Lianne fiddled yet again with the dial. “Incredible cultural treasures are simply gone, in hiding, because the rules of the game of provenance changed.” She looked up. “Like now. Somebody has changed the rules. Or in this case, the combination.”

  “Excuse me,” Archer said, gently pushing Lianne aside.

  “Get out of his way, sweetheart,” Kyle said. “This is why I let him come along.”

  Perplexed, she watched Archer reach into his jacket and pull out what looked like a very small tape player with earplugs attached. He tucked the plugs into his ears and pressed the box onto the vault door, near the dial. Eyes closed, face intent, he bent over the dial like a man over a lover, closing out everything else, living only for the next motion, the next sound, the next soft stirring that would tell him that his lover was responding.

  In the silence, even Lianne’s hushed breathing sounded loud. Archer caressed the dial with small movements of his fingertips, listening, listening, listening for the tiny noise that came when a tumbler fell into place and it was time for him to turn the dial the other way, find another number, another tumbler, and then another, until the last secret was known.

  Ten minutes later the vault door softly opened.

  “And I thought you were just another pretty face,” Lianne said to his back.

  “Live and learn.” Archer wiped off the dial with a clean handkerchief. “After you, Lianne.”

  She looked at the Donovan brothers, one light, one dark, both alike in all the ways that mattered. “You two should come with a government warning label.”

  “Innocent until proven guilty,” Kyle said. “Right, brother?”

  “Yeah.”

  Kyle nudged her into the vault. Archer was on their heels. As soon as they were inside, Lianne pulled the heavy door shut and turned on the light. Kyle took one look at the white jade bowl sitting on the small mahogany table, let out a reverent oath, and went closer.

  “Don’t touch anything,” Archer warned.

  “Suck eggs,” Kyle said absently. Hands in his pockets, he circled the table, devouring the bowl with his eyes.

  Lianne walked quickly to the small room that held Wen’s greatest prize. As always, the door was locked. She looked at the dial suspiciously, then at Archer. “I may need you again.”

  “I’ll be right here, wiping Kyle’s drool marks off the merchandise.”

  With fingers that were cold despite the warmth inside the vault, Lianne began turning the dial. She worked carefully, then let out a relieved sigh when the lock clicked open. As always, the door itself was stubborn. She tugged at it once, then again, harder.

  “Let me,” Kyle said, reaching past her.

  The door opened with a grumble, as though awakened from sleep. Holding her breath without realizing it, terrified that she would see only emptiness, Lianne reached in and turned on the light.

  A stone shroud lay on top of the coffin-sized table: motionless shades of green, the muted flash of gold threads beneath the overhead light.

  “Well?” Kyle asked.

  “It’s not Wen’s,” Lianne said simply.

  “How good is it?” Archer asked.

  “It’s perfect,” she said on a rush of breath. “Just plain perfect.”

  Kyle smiled like a wolf. “I’ll get the suitcases.”

  Lianne watched Jake, Kyle, and Archer
stow the last of the heavy suitcases aboard Kyle’s boat, which was chuckling and rumbling with power as the big engine warmed. All twenty-seven feet of the Tomorrow rocked and tugged at the lines tying it to the dock below Kyle’s cottage, which stood on a bluff. Strapped on top of the boat’s white cabin, overhanging at both ends, a Zodiac lay facedown. The inflatable boat was blacker than the night.

  The moon hadn’t yet risen. Nothing brightened the dense lid of clouds except for two distant, separate glows where the city lights of Victoria and Vancouver bounced off the bottom of the clouds. The strait was a dark, subtly shimmering presence alive with the rush of wind.

  There were no other boats at the dock, no other houses nearby. Kyle had chosen the cabin for two things: solitude and the private dock. It wasn’t the first time that both had come in handy.

  He stepped up out of the boat to the dock beside Lianne. He used only the colored reflections of the boat’s running lights to find his way. No one had turned on the Tomorrow’s cabin lights. No one would. If anyone really wanted to see, there were night-vision goggles aboard.

  Putting an arm around Lianne’s waist, Kyle turned her toward him and tipped her face up to his. A ribbon of wind curled around them, bringing with it the scent of fir trees and the sea.

  “You don’t have to do this,” he said quietly.

  “I’m going. Nothing you can say or do will change my mind.”

  “I know,” he whispered. “Damn it, I know.”

  He bent and kissed her, ignoring the stiffness that only slowly loosened beneath his caressing mouth.

  But loosen it did. No matter how many times Lianne told herself that all she and Kyle had going was hot sex and cold business, she couldn’t help responding to him. Adrenaline, nerves, plain old hormones, whatever. She didn’t know. Right now, she didn’t really care. She was hungry for him in ways she didn’t even want to think about.

  The intensity of her emotions frightened her more than anything else that had happened so far.

  “You’re shivering,” Kyle said. He breathed warmth across Lianne’s temples, her eyelids, her lips, her stubborn chin. “Do you want my jacket?”

  She shook her head. Once she had changed out of the little red stretch dress and put on real clothes, she had warmed quickly enough.

  “Scared?” he asked.

  “About tomorrow? No.”

  “Then what?”

  “It doesn’t matter. This will all be over soon. And then…then it won’t matter. I’ll go back to my business and you’ll go back to yours.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Business,” she whispered. “Just business, that’s all.”

  Archer’s voice rose from the stern of the boat. “We’re at operating temperature. Jake says if we don’t leave pretty quick, we’ll run into some real chop in the passes.”

  “I’m ready,” Lianne said.

  Kyle started to hand her down into the stern well, but she pulled away from him, slipping like warm water through his fingers, leaving him cold. She went into the boat cabin without looking back to see if he was following.

  Anger and an uneasy chill curled along Kyle’s spine. Something was wrong. Not with the jade or tomorrow’s dicey raid on Farmer Island, but with Lianne herself. She was acting as though she couldn’t wait to say good-bye to him.

  It doesn’t matter. This will all be over soon. And then…then it won’t matter.

  He wanted to go after her and find out what the hell was going on in her quick, intensely intelligent, maddeningly female brain, but he didn’t. Jake was right. They had to get going or they would hit wind against an ebbing tide in some of the passes. In terms of speed, it didn’t matter; the SeaSport had plenty of power to outmuscle the tide. But if they got caught in razor waves, it would be a nasty bitch of a ride.

  Kyle bent down and began undoing the Tomorrow’s lines. Voices floated out from the open door of the cabin.

  “How long will it take to get to Jade Island?” Lianne asked Jake. He was standing in the aisle, calling up a program on Kyle’s electronic chart plotter.

  “Depends on what the water is like in the passes,” Jake said, “and if the wind stays below fifteen knots.” He punched another button on the plotter. “But unless it really sucks, we should anchor at Jade Island in time to get a decent night’s sleep.”

  “Speak for yourself,” Archer said. “I lost the toss for the bed. Such as it is.”

  “Yeah,” Jake said, looking at the dinette, which converted into a bed of sorts. “Even if I sleep fetally, it will be a crunch.”

  “You can always sleep up in the notch with me,” Archer offered. “Kyle said it was kind of comfortable.”

  “The last time Kyle camped out on Jade Island,” Jake retorted, “he was wounded and half out of his mind with dehydration. I’ve seen the little ravine where he hid. If it rains, you’ll be up to your ears in runoff.”

  “Maybe I’ll just cut to the chase and sleep in my wet suit,” Archer said.

  The sound of the engine changed as Kyle throttled it down to idle. Archer stuck his head out the cabin door. Kyle was standing at the aft station, his hand on the gas lever.

  “Want me to get the lines?” Archer asked.

  “I got them,” Kyle said. “Sit at the forward helm. I’ll be along as soon as we’re clear of the cove.”

  The dock began to fall away as Kyle eased the Tomorrow backward, turned, and put her bow toward Thatcher Pass.

  “Take it,” he called to Archer.

  “I’ve got the helm,” Archer answered.

  While Kyle came forward and closed the door, Archer took the speed up to about fourteen knots. The boat could easily have done twice that, but there was no need. Too many logs, deadheads, and clumps of seaweed floated around the waters of the San Juan Islands for anyone to race off in the dark unless it was really necessary. Since no one was shooting at them, fourteen knots was plenty of speed.

  Lianne pressed against the built-in dinette table to let Kyle pass by in the narrow, sunken aisle that ran from the rear of the cabin to the V berth. But instead of passing by her, he stopped, pinning her between the hard table and his equally hard body. His hands shot forward and gripped the edge of the table, caging her, cutting off any possibility that she could move aside.

  She could barely breathe as she stared up at him. Rain spattered across the windows. Running lights turned the rain into melting green-and-red gems. His eyes glittered like shards of ice with slices of colored shadows caught between the sharp edges.

  “I don’t know what’s gnawing on you,” he said flatly, “but it will have to wait until we’re finished getting Uncle off our backs. Understood?”

  “No problem,” she said, her lips stiff.

  He just looked at her. “I don’t believe you.”

  “You think I can’t hold up my end of this?”

  “You can do whatever you put your stubborn mind to,” Kyle said in a low voice. “What worries me is what might be going on in what passes for your brain.”

  “Kyle,” Archer said. “Is the back eddy along the point still loaded with trash from the high tide?”

  “Yes. Want me to take the helm?” Kyle asked without taking his eyes off Lianne.

  “Good idea. It will give you something to do besides intimidate our jade expert.”

  “Our? I hate to break it to you, brother dear, but Lianne isn’t ours. She’s mine.”

  Archer glanced over his shoulder. “Only if she wants to be. Right now, she looks like what she wants is to kick you in the balls.”

  “Save it,” Jake said before Kyle could retort. “I’ve got better things to do than bruise my knuckles on you two hardheads. Hell, Archer, you know better than to pick a fight with a team member at this point.”

  “Yes,” Archer said. “But apparently Kyle doesn’t.”

  “What do you mean?” Kyle snarled. “I wasn’t the one talking about—”

  “You were baiting Lianne,” Archer interrupted. “Like it
or not, she’s a member of our team. Ours, little brother. Not yours.”

  Kyle hissed a searing word and brushed past Lianne to take the helm. Before he got there, Archer crossed the aisle to the pilot seat and settled in next to Jake. Their wide shoulders overlapped, but otherwise the bench seat was quite comfortable.

  Lianne let out a quiet breath and stepped up to one of the bench seats along the dinette. Kyle was too quick, too accurate in his reading of her. No sooner did she try to put some distance between them than he reached out and dragged her back.

  It’s business. Just business.

  Only for her, it went deeper than business, deeper than lust. She was in danger of giving too much of herself to a man who didn’t want anything more than sex. Closing her eyes, she wondered if she had been born to be stupid about men or if it was something she had perfected in the past thirty years.

  Lianne folded her arms on the table, laid her head on them, and listened to the masculine rumble of voices discussing the weather, the water, and the occasional tugboat passing in the night. Gradually the subdued, muscular growl of the engine overcame the voices. She slept, but her dreams were fitful swirls of jade and accusations, fear and the black heart of an approaching storm.

  “Is it time to go ashore?” Lianne asked, her voice foggy from sleep.

  “No,” Kyle said. “It’s time to go to bed.”

  Before she could argue, he lifted her out of the dinette nook, put her on her feet, and half guided, half pushed her toward the bow. Behind him, Jake started muscling the table off its pedestal so that he could make up his bed.

  “Watch your head,” Kyle said.

  Even with the warning, Lianne bumped her forehead as she stepped down into the V berth. She was so sleepy she didn’t care. She just peeled off her shoes, jacket, and jeans and crawled beneath the specially made, V-shaped blanket.

  Kyle stripped off everything and crawled in next to her.

  “What are you—” she began.

  “Scoot over,” he said.

  Lianne moved so far away from him that the blanket couldn’t cover her, but even that wasn’t far enough. Although plenty wide at one end, the pie-shaped bed didn’t leave a lot of room for privacy at the other. The section of foam mattress she was lying on gave beneath Kyle’s weight as he settled into the bed. Searching fingers of cold, damp air slid under the blanket.