by LETO, JULIE
His brother. The realization still boggled his mind. To find one sibling, Michael, had been an unexpected surprise. To find a second stunned him to his core.
“Dios mio,” he said, realizing that he and Lucienne had just made love without protection. “What if you’re pregnant?”
“What?” she asked, then laughed. “I’m a big girl, Alex. I know all about birth control.”
“Good,” he said, only half relieved. “But…what if you’re pregnant…someday?”
There was so much he didn’t know about Lucienne. Likely, there was much she’d yet to discover about herself. His good sense told him he should go slowly and resist the urge to push her. But then, with Lucienne, his good sense rarely won over his gut instinct.
She took his hand and splayed it over her flat belly. “I’ve never in my life thought about having children. How could I, when my parents did such a shitty job? But you know, if I did get pregnant, you’d be a fabulous father.”
“Ramon wasn’t.”
“He was to Michael. And anyway, you’re not Ramon. You’re Alejandro Aguilar of the House of Aguilar,” she said, sounding entirely respectful, impressed and, if he wasn’t mistaken, a little turned on.
If he hadn’t been satiated and exhausted, he might have puffed up a little.
“And, in the American tradition, you will be Lucienne Aguilar,” he said.
Part of him expected her to object, but instead, she scooted even closer and wrapped his arms tighter around her middle.
“That’s a name I think I can live with,” she said with a sigh.
“Forever?” he asked.
She twisted until they were body to body, their arms and legs entwined, her breasts pressed tight against his chest. “If you’re game, for the rest of our lives.”
He kissed her until they were both out of breath, then he took her right hand in his and circled her finger with his tongue while he imagined the precise size and shape of the diamond he intended to put there at the first opportunity.
“To the ultimate adventure. You and me, together.”
Epilogue
MICHAEL TRIED not to be annoyed, but it was damned hard to fight his gag reflex while Lucienne and Alex sat so close together in the interrogation room that they might as well have been sitting on the same damned chair.
He glanced down at his father’s ring and smirked. When he was selling his brother on the legend, he hadn’t believed all the nonsense. He’d only been thankful for whatever inspiration had caused his dad to transform from a notorious conman to a devoted husband and father. When Ramon had professed his belief that his ancestor’s ring could change a man for the better, Michael had humored him.
But he hadn’t really believed it.
However, looking at Alex got him to wondering.
The overeducated, pampered prince of an influential Spanish family had not only successfully broken into Lucienne’s secured apartment without alerting the police he’d had watching the place, he’d also escaped two direct threats on his life. And he’d won the girl. And since the girl had spent the majority of her life selling illegally acquired artifacts to some of the most ruthless collectors in the black market, she was a danger in and of herself.
And yet Alex had her giggling like a high school cheerleader.
“Sickening, huh?”
Since he hadn’t wanted to be cooped up with the love-birds on his own until Danny arrived, he’d asked Ruby to tag along. She would wait outside once his incarcerated brother showed up, but for now, she was having a good time taunting him about Alex and Lucienne’s new relationship.
“Hey, if they found their bliss, more power to them,” Michael said, struggling to be sincere.
“So I guess the ring’s magic worked.”
He shoved his hand into his pocket. “The ring isn’t magical.”
“So you say,” Ruby argued. “Looks like it did a number on them. I wonder what it’ll do for you.”
“I’m only wearing it to keep it safe.”
“You could lock it up in a bank vault,” she said.
“Pop didn’t want it locked up. Least I can do is wear it myself, now that Alex claims threats of robbery are cramping his style.”
The two men who had attacked Lucienne and Alex at her apartment had been apprehended. But neither Jimmy the Rim nor Baxter Jones seemed to know precisely who’d hired them to retrieve the ring from Lucienne. Until they mined their way through the twisted connections of the criminal underworld, the danger of another attack remained.
“You have a death wish,” Ruby said.
“I just want to protect what’s mine. Nothing wrong with that.”
Ruby eyed him carefully, and for a moment, it was as if she was looking at him for the first time.
“What?” he challenged.
But before she could answer, the locked door buzzed open and Danny came in, flanked by his new lawyer and a guard who released the prisoner’s shackles. Ruby left and the attorney, after a nod from Alex, exited as well.
Danny stood just inside the doorway, rubbing his wrists warily until Lucienne threw her arms around his neck and squeezed him so hard he nearly lost his balance.
“Easy, Luce. You’re going to squeeze the life out of me.”
When she stepped back, her expression was fierce. “Better me than someone else. What the hell is going on, Danny? I want the whole story this time.”
She jammed her hands onto her hips. With a chastised look that shaved a layer of toughness off Danny’s face, he glanced at Michael as if for help.
“Don’t look at me,” Michael said. “I want to know everything, too.”
Alex came up behind his new lover and eased his hands around her waist. “I’ve found, mi hermano, that it’s best not to argue with a woman like Lucienne.”
“Lucienne is it now?” Danny said, a brow arched.
“Yes,” she shot back. “You have a problem with that?”
“Luce, you can be whoever you want to be. Maybe it’s better if you run off to Spain with Alejandro until all this is settled.”
“We’re not going anywhere,” Alejandro said. “Not until you are free from this place.”
Danny shifted from foot to foot, then nodded toward the metal table in the center of the room. They each took a seat, and for an instant, Michael wondered what it might feel like to share a meal with these people—his family.
Danny’s face was battered, but still good-looking. Like Ramon and Alejandro, he had a dark, olive complexion and jet-black hair. Like Michael, who’d inherited his blue eyes from his mother, Danny’s irises were light, albeit green. He looked thinner than the last time Michael had seen him, but healthier, especially since the bruises he’d been accumulating had finally started to fade.
“Alex’s lawyer is top-notch,” Danny announced. “He’s already found out that some of the evidence used to get me locked up is missing. The district attorney’s office is flailing. And the security guard woke up two days ago. They think he’s going to recover.”
“So there’s a good chance you’ll be out soon?” Lu cienne asked hopefully.
Danny shrugged. He probably didn’t want to get his hopes up, but Michael knew this was good news. If the attorney could break down the DA’s case prior to trial and the murder charges were off the table, they might drop the matter altogether.
“That’s all fine, but it doesn’t explain how you got into this mess in the first place,” Michael said.
Danny leaned forward. Alex, Lucienne and Michael all followed suit. The room was secure, but none of them wanted to take any chances. “A couple of months ago, I had a collector contact me, wanted me to procure a certain item for him.”
“What kind of item?” Michael asked.
“A statue. Gold. Heavy as hell, though it wasn’t big. Seven inches in height, about four inches at the widest part.” He gestured with his hands to describe the piece.
“Who owned it?”
“Private collection in one of those ol
d Hollywood mansions. There wasn’t even supposed to be a security guard there. I’d cased the joint for two weeks.”
“You think someone tipped off the owners?”
Danny shook his head. “I don’t know, but I’m telling you this much—I didn’t get within five feet of the statue before the cops swarmed the place. When the lights came up, the guard was unconscious on the floor and he was holding the statue. The police took it as evidence.”
“Why was it so valuable?” Lucienne asked.
“No idea. The guy needed me to lift it quick, so I didn’t do much research beyond figuring out how to get in and out. After my arrest, my cell mate got swapped out for some big dude with a message for me. The collector was pissed I’d screwed up with the statue. It was locked up in an evidence locker and he wanted his money’s worth. He wanted Ramon’s ring instead.”
Lucienne sat back, her face twisted in confusion. “A statue made of solid gold, of the size and shape you described, would be worth a lot more than the ring, even if the ring’s history was common knowledge—which it’s not, right?”
Michael ran his hand through his hair. “No way. Pop was supersecretive about the ring’s history. I knew. My mother knew, but she’d never tell anyone. He didn’t want anyone but family to know.”
“But this collector,” Alex asked. “He knew the ring’s story?”
“He never said,” Danny answered. “I didn’t even know the story until Alex told me. Load of crap as far as I’m concerned, but it might explain why someone thinks it’s so valuable.”
Lucienne entwined her arm with Alex’s and leaned her head on his shoulder. Michael watched Danny for any sign that he did not approve of this romance between his adopted sister with his newly found brother, but he saw nothing but a warm smile his brother tried—very unsuccessfully—to hide.
“We got the name of the collector from the stooges he sent after Alex,” Michael said. “But the guy doesn’t exist.”
Danny chuckled. “Of course he doesn’t. I don’t think he ever wanted that statue. He was setting me up so I’d send someone after the ring. Probably figured that as long as an FBI agent had it, he couldn’t get near it. Not unless he had an inside track through a family member.”
“So you’re acknowledging that we’re family now?” Michael asked, surprised.
“Are you?” Danny shot back.
“Neither one of you have a choice,” Alex declared, and for the first time, Michael understood what it meant to have an older brother whose word was law.
Michael didn’t want to argue the point anyway. He disapproved of Danny’s choices, but little by little, he was starting to understand what had pushed him down this road. He hadn’t had a family to keep him out of trouble.
Until now.
“I’ll see what I can do about finding this collector,” Michael said.
“No,” Danny insisted. “This is my fight. When I’m out, I’ll deal with him myself.”
“Or he’ll deal with you,” Lucienne countered. “Maybe with a single gunshot to the head?”
“He doesn’t want me dead,” Danny argued. “He wants the ring. My lawyer thinks he’ll have me sprung in no time. So you’ll just have to keep it safe and watch your back until I’m out of this joint.”
Michael chuckled and tried not to imagine the trouble his brother might get into if he played vigilante. “You’re a thief, not an enforcer. Looks like I’m heading out to Louisiana soon for a case. When I get back, we’ll work together to find out who’s after Pop’s legacy.”
“Our legacy,” Alejandro corrected.
He reached across the table and slapped his hand over Michael’s. With a girlish laugh, Lucienne slipped her hand atop his, then eyed Danny pointedly. With a groan, he joined the pile-on, but only for a split second before he tore away from the table and pounded on the door so his lawyer and the guard would return.
“Take good care of my sister,” he said to Alex while the guard reattached his handcuffs.
“Sister-in-law,” their older brother amended. “Soon, at any rate.”
“Yeah, well, wait until I’m out to marry her, okay? Someone’s gotta walk her down the aisle.”
In his lifetime, Michael never would have imagined that Danny was so sentimental. But then, he never would have imagined that less than a year after his father’s untimely death, he’d have more brothers than he knew what to do with and soon a sister-in-law to boot.
Their lives were changing—irrevocably and with lightning speed. And as he looked down at his father’s ring, he couldn’t help but wonder if the bandit’s influence had something to do with it.
EXPOSED
1
“HEY, SWEET THING. Wanna lift?”
Ariana Karas swung her pack securely over her shoulder, ducking her head so the tube of architectural plans shoved inside didn’t knock off her lucky hat. She secured the Greek fisherman’s cap by pressing the brim firmly over her dark bangs and stepped onto the Powell-Hyde cable car for her ride back to the restaurant. She flashed a weary grin at Benny, the sixty-something brakeman who flirted with her on a nightly basis, just enough to make her smile—even tonight.
“Sweet thing?” she asked, eyebrow cocked. “I should be offended, Benny.” She produced her transit slip.
Benny rubbed his bearded jowl and laughed. He released the lever and tweaked the bell, setting the car—empty except for her in the front and a group of chilled tourists riding inside—in motion up Powell Street toward Fisherman’s Wharf.
“Heaven help me if I ever offend you, Miss Karas. That tube you’ve been carting from the restaurant to Market Street for the past few months would end up whacked upside my head.”
Ariana laughed silently, wondering how Benny and everyone else in the world could ever get the idea that she was so tough. Sure, she talked a good game to keep her rowdy bar patrons in line or to ward off the aggressive transients that sometimes hung around in front of the restaurant, but on nights like tonight, Ariana relived all the uncertainty she’d felt when she’d left home, young and starved for independence. Against the wishes of her entire family—grandparents, father, mother, two brothers and two sisters—she’d packed up and moved across the country from Tarpon Springs, Florida, to San Francisco, California. She’d had a degree in accounting from the local junior college and little knowledge of the world outside her tight-knit Greek community.
But she’d also had dreams taller and wider than the Golden Gate Bridge. She’d wanted to be her own woman, make her own dreams come true—on her terms and with few debts owed to anyone when her lifetime of fantasies became reality.
Eight years had passed. And tonight, three years of marriage, one divorce and five years of fourteen-hour days later, she was one week away from seeing her dream begin. Starting tomorrow afternoon, the restaurant she operated would be closed for business for the first time since her uncle had turned management duties over to her. When the remodeling was done and she reopened, she’d have a large, airy, modern space to serve locals and tourists alike. Customers would line up to taste her eclectic blend of hearty Greek and Italian foods and sip original libations in her signature bar.
She’d call it Ari’s Oasis.
She’d worked so long, so hard to compete with the other operations on the Wharf, some of which had been serving food to San Francisco since the turn of the century. Her uncle inherited the building from her aunt Sonia’s family, fishermen who used to sell their catch from makeshift carts. The permanent structure had evolved over the years, but the crisp, white-paneled walls, quaint fishing nets strung from the ceiling and red checkerboard tablecloths, while homey, were showing their age. Even Uncle Stefano knew the time for change had come. But he enjoyed sipping strong Turkish coffee in the mornings and ouzo in the evenings with customers more than supervising the menu or balancing the books.
Ariana had left home specifically to work for Stefano and Sonia, in hopes of inheriting the business from her childless relatives. Marriage to Rick got in
the way. But soon after Ariana found herself divorced and jobless, she’d accepted Stefano’s offer to take over. In record time, she’d put the restaurant in the black and on the map, and had secured financing for much-needed renovations. She’d even approved every blue pencil mark on the prints she carried in her pack.
Now she had seven days—the contractors wouldn’t arrive until a week from Monday—to clear out the place before they started knocking down walls. Since Uncle Stefano insisted that he supervise the moving of the equipment and furniture into storage, he ordered Ariana to take the week off—her first real vacation since she moved to California—to rejuvenate before her life descended into complete turmoil.
And who was she to argue? Stefano had a way of making his rare commands sound like sweet talk—a skill he’d developed to deal with his loving but willful wife. A woman Ari reminded him of, judging by the times he called her Sonia, particularly during a disagreement. Ari swallowed a bittersweet smile.
Sonia’s death and Ari’s divorce had been strong catalysts to her single-minded pursuit of success for the restaurant. She’d worked tirelessly for five years. But now she really needed a break. For herself. For her sanity.
The cable car rattled and shook as it moved uphill, a familiar buzzing hum beneath her feet and a crisp San Francisco night chilling her cheeks. The fog was rolling in late tonight. Fingers of smoky moisture twirled toward them from the Bay. But over her shoulder the scene was clear—the glittering, neon and historic charm that was San Francisco.
The cable car paused between the intersections at Geary and Powell, then shrugged forward when no one jumped aboard at Union Square. The main cable car traffic at this time of night was on the return trip, from the Wharf to the hotels at Market Street and stops along the way. At least, that’s what she’d heard.