Billionaires Prefer Blondes

by Suzanne Enoch

  “The flight landed at seven this morning, sir.”

  “Rick, please. Did Sarah arrange a place for you to stay?”

  “She wasn’t certain how long you would be in town. I left my luggage with your butler until I could—”

  “We’ll put you in the guest room,” Richard decided. “We should only be in New York for another week or so.” Barring disaster, that was. “You’ll have considerably more space in Palm Beach.”

  “If I might ask, the lady, Miss Jellicoe, is she…I mean to say, is there anything I need to know in order to perform my duties?”

  “It is very unlikely that Samantha will tackle you again.” Rick stifled a grin. “We had a break-in a few days ago, as you may have heard. We’ve been a bit jumpy.” Technically, they’d had three break-ins, all apparently perpetrated by the same man, but that wasn’t for public dissemination.

  “I see, sir—Rick. Of course. I should have announced my presence, but I…presumed you were occupied.”

  Yes, in the room right next door. Rick returned to the paperwork. If Stillwell had overheard part of his conversation with Samantha, that could explain the fellow’s haste in trying to exit the office, and his visible nervousness now. On the other hand, John might have heard the sex, or he could be suffering from first-day job jitters. While Richard had never been excessively paranoid, with Sam in his life it would be crazier not to be a little cautious and careful.

  “I should bring you up to speed for today,” he continued. He sized up opponents for a living; he would assess Stillwell in the same way. “I have a price—eighty-seven million. What I don’t have is a timeline for me to take over operations, or a final agreement from the city on property tax reassessment and tax incentives.”

  “I read up on New York commercial property ownership on the flight over,” Stillwell said.

  “That’s excellent,” Rick returned, “because you’re going to be chairing the meeting. I have another matter to see to this morning.”

  His new assistant blinked. “I beg your pardon, Rick, but I read a book. I’m more than willing to assist, but frankly I’m concerned that I may make more of a muck of it than anything else.”

  “American laws and British laws are for our attorneys, who will be there to advise you. Use them. Right now I want to see what you can negotiate for me. I’ve seen you work, and I need to know whether or not I can rely on you, John. Better to find out now than later.”

  “I…very well. I won’t disappoint you, Rick.”

  Rick looked him in the eye. “I hope not,” he said quietly.

  He handed over the packet to Stillwell and gave him a few suggestions, then had Ben stop the limousine at the front entrance to the building.

  “You have my mobile number if you need to contact me,” he said, as John climbed out of the car. “I’ll be back in an hour or two.”

  “Thank you for the opportunity, Rick.”

  As soon as Stillwell disappeared through the rotating glass doors, Richard sat back again. “Ben, what’s the best place to be seen in Manhattan?”

  “To be seen by whom, sir?”

  “Everyone.”

  “Times Square.”

  “Good. Take me there.”

  It wasn’t much of a plan, but he’d only had the morning to come up with it. And it had worked once before, the first time he’d tried to track down Samantha. He hoped her father was half as smart as she was.

  Ben double-parked the limousine just short of Planet Hollywood. “Sir, are you sure you want to get out here? It’s pretty crowded.”

  “That’s what I want.”

  “But you’ll be mobbed. Do you want me to go with you?”

  “No. Go back to the office.” He grimaced. “But be available for a rescue mission, just in case.”

  “Yes, sir. Good luck.”

  With a deep breath, Richard climbed out of the limousine. He liked privacy. Considering how many people knew of him, he was exceedingly thankful for his high walls and topline security. In Manhattan privacy wasn’t as much of an issue—unless a celebrity appeared somewhere frequented by tourists.

  In his blue Armani suit, dark burgundy shirt, and black tie, he was probably at his most recognizable. And that was what he was counting on.

  It took a minute and a half. Threading his way through the streams of honking taxis, street vendors, and what felt like half a million pedestrians, he strolled in front of the ABC Television Center, figuring that would be a good place to be seen. A group of young ladies two or three years younger than Samantha, all of them dressed as cheerleaders with “Texas Tech” emblazoned across their chests, bounded up around him.

  “You’re Rick Addison, aren’t you?” one of them chirped.

  He gave his photo-op smile. “I am.”

  “I told you!”

  “Oh, can we have our picture taken with you?”

  “Certainly,” he said.

  “What are you doing in New York?”

  “I’m looking into some real estate prop—”

  “Do you know Donald Trump?”

  His smile twitched, and he fixed it again as more tourists crowded to join the cheerleaders. “Yes, I do.”

  “Do you call him ‘The Donald’?”

  “N—”

  “Who cares about Trump?” somebody else said. “Addison’s got more money.”

  “He’s cuter; I know that.”

  For ten minutes he did his least favorite things in the world—he posed for pictures and he signed autographs. The crowd continued to get larger and louder, but at least no one had picked his pocket or trampled him yet.

  A police officer elbowed through the crowd. Now he was getting somewhere. “Everything okay, Mr. Addison?”

  He deepened his smile, and more cameras flashed. “Yes, I’m quite well. It just occurred to me that with all the time I’ve spent in New York, I’ve never walked through Times Square.”

  “Right.” The officer said something into the radio on his shoulder. Across Broadway two mounted police began to clop in their direction. About bloody time. And finally one of the police radio-monitoring news teams scrambled out of the studio behind him.

  “Rick Addison,” the reporter said, pushing her way through the crowd, “what brings you to Times Square?”

  For the camera he repeated what he’d told the police.

  “You had a valuable painting stolen last week. Have the police uncovered any new leads?”

  “No. I have a meeting with Martin, my lawyer, at noon. I imagine he’ll come to my office.”

  The newswoman whose name he couldn’t recall eyed him for a moment, then gave her professional smile again. “What about your girlfriend, Samantha Jellicoe? Is she still considered a person of interest?”

  His task accomplished, Richard let his smile cool. “To me, definitely. As for the police, you’d have to ask them.”

  “Will we be hearing any wedding news from you this year, then?”

  Rick gazed at her. “No comment.”

  There. The piece should run on the eleven o’clock morning news. All he could do now was get back to the office and hope that Martin Jellicoe watched the news as diligently as Samantha did, and that Veittsreig didn’t, or that he wouldn’t make the connection. As for how odd he might look on the broadcast, he was British. That excused quite a bit.

  “Carabiners and climbing rope, check,” Stoney said, jumping back into the passenger seat of the black Jeep Cherokee he’d rented.

  Samantha pulled back into traffic. “This is such a pain,” she grumbled. “If I’d known I would be doing a B and E in New York, I would have brought my own gear.”

  “Am I mistaken, or are you revved about this?”

  “Come on, the other night’s big trick was peanut butter. This is my first real fix in five months. I didn’t give the business up because I didn’t like doing it.”

  Stoney folded his arms across his chest. “Why did you give it up, then? Because if I’m working in a damn office and setting up d
amn security appointments for no good reason, I’m going to be kind of mad.”

  “I gave it up because I had a really long streak of really good luck, and sooner or later it was going to run out. And because three people got killed during the course of my last job.” And because on that last job she’d met someone who for the first time tempted her more than the adrenaline-laced danger of her old life.

  Obviously Stoney knew that last part, too, whether she wanted to talk about it or not, because he snorted as he tossed the equipment onto the back seat. “Head over to Sixty-third. I know a guy who knows a guy, and he should be able to fix you up with an electronic splitter.”

  Her phone rang. Frowning, she checked the number, but all she could tell was that whoever was calling her was doing so from Manhattan. “Hola,” she said, answering.

  “Is that why you encouraged me to date Boyden Locke?” Patricia’s voice came, her fury obvious in the clipped British precision of her speech. “Because you knew you were going to steal from him the next day?”

  “Oh, good gravy. I had nothing to do with it, Patricia. Not everything’s about you.”

  “Why, because it has to be about you?”

  “Hey, you called me.”

  “Because I won’t be pushed around again. I helped you, and this is how you repay my charity. That’s even nastier of you than I’ve come to expect.”

  “The Ex?” Stoney muttered.

  She nodded. One of these days she was going to have a serious discussion with Rick about what had been wrong with him to marry this woman. After all, he was the one who’d brought the Ex into their lives. She certainly wouldn’t have married Patty—but then she had a lower tolerance for bullshit than Rick did. “Setting you up with Boyden was how I repaid your charity. The rest of it is probably just your usual bad luck following you around. Maybe you need an exorcism.”

  “Only to free me from your clutches.”

  Samantha snorted. “I don’t want you anywhere close to my clutches. And I’m kind of busy right n—”

  “Destroying my chances with two men wasn’t enough, was it? You have to set me up so you can knock me down yet again!”

  “You slept around on the one good guy in your life, then married a murderer, and you dated another one. Blame them for crossing me, and blame yourself for being a nutball. I didn’t take anything from Boyden Locke. Goodbye.” She flipped the phone closed. “Now my day is complete.”

  “What’s she blaming you for now?” Stoney asked.

  “I suggested she might like Boyden Locke, so now she thinks that because he got robbed, I’m sabotaging her again.”

  “That is why I never try to fix people up.”

  “Thanks for the support.”

  “Uh-huh. Make a right, if you want to miss the construction up there.”

  Nodding, Samantha signaled and turned right. A blue Lincoln made the same turn two cars behind her. So had a half dozen taxis, though, and when she edged into the next lane over, he didn’t follow.

  “You need to make a right at the next corner,” Stoney pointed out.

  “I will. I’m just playing tourist.” She waited until they were a dozen yards from the light, then cut back into the right lane and made the turn. With a more proper signal and speed, the Lincoln turned, as well.

  “What is it?” her copilot asked, his gaze on the sideview mirror.

  “Me being paranoid, probably. But if it’s one of Gorstein’s guys, I really don’t want to be seen picking up a splitter. And if it’s one of Nicholas’s, I don’t want them to know that you’re involved.”

  “Were they behind us at the last stop?”

  “Not that I noticed.”

  “Then they weren’t. Make another turn and see what happens.”

  Doing the signal and lane change in the right order this time, she made another left. So did the Lincoln, moving in directly behind her this time. Evidently this guy had been paying attention during her previous taxi dodges, and he wasn’t going to let her squeak out a last-second turn. “Dammit,” she muttered.

  “So lose ’em.”

  “You rented the car. If we get into a pursuit, you’ll be the one they trace to it.”

  “They’ve already run the plates by now, honey.” He cracked a grin. “And do you actually think I would use my real ID?”

  Samantha blew out her breath, relieved. “At least one of us hasn’t lost his edge. Who has this car?”

  “Antoine Washington. From Brooklyn.”

  “Ah, one of the old standards. Get the gear out of the back seat, will you?”

  Reaching around, he retrieved the climbing equipment, black spray paint, and industrial-strength glass cutters, shoving them into the backpack she’d brought along for the occasion. Then he pulled on his seatbelt.

  “Ready?” Samantha asked, pulling a cloth from her purse and wiping down the steering wheel, gearshift, and door handle before she gave it to Stoney to do the same thing on his side. She slipped on her leather gloves and gripped the wheel again.

  “Ready.”

  “Hang on.” She tapped the accelerator, putting a little distance between the Jeep and the Lincoln. Then she threw it in reverse and floored it.

  The rear of the Jeep slammed into the Lincoln. With a whoosh she could hear even with the windows up, the Lincoln’s air bags deployed. Jamming the Jeep into drive again, she whipped a right and then a left, nearly taking out a taxi and a hot dog stand. At the next left she slowed, cruising back into legal driving speed.

  “There’s a parking garage up on the right,” Stoney said, checking his mirror. She’d already checked hers. Nobody followed them.

  “Got it.”

  She turned down the ramp, took a ticket, and parked the Jeep. They took turns climbing out and closing the doors using the cloth, before she wiped down the keys and tossed them on the seat. The car would probably be gone within ten minutes, but that would be to her benefit.

  “I don’t think you’re losing your edge, honey,” Stoney said, handing her the backpack and leading the way to the stairs. “That was nice.”

  “Thanks. I just hope the guy in the Lincoln really was a cop.” Shouldering the backpack, she followed him back up to street level. “What say we divide up the rest of the shopping list, and I’ll meet you in front of Trump Tower at…” She looked at her watch. “At three? That gives us another couple of hours.”

  Stoney nodded. “I’ll take the splitter and the wire strippers. You get the infrared glasses and the thermometer.”

  “And then we’ll roast the turkey.”

  She let Stoney find a cab first, then walked another block before she hailed one herself. In the distance she could hear multiple sirens, but since nobody else on the street was reacting or looking around, she didn’t do so, either.

  As she sat on the back seat of the taxi, a Mercedes-Benz service rental drove by at just more than legal speed. She caught a glimpse of black-silver hair and Ray?Ban sunglasses. Boyden Locke. That was quite the coincidence, unless he’d been following her, too. Did he suspect that she’d taken his Picasso?

  “Follow that Mercedes,” she said, gesturing.

  “Okay.” The driver started off. “You a cop?” he asked in broken English.

  “I’m his wife,” she returned, painting a pained, affronted look on her face.

  “No shoot-ups from my cab, lady.”

  “I just want to know where he’s going. No shoot-ups.”

  “Okay.”

  Locke circled the block, then the next one over. Yep, he was looking for her. So much for implying his support by inviting her to parties—though he’d still had his Picasso then. Patty had probably ratted her out. Great. She’d be getting the phone call turning down her services any day now, then. If this theft thing got any more play in Palm Beach, Donner wouldn’t be the only one calling from there, either. She needed to check in with Aubrey Pendleton, to see if anybody had canceled appointments with her because of this mess. Damn Martin, and Damn Nicholas Veittsreig. If
she couldn’t advise security, she didn’t know what the hell she would do to keep herself from going insane.

  “That’s good enough,” she told the driver. Instead she requested him to drive her to the nearest electronics superstore. Veittsreig and his crew probably had surplus gear, but if she was coming in as a professional she was damned well going to be equipped like one. It was a matter of pride; after all, she was Sam Jellicoe, Martin’s kid. The girl who’d surpassed her dad in the business and been resented by him for that ever since.

  If he resented her so much, though, why had he arranged for her to be part of this job? Did he intend to get her picked up by Interpol, as Rick seemed to think? She honestly didn’t know. Martin played her like he played everyone else, but he was, after all, her dad.

  Inside the electronics store she headed past the televisions, the cell phones, the iPods, and the Xbox 360s. They only carried two brands of hunting binoculars with infrared and night-vision capabilities, but the lighter one looked like it would do the trick. She usually went with lower-tech gear herself, preferring to rely on her skills rather than a piece of engineering with tiny, breakable parts, but the Met was extremely high-tech. She would have to adapt.

  Halfway back down the television aisle she heard the murmur of a familiar voice, and she stopped. Rick, his face multiplied by about twenty sets, stood in the middle of a mob, the Planet Hollywood sign over his right shoulder. Swiftly she moved to the nearest TV and turned it up.

  “…artin, my lawyer, at noon. I imagine he’ll come to my office.”

  The reporter asked something about that Jellicoe woman and then about marriage. After Rick’s “no comment,” Samantha stopped listening.

  “That big, sneaky bastard,” she muttered, hurrying to the checkout line and paying for the glasses—no sense getting nabbed for shoplifting while collecting gear for a two-and-a-half-million-dollar job.

  Outside she hailed another cab and headed for Brook-stone. They would probably have digital air temperature thermometers. And then she was going to Rick’s office and find out why the hell he was trying to contact her dad.

  Richard paced the length of the glass-walled conference room. At the table behind him John Stillwell, using a fair share of his British patience and biting politeness, actually made some headway with the New York Building Commission. If felt odd to be on the sidelines during a negotiation, but he’d already made the decision that his life with Samantha was not going to go the same way as his marriage with Patricia Addison-Wallis-whatever it was today.