Thrill Me to Death

by Roxanne St Claire

  “I’m right here, darling.” Breezy swept into the room, as bright as the buttercup St. John knit that clung to her tiny frame. “I was just coming in to break up your business meeting. Gifford, my love…” She glided to her husband and threw her arms around him with enough force to flutter the papers on the nearby desk, kissing his cheek noisily. “Go to work and make scads of money.” She nudged him toward the door and pointed at Cori. “You, woman, are going for the super-deluxe-ultra-overpriced fabulous day package at the Mandarin Oriental Spa avec moi. And you,” she turned to Max and fluttered one of her hands like a bird, “go stand at the gate like a gladiator and step on Billy if he shows up.”

  Cori stifled a laugh, watching little Breezy wave at big Max. “I’m not going to the spa, Breeze. I have too much work to do.”

  Breezy’s face melted in disappointment and she looked accusingly at her husband, who was stuffing papers into his briefcase. “I told you to free her up, Giff, not bog her down. I need my gal pal.”

  “She’s got a mind of her own, as she likes to remind me,” Gifford said with a wry smile, closing his briefcase over the papers. “And I need to get to a meeting. Max, good to meet you.”

  When he left, Breezy slapped both hands on the desk, staring at Cori and jutting her rear end out just inches from where Max stood.

  “If you stay in here and work when I have set up a full treatment for us at the Mandarin, I will make you suffer so badly that your very own bodyguard won’t be able to protect you.”

  Cori laughed. “He’s going to work on the security of the house, and I’m going to work on the Foundation launch. And Swen will work on you. Give him my best.”

  Breezy let out a moan. “I hate you, Corinne Peyton.”

  “So you’ve said.”

  Standing straight, she tossed her hair over her shoulder and grinned at Max. “But I do like Swen.”

  Cori saw the light in his eyes and knew he was on the brink of smiling. No one was immune to Breezy’s charm. Knowing what it took to coax a smile from Max, she swiped at a bubble of jealousy that floated around her chest. “Tell Swen I’ll be in for a full treatment very soon.”

  Breezy waved over her shoulder. “Yeah, yeah. He could be deported back to Finland at any minute, then you’ll be sorry you missed the magic hands.”

  When she left, the room felt empty.

  “She makes me laugh,” Cori said, watching the sunshine yellow disappear.

  Max leaned on the edge of William’s desk and regarded her. “She certainly stood up for you.”

  “She did? When?”

  “When she broke into the guest house and interrogated me.”

  “She interrogated you? Why am I having trouble believing that? You could make a waitress confess her sins before she even took your order.”

  His eyes crinkled in a smile, popping that bubble in her chest.

  “Your friend didn’t confess a thing. But she told me plenty about you.”

  Cori shrugged off the implication in his tone. “I’m not worried about anything Breezy would say. She has a heart ten times her dress size.”

  “Oh, yeah,” he agreed in a dry voice. “A big enough heart not to care when her husband has his hands all over you.”

  She burned him with a warning look. “He did not have his hands all over me. We’re friends; he’s like a—a father to me.”

  As soon as she said it, she wanted to seize the words back.

  Max said nothing, bending over and picking up a piece of paper so that she couldn’t see his face. “If you’re going to be in here for a while, I’ll start the security inspection here on the first floor. You may want to clear it with any housekeeping staff you have around.”

  “You’ve met the staff. She’s an army of one: Her name is Marta Gaspero and she really runs the place, not me. If you’re nice to her, she’ll cook you insanely delicious food.”

  Now he smiled. “You know my weaknesses.”

  God, did she ever. “You don’t still eat raw meat, do you?”

  “Only when provoked.”

  The innuendo shot a high voltage charge through her. “Go ahead,” she said. “Go shore up the place.”

  He didn’t move, reading the paper that had fallen to the floor. Then he frowned. “When did your husband die?”

  Her chest squeezed at his tone. “In May.”

  “What day?”

  “May seventh.”

  He set the paper on the desk, flipping it around so she could read it, pointing to the bold, angular signature at the bottom. “Then either the date is wrong on this conceptual design approval, or your husband signed it posthumously.”

  “Good God,” she whispered. She blinked at it, unable to believe what she was seeing, then looked up at Max. “That’s not his signature.”

  He just lifted an eyebrow.

  Across the top of the form, she read the property information. The Petaluma Mall. Sonoma County, California.

  “I’m sure there’s an explanation,” she said quietly, though her heart was pounding. She took the paper. “By the way, I’ll need you to accompany me to a board meeting tomorrow.”

  The bedroom was ridiculous.

  From the coffered ceiling with a chandelier that could light Versailles to the over-the-top Renaissance bed fit for an empress, every corner screamed luxury and decadence and silly money.

  But it was Cori’s bedroom, so Max was drawn to it.

  He’d finished a survey of the first floor of the house, working to see the whole place as a security challenge instead of the palace where the princess lived. He’d scrutinized the rooms for the basics, from the curtains to the chimney access, but found it nearly impossible not to pass judgment on the resident of a home where no detail was spared in the design and finishes.

  The place was so incredibly perfect that it looked like Architectural Digest would be arriving for a photo shoot any minute.

  And that’s what really bothered him. Why, he wondered as he entered a closet the size of Milwaukee, had she stayed there all alone after her husband died? What kind of life was that for a beautiful, smart, twenty-eight-year-old woman? Was her joy in running her husband’s business? She hadn’t wanted to blow off work and go to the spa like most trophy wives, and she’d never been a shopper.

  At least, she didn’t used to be. With a low whistle of disbelief, he pivoted in the massive closet, his gaze falling over an endless rainbow of shades and fabrics and dozens of shoes.

  “Looking for a particular style?”

  He completed his turn to find Cori leaning against the doorjamb, arms crossed, with that sneaky little smile she got when she was holding a couple of fours and trying to act like it was a royal flush.

  “Exactly how many handbags does one woman need?”

  She shrugged. “Comes with the job.”

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot you own malls.”

  She took a step into the closet, and shrugged. “Not technically. Peyton Enterprises holds the REIT—the real estate investment trust—on one hundred and forty-eight properties, in its aggregate of ninety-nine million square feet of gross leasable area in twenty-two states plus Puerto Rico.”

  He dropped his hands into his pockets and eyed her. “You sound like an annual report.”

  “Some days I feel like one.” She fingered a beaded, shimmery gown, tugging at the pale blue silk. She probably looked insanely gorgeous in that thing. “I guess this does look like a disgusting display of consumerism, but William bought me beautiful clothes and,” she laughed softly, “my best friend likes to shop.”

  She dropped the fabric and looked at him. “What are you doing in here? Installing cameras?”

  He rubbed his jaw, considering the illicit benefits of that. “I’m still surveying the residence. I’ll give you a complete analysis of what you need when I’ve finished the house. That could take a while in this place.”

  “Stop making digs at how I live.”

  “I’m making observations, not digs. You live in a six-zi
llion-square-foot house with a theater and two kitchens and more open terraces than the palace at Monaco—I know, because I did a security detail there last year. But I’m not casting aspersions on your lifestyle, Cori. I think you’re overly defensive.”

  He expected a spark of denial, but got a sigh instead. “Then stop observing. I’ve had a lousy morning.”

  With the surprisingly open admission, she kicked off her shoes and pushed them toward the shoe department, then dropped onto a creamy chaise along one wall. She wore a pale pink sleeveless top with matching pants, and looked like a model for the designer label he suspected he’d find inside.

  “You don’t look like you’ve had a lousy morning.”

  That earned him a quick glance as she pulled her thick hair back and twisted it into a makeshift ponytail, a move he’d seen her do a hundred times. She rubbed the back of her neck with both hands. “I should have gone to see Swen.”

  This was the first time since he arrived that she’d sounded like the girl he remembered.

  “Did you figure out how that document got signed?” he asked.

  She closed her eyes. “Working on it.”

  “Want help?”

  “No.” Then she glanced sideways at him. “What could you do?”

  “The Bullet Catchers have great resources. We could do a lot of things to trace a forgery.”

  “Maybe,” she said. “First, I’ll exhaust my own resources and talk to some people at Peyton.”

  “What else has you so unhappy?”

  She blinked at him, her lashes grazing the fringe of bangs. “You want to know the truth?”

  That’s why he was there. “Hit me.”

  “The weight of what William left me really hurts sometimes.”

  “You sound surprised,” he said, leaning against a granite-topped center island that housed dozens of drawers and cubbies. “Didn’t you know you’d inherit this kind of responsibility? I assume you discussed his last will and testament.”

  She shook her head. “He didn’t like the topic.”

  “Come on, Cori. The man was sixty-three and worth billions. And you seem pretty tight with the family attorney. Surely you knew that if something happened to your husband, you’d be in charge. Surely you discussed that with him and planned for it.”

  She looked up at him, her eyes suddenly dark with emotion. “He discussed those kinds of things with Giff.”

  He looked at her for a long moment, taking in the shadows and tiny lines of exhaustion around her eyes. Lots of things could make a woman that tired. Grief. Stress. Committing murder. For all he knew, she was having an affair with her husband’s attorney.

  He had a long way to go before he got behind Corinne Peyton’s mask.

  “And didn’t you discuss those things with the lawyer?”

  “Let’s get back to the house,” she said, crossing her arms and shutting him down. “What did you find?”

  He had to remember, she knew he was a skilled interrogator. “I found that your architect thought of everything but a safe room.”

  “You mean, like a panic room?”

  He nodded. “We prefer to call it a safe room. It needs to be an interior room, not too big, with a single entrance. I haven’t seen anything that qualifies.”

  “There’s a room exactly like that.”

  He scoured his mental layout of the house. “Where?”

  She pointed over her shoulder. “It connects to my bedroom, and isn’t accessible from any other place.”

  “Is it bulletproof, blast resistant, and stocked with first-aid and emergency supplies?”

  A wistful look briefly crossed her face. “It’s empty. You can stock it with whatever you want.”

  “Good. I’ll check it out and add it to the list of recommendations.” He waited for a second. “Want to show me, or should I go exploring?”

  Her hair untwisted as she stood, falling over her shoulders like a black velvet drape. He followed her out the door, his gaze traveling down her backside, taking in the way the expensive linen rode her hips as she glided through her bedroom.

  He stared at her ass, her waist, her hair, a powerful, familiar clutch in his belly and balls. That hadn’t changed.

  But everything else had. Where was the easy laugh? Her quick wit? Where was that face so open that reading her was easy…and so damn fun? Something had made her closed and insulated.

  Money…or murder?

  She opened a door that led to a small hallway and another door, then took an unsteady breath before she turned the handle and revealed a small empty room, unpainted, uncarpeted, and unadorned.

  “I didn’t want to decorate,” she said, seeing his surprised look. “It seemed like bad luck.”

  “Is that some kind of feng shui thing?”

  She laughed softly. “No. I just didn’t want to jinx it. I kept…hoping.”

  He stepped inside, looking for a clue to what she meant, but saw none. “Hoping for what?”

  She lifted her chin and squared her shoulders. “A baby. We’d been trying for a baby when we built the house. This was designed to be a nursery.”

  He didn’t like the impact that came along with the image of her trying to have a baby. It was one thing to think about Cori having dinner parties or going to functions on the arm of her rich, older husband. But that’s as far as his imagination wanted to go.

  “So, what was the problem?”

  “None of your business.” Her response was clipped and, he had to admit, justified.

  “Fair enough,” he conceded. “We’ll have to seal the room, close off the window, and reinforce the walls with steel or concrete. We’ll need a metal door with a keyless dead bolt.”

  “Whatever you like.”

  “Of course…“He took a few steps, his shoes echoing on the hardwood floor. “If you think you’re going to use this room for its intended purpose someday, we could build a bunker downstairs.”

  She shook her head. “No. I won’t.”

  Suddenly feeling way too big for the little room, he stepped past her and back into her oversize bedroom where he fit. “I’ll add the necessary supplies for a safe room to the security analysis. And I’m done in here.”

  But she was still back there, and didn’t seem to notice him leave.

  Was she sad about wanting a baby that she’d never had? Or was that guilt in her eyes? How desperately were they trying to have a child? Enough for her to want to end her marriage when William couldn’t make her pregnant?

  He blew out a breath and headed down the hall. And he’d thought this would be a cakewalk.

  Gifford Jones rubbed his throbbing temples and squeezed his burning eyes shut.

  The pages of black print swam before him, torturing him like pinpricks on his irises.

  Key points, he told himself, just read the key points.

  Peyton Enterprises mandates that the majority of its directors be independent…replace the Company’s inside director with an independent director…prohibits repricing of stock options…no outstanding loans to officers….

  The last one was what caused the searing pain in his head.

  If he had to, could he convince the board that the money had been a loan? If William the Great hadn’t insisted on rules of corporate governance stricter than the SEC’s, maybe he could.

  He took a long slug of the Scotch Breezy had thoughtfully brought into his office when he told her he’d be working late. God, if she knew that he was really covering tracks…That’s all he ever did now. He couldn’t even imagine the look of disappointment, of horror for what he had done. It wouldn’t matter why he’d done it, it would only matter that he’d done it to her dearest friend.

  Ignoring the pain in his temples, he opened his fountain pen and initialed the draft in front of him. Screw it. His head hurt too much to try and think of a way to fix this right now.

  He reached for the next file, expecting another contractor agreement, then blinked and stared at the document. The menu for the board of dire
ctors meeting? Micromanagement was definitely the cause of this headache.

  But if he didn’t micromanage, someone could find his trail.

  He started to scratch his initials on the page, but as he read the names of the meeting attendees, he exhaled a quiet curse.

  Corinne Peyton.

  She was the real cause of this headache. She was the root of all his problems. She was the one who should have died, not William.

  He scrawled his initials, blood pounding behind his eyes as a shadow crept in his peripheral vision. His headache-darkened vision. He’d tried and tried to ignore it, but something was very, very wrong with his sight.

  Rubbing his temples, he knew it would clear with sleep. But he hadn’t slept well in a long, long time. And he wouldn’t until he came up with some way to keep Cori Peyton out of the boardroom tomorrow—and out of the picture for good.

  Chapter

  Five

  M ax opened the French doors of his living room so that he could hear any unusual sounds during the night. A wave of August humidity rolled in, and he peeled off his T-shirt.

  In his opinion, the biggest sacrifice a bodyguard had to make was sleeping in clothes—and in this swamp it was torture.

  Grabbing an ice-cold bottle of water from the refrigerator, he positioned himself at the kitchen counter so he could see through the open door, then flipped up his laptop and scanned the message he was about to send Raquel Durant. Lucy’s assistant would arrange for the materials and construction necessary to secure Cori’s mansion, magically using her ability to Make Things Happen. They’d all be lost without her and, feeling magnanimous, he added that in a PS at the end of the e-mail. No doubt that would elicit her classic New Jersey eye roll.

  That done, he roamed the guest house, glancing out the windows and the open door, counting the lights still burning in Cori’s house. When did she go to sleep? The office and master suite were the only rooms still lit; the rest of the place was dark and hopefully sealed for the night. He’d already checked every door once, around eleven.

  It was midnight now.

  He picked up the remote for the TV, considered trolling for sports, then flipped it back on the table. He opened up a magazine about Florida living and fluttered a few glossy pages full of sun and fun, but some sixth sense pulled his attention to the open door.