“We’ll swing by and get it.”
Sam was definitely beginning to feel more like prey than predator, and she didn’t like it. This partnership had been her idea, not his. “Like hell we will,” she snapped. “I drive myself to the estate, or forget it. You don’t need to run my errands.”
“I want to run your errands,” Addison insisted, annoyance just clipping the edges of his warm voice.
“People don’t disagree with you very often, do they?” she asked.
“No, they don’t.”
“Get used to it,” she countered, having no intention of giving up the quarterback position. She could probably ease her way into command later, but with Addison she wanted some ground rules set.
“Why don’t you just cooperate and be grateful we don’t call the cops, Miss Smith?” the lawyer grunted, arms folded across his chest. Leaning back against the side of the limo, he looked like a tawny-haired mafioso with a tan and cowboy boots.
“Don’t you have ambulances to chase?” she returned, glad she didn’t have to work any particular charms on the lawyer. “Or do you have to be available to wipe Addison’s ass?”
“I wipe my own bum, thank you very much,” Addison put in mildly. “Get in the car.”
“I—”
“I’m not going to keep arguing. At this moment you’re free because I haven’t called the authorities. We’ll get your things, then we’ll go back to my estate and get down to business. That’s as compromising as I’m going to get, love.”
For a moment she wanted to ask what kind of business he had in mind, but under the circumstances that didn’t seem wise. He was right about having the advantage here. Even if he didn’t call the cops, the longer they stood out on Worth Avenue in the open, the more likely she was to end up in handcuffs. “All right.”
“Let’s get a move on, then,” the attorney said, his expression darkening as he looked past them. “Unless you want to use the six o’clock news to invite Dracula or Hannibal Lecter to dinner.”
Sam glanced over her shoulder, narrowing her eyes against the glare of the afternoon sun. The sight of a herd of news cameras loping in their direction made her yelp. Not bothering to wait for someone to open the limo door for her, she did it herself and leapt inside. No photos. Ever. A photo meant you were labeled and remembered and recalled at convenience. “Come on,” she ordered, sliding to the middle of the seat, away from the windows.
“And I thought I hated the press,” Addison commented, sitting beside her.
Donner took the seat opposite, and the limousine rumbled with reassuring speed into the light traffic. Sam didn’t let out her breath until they’d passed the last of the news vans.
“Will they follow?”
“Of course they will. I imagine we’ve got at least one news helicopter tailing us right now, too.”
She frowned. “Then forget my car. I’ll come back for it later.”
“I’ll send someone for it. Will that make you feel better?”
“I’ll feel better if I’m the only one who knows where it is.”
“You’re twitchy, aren’t you?” the attorney said, pulling a bottle of water from a built-in refrigerator beneath his seat. He didn’t offer her one.
“Are the police after you?” she retorted.
“Nope.”
“Then shut up.”
Addison ignored the exchange, instead flipping a button on the door console. “Ben, take us home, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
Jaws clenched with a nauseating combination of nervousness and annoyance and adrenaline, Sam watched Donner tilt up the water bottle and take a long drink, condensation running down his thumb and dripping onto his tie. “Are those for everybody, or is he special?”
With what sounded like a suppressed chuckle, Addison leaned down to retrieve another ice-cold bottle and hand it to her. “He is special, but help yourself.”
“I’m glad you’re amused, Rick,” Donner muttered. “This isn’t what I pictured when you said you wanted her help. I was thinking more along the lines of a phone call or two—not inviting the fox back to the henhouse.”
“All of Addison’s chickens are safe,” Sam retorted. “Does he really need to be here?” She turned to Addison, who was watching her with that amused, sexy expression on his face.
“For now, he does.”
“Great.” She’d meant to sound more annoyed, but no man had any right to look that good three days after a bomb had nearly blown him to pieces. Her uncertainty about this whole deal grew, and she tried to drown the butterflies in her stomach with a swallow of water. Uncertainty, or lust, Sam? With the heated vibes ricocheting between them, she had a good idea which it was.
“What changed your mind about me?” she pursued.
“Curiosity.” He sat back, as at ease and relaxed in his expensive blue suit as he’d looked the night before in jeans and bare feet. “So, Samantha, do you have any idea who might have taken the stone tablet and planted that bomb?”
Sam froze with the bottle halfway to her lips. “The tablet’s gone?”
He nodded. “Disappointed?”
She deserved that, she supposed, and let the comment pass. “It makes a difference.” Scowling at the attorney’s cynical expression, she drank more water and silently cursed Etienne a few more times. And whoever’d hired him. That, she needed to find out. “A difference about the intent of the crime. Not a difference to me. Speaking of which, Addison, do you have any idea how you’re going to help me?”
“I have an idea or two. But I do expect your help in return. I won’t give you something for nothing. That’s not the way I do business.”
“Me, neither.”
Actually, getting something for nothing was precisely how she preferred to do business. But this was anything but business as usual. Everything she’d learned in her life screamed that she couldn’t trust him, couldn’t trust anyone. Her freedom and her life were her responsibility. Yes, she had a damned good idea who’d taken the tablet and more than likely planted the bomb. Etienne wasn’t going to confess, and she wasn’t going to turn him in. Throwing Etienne’s boss to the wolves suited her just fine, but she needed time to find the bastard before the police found her. Hence she’d answered Addison’s televised invitation, and now she was riding in his limousine.
Addison nodded, sending a warning glance at the attorney. “We’ll all make an effort to cooperate here.”
“I’ll do my part, but I reserve the right for griping and future ‘I told you so’s,’” Donner said, settling back with his water.
“That’s helpful,” Sam noted.
“I wouldn’t have to be saying it if you hadn’t broken in, Miss Manners.”
“But you’d still have a theft and an explosion, Harvard. And no one to help you figure it out.”
“Yale. And you—”
“Enough, children,” Addison broke in. “Don’t make me stop the car.”
Smirking at the lawyer, Sam sat back. Her father must be spinning in his grave right now. His daughter was riding in a limousine with an attorney and one of the wealthiest men in the world. She knew exactly what Martin Jellicoe would do with the opportunity—steal Richard Addison blind, deaf, and dumb. That thinking, however, was why her father had spent the last five years of his life in prison. She’d learned the lessons of restraint and patience, even if he hadn’t. As she glanced again at Addison, she decided that the restraint lessons would come in especially handy.
She gazed out the window past the attorney to watch the palm trees and coastline fly past, and wondered what she’d gotten herself into. Every mile took her farther from her gear and her car, farther from the safety net of the city and its crowds. For God’s sake, she didn’t even have a change of clothes with her. But she could play this game; she would play it, because she didn’t have any other choice.
They approached the front gates, a uniformed cop standing in front of either post. Sam couldn’t help sinking lower in the seat as the
y slowed. No, she wouldn’t have liked doing this on her own, but then, she wouldn’t have driven up to the front door. The limo driver rolled down his window, held a brief exchange with one of the officers, and the gates opened.
“See, you’re safely inside, as I promised. No need to go over walls, dig tunnels, or anything.”
Samantha turned around to watch the gates close again. “You have lousy security.”
“We have two cops at the front gate,” Donner said.
Facing forward again, she scowled at the attorney. “And they didn’t even check the trunk or the passengers in the limo. If the idea is keeping Addison safe, you might want to suggest they log everybody’s identification and check that no one’s holding anyone hostage before they open the gates. I know you gave them a description of me, because I heard it on the news. And yet here I sit.”
Richard kept his gaze out the window. Samantha had a point. The deference with which the Palm Beach police treated him was expected, given his status in the close-knit, elite community, but he would be a fool to rely on it for anything more than keeping the press away from his front door. They certainly hadn’t kept his visitor out last night—or just now. “Worried about me?” he asked.
“You’re my way out of this,” she returned, the tease coming into her voice again.
“Then try to be honest with me.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“Thank you.”
Tom looked skeptical, but Richard suspected she was telling the truth. Even so, he intended to keep his perspective. She might give off more heat than the Florida sun, but she was playing a game, just as he was. The only difference was that she wanted to get away free, and he wanted…her. “I do occasionally conduct business on the estate,” he said. “I also entertain. Guests are to be expected. And you have to admit, you’re not precisely dressed like a thief at the moment.” He took the occasion to run his gaze down her long legs.
If she noticed the scrutiny, she didn’t say anything about it. “I could have been naked or draped with ammunition bandoleers, Addison, and they wouldn’t have blinked.”
“Point taken. And since all I have is your first name, you may as well call me Rick.”
“I’ll decide what I might as well do,” she returned, though her tone softened a little. “But thanks for the offer, Addison.”
So she would put up some boundaries. That was interesting—and even more intriguing.
Ben drove up the long drive and stopped, coming around to open the door for them. Samantha jumped out first, obviously relieved to have escaped the limousine intact. Richard watched as she did a turn on the front steps. She’d probably never seen the estate in daylight.
“I’ll give you a tour later, if you’d like.”
“You’re not her damned host, Rick,” Tom whispered, as they followed her to the front door. “You’re a target. And you may think she’s cute, but I don’t trust her. She’s been here twice already. Uninvited.”
“And now she’s invited. Back off, Tom. I’ll meet you in my office in a few minutes. Get William Benton on the phone for me.”
“Benton? You—”
“Tom.”
“Yes, sahib.” Donner strode through the foyer and up the stairs, sending a last glare at Samantha. She didn’t seem to notice, because she was busy running her fingers over the vase on the front table.
“Why would you keep a fifteen-hundred-year-old vase so close to the front door? Don’t you get hurricanes here, or do your gates keep those out, too?”
“It’s—”
Frowning, she leaned closer to study the pattern, tapping the rim with the tip of a fingernail. “Oh. You own fakes?”
“I thought it was pretty,” he said, grinning and impressed. It had taken Danté nearly an hour to figure it out. “And it was a replica, for a fund-raiser. How much do you know about art?”
“I can recite the best seller list, but I prefer antiques. What kind of staff do you have here?”
“Don’t thieves know that sort of thing before they break in?”
“You weren’t supposed to be here. Your staff while you’re not in Florida is six during the day and two at night, plus hired security, and a room where your art acquisitions manager stays sometimes when you keep him here working late. I don’t know who shows up when you’re in residence.”
“A dozen or so full-time staff,” he supplied, “though I haven’t called most of them back yet. The police thought I should keep personnel to a minimum, and I don’t want to endanger anyone.”
“Makes sense. Do you have a butler?”
“Yes.”
“Is his name Jeeves?”
Rick gave an appreciative smile. He was rapidly discovering that the charm he’d seen in her was part of her character. She’d obviously figured out how to use it to her advantage, but he couldn’t help enjoying it. At the same time, he wouldn’t forget how good she was at this. “Sykes. He is British, though, if that makes you feel better.”
“So they travel the world with you, going from house to house?”
As she spoke, she wandered out of the foyer and into the downstairs sitting room. Several antique pieces of furniture housed various figurines and china plates, and Richard followed her to lean against the doorframe. She seemed a little more at ease with Tom absent; given her occupation, he could see why she wouldn’t like lawyers. Again she ran her fingers along the fine-grained wood of the seventeenth-century writing desk, as though she had to touch it to judge its value.
The sensuality of her hands kept distracting him. But this wasn’t a bloody date; it was a murder investigation. He drew a slow breath, watching the fluid grace of her movements. Damn, she was mesmerizing.
“Do they?”
Richard blinked. “Beg pardon?”
“The servants, Addison. Do they follow you around?”
He cleared his throat. “Some of them do. Most, like Sykes, I keep on salary at a particular house year-round. He stays in Devon at my estate. There’s a lot to maintain whether I’m there or not, and some of them have families and don’t want to move around. Why?”
“Call me suspicious.”
“Of my staff?”
“Don’t tell me the police didn’t ask you any of this,” she said, glancing over her shoulder at him before moving on to the china cabinet.
“They did. None of my staff anywhere matched your description, however, and they remain focused on finding you.”
She sighed. “That figures. For my edification, then, how many of your staff knew you were coming back to Florida early?”
“Just the flight crew, my driver Ben, and the housekeeper Reinaldo. I was staying at a hotel in Stuttgart, so I didn’t have to inform anyone there where I was going. But it wasn’t one of my staff.”
“How about their family members?”
“No.”
“Well, it wasn’t me. What about personal…friends in Germany?”
“You mean do I have a fraulein in Stuttgart?”
He thought a blush crept up her cheeks, but with her face in profile he couldn’t be certain. It surprised him. She seemed so worldly and capable, yet she could blush.
“Sure. Do you?”
“Not on this trip. I was there on business.”
“Hm.”
“Hm what?”
“I’m thinking. Give me a moment.” Sam wandered past him into the hallway again and back toward the front door.
“What are you thinking?”
She shot him another look, a half smile still on her face. “What are you thinking, Addison? You’d never have invited me in here if you really thought I’d set that explosive, so who are your suspects? What are their motives? Any other signs of breaking and entering? I mean, I said I’d help, but you have to do some of the work.”
The antique grandfather clock in the main hall chimed six times. “I don’t keep an enemies list.” He smiled briefly, noting that she still refused to use his first name. He wondered how many other roadblocks sh
e might attempt to set up and how much he would be able to find out about her. He had her first name, which was more than he’d known last night, but given the reluctance with which she’d handed that out, this wasn’t going to be easy. Thankfully, he liked a challenge. “And no, the police didn’t find any other doors or windows forced open,” he continued. “We did assume that it was you who used the mirrors at the front gate and cut open my patio window. Would you care for dinner?”
Her expression drew tighter. “I’m not staying.”
“You’re safer here than anywhere else, especially until we can find a way to convince Detective Castillo of your innocence.”
“I’m safe here unless someone tries to blow you up again, you mean. You’re charming, but I prefer to keep breathing.” Taking a last step forward, she curled her fingers around the handle and pulled open the door.
“I will sound the alarm if you try to leave,” he said quietly. She wasn’t getting away. Not yet.
One hand still on the door, she stopped. “I thought we had an agreement.”
“We do, love. You will help me, and I will help you. I thought I’d grill some steaks, since you and Tom are here.”
“Does Harvard sleep at the foot of your bed, too?”
“He’s my friend, and he thinks I’m being foolish. I therefore expect him to annoy me to a certain degree. Don’t worry; he’ll leave soon.”
Her shoulders heaving with the breath she took, Samantha faced him again. “Steak sounds delightful. But then I’m afraid I must depart for my chateau.”
“Your chateau in Pompano Beach? I’d avoid going there, if I were you.”
“Pompano Beach. That’s near here, isn’t it?” she asked, not batting an eye. “Is that where you think I live?”
“Someone thinks so. Now come along, and I’ll show you to a room. I have a few minutes of business with Tom, then we’ll start dinner.”
“You can’t keep me prisoner here,” she said as she brushed past him, heading deeper into the house.
“I’m merely making certain we’re both in a position to uphold our ends of the bargain.” He closed the distance between them. “You are a self-confessed thief, Samantha. Don’t expect me to forget that.”
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