He came naked to her side, his cock half-hard. “What?”
“Looks like coffee, smells like coffee, but I don’t think its coffee.”
He unscrewed the top of the grinder, licked his finger, touched it to the powder and put the tiniest speck on his tongue.
Summer grabbed his hand. “Don’t. What if it’s arsenic or something?”
He raised his eyebrows.
“Okay, arsenic was stupid, but you were just as stupid to taste something when you didn’t know what it was.” She glared at him.
“It’s coke. It tastes bitter. Even that one grain has numbed my tongue.”
“Oh fuck. I sent ten bags of coffee back from Colombia with my things. Nine bags are still downstairs in the freezer.”
“Better go and get them before someone else tries to grind them.”
Summer dashed downstairs and was relieved to find all the bags still there. She brought them up and dropped them on the counter.
“Do you think they’re all been tampered with? Should we check?” she asked.
The contents of the other bags looked the same as the first. But each bean taken at random from every packet was a fake.
Jai rolled one of the beans between his fingers. “They went to a lot of trouble to make them look like the real thing.” He dropped the bean back in the bag and sighed.
“Oh hell. What should I do? Go the police? I could dig a hole and bury them all. Probably cause a growth spurt in the local vegetation. Potatoes leaping out of the ground in excitement.”
“Or just chuck it down the loo.”
“I can’t do that. It would end up in the water system. It has to be disposed of properly.” She sagged. “Oh flip. I’ve just realized what Piero meant. Did I tell you I’d phoned my so-called friend in Colombia?”
“No.”
“He said he didn’t know what I was talking about. I told him I’d left the case and the dog in Bogota Airport and his response was, ‘Just give them what they want and they won’t hurt you.’” I didn’t think he believed me about the case but maybe he did. Maybe he was thinking about these bags of coffee. The bastard.”
“I think you have to go to the police. These guys could get nasty.” He took her hand and squeezed her fingers. “They’ve probably already paid for part of this. They’re not just going to let it slip through their fingers.”
“Yep. The police. Right, but not now, not while I’m here. My mother would go apeshit. It’s not pretty.”
“I’m still desperate for coffee,” he said. “Want me to go and beg some from the house? I can pick up my car keys at the same time.”
“I’ll come too. If my mother gets hold of you, you might never come back.”
He laughed and unbuttoned her shirt. “We better have a wash.”
“Try not to drown me this time.”
* * * * *
Summer stripped the bed and carried the sheets and towels over to the house while Jai brought the tray of croissants. She’d carefully slotted the two she’d taken back inside.
“At least my car’s here.” Jai nodded toward a black Lexus.
“I hope it’s fast,” she said under her breath.
He followed her into the laundry room and she loaded the machine and switched it on. Winston was curled up in his basket and he wagged his tail when she bent to stroke him.
As they walked into the kitchen, everyone stopped taking. Her parents, Pippa and her boyfriend, and Baxter sat at the table.
“Morning.” Jai held up the tray of croissants. “Did you want these or should I take them back?”
“I’d forgotten about those,” her mother said. “Thank you.” She put them into the Aga.
Summer headed for the coffee machine, took mugs from the cupboard and poured coffee for her and Jai. “Anyone else need one?”
“Why don’t you bring over one of the bags of coffee you bought us?” her father suggested. “We can try one out.”
“Ah.” Summer winced. “We just opened a bag and it’s…gone off. White mold. They probably saw me coming and sold me some crappy stuff. I’m going to complain.”
“Can coffee beans go off?” Baxter asked. Smart-arse.
“It was a lovely wedding.” Jai sat at the table. “The katas were sensational. They’d been decorated beautifully. Bride and groom going anywhere warm?”
Summer smiled her thanks for him changing the subject.
“On their way to Bali,” her father said. “We managed with two days in Paris, didn’t we, dear?”
Her mother shot him a smile.
“Your keys,” her father said and nodded toward the dresser.
“Ah thanks. I hope the roads are clear. I hate driving in the snow.”
Summer was aware Jai was trying to make normal conversation, but there was a big fat elephant in the room waiting to slap down its foot.
Her mother cleared her throat. “Doug’s mother was very upset. She had to leave early.”
Oh shit.
“I’m sorry,” Summer said.
Jai put his hand on her arm. “No. Don’t apologize. It was my fault. You told me what happened in confidence and I should have kept my mouth shut. Though I didn’t expect the grapevine to be quite so supersonic.”
“I can’t believe—” her mother started.
“I can,” Baxter said. “He was that sort of guy, always on the lookout for something different.”
“Angie said you encouraged him.” Pippa put her mug down on the table and the contents sloshed over the rim. “She thought you and he…”
“No.” Summer took the croissants out of the Aga. “I didn’t lead him on. There was never anything between us apart from dislike on my side and lechery on his.”
She tipped the pastries onto a large plate and put it on the table.
“Why didn’t you say something?” Baxter asked. “You should have told us the truth.”
“What was the point? It would have looked as if I was wriggling out of being blamed for the crash. Angie was going to hate me anyway.”
“You were responsible,” her mother pointed out.
“That’s not fair,” her father said.
“But Mum’s right. I was responsible, regardless of why I lost control of the car. You think I’ve wiped that from my mind? That I don’t think about it? A man died because I crashed. Nothing changes that.”
Jai’s hand settled on hers.
“I can’t believe Doug touched you,” her mother said.
Summer’s chest tightened. “Why not? Why would I lie now? You’ve already made it clear that you’ll never forgive me, so what difference would this make? Apart from making you hate me even more?”
“I don’t hate you. I think you’re trying to find a way to convince everyone you’re not responsible. Doug’s not here to give us his version. You’re clutching at straws.”
“For Christ’s sake,” Jai barked. “What the hell sort of mother are you?”
“Enough,” her father snapped, turning to her mum. “I believe our daughter, and you should too. I know you didn’t get the wedding you and Kathryn had been planning for all those years, but Angie dodged a bullet. She’s better off with Tim. If Doug hadn’t assaulted Summer, he’d still be alive. It’s not fair to load the guilt on her shoulders. She’s borne it for too long. You should apologize to her.”
Her mother cleared her throat. “I’m sorry.”
She obviously didn’t mean it.
“Sorry, Summer,” Pippa said. “I believe you. I wonder now if Angie sensed he was interested in you, but turned it around because she couldn’t deal with it.”
“You believe me?” Summer whispered, her heart pounding against her ribs.
Pippa nodded. “The crazy thing is, I wouldn’t have believed you then, but I do now. I can see why you kept quiet and I feel terrible you’ve had to have this hanging over you all this time.”
“Doug was such a nice boy,” her mother muttered.
Her father huffed in annoyance. “Leave it
alone.”
“But he wasn’t nice, was he?” Baxter pointed out. “You thought he was and you were wrong.”
Her mother shot her a look of such complete desolation, Summer’s heart jerked into her throat.
“His mother is my friend,” her mum whispered.
“And Summer is your daughter,” said her father.
Summer couldn’t deal with this anymore.
She pushed the plate aside and rose to her feet. “We need to be going.”
Jai stuffed the last piece of croissant in his mouth, took a swallow of coffee and grabbed his keys. He followed her from the room without saying a word.
Summer exhaled with relief once Jai had pulled out of the drive.
“Well, that was interesting. Your mother is…”
“I know.”
“Has she always been like that?”
“With me, yes. She didn’t want a fourth child. She had to have more time off work when she was just getting her career back into gear. All the things she thought she’d left behind with Baxter, the nappies and being woken in the middle of the night, she had to start all over again with me.”
“What does she do?”
“She’s a High Court judge.”
“Oh fuck.”
He laughed and after a moment, Summer laughed too.
“Right,” she said. “No more stressful conversation. I don’t want to talk about my family or international drug smuggling or Naomi Campbell. I bet you are friends. I don’t want to hear a thing about her.”
“Spoilsport.”
She grinned. “Instead, we’ll talk about the weather. A completely safe topic. Look out the window at the crepuscular rays.”
“What? Are they going to attack us?”
“I think we’ll live. They’re sunbeams that radiate out through holes in clouds and turn boring stratocumulus into something special.”
“Not a sign from god, then.”
“When I was little I thought they were ladders that people who’d died used to climb to heaven. Then I decided they were actually paths down to Earth from an alien spaceship. I was disappointed when my dad explained they were formed because of reflections from particles of dust or snow or fog. Crepuscular rays were the first entry in my little book. I tried to slip the word crepuscular into conversations as often as I could. I was such a little show-off.”
“I want you on my team when we play Scrabble.”
“When are we going to play Scrabble?”
“At my parents’. Whenever we all get together for dinner it’s compulsory to play afterward.”
You’re going to take me to meet your parents? She bit her lip to stop a smile breaking out on her face.
“Who usually wins?”
“It varies. But not me. I’m not that bright.”
She frowned. “Has someone told you that you’re thick?”
“They didn’t need to tell me. I came bottom of every exam. Richard came top.”
“Why did you come bottom?”
“Everyone else was cleverer than me.”
She growled. “Smart aleck. Weren’t you interested? Didn’t you even try? What was the problem?”
“I managed in class but when it came to the exams, there was too much to remember. Within a couple of pages of a topic, I was lost. I tried to learn it off by heart and that worked until the amount I had to remember was too much. I felt like my head was going to explode.”
“I could see that with history or geography but subjects like physics, math and chemistry, they’re more understanding than learning.”
“But if I didn’t get it the first time it was explained, I was lost, and you still have to remember equations and formulas. I was at a school where everyone was bright. I’d have been happier elsewhere but my mother insisted I stayed with my twin and at least Evan was there as well for a couple of years. I was dismissed as the thick twin and eventually I stopped trying and just messed around. The day I left school was one of the happiest of my life, until I was stuck at the Philadelphia airport.”
“Ahh.”
“I think it was three years ago, one snowy Christmas.”
She chuckled. “I’d smack you for that, but you can see I’m a little skittish about doing anything other than sitting like an angel when I’m in a car.”
“I should forget the blowjob then?”
“Not while we’re moving.”
He groaned. “You could have just said no. Now I’m thinking I could park. I’m sure no one would mind if I pulled onto the hard shoulder of the M2. The police would be totally understanding.”
“You’ll have to wait until we’re back.”
“Are we going to your place or mine?”
“Yours. I’ve no food. How did you come to share with Brody and Nev?”
“I answered an ad. They let me have the room. I think they feel shortchanged though because they expected me to come with a chain of models. You’re the first woman I’ve ever taken back there.”
And didn’t that give her a warm glow?
“I’m saving up for my own place,” he said.
“Me too.” Though she suspected Jai would get there a lot faster. “One of the advantages of being away for eighteen months is that I’ve been able to hoard quite a bit. I sublet my flat and there wasn’t exactly much to spend money on in most places I stayed.”
“My dream is to have a little wooden house that’s all on its own with a view of the sea. And in the garden I’ll have a glass summer house where I can write.”
“Where you can look out onto rolling dunes and a big open sky and an idiot girl trying to kite surf in rough water.”
He laughed. “And there’s this guy who sees her in trouble and dives in to save her.”
“But she wasn’t in trouble at all, waving not drowning, and as they’re thrown together in the water, they accidentally kiss.”
“And get thrown up on the beach like stranded whales except she’s lost her bikini top and he just can’t resist…”
“Can’t resist what?” she asked.
“Can’t resist her.”
* * * * *
Jai pressed the remote to open his garage and drove the car inside. His cock was already getting excited at the idea of his bed and Summer in it, minutes away. Plans to tell her about the deal he’d made ten years ago with two devils would have to wait. First sex, then lunch, then they’d talk about what to do with the drugs. After that, he’d tell her about the night he’d sold his soul, because he wanted to ask her to help him get it back.
Summer lifted her bags from the trunk. When she’d shown him the paper butterflies she’d brought back from Chile, he’d understood how much it had hurt her that Angie hadn’t wanted them. Summer’s sister was a fool. The butterflies would have looked perfect in that kata. It hadn’t escaped his notice that Summer had left her bridesmaid’s dress and shoes behind. He guessed she wanted to forget she’d ever worn them.
“I’ll take the…er, coffee into the police this afternoon,” she said.
“I’ll come with you.”
“No, I don’t think you should.”
Too bad. Jai closed the garage and they set off down the road.
“You’re famous, Jai. You can’t afford to get drawn into any sort of scandal, particularly one involving drugs.”
The one he was in was far worse. “Then I’ll come with you and wait outside.”
No paparazzi were camped out on the street. They sometimes did when papers had column inches to fill, which was part of why Jai had never brought any woman back here. If he wanted to fuck someone, he went to her place or a hotel. But it had been a long time since he’d done that. Marta had sucked him dry.
“You go up,” Jai said as he unlocked the door. “I’ve got a bottle of champagne in the fridge.”
“I think I drank enough last night.”
“It isn’t for drinking. Well, not out of a glass.” He grinned and was rewarded with a blush. “Take your laptop up and we’ll find somewhere n
ice to go for a meal tonight.”
He dumped his bag next to hers and headed for the kitchen. It looked as though Brody and Nev were out. He took the champagne from the fridge and hunted for two glasses. He already knew there were no flutes but he wanted to drink most of the champagne from her body in any case. His cock stiffened at the thought. He levered the cork out with a quiet pop, then opened the cupboard under the sink to throw it away. He’d shut the cupboard again before he registered he’d seen his smudged name on a piece of paper.
When he picked it out of the garbage, it fell apart. Jai couldn’t make out anything other than his name written in Brody’s slanted block capitals. A note? Why had it been thrown away? He pulled out his phone to see if he’d been left a message and belatedly recalled he’d switched it off once he’d arrived at Summer’s. He picked up the champagne and headed out of the room as he checked his phone. There were messages from his brothers, seven voice mails from Marta, one from Saul and two texts. Both from Brody.
Don’t bring Summer back here. Your agent’s wife is in your room.
He read the second message as he bolted for the stairs.
She’s naked.
Jai burst into his room, his heart hammering. Summer stood halfway between the bed and the door. Marta had a sheet draped over her, but most of her was on deliberate show. Naked except for a pair of red stilettos.
“Champagne! Lovely,” Marta said. “My favorite too.”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” Jai could feel happiness slipping through his fingers as his mind tore open. He put the bottle down before he cracked it over Marta’s head.
The bitch pouted. “I’ve just been telling your little friend about our arrangement, darling. You crawled out of my bed on Saturday morning without even kissing me goodbye. That’s not very gentlemanly.”
Summer seemed to be shrinking, her shoulders dropping, her body folding in on itself as she clutched her laptop to her chest.
What do I say? “Get dressed and get out.” It was a start.
Marta narrowed her eyes. “No. Get this little bitch out of here. We need to talk.”
Summer turned to face him. All the color had drained from her beautiful face.
“Don’t go,” he pleaded.
“Is it true?” Summer whispered.
“What has she told you? What poison has she poured in your ears?”
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