by Casey Hagen
“A 1957 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa in 1958, then 1960 and 1961,” Jeremy said with a smile.
Oh, he was smart…and just short of cocky with it. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but his intelligent green eyes had seen hardships. He had a business, a business profitable enough that he could walk away and be here helping her. He was tough, a fighter, and likely just the guy she needed on her side.
She nodded. “I’m impressed.”
He smirked. “Ahh, so not sending me home then?”
“Not sending you home,” she said with a grin.
The way he held her stare, a slow smile of his own splitting his handsome face, told her that, before long, they were going to tangle with one another. She’d finally found a man capable of sharing her love of cars. He hadn’t come in and treated her like the little woman he needed to educate. He’d shown no sign of believing her inferior to him in knowledge.
She respected that, and in turn she respected him. Now, she needed him to tell her what the hell was going on with her cars so she could feel safe again.
“Follow me. Let’s see what you’re really made of.”
Valentina led him along a winding walkway to the garage. A frigid breeze pushed through, and she pulled her ivory shawl a bit tighter about her. It would seem silly, but he wanted to offer her his shirt, not that she would welcome some plaid fleece over a dress that probably cost thousands of dollars.
The lace teased, revealing yet hiding, and left him intrigued by what lay below. He’d seen her, of course, he had confessed as much, but seeing a model on a runway and seeing a full-blooded woman before you, naked, wanting, that had to be far different.
He didn’t need fancy makeup, perfect hair, glitter, shimmery creams, and spray tans. He wanted naked and soft, exposed skin. Give him the Dame, with eyes only for him, every inch exposed for him, his hands, and his mouth, lying in the middle of a king-size bed tangled in soft sheets and blankets, the rise and fall of those high breasts while she took ragged breaths.
He slowly blinked to clear the tantalizing image from his head. Cars first, the Dame second.
Tell that to the growing problem in his pants.
And, of course, this all depended on her willingness, but he’d swear by the look in her eye…
At the door she glanced around, but it was just the three of them. Jeremy gave her a questioning look and did the same. There was nothing. Not a single soul about.
She pulled the key from the cord on her wrist, unlocked the door, and pushed it open. The recessed lights worked off a sensor and lit up in sequences, running the line of the garage, the row closest to them first. The ivory walls and warm lighting set the room aglow. The warm air inside chased away the chill from outside.
Jeremy blinked once, then twice, not believing what the hell he was seeing. Two rows of cars, all parked in perfect lines, the front ends all aimed toward the center of the room, the space open enough to easily pull out whichever car one wished to drive.
By the looks of things, the Dame clearly had a thing for Mercedes-Benz Roadsters, Ferraris, and Christ, was that…? Holy shit, it was. A black 1947 Bentley Mark VI gleamed in all its proud glory.
He left Valentina and Dante behind as he wound through the cars, admiring the paint, the lines, the leather work on the interiors, the goddamned history surrounding him.
“You drive all these?” he called out to her.
She smiled and dragged a fingertip over the hood of a 1957 Ferrari 625 TRC Spider. “Yes. Well, until yesterday I did. Now, I don’t trust getting behind the wheel of any of them.”
“Tell me about the accidents,” he said as he worked his way back toward her.
She shrugged. “A few weeks ago, the tire blew when I was driving the Helica. I dismissed it, thinking it was just a case of a dry-rotted tire. Then the Gullwing caught fire under the engine. It can happen, but I started to wonder. I left two messages for my dad’s former mechanic and still haven’t heard back.”
“Your father’s mechanic?”
She cocked a hip on a silver 1964 Ford GT40. “Yes, George Young. This collection belonged to my father. He willed it to me.”
“When did your father die?”
“Six months ago,” she said.
She flinched when she said it. He didn’t miss the hitch to the words. She’d loved her father, must have had a good relationship with him. Jeremy respected that. He’d given everything he could for his father. He had taken over the shop, grown the business, and done everything possible to see his sister happy and secure when Alzheimer’s had stolen his father’s ability to lead the family as he’d done for their whole lives.
“You have no siblings, no other beneficiaries to the will?”
She shook her head. “No. No one.”
“Okay. Didn’t you say there were three accidents, Dante?”
“Yes, yesterday was the third,” Dante said.
“And my worst yet. I crashed the Camaro.”
He closed his eyes, almost afraid to ask. “What kind of Camaro?”
“A 1969 ZL1,” she said.
Of course it was. He put a hand to his heart and flinched. “When you say crashed…”
Her mouth had gone hard again. “I hit two trees.”
“Ouch. Seriously, my heart.”
She glared. “Tell me about it. I love that car.”
“Where are they?”
She headed to the end of the showroom. “Through here.” She led him into what looked like a mechanic’s shop. Well, minus most of the dirt and grease of a mechanic’s shop. There were four bays, all with pits and lifts. The Helica, the Gullwing and, Jesus, the Camaro, formed a sad little line of busted-up vehicles.
He circled around the Camaro and flinched. “What happened with the Camaro?”
“I was drifting—”
His gaze snapped to hers. “Drifting?”
She crossed her arms, her spine stiffening. “You’re a car guy; you must know drifting.”
“Yes, I’m just surprised you do,” Jeremy said.
She smiled then and relaxed her tense shoulders. “I had a couple of friends at one time who got me into it. I was never really great at it, but I did it for fun. Anyway, I had just cleared a corner, the last corner I planned to drift around. When I went to hit my brakes, nothing. The car slid off the road, the rear panel hit a tree, then the front end hit another tree,” she said, gesturing to the crumpled-up front end.
The cherry red metal had crumpled into the window frame and trunk compartment. Ugly, but not terminal. As for the front, the radiator had taken a hell of a hit, but from what he could tell, the engine had not been damaged.
“I don’t know until I get in, but my best guess is the Camaro is salvageable. It’ll be pricey, though.”
“Money doesn’t matter. I want my car back.”
He nodded. “Okay, then. I want them towed to my shop.”
She opened her mouth to speak, but he raised a finger in the air to halt her. “I don’t know about the Helica or Gullwing yet, but the Camaro is going to be a hell of a project. I definitely need it there, where I am. I can stay and go over the other cars here, using this shop, while I have the others towed to my place.”
She relented with a hesitant nod. “Fine, Dante…can you call a tow company—”
He’d forgotten Dante was even there. “No. I want someone I can trust. I’ll call my sister.”
“Your sister?”
“Yes, she runs the other half of our business, Jack’s Towing.”
“And her name…”
He laughed. He got that look a lot. “Jack. Short for Jacqueline, but don’t call her that. It pisses her off.”
The Dame threw her head back and laughed. Not a dainty laugh, but a full-bellied sound, free of the underlying tension of the past hour. He desperately wanted to make her laugh like that again. Something about her seemed so lonely, like it was her against the world. He wanted to change that, if only for a brief time.
After all, what cha
Jeremy wasn’t stupid enough to think he had a shot at beating the odds.
They’d be temporary. Two ships passing in the night.
Never to meet again.
CHAPTER FOUR
Out of Control
VALENTINA PACED HER OFFICE waiting for him to return, but he didn’t. Dante put in a call to the shop, only to have it go unanswered. That’s when she sent him to the shop to make sure everything was okay. Every minute that went by, more and more tension settled into her shoulders and back until she was sure her spine would snap.
Fifteen minutes later, he arrived back in her office. “He’s fine. He’s working. He said to stop calling him, and that he doesn’t need to be looked after like a little girl.”
“He’s good, isn’t he?” she said.
Dante nodded. “He’s good. Look, you’re pacing a hole in the floor. Camille held dinner. Why don’t we go eat?”
She parted the curtain and looked out to the garage. Darkness had fallen an hour earlier. The lights burned bright in the shop. When Dante had headed out to the shop to check on Jeremy, she heard the faint sound of rock music drifting through the night air.
Jeremy fascinated her. She’d known men with car knowledge, but never had she met one with a true love deep in his core. Jeremy lived and breathed the history, the beauty, and the power of automobiles. Bonus, he lacked the polish and shine of the men she normally mingled with. He possessed a real, almost raw, power.
She dropped the curtain and followed Dante into the dining room. They sat together at one end of the white marble dining table that easily held sixteen people. Not that she ever planned to bring that many visitors into her sanctuary. She’d be hard-pressed to invite more than two or three.
Camille came out of the kitchen with two steaming plates and a smile. The tiny woman full of unwavering energy had been cooking for Valentina and her father for as long as she could remember, and in so many ways had been a mother figure for Valentina.
“It’s about time you stopped fretting by that window. I swear, child, how many times have I told you that the more you watch something you’re waiting on, the longer it will take?”
Valentina took her hand after she set down the plates. “I know, Miss Camille. I just can’t seem to help myself,” Valentina said as she squeezed the tension in the back of her neck.
“Twenty-nine and still the patience of a twelve-year-old.” Camille smoothed a hand over her head.
Valentina closed her eyes and relished the gesture. Her father had once done the same thing, and she missed it.
She lifted her fork and smiled. “If patience is the measurement of adulthood, I’m never growing up, Miss Camille. You’re just going to have to accept it.”
“Well, I do hope you grow up enough to have a family of your own, child. Rattling around in this house alone with just the staff to keep you company…” She shook her head. “It’s a shame is what it is. You’re restless because you need a good man to challenge you.”
Valentina glanced to Dante, who bit his lip and suppressed a laugh.
Damn him.
Camille pointed a finger at Dante. “That goes for you, too, young man. I see you laughing at her. And, yes, I know you are of another persuasion. More difficult, maybe, but not impossible. You need to find a good man, too!”
Valentina raised her glass of red wine. “To finding a couple of good men.”
Dante raised his glass and clinked it to hers. “Well, as long as we’re asking…to finding a couple of good and well-hung men.”
Camille shook her head and huffed on her way back into the kitchen.
Valentina laughed as she cut into her Beef Wellington.
“You know, we need to talk about it,” Dante said around his first bite.
“About what?” Valentina said.
“About who might be trying to get to you. The staff—”
She met his gaze. “My staff wouldn’t hurt me.”
“Can you be sure about all of them?”
She thought so. God, she hoped so. She didn’t want to think it was one of them. There were so many others on the outside who nurtured bitterness toward her; she didn’t want to think of it coming from within.
Alan Stokes had assumed he would step in and head up her father’s companies, never once expecting that not only would Valentina plan differently, but that she also had the knowledge to step in and do so seamlessly. Her father had always filled her in on his business dealings. He’d also left a wealth of information and records for her to figure out whatever she hadn’t known.
Stokes had resented her ever since.
There was the missing mechanic. She still didn’t know where he had gotten off to or how he would stand to benefit by having her out of the way.
“I can’t see the staff having anything to gain by getting rid of me. They were all in my dad’s will, and all received generous sums from his estate. The only hostility I’ve gotten is from one man. Alan Stokes. He’s a worm, but he’s excellent at his job. He has a family and a lot to lose if he’s busted trying to harm me. If he had anything to do with it, he’s far removed.”
“And in the modeling world?”
“I’ve almost extricated myself from it entirely. Any competition won’t have me for competition much longer. Why risk getting caught for something that’s coming anyway?”
Dante leaned back in his chair and sipped his wine. “I’m running out of ideas.”
“Me, too. Maybe I’m missing something. Maybe I’m overreacting and it’s all just paranoia. Jeremy could waltz in and tell me that the cars just had issues, and they had nothing to do with sabotage.”
“Or Jeremy will tell you that you’ve got a problem on your hands,” Jeremy said from the doorway.
Valentina’s heart clenched. No…no, no, no, damn it!
Jeremy pointed at Dante with a stern look and a hard jaw. “She’s not to be left alone. Not for a single minute.”
Valentina pushed out of her chair. The wine lingering on her tongue that had tasted sweet and smooth just a moment ago turned rancid in her mouth.
She’d told herself it was likely, but apparently, she hadn’t truly accepted the possibility for real. Now, Jeremy gave her no choice but to face the reality that someone wanted her gone.
“Who knows about the first accident?” Jeremy asked.
Her eyes darted to Dante, then back to him. “Dante and the staff here. Plus, I left a message with George, my dad’s former mechanic. He often takes a vacation this time of year and is hard to reach. He likes to go into the mountains and fish.”
“And the second accident?”
“The same.”
“And this one?”
“All except George.”
Jeremy rested his hands on his hips and took a minute just to piece it all together. “Okay, three accidents in three weeks. What did you do over the last three weeks, between the accidents?”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Why are you asking me all of this?”
“Because I suspect the person doing this is here, and your answers will help me determine that.”
“Why, what did you find?” Dante said.
“You blew a tire in the Helica, as you knew, but the reason you blew a tire is that there’re a series of small slits along the wall of the tire. There were no signs of distress, wear and tear, or dry-rot. The slits were made by a blade. The Gullwing, someone had doused the whole area under the hood with an accelerant. Not sure what kind.” He hated the way the color drained from her face, but she had to know.
“And the Camaro?”
She’s lucky she wasn’t dead. Yesterday could have been her last day, and he never would have met her, bantered with her. She’d been the first to spark interest in him in years. Lost in his work, no one had been fascinating enough to draw his attention away from his goals.
One thing was for sure: now that he’d met her, even though their time was temporary, he sure as hell wasn’t going to let anything happen to her.
“They got serious with the Camaro. They made it look like you slipped a brake line, but it was definitely deliberate. They missed on the first shot at the line and left a telltale slit.”
“And they likely sabotaged my harness.”
Jeremy darted a look between Valentina and Dante. “When the hell were you going to tell me about this?”
Valentina straightened to her full height, maybe an inch shorter than his six one, tops. “It’s not like we were keeping it a secret,” Valentina said.
Jeremy marched right up to her. “It’s not like you were offering up all of the information either.” He narrowed his eyes at her forehead over her left eye. “Is that…?” He brushed his fingers over the skin above her eyebrow. “You were hurt in the accident?”
“It’s a bump. No big deal.”
“A mild concussion,” Dante said.
Valentina glared at Dante, and he shrugged back at her. “I’m not interested in getting on Jeremy’s bad side.”
“Who signs your check?” Valentina bit out.
“Good point, but you love me and would never fire me.”
“Oh, shut up!” she snapped.
“I think it’s someone here.” Jeremy said the words low, so only they could hear him.
“Why?”
He pinched a lock of her hair between his fingers, and then let it fall. There would be time for that. “It’s happening too fast. Do you go into an office every day or is your schedule always different?”
“Different. Why?”
“If it were someone at one of your companies, they would need to get word that their sabotage didn’t work and have time to come up with an alternate plan. I’m assuming those businesses aren’t centered in Napa, so that would take time to work out.”
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