As she slipped into sleep, her mind returned instead to the moment the bowl of spiced coffee slipped from the table. She had made sure the chain did not tangle with the bowls as she’d slipped the cuff high up on her forearm to keep it out of the way. How had it fallen over Soto’s bowl?
Duardo must have slipped it over when the men were all watching what Soto was doing to her. The spilled coffee had given him the excuse to scream at her and throw her back into the bedroom, out of their reach.
He had been protecting her all along.
* * * * *
“God, I can’t stand it!” Nick cried, clutching his hands to his head.
Josh glanced over his shoulder to make sure the office door was firmly shut, then crouched to pick up the spill of folders and paperwork Nick had literally thrown up into the air to accompany his declaration.
“What makes you so special?” Josh asked carefully. “Plenty of other heads of government put up with it.”
“Christ, they have...money for a start.” Nick lifted his head from his hands and shook it. “Everyone has this sublime faith that I can just figure this out, but I can’t fight physics. I can’t fight facts.”
“Don’t, then. Go around them,” Josh said, pretending a blitheness he did not feel. It had taken a while, but Josh was finally beginning to understand that the reason Nick kept him so close was because Josh was one of the few non-Vistarian people Nick trusted enough to disgorge his doubts, fears and hesitancies.
Nick rolled his eyes. “How the hell does one launch a beachhead assault without a beachhead?”
“You’ve got a beachhead—it’s three hundred yards from here.”
“And the equipment?”
“Buy it.”
“Landing craft don’t come cheap.”
“Use credit. Every other bloody country in the world does.”
“They have security.”
“And you’re a bellyaching old woman,” Josh said calmly.
Nick grinned.
Josh cleared his throat. “You’re just letting the scale get to you. Running a country and organizing a counter-revolution is just like running a business and a hostile take-over. Just a whole lot bigger.”
Nick’s smile faded. “It’s not the scale that’s the problem,” he said. “I’ve been thinking on that sort of scale all my life. It’s the impossible-to-solve stuff that’s bothering me.”
“At a high enough level, nothing’s impossible to solve.” It was Calli’s voice that interrupted. She stood at the private door that led to the master bedchamber, which everyone had insisted she and Nick continue to use after their wedding, a DVD disk in her hand. “Basic world economic theory. You should know that as well as me, Nick.”
Nick grimaced.
“She’s the economics professor,” Josh reminded him.
“Almost professor,” she added. She came into the room, kissed Nick’s temple and stepped over to the small TV and DVD player on the sideboard behind his desk and shoved the cassette into the maw of the player and switched the TV on. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I thought you’d both like to see this. General Blanco brought it to me.”
Nick took a deep breath and shoved his hands into his pockets. “Go.”
She hit play.
It was the breakfast news and business show of one of the Acapulco television networks. Because the majority of the population in Acapulco were tourists and inclined to sleep in late, the news show was a low-ratings one. As a result, it was free to provide hardcore news of interest to real Acapulco residents and the antics of Mexico’s near neighbor formed part of that interest.
The footage concerned some sort of official visit by Serrano to the poorer communities along the eastern coast. In fast Spanish the commentator exclaimed over Serrano’s generosity as the camera captioned him dolling out the big Vistarian currency in fistfuls to happy family members gathered around him laughing and crying tears of gratitude.
Josh winced. “It’s so melodramatic I want to puke. Surely anyone with half a brain can figure out he’s doing it purely for the PR?”
“The families getting the money don’t care about that,” Nick said quietly. “What I want to know is how the Acapulco station got this footage. Vistaria has been sealed tighter than a drum for the last three weeks.”
Calli clicked her tongue and stopped the tape. “You’re both missing it,” she said, and set the clip back. She played it again. “Watch the background,” she warned.
They watched again and this time Josh lurched to his feet at the same time Nick breathed, “Jesus Maria!”
Calli paused the playback and backed it up a few frames at a time until the image was back in frame. They all stared at the ocean view the sweeping camera shot had included. The lone yacht in the bay stood out like a sore thumb.
“That’s your boat, Nick,” Josh murmured.
“What’s that flapping from the sheets?” Nick asked, narrowing his eyes. “The image is too small.”
“They’re dresses,” Calli said quietly. “One red, one green.”
He looked at her. “You’re sure?”
“I’ve seen more dresses hanging loose than you have. I’m sure.”
Josh pushed his hand through his hair. “Then Calli guessed right. They’re over there.”
Nick was still staring at the television. “Is this a message?” he asked of no one. “A message for us?”
“From whom?” Calli asked. “And saying what?”
“From Minnie and Carmen,” Josh offered. “‘Na-na, we’re over here’.”
Calli gave him a gentle look. “Neither of them are that stupid. Whatever the reasons they went over there, I guarantee they know the risks they’re taking. They wouldn’t indulge in a childish gesture.”
Nick punched the button that ejected the tape and the television turned to snow. He flicked it off with another impatient jab. “I can’t deal with this right now,” he said, thrusting the tape at Calli. “Please.”
She nodded. “I’ll look into it. I’m better at recognizing dresses than you anyway.” She smiled.
Josh recognized that she was trying to lighten the moment, to assure Nick he could at least let go of that one responsibility. “All that almost-professor training, right?” he said to Calli.
“Absolutely,” she agreed. Then her eyes narrowed and she looked at Nick. “What was impossible, by the way?”
“Nothing. Don’t worry about—”
“Don’t tell me don’t worry,” she said swiftly. “What’s impossible?”
“According to you, nothing.”
“Try me.”
Nick took another deep breath. “Well, for a start, everything’s impossible without money.”
“Credit?” she countered in a thoughtful tone, her forehead wrinkling.
“Personally, I’m already extended so far I’m in danger of tipping off the end of the world. I’ve liquidated anything that is worth it, except this house as I assumed people would like shelter from the sun.”
She frowned harder. “National debt.” It was again a soft suggestion.
“We’re a nation without a country,” Nick said. “We have nothing to secure the loans against. Most of the countries that have the cash to lend us won’t deal with us on diplomatic levels, so they can’t deal with us on economic matters either.”
“You’re thinking of the States,” she said.
“And every other western nation,” he agreed.
She thought some more then abruptly her frown cleared and she began to smile. “You’re thinking too large,” she said. “You’re thinking on a national scale.”
“It is a whole nation we’re dealing with,” Josh pointed out.
“No, you’re not. You’re dealing with a lack of money. Bring it down to that. And find something to secure loans with. Any loans.”
Nick shook his head. “There is nothing.”
“Not at the level you’re thinking, of course there isn’t. But you have to change the way you look at it. W
hat have you got going for you right now?”
Both men stared at her and she gave an impatient click of her tongue and turned to Josh. “Josh, your company, Eastcore Mining. How many billions in infrastructure, investment and research would they have sunk into the silver mines on Las Piedras Grandes before the revolution closed them down? How many millions in personnel relocation and training?”
“Plenty,” he said. “I couldn’t give you an estimate without a lot of thought, though.”
“Ballpark. Five billion?”
“Oh, easily.”
“Think they’d like it back?” Calli asked softly.
Josh snorted. “They’re a business, not a country,” he said dryly. “They don’t like red balance sheets.”
“Exactly,” she shot back. “Nick, you start up a dialogue with Josh’s board of directors. Explain to them how you’re guaranteed to win back Vistaria if only you have enough resources to do it. If you win back Vistaria, they get back their mine, their revenue and their big chunk of change in investment, plus whatever interest they care to charge Vistaria for the stake money they’re going to give you to raise your counter-revolution.”
“They’d never go for it,” Nick said. “It’s too big a gamble.”
“Bullshit they won’t,” Josh shot back. “This is exactly the sort of odds they gamble with in every venture they sink billions into every year. This is better odds, too—they get to reap profits from a mine that was already producing before they lost it and they get lending interest out of Vistaria. Oh, they’ll try to bleed you dry while they’re negotiating terms, but they’ll give you the money. Take Calli with you. She’ll pick off the leeches and spot the hairy clauses as they’re coming at you.”
Nick’s expression was an almost comical mix of astonishment and wariness, but beneath it was a growing excitement. He had studied economics himself. He understood the forces that worked on world economics and he recognized the accuracy of Calli’s assessment.
“But not just Eastcore Mining,” Calli added. “Keep it an open market and let the forces of competition work for you. Approach every other multi-national who had interests in Vistaria before the war and offer them the same sort of deal, and be very careful to let them all know you’re shopping around.”
“It’s a matter of scale,” Joshua said softly. “You just have to pick the right scale to look at it.”
* * * * *
It was dark when he came back.
Minnie was awake this time and heard the door open. The subdued light from the office beyond flared before the closing door extinguished it. She heard him moving around the room. The blind at the window had not been drawn and moonlight and starlight made his silhouette glow in the dim light. He did not turn on any lights. There was a whisper of cloth, the metal clink of a belt buckle and her heart thundered. Duardo was back.
Then she remembered the microphone beneath the bed. She must still play the role.
The mattress moved and cool air bathed her back as he lifted the covers and slid beneath.
With a convulsive jerk, she surged from the bed. She threw the covers aside and slid from the mattress like an otter from a pool. As her feet hit the floor, she pushed off with one foot, heading for the door to his office.
Only to be yanked to a standstill by the chain around her wrist. She hissed at the strain on her shoulder and wrist and grabbed at the cuff digging into her hand. He was pulling on it.
“Oh, no you don’t, my little spit-fire,” he said, in English. “You are staying on this bed.”
Slowly, relentlessly, she was drawn back to the bed, her cuffed hand held out before her almost in supplication. She resisted every inch, throwing her bodyweight into it, even though she knew he was far stronger than she. He reeled her in liked a fish, onto the mattress until she was kneeling before his dark outline. He reached for her other hand and wrapped the chain around both wrists. His movements were slow and deliberate. She sensed he was using just enough power to complete his task and no more.
Her bound hands were a reminder of that morning. She recalled being bent over the bed and her breath caught.
He lowered her hands to the mattress and they were pinned there by his hand on the chain, bending her over once more. There was a tugging on the chain and his hand lifted away. She tried to sit up and discovered that he had hooked the chain to both the head and foot of the bed, keeping her hands pinned to the mattress between the taut chain. It left both his hands free.
“If I didn’t know better, I might think that you enjoyed the lesson I gave you this morning,” he said.
She shuddered.
“Hm.... Shall I repeat the lesson? Or teach you a new one?”
“Either way, you’re still an animal,” she hissed.
His long fingers brushed at her wrists, probing the chains and she realized he was checking to make sure the chains were not too tight and did not cut into her flesh—just enough to hold her and no more.
His fingers stroked her forearms, trailed up to her shoulders. In the dark she could see him rise before her, blocking the moonlight from the window. He remained silent until his fingers found her face and gently lifted her chin so that if there was light enough, she could have looked at his face. He leaned toward her, so close that she could feel his heat on her face.
“It is your turn to take,” he whispered. “Pretend your soldier has returned once more. Pretend he could not stay away from you.”
“How can I take if you’re the one who is free?” she shot back, tugging on the chains.
He was moving around her, moving behind her. She stiffened, waiting for the tug on her feet that would bring her to that mortifying position bent face-down over the bed. But the tug did not come.
Instead, his hands touched her back and softly traced their way around, under her arms, to cup her breasts. His touch was electrifying. Her nipples were already taut and receptive. As his fingers rippled over them she gave a tiny gasp in the dark.
“You understand perfectly,” he whispered back. “I knew you would.” His fingers continued to play, to tweak and coax from her the responses he sought.
He was right, she did understand how it was she could take from him. She merely had to reach for her own pleasure and indulge herself as she had last night. She could enjoy the fact that Duardo was behind her, stroking her breasts, his own breath growing uneven.
He used nothing but his hands on her. They roamed across every available inch, stroking, teasing, nudging. Her toes were not spared, nor was her head. As his fingers buried themselves in her hair, they moved with firmness and banished tension there before moving down to her shoulders to knead and loosen the muscles. But the kneading evolved into stroking, to the lightest teasing that drifted over the surface of her flesh. It was so light she felt nothing but the heat of his touch, drifting lower and lower, to hover over the dip between her cheeks. Minnie arched in reaction. She could not help it. She had always been sensitive in that place and her flesh quivered at his almost-not-there touch.
He read her movement for what it was. For long minutes he lingered over that small area of sensitivity. He toyed with it mercilessly, using light and more definite strokes, pulling from her the most exquisite surges of pleasure and longing. She gave a shuddering gasp in reaction.
He sensed her submission. His hands tugged gently at her ankles, guiding her. She eased her legs off the bed and the tension on the chains at her wrists forced her to bend over. Her body throbbed as the vulnerable core of her was opened up to him.
She felt tugging at her wrists, the clink of the chain and suddenly, her hands were free. He massaged the wrists then planted her hands back on the mattress, so that she was propping herself up. “Now, you take,” he murmured, moving around behind her.
She closed her eyes. That was Duardo—the old Duardo, using the odd constructions that Duardo had once used, rather than grammatically perfect English.
She could feel his body heat behind her and her heart began to thunder. She p
ressed back, offering herself. When he touched her ankles, she spread her feet without further encouragement, opening up even more. There was a delicious tension in being so exposed to him. What would he do now? What would he touch next?
He touched her ankles again, the long fingers curling around them without effort, spreading heat, before exploring each dip and peak and tendon, finding every little sensitive location. Minnie began to quiver with building pleasure. She had never known it was possible to become so aroused from something as simple as fingers playing with her ankles.
But the fingers were moving. Climbing. For long moments he worked his way up the length of her legs until the fingertips fluttered at the very top. By then her breath was burning in her chest as she panted and writhed. She could feel the depth of her arousal by the slickness between her legs and the heat and throbbing of her clitoris. She ached to be filled with him. She wanted him to batter his way inside. She wanted to be taken, and taken hard.
His hands cupped her bottom, the fingers moving restlessly. Close...so close, but not where she wanted them.
His thumbs pressed into her folds, probed deep into her pussy and she threw her head back with a gasping sigh that ripped through her throat. The thumbs explored, spreading the muscled entrance. She pushed back, inviting him to probe deeper.
Instead, the digits were withdrawn. She choked back her frustration.
His fingers came to life again, the hands sliding around her hips to cup her belly. Her abdomen muscles rippled at his touch and her clitoris throbbed with the need to be touched, to be stroked. His fingers lay a bare inch from the proud flesh. He merely needed to slide a little deeper....
His hands slipped up her torso, toward her breasts and she stiffened in anticipation. He curled them around each breast, but his hands did not remain still. They chafed and stroked across the nipples, over every part of her breasts, even the sensitive side swell.
Her arms were trembling violently now, her body shuddering.
He leaned over her, she could feel his heat against her back. “Tell me what you want,” he murmured.
Black Heart Page 17
