Not Spence.
She struggled to get up, gazing around to find the figure she’d glimpsed on the floor. The moonlight was brilliant enough for her to see blood on her own clothing, but not bright enough for her to locate a body on the floor. There was something wrong with that picture, but Natalie didn’t take the time to sort it out. Using the door frame for support, she pulled herself up and felt for the light switch.
Light flooded the room, illuminating every nook and crevice. There was more blood on the floor, along with her glasses, but nothing else. No body. No Spence.
Natalie leaned weakly against the wall, closing her eyes, trying to ignore the pounding in her head. What was happening here? What was happening to her life? How had it suddenly gotten so out of control? She had never felt so helpless, not even when she’d found out she was pregnant. Not even when Anthony had threatened to take away her son if she didn’t agree to his terms.
Where, in God’s name, was Spence? It seemed he was always disappearing when Natalie needed him the most.
The door beside her opened, and she gasped, jumping back, looking around wildly for something with which to defend herself. But as if summoned by her silent plea, Spence walked through the door.
His presence was hardly comforting. Blood trickled down the side of his face, and his own shirt was splotched with big red circles. His eyes seemed to have a hard time focusing on her.
“Natalie,” he said, sounding relieved. “Are you all right?”
“I think so,” she said hesitantly. “Are you?”
“At the moment, that’s debatable.”
He came into the room and Natalie realized for the first time that he was carrying something in each hand—his cell phone in one, and her first-aid kit in the other. He sat down wearily at the kitchen table.
“I’ve called 911,” he said. “The police and an ambulance should be here soon, but maybe you’d better let me have a look at that bump anyway. You were out cold for a couple of minutes.”
“What about you?” she asked, bending to retrieve her glasses before coming to sit down beside him. “I saw you on the floor— At least, I thought it was you. Then someone hit me. Next thing I knew, I was waking up and you were nowhere to be found. What happened?”
He grimaced, putting his hand to the cut on his head. “I’m losing my touch, that’s what happened. Bastard jumped me from behind. I never even saw it coming.”
“Maybe you’d better let me have a look at you,” Natalie said. “Judging by all that blood, I’d say you’re in worse shape than I am.”
“It’s nothing,” he mumbled, but winced when her fingers explored the cut on his head. “Sorry about your blouse.”
“So this is your blood.” Natalie wondered why that notion didn’t particularly relieve her.
“I bent over you to see if you were okay. When I couldn’t get you to come around, I decided I’d better get an ambulance over here.”
The image of him, hurt and bleeding, disregarding his own wound to tend to her filled Natalie with an emotion she didn’t understand. Then again, maybe she did. Maybe that was why her heart was pounding away inside her as she stood over him to tend to his.
“It’s not that deep,” she told him. “But you may need a few stitches.”
“They’ll have to wait.” He took her arm and pulled her down in the chair beside him. “Before the police get here, there’s something you and I need to talk about.”
“Like what?”
“Like what happened here tonight.”
“But I don’t know what happened. I don’t know any more than you do.”
His green eyes seemed to have no trouble focusing on her now. Cool and relentless, they searched her face. “I think you do know. I think you know a lot more than you’ve been telling me.”
“About what?”
Those same green eyes hardened on her. His every feature seemed to tighten into a mask of cold, dark suspicion. “About Anthony’s murder. About the diamonds.”
“Diamonds? I don’t know—”
“Game’s over, Natalie. Where are they? Hand them over before someone else ends up dead.”
“What are you talking about? What diamonds?”
Spence watched her, looking for the telltale signs of guilt—dry mouth, darting eyes, trembling fingers.
Natalie displayed none of those as she glared at him. If she was lying, she was a damned good actress.
But hadn’t he known that she was? Hadn’t he been taken in by her before?
“Where are they?” he repeated.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about. I don’t know anything about any diamonds.”
She looked so bewildered, Spence could almost feel sorry for her, but he wouldn’t let himself. He wouldn’t let anything dim his assessment of her reaction to what he was telling her. Not even the kiss they’d shared earlier. Not even the memories that kiss had awakened, nor the emotions it had aroused.
He studied her now, wondering if he was doing the right thing by laying his cards on the table. It wasn’t in his nature to be so forthcoming, but he needed Natalie’s help. And he needed to know if he could trust her.
“The diamonds Anthony was looking for in your store the night he was murdered.”
Her eyes widened. “Why on earth was he looking for diamonds in Silver Bells?”
“He came in earlier that day and bought something that he wanted you to deliver, right?”
Her eyes grew even rounder behind her glasses and their blue deepened. “Yes! How did you know that?”
“We had him under surveillance.”
“Surveillance? But why?” Suddenly, a light seemed to dawn for her. “Why didn’t you tell me this before, when I was trying to convince the police Anthony was looking for something that night? They didn’t believe me. Why didn’t you come forward and tell them the truth?”
“I had my reasons.”
Her eyes flashed with fire, but not the deep, sultry warmth he’d glimpsed earlier when he kissed her. The heat he saw in those blue depths now was pure, unadulterated anger. And in some strange way, it was no less stirring.
“What possible reason could you have to justify withholding information like that from the police? Information that might clear me.” Then she said slowly, “Wait a minute. If you followed Anthony to Silver Bells that day, what about that night, when he was murdered? Were you following him then? Do you know who killed him? Do you?”
Behind her wire-rimmed glasses, Natalie’s eyes shot daggers at him. Spence thought that he had never seen anyone look so angry, and with good reason, he had to admit. He had withheld things from Natalie and from the police, and now he was going to have to ask her to do the same.
“After Anthony left your shop that day, he went back to his office, where he stayed the rest of the afternoon and evening,” Spence told her. “Sometime later, he gave us the slip. We still haven’t figured out exactly how he managed to leave the building without our seeing him. But we figure he must have come straight to Silver Bells, somehow got in and turned off the alarm, and was looking for the diamonds when you walked in on him.”
She crossed her arms and glared at him. “You still haven’t told me why Anthony was looking for diamonds in my shop in the first place.”
“We think he meant to send them in the package he had you deliver, only something went wrong. When the package was delivered to the drop, the diamonds were missing.”
“But how did you know where the package was being delivered?” she asked incredulously.
“We had an agent in the store while Anthony was there. She got the address off the counter while you were busy with another customer.”
“Real cloak-and-dagger-type stuff.” Natalie shook her head, unable to believe everything she was hearing.
“More like life-and-death,” Spence replied, not wishing to scare her any more than she already was, but knowing he had to impress upon her the seriousness of the situation. “Someone has already been murdered because of those di
amonds, Natalie. I don’t want to see anybody else get hurt.”
She put trembling fingertips to her temple as she gazed at Spence with troubled eyes. The bluest eyes he’d ever looked into, and he had the sudden, almost-irresistible urge to pull her into his arms, to shield her from the dirt that both he and Anthony had wittingly drawn her into.
But now was not the time, and this was certainly not the place. Besides, once he told her the rest of his story, his arms would be the last place she would want to seek shelter, he thought with a stab of bitter remorse.
“Who is it that wants those diamonds?” she asked. “Besides you, I mean.”
“Have you ever heard of a man named Jack Russo?”
Something flickered across her features. A glimmer of recognition. Then she shook her head. “Who is he?”
“A crime boss who was arrested three years ago for murdering a diamond dealer in Dallas. The man was killed during a robbery, but the only witness who came forward to testify against Russo was later found dead. There was nothing tying Russo to the murder except the fortune in diamonds that was stolen from the dealer. Anthony was Russo’s attorney. He got the murder charges thrown out for insufficient evidence. Russo was later sent to a federal penitentiary on racketeering charges, but he’s out now. And the diamonds were never recovered. We think Anthony was holding them for Russo until he got out of prison.”
“You mean Anthony deliberately hid evidence from the police that would have sent Russo to prison for murder? Why?”
“Why would he agree to defend a man like Russo in the first place? Anthony isn’t here to tell us, but I’m guessing it was greed. Russo probably agreed to give him a cut.”
“But Anthony was rich. He was a Bishop.”
“Anthony was not rich,” Spence said. “At least, not in the sense you mean. He had money—plenty, by most people’s standards. But Anthony wasn’t most people. He lived an extravagant life-style, and he had an image to uphold.”
“What do you mean?” Natalie asked.
Spence got up and walked to the window, staring out into the darkness. “The Bishop family has money, including the law firm and several real-estate holdings worth millions. But my father’s will left everything in trust. Everyone gets an allowance—Mother, Anthony, and Anthea—but the bulk of the estate was to be held in trust for the first Bishop grandson.”
He turned from the window in time to see the color drain from Natalie’s face. She looked beyond shocked. She looked devastated, and Spence’s first thought was one of relief. She hadn’t known. Anthony hadn’t told her about the money.
Her hand fluttered to her heart. “Are you saying—”
“Kyle is the sole Bishop heir.”
“Why didn’t anyone ever tell me?” she asked in a stunned whisper.
“The terms of my father’s will were not something my family wanted to make public. Besides the law firm, the family has always dealt heavily in real estate. If word had gotten out that the Bishop fortune was out of the picture, important deals could have fallen through. Besides the fact that the Bishop reputation had to be maintained. Appearances had to be considered. Mother and Anthony, and even Anthea to a lesser degree, would have been publicly humiliated if it were known they no longer had the Bishop fortune backing them.”
“How long have you known about this?” Natalie asked weakly.
“Since before my father died ten years ago. He wanted to make certain I understood certain aspects of the will, so that I wouldn’t contest it.”
“What aspects?”
“That he had cut me out completely.” He said it flatly, with no emotion whatsoever, but Spence could still remember the pain that had knifed through him at his father’s arrogant dismissal of him.
“You’ve refused to do as I say. You’ve cut yourself off from this family, and now I have no recourse but to do the same to you. You will never get your hands on one cent of Bishop money. Your flagrant disregard for my wishes and this reckless, rebellious behavior you seem to take so much pleasure in flaunting before my face leads me to conclude that any money given to you would not only be ill-spent, but also ill-advised….”
There had been more, but Spence cut off the memories and returned them to where they belonged—in the deepest, darkest recesses of his mind. He focused once again on Natalie and what this information had done to her. Her face was still white and drawn, her whole demeanor so fragile she looked as if she might pass out at any second.
Not exactly the reaction you would expect from someone who had just learned her son would someday inherit a fortune worth millions.
“The trust,” she said, still looking dazed. “You said…it was to be held for the first Bishop grandson. Did you mean…Anthony’s son?”
“He’s the only Bishop grandson.”
“I know…but…” She trailed off, as if uncertain how to voice her next question. She took a deep breath, but her eyes refused to meet his. “What if…you had a son first. Would…the money still have gone to Anthony’s first son, since you were cut out of the will?”
“That’s the strange part.” Spence came back over and sat down beside her at the table. “The will stipulated first grandson, not necessarily Anthony’s, and I wondered about that, too. But I think I figured out why my father did what he did. He wanted Anthony to marry and have children. At the time of my father’s death, Anthony was thirty-one years old, and showed no sign of settling down. That was the only bone of contention between the two of them that I ever knew about. The old man wanted to make sure the Bishop line was carried on, and he knew the one sure way to make Anthony comply with his wishes was to hold the money over his head.”
“H-how could he have been so sure Anthony would have the first grandson? What if you had met someone…fallen in love…had children…?” Natalie left the question dangling as she searched his face for some clue, some hint of what he might be feeling. But his face was like a mask, wiped clean of every last emotion.
Was this the same man who had kissed her earlier? The same man who had brought her to her emotional knees with the intense feelings he’d unleashed inside her?
Natalie tried to put the memories of that kiss aside as she concentrated on what he was saying. Because everything he’d told her had hit her with terrific force. Suddenly, so many things became clear, and the past took on a new and more ominous meaning for her. She understood Anthony better than she ever had before. No wonder he’d been so desperate to marry her—and to get custody of Kyle.
“My father knew he could count on Anthony to make sure I stayed out of the picture,” Spence was saying. “And I’m equally certain that Anthony was prepared for such a contingency. He knew I’d never cared about the money, so there was no reason for him to think I’d rush out and father a child simply to try and get my hands on the inheritance. But if I’d become serious about someone—fallen in love, as you said…” His words faded away as their gazes held for the briefest of moments. “I’m sure he would have found a willing accomplice and rushed her to the altar in record time.”
Like he did me, Natalie thought. Anthony had always taken great pleasure in thwarting his brother at every turn. This must have been the ultimate coup.
“What about Anthea?” Natalie asked.
“My father was a chauvinist of the worst kind. In his eyes, Anthea’s children wouldn’t have been Bishops. He made that clear in the will, and besides, he knew she would never go against his wishes. Anthea wasn’t a threat, but I was, so he pitted Anthony against me in order to force Anthony to carry out his wishes.”
And in the meantime, driving Spence and Anthony even further apart, Natalie thought. To make matters worse, she had entered both brothers’ lives, and had unwittingly become a part of the drama. And the tragedy…
“I can’t believe no one ever told me about this,” she said. “Why did your family keep it from me?”
“Probably because they were afraid you would try to get your hands on the money. Everyone else has,” Spence said
dryly.
“So that’s why Anthony was going after custody of Kyle,” Natalie said. “He wanted the money.”
“Maybe. The trust is protected until Kyle turns twenty-one, but Anthony might have thought it was time he began feathering his nest, so to speak. Getting in Kyle’s good graces.”
For a moment, neither of them said anything. They didn’t have to. Both of them knew what kind of man Anthony had been—greedy, ruthless, and arrogant. And now, it seemed, he’d also been a criminal.
Natalie glanced up, wary. “All of this explains why Anthony would have gotten involved with a man like Russo, and why he would have hidden the diamonds that could have been used for evidence. But what you haven’t told me is what happened to those diamonds.”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
She’d been in the process of getting up, but that stopped her cold. She looked at him in shock. “You can’t still think I have them.”
“We’re almost certain Anthony planted those diamonds in the package he had you deliver. The diamonds were missing when the package arrived a few hours later. We know for a fact the courier went straight from your shop to the delivery address. Unless he somehow managed to unwrap the package, find the diamonds and remove them, then rewrap the box while he was driving, we can pretty much rule him out. That leaves a very small window of opportunity. The diamonds had to have been taken while they were still in your possession.”
Their gazes held for the longest moment, and Natalie’s heart sank at the suspicion she saw glittering in his eyes. How could he? How could he think she took those diamonds? How could he think her capable of something that devious?
And yet, just a few days ago, hadn’t he thought her capable of murder? Put in that context, he probably thought stealing a few diamonds was child’s play for her.
Obviously, he’d never known the first thing about her. To think she’d once let him make love to her. To think she’d let him kiss her only a few hours ago. And that, just a few minutes ago, she was wishing he would do it again.
“How could you think that about me?” she whispered, feeling the sting of tears threaten behind her lids.
A Man of Secrets Page 12
