High-Stakes Affair

by Gail Barrett

  Dante only grunted in answer, then held his penlight out. “Here. Hold this.”

  Still staggered at Dante’s prowess, she grabbed the penlight and aimed it his way. His back muscles flexed under his suit coat as he gripped Carlos beneath his arms and dragged him across the hall.

  “Open the door,” he ordered, his deep voice rumbling in the dark.

  Feeling even more off-kilter, she opened the restroom door. Dante dumped Carlos inside and reached for the penlight again. “Let’s go. We don’t have much time.”

  “Right.” They had to hurry to commit a crime.

  He strode down the hallway, the small light bobbing in the dark. Her sense of unreality mounting, Paloma scurried behind him, trying to keep up with his lengthy strides. Disembodied voices floated through the darkness—casino workers running through nearby corridors, rushing to restore the power.

  But her thoughts kept returning to the bodyguard sprawled on the restroom floor. What would he do when he regained consciousness? Would he assume she’d been abducted and raise the alarm? And what if she and Dante got arrested? What if she couldn’t find the blackmailer’s evidence, and the royal family was ruined?

  Fighting back a flurry of anxiety, she rushed after Dante down a private hall. This plan would work. It had to. She’d find that computer disk and return to the hallway before the power came back on. She had too much riding on this to fail.

  Dante stopped at the tower door. A remnant of the medieval stronghold, the circular, three-story watchtower led to the penthouse, where the casino owner, César Gomez, had his private suite. Dante tugged on a pair of gloves and swung open the door.

  She shot him a look of surprise. “It wasn’t locked?”

  “It’s electronic. That’s why we cut the power.”

  Of course. Completely out of her depth now, she followed him through the door. He led the way up the spiral stone staircase, taking the steps two at a time. She hurried after, her nerves coiling tighter as they neared the penthouse floor.

  Would Gomez be at home? That was the million-dollar question, the one she’d been trying to answer all night. He hadn’t answered her phone calls. His employees hadn’t seen him in days. She prayed he’d left town on an impromptu vacation, because if he found her snooping through his penthouse…

  She swallowed hard. It didn’t matter. No matter what the danger, she had to take the risk. It was pointless to pay a blackmailer to stay silent; his demands would only get worse.

  And she didn’t dare let him expose that surveillance footage. Not now. Not with the country on edge. The sight of her brother partying with an international terrorist—no matter how innocent his actions had been—would further anger the citizens, leading to even more violent unrest.

  They reached the fire door at the top of the staircase, and Dante paused again. “Wait here until I check it out.”

  Nodding her agreement, she leaned against the wall to catch her breath.

  Dante opened the door and peeked out. “It’s clear. Come on.”

  Her pulse skittering wildly, she followed him from the stairwell into a wide stone vestibule carpeted with Belgian rugs. To the right stood Gomez’s private elevator, now dark. On the left loomed the door to the penthouse suite, its heavy planks covered with iron studs.

  Experiencing another burst of anxiety, she glanced around, the ominous silence fueling her doubts. Because if anyone got wind of this break-in…

  But she was committed now.

  Dante handed her the penlight again. “Hold this while I pick the lock.”

  “I thought the locks were electronic.”

  “This one has a battery backup.”

  That made sense. “You need the light?” she asked, shining it at the door.

  “No.” Tugging two metal picks from his coat pocket, he lowered himself to one knee. Then he inserted the tools in the lock and closed his eyes.

  Paloma shot another nervous glance behind her, then returned her attention to the thief, taking in his hard, chiseled mouth, his flat, masculine cheekbones, his thick shock of straight black hair. He probed the lock by feel, his big hands surprisingly gentle as he worked the picks, intense focus etched on his handsome face.

  No, not handsome, she amended. His features were too strong for that, his nose a little too crooked. He was…virile. Blatantly and unapologetically male. She skimmed the cords of his sinewed neck, the impossible breadth of his shoulders, the black beard scruff shadowing his jaw.

  She experienced a wayward thrill.

  She stiffened, shocked. She could not be attracted to this man. He was a thief, a common criminal. And she’d worked far too hard to subdue her wild streak to backslide into temptation now.

  The lock gave way. Motioning for her to be quiet, Dante rose and cracked open the door. He listened for a moment, his ear to the small opening, then signaled for her to follow. Trying to keep her mind off Dante and on the job she needed to do, she slipped inside.

  A feeling of wrongness instantly struck her. She glanced around the penthouse, intense dread gathering at the base of her spine, but nothing appeared out of place. Moonlight filtered through the deep-set windows. A profound stillness gripped the suite, assuring her that they were alone. She scanned the grand piano rising like a phantom in the moonlight, a huge dining-room table with high-backed medieval chairs.

  Of course she’d feel jittery. She’d never committed a crime before. What did she expect?

  “What are you looking for?” Dante asked, his voice low.

  She opened her mouth to tell him, then stopped. The blackmailer was targeting her brother. It was Tristan’s secret to reveal, not hers.

  Impatience flashed in Dante’s eyes. “Look, Princess. We’ve only got a few minutes until the power comes on, and I don’t intend to be here when it does.”

  She couldn’t afford to get caught, either. And two people could search faster than one. “I’m looking for a computer disk.”

  “What’s on it?”

  His blunt question caught her off guard. “Does it matter?”

  “If I’m going to steal something, I’d like to know why.”

  “We’re not stealing. Not really,” she added when he shot her a look of disbelief. “It’s footage from a surveillance camera. It has something…incriminating on it. Blackmail evidence.”

  Dante snorted.

  She blinked, his skepticism taking her aback. “You don’t believe me?”

  “Hardly.”

  “But…why not?”

  “Because it’s ridiculous, that’s why. Why would anyone blackmail you? Your reputation’s already bad.”

  His obvious disdain made her face burn, but she couldn’t argue his point. The tabloids had bad-mouthed her for years—and rightfully so. She’d made so many mistakes since childhood that País Vell’s citizens despised her now.

  And no matter how hard she tried to redeem herself—no matter how many charities she funded, no matter how many hours she volunteered each week at the royal hospital, doing everything from fundraising and reading to patients, to entertaining the children in the pediatric ward—she couldn’t change their minds.

  Which was exactly why she was here. She knew better than anyone the damage a bad reputation could do. And she refused to let that happen to her brother, Tristan, the heir to País Vell’s throne.

  She raised her chin. “I’m telling you the truth. I’m trying to stop a blackmailer, whether you want to believe me or not. Now, I suggest we get to work.”

  Dante didn’t move. His gaze stayed clamped on hers, his skepticism clear. Then his eyes shifted to her mouth and heated with sensual awareness, making her pulse go berserk.

  So he felt the attraction, too.

  But his mouth hardened into a scowl. “Have i
t your way, Princess.” He slapped the penlight into her hand. “You check the cabinets. I’ll look for a safe. Did you bring gloves?”

  “Yes.” Her voice came out breathless. Her heart racketing around her rib cage, she pulled a pair of leather gloves from her back pocket and put them on. Wrong man. Wrong time. Definitely the wrong place, she reminded herself sternly. She had to concentrate on finding that computer disk, not let her unruly hormones lead her astray—no matter how compelling Dante was.

  He disappeared into the shadows. Still badly rattled, she forced her attention to the suite. Starting at the nearby wet bar, she searched the liquor cabinet and cupboards, then continued around the room. The dining area yielded nothing. Neither did the sideboard, the closet in the spacious bedroom or the bedside table drawers. Kneeling, she shone the penlight under the bed. Nothing, not even dust.

  Her desperation growing, she rose. That computer disk had to be here, and she had to find it tonight. But she was fast running out of time.

  She spotted Dante searching the office and headed his way, catching up with him at Gomez’s desk. “I doubt he’d keep it here,” she said, but she rifled through a drawer, just in case. “It’s too obvious.”

  “You’d be surprised what people do. Half the time they install safes, then don’t even bother to put their valuables inside.”

  She paused at that, his words a stark reminder that she hardly knew this man. She knew he owned a small stonemasonry business on the edge of town. He was supposedly a thief, which his actions tonight confirmed. She’d even heard rumors that he might be El Fantasma, the Ghost, a modern-day Robin Hood who plagued the aristocrats of País Vell. And he’d spent the past two weeks locked up in the royal prison, although with his arrest record oddly missing, no one seemed to know why.

  She shook her head. Dante’s background didn’t matter, not with that damaging surveillance footage threatening the security of País Vell. But neither could she afford to discount his expert advice. In case Gomez had left the incriminating evidence in the open, she fished a plastic bag from his wastepaper basket, then scooped up every flash drive and computer disk she spotted, no matter what their labels said.

  “I need the light,” Dante said from across the room. He swung aside a wall painting, exposing a safe.

  He’d found it. Relief spiraling through her, she rushed around the desk.

  “Aim it at the keypad,” he added.

  Moving in even closer, she complied. But standing this near, the heat from his muscled body teasing her senses, she couldn’t keep her gaze off him. She skimmed his short, tousled hair, the grooves bracketing his sensual mouth, the black beard shadow coating his throat. Another shimmer of awareness fluttered through her, and she dragged in a calming breath. There was something riveting about this man, something that appealed to her in a basic, primal way.

  Something she had no business indulging in right now.

  Not ever. She’d put an end to her rebellious streak and sworn off inappropriate men. She had a duty to her country to fulfill.

  Dante’s long, lean fingers tapped the keypad. The safe popped open, and he edged the door aside.

  “That was fast,” she said.

  “He’s sloppy. He’s worn off the numbers on the keys he uses most, so it was easy to figure out. And I got lucky. These electronic keypads go into lockdown if you enter four invalid codes. I got it right in three.”

  Not sure whether to be impressed or appalled, she peered into the open safe. But all she saw was a stack of ledgers, and her hopes instantly tanked. “That disk has to be here.” She couldn’t keep the desperation from her voice.

  Dante glanced at his watch. “I’ll look in the bathroom while you check. Then we need to go. We’re cutting it close as it is.”

  Not wasting any time, she took out the stack of ledgers and searched the safe. She found a bag of antique coins, a few pairs of diamond cuff links—but no computer disk. Cursing César Gomez, she held the ledgers by their spines and shook them, in case the disk was wedged inside.

  A tiny manila envelope fell to the floor. Bending down, she picked it up and looked inside. It was a key—but to what? Obviously not this safe. Unless there was another one in the room? But surely Dante would have found it by now.

  On the off chance that it mattered, she stuffed the key into the bag with the computer disks, replaced the ledgers and closed the safe. Then she headed to the bathroom, her last resort. But as she stepped inside, Dante hustled over and blocked her way, forcing her to stumble back out. “What are you doing?” she asked, trying to go around him.

  “Don’t go in there.”

  “Why not? I need to—” A horrible stench wafted past, and she gagged. Oh, God. “Is it Gomez? Is he—?”

  “Yeah, he’s dead.”

  Shock rippled through her. She grabbed hold of the door frame, unable to catch her breath. “Dead?” she repeated, dumbfounded. “But that’s impossible.” He’d been alive two days ago, when he’d telephoned her brother, demanding cash. “Let me see.”

  “You don’t want to go in there. It’s bad.”

  “How bad? Was he murdered?”

  His eyes grim, Dante shook his head.

  “Suicide?”

  “Worse.”

  “Worse than suicide?” A deep sense of trepidation clawed her throat. What could be worse than that? “Please,” she whispered. “I need to know.”

  His eyes turning even grimmer, he took her bag from her trembling hands and stepped away.

  Foreboding turning her blood cold, she took a deep breath and went inside.

  Chapter 2

  Paloma inched her way into the bathroom, fear beating against her breastbone like a vulture’s wings, the narrow beam from the penlight wavering on the marble floor. She held her breath, one hand clamped over her mouth and nose as she tried not to inhale the fetid stench.

  An unnatural silence drummed around her. The soft thud of her footsteps echoed in the gloom. Keeping her gaze trained on the wobbling penlight, she crept past an Iranian granite vanity, a shower big enough to dance in, an enormous ivory stone bathtub shaped like a giant egg.

  The beam struck a man’s bare foot, and she stopped. Her heart revving fast enough for liftoff, she swept the light over his pajama-clad body, then blinked, struggling to process the sight.

  It was Gomez, all right. He lay flat on his back in a pool of blood. More blood had run across the floor tiles, settling in the grout lines like a macabre maze. And his face…

  Her stomach roiled. A wild sound escaped her throat. His skin had puffed up, as if trying to separate from his body. He’d bled from every opening—his nose, his mouth, his ears. Even worse, a bizarre rash covered his face like mutant tapioca pudding, large patches of it forming purple shadows across his cheeks and jaw. His open eyes were a shocking, unnerving red.

  Bile instantly mushroomed inside her. She spun on her heels, raced around the corner to the toilet and retched, unable to believe what she’d seen. What on earth had killed him? What caused that grotesque rash? A disease? But what? And the color of his eyes…

  She vomited again, repeatedly, until the violent spasms gave way to dry heaves. Her legs threatening to collapse, she flushed the toilet, then staggered to the vessel sink nearest the door. She snapped off her gloves, turned on a sleek chrome faucet studded with Swarovski crystals, and cupped her hands to rinse her mouth, so shocked she could hardly think.

  Dante appeared beside her. His eyes connected with hers in the shadowed mirror. “Are you all right?”

  Her knees trembling madly, she grabbed hold of the vanity and shook her head. “I’ve never…I’ve never seen anything so awful. All that blood…” Her head grew light, and she swayed.

  Swearing, he lunged toward her. He grabbed her arm, towed her outside the bath
room and slammed the door, walling off the disgusting smell. Then he wrapped his arms around her and pushed her head against his chest. “Breathe,” he ordered, his voice gruff.

  Too badly shaken to protest, she clutched the lapel of his suit coat, taking refuge in his strength and warmth. Gomez’s death had been worse than suicide, all right. But what was it? What could have caused those demonically red eyes?

  Pressing her fist to her solar plexus, she fought down another dry heave. She wasn’t weak. She could handle this. She’d seen terrible injuries during her volunteer work at the royal hospital the past few years. But that rash…

  She shuddered, something flitting along the edges of her memory, but she quickly pushed it aside. She’d ponder the details of his death later, after they’d left the suite.

  Several seconds ticked past. Her heartbeat gradually began to slow. She finally managed to breathe deeply, filling her lungs with Dante’s warm, safe, living scent.

  And suddenly she realized how close they stood—her face nestled into the hollow of his collarbone, his rock-hard thighs pressed against hers. He’d splayed one large hand across the small of her back. His other palm cradled her head.

  Her face warming, she leaned back. She didn’t even know this man, and she’d wrapped herself around him like bark on a cork tree, ready to climb right into his skin. Loosening the death grip she had on his suit coat, she stepped away and met his gaze. “Sorry.”

  “You’re all right?”

  “After seeing that?” Hysteria bubbled inside her. “Not really. I’m going to have nightmares about his eyes for years. But I’m not going to faint, if that’s what you mean.”

  His mouth formed a somber slash. “Yeah, it was bad.”

  “What do you think happened to him?” A shudder racking her body, she stole a glance at the bathroom door.

  “I don’t know.”

  She met his gaze, something in his tone making her wonder if he knew more than he’d let on. But that was silly. What would Dante know about a disease?

  Especially that one. She frowned, another sensation of familiarity nagging her at the thought of that awful rash. And then she remembered. She’d recently overheard the doctors at the royal hospital discussing a case....