Steph fought back a smirk. “How thoughtful.”
“Too bad you weren’t able to join Isla and her staff to enjoy the lunch. I heard you stopped by her gallery yesterday. That was so nice of you, and she was delighted to see you. She told you what happened, right?” he asked, dropping his voice to a whisper even though it was only the two of them. He mimed touching his neck.
“Yes. She did,” she said, feigning horror at the prospect of Isla’s diamond being stolen. “Who took it? Do you have any idea?”
He shook his head, and the corners of his mouth curved down. “It’s terrible. That was an engagement diamond, too. It saddens me,” he said, bringing a hand to his heart. “I’ve been on nonstop calls with the insurance company since it happened. You wouldn’t believe the amount of paperwork they require for stolen goods.”
“You reported it to them already?”
“Of course,” he said, dropping his hand to the leather in a slap for emphasis. “You can’t let thieves get away with anything.”
“No, you can’t. You definitely can’t,” she said emphatically, seconding him. They agreed on that count because she had no intention of letting the thieves get away with snagging her diamond. She didn’t want Eli taking the fall, either, if it turned out—oh God, she hoped it turned out this way—that he wasn’t the one who’d stolen the money, that someone had set him up, maybe even his own fiancée. But if he had bamboozled the funds, she would try once more to convince him to do the right thing—to return the money to her mother and his company without getting the authorities involved. She just needed the damn diamonds in her hand in order to get him to listen. Otherwise, he’d deny, deny, deny that he had them. “Are you going to get her a new one when the insurance pays out?”
He shook his head, a look of pride spreading to his blue eyes. “Nope. And that’s how I’m not going to let the bad guys get away with the crime of stealing a beautiful gift of love. I’m turning the other cheek,” he said, then demonstrated by raising his chin high and shifting his gaze.
“But how are you letting it go if you’re pursuing the insurance money?” she asked, pointing out the flaw in his logic.
He held his index finger in the air, stabbing it to make a point. “I’ve decided when the insurance payout comes, I’m not even going to buy a replacement. I’m going to donate the payout to our favorite charity in Africa.”
There it was again. The charity mention. He seemed damn proud of it. How could a man so focused on giving money away have stolen it for personal gain? Isla had to be the perpetrator. She’d probably Svengali’d him with her charity-this and charity-that routine. Maybe he didn’t even know she’d taken all those stones and squirreled them away. “The charity that helps support schools for kids affected by the former diamond economy?”
“Yes!” he said, his eyes lighting up. “I think it’s the perfect solution to a terrible crime. We don’t technically need another diamond, after all. I have plenty, and you have yours, and I trust it’s safe and—”
At eleven thirty on the dot, his office phone bleated loudly.
Thank God.
She hoped that was for her.
Eli didn’t even acknowledge the call. Good. She wanted the staff at the club to answer it. Twenty seconds later, Clarissa rapped gently. “Knock knock,” she said. “I have a phone call for Steph. It’s Tommy.”
Steph jerked her head to the side. Adopted a look of utter surprise. “Why isn’t he calling me on my cell . . . ,” she said, then dipped her hand into her purse and fished around, as if hunting for the phone.
But she hadn’t brought it. So that she could pull off this ruse.
“He sounds sad,” Clarissa added in a whisper.
Steph wanted to punch her fist in the air. Tommy was supposed to sound sad. Poor Tommy and his heartbreak. She turned to her stepfather. “I forgot my cell. Is there any chance I could just . . .” She let her voice trail off. If he offered on his own, it would be all the better.
Eli rose and gestured grandly. “Of course. Use my office. As long as you need. Let me know when you’re done.”
“Just hit line nine,” Clarissa added, tipping her chin toward the desk.
Steph laced her fingers together and thanked them both. As if on cue, Clarissa exited with Eli right behind her. He shut the door. When it clicked, she raced over to lock it, then marched to the desk and picked up line nine.
“Hello?”
Sobs greeted her. “I’m so sad. I’m all alone with the snorkel gear and can you please talk to me?”
“Of course, Tommy,” she said to Jake, and a smile burst on her face. She was alone in Eli’s office with the artwork. She shucked off those brief flashes of guilt. There was no room for guilt, no space for second thoughts. She was within reach of solving the mystery.
She was going to be the one to open that frame, snag the jewels, and return them to their rightful owners. She would see that justice was done. For everyone. The investors who’d lost millions in retirement money would get it back, her mom would see the return of some of her seed money, and she might very well save Eli from further trouble.
But they weren’t the only ones.
She was also doing this for Jake. He was the most dedicated man she knew, and she admired his drive to support his family. Finding the diamonds and returning them to the fund would help him finish the job.
“Just dab your eyes and I’ll be right back,” she said to her partner in Robin Hooding.
“I will. I’ve got my Hello Kitty tissues,” he said with a wailing cry that nearly made her crack up.
She set the receiver on the desk, raced to the wall, stood on the couch, and grabbed the edge of the frame. Thank the Lord it wasn’t a huge frame—maybe a foot and a half on each side. Gingerly, she lifted it off the hook. She shook the frame, and something in it rattled.
Her heart sailed into the stratosphere.
Excitement roared through her.
All the clues had added up. All the dead ends were in the rearview mirror now. All the strikeouts were becoming home runs. A grand slam, even, judging from the zipping sounds the gems made as she held the frame.
A focused thrill pinged through her body. Setting the frame on the couch, she flipped it around and surveyed the back side. Perfect. It was covered in sturdy brown paper that was stapled on, as most framed art was. Steph dug around in her bag and grabbed a pocketknife Jake had given her to use. Flipping open the blade, she carefully sliced a thin line a few inches along the bottom corner, then up the adjacent side. She peeled the paper and held her breath.
She peered into the opening, and her heart nearly rocketed to the moon. There it was. A slim, plastic black cylinder. Like the size of a travel toothbrush container. It was taped to the inside of the frame.
Wow, she mouthed.
This moment was truly surreal. Steph Anderson, adventure tour operator and marine biologist, was transforming into a treasure hunter—a modern-day Robin Hood.
Dipping her fingers into the paper opening, she undid the tape and slid out the tube. The hair on her arms stood on end as she raised it in front of her face. She opened the cap and tipped it into her palm. The diamonds bumped and rattled as they slid along the chute of the plastic tube where they’d been hiding. On a mad dash for her hand. In less than a second, she’d have a handful of precious gems.
They landed in her palm.
A whole handful of . . . nuts.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“Tell me everything you learned.”
Jake parked himself on a bench at the edge of Seven Mile Beach, grinding his jaw. If he was this stewed over nuts, he couldn’t even imagine how frustrated Steph must be sitting through a lunch with her stepfather.
No wonder Ferdinand had been crunching on cashews when Jake spotted him leaving Eli’s office. The question was—had Ferdinand planted the nuts, or had he been roadblocked by them, too? Maybe he’d been hunting for diamonds and came up with nuts. Or maybe Ferdinand was in on the trick and had pl
anted the nuts in the frame on behalf of Eli.
That was the problem. Ferdinand was a wild card. He might be working for Eli, or he might be working against Eli.
Jake hoped Kate’s intel would help him figure out which side the man was on.
Kate began her debrief. “Ferdinand Costello has worked in the nightclub business for eight years. He managed the facility for its prior owner before Eli bought it. Eli kept him on board to run the place,” Kate said, sharing details she’d gleaned. “He helped with the renovation, helped with the hiring, helped line up security.”
“Is he local?”
“Yes. Born and raised in the Islands. He has a huge family. Like five brothers and two sisters big.”
Jake whistled in admiration for the size. “That is big, and that’s also pretty much the definition of motivation. That is, if he supports them. Do we know?”
“Seems to be the case. His dad died a few years ago of cancer,” Kate said, and Jake’s heart ached for the guy.
“Sorry to hear,” he said softly.
“Yeah, me, too,” Kate said, though Jake couldn’t help but wonder if the pressure to support his family now was making Ferdinand take a walk on the dark side. Ferdinand might very well have played the role of Mr. Smith, diamond thief.
“What about that tattoo? Anything to it?”
“Apparently, he has a few pet snakes,” Kate said.
Jake’s stomach curled at the thought. He tended to agree with Indiana Jones on this count. Snakes. Why did it have to be snakes? “What about Tristan O’Doole?” he asked, moving on. “Tell me about the restaurant guy.”
“Ah, Tristan. He’s from Boston. Been around for a long time and has lived in the Caymans for twenty years. He had a few restaurants in the Boston area a while ago. One was a big success initially, but then it turned out the place was swimming in debt. He started Tristan’s fifteen years ago and it’s become a mildly successful place on the island. I checked out a few restaurant trade magazines from years ago, though, and it looks like one of the reasons his first restaurant went belly-up was he’d tried to make custom coffee and liquor drinks. He started investing in manufacturing a whole line of coffee and whiskey,” Kate said, with an isn’t-that-odd tone. “I mean, I get that some people put whiskey in their coffee, but it hardly seems like something one intentionally needs to mix and market.”
Jake nodded and stroked his chin, an idea forming. “He’s trying to do business with Eli. I wonder if he’s aiming to resurrect some sort of idea like that,” he mused.
“Apparently, he’s tried his hand at specialty drinks a few times with limited success. Looks like he’s worked up a few concoctions over the years and has tried to use his restaurants as launching pads for new drinks and whatnot. Most have fizzled. A year ago he tried out some strange chocolate drinks at Tristan’s that didn’t quite win any fans.”
“Interesting. Since Eli’s investment that went belly-up was in cocoa beans. Maybe he should have done a deal for Eli’s chocolate because the ones I tried from his secret stash were damn good,” Jake said, making a mental note to ask Steph what she could find out about Tristan. “How is the restaurant here doing? Any debt trouble?”
“None that I could find. Seems solid enough. Looks like he hit his stride with this one,” she said.
“OK, so the money troubles are behind him, making him less suspicious.”
He leaned forward, resting a palm on his thigh, staring out at the vast expanse of blue. Some kiteboarders skimmed the small waves near the shore, and off in the distance, a pair of jet skiers cut clean lines through the water. Farther toward the horizon, fishing boats bobbed in the water. “What about International Diamonds? Were you able to find an employee named Monica?”
“I called International Diamonds and was able to get her last name. Monica Smith,” Kate said, and Jake sat up straight on the bench, like his spine had become a ruler.
“That was the name used at the front desk of Steph’s hotel,” he said, then quickly explained about the man who’d arrived at her hotel claiming a meeting.
“Right,” Kate said calmly, her tone a counter to Jake’s enthusiasm at putting clues together. As if she were trying to temper him. “But that’s kind of a common fake last name, Jake.”
“I know,” he said with a heavy sigh. “Still, what are the chances it would be used by both the guy at the hotel and this woman?”
“Um, pretty good?”
He scoffed. “Anyway, did you find anything on her?”
“Nope. Zero. Zilch. Nada. I scoured the usual sources. I wasn’t able to track down a Monica Smith living in the Caymans.”
Maybe Kate thought it was merely a coincidence that she shared the same last name as the man who dubbed himself Mr. Smith. But Jake didn’t. The woman had been following him earlier. She’d been suspicious of him days ago. She knew he had a blue-tinted diamond worth ten grand, and she’d been skulking around the bar at the beach the night he was with Steph.
Wait.
He straightened his spine. How had he missed it? He smacked his palm against his forehead. Just last night Steph had been telling him about a woman who looked familiar. A woman she’d seen at Isla’s party. Monica was turning diamonds; Isla was involved with a man who’d stolen diamonds, and Jake Fucking Harlowe had been so into his partner last night he hadn’t bothered to follow through on her tip.
The buck stopped here.
No more slip-ups. No more missteps. Today’s narrow focus on work was all he could afford. Every tip, every instinct had to be examined. He couldn’t afford to lose his edge.
But he had it back.
Because just like he sensed danger, just like he knew how to find the stolen Strad, he was sure that Monica was onto them. Most likely, she was working with a partner—a man who’d ambled over to the front desk posing as Mr. Smith.
Monica and Ferdinand?
Monica and Tristan?
He wasn’t sure who her Mr. Smith was. But he was dead sure Monica was working with him.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Salty peanuts.
Honey.
Almonds.
She seethed, detesting them all. Because they sure seemed to prove that something was fishy.
“I’ll have the Asian chicken salad,” she said to the waiter at Tristan’s, fixing on a phony smile. “Please hold the peanuts.”
“And the Cobb salad for me,” Eli added with a smile.
Her stepfather had no clue she’d had the nuts in her hand. After cursing silently to the moon and back, she’d dropped them into the plastic tube with a plink, plink, plink. Then tucked the tube in place behind the frame, taped it down, and secured the brown paper in place. She’d washed her hands, erasing the traces of nuts.
Sure, if Eli removed the frame from the wall, he might notice someone had been poking around in the paper, but she didn’t care anymore. She hadn’t stolen anything. Nothing could happen to her, and there were enough people after his jewels that she didn’t think any fingers would point to her as the culprit.
Culprit of what? Of checking out a tube of nuts nestled inside a picture frame? She was no law-enforcement expert, but that hardly seemed a crime. Besides, she had half a mind to throw in the towel at this point. Eli was too smart, too clever, and too damn determined to win. Obviously, he knew someone was after his diamonds. Why else would he put freaking nuts in a frame? Just for kicks? Or as a taunt? She was willing to bet he’d hidden nuts there as a decoy. He’d probably purposely planted clues all over town as to the fake location of the diamonds.
While she didn’t think he was trying to fool her, per se, he was certainly trying to fool everyone else by dropping hints that he had diamonds in the frames of his art.
She scoffed to herself.
That was part of his plan. Throw everyone off the scent with false clues. But just to toy with them, he hid worthless nuts in the frame instead. Turning it into a gag gift. He was one step ahead of everyone. He always had been. He tricked, and then he
tricked back, like he’d done with her mom when he’d fooled around. Today she’d been the one to sit on the whoopee cushion.
Now it was lunchtime, and this was supposedly why she’d arrived early—to dine with him. She tried desperately to shove aside her frustration. After they ordered, she asked how business was at Sapphire, biting back her lingering anger over how he’d funded the club—with her mother’s money. But still, Sapphire was an easier topic of conversation than where are your damn diamonds?
Business was great, he said.
Of course.
She inquired about Isla’s gallery.
Everything was fantastic there, he told her.
Naturally.
“And are you able to expand it like you wanted? Isla mentioned something about annexing the shop next door?”
He downed some of his champagne, then nodded enthusiastically. “Yes, as a matter of fact I just got word before you came in. The deal is on, and I called Isla to share the good news while you were on the phone with your friend.”
Ah, so that’s what the deal was that would thrill her. No surprise there. Once again, Eli was getting everything he wanted. The woman, the art, the jewels, the club, the goddamn never-ending string of unbroken luck.
She clenched her fists as he spoke. But after listening to him go on and on about how the sky rained gold coins and rainbows in the wonderful old Land of Eli, she couldn’t take it. She was getting nowhere with her private-eye act, and being in his pocket had done little to help her pull off the reverse jewel heist.
Time for an entirely new tactic.
Honesty.
“Eli,” she said, snapping her napkin from the table and spreading it in her lap.
“Yes, my dear?”
“There’s something I want to talk to you about,” she began, and was ready to dive into questions about his hedge fund. She hadn’t scripted this moment, but she didn’t need to. Because she was going to speak from the heart and ask point-blank if he’d skimmed money off the top. She was done dancing around the topic. She was finished with deciphering clues. She didn’t have the damn diamonds to make her point, but she had words.
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