by Vivien Dean
“You know what it’s about?” Cash asked.
She jumped when his hand found the small of her back and guided her toward the door. A quick glance in his direction, however, showed his attention was on Gino. He probably wasn’t even aware of what he was doing. Good breeding, she told herself. He’s English. They’re more particular about that kind of thing over there.
Gino shook his head in response to Cash’s query. “You’re tooting the wrong ringer. Why would Lombardi say anything to me?”
As the front door of the club opened, it dawned on her that she couldn’t hear a sound coming from within. Her memories of the previous night were a little fuzzy, but she remembered enough to know there should at least be music playing. Even if the club wasn’t open yet, wouldn’t there be noises of the band warming up?
The club’s main room was in darkness, inky and devoid of anything resembling life. Maddy took a step closer to Cash and felt him shift toward Gino. Probably to ask what was going on. Before he could, the overhead lights came blazing on, erupting the dance floor with illumination and unveiling the Sun’s employees scattered around with huge smiles plastered across their faces.
“Surprise!”
Instinctively, she leapt toward Cash, pressing into his side. She was too startled to even notice when he slipped his arm around her back.
“Didn’t think I’d let you two get away without an engagement party, now did you?” Lombardi boomed as he stepped forward from the throng. He scooped the pair into a bear hug that had Maddy gasping for air. “Closed the club for the night just for the occasion. Tonight, it’s all about you two lovebirds.”
Cash glanced over at Gino, who shrugged. “I just do what I’m told,” he said, trying not to break out into a grin.
Rolling his eyes, Cash turned to Maddy. “It looks like we’ve been hijacked. Feel like a party?”
“Good thing we dressed for it,” she replied with more enthusiasm than she felt. Stepping away, she slid her coat from her shoulders, revealing the gown underneath before turning to hand the outer garment to Gino.
Lombardi groaned. “Oh, sure, tonight she decides to show some skin.”
Cash didn’t comment. He was too busy staring at Maddy.
She hadn’t been able to decide what color the dress really was. Green taffeta formed the foundation, but layers of blue and green tulle over the long skirt caused the hues to shimmer, changing in the light. Depending on where she stood, the gown could look royal blue or hunter green. The shades intensified the vibrancy of her eyes, a mirage of the fabric she’d witnessed while pirouetting in her dressing room. To finish it, her arms and shoulders were bare, the rhinestone-covered bodice offering her cleavage to the supplication of anyone looking.
Unblinking, Cash reached forward and grabbed Maddy by the waist, his long fingers digging into her hip as he pulled her flush against him, his head dipping so that his lips could brush against hers. “Breathtaking,” he murmured. “Next time I tell you to hurry it up, you’ve got my permission to tell me to go to hell.”
Her head was spinning as Cash pulled away. All part of the act, right? It had to be. But the tenderness of the kiss, the way his hand still held her at the waist, it all seemed too genuine.
Then, it dawned on her that he’d spoken too softly for anyone else to hear him. His sentiments had been directed toward her and her alone. If this was all part of the being-in-love act they had to maintain, why wasn’t he sharing with the group?
She was only half-aware of being led to one of the tables, of the girls giggling around them as they passed by, of jealous eyes flitting from Cash to Maddy, then back to Cash again. Somewhere on the other side of the room, Lombardi’s barked orders slipped into her consciousness, followed immediately by the brass band striking up the dinner music. As she sat down, Maddy glanced once more at her companion.
He was laughing and joking with Gino, like he belonged nowhere else but here. Without looking, Cash reached to take her hand in his beneath the table, squeezing it gently as he continued to chat.
Maddy decided then and there that she had definitely stepped into the Twilight Zone.
The clock on the wall stared back at Ava, taunting her with its creeping hands. An hour late. Maddy was never late. The fact that Cash hadn’t shown up yet either was almost as worrisome. While he wasn’t quite as punctual as his co-workers, sixty minutes stretched even his limits.
Abruptly, she slid off her stool, marching over to the phone on the wall. Her fingers stabbed at the touchpad, the electronic tones beeping in the silent room, and she cradled the receiver in her shoulder while she stretched to reach her purse a few feet away. In her ear, the phone rang. By the time Maddy’s machine clicked on, Ava had her cell phone out, scrolling through her directory for Cash’s number.
Calling Cash produced the exact same result. The only difference was the Monty Python recording on his answering machine.
Grabbing her coat, Ava bolted from the storage room, nearly running through the corridors for the main offices. It was after seven. Aaron was probably gone for the day already, but she had to check and make sure. His appearance earlier made it obvious that he was just as worried as she was about Cash and Maddy. If he knew something about what was going on, Ava wanted to know. She thought he would be pretty keen to find out that neither had showed up for their shift that night too.
His door was open, a light streaming from within, and she slowed to a walk as she approached. Inside, Aaron sat at his desk, shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows, powerful forearms flexed as he scribbled away at a notepad, but when she cleared her throat to alert him to her presence, he immediately relaxed.
“What’re you doing here so late?” he asked with an easy smile.
“I could ask the same of you.” She stepped inside and grabbed the door to close it behind her. “May I?”
His grin faded, brown eyes darting from her to the hall behind her. “Go ahead.”
“I think there’s a problem,” Ava said as soon as the door was shut. “Cash and Maddy never came into work tonight.”
Aaron stiffened, but when he started to reach for his phone, her hand shot out to stop him.
“I already tried calling both of them at home. They didn’t answer.”
Shifting his weight, Aaron’s leather chair groaned as he leaned back. “That’s not good.”
“Why were you asking about Cash today? Do you know something I don’t?”
He shook his head. “His sister called me, all in a dither because she couldn’t reach him. I was just trying to get something I could tell her.”
It would have made sense if she hadn’t witnessed how agitated he’d been earlier when he couldn’t find Cash, or heard his cryptic comment about being able to work with the information about the painting. She took her time in responding to him.
“What are we going to do about this?” Ava asked. “If something’s happened to Maddy—”
“Nothing’s happened.” Rising from his chair, Aaron came around the desk to sit on the corner closest to her. “Look, I appreciate you coming to tell me about this. What I want you to do now is go home, get a good night’s sleep, and don’t worry about them. I’ll have a talk with security and go over all the logs myself to see if anything out of the ordinary happened.” His grin returned. “But I’ll bet you top dollar that wherever they are, Cash and Maddy are together. They’ve probably just realized what the rest of us have been seeing all along and are making up for lost time.”
Under any other circumstances, she would’ve believed him. Hell, she half-believed him now. But something about all his questions still nagged at Ava, even as he hustled her out of his office.
“I’ll take care of it,” he said, right before he shut the door in her face. “I promise.”
As she headed out to her car, Ava decided she’d let it go until morning. If Maddy showed up then with a hickey the size of New Jersey and a never-ending smile, Ava would personally kill her for making her worry.
Aaron
didn’t like the math, but he knew if he waited, the woman would probably reach across the Atlantic and pull off his testicles, and frankly, he preferred having his balls exactly where they were. He had to make the call now, time differences be damned.
Flipping through his contact list, Aaron found Kate Beckstrom’s number, complete with international exchanges, and punched it into his phone. Five hours. It was after midnight in England. He would be waking her up in the middle of the night with this not-so-wonderful news, and then he was going to have to listen to an hour of I told you sos before they could get around to actually talking about how to fix this. This was definitely not how he’d envisioned spending his night.
She answered on the second ring.
“Cash?”
The urgency in her voice was unmistakable, and he girded against what was to come. “No, it’s Aaron Keating. I’m sorry to wake you, but I told you when we spoke this morning that I’d call if I had any news about your brother.”
A heavy sigh drifted across the line. “This isn’t going to be good, is it?”
“I’m afraid not. Cash didn’t show up for work tonight.”
There was a stream of colorful curses, the only ones of which he recognized were the bloody fucks that had punctuated her speech during their earlier conversation. Kate Beckstrom was a woman not afraid to say exactly what was on her mind. Aaron imagined she must have been a terror to have as an older sister.
“I think there might be something else going on,” he continued when she stopped to take a breath. “Madeline Cardinale, another of our conservators, didn’t show up for the same shift. That’s very unlike her.”
“I know that name. Wait.” There was a pause, during which the only sound he could hear was her breathing. “That’s the little blonde Cash works with, right? The one who helped with that Renaissance exhibit last month?”
“Yeah.” Aaron frowned. The latter was information nobody outside the museum was aware of. Maddy had refused to take credit for her role in acquiring the collection. “How’d you know about that?”
“Cash told me. He wouldn’t stop going on about it. You wouldn’t believe how much he talks about that woman. Have you contacted the police yet?”
“Not yet. They wouldn’t do anything anyway. It takes three days for someone to be declared a missing person.”
“Then I’m coming out. Flights from Heathrow are generally in the morning, so I should still be able to catch one. I’ll be in New York by tomorrow evening.”
Panic at having to face this woman in person scuttled across his skin, and Aaron clutched his phone until his knuckles hurt. “You don’t need to do that. What if Cash shows up? You’ll have wasted a trip for nothing.”
“Then I can kick his ass in person for making me worry. Thank you for calling me. I look forward to finally meeting you in person, Mr. Keating.”
She hung up before Aaron could say another word, and he set down the phone with his heart pounding in his ears. Something about Cash’s older sister had always thrown him off his game. Though they had only spoken a handful of times, each time was as raw as the last, leaving him wondering just when in hell he’d turned into such a pushover. He wasn’t like this. Women didn’t intimidate him. Behind his easygoing manner was the spine of a fighter, and it took a lot more than a gorgeous accent and an inability to take no for an answer to get him to bend. With a sigh, Aaron stood to grab his coat, ready to go down to security and see what he could find there. Only then did he realize he was hard as a rock.
Damn it.
He hoped Kate looked like a hobbit. If she did, it gave him a chance to not fall apart in her presence.
Even if it was just a slim one.
Chapter Seven
In spite of her better intentions, Maddy found a champagne flute pressed into her hand before dinner was served, raising the glass to the first of many toasts that rang out among their so-called friends. The champagne tickled the inside of her head with its fizzy bubbles, but she made a conscious effort to set it down before she reached the same state of inebriation from the night before. She was in no rush for a repeat performance of her hangover.
When the food was served, her stomach gurgled audibly at the sight, making her blush as Cash stopped in mid-sentence to look at her. “I worked up an appetite,” she said in explanation, but her voice must have been a little too loud, carrying through to some of the nearby tables.
Someone laughed. “With Cash in your bed? I don’t doubt it.”
More laughter filled the room. Conversation shifted to Cash’s prowess both on and off the floor.
Ignoring the innuendo, Maddy tucked into the food with gusto, sampling everything that was brought to the table without heed to pretending she wasn’t hungry. Across the table, a bottle-blonde wearing a silver dress she had to have been poured into watched with finely arched brows.
“It must be nice not having to worry about your figure any more,” she commented pointedly.
Maddy paused in mid-chew, staring at the woman in shock before slowly swallowing what she had in her mouth. Adopting an air of innocence, she turned to Cash. “Did I do that before?” she asked, and then pretended to think on it. “I don’t remember ever paying much attention to my figure.”
The heavy weight of Cash’s arm materialized around the back of her chair, pressing lightly into her shoulders. “That’s because that was my job,” he replied, playing along with her game.
She turned a bright smile back to the other blonde. “I guess it’s natural for you to assume something like that. Since you have to work so hard at it yourself, I mean.”
Gino started choking, while the others were more forward in their laughter at the cutting remark. The blonde’s eyes grew icy, but it was the warmth of Cash leaning into her that Maddy really noticed.
“That’s my girl,” he murmured. A soft kiss along her jaw followed it, leaving her more flushed and giddy than even the champagne could accomplish. She finished the meal more relaxed than she’d felt since arriving in the painting world.
As the dinner plates were being cleared away, Cash pushed his chair back and rose to his feet. “Come on,” he said, holding out his hand for Maddy.
She took it and followed him around the edge of the room, her featherweight skirts floating around her legs. The multitude of faces swam around her. While they blurred beyond easy recognition, there was an ease of reality to the entire situation that left her dizzy. It would be simple to forget about her other life, she realized with alarm. She was already growing entrenched into the details of this one.
Cash stopped in front of the band, taking the singer’s microphone while motioning for the musicians to stop playing. “On behalf of Maddy and myself,” he said, turning to face the waiting group, “I’d just like to say thank you to Mr. Lombardi for such a nice surprise—”
“And for the night off,” Maddy leaned in to add.
Light laughter rippled through the room, and Cash glanced down at her, his mouth curling into a slow smile. “That too,” he agreed. But his eyes said more. His eyes told her how grateful he was that she was going along with it so easily.
“Speech!” cried someone from a far table.
The single word broke the spell around them. “What’re you talking about?” Cash joked, turning back to the crowd. “That was the speech.”
“Tell us about when you first met Maddy!” someone else called out.
That stopped him, and the hand that still held hers tightened. “When I first met Maddy…” His eyes took on a faraway gleam. “Yeah. I think I can do that.”
The normal jocularity of his voice disappeared, replaced by the soft ruminations of memories relived. “It was at work, of course,” he started. “Her first day. I didn’t know what exactly to expect. As far as I knew, it was going to be a repeat of the seventh circle of Hell. No offense, but a lot of you Yanks bore me to tears.” The crowd tittered. “Still, open mind and all. I walked in, and there she was. If I’d blinked, I would’ve missed
her. Such a little slip of a thing. But before I could let that judgment set itself in stone, she spoke up.” He looked down at her, and Maddy shivered from the intensity of his gaze. “Who would’ve thought so much fire could be contained in such a luscious little package? I knew then that work would never be boring again.”
It dawned on her midway through that the story he wove was based on the truth. On her first day at the museum, she’d gone into work early to have Ava show her the ropes. By the time Cash had shown up—late as usual—she was already knee-deep in a fresh restoration, and she had lashed out at him in annoyance when he’d made some glib remark about needing a booster seat for her stool. He’d soothed her ruffled feathers, flirting her into submission, but then she’d witnessed his behavior with the other women and any sense of comfort she’d taken in his sincerity vanished. She disliked this tall, devilish Englishman, and nothing would ever change her mind on that.
Until now.
Gino’s voice rose from the crowd. “What about when you fell in love with her?”
Cash laughed, tearing his eyes away from Maddy to look out at his friend’s drink-flushed face. “Sorry, mate. That’s the exact same story.”
An awwww spread throughout the room, and Cash quickly leaned over to the conductor, whispering something before turning back to the microphone. “That’s enough of speeches.” The music started to swell behind him. “I rather fancy dancing with my fiancée now, if you don’t mind.”
He led her onto the dance floor, pulling her inside the circle of his arms as soon as he possibly could. “I asked for a slow one,” he said, leaning in to murmur in her ear. “Give you time to warm up.”
She knew he meant to the dancing, but the deliberate way he cupped her hand in his made her wonder if there was more to Cash’s sentiment than what was on the surface. Though he held her no differently than any of the other men on the floor held their partners, the firm touch of his hand in the small of her back as he guided her around the floor seemed almost possessive, territorial even, as if he silently dared anyone to come and attempt to take her away. Cash was slipping into their roles as easily as she was. But…how much of it was real and how much was for their own safety?
