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by Unknown

Fighting to keep her breathing even, she felt the pull in her calves each time her foot sank into the sand and struggled for traction. Fifty yards became forty…thirty…twenty. There was another spray of sand, this one to her left. Finally, they reached the first line of trees.

  Chance kept up the pace until palm leaves closed in on them and the sand at their feet became completely covered over with vegetation. Beach had become swamp in an instant.

  They would have to go more slowly now or run the risk of falling or twisting an ankle.

  “Follow me,” Chance said. It was only when he took the lead that Natalie saw the blood on his shirt.

  “You’ve been hit.”

  Chance pulled the shirt off his shoulder and glanced down at the wound. “It’s just a scratch. C’mon.”

  Natalie pressed a hand against the knot of fear that had formed in her stomach. The mark was angry-looking and it was oozing blood. But he was right, she told herself. It was just a scratch. And she wasn’t going to let herself think about the fact that it might have been worse.

  They walked swiftly in silence for a while. Natalie tried to keep her mind blank and focus on putting one foot in front of another. Moving as fast as he could, Chance cut a path through the vegetation by tamping down palm fronds and grasses. Now only thin spears of sunlight pierced the darkening gloom, and damp heat pressed in on them. Natalie felt a trickle of sweat run down her neck.

  Something moved under her foot. Stifling a scream, Natalie reached out to grab a fistful of Chance’s shirt.

  “What?” He stopped and turned so fast that she bumped into him.

  “Nothing,” she said.

  When he merely studied her for a minute, she lifted her chin and repeated, “Nothing. Go.”

  She was just not going to let herself think of what might be under her bare feet, not while a gunman might be after them. Snakes had always scared her, but they weren’t nearly as dangerous as whoever was using them for rifle practice.

  “This way,” Chance said and made a sharp right turn.

  She hoped he knew where he was going, because the oval expanse of black water to her left had her thinking of another kind of danger that lurked in the Florida swamps.

  Alligators. Hadn’t she read that wherever there was water, you could bank on finding one—or more?

  No. She tore her gaze away from the water, fastened her eyes on Chance’s back and made herself think about who had shot at them. Brancotti? Had he somehow seen through their disguises? But how?

  If it wasn’t Brancotti, who else could it be? Keeping her gaze fastened on Chance’s back, she pictured each one of the people she’d met at the dinner party the previous night.

  Her favorite suspect would have to be Armand Genovese. A man with mob connections wouldn’t even have to pull the trigger himself. He’d have easy access to a professional hit man.

  And a hit man wouldn’t give up until the job was done. He might even now be following them into the swamp.

  Natalie risked one quick glance over her shoulder and saw only shadows. She stumbled, caught herself and refocused her attention on Chance’s back.

  Sir Arthur probably hunted, but even when she formed an image of him with a rifle in his hands, she found it hard to believe that he was a killer.

  She didn’t know as much about the other guests, but they were all very wealthy. Any one of them could have hired someone.

  But why would any of them want to kill Steven—unless…

  Chance stopped abruptly, and she walked smack into him again. Peering over his shoulder, she saw the trunk of a fallen palm tree blocking their path. He gripped her hand and guided her around it.

  Once on the other side, they crouched down and Chance leaned close, his voice making no more sound than a breath. “If we’re being followed…” He reached into his pocket and drew out a small gun. Together, they waited, listening. Gradually, she could hear other sounds above their breathing. No sounds of footsteps. Leaves rustled overhead, insects buzzed, and farther off, a gull shrieked. A minute stretched into two and then three.

  Natalie shivered as she watched a spider the size of her fist crawl down the side of the tree trunk.

  Clamping her teeth together, she made herself wait another minute before she said, “I want to get out of here.”

  “Yes,” Chance said. “‘Calli’ can get sick. I’ll tell Brancotti that I want to fly you back to New York.”

  She stared at him. “Forget it. I was talking about getting out of this swamp. I’m not leaving you here alone.”

  His expression was grim, his eyes cold. “It’s too dangerous. I don’t want you here.”

  “Tough.” She could make her eyes cold, too. “I don’t cut and run until a job is finished.

  Besides, you need my help.”

  He said nothing for a minute. Because she was right. Natalie pressed her advantage.

  “We’ve decided that unless we get lucky and find the real diamond on the first try, we have to hit both safes. You won’t be able to do that alone. Once the job is done, I’ll be ready to leave. And instead of arguing with me, you’d best put your energy into figuring out who took that shot at us.”

  CHANCE SHOVED DOWN on the emotions that had been swirling through him since they’d narrowly missed that barrage of bullets on their sprint for the trees. He couldn’t afford to let them cloud his mind, not now when he had to focus on protecting Natalie.

  Gathering his thoughts, he said, “I don’t have to figure anything out. It was Brancotti.”

  She shook her head. “Not necessarily. It could be anyone he’s invited to his house party.”

  Chance bit back his impatience as she ran through her little rogue’s gallery of suspects, but he still wasn’t convinced. “What’s their motivation?”

  “Any one of them could be worried that Steven Bradford might outbid them.”

  Chance shook his head. “My money’s still on Brancotti.”

  “He’s a businessman. He wants Steven Bradford here as competition. You’ll drive the price up.”

  She had a sharp mind. Chance had to admit that, but she wasn’t aware of all of the facts.

  “I’ve gone up against him before.”

  “I read the file. You lost your partner.”

  Chance nodded. “He could have put us in the Venetian room to let me know that he suspects who I really am. And now he’s decided that the game is over.”

  Natalie thought for a minute. “I don’t think so. Wouldn’t he rather play the game out to the finish—let you get the diamond in your hand and then spring a trap?”

  Chance remained silent. She could almost see his mind at work.

  “Besides, if he kills Steven Bradford, he calls attention to this place. He can’t want the police wandering through, questioning his guests or even worse, wondering why all these people are gathered here. It’s too risky.”

  “But he didn’t kill me,” Chance pointed out. “He could still intend to play the game to the finish. Either way, it’s too risky for you to stay.”

  Natalie studied him in silence for a moment. Then she said, “I’m not going unless you come with me.”

  “I’m not leaving without the Ferrante diamond.”

  “Then I stay, too.”

  Chance grabbed her wrist as she started to rise. “Haven’t you heard a word I’ve said? It’s too dangerous for you to stay. It’s possible that Brancotti set this whole auction up to trap me because I came too close to catching him the last time.”

  She gave him a long, cool look, and when she spoke, her voice was just as chilly. “I’ve heard everything you said. But I don’t desert my partners.”

  When he opened his mouth, she raised a hand to silence him. “You haven’t convinced me yet that Carlo is on to us. Your history with him and the fact that you lost a partner may be clouding your judgment.”

  “You may be right, but—” He cut himself off as he looked into those cop’s eyes. He owed her the rest of the truth. “There’s more that I have
n’t told you. Carlo and I go back a long way—all the way back to that orphanage I told you about. His name was Damien back then, and he was my best friend, my mentor. I trusted him until he betrayed me.”

  “How?” Natalie asked.

  “I was twelve and he was seventeen when I was placed there, and he took me under his wing right from the start. You’ve seen what he’s like. I came to worship him. The nuns at the orphanage trusted him, too. He could go anywhere without being questioned. He had a knack for opening locks and under his tutoring I found that I did, too. After lights-out at night, he’d come and get me, and we’d practice. Once a month they changed the combination on the safe in the headmistress’s office. Damien would finesse the lock on her office door and then we’d practice on the safe. It took a while, but eventually, I was able to open it. Each month after that we’d have competitions to see who could open it the fastest.”

  Natalie couldn’t help but recall that she and her father had had the same kind of competitions.

  “One night, Damien excused himself while I was working on the safe. He said he had a surprise for me. I don’t know how long he was gone. I was totally focused on listening to the tumblers fall. This particular night the safe was empty. I didn’t even have time to wonder about that when Damien returned with the headmistress and the police. There’d been over a hundred thousand dollars in the safe—money from the annual fund-raiser.

  Looking back, I can see that Damien had laid his plans far in advance.”

  “They didn’t suspect him?” Natalie asked.

  Chance laughed dryly. “Why would anyone suspect St. Damien? He looked as horrified as the headmistress to find me there. He told them that he’d heard something when he was making his rounds and he’d called the police immediately. They found me in front of the open safe, and then they found letters under my mattress—from my accomplice. In them, I was told just what to do and I was even given the combination of the safe. The police assumed that I had tossed the money out the open window of the office to my ‘partner’

  and that, thanks to Damien, I hadn’t had time to make my escape. Looking back, I can see how stupid I was.”

  “You were twelve, a child. How could they have been so stupid to suspect you?”

  Chance glanced down to find that Natalie had slipped her hand into his. He couldn’t help wondering how his life might have turned out if someone at the orphanage had had even a little of that simple faith in him. “The nuns didn’t think that being twelve was an excuse.

  And they didn’t want to disbelieve Damien.”

  “What did they do with you?” she asked.

  “I was taken away to jail. Of course, my accomplice was never found. Later, I learned that Damien left the orphanage shortly after that.”

  “And no one suspected even then?”

  Chance shook his head, almost smiling at the vehemence in her tone. “He was close to eighteen, and he had a right to leave.”

  “What happened to you?” she asked.

  Chance smiled. “Don’t look so worried. The one thing I owed Damien for was that I’d become very good with locks. I spent one night in the town jail before I blew the place.”

  “You were twelve and alone on the streets?”

  Because he couldn’t resist her, he briefly touched his lips to hers. “The streets were a hell of a lot better than that jail. Now that you know what Carlo is really like, is there any chance that I can convince you to leave?”

  “No.”

  There were some battles you could win, Chance thought, and some you retreated from so that you could fight another day. Tipping up her chin, he met her eyes steadily. “We’re going to have to be very careful.”

  “Yes, we’ll need some kind of a plan.”

  Chance could almost hear the wheels inside her head turning.

  She glanced around. “I’ll be able to think better once we get out of this place. If there’s one creature that scares me more than alligators and snakes, it’s spiders.”

  Laughing, Chance tucked his gun away, then pulled her to her feet and said, “Follow me.”

  “HAVE YOU GOT IT?” Natalie asked.

  Chance glanced down at her as they stepped onto the circular drive that led to the house.

  There were smudges of dirt on her nose and cheeks, but she was totally focused on explaining the tack she thought they ought to take with Brancotti. It wasn’t bad as plans went, Chance supposed.

  “I’m going to be upset, angry, afraid,” she said. “Someone shot at us, and I’m going to want answers.”

  Natalie Gibbs was a woman who seldom lost her focus, except when he was making love with her. Then that line of concentration disappeared from her brow, and that incredible mist would fill her eyes and darken them.

  “Well?”

  He filed away the image that had filled his mind and glanced down at her.

  “And you’re going to be—?” she prompted.

  “I’m going to be upset and withdrawn. Let you take control. I don’t much like that part.”

  She shot him a grin. “Steven Bradford’s a bit of a weenie. That makes him very sexy to someone like me.”

  “I’ll have to remember that,” Chance said.

  “I’d rather that you remember the plan—and stick to it.”

  He’d stick to it for a while, at least. Their best shot at leaving the estate with the diamond was to continue playing their roles. Natalie’s instincts were good, and she was managing to keep her objectivity a hell of a lot better than he was. For the moment, he couldn’t do better than to follow her lead.

  “Ready?” she asked as they climbed the steps.

  “Yeah. Are you ready?”

  “Yes.” She drew in a deep breath, let it out. And then Chance watched her turn into Calli.

  Her step quickened and she slipped her hand into his. “The first thing I’m going to do is demand that you see a doctor.”

  “Whoa. That wasn’t part of the plan you just outlined. I don’t need a doctor,” he said. “It’s just a scratch.”

  “It’s bleeding. A doctor should look at it.”

  She was being mother hen, Chance thought in some disgust. There was a lot of Natalie, the big sister, in Calli.

  They stepped into the entrance hall just as Lisa entered from one of the hallways.

  “I demand to see Carlo,” Natalie cried. “Someone just tried to kill Steven.”

  “This way,” Lisa said, gesturing them into the hallway she’d just stepped out of. “Carlo has already been informed of the incident. He’s talking to the security people right now.”

  Chance let Natalie draw him down the hallway. Lisa stopped at a door with a coded keypad. Figuring that this was the same room that Carlo had shown Natalie on her tour, he took a quick survey as he stepped through the door. He spotted the guard right away, just outside the doors that opened onto a patio. Natalie strode forward and placed her hands, palms down, on Carlo’s desk. “What is going on here?”

  Carlo glanced at Chance, then back at Natalie. “I’m working on it. My men are searching for the shooter. I hope to hear shortly that they have apprehended him.”

  “And why should we trust you?” Natalie asked. “How can we be sure that it wasn’t one of your men who shot Steven?”

  For a moment there was silence in the room as Carlo looked from Natalie to Chance and back again. Chance could see the anger in Carlo’s eyes and in the pulse beating in his temple. For a moment, he wondered if Natalie had gone too far.

  Finally, Carlo moved around his desk and took one of Natalie’s hands. “You’re upset.

  Understandably so. Please.” He glanced at Chance and gestured to the two chairs in front of his desk. “Sit down. Lisa? Pour our guests some brandy.”

  As Lisa did his bidding, Natalie and Chance sat while Carlo picked up his phone and punched in numbers. “I’m calling my own personal doctor. She lives right here on the estate. You’ll want to have the wound looked at.”

  “It’s only
a scratch,” Chance said. “Give me some antiseptic and a Band-Aid and I’ll be fine.”

  “Thank you. He’ll see a doctor,” Natalie said.

  Carlo gave orders over the phone, then hung up and waited for Lisa to distribute the brandy snifters.

  He took a quick sip of his before he spoke, and Chance used that moment to study his old enemy more closely. Carlo’s hand wasn’t quite steady as he set his glass down on the desk. He was either rattled or giving a good imitation of it. Of course, Chance was well aware that Carlo was skilled at deception.

  But what would be the point of acting rattled? Unless he truly was. Was it possible that Natalie was right and Carlo wasn’t behind the shooting?

  Chance had no reason to give him the benefit of the doubt.

  “I want to apologize.” Carlo said. “Nothing like this has ever happened on my estate before. In answer to your earlier question, I don’t usually invite people here to shoot them.

  This villa—” he gestured with a hand “—is a place where I conduct a very lucrative business. And most of my clients are repeat customers. If word got around that something like this could happen here…well, you can imagine the repercussions. That is why you may rest assured that I had nothing to do with this deplorable incident. You can also be certain that I will do everything in my power to get to the bottom of it.”

  It was a nice speech, Chance thought. There was a line of tension in Carlo’s shoulders and a bite of fury in his movements as he lifted the glass and took another sip of brandy. It was a superb performance.

  “You say the shooter isn’t one of your men. But how could he have gotten past your security?” Natalie asked.

  Bull’s-eye, Chance thought as a muscle twitched in Carlo’s jaw. Was that why Carlo was so angry?

  “That is an excellent question. I will have the answer soon,” he promised.

  On impulse, Chance said, “I want to send Calli home.”

  She rounded on him. “No. If we go, we go together. I don’t care about that diamond. I only care about you.”

  There were real tears in her eyes. Chance would have staked his life on it. And they hadn’t discussed this scenario. He’d sprung it on her out of the blue.

  “No. Please,” Carlo said.