Sure Bet

by Maggie Price

  "Makes sense," Morgan commented.

  "Yes, but there are bare spots where I can't get the moss to fill in. I'm wondering if you know of a solution?"

  Morgan looked past the swimming pool, noting the dark cabana. "Buttermilk," she said, looking back to meet his gaze.

  "Buttermilk," Spurlock repeated.

  "Mix a pint of buttermilk with a gallon of water and paint the mixture on the bare spots. The moss should settle in."

  His gaze slicked down her red cat suit. "You're not only an expert on plants, you're a gorgeous one."

  "Thank you."

  A short, thin Oriental man in a white coat appeared, carrying a silver tray with the unopened bottle of water Alex had requested. Spurlock slipped the bottle from the tray, waved away the servant and shifted his gaze to Alex. "Mr. Donovan, are you sure I can't interest you in something other than bottled water?"

  "No, thanks, and call me Alex," he said amicably as he accepted the plastic bottle and twisted off the cap. "I like to keep a clear head when I'm talking business." Giving Morgan a smooth smile, he slid an arm around her waist. "And I agree with you, Carlton. My wife is gorgeous."

  "Extremely." Spurlock sipped from his flute, then inclined his head. "I wasn't aware you and I had business to discuss."

  "I'm looking for advice on an investment," Alex explained. "I've got the chance to buy a small vacant shopping center on the city's northwest side." He took a drink of water. "Someone at the track mentioned you own a land development company."

  "Among other things."

  At that, anxiety built in Morgan's belly. According to her and Alex's plan, his mention of business was the catalyst that would give her time inside the mansion to search for the gold bedroom where Krystelle Vander hid the evidence that would prove Spurlock ordered the hit on the jockey.

  "So," Alex continued, "I thought you could give me the pros and cons of opening certain types of businesses in that area."

  "Perhaps." Spurlock eyed him. "What type of businesses?"

  "I plan to convert most of the space into a movie theater."

  Spurlock arched a brow. "A movie theater?"

  "To show low-budget, independent films for select clientele. I'd put a bookstore in next door to the theater. There'd probably be room for a novelty shop, too."

  Easing out a bored sigh, Morgan glanced at Spurlock before shifting her attention to a nearby trellis, thick with thousands of white clematis blooms. She could almost see the man's mind working behind those steel-gray eyes. Alex had clearly gotten the message across that the theater would show porn films, with an adult bookstore and a shop for sleazy sexual paraphernalia nearby. Businesses like those had customers who paid in cash. Capacity and sales numbers, especially for the movie theater, could be easily manipulated on the account books to show a lot more profit than what actually came in. That made the operations excellent devices for laundering large numbers of small bills.

  A man who operated a gambling casino—and other criminal endeavors—was perpetually looking for ways to wash illegal money.

  "Yes, Alex, I believe I can give you some advice." Spurlock glanced at his solid-gold designer watch, then swept a hand toward a round, glass-topped table. "My cook will have dinner ready in about twenty minutes. We can discuss the potential of your investment now if you'd like."

  "I'd like." Alex tucked Morgan's hand into the crook of his arm as they strolled toward the table. "Darling, I know business discussions bore you."

  She gave her hair a petulant pat. "Can't you put this off?"

  "I would, but I have a meeting with the property owner tomorrow morning," Alex explained. "So I need to talk to Carlton now."

  She gave a sulky shrug when they reached the table. "You did just spend an hour looking at roses without complaining."

  "True." He turned toward the table, pulled out one of the padded chairs for her. "This won't take long." She knew the comment was Alex's reminder they had agreed she would spend no more than five minutes on her first search for the gold bedroom.

  "Actually, I think I'll go powder my nose while you talk business." She set her flute on the table near a crystal vase from which magnolia boughs spilled. Fingering the gold chain on her evening bag, she met Spurlock's gaze. "You'll excuse me?"

  "Of course."

  "Didn't I see a powder room when we came in through the hallway?"

  "Yes. I'll be happy to summon Chan and have him show you the way."

  "Don't bother," she said, even as she moved off with a confident swing of hips toward a set of French doors. "I remember where it is."

  Morgan stepped inside the doors, checked her watch. When they first arrived, she had casually ascertained from Spurlock that his massive home had four bedrooms downstairs, eight upstairs.

  There was no time to get upstairs tonight. If luck was with her, she'd find the gold bedroom on this level.

  She moved hurriedly through an expansive living room past a grouping of leather sofas and chairs, polished tables and bookcases filled with leather-bound first editions. The air was ripe with good, rich scents coming from the far-off kitchen.

  She turned into a softly lit hallway wainscoted in silky mahogany. The pounding of her heart matched the staccato click of her heels against the wooden floor. As she moved, she turned the clasp on her leather bag. If any kind of surveillance camera was recording her movements, a small tone would sound. She heard nothing.

  The first door she came to was the small powder room she'd passed earlier. She cast a look up and down the hallway, then reached into the room, flicked on the light, then pulled the door to the powder room closed.

  Retrieving the lipstick tube/camera from her purse, she continued along the hallway, turned down another, wishing she had some idea of how many servants were in the mansion. She had to assume a couple, all of whom might appear and confront her.

  She edged open the first door she came to and flipped on the light. She found a huge bedroom, done in crimsons and gray blues, and felt an instant flare of disappointment at not finding the gold bedroom on her first try. Aiming the small tube, she snapped two pictures, turned off the light, shut the door.

  Shoulders tight, spine stiff, she hurried down the hallway, telling herself she would maybe relax again in about ten years. Right now, her body felt razor-sharp and all edges.

  She continued her search, repeating the picture-taking process in a bedroom with a hunter-green motif, and another decorated in soft, oyster-white hues. All the bedrooms she had seen so far looked obsessively neat and had an unlived-in feel.

  She checked her watch. Over two minutes had passed.

  Hurry.

  Even the silence around her seemed laced with tension as she stepped to the door at the end of the hallway. Easing it open, she caught a whiff of lavender as she flicked on the light, illuminating a large bedroom done in French blue and pale coral. The bed was massive, covered in a luxurious velvet spread. A vase of yellow roses sat on the nightstand, giving the room a lived-in feel. Morgan was about to snap a photo when she heard the distant scrape of footsteps advancing along the hallway's wooden floor.

  Heart in her throat, she rushed across the expanse of dove-gray carpet into the small adjoining bathroom. She locked the door behind her then leaned against it, dragging in air as her body trembled. She strained to make out any noise coming from the other side of the door, but couldn't hear past the pounding of her heart.

  Instinct told her someone had come looking for her and she would find them waiting for her when she opened the door. Was it Spurlock? His servant Chan? The cook or a housekeeper? Maybe even the hired bodyguard, Colaneri, who had stopped her in the street this morning, and had yet to make an appearance tonight?

  She knew how to play this. She and Alex had prepared for something like this happening, had worked out a scenario for what she should do if someone confronted her. All she had to do was keep her cool. Maintain cover. Get through it.

  After waiting an appropriate length of time, she flushed
the toilet then moved to the long marble counter, turned on the solid-gold tap and stuck her hands under the cold water. Taking a series of deep breaths, she checked her reflection in the mirror ringed in lights. Despite a tan and the blush she had applied earlier, her skin was pale as a sheet.

  She dried her hands on one of the thick towels hanging nearby, then pinched her cheeks to put color back into them. Sliding an unsteady palm down one red spandex-covered hip, she drew in a last deep breath, forced a nonchalant look on her face, then pulled open the door.

  She shrieked when Colaneri shoved her back, her ice-pick heels nearly skidding out from under her on the ceramic-tiled floor. Like a charging bull, he rushed into the bathroom, slammed the door, then took a step toward her.

  Fear shot up her spine in a single, icy arrow as she grabbed the counter to keep her balance. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" she demanded.

  His mouth curved while a hovering cruelty glinted in his dark eyes. "What've you got under that cat suit, blondie?"

  Chapter 11

  When Colaneri reached for her, Morgan skittered two steps back. "Keep your hands off me."

  On the edge of her vision, she checked the doorknob. He had set the lock when he shoved her back into the bathroom and shut himself inside with her.

  "You wearing a wire under that cat suit, blondie?"

  She kept her face blank. The situation would only get worse if he caught a whiff of the fear slithering along her nerves.

  "An underwire bra?" she asked, purposely misunderstanding.

  "Cute." His mouth curled on one side. He wore black trousers and a white silk shirt open at the throat to expose several gold chains around a neck in which the tendons looked as taut as guy wires. He wasn't overly muscular, but he was taller than her and wiry, which gave him the advantage of height and strength. He had scars around his eyebrows and mouth, and his nose looked as if it had been hit once or twice too often. All were physical signs of someone whose rap sheet listed numerous assault arrests.

  "Hey!" she protested when he grabbed her evening bag and jerked the chain off her arm.

  "Shut up."

  Stay calm, she told herself. If she acted like a victim, she would wind up one. And if he found the camera hidden in her lipstick tube, she definitely had the potential for coming out on the bad end of this encounter.

  "What the hell do you think you're doing?" she demanded.

  "What the hell do you think you're doing snooping around?" he asked, mimicking her words.

  He pulled out the lipstick tube, yanked off the top and twisted the end. Glancing down, he checked the slim column of red lipstick that swiveled up.

  Morgan swallowed hard when he jammed the cap back on the tube, then dropped it into her purse.

  "Snooping?" she asked. "Who's snooping? I had to use the bathroom." Deliberately careless, she swept her arm to one side. "This is a bathroom, isn't it?"

  "You bypassed four others on your way to this one," he pointed out in a low, bloodless voice. He examined her compact, then her small atomizer of perfume. Finally he tossed the purse onto the counter.

  When his gaze settled on her breasts, cold fear prickled on the back of Morgan's neck.

  "You wearing a wire, blondie? Maybe got a bug hidden in your bra, thinking you'd plant it around here some place?"

  "Why would I do that?" she demanded with a lot more bravado than she felt.

  He smirked. "To spy on my boss. There's lots of people who'd like to know all about his business dealings."

  "Well, I'm not one of them." She tossed her hair back even as her legs trembled. "For your information, I don't care what Mr. Spurlock does."

  "I do. And I get real suspicious when someone starts snooping around, sticking her nose where it doesn't belong."

  "I had to go to the bathroom!"

  He took a step toward her. "Here's the deal, blondie. I'm going to pat you down to see if you've got more than just the usual goodies under all that red spandex. You don't, I'll apologize. You do, you and I will have something new to talk about."

  Her pulse beat at a furious pace as her mind echoed the intel information she'd read on Colaneri. The image of the crime-scene photos of Krystelle Vander's cut throat and bloody, knife-shredded flesh loomed in Morgan's vision. If she gave in to Colaneri's request, she had no guarantee he would stop at a pat down. He could have her stripped—maybe raped, maybe dead—in minutes.

  That wasn't going to happen. She was a cop. Just because her partner was dealing with another bad guy and not around to back her up didn't mean she couldn't get herself out of hot water. She had, after all, come out top in the academy's self-defense training.

  She just had to defend herself like a woman, not a cop.

  Silently cursing her ice-pick heels, she spread her feet for better balance. "You want to pat me down," she repeated coolly, then leaned in, narrowing her eyes in disdain. "Isn't that a police term? Are you some kind of undercover policeman who gets his kicks fondling defenseless women?"

  "Do I look like a damn cop?" Colaneri's voice sounded like chipped glass, and she could see in his eyes the brutality was only a whisper away.

  Her throat was raw and hot, and she felt a trickle of sweat between her breasts. She had to get out of there fast.

  "Do I look like a woman who's going to just stand still and let some pervert feel her up?"

  "You asked for it, blondie," he said, then reached for her.

  Quick as a snake, her hand lashed out, grabbed his thumb, and forced it back into his wrist. At the same instant she stomped a stiletto heel into the top of his foot. Roaring in pain, he dropped to one knee, his free hand flailing for the marble counter.

  "Don't ever touch me again," she hissed. She grabbed her purse; in seconds she had the door unlocked, opened and was racing down the hallway, air heaving in and out of her lungs.

  She knew the performance she was about to put on for Spurlock would determine whether she and Alex got out of there alive.

  Shoving through the French doors, she rushed onto the terrace. The sky was now black as pitch. Lamps illuminated the round table where Alex and Spurlock sat, their intent expressions confirming they were still talking business.

  She marched toward them on unsteady legs; with Spurlock's back to her, she met Alex's gaze, sending him a look of urgent warning. She saw the skin beneath his eyes tighten, then relax. He leaned forward, watching her face intently when she slapped her palms on the table top and gave Spurlock a fiery look.

  "What kind of sick place are you running here?"

  Alex lunged to his feet, gripped her arm. "What happened?"

  He couldn't have known—had no way of knowing—how just his touch had the power to reassure.

  "Yes," Spurlock said, rising from his chair, his gray eyes cool as they took her in. "I'm curious to know why you believe I'm running a sick place."

  "Your goon tried to feel me up, that's what happened." She gave Spurlock a look as hot as his was cool. "He takes orders from you, doesn't he? Did you know he was going to do that?"

  Alex wheeled on Spurlock, his hands fisted. "What the hell is this?"

  Spurlock dipped his head. "I assure you both, I don't know what this is about. If you'll excuse me, I'll find out."

  He turned just as Colaneri burst out of the French doors. He limped halfway across the terrace before Spurlock held up a hand. Like a trained dog, Colaneri stopped in his tracks. The look of red-hot hatred in his eyes chilled Morgan's blood.

  "Him!" She stabbed an indignant finger into the air. "That ape said if I didn't let him feel me up he was going to do it anyway."

  "Bastard," Alex spat with snarling fury. When he took a menacing step forward, Morgan grabbed his arm.

  "No. Alex, he didn't lay a hand on me, I made sure of it. Just take me home. Now."

  Spurlock turned back to face them. "Mrs. Donovan, Morgan, I would prefer you not leave, at least until you tell me what happened." He sliced a look at Colaneri, then remet her gaze. "If one of my e
mployees has treated a guest badly, I need to know so I can deal with the situation."

  "Well…" Putting a hand to her throat, she glanced toward the mansion. She had made progress tonight. She had determined the gold bedroom was not on the mansion's first floor. That meant it was one of the eight bedrooms on the second level. It was a sure thing neither she nor Alex would be taking another tour of the mansion tonight, which meant they had to play this so their host would invite them back.

  She met Spurlock's waiting gaze. "I went in to use the powder room in the hallway, just like I said I was going to do," she began, relating the story she and Alex had devised earlier. "But the door was shut and I could see the light on underneath it, so I figured someone was in it." She flicked her wrist. "This being a mansion, I assumed you had more than one powder room on the first level, so I just went on down the hall. I opened doors, and all I found were bedrooms. It seemed a little personal for me to tromp through someone's bedroom to get to the adjoining bath, so I kept going, thinking the next door I opened would be one to a separate powder room. When I got to the end of the hallway, I opened the last door and saw it was another bedroom. I…" She swept her lashes down demurely.

  "You what?" Spurlock prodded quietly.

  "Well, by then I had to really go so I went on through the bedroom into the powder room and took care of business." Lifting her chin, she sent Colaneri a blazing glare. "When I opened the door to leave, that animal shoved me back inside. He searched my purse while accusing me of wearing a wire and planting a bug. Then he told me he was going to pat me down."

  Alex gripped both her arms. "Did he?"

  "No—"

  His hands tightened and he almost pulled her off her toes.

  "Dammit, Morgan, I want the truth," he demanded, his voice tight with barely controlled fury. "Did the bastard touch you?"

  "No." She patted his chest, and felt his heart racing. "Baby, I swear he didn't get the chance." She sent Spurlock a self-satisfied look. "A girl doesn't serve drinks in Vegas for long without learning how to stop lechers from copping a feel."