by Leslie Kelly
“You’re the perfect guide for these old plantation houses.”
“And you’re relentless about getting what you want. You must have driven your parents crazy, you spoiled brat.”
He shrugged, unrepentant. “You like getting your own way, too. You’re just a little more genteel about it.”
True. She did like getting her own way. She’d had to. She’d been pretty much in charge of her little family since she was a teenager, and had become used to her mother following her advice. “Okay, so we’re both used to being the boss. Both oldest kids—”
“And oldest grandkids,” he added.
“Correct. We both like to be the one in the driver’s seat.”
He leaned close to her ear. “Right. And sometimes we both want to be on top. But I think we’ve managed to compromise and work things out there, don’t you?”
Oh, lordy, she had set herself up for that one. She gulped, pushed a long strand of hair off her face and ordered herself not to blush. Not now, when other business owners she knew were walking by, nodding their hellos as she stood there, getting wet and aroused because of this man’s wicked whisper.
“We have already established sexual compatibility,” she conceded, keeping her voice low. “I’m talking about elsewhere. We don’t have much else in common.”
He rolled his eyes and made a sound of disgust. “We don’t know that. Why do you think I’ve been insisting you spend your days with me? So we could get to know each other better. Like today, we’ll be seeing headstones and houses full of dead people when what I want to do is go back into your office, lift you on top of your desk, flip up your little skirt and take you right there in front of Savannah and the world. Because maybe if I come inside you, again, you’ll begin to believe there’s something real happening between us.”
She dropped her purse—literally dropped it out of her weak fingers—and stood there staring up at him, wide-eyed, on the sidewalk. Two women walked by, women she recognized. They giggled, then one of them picked up her handbag and put it in Jade’s shaking fingers.
“Have a nice day, y’hear? ‘Bye, honey,” she said after giving Ryan a thorough head-to-toe examination. Then the women moved on.
Jade still couldn’t say a word.
Finally, he tipped her gaping jaw closed with his index finger. “Do we go back in your office?” he asked, one brow quirked. “Or do we go visit those old museums you so love?”
Swallowing the first answer, the impulsive one from the deepest, most sensual part of her, she snapped, “Let’s go.”
WHILE DRIVING OUT OF Savannah for their day visiting historic houses of the South, Ryan and Jade maintained a comfortable silence. The hum of the engine droned beneath the hiss of the air conditioner, which tried to bring the stifling outside air to a breathable temperature. Her hand rested on the seat, his close to it, so that just their pinkies touched. That slight touch told him she’d forgiven him for the sexy taunt outside her office.
Hell, he was the one who’d lived to regret it. It’d taken ten minutes of their drive for him to will his hard-on back down.
The tension was gone, though the awareness remained. There was more, though. If anyone had told him a few days ago that he could be falling for this woman, Ryan would have laughed in that person’s face. But it was true. Somewhere between the sex and the anger, the schemes and the desire, they’d started to enjoy one another. To like one another. And, at least on his part, maybe more.
How twisted was that? He cared for a woman he believed was a thief. He was intrigued by her like he’d never been intrigued by anyone. He liked her intelligence and her caustic wit, her smile and her dark, mysterious eyes. Even the hint of vulnerability she’d hate to have anyone notice.
He’d noticed. He’d paid attention to the slight weariness in her shoulders after she’d worked out this weekend’s tour schedule last night in his bed. The wistful tone in her voice when she spoke of missing her mother and sister told him more about her than any conversation about their families could have. The sadness when she spoke of the father she’d lost at such a young age broke his heart a little. The exasperated fondness when Lula Mae’s name came up merely cemented what he’d figured the night he’d met the old woman.
Jade was the glue that held them all together. He knew that now, without ever having met most of her family. And he liked her even more for it.
None of it reconciled with a deceitful con woman who’d steal from the elderly. None. So he had decided to do exactly what Lula Mae had told him to—get closer to Jade. Much closer. And try to either win her trust, so she’d confide in him, or figure out all on his own how her mind worked.
“So why did you want to go on this field trip today, anyway? Aren’t there enough old houses in the city for you to explore?” She shot him an amused look. “Or are you just trying to get away from Mamie Brandywine? She has to have tracked you down by now.”
He grimaced. “She left a message for me at the hotel.”
“She’s relentless.”
“She’s a hundred and two.”
“More like sixty.”
“Who could tell?” he asked, wanting to change the subject to a much more pleasant one. “Besides, today gives me a chance to be alone with you, with no cell phone, no pager, no tourists recognizing you and asking questions about where to visit.”
She reached to turn up the AC and a thick blast of cold air emerged from the vents. Jade leaned toward it, almost cooing her appreciation. She was such a creature of her senses, and watching the delight she took in so many things drove him crazy. She savored rich smells, decadent desserts, sultry whispers, or coolness against her overheated body.
His touch.
Ryan swallowed hard, knowing he had to get a grip before he drove off the road.
“We’ve been alone for the past two nights,” she said, one brow lifted as she gave him a secretive smile.
So much for getting a grip. That comment put his brain right back into his lap. “I’m gonna get into a wreck if we start talking about the past two nights.”
“They were fabulous.”
Witch.
“It’s a good thing it’s not possible to overdose on orgasms, because I’d be a dead woman right now.”
He growled and shifted again. “Shut. Up. Jade.”
She giggled. “Just getting even for what you said back in front of my office. But I’ll shut up now.”
Unfortunately, it was too late. Her comments had his mind focused only on the hot, sensual encounters they’d shared. He could not get enough of her. No matter how many times he touched her, his hands felt empty when she wasn’t in them.
He’d half wondered if her Aunt Lula Mae had slipped something into his tea that first night. But whatever the spell had been, it hadn’t worn off, hadn’t decreased in intensity at all. She was all he thought about while awake, all he dreamed about when asleep.
“Well,” he said, trying to change the subject to a safer one, “the nights have been private. But yesterday was a little crowded.”
“Crowded?”
He nodded. “Everyone knows you. Everywhere we went, people have been asking you questions, wanting your advice. I can barely exchange ten words with you before we’re interrupted.”
From vendors selling brightly-colored T-shirts to sweaty tourists, to artists peddling ten-dollar caricatures, she stopped to talk to them all. Old and young. Male and female. She had a ready smile, a word of support, an answer for every question.
“That happens in a place like this. You see the skyline and think we’re a big city. But when you walk the old squares, you know it’s still a very small town.”
“Still seems strange to me,” he said with a shrug.
“There’s a whole history here,” she said. “So many families have been here for a long time. We grew up together. Went to school together. Went to the same birthday parties and the same Southern colleges. Lifelong friends who grow up, marry and stay put so their children can be life
long friends. That’s Savannah.”
So much for thinking Jade wasn’t liked at the party the other night. Because she was obviously very well-liked among her people, as she called them—the modern, hard-working businesspeople of a thriving modern city. They didn’t just like her. They admired her, looked up to her. Hell, they loved her.
How on earth she could be the thief he knew her to be, he had no idea. It didn’t make sense. He’d thought it over a dozen different ways since their first night together, but no matter how he looked at it, the idea of Jade actually stealing from someone seemed impossible.
But his grandmother had told him she had. And the painting was missing.
The frustration of not knowing what to believe was driving him insane. He wanted to get the whole thing out in the open and done with. Whatever kind of trouble Jade was in—whatever would lead her to such a desperate choice—he wanted to know. To help her solve it, and to move on.
Until she trusted him enough to open up to him, however, he didn’t think he’d be getting the answers he wanted. Not without giving her enough reason to disappear from his life for good. Like the fact that he’d been lying to her from the minute they’d met.
“How’s your article coming?” she asked, giving him something else to think about.
The article. The one he was supposed to be writing about the architecture of old Georgia. The one he hadn’t even started yet. “It’s okay. Today should give me some new angles.”
“Good. You’ll love the Martinique place. The man who built it back in the mid-eighteen hundreds had every stone in the garden wall brought over from the ruins of an ancient castle in France.”
“Probably because his wife asked him to, huh?”
She looked disgruntled. “Now how did you know that?”
“Isn’t every romantic story about walls being moved or Taj Mahals being constructed somehow related to a man totally out of his mind over a woman?”
“Pessimist.”
“Romantic,” he shot back.
“I don’t think anyone’s ever called me that before. Pragmatist, yes. Romantic, no.”
“Wicked,” he offered.
“Without question.”
He couldn’t help twining his fingers in hers and bringing her hand to his mouth for a quick kiss. “I wouldn’t change a thing.”
Except maybe her side job as a thief.
“Have you studied any of the guidebooks to get a history of the area?” she asked.
He nodded, but didn’t elaborate on what he already knew. He wanted to see Jade’s world through her eyes. She was the ultimate tour guide—a woman who could trace her ancestry right back to the slave quarters and the mansion of a Southern plantation. Unbelievable.
“Is the place lecherous old great-great-grandpa Lester used to own still around?”
“Four greats,” she corrected. Then she shook her head. “And no, it burnt to the ground. Sherman spared much of Savannah, but not a lot outside it.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “I did visit the site once. Lots of ghosts there.” She didn’t sound like she was being fanciful, merely introspective.
“How were you able…”
“To track down the family tree?” she asked, as if reading his mind. “I didn’t have to do anything. The members of my family all like to keep records. And to talk.”
“Including Lula Mae?” he asked, not letting on that he’d actually met the woman. He wasn’t ready to share that tidbit with Jade yet because it would invite a discussion about why he’d been at her place.
“She’s not a blood relative,” she explained. “My great-grandfather married Lula Mae’s mother, a Jamaican immigrant, when my grandmother was a little girl. He adopted her. The two girls were raised like sisters, which scandalized the Old Guard. It got so bad they had to leave Savannah for several years.” Her voice held a tinge of hurt for her elderly relative, for the pain she’d experienced decades ago.
“But she’s here now.”
“Home. With her family. We love her dearly. She’s been like another grandmother to Jenny and me since we were little.” Then she rolled her eyes. “That voodoo stuff is highly exaggerated, but she gets a kick out of the rumors.”
Their conversation was interrupted when they arrived at their destination. Ryan turned the car off the main road, following Jade’s directions and some small white signs. Martinique Plantation might be a popular tourist spot, but it was well hidden behind enormous groves of pecan trees, which lined the road leading to the parking lot.
“Beautiful,” he said, whistling as he looked at the facade of the building.
“Wait ’til you see the inside.”
And she was right. The inside of the place was perfectly decorated and furnished, every item either unique to the period or a fine replica. Ryan hadn’t been too surprised when they’d been allowed to enter the museum without an escort. The woman at the entrance had called Jade by name, chatted about the summer heat and parties and hairdos, and ushered them in without asking for the usual donation.
Though he wouldn’t have believed anything could capture his interest as much as the woman at his side, he found himself getting caught up in the ambiance. Little touches of elegance and pride of workmanship shone in the mellowed oak of the floor, polished to a high sheen. Some unusual angles used in the balustrade deserved closer attention, as did the wainscoting in the dining room. The magazine planned to send a photographer to some of the buildings he mentioned in the article. The grand staircase to this place might make a nice center spread.
Strangely, when they entered what had once been a grand drawing room, he began to feel a sense of familiarity. He cast his eyes around the room, focused on nothing, but taking it all in. A large room, tastefully furnished. Groupings of red velvet sofas and cherrywood tables stood at either end. A harpsichord sat next to a set of French doors leading out to the expansive veranda.
“Come look at this,” Jade said, tugging at his arm. “Here’s the bride of the man who built this house. She was a renowned beauty in her time. Maybe you’ll understand a little more about his grand gesture.”
Then he saw it—the familiar sight that his subconscious had recognized before his eyes had even been aware of. He gaped, his jaw falling open as he beheld the painting hanging over an enormous fireplace.
The one he’d last seen on a wall at his grandparents’ house in upstate New York.
RYAN SOMEHOW MANAGED to keep himself from confronting Jade about the painting right there in the drawing room of the Martinique house. It wasn’t easy. He’d stood there, slack-jawed, staring at the thing, knowing for sure it was the same painting he’d gazed at so many times in his grandmother’s house. Mainly because the attractive woman in it was wearing a very low-cut gown. For a twelve-year-old boy, it had been about as close to titillation as he could get in an old-people house that didn’t have so much as a National Geographic to ogle.
He hadn’t known how to react—whether to confront Jade, accuse her, try to reason with her or take the painting off the wall and run like hell. Fortunately, Jade hadn’t noticed his preoccupation with the portrait. She’d bought his story that he was deep in thought about the article, when in truth he was trying to figure out what was going on.
He was still a little shell-shocked a couple of hours later, sitting alone in his hotel room. He’d made an excuse—an important interview—and driven them back to the city right after they’d finished at the first house. Jade had seemed surprised, but she hadn’t objected. Only when he’d dropped her off in front of her office had he noticed her look of confusion. It had probably been matched by his own, but there hadn’t been anything he could do about it.
He had to think. To be alone. To have a drink from room service.
A double.
As he sipped his gin and tonic, he tried to piece it together. Jade had stolen the painting. The painting was now in a Southern plantation house on display for everyone to see, not hidden away. He knew there was a black market for stole
n art, particularly anything by the Impressionists. But he’d never have thought a legitimate museum would be involved with a shady transaction. So it was likely they hadn’t known the painting was stolen when they’d purchased it from Jade.
Seeing the glaring, full-color reminder of his purpose in being here, it was impossible not to let the reason for his trip here interrupt the happy, lust-filled daze he’d been living in. He’d come to Savannah to track down his grandmother’s property, and to get vengeance on the woman who’d stolen it.
His lover.
“What a mess,” he muttered as he sat on his hotel bed, sifting through notes, maps and brochures he’d been collecting for the article. Some of the brochures were for the local homes, including Martinique Plantation.
Even here he couldn’t get away from the problem. Front and center on the Martinique brochure was a color picture of the LeBeuf painting. Below it, in fancy text, was an invitation to come see the painting that had long ago been lost.
The museum was touting its return to its rightful home because it had been…” Stolen during the Civil War?”
That widened his eyes and had him reaching for his drink again. He couldn’t imagine what Grandmother would think about having stolen goods in her house.
Ryan continued to read. “The piece has recently been donated by a generous and anonymous benefactor, and is on display during regular operating hours.”
Donated. On display.
“Dammit, Jade, what have you been doing?”
But he knew. He didn’t even have to think about it.
Jade was doing what she always did. Taking control. Righting a wrong. Getting justice, even if she had to go about it by stepping outside of the law.
She’d stolen the painting so she could return it to its original home.
Foolish. Risky. Daring. Honorable in a twisted sort of way. How like Jade.
He finally understood all the pieces that hadn’t made sense—Jade’s innate sense of justice, her love of history and tradition and culture. She was doing her part to set things right, in the only way she could.
