“It’s the only one I answer to.”
Leaning close, he dragged his index finger up the center of her body. “Surely I can do better.”
As seemed to be the norm with him, she found her head buzzing and her extremities tingling. The memories of his touch, his kiss, were fresh in her mind, intensifying her need. She should be planning what to say to Richard over breakfast, or trying to intimidate Peter into bailing from the weekend.
“Vicky’s out,” Jared whispered against her ear.
Considerate.
He was hot, smart, fun, generous and considerate. No matter how the competition for the contract went, she had no hope of resisting him.
“What about Tori?” he asked, brushing his lips across her cheek.
Victoria tried to concentrate. “With a y or an i?”
“Does it matter?”
“One’s a stripper’s name, one’s a conservative English political party.”
“I should have known. Tia?”
“Again, stripper.”
“Vic?”
“Is there a reason you can’t call me by my whole name?”
“It’s long.” He placed a lingering kiss beneath her jaw. “In the heat of passion, I need something to gasp.”
Victoria had to swallow her own gasp. The man was forever saying something outrageous. Something tempting.
Smiling, she laid her hand on his cheek. His brown eyes were warm with need and completely focused on her. “Maybe—”
That’s when they heard a bloodcurdling scream coming from upstairs.
* * *
JARED WAS THE FIRST TO REACH Rose’s bedroom, where the terrified sound had come from.
Given her tendency toward drama, he wasn’t too concerned. Maybe her nail polish had clotted? Still, he pulled her into his arms when he saw her shaking in a corner. “It’s okay. You’re safe.”
“Oh, Jared,” she sobbed against his chest. “I’m so glad you’re here. It’s horrible.”
He patted her back as he heard several other people rush into the room. “Don’t worry.”
“What happened?” Victoria asked calmly.
Behind her stood the rest of the household, most looking shocked, some suspicious. Rose’s tendency toward drama was well-known.
“My necklace,” she wailed. “It’s gone!”
Again, Victoria was the first to speak. “You mean the necklace you wore last night?”
“Yes.” Rose covered her face with one hand and clung tighter to Jared. “My beautiful necklace. It’s been stolen.”
Parting the crowd, Richard strode into the room, obviously intending to take charge. “What’s happened?”
Jared wondered if he’d practiced his authoritative expression in the mirror.
“My necklace!” Rose wailed again.
With his shirt only partially buttoned, Sal shoved his way into the room and rushed to Rose’s side, pulling her into his arms as Jared stepped away. “There, there. Don’t cry. You’ve simply misplaced your necklace. What did you do with it after you took it off?”
She pointed a trembling finger to her antique wardrobe. “I put it in the safe.”
Richard moved in that direction. “I’m sure it’s here.”
“It’s not! It’s gone!”
While Richard examined the small safe on the wardrobe floor, Jared’s gaze moved to Victoria. She looked as speculative as everybody else, and he shrugged.
After her accusation that he and Rose had once been lovers, her throwing herself in his arms had an entirely different meaning for the two of them.
He liked the private conversation going on, even though not a word was exchanged. He’d always put a fair amount of stock into body language, but with Victoria, the implications took on greater meaning. She was a demanding woman with a gentle side, and after last night, he was all the more curious about how much more lay beneath the surface.
She had him hooked like a fish on a line. Except he had no intention of escaping.
Richard’s face was white as he turned. “It’s not here.”
Rose looked pleadingly at Jared, as if he could save her. “I told you.”
“Don’t worry, Rose,” he said. “We’ll find it.”
“Of course we will.” Her smile bright, Calla rushed forward from the crowd gathered in the doorway. “We’ll retrace your steps from last night. I’m sure—”
Richard stormed past Calla to his mother’s side, grabbing her upper arm. “Was the safe open or closed when you got up this morning?”
“It was open.” Angry tears filled her eyes as she wrenched away from her son and moved closer to Sal. “That’s why I walked over there and looked inside.”
“You’re sure it was open?” Richard pressed.
Rose’s temper was beginning to take over from shock. “Yes.”
Richard paced beside her. “You couldn’t have locked it in the safe, Mother.”
Was he trying to convince himself, her or everyone else?
Most likely all three.
For if the necklace was missing, and Rose had locked it in the safe, then somebody in the house was a thief, and Richard’s precious new invention had failed.
Which would be lovely justice if it wasn’t so disturbing. And damned inconvenient.
How was Jared supposed to enjoy, and ultimately seduce, Victoria if Rose was crying, Richard was pacing and the rest of them were wondering who had a valuable necklace stuffed in his or her luggage?
“We need to call the police,” Victoria said firmly when everyone else seemed shocked into silence.
“Yes.” Relief washed over Rose’s mottled face. “The police will sort all this out.”
Mrs. Keegan nodded. “I’ll take care of it, Mrs. Rutherford.”
Before anybody could move, Richard slashed out with his hand. “No.”
Ruthie rushed to her husband’s side. “Darling, this isn’t something we should handle alone.”
Victoria joined the group around Rose. “Ruthanne’s right. There’s obviously been a break-in. The police need to come and examine the scene, get statements from all of us. We should go downstairs and wait for them, so we don’t contaminate the evidence any more than we already have.”
“We’re not calling the police,” Richard insisted.
Jared raised his eyebrows. “If a crime’s been committed, I’m pretty sure we don’t have a choice.”
Richard’s smile was smug. “This is Southampton. We do what we like.”
Could the guy sound any more like an arrogant weasel?
Ruthanne squeezed her husband’s arm. “Shouldn’t we leave this kind of thing to the experts?”
“And open the company to negative publicity?” he asked incredulously. “Absolutely not. Besides, we have an expert. Victoria is here.”
“Sure I am,” she said calmly, then paused and shook her head. “What?”
“You can deal with the missing necklace,” he said, his voice firm.
She looked as confused as everybody else. “How? What do I know about police procedure?”
Jared was also wondering how this was in any way Victoria’s problem.
“Your father’s a lawyer,” Richard stated.
She shook her head. “He’s a corporate attorney, not a criminal one.”
“You just said the scene needs to be examined, and we should get statements.” Richard’s tone was stubborn. “You know about contaminated evidence.”
Astonishment flickered across Victoria’s face, followed quickly by a sarcastic tone in her voice. “Of course I do. I read crime novels on vacation.”
“But, V, last spring we did—”
Victoria stepped in front of Calla. “We did. That’s right, we went to the movies and saw that new courtroom drama. I must admit I did figure out who the bad guy was pretty early on.”
Seeing Victoria’s bold, fake smile, Jared stifled a chuckle. He’d love to know what she and her friend had actually done. “I agree with Victoria,” he said, moving toward the bedroom doorway, where Shelby, David and the Standishes hovered. “Let’s go downstairs and talk this out. Rose could use some tea and breakfast.”
“This is my house, McKenna,” Richard said as he marched from the room. “I’m in charge here.”
Jared exchanged a frustrated look with Victoria. Richard in command?
Heaven help them all.
7
SITTING ON THE SOFA WITH CALLA and David, Victoria sipped coffee from an elegant Dresden china cup Mrs. Keegan had set out for the guests.
The housekeeper darted about the room while the people she served twitched, glanced around and whispered to one another.
Had there been a break-in?
If so, the porcelain Victoria held in her hand was probably as valuable as anything. Why wasn’t it taken?
Moreover there were paintings, electronic equipment, sets of silver, as well as other pieces of jewelry still sitting around Rose’s bedroom. Victoria had seen both a genuine pearl necklace and diamond tennis bracelet on the dresser. If a professional thief had sneaked in, why not scoop up the lot? No extra time or effort required.
No, a break-in didn’t make sense. Which meant one of the people in the parlor was a thief.
Richard was in both denial and CYA mode, and Victoria knew she was caught in the middle. She had to placate her client and somehow not break the law. Question was, how could she use this development to her advantage in winning the PR campaign?
Maybe the very idea was coldblooded. Maybe she should include herself in the group of women surrounding Rose, holding her hand and assuring her everything would be fine. Maybe, like Peter, she should be talking in quiet tones with Richard, assuring him he was a wise leader and handling the unexpected situation with brilliance. Maybe she should join Calla and David’s ludicrous conversation about them all being trapped by a vicious storm, then murdered off one by one by an ax-wielding psycho from the village.
David, who’d suggested the theory, obviously didn’t realize he’d been tossed into the midst of Robin Hood’s gang, not an Agatha Christie movie.
Victoria refused to submit to the last, desperate thought that flashed through her mind. Call Mother. She’ll know what to do.
No. She drank more coffee, the hot liquid soothing her urge to panic. Her mother would have had the contract signed five minutes after she walked in the manor door. That’s what legends do.
Jared knelt beside the sofa. “I bet ole Rich is regretting not giving his mother the retina scan model of his super wonderful safe now.”
Grateful to set the image of her own mother aside, Victoria choked back a laugh. In fact, this whole situation was ironically hilarious. Or would be, if she wasn’t the one getting screwed by it.
“If you find the necklace, do you get the contract?” he asked quietly.
The fact that he’d guessed the direction of her thoughts spoke to his sensitivity and their unique connection.
Since there was no way she was that transparent.
“I guess so.” She dragged her gaze from Rose in Vulnerability mode to look at Jared. Much better view. “This puts a damper on your wild adventure weekend.”
He crossed his arms over his broad chest. “I get paid regardless. But I’d rather be out there than in here. Are you going to press the issue of calling the cops?”
“I don’t think so. Rose could’ve misplaced the necklace. Shouldn’t we look for it first?”
“And compromise the crime scene?”
She swallowed, caught by her own logic. And ethics. “I said that impulsively.”
“Because you’re right. Calling the police is the right thing to do.”
“Who says?”
His eyes flashed with annoyance. “Anybody with integrity.”
“I’m sure they have insurance.”
“So you don’t care if a thief gets away?”
“Absolutely, I care. But I don’t see how I can change anything.”
“You want the contract more.” He sighed as a look of disappointment moved across his handsome face. Leaning close, he rasped, “I warned you about Richard’s lack of ethics. Be sure you don’t follow him down that road.”
As Jared walked away, Victoria scowled at his back. That high-handed, self-righteous…
Before she could come up with another, more scathing adjective, Richard appeared in front of her. “I need your help,” he said.
Since she was either going to get a crick in her neck staring up at him or Calla and David were going to add a new layer to their already crazy plot, she rose. When she and Richard found a bit more privacy in the corner of the room, she admitted, “I don’t know anything about solving crimes.”
“Sure you do. Ruthanne read about you and your friends catching a big-time swindler this past spring.”
Damn that Peeps Galloway. “Pure gossip,” Victoria said, tossing her hair back. “You know how they love to make something out of nothing.”
“Exactly. If the police come to investigate, the media will hear about it, and they’ll print all kinds of lies about how my safe failed, how I can’t protect my own family, and why should the public trust me? It’s a PR nightmare.”
But his safe had failed, he hadn’t protected his own family and maybe the public shouldn’t trust his products.
“How did this happen, anyway?” she asked, knowing she couldn’t reveal her thoughts. “Did the safe look like it had been broken into?”
“No scratch marks or a crowbar lying around, if that’s what you mean. Besides, you can’t force the door open that way. It would trigger the alarm.”
Yeah, sure. A gnat landing on the handle would supposedly set off the alarm, and yet some Houdini had managed to pull off the impossible. “Is there a way to check when the code was entered?” She left off the implied maybe it was an inside job.
Richard’s face flushed. “Not really.”
A migraine started in her temples. “What about spy-quality fail-safes? What happened to James Bond not being able to crack the technology?”
“We haven’t gotten all the bugs worked out on those features yet.”
Terrific.
But when had Victoria let a little thing like absolute truth get in the way of a successful campaign? Some things were hidden for the greater good.
If she could save Richard from the nightmare, or better yet, prevent the gloom from descending at all, she’d definitely get the contract. Renowned, maybe not. But it would be a start.
Whenever her mother was introduced at a conference, meeting or even cocktail party, it was “the legendary Joanne Holmes.” A revered hush filled the room when her father, the lawyer, entered. So the thought of no longer being the daughter who couldn’t live up to her parents’ brilliance was enticing beyond measure.
Richard clutched her hand. “You have to help me, Victoria.”
She squeezed back. “Certainly I will.”
/> “We’ll probably find it in a laundry hamper or something.”
“Maybe.” Could she be that lucky? “But if we can’t, and we eventually have to call the police, how are we going to get around the fact that we didn’t phone them when the theft actually happened?”
“We’ll tell them we only just noticed the necklace was missing.”
Victoria hid her wince. Now Richard had them all lying to the police. Not to mention there were twelve individuals who knew the truth. A conspiracy among that many people would last about twelve minutes.
She’d have to make Richard sign the contract before they got arrested.
Her gaze slid to the group around Rose, which now included Calla. Calla who was friends—and possibly more—with an NYPD detective. A detective who’d recently caught her and her friends breaking into a downtown Manhattan office building and had looked the other way in order to get the evidence needed to uncover a big-time swindler.
If they did have to call the police, at least she knew somebody who might be both discreet and not too picky about the timing of the report.
Not that the NYPD had any jurisdiction over Southampton.
She’d been handed this disaster for five minutes and already she could see twenty potential complications. “Get everybody to go outside with Jared. Let them continue with the original water sports plan. Mrs. Keegan and I will stay in the house and do a full search.”
“Including everybody’s luggage?”
No way Victoria could hide her wince now. “Let’s tackle one thing at a time. If the necklace has been misplaced, we won’t need to go there. Mrs. Keegan and I will look in the rooms together, but not pick through personal possessions, yet.”
“And if you don’t come up with anything?”
Was she actually going to interrogate her friends and colleagues? Rummage through their unmentionables? Even Sal and David’s? And Richard’s mother’s, his wife’s? And even the man himself?
Could it really be an inside job? What if this was some kind of insurance scam?
Breathless on the Beach Page 8
