by Aitana Moore
License Notes
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Copyright © 2018 by Aitana Moore
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Without limiting the rights under copyright(s) reserved, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. Making or distributing copies of this book constitutes copyright infringement and could subject the infringer to criminal and civil liability
CONTENTS
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
TWENTY-SIX
TWENTY-SEVEN
TWENTY-EIGHT
TWENTY-NINE
Other books by the same author:
Historical romance as Lara Blunte:
The Last Earl
The Abyss
True Born
To Be King
(Winner of the Wattys 2015)
Contemporary romance as Lara Blunte:
A Man in Africa
ONE
“Martin!”
Lee’s false surname was French, but it was being pronounced in English. The call was followed by a sharp knock on the door that made her jump from the bench of the holding cell.
She had been waiting for that knock. The cell had held her for half the night and all the morning, and she now expected to be taken to an interrogation room, where the police would throw her French passport at her, aware that no such person as Lydie Martin existed, and read her charges of theft and grand larceny — or however they called her crimes in the UK.
They had found her the previous night, sitting in a bus with about twenty million dollars in precious jewels. She had run away from Deerholt two days ago, taking one of the estate’s cars from the garage. Fifty miles later, she had abandoned the car and cut through woods to a town where, wearing a beanie and dark contact lenses, she had boarded a bus to another small town. There she had worn sun glasses, a dark scarf around her head and shapeless long garments to buy hair dye at the drugstore. She had used a foreign accent; perhaps they would think she was Muslim.
Another disguise, another bus and she had ended up at a small hotel in Winchester, where she checked in with her French passport. In her room she had cut her hair, dyed it dark brown and destroyed all her other documents, including the American passport.
She had been on the bus to Portsmouth when she spotted the police moving toward her. They had appeared out of nowhere, weaving through the crowds at the station. There were several cops, but only two had entered the bus, without weapons, and asked her to step out. They had opened her bag, felt for the diamonds and found them; they had handcuffed her and asked the driver to take her luggage out of the hold.
Lee had watched the people watching her from the bus window. They had gaped at the policemen and then let their curious gazes rest on her. Who was that young woman, and what had she done?
By that time, she had made too many mistakes. James had been fast and she much slower than usual. She could imagine him telling the police to watch out for foreigners arriving in small towns, or women with hats and glasses. He would have told them to look at the footage in bus stations, because she couldn’t rent a car or call a taxi or Uber, at least not until she changed her appearance. He would have known she needed to dye her hair.
A job ought not to be handled like that. She ought to have run away from James in London, a big city where she could easily vanish. She ought to have calmly arranged the exit strategy with Quinn and handed the diamonds to him in an efficient and clandestine exchange. She ought to have been out of the country in six hours maximum — before the man she had robbed even woke up.
But one’s potential couldn’t exclude one’s weaknesses. Lee had the potential to be a multi-million-dollar thief, but she had also had the potential to fall in love with James. She might have gotten away, if she hadn’t hoped that he would catch her. When her instinct of survival kicked in by the second day, it had been too late.
Now she ran a hand over her short dark hair and smoothed her black T-shirt as the policeman opened the door. "Someone’s here for you," he said, motioning with his head for her to walk ahead of him.
"Who is it?" she asked. “The attorney?”
“It would be a solicitor.”
The night before, Lee had refused to talk and asked for representation, and today the policeman was non-committal as he escorted her out of the cell and down a corridor. Voices drifted out to her. A woman hadn’t stopped cursing for hours.
They reached a battered door and the policeman opened it. Lee was surprised, because she had not expected to find James there. He stood behind a table, wearing a dark suit, a crisp white shirt and looking rich and well-born, as he was.
"All right, sir, when you're done just knock," the policeman said.
"Thank you," James replied.
Once the man left, James politely motioned toward the chair across from his. "Sit down, please."
"James—”
He interrupted her by going around the table and pulling the chair for her, as he always did. She obeyed, and he took his seat. He looked her up and down; in her short hair, T-shirt, jeans and trainers she looked quite different from "Vivien."
"Is that the real color of your hair?" he wondered, not really expecting an answer. "I knew you were a brunette, of course. Your being blonde was the thing that added up the least.”
She tugged at her hair as if it could cover her.
“You became three or four different women in two days, I’ve heard. Not an amateur, then, at the theft thing?”
Lee didn't say anything; what could she say? He was angry beneath the surface — not beast-angry, but ice-cold furious.
"What’s your real name?”
"Lee," she said through stiff lips.
"That’s not Lee for Lydie, I’m guessing.”
She looked at the ground again.
“Probably it’s not even Lee, but it will do. That French passport is fake, of course.”
Lee nodded; there would be no use lying to him anymore. She would have to beg him not to prosecute her, because she couldn’t go to jail or Cora would have to return to their mother. That could not happen.
But James clicked his tongue and said lightly, “Crikey, you’re in trouble. Caught with millions of pounds in stolen jewels and a fake EU passport, no less.”
Gathering courage, Lee looked at him. "
James, I’m sorry—"
He scoffed. "I'll get the diamonds back — no great harm has been done. You need to feel sorry for yourself now.”
Having found out what she was, he probably cared nothing for her. Then why was he there? To gloat?
“I don’t know if you know,” he said, “but in the UK we have what is called ‘theft with breach of trust.’ Have you heard of it?”
Lee shook her head.
“Well, it’s self-explanatory. Then there are degrees. The person who plans and executes such a theft is found to have high culpability, which would be your case.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’m sure some other victims of yours can be found. Always men?”
Again, she nodded.
“How could it be otherwise? They have run your prints and not found any trace of you, so I guess it was your debut in this country?”
“Yes.”
“I’m honored. But even if I don’t go to the trouble of unearthing a few fellow victims, just with my charges you would be behind bars a while."
This time her eyes flew to his. "Would?"
He gazed at her for a long moment, then said slowly, "I find that you are absolutely essential to me."
Lee had been in confusion for days, and she could not, at first, understand what he meant. Had he found her because he wanted her back?
Except that his eyes were flat as he added, "I'm in dire need of a thief."
TWO
A thief.
Well, that was what she was.
It was still difficult for her to speak, but she looked at her trainers and said, "I understand why you're angry. I lied the whole time, so I could steal from you.”
“In spite of being slow, I had gathered that much.”
By avoiding his eyes, she managed to say in a rush, “I’m sorry that I did it right after you found out about Imogen. Everyone lied to you, but I thought it would only be worse if I waited.”
“Oh, I agree there’s never a good time to open a man’s safe and steal from him,” James said airily. “You might as well do it on Tuesday as on Saturday.”
“James, I didn’t want—"
Changing his tone, he interrupted her. "I think you know men, Lee. We're vain — it would be embarrassing for me if we had to hash the whole obvious thing out."
"I was—"
"It would also be reckless of you, really," he added, his eyes narrowing. "You’d be provoking me when I’m here to propose something that will get you out of jail. You're a businesswoman of sorts, I’m sure you want to listen to a deal?"
James seemed reasonable as he sat with legs crossed, elegantly holding a plastic cup of water, but it was fruitless for her to talk; he wouldn’t listen.
"All right, then,” she said. “What am I supposed to steal?"
"It seems that a bloke has gotten Caitlin into trouble.”
Lee’s head snapped up. "Caitlin?"
He gave her another forbidding look, as if warning her not to show a regard for Caitlin which he didn't believe was real.
"She dated a young man from Mexico a little while ago," James continued. "According to what she told me, she was more than turned off when he acted like a bit of a freak. I didn't want to know the details, and neither did she want to tell me. She broke up with him not long before her birthday party. The point is that the dickhead recorded Caitlin without her knowledge in ways she would not want to be seen. I would definitely not want her to be seen like that. He wasn't happy about being dumped and is now threatening to release the film on internet."
"I can’t believe anyone would do that to Caitlin!”
James smiled. "Don't people do the strangest things, though? Of course what I’d like is to get hold of the wanker and split his skull like a melon. But I've often been told I should never follow my first impulse."
Lee dreaded what was coming. "Why do you think I can do something about any of this?”
"I only realized what your real occupation is a couple of days ago, but I have to consider it serendipity. Here am I, in need of someone who can lie and infiltrate a man’s life, and abracadabra, there you are.”
A look of real delight animated him. He was going to make light of things to save his pride.
"How am I expected to steal a feed from this guy?” she asked. “He might have uploaded it in the cloud. It could be anywhere and everywhere."
"I am aware we are no longer at the age of the 8-millimeter film," James said. "We can't burn all the copies of this abomination. What I expect is for you to encourage the something horrible he likes to do and film it."
"Something horrible?" Lee felt that her breathing had become shallow, but her voice didn't falter as she went on, "Do you mean—?"
He waved a hand. "Like I said, I don't know any details, but I am fairly certain that a woman of your experience can encourage his tendencies. His family is powerful but conservative, and from what Caitlin tells me, Diego — that’s the idiot's name — lives in terror of his father."
"Why can't you ask the father to make his son stop?"
"Who goes begging to someone they don't know?" he wondered with a laugh. "And it wouldn't be enough assurance that what Diego has on Caitlin won't see the light of day sometime or another.” His tone changed again, to a decisive one, “My sister has been through enough, and I want this nipped in the bud."
"I see. You want me to encourage something bad—”
“As bad as possible.”
“And record it. With me in it.”
James shrugged. "You don't even look like the woman I knew, and I'm sure you'll change again. Your name changes. What would be the problem, exactly?"
How can you not know what it would cost me to go to someone else?
"It’s your profession,” he insisted. “You must have had weird rich victims before. You’ll know what to do.”
She flushed at the implication in his words as he steadily continued, "A honeytrap — I think that's the expression — like you can't be squeamish, surely?"
"I want to help Caitlin, but not like that."
"There is no other way, and I am not really interested in what you want." His voice sounded like velvet now, something that only happened at very intimate or very angry moments. "Unless what you want is to stay in jail for a long time."
Lee was used to controlling her own emotions, at least in front of others, but James’ eyes would not leave her. He wanted to drink in all her misery and discomfort; he wanted her pinned to the wall, and there she was, wriggling.
She couldn't help wishing that he was acting out of vindictiveness and not from the realization that she was worthless, except for this one thing that she could do. The pain of having become a mere instrument to him was sharp. It was going to be written all over her face, so she turned to look out the barred windows, as if she were considering his proposal.
It's my fault. I did this. But she couldn't help feeling angry when she looked back at him and found a blank face. He was so perceptive; how could he not know what she felt? How could he not know that she had run away because she had been terrified?
James waited for her answer. She drank some water and finally managed to say, "Would I be able to walk away from this without a record?”
"I’d put the whole thing down to a misunderstanding between us. And if we do it quickly, they won’t check your passport."
"You don’t care about what I tried to do, then?”
"Don't flatter yourself. You're just a thief. What do I care if some other idiot falls for you and loses his jewelry?"
"You trusted me—"
"And I was even about to propose matching tattoos. I'd say you did your running away in the nick of time. But, back to business,” he insisted. “Is it jail for the foreseeable future or just a bit of work you're used to?"
Don't do this to me.
He had retreated behind the wall of his irony and lifted both eyebrows, expecting her reply. She hated him for it, even though she deserved everything he was heaping on her.
&n
bsp; "I'll do the work, of course," she said, speaking like the tough-as-nails businesswoman she was meant to be. "You can count on me to get something really disgusting on him."
There was still no expression on his face, not even a flicker of anger, regret or victory as he stood and moved to the door, knocking on it. "I just knew I could."
THREE
"GUESS IT’S TRUE that he wasn't like the others," said Quinn.
"I guess."
Lee had rented a house in the hills of Lisbon, a quiet place to meet Quinn and prepare for what would come next. It was mid-August, but an unusual cold front was sweeping through Portugal, and she huddled inside her sweater as they sipped bourbon outside. Quinn, as usual, reclined in a patch of sun that kept shifting with the clouds.
"I don’t mean to rub it in,” he said, stretching. "Just reminding you, because I have the small suspicion that you're not done with the man."
She ignored him. "What's my name this time?"
Quinn was jealous, but he could control the feeling; he wasn't too angry at her because although she had made a mess, she had assured him that James was no snitch. Besides, Lee was going to need Quinn and the money she had in her accounts to help Caitlin.
James had left her Quinn, her stolen money and three other things that had been restored to her when she was released from the holding cell in England, soon after their conversation: a white gold chain, a medal and a brooch with diamonds that mimicked drops of rain.
"They're not..."
... mine, she had wanted to say. But they were hers, unlike everything she had taken from his safe. He had given them to her.
She hadn’t finished the sentence, but she had been equally unable to put the chain around her neck. It had hardly ever been anywhere else until she had run away. After she was released, she kept it in a box inside the zipper of her bag, with the brooch in another box.
Sentimental idiot. Things must have a purpose; those things had none. They had useless feelings attached to them, that was all. And James had left the jewels to her as a rebuke, or as the proof of his indifference; or perhaps because it would be uncouth to take back presents, even from a thief.
