A Touch of Minx (11 page)

His mobile phone rang as he slid into the back seat of the stretched S600 and Ben closed the door for him. He grinned as he looked at the caller ID. "Yes, my love?"

"I just checked Manhattan weather on the Net," Samantha's voice returned. "You do realize it's forty degrees colder there than it is here and that you're going to freeze your British patootie off."

"I have my coat."

"Okay. And if you have time, would you bring me back a couple of those peppermint brownies? But don't let Hans know that I like Andre's brownies better than his."

"Your secret is safe with me." And since he couldn't imagine that the chefs from his New York and Palm Beach residences ever conversed about brownie recipes, their secrets were probably safe from each other, as well. "I'll put them in a shirt box or something."

"Thanks, James Bond. Before you know it you'll be ready to smuggle fruits and vegetables across state lines." She snorted, obviously finding herself hilarious. "I love you. Be careful."

"I love you, too. Don't commit any federal offenses while I'm gone."

"No promises. Ta."

"Ta."

She'd said it first again, something she did only rarely. And there he was, rich, powerful, influential, and those three single-syllable words from her could lift his feet off the floor, give his heart happy palpitations, and make him feel like a genuine superhero.

And as a superhero, there was one more thing he could see to while he was in New York. Before he put his phone away he opened it again, scrolled through his saved phone numbers—which after having witnessed two of his phones destroyed over the past six months he now backed up onto his laptop—and found the one he wanted.

"Gorstein," came the terse voice on the other end.

"Detective. This is Rick Addison. Do you have a moment?"

"I have about one moment. What can I do for you, Addison?"

"I'll be in Manhattan this afternoon, and I wondered if you would be able to meet with me for fifteen or twenty minutes today or tomorrow."

"Is Ms. J in trouble again?"

He couldn't blame anybody for thinking that—she did have a way of finding mayhem. "No. She's doing some research. Since I'll be there, I thought I might see if I can lend her some assistance."

"Is this a home thing, or an office thing?"

"The police station would probably be the most useful place to meet."

"Okay." Gorstein flipped through some papers. "How about… eight tomorrow morning, right here?"

"I'll see you then. Thank you, Detective."

Good. Both Gabriel Toombs and the Picaults had homes in New York in addition to the mansions hi Palm Beach, and Gorstein's odds of finding anything useful were as good as Castillo's. And before Samantha went to visit Wild Bill's house, with Aubrey Pendleton in tow or not, he wanted all of the information he could get his hands on. And he had no problem at all with throwing around his considerable influence to get what he wanted and needed to protect Samantha.

Tuesday, 12:03 p.m.

Samantha pulled around the corner from

Cafe l'Europe so she could park the Bentley herself. Valet parking was cool and all, but she preferred knowing where her own car and the keys were.

Katie Donner arrived just as she walked up to the front door of the restaurant. For a second she wondered whether they would do the fashionable Palm Beach double miss-kiss, but the petite blond gave her a sound hug and a peck on the cheek.

"Thanks for not being a ten-or a fifteen-year-old or an attorney," she said in her soft Texas accent, grinning. "Though they can all be pretty much the same thing."

"I'm not going to argue with that," Samantha returned, nodding as one of the hosts held the door open for them, "but I'll add British guy to the list."

"Reservations for Dormer," Katie told the maitred', who immediately summoned a waiter to seat them close to the window in the main dining room.

Samantha heard the whispers as she took the seat facing the entrance—apparently she had been attached to Rick Addison long enough that she was her own tourist attraction. Most of these people, though, were locals, tanned and rich and with too much time on their hands. However much it still bothered her to be stared at, to them she presented a confident smile and the attitude that she absolutely belonged there.

After a year it wasn't even the instinct to blend so much anymore as the thought that as long as she and Rick were together, she did belong there. Hell, she probably had as much money secreted away as some of these people did, anyway, and she had her own reservations about whether they'd been any more honest in acquiring their wealth than she had been. She'd definitely helped some of these people express their dark sides, whether they knew she was the one who'd done the acquiring of loot for them, or not.

"Hi, I'm Sean, and I'll be your server. May I get you something to drink?" the waiter asked.

"An iced tea for me," Katie said, opening the menu.

"A Diet Coke for me."

"No wine for you lovely ladies? Perhaps a nice Chardonnay?"

"We're both driving, but thanks," Katie commented, before Samantha could.

"Very good. I will give you a few moments to peruse the menu."

Samantha's gaze met Katie's, and they both laughed. "'Peruse'? Mr. Sean thinks he's hot stuff."

Katie chuckled. "It's a good thing for him that the food tastes so good."

Once they'd received their drinks and Katie ordered the calzone while Samantha decided on the chicken fettuccine, the waiter left them alone. Katie sipped her iced tea, her light blue eyes taking in the restaurant's decorations and the other diners. Considering that Katie was probably the most together, confident, and secure woman she knew, Sam's Spider-sense began to tingle. Katie was hesitating about something. Whether it was personal or had something to do with Anatomy Man or Rick and Yale's fight, she didn't know yet—but she would find out.

"Are you going to come stay at Rawley Park for the gallery opening in December?" she began, taking a piece of bread from the basket on the table.

"The kids are excited about it," Katie answered. "And Christmas in England sounds very… romantic."

"But?" Samantha prompted, hiding her abrupt irritation that Rick's closest friends might not show up to celebrate the opening of the Devonshire gallery. Rick had devoted the entire south wing of his ancestral mansion to showcase the rare artworks and antiques he and his forefathers had acquired, and the last year to renovations and selections. And he was doing it on his own dime, just because it was the right thing to do.

"It's kind of silly, I guess," Katie said, "but I really hate flying. It terrifies me."

Samantha blinked. She'd expected some lame excuse or other, but Katie's cheeks reddened and her gaze lowered. She was genuinely embarrassed. "I don't like it much, ei-ther," she admitted, "but mostly because once you go up, there's no exit until you land again."

Katie leaned forward. "Is that because of the thief thing?" she whispered. "Like the plane's a cage or a prison or something?"

So being a cat burglar was a "thing" now, like psoriasis? She shook herself. "I think it's about being in control. And if you can't spend five hours on a plane, Rick will understand."

"Yes, I know, but I want to go. I want to share the experience with my kids. And I don't want them to get all crazy about flying just because I am." She sighed. "When I married Tom, I never thought about being a mom. I had the worst crush on Pierce Brosnan from Remington Steele. Oh, boy, did I ever want to be Laura Holt."

Samantha snorted. "That's funny. I always figured I was Remington Steele." Shaking her head, she sipped at her soda. "I guess that makes Rick Laura Holt with an accent. Don't tell him I said that, though. He thinks he's James Bond."

"Do you think about kids, Sam? I don't mean for next week, but do you think about it?"

Okay, kids were apparently the theme of the week. "Not really," she answered. "My mom kicked us out when I was five, and I haven't heard from or seen her since. All I know about her is that her name's not Jellicoe. I guess I don't want to be in the position of being that person who hates her husband and kid so much that getting rid of them is the best solution—and yes, I know I probably need to see Dr. Phil or something about my screwy life, but what the heck. I had a terrible couple of role models."

"Yes, you did." Katie sat back again as Sean the waiter brought their lunches by. "But you shouldn't judge your future by your past."

"You sound like Rick. But the mistakes I've made are the kind that other people care about." She hadn't even considered them mistakes until she'd met Rick and realized that the marks from whom she'd stolen were flesh and blood people and not just money and artworks and a B and E challenge.

"You know, we've never really talked about this before," Katie said in a low, confidential murmur, "but you weren't just a pickpocket, were you?"

Twirling her fettuccine onto her fork, Samantha shook her head. "Depending on who you asked, I was one of the top two or three cat burglars in the world." Or the top one, according to Stoney, but that sounded too much like bragging.

"And you stopped because of Rick?"

"I'd pretty much stopped before I met Rick, except for a really interesting gig now and then. I just had the feeling that things were going to catch up with me, sooner rather than later. But meeting Rick definitely gave me some… incentive I didn't have before." She looked down, knowing she was smiling and unable to help herself. Sappy much, Sam?

"Rick said your dad didn't think much of you retiring."

"Martin? Considering that he played dead for three years and didn't bother to tell me either that he was alive or that he was working with Interpol, I don't think much of what he thinks." It was way more complicated than that, but this was not the time or the place for that conversation.

"So you don't regret it? Retiring from that life, I mean."

Samantha eyed her lunch companion. "You're not secretly working for the Inquirer, are you?"

"I doubt they would hire me if they've heard my opinion of some of their articles about Rick." Katie stirred the artful pile of steamed veggies on her plate and then went back to the calzone. "I don't mean to pry. It's just that your life seems so much more… exciting than mine. I spend my days figuring out how many candy bars Livia has to sell to earn trie spinning glow light, and "whether I can attend the SPERM lunch and still make Mike's baseball game."

SPERM—the Society for the Protection of the Environment and Range of Manatees—and Samantha's favorite cause once she'd heard their acronym. She'd even given them a check once in the course of investigating a theft. But the thing about Mike's baseball game gave her an opening. "Does Mike have practice every day? It seems like he's always at a game or at practice."

"No, though it does seem that way sometimes," Katie said with a laugh. "He's got the whole afternoon off today, so he and his friends are going to, yes, go play baseball. I'll bet you've never been to a baseball game, have you?"

"No, I haven't." Though she might, this afternoon.

"And I've never been to a crime scene."

Samantha started to say something sympathetic about how Katie's life was more wholesome, but a pair of figures taking seats across the room caught her attention. August and Yvette Picault, the French collectors of Japanese antiques, apparently liked Italian food.

"What is it?" Katie asked, starting to turn around.

"Don't look," Samantha said sharply.

Katie immediately froze and returned to staring at her plate. "Oh, my. What's going on?"

"Two people I'm investigating just showed up here. The Picaults. Do you know them?"

"We've attended a couple of charity events together, but I don't think Tom and I travel enough to make it into their circle."

She didn't sound offended or even upset. Samantha had never been excluded from any event or circle she chose to attend or join, because she made sure that she fit in. Being stuck in a particular place and in a particular life—that seemed foreign. Weird. But perfectly normal for Kate Donner.

Kate Donner—who apparently wanted a little more excitement in her life. "Let's get out of here," Samantha said, motioning for the waiter. It might make her miss her chance to talk with Mike away from the Donners' house, but samurai armor trumped Anatomy Man.

"What? We've—"

"The Picaults are out of their house. I'm investigating something they might have acquired illegally. I need to take a quick look around and maybe eliminate them from my list of suspects." Her list was pretty much focused on Kwai Chang Toombs now, but much as she trusted her gut, she preferred fact to feeling.

"You mean break in?" Katie whispered, setting her fork down with a clatter. "Us?"

"I need a wheelman. Someone to keep watch. What do you think?" The waiter arrived, nodding politely. "Our bill, please."

"Is something not to your taste, mademoiselle?"

"Just a Bill Blass emergency," she returned, gesturing at an imaginary blemish on her dark gray blouse.

"Right away, then."

"You're serious, aren't you?" Katie continued as he hurried off, her tanned skin growing pale.

"I am, but I'm not going to drag you into anything you don't want to do. I'll manage on my—"

"Let's get going," she interrupted. "I have to be back in time to pick Livia up from school."

Well, this was going to be interesting.

"Ready?" Samantha asked, pushing open, the passenger door of Katie's Lexus.

"Are you sure you want to trust me with this?" Katie returned, her ex-Texas drawl shaking a little. "I'm not exactly a professional wheel man or anything. I feel like my heart's going to explode or I'm going to throw up. Or both."

Samantha grinned. The old adrenaline rush. She could definitely sympathize with that sensation, though personally she liked—craved, even—the rattling of her muscles, the hyper-aware feeling of invincibility poised on the edge between fight and flight. Hoo.baby. "All you have to do is watch to see whether anybody pulls up to the gate. If they do, ring my cell, which is on vibrate, and I'll head back out again."

"But what if they notice me here?"

Katie obviously needed a little reassurance. "If they do, tell them your husband just called you to say he made reservations for a vacation in Morocco, and you were so excited you had to pull over before you wrecked the car."

"And they'll see me on the phone and not be suspicious. You're very good at this, aren't you?"

Sam shrugged. "I try. But I'd better get moving. I don't know how long it'll take them to eat their pasta, or if they're going somewhere else after or not. So are you ready?"

Katie took a deep breath. "Yes. I'm ready."

With a last, encouraging smile, Samantha closed the car door. Once traffic cleared, she climbed onto the roof of the Lexus and from there hopped to the top of the fence. She wasn't in any kind of B and E uniform, but at least she'd worn slacks. Otherwise she would have had to do this in her thongs.

With a forward roll she flipped off the wall and landed on her feet just inside the well-manicured grounds of the Picaults' Palm Beach house. Rick wouldn't like this, because not even she could put enough spin on this to make it seem legal, but he was in New York by now. And if Toombs didn't have the armor, the Picaults did. So there she was. An opportunity to look into things firsthand—with relatively little risk involved.

No exterior cameras—apparently the Picaults lived in fairy-tale land where nobody tried to take anybody else's shit. If the windows hadn't been wired, she probably would have turned around in disgust and gone home.

As far as she'd been able to figure out, there were three classes of people: the cautious, paranoid ones determined to keep what they owned, stole, or otherwise acquired; the stupid, naive ones who figured everybody was as honest as they were; and the arrogant, self-centered ones who took what they wanted and thought nobody else was smart enough to stop them. Oh, and the fourth group—the ones who moved outside everybody else's boundaries and did what they wanted.

To the Picaults' credit, the windows and door were wired—nothing special, but at least they'd taken that one Step. A pair, of gardeners worked at the far side of the house, though, and through one of the windows at the side of the front door she spied an older lady dressed in a maid's uniform and carrying folded sheets. Half the upstairs win-dows were open, probably to catch the nice early afternoon breeze.