Ring of Truth (Devlin Security Force Book 2) (13 page)

“So did your father come in through that skylight?”

He shook his head. “Doesn’t open, but it was wired. Cracking the glass would’ve broken all hell loose in the form of alarms.” He gestured toward a wall vent. “An air circulation duct that vents on the roof. I lowered Leon down on a rope.”

“I’ve seen the air ducts in the DSF building. Narrow.
You
’d never fit inside. That why Leon went in alone?”

“Probably. He never asked me. Maybe because he knew I wouldn’t agree. Maybe because he knew I wouldn’t fit. Maybe because I’d have no clue what to do once inside.” He shrugged away the issue. “Doesn’t matter. I helped him open the shaft and waited for him to climb up with the bag of
loot
.” He pantomimed air quotes with the last word. “Then we ran to where we’d left the grappling hook and hit the ground running.”

When she looked up at him from the exhibit’s sparkling gems, her dark eyes glistened. “You were scared.”

Scared didn’t begin to describe it. He’d heard descriptions of soldiers facing battle. Shaking limbs, clammy hands, pounding pulse, loose bowels. He’d experienced all but the last. Like now, his gut had frozen. “Hell yeah, I wasn’t sure my legs could carry me to the car. Satisfied now you’ve visited the scene of the crime?”

She frowned. “I’m not sure satisfied is the right word. But I’m glad we came.”

When a guard announced the museum was closing and they’d have to leave, they followed the stream of tourists back to the blue whale and their exit.

“I guess seeing the scene of the crime got you through the aftermath of that fiery cocktail. But you have to know it may not be the last danger we face.”

“I’m aware of that.” Her chin lifted. “I won’t be such a wuss the next time, I promise.”

The resolute look in her eyes convinced him she meant it. Next time. Shit, for sure there’d be a next time. June was coming up too damn fast.

***

Rousso paced the hotel room’s plush green carpet.

Two hours since he had given the order. Where
was
the man? Muscle with the brain of a turnip but he did follow orders. But little better than a turnip.

He stomped to the mini-bar and poured a glass of Perrier. When his cell jangled, he jumped. “What?”

“Mission accomplished, Mr.—”

“No names, remember?” He had checked the phone for listening devices but one never knew. If the fool wanted to incriminate himself, that was one thing, but Rousso would not allow himself to be dragged along with him to prison.

“Yeah. Sorry. Um, house burnt to the ground. Fire department couldn’t save ’er,” the voice on the other end said, glee apparent in his tone.

“What about the two you are trailing?”

The other man hesitated, uttered unintelligible grunts, as if searching for words.

Rousso sipped the sparkling mineral water. “The second transponder, does it work still?”

“No problem. It works good. Just it, um, led me to the, um, thief’s house.”

Rousso closed his eyes for strength against his frustration. Of course Jones went to search his father’s old partner’s house. He should have sent this man sooner to eradicate his sloppy search, a big mistake. “Do not tell me they were inside when you threw in device.”

“They didn’t see me or nothing. I floored it outta there. Then I hung back outta sight when they split.”

“Vhere—
where
they are now?”

“Went into the District. They parked the pickup in a building downtown. Near the Federal Triangle stop.”

“And they went?”

“Dunno. You said not to follow them on foot. I shouldn’t be seen.”

Dolt. Yes, he obeyed orders. But too literally. Rousso gritted his teeth and gripped the phone nearly tight enough to crack the case. He called on willpower not to beat his head against the wall.

Federal Triangle. He glanced at the Metro map open on the bed. Did they go to the museum? Why? What was there so many years later?

“What do I do now... sir?” He was an overgrown puppy ready for the next trick.

“Hang up. Go home. Await my call.”

They cleaned up at Mara’s apartment before driving north for dinner. As she pulled into the jammed parking lot of the Severn River Marina, the rearview mirror revealed the same big black sedan she’d noticed behind them as they left the District. It had followed them all the way to the restaurant. Centaur’s man? Or was Cort keeping another threat from her? Now wasn’t the time but she’d grill him later.

“You sure this is where Cassie said to meet them?”

Cort’s dubious tone triggered her chuckle as she shut off the car engine. The marina, with weathered boards and a sagging wrap-around porch, looked like a place to avoid, not where a respectable fishing boat would dock.

“The place isn’t much to look at,” she said, “except for that new blue metal roof. Dad used to bring the family. They receive fresh catches daily. Best crab cakes in Maryland. Spiced shrimp and hush puppies too. Dad liked the cheap prices and it didn’t matter if we made a mess.”

“My mouth is watering already,” he said as they climbed from her Versa.

Her mouth watered too, and not from the aromas of spiced shrimp and boiled crabs wafting by. Cort looked way too hot in the same khakis and blue dress shirt he’d worn to DSF the other day. The light touch of his big hand sent tingles up her arm and across her scalp. She shouldn’t think of this outing as a date.

When they entered the dining room, she spotted her sister immediately, at a prime booth for the water view. Cassie started to wave but her hand froze and her eyes narrowed.

“She didn’t know I was coming,” Cort whispered. “Why did you bring me?”

“You know why.” Although having him scrutinize the new guy wasn’t her only motive. She wanted his company, his solid presence and frankness. “And she did know. I told her. She’s just not happy about it.”

“Hostility’s great for the appetite.”

“The digestion too. Suck it up, big guy.”

“I’ll just order a stiff one. Or two. André looks like he’d rather be on the tennis court.”

“Or in a Ralph Lauren ad.” The pale yellow cable-knit draping his shoulders typed him. That and his dark hair and soulful eyes. She pictured him with a racquet in his hand instead of the wine goblet.

They threaded through the plain wooden picnic tables to where her sister and André sat by a window overlooking the docks.

Cassie made hasty introductions and the two men shook hands. Mara couldn’t help a smile when she saw André wince at Cort’s grip. Not that Cort meant a warning. No way.

A waiter whisked over to take their drink order and left the four of them to stare at each other. Mara chalked it up to nerves when she and Cassie gushed family stories about meals at the restaurant and about the gorgeous view of the river. Finally they ran down like wind-up music boxes.

“Did you drive, André?” Mara said, searching for a new topic, a neutral one, a safe one. “I didn’t see Cassie’s car outside.”

André and Cassie exchanged amused glances. He slung an arm around her shoulders and kissed her forehead. “We came by boat. The romantic way to travel.”

No wonder Cassie was falling for this man. His voice was velvet smooth, his accent French with a trace of British.

“André’s boat.” Cassie snuggled closer.

Blushing, hanging on him like a teenager. Whoa. Mara had never seen her sister so blown away. She’d been hot for several guys since the divorce but not like this. No cigarettes either.

“The sailboat?” Cort nodded toward the craft at the end of the marina dock.

“Not the skipjack,” Mara said. “That’s—”

“Sis, please don’t,” Cassie said, holding up a hand in a stop signal.

Mara stifled herself. “Okay.” She managed an apologetic shrug.

“What?” Cort said. “What’s the deal about the skipjack?”

Mara’s glance darted among the three of them, settling on Cort and pleading with her eyes for him to drop the matter. “Nothing. Just local trivia.”

“Hell, now I’m curious,” he said. “Go for it.”

“Please,” André said, his gaze encouraging. “I would like to know.”

After a reluctant nod from Cassie, Mara said, “To conserve the oyster fishery, Maryland law allows only sail-powered boats, and skipjacks are the original Chesapeake oystering boats. The V-shaped hull and the square stern are distinctive. Most skipjacks, at least the few remaining that still fish, are forty to fifty feet long. Like this one. It’s a working boat. See the winch above the hold and the dredging rig?”

“Why you said André’s boat wasn’t the skipjack,” Cort said.

“You got it.” Better to stop at that. They didn’t want the rest of what her magnet of a brain had acquired about dragging for oysters.

“Mara’s head is chock full of all sorts of odd factoids,” Cassie put in. “If I don’t stop her, she bores people with useless facts.”

“Unless, like now,” Cort said, with a pointed glare at Cassie, “the factoid wasn’t useless but pertinent.”

Cassie looked away but didn’t squirm or make excuses.

“And fascinating.” André nearly blinded Mara with his smile.

Cassie might be melted into a puddle of mush and lust, but André’s charm and looks had little effect on her.

“My boat is the cruiser on your right, with the inboard motor,” André said, indicating a low-slung burgundy speedboat. A scrolling font on the hull identified it as
Vendange
. “Traveling from Baltimore under sail would require many hours.”

“Sweet. Cigarette boat. Those babies go like hell,” Cort said. “You must do all right. What business did you say you were in?”

And so the match begins, Mara thought. Serve over the net to opponent.

“
Vendange
means
vintage
,” Cassie chirped, watching the two males as intently as Mara. “André’s in wine imports.”

André’s grin became sharklike. Response ready for the ball swooshing through the air. “From France, Italy, Spain. My family has a vineyard in the south of France.
Mon père
has retired. My brother runs it now, but travel appeals to me more than pruning vines.”

“He’s here to arrange a deal with several of the big hotels,” Cassie said.

“That is enough about me,
chérie
. Now I am the one who does not want to bore.”

Oops, ball out of bounds. But before Cort could serve another, the waiter arrived with Mara’s white wine and Cort’s vodka tonic and a crab cake appetizer served with a creamy herb sauce. With their meal order, André insisted on a bottle of chardonnay, one imported by his family company.

As they ate, the match progressed but with Cort observing André quietly. Assessing, analyzing, figuring the man’s angle, Mara suspected. André quizzed Cort about his furniture building, asking intelligent questions about wood and dovetail joints. When Cassie looked puzzled, Mara smiled but remained quiet as Cort explained that dovetails were interlocking wooden pins and tails. No reason to rile her sister again. Let her enjoy time with her new guy for as long as it lasted.

Later, after seeing the new lovers off in
Vendange
, Mara asked Cort’s opinion.

“Hard to say. The man’s slick but he seems to be what he says he is. Your research found nothing to the contrary?”

She shook her head. “I found the family vineyard, the company, even André, online. Some education in England, which explains the mingled accent, a business degree in Lyon. No children, not married. I’ll show you on my tablet later. Could he be with Centaur anyway?”

Cort’s jaw worked over the question as he pulled out of the restaurant parking lot. “He seems to care for your sister, but there’s a hard layer to him. You noticed the way he deflected questions about himself. Slippery. Makes me think he has something to hide.”

***

Cassie poured a brandy for André. She ought to have a proper snifter. At least she had wine glasses and not just her Target tumblers. André was way more sophisticated than any man she’d been with, and she felt like a bumpkin.

The hour was late, after eleven. She normally wouldn’t stay out so late on a weeknight. School and work meant early bedtimes. But she didn’t have to be at the bank until nine and Livvie wasn’t here. Cassie had gotten on her daughter’s good side by agreeing to let her stay overnight with a friend. To work on a science project, Livvie’d said in her most annoying wheedle. Cassie huffed at that but trusted the parents to keep the girls corralled in the house. So she was free to enjoy the evening—maybe the entire night—with André.

“I am not certain of your sister,
chérie
,” André said, “but her friend did not like me.”

“You’re imagining things,” she said, astonished he lacked any confidence about himself or care what others thought, much less express it. She didn’t enjoy the taste of brandy but she poured one for herself and joined him on the sofa. “It’s me Cort doesn’t like. Because I disapprove of this adventure he’s talked my sister into.”

“Adventure?” André’s gaze turned upward as if remembering. “You mean he is the son of the jewel thief, the one you told me about? We had dinner with a criminal?”

Cassie set down her glass and reached for his hand. What if he left? What if he refused to see her again because of Cortez Jones? “I apologize. But I didn’t know. I warned her not to bring that man. Like I warned her not to go along with his scheme. But she doesn’t listen to me anymore. I—” Her voice cracked and she stifled tears.

When he lifted her hand to his lips, she melted at the romantic Gallic gesture.

“It’s not your fault, Cassandra.” He raised one shoulder in another purely French gesture. “I am merely concerned for Mara, as you are. But perhaps what they do is not so dangerous if they are simply examining your father’s files.”

Maybe she shouldn’t have told him anything about the Gramornia jewel theft. Maybe she should’ve kept it all inside. But André’d entered the room when Mara was telling her on the phone about being followed. She freaked out, cried like a fool, and he was so comforting, so sympathetic, the whole story came pouring out. Including her father’s role. If he had a role other than insurance investigator.

She pressed a hand to her stomach. “I’m afraid it’s gone beyond that now. The whole thing—Jones, my sister, the jewel hunt—just makes me crazy. I can’t talk about it.”

André tipped up her chin and kissed her lightly. “Then do not. When you feel better, you can tell me anything you like.”

She gave him a tremulous smile. “Maybe later.”

After a deeper kiss, one that sizzled her senses and drove all thought and worry from her brain, he clasped her hands and pulled her to her feet. With his arm around her shoulders, he nudged her down the hallway to the bedroom. “For now let us not talk at all.”

***

“Two men in a black car are watching this building from across the street,” Mara said, every word stiletto sharp. “They followed us to the restaurant and back.”

Shit. Oh shit.
Cort hurried to finish brushing his teeth. She’d spotted the Clone Brothers. Had to happen sometime, but why now?

Barefoot and shirttail loose, he crossed the darkened living room to where she stood looking out the front window and pulled her back into the shadows. “Probably FBI. Nothing to worry about.”

She stiffened. “In a luxury sedan? Two ugly-mean dudes in black? They look more like enforcers for Tony Soprano.”

When he said nothing, she eyed him with suspicion narrowing her eyes. “Cort, what’s going on? You’re hiding something from me.”

He rubbed his nape and looked away.

“If you don’t tell me everything,” she continued, “I’m going out there and confront them.”

“Dammit, Mara.” She was too smart and too naïve. She might actually do it. When she made a start for the door, he snagged her hand. “Okay. But check the apartment again with Devlin’s fancy bug detector. Leave the lights off.”

She glared at him for a moment before fetching the RFD unit, the size of a TV remote, from her purse.

After she declared the apartment clear, they went to sit on her bed where, as she informed him, she could see his face as he ’fessed up. He finished his narrative about Colonel Yerik with an apology for his secrecy but without mention of the beating.

She sat staring at him. Fear joined the ire in her eyes, along with an emotion he couldn’t read. Her silence made sweat break out along his hairline.

“I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to scare you more than you already are. I’ve enlisted... assistance in stopping their plot but I need time. I’m doing everything I can to keep you safe and make the son of a bitch think I’m doing nothing to find the jewels. That’s all I can tell you for now.” His backstage tinkering had to remain just that. A slip could blow it all to hell.

Her expression gentler, she pressed a soft palm to his jaw. “The wounds on your face, the bruises. You didn’t get in a fight at all. They beat you.” When he merely shrugged, she tsked. “You’ve been holding all this inside. No wonder I hear you tossing and turning every night.”

She wasn’t cursing him for endangering her or lying by omission. He’d feel less guilty if she did. He kissed her palm and released her. Lowered his head in his hands. “Should’ve walked away from the whole thing. Then you’d be safe.”