Until Noon (11 page)

Carlo put a hand to his heart. “Swear on the soul of my departed grandmother, this

man is the very best you can find. Anywhere.”

“Especially since my Carlo married me,” said a stunning black-haired beauty who

appeared at his side. She put out her hand to Pilar.

“Maya Roderiguez and this arrogant fellow,” she said as she elbowed Carlo, “is my

husband. How do you do?”

Pilar chuckled and took Maya’s hand. “Very well. I am Pilar.”

“What can I get you to drink, Pilar? My husband forgets his manners and the

reason you came inside.”

“A nice red. Hearty and full. We’ve had a tough morning.”

“Bravo. A
tempranillo
then. And to go with that? Baked baby artichokes in olive oil.

Fresh grilled anchovies. A pork and truffle peccadillo with sun-dried tomatoes.”

Raul chuckled as he saw how transported Pilar was at the mention of Maya’s

specialties. “Pilar loves to eat.”

She cast him such a startled look that she blushed and the Roderiguezes pretended

not to catch the sexual inference.

“And…um…so do I. You know I do.” Hell, he was making a mess of this. He shook

his head. “Just bring us relief from this embarrassment!”

Carlo flung his towel over his shoulder. “I can do that. Get you drunk, shall we?”

“No, please.” Raul put up a hand to ward him off.

“We’re working,” Pilar told him with a polite refusal. “Wish we weren’t.”

“Even here,” Raul put in, then swiveled to track a pedestrian beyond the

restaurant’s tables. “Oh! Wait!
Hell!”

He jumped up, racing out, glimpsing once at the oncoming traffic for clearance. He

hurdled like a track star. Over a child’s wagon and a parked moped, he chased a short 54

Until Noon

thin man with black knit hat. Bastard had lounged against the building across the street but took off when Raul spotted him.

At the next corner, the man pivoted, shot into a side street and disappeared into the crowd. Raul sped on, dodging into shops, running up steps for a better view. Four

blocks and nothing. He was nowhere to be found.

Damn. Damn.

He jogged back to Pilar’s side and sank into his chair. “Gone.”

She took his hand in hers, her dark eyes alight with gratitude. “He’ll return. And

then we’ll spot him, catch him.”

“He may have friends. Change his clothes so he appears different to us.”

She picked up a tapa between her fingers and put the luscious beef to his lips.

Taking her cue, he nibbled the delicacy off her fingertips, being certain to linger longer than necessary. With a swipe of his tongue, he licked the juices from her flesh the same way he would lave all of her later.
Later.
He saw her shiver. His own arousal, hot and hard. pressed against the zipper of his trousers. Swallowing, he caressed her with his eyes, hoping she saw in them the promise of savage, lusty acts.

She blushed, then pushed a large goblet of ruby wine toward him. “No one lives by

work alone. Enjoy our lunch, Raul. We’ll catch him. Together.”

He caught her fingers in his hand and caressed them. “The best way.”

Raul prayed it was so. Pilar seemed ready to work with Enrique. He hoped to god

she was ready to share everything with him.

* * * * *

At eight that night, Pilar emerged from the shower, freshly shampooed and dressed

to join Raul in her kitchen. With her frilly pink apron on over a purple polo and jeans, he looked like the not-so-average handsome-as-sin detective preparing dinner for his

lover. He also appeared to be an expert cook with the way he effortlessly chopped

onions.

She smiled to herself, admiring him and his gentle ways. He was so easy to be with.

Easy to work with. Kind and so damn beautiful he ought to be in pictures. Patient too.

A useful trait for an investigator.

God knew they had needed patience for their work today. Their entire afternoon

had been a frustrating search for small clues with even smaller rewards. Their little man in the black knit hat had not reappeared. Enrique’s team had made no progress on clues found with Graham’s body. And even though Enrique had pressured the local officials

at the maritime commission, no maps arrived to aid them.

Despite that lack, she and Raul had charted a surveillance boat from a rental

company and taken a trip around the harbor. They had learned precisely two facts. One was that Roca Oil certainly did have exposed shoreline on the northern aspect of its

facilities. A ten-foot electric fence surrounded the site, but it sagged badly at one stretch 55

Desiree Holt & Cerise DeLand

as if someone had scaled it recently. Yes, the fence was still electrified. They had thrown items at it to see if they would spark. They did. But she and Raul speculated that with a ladder, an agile man could jump the fence. The other fact the two of them learned as

they motored close to the mysterious island was that the large house she had spotted

earlier looked more like a mansion, well protected by its own surveillance cameras and concrete walls.

Taking a bottle of cava from her wine cooler, she sidled next to him and kissed him

on the shoulder. “I will be careful when I tell you about my talents with a knife. You’re not so shoddy yourself.”

“Thanks,
cara
. But my skills are on a chopping block. And with a gun.”

She worked on the champagne-like cork, grinning at him. “A marksman?”

“Guilty.”

She shivered. “Glad you told me. I don’t want to learn the hard way.”

“Stick close then,” he said with a wicked grin.

“I will,” she murmured.

“While you were in the shower, a fax came through for you.” He pointed the knife

in the direction of her desk in the far corner of the living room.

“Who’s it from?” she asked without any forethought and watched with chagrin as

he locked his dark eyes on hers.

“I have no idea.”

“You didn’t look?”

His stark expression told her,
Of course not
.

She felt like a fool. He hadn’t looked. This was not his fax. Not his apartment. Not

his business. Again she had to remind herself he was not Rhys. Nodding at him

expressionlessly, she popped the cork and placed the wine bottle on the granite and

strode to her fax. A multiple-page document had come through, so long that a few

pages had fluttered to the floor. One sat, curled upon the white Berber carpet, rolling gently in the breeze from the open door to the balcony. No, he definitely had not even come near to read the text from afar.

“Manuel Ortega, my associate I told you about this morning, just sent this. Wow.

Wow.
” She skimmed the report. Stopped dead in her tracks. “It’s the dossier on our attacker last night.”

He said nothing, but stood slicing green peppers, watching her.

Okay. No reaction? You’re allowing me to share or not.

She returned to read in depth. “Adolpho Boretsky. Age thirty. Nationality, half

Russian from daddy and half Italian, from mama. Sicilian, no less. That’s a scary

combination, right?”

Raul snorted and measured out rice in a glass cup.

56

Until Noon

All right. Be silent. Listen then
. “Priors include assault in Genoa, age eighteen.

Charges dismissed. Cocaine possession in Casablanca, eight years ago. Oh, boy, that got him four years in one of Morocco’s sumptuously appointed prisons. Then last year, oh

wow, listen to this…” She flipped the page. “He felt up a woman in a convenience store in the Gothic Quarter here in Barcelona and got off with a week in jail and a warning.

What do you think?”

“Tame stuff.”

So why attack us, huh?
Pilar put the report on the counter and poured some of the bubbly for the two of them. Handing Raul a flute, she picked up the papers again and

walked to her counter, then sat on a stool to read to him.
Listening there, Raul?

“Current employment. AS Export-Import Company, headquarters Sevastopol, the

Crimea. Local headquarters, Genoa, Italy. And the owner of the conglomerate is—”

She flipped another page.
Oh, hell.
She dropped the papers to the counter and stared at Raul.

“Who?”

She swallowed. “Dmitry Arsov.”

His dark eyes narrowed in concern, but his shook his head. “I don’t know this

company. Who is Dmitry Arsov and tell me exactly why we care?”

She shook so badly, she had to take a drink. She gulped the fine white cava back.

“Dmitry Arsov and wife Sonja head a cartel that controls most of the Russian oil

dealings. His cartel provides thirty-one percent of oil to Spain.”

“So a little more would be a fine addition to the company’s coffers,” Raul

concluded, his eyes dead, his body taut.

“Exactly.” Swallowing down her concerns, she waved a hand at him. “Turn off the

stove. Take off your apron. We’re leaving.”

He blinked, frowning. “Where are we going?”

“To the maritime commission.”

Raul chuckled. “It is nearly nine o’clock,
cara
. No one is at home at the commission at this time of night.”

“No, we’re—we—Oh, hell, Raul!” She ran both hands through her hair. “I don’t

think this can wait. I know the Russians. I’ve seen the evil things they do. They have no respect for life when they want something. If they have definitely targeted Roca Oil we need to let people know. ”

He arched a long brow. “Darling, I’m afraid nothing can be done tonight. Check the

time. There is no one to contact in the commission at this hour.”

“But—”

He pointed his long wooden spoon at his large pan of rice, shrimp and vegetables

on the stove. “If you think I am leaving my paella with all those good aphrodisiac

ingredients to go to waste, you are,
Señorita
, very wrong.”

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Desiree Holt & Cerise DeLand

“Oh, but Raul.” She waved her hands in frustration.

“Listen to me, Pilar. We need to find out more about what they might have planned

and when. We will contact the commission tomorrow. Believe me, I’m not about to sit

around if people will be in danger.”

“I know. But—”

“Besides,” he whispered, as he moved forward and took her flush against him, his

hands covering her ass. “I have better things to do with our time tonight than chase

ghosts.”

“You do, eh?”

“Yes. As I just pointed out to you, nothing will happen between tonight and the

morning. And I know how to take your mind off the situation.”

“Show me.” She giggled, letting herself relax as she realized the truth of what he

said. Wrapping her arms around his strong, warm body she felt his cock grow harder as he pressed nearer. Her own channel gushed with expectation. How often she wanted

this man inside her was against any law she knew.

“I am certain you can tell,” he teased.

“I can,” she murmured, brushing her lips on his. “I’m hungry for you too, Raul.

Will you not shut off the damn paella for any reason?”

58

Until Noon

Chapter Seven

He stepped away.

She whimpered. He was leaving her to stand there, wet and swollen for him,

without giving himself to her? “Don’t—”

“Shh. Take your clothes off.” She curved her lips in a bewitching smile. “I must

seduce you? Is that what you want?”

He stepped backward to the stove, reached behind him and turned off the burner.

Then put a lid on his skillet. “I do. I can’t satisfy you by showing the world outside on your balcony how glorious you are when you come, but I will do the next best thing.”

She was soaring with excitement. “What? What is it?”

“Strip for me. Exhibit that gorgeous body for me, Pilar.”

She gulped. “I’ve never done that before.”

“For me, then. I am the first.” His eyes went black with desire. “I want to be the

only man you ever strip for.” His voice thickened. “Now, do it.”

She sucked in air, her nipples going hard as stone, her pussy dripping with sweet

cream all for him. Him. Yes, she would do this for him. Anything to have his rigid penis pounding inside her again.

He leaned backward against the stove, crossed his arms and made a twirling

motion with the index finger of one hand. “Let me see all you have, darling.”

The simple white cotton dress she’d slipped over her head was a favorite of hers,

one she wore in summer. One she wore usually here in the house without any

undergarments. Tonight, she had put on a tiny white lace bra and a thong, just for

modesty’s sake. But now she thrilled to the idea of doing a striptease for him, beginning with the opening of the little shell buttons that dotted the front closure of the dress like miniature pearls.

With a toss of her dark waves over her shoulders, she leaned back against the

kitchen island, pushed herself up to sit on it, then got to her feet. If she was going to dance, by god, she’d make her own stage.

Raul chuckled, settling himself for her performance. “Bravo, darling. I am

intrigued.”

She tipped her head, wishing for music, but then deciding she’d hum her own. An

old Spanish love song sprang to her mind and she began, the sweet notes rising in her throat with her maddening desire to have this man fuck her. Love her. She grinned to

herself and then to him as she swayed and took one button at a time to unveil how

dearly she craved him.

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Desiree Holt & Cerise DeLand

One button opened with a flourish. The next with slow seduction. The third with a

teasing swirl toward him. The rest came apart, one, two, three, until Raul had walked forward, grabbed her ankles and kissed his way from her calf to her knee.