“Jack’s one of the up-and-coming designers here tonight,” Chloe explained. “He wants to do a catalogue shoot for his new line while we’re shooting the swimsuit calendar down in the Keys. And I’ve told him that it’s simply no fun being out on an island if you don’t have a boat. A nice little cabin cruiser. And who but you to hook him up?” she asked Brad.
“It’s what I do,” Brad told him, smiling with boyish charm.
Luke was startled when Victoria shivered. “That island—we shouldn’t be going back out to that island.”
Jared slipped an arm around her shoulders. There was sincere affection in both his eyes and his tone as he said, “Victoria, there’s nothing evil about the island.”
“It’s where Colleen disappeared,” Chloe said flatly. She was addressing Jared, but she nodded toward Luke. “Mr. Smith—Jack—is a new client for the agency. We should be hyping the shoot, not scaring him off.”
Brad smiled at Luke. “She’s right. And you’ll love the place. It’s the agency’s own little piece of pristine heaven. Not to mention that it’s three miles from Islamorada, which you must have heard of. It’s the sport fishing capital of the Keys, for sure, maybe the world.”
“Still, it’s true. It is where Colleen suddenly went missing,” Chloe said. Push-pull. She had said they shouldn’t frighten him, yet here she was focusing on the other woman’s disappearance. Clearly she didn’t want to let the conversation drop, and she kept glancing at him, which definitely struck him as strange.
“I did hear about that,” Luke said. “Are they sure nothing happened to her? I mean, why would she just disappear?”
Jared shook his head. “Who knows? Models tend to be emotional and just plain crazy.”
“Hey!” Victoria elbowed him.
“Most models. Some models,” Jared said. “Not you, Vickie. You’re totally sane.”
“But, honestly,” Brad said, lowering his voice, though with the conversations going on around them and the pulsing music playing in the background, it was unlikely anyone could hear them. “Tell me that Jeanne LaRue isn’t a bit on the wacko side.”
“She’s…blunt, that’s all,” Victoria said.
Jared snorted. “She’d walk over her own mother in spike heels if it would get her where she wants to go.”
“But she’s honest about it,” Chloe said. “I like that. What’s that saying? Something about the enemy I can see being less dangerous than the friend I trust?”
“Yeah, something like that,” Brad agreed. He slipped a hand into his jacket pocket and produced a card for Luke. “While I’m thinking about it. We’ll get you set up for the shoot. Lots of people fly in, but you’re not even talking fifty miles, and a boat gives you a lot more control over your schedule. You know anything about boats?”
“Actually, I do,” Luke assured him.
Brad nodded. “Then it will be up to you whether you want a captain to come along or not. Depends what you’ll find more relaxing.”
“Are you associated with the agency?” Luke asked him.
Brad laughed. “No, not really. But I’m Vick’s cousin, kind of like her big brother, so I watch out for her.”
“And Chloe,” Victoria said.
Brad blinked. “And Chloe. Of course.”
“We’ve all known each other a long time,” Jared said.
“So you’re all from the area?” Luke asked.
“Born and bred,” Jared assured him, and grinned. “I have no association with the agency at all, though. I just tag along because we’re all friends, and the girls set me up now and then. I wouldn’t mind doing some modeling, though.” He lowered his voice. “This is actually a big night for me. First time I’ve actually met Myra Allen.”
“Myra likes working from the mansion or, if she even goes along to a shoot, her hotel room. She’s not into the great outdoors,” Brad said.
“She’s a legend, though, and it’s really cool to finally meet her,” Jared said.
“Sounds like somebody’s got a crush,” Victoria teased.
“My only crush is on you. Myra Allen is on a pedestal, to be—worshipped from afar,” Jared assured her.
He was speaking casually, but Luke had seen the way he looked at Victoria, how his eyes softened when he spoke to her, even jokingly. He was in love. Maybe he’d been pining away for years. Victoria might set him up on dates with some of the other models, and he might go, but it meant nothing. He was in love with her.
“Besides,” Jared said, his eyes steely as he spoke, “I don’t buy it that Colleen Rodriguez just up and left. I think something happened to her, so if you girls are going out there, then I’m going, too.”
From the corner of his eye, Luke saw through to the living room and got a fleeting glimpse of someone slipping through on their way to the stairs.
“What do you think—Jack?” Victoria asked.
“Pardon?” he said, distracted. He needed to get away, get upstairs and see what was going on.
He turned to make his excuses and noticed that Chloe wasn’t standing there any longer.
Luke excused himself quickly, saying he was on a search for the loo—a term that made them all smile—and quickly headed inside. He moved carefully through the crowd and up the stairs.
The place was huge—he wasn’t sure how many rooms were up here, but he had a sudden and inexplicable feeling that Rene Gonzalez was in one of them.
He opened the door to a large master suite. No one, though it looked as if someone was living there. He saw pictures on the dresser, and chanced a quick look. The images were of Myra—when she had been young and incredibly perfect.
He left that room and tried the next. There was a bag at the foot of the bed, and the luggage tag said Jeanne LaRue. So she was making the mansion home, too, at least for now.
A third room turned out to be Lacy’s. Teddy bears adorned the bed.
He moved more quickly. The next room was occupied, as well, but it seemed that whoever was staying there was keeping the space impersonal.
As he glanced around, though, he saw movement. The sheer drapes over the doors that led out to the balcony were shifting. He hurried over and discovered a sturdy wooden trellis that could easily be reached by climbing over the balustrade.
And someone—a woman—was running across the side lawn, on the other side of the trees that lined the pool. She was headed toward the back of the property. Luke had studied the plans and knew the wall went all the way around, unbroken except for a second gate that could be opened for easy beach access.
The gate shouldn’t be open tonight, but that didn’t mean someone couldn’t open it. And he didn’t see any guards there.
He was certain now that the racing figure was Rene Gonzalez, alerted by the fact that her thick dark hair trailed behind her in the wind as she ran.
Would she make it to the beach? Or would she find herself trapped? And was she running from him? Had she heard he was looking for her, or was she fleeing whoever had engineered the disappearance of Colleen Rodriguez?
He quickly crawled over the railing and started down the trellis.
Then he heard someone clear their throat and looked up.
Chloe Marin was standing at the railing, staring at him with sharp suspicion.
“I’d heard you were looking for the bathroom, Mr. Smith. You really don’t have to climb down from the balcony and make use of the beach as a ‘loo,’ as you call it—I’m assuming that’s the story you’re going to give me?” she asked sweetly.
Rene Gonzalez was slipping away.
“Nothing like the great outdoors,” he said, then swiftly climbed down a few feet, praying the trellis would hold, jumped to the ground and took off in pursuit of Rene Gonzalez.
TWO
Damn the man.
She wasn’t dressed to go swinging from balconies and leaping to the ground.
But the man who called himself Jack Smith had been beyond suspicious even before he’d climbed down from the balcony and followed Ren
e toward the beach—a feat that put her in a position where she longed to call in the police. But at the moment, what would be the point? He had an invitation to be here, though he’d certainly been a rude guest, looking into bedrooms, not to mention leaping off a balcony. Still, Victoria had told her that two years ago Bjorn Bradikoff, famed for his jeweled sandals, had streaked down the beach in nothing but a pair of his trademark sandals, proving their elegance, whether matched with cocktail finery, casual attire or nothing at all.
Compared to that, exiting via balcony wouldn’t even begin to get a man arrested.
Swearing, she tossed off her borrowed designer heels and swung a leg over the balcony railing, carefully maneuvering herself to the trellis. She crawled down the latticework, amazed that none of the slender slats had broken. Just as she thanked her lucky stars, she grasped at a piece of wood that split in her hands, and tumbled down the last six feet, landing hard in a patch of mixed dirt and sand, but avoiding the sharp-toothed needles of the bougainvillea that grew in a riot of color around the house.
Swearing more vociferously, she got to her feet, dusted herself off and followed in the direction the other two had taken.
As she tore around the trees, she felt a twinge of guilt; her uncle would be furious with her for going in unprepared pursuit of a man who might be dangerous, might even be armed.
But she didn’t think so. At least, she was pretty sure he wasn’t armed, though he might well be dangerous. Certainly in her observations of the agency, he was the first truly suspicious character she had seen. Then again, it could be hard to tell sometimes. Eccentricities could hide all kinds of stains on the human soul, and it was often difficult to tell the truth from illusion.
The man had an educated, British accent. Or was it feigned? Probably not. It was slight, as if he’d been away from his homeland for many years.
The back gates were open. There was one guard on duty, but he was flirting with someone Chloe didn’t know, a slim young woman with long blazing red hair. She was wearing a strapless tube gown and doing it very well. If Chloe was right in her assumption that the other woman wasn’t on the guest list, then apparently the guard wasn’t above allowing uninvited guests into the party, at least if they met his own personal requirements.
She herself was now covered in dirt, sand and bits of bracken, and her hair was undoubtedly in a wild tangle. She should ask the guard if he’d seen anyone exit, but she doubted he had seen anyone but the flirty redhead.
She tore out to the beach. Neither the guard nor the redhead spared her a glance. So much for security.
She ran south down the beach, following a trail of footsteps in the sand that led from the mansion. She wasn’t afraid; she could see late-night wanderers as she ran. Remodeled deco hotels, which had once been cheap housing for down-on-their-luck locals, now gleamed proudly in the night, lit in bright colors that drew the eye. The gentle sound of the surf made a pleasant background, and the breeze was almost dainty, carrying in a cooling note from the water.
How far could they have made it so quickly?
Chloe stopped running. They could have gone anywhere. Their footprints had gotten mingled with all those left over from the day.
She caught her breath as she looked around. They could have gone in a half-dozen different directions. Not only were their footprints impossible to distinguish anymore, she had passed at least five hotels, restaurants and clubs as she ran, and the pair could have ducked into any one of them. Not to mention that a block ahead, the hotels and restaurants shifted, and were all on the other side of the street, providing another range of possible hiding places.
What if this man had something to do with Colleen Rodriguez’s disappearance? Was Rene in danger now, too?
She closed her eyes, fighting a wave of panic.
Every once in a while, hitting so briefly that no one else even noticed, it came. That sensation of absolute terror. A memory of the colors of death that had bathed the world in red and black that night ten years ago.
This had nothing to do with the past, she told herself. Nothing at all.
She fought the panic, and as quickly as it had come, it was gone. Fighting back had become her way of coping on a day-to-day basis with what had happened a decade before. Her uncle had told her that she could curl up and hide for the rest of her life, or she could learn to live again.
She had chosen to live. And she had taken classes in every form of defensive—and even offensive—fighting that she could. She had also become a crack shot.
She could even string a crossbow.
But all the training in the world couldn’t help if you couldn’t find the person you were trying to protect.
It was time to go back. To admit defeat. To live to fight another day.
Except that this was what she was fighting for. To discover the truth about the Bryson Agency and the disappearance of a young woman who’d had everything to live for.
She turned around to head back and was stunned to find herself staring at Jack Smith.
“Where’s Rene?” she asked, immediately going on the offensive.
“You tell me. And thanks for confirming that that was Rene. At least we know she’s alive at the moment, and presumably well.”
Chloe frowned, watching him. “What is your concern with Rene?”
He shrugged.
He was an interesting man, she decided. Tall and lean, but with broad shoulders and hard-muscled arms, and an abdomen that was probably like steel. And his eyes. They seemed to cut right through her. His face had too much of a hard, rugged edge to be termed handsome, but somehow the conglomeration of all his features made him more attractive than any of the perfect models back at the party. He was undeniably compelling. She was extremely suspicious of him, and yet…being close to him seemed to make the night warmer. She had the sense that touching him now would be like trying to hold on to an electric shock. He’d been courteous when they’d been introduced before…but there was something in his eyes. Something hard. And it made him all the more suspicious—and, somehow, physically appealing.
“She’ll make a great swimsuit model,” he said.
“So great that you were wandering around upstairs—hunting her down?” Chloe demanded.
“You have to break a few rules to get ahead in this world,” he told her. “So, your turn. Why were you chasing me?”
“Because you were chasing Rene.”
“Why wasn’t Rene at the party when she was at the house?” he demanded. “You girls are tight—I assume. Or are you?”
She was a fake, of course.
But the others were the real thing.
“I don’t know,” Chloe said. “Maybe she was afraid that some strange new designer would be looking for her. Some guy who’d gone a little off the deep end, enough to chase her down a trellis and all along the beach.”
He grinned at that. She was surprised to see how that grin made him…even more appealing and…flat-out sexy.
Dangerously so? she wondered. After all, some of the most heinous killers in history had exuded a deadly charm.
“All’s fair in the fashion industry, or so I understand,” he said.
As they stood there, frozen in an odd face-off, someone suddenly emerged from the low foliage that separated the sand from the street.
It was Rene, and she jetted off like a rabbit in alarm.
Jack immediately lost interest in their conversation and turned to go after Rene.
Chloe’s own response was impulsive—and protective. She flew across the sand after him and leaped onto his back. To her amazement, he managed to remain upright and sling her around so that she fell to the sand. He started to run again, and she caught his ankle. Still, he didn’t fall, not until she twisted around in a mixed–martial arts movement that brought him down at last.
She didn’t need to win; she just needed to buy enough time for Rene to disappear somewhere. She didn’t know what was going on, but designers did not chase down models, whether all
was fair in fashion or not.
Chloe jumped back to her feet—it was her turn to run.
But apparently he knew he’d lost Rene and had decided to maintain whatever connection he had with her instead. This time he caught her ankle, and she plunged back to the sand. Before she knew it, he was straddling her, pinning her wrists. He wasn’t really trying to hurt her, though. His hold was easy, and he was keeping his full weight off her.
“All right, time for an honest conversation,” he said. He spoke like a man accustomed to being in command, and she resented it. But she was also acutely aware of the way his thighs cradled her body as he held her down. Warmth spread through her, and she was appalled by the way she found herself wondering what he would be like if he cared about a woman….
She gritted her teeth. They were engaged in a physical battle, she could be in danger, and he could be a monster. What the hell was wrong with her?
The man couldn’t be a monster. Every instinct she had was sure of it.
She told herself not to be an idiot. An untold number of dead women had no doubt told themselves the same thing.
No. There would be no conversation, and no letting him maintain that edge of authority. Her wrists might be pinned, but her legs were free, and she could tell that he wasn’t prepared for her to fight back. She twisted and slammed her knees up at the same time. To her delight, she did take him by surprise, throwing him off to the side.
But he was quick to rebound. He caught her before she could rise. She tried a feint to the left, but he was ready, so she became a flurry of motion. He swore, trying to contain her flying arms and legs, but she got in one good whack to his chin; she heard the thunk and his grunt of pain.
But he didn’t give up. She might be a vicious terrier, but it seemed she had come across a rottweiler.
And he was still trying to restrain her, not knock her out. She had definitely hurt him, but he was just fighting for control—and he was winning.
“Hey, hey, hey! What the hell is going on?”
Chloe knew the voice, and she sighed with relief.
Lieu tenant Anthony Stuckey, metro police. Stuckey never had to leave a desk these days unless he wanted to, but he was an old-time cop, and—he wanted to. He was friends with her uncle Leo, and friends with her. He had encouraged her to pursue her interest in art after her sketches had helped solve her own case, and he had encouraged her to use her artistic talent to help the police, though he also spent plenty of time warning her that she wasn’t a cop herself.