Bellingham nodded, his lips tugging up at the corners. “What sort of artifacts would your client be interested in exactly?”
Istvan dragged out the moment as if reluctant to reveal even that much. “He fancies himself the king of the underworld. Don’t they all?” He chuckled again.
Bellingham’s eyes narrowed. “And what brought you to
my
door?”
“Your reputation for one. If there’s anything out there, I thought you might have heard of it. But I’ll be making the rounds elsewhere, as well. I’ve heard a rumor that something somewhere might have disappeared. Some body has to know where it went.”
“Let me see what I can find out.” Bellingham stood.
“I hear you’re a fan of Cubist art. I have a collection upstairs if you care to view it.”
Istvan’s heart about stopped. Lauryn was finally climbing back out the window. And Bellingham could turn any second.
“A wonderful library you have,” Istvan said quickly, pointing at the shelves opposite from the window to draw the man’s attention elsewhere. “I have lately grown to appreciate rare volumes myself. Another vehicle for investment.”
“Feel free to look around,” Bellingham said with pride in his voice.
Agents also being collectors wasn’t that unusual.
They started with lots they couldn’t sell, then invested in better pieces over the years, as well. Having inventory on hand didn’t hurt when they had clients with predictable tastes. Orders could be filled that much quicker.
“Look all you want.” He indicated the room with an outstretched hand, turning in a circle, just missing Lauryn as she closed the second window behind her.
“I
ALMOST GOT CAUGHT
at the end. Somebody was coming into the office, but I skipped out the window while they fiddled with the lock. I’ve never been so grateful for a stuck key. What do we have so far?” Lauryn asked from behind Istvan.
They were back in their hotel suite, watching the screen change on the laptop in front of them. They had remote access to Bellingham’s files.
“Enough to put him away for life, but nothing that would connect him to Valtria’s royal treasures. He put out feelers after we left. His e-mails are vague. He’s fishing around. If he found the stolen artifacts first, he could get a commission and I’ve given him the impression that my buyer is a grateful man.”
“So even if he’s not our guy, he’s at least working for us.”
He smiled, a glint of excitement in his dark eyes.
She felt the same. The hunt was on. To pursue her goals to the end was a challenge that gave her energy. She enjoyed every moment of the job. And judging from the look on Prince Istvan’s face, maybe they weren’t so different after all.
He’d already set up another meeting for tonight, with one of the two men who looked like the best bets out of the five black market bosses on the island. Berk was originally from Mersin, the Turkish port where the ship they’d taken to the island had been headed. It could be a connection or nothing more than coincidence. A link they planned to investigate, in any case.
“Dinner before we go?” Istvan asked her.
“Here?”
They’d been taking their meals in his suite, not wanting to take the risk that someone would recognize him despite the disguise. Their seclusion also fit their cover. Fernando was a man known to keep to himself.
He nodded, holding her gaze, and she had a feeling that this invitation was different than the ones before. She said yes anyway.
He made the call to the concierge and this time didn’t invite his guards to dine with them, although his suite had a large enough dining room for a private party. The table for twelve was made of mahogany, a crystal chandelier overhead, the place also suitable to serve as a meeting room in a pinch.
He took off his jacket and unbuttoned the top button of his dark blue, tailored shirt, rolled the sleeves up to under his elbows, then took the chair at the head of the table and leaned back casually.
“I hope you don’t mind if I don’t sit on the other end.” She picked a seat halfway down the table from him.
“Not at all. In fact, I’d prefer you closer.”
His voice tickled something behind her breastbone. But his face was unreadable, and she couldn’t be sure if there was any hidden meaning behind his words, or if he was simply stating that he didn’t expect her to stand on ceremony.
She didn’t have time to work out what all of it meant, the private dinner and his strange mood. The food arrived with super speed. Apparently, being rich enough to take the most expensive suite came with its privileges.
The waiter pushed a cart in, left it just inside the door without looking up once, as before, and was gone before they could have thought about a tip.
Istvan stood to serve them—one of his guards had done the job before. She jumped to head him off and take over the task. Her nerves seemed on edge suddenly, unreasonably. She wanted to move, do something that kept her busy.
She set the table and realized it’d be smarter to sit closer to him so they could both reach the platters they received. He made no comment, simply watched her, which made her nervous and then angry. She didn’t get nervous under any man’s gaze. She’d faced down Agent Rubliczky, for heaven’s sake. Not to mention a number of rivals over the years, and even an amorous mob boss who hadn’t taken kindly to being told no when he asked for a date.
She lifted the first silver lid. “Tava,” she said as she recognized the dish, a stew of meats with onions and herbs, her uncle’s favorite. The next dish was stuffed grape leaves.
“Vegetarian dolmades.” He shook his head as if not knowing what to make of them. “Stuffed with seasoned tofu.”
He hadn’t asked her what she wanted, and she hadn’t paid much attention when he ordered, her mind on other matters. That he remembered her preferences softened something inside. She lifted the next lid. A seafood platter with prawns and other delicacies, another thing she could eat.
“And kebabs for me,” he said when she reached the last dish. “I dare say the service is as good as at the royal palace. Commandaria?” He picked up the sweet dessert wine from the tray, a treat that had been enjoyed on the island for centuries.
They had a few hours before they had to leave for their meeting. “Sure.”
She started with the dolmades, he went for the kebabs. He ate as elegantly as he did everything else. The muscles of his lower arms moved sinuously as he put pressure on the knife. His skin was tanned. Looked as if he spent plenty of time outdoors.
He looked up. Caught her watching him. Held her gaze.
“How does one become a thief?” he asked after a few heated seconds.
Her back muscles stiffened. “I’d say one either chooses the life or is born into it.”
“Still, even with the born-into-it thing, there’d be a choice, I imagine.”
“When you were young, were you fully aware that you could choose to stop being a prince?”
His fork hesitated halfway to his sensuous mouth, lips that had at one point been enclosed around her nipples. She drew a slow breath, forcing a nonchalant smile onto her face.
He took his time to consider the question carefully. “You mean abdicate the title?”
She inclined her head.
“I don’t suppose. But one is a prince from the moment of his birth. He is what he is long before he has intellect enough to think about it. It cannot be such with a thief.”
“Infants are used as decoys, their strollers and diaper bags are handy hiding places.”
“But they don’t actively participate.”
“They see the life. It’s their earliest memory. They see it before they know right from wrong. When right or wrong is decided by daddy.”
“Even so.” He didn’t look ready to concede. “At some point, there’s a conscious choice to participate.”
“If by conscious choice you mean a four-year-old fully realizing what her father wants when he pushes her through a dog door and asks her to turn the lock to let him in.”
Surprise glinted in his eyes, even as his face darkened. “Four years?”
“Or even earlier.”
“What kind of parent—”
She cut him off, not wanting to go there. “Maybe one who was raised the same way.”
He put food into his mouth at last and chewed methodically, not looking as if he enjoyed his meal the least even though it was prepared superbly. Not that Lauryn could enjoy hers. She hated to discuss her past, even in the impersonal way they were doing it now.
“And when that child grows up,” he said after a while, “does she not rebel? Surely, at one point there is some understanding.”
“By that point, rumors about her might make it impossible to switch to an honest line of work, certainly not in the art world. It’s too small. Everyone knows everyone.”
“And yet, apparently, it can be done.” He looked at her pointedly.
“If law enforcement chooses to stop all investigation and wipe the slate clean. I’m guessing that doesn’t happen to everybody.”
Thank God, it happened to me.
Thank God.
He dabbed a satin napkin to his lip. “Why would they do such a thing?”
“For a price.”
“Such as?”
“Information on the location of a lifetime of acquisitions. For the child to betray her parent.” She set her fork down and pushed her plate away as a dark ache spread in her chest.
“And the parent?”
“Got to live the last few months of his life in a hospital under proper care instead of on the run or in prison.”
She pushed her chair back and walked to the window, keeping her back to the prince. She didn’t want him to see the moisture in her eyes, the guilt and conflict she still felt over some past decisions. “Somehow, I don’t see you betraying your family, your brothers.”
“No,” he remarked quietly. “But neither would they break the law to such degree that the authorities would come to me offering deals.”
Outside, storm clouds gathered on the horizon, the sea choppy. Waves crashed to shore in an endless line. She watched the water, trying to quell the storm inside. Then strong arms came around her and she was pulled against the prince’s wide chest, his chin resting on the top of her head as he held her from behind.
“You surprise me. Perhaps I judged you rashly.”
She blinked the moisture from her eyes, then gave an unladylike snort, which didn’t seem to put him off.
He turned her in his arms gently, held her gaze. His attention on her was full and undivided, mesmerizing. His head dipped.
She stood still, needing this, needing him, refusing to think of any of the hundreds of reasons why she should move away.
The moment their lips met, heat flooded her. She felt like she had when they’d swum to shore in Porto Paphos after escaping the bullets and the jellyfish field, reaching the safety of land—immense relief and rightness, a sense of security and gratitude for having found a safe haven.
For a while, she had no coherent thought in her head, and getting lost in him was bliss. But eventually the questions came. What on earth was she doing here, with this man? What did she expect to come of this? Where did she think they were heading? Sure as anything, it wasn’t some fairy-tale happy ending.
She would have thought she had more sense than to become a momentary play toy for the rich, but she was proven wrong when her mouth defied incoming instructions from her brain and opened to him.
He tasted like sweet wine and felt like heaven.
She recognized danger when she saw it.
She liked him too much, that was the trouble. Really liked him, far more than any of the others. Honor was woven deep into the fabric of him. He drew her against all reason, and the strength of that frightened her as much as it thrilled her.
She pulled back, working hard to produce some righteous anger. She needed
something
to put between them. “Just like a man. Now that you want me, you’re ready to forget my past and forgive everything.”
Better to have him mad at her than have him in his current mood. He was dangerous when he was bent on seduction.
“I want you. I’m not going to apologize for it,” he said evenly. “You don’t have to be scared of this,” he added.
Her chin came up. “I’m not scared of anything.”
Even as he lifted an eyebrow, a smile hovered over his upper lip. He unceremoniously pulled her back into his arms for another kiss.
It had been a long time since he’d held a woman like this. And what he remembered hadn’t been this raw, this urgent. Lauryn had blasted into his life like a comet, turning everything upside down, setting him on fire.
They’d fought for their lives together, outwitting thugs on that ship, even spent a few quiet moments here and there, talking about excavations on the island and the diary of the Brotherhood, shared a couple of meals, a couple of kisses. He wanted more. More of what they already had—minus the running-for-their-lives part. She
was
the most self-sufficient woman he knew, but he still hated to see her in danger. He wanted a prolonged, full-fledged affair.
He liked her and he didn’t want to let her go. It was that simple for him. But knowing women and the way they couldn’t help but make everything out to be more complicated than it had to be… The key was not to leave her too much time to think.
So he deepened the kiss, drinking in her sweetness as he lifted her into his arms and carried her to the bedroom, to the bed they hadn’t yet shared. Now was the time. He laid her down gently and gave his hands free rein.
Running his seeking fingers and lips over her body nearly drove him out of his skin with need. She had sleek muscles, soft curves in other places, a delicious contrast.
But his appreciation for her went far beyond his appreciation for her body. He’d begun respecting her resilience on the ship and during their escape. He’d seen her intelligence numerous times since. And now he was beginning to understand some things about her, about her past. His old prejudices were fast disappearing, leaving something new behind, a yearning for companionship with someone who was very much like him in some regards and completely different in others.
But all that was still too new for him to fully comprehend let alone articulate. For now, he was content to let his body speak. And his body and hers were definitely speaking the same language.