Page 176 of Summer Heat
Jackson stood silent, eyes narrowing. “Nic owes me. Man, does she owe me.” He walked around, carefully opened the door, grabbed the rifle case, then the pizza. He put the case down, and chucked the pizza into a nearby parking space. Asshole.
At least the gun survived. That gun signified his whole world.
After speaking into a mic, Jackson came back to Cash’s door. Two men got out of the third vehicle, both in their bombproof moon suits.
“Now what?”
Jackson pointed at the men. “Now, they pull your ass out while I hold down the sensor and try to disengage it without hurting your precious vehicle.”
All right. At least the asshole had a plan. Jared took one large step back. Okay, then. The plan must not be one hundred percent foolproof.
One man held what looked like a lead blanket, the other grasped his arm. Jackson knelt by his knee. They gave signals, someone gave a countdown. “Three, two—” and a noise. A beep. A roar. Blast!
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
David drummed his fingers inside the pocket of his Armani tuxedo pants. The impeccable tailoring was only one of the many reasons he looked ready to waltz Nicola into this gala, if she’d ever show up. She was late by at least twenty-five minutes. He waited in his chauffeured Rolls for her to grace him with her unrefined presence.
But he was refined. Refined manners. Refined looks. His high cheek bones and sculpted nose were perfect, all healed from his scuffle with the exception of fading bruises covered by makeup. He had aristocratic bone structure, bless his mother for that, and his father’s conniving skills allowed him to float in and out of this world, dripping in diamonds and silk, without so much as a hiccup.
He’d absolutely been born into the wrong class of people, and as luck would have it, he was corruptible. Moral flexibility was a wonderful characteristic to have, once he’d learned how profitable it could be. David hadn’t even known that about himself when he’d started at the CIA. They didn’t see it in his profile. Surprise, surprise.
Maybe Nicola was late because everything on the home front was going according to plan. Mister Nero would be
thrilled, and David would love to see the look on her face once she learned her parents had been blown sky high.
He’d tacked the blond cowboy on as an added bonus. Had that fool cracked his jawbone in their scuffle, David might’ve considered letting the Gianori mob take their time with his demise. Regardless, the guy had to die, and a bomb would do the trick. David was too powerful, had too many connections to let some wild-West blowhard get away with hitting him.
Funny, he thought, how he now bartered and traded outside of currency. The better things in life couldn’t be paid for out of Cayman Island bank accounts.
After David found out the how and why of Nicola’s background—that the Gianori Mob wanted her head—his plan fell into place. He knew Mister Nero wanted Nicola for infiltrating Smooth Enterprises as a CIA operative, even if she was ineffective. Mister Nero had preached the power of retaliation and could not wait to take her parents. An eye for an eye. Bloodshed for bloodshed.
The Gianori mob wanted Nicola because the mob never forgets. He promised her to the mob only if they could complete two tasks. The first was Mister Nero’s: blow up the parents. The second was his: take out the cowboy.
There’d be no way to connect the parents’ demise to him, and the mob would never be able to find him once he handed Nicola to Mister Nero. The Gianori clan would be shit out of luck, but it wasn’t his problem. The CIA had trained him well. David could disappear into a crowd of one, and they’d never find him.
This was a new way of doing business and, thus far, it worked out beautifully. David chuckled at his ingenuity.
A flurry of black silk and chiffon caught his eye, and he stared out the window. Nicola was a beautiful woman. She looked rushed. Worried. A pleased smile dripped across his face. The explosions must’ve been a success. Parents and cowboy, check.
The worry washed away when she slipped in through the chauffeur-opened door. It wasn’t his imagination. It had been there.
“Michael,” she crooned in front of the chauffeur before he shut the door. Nicola leaned over and kissed his cheek. It was a very appropriate response for an untimely wife. “I apologize for my tardiness.”
The chauffeur slid into the driver’s seat, and the Rolls began to glide toward their destination a block away. “But of course, Sarah Beth. You look stunning, as always.”
She did present a nice picture. Gorgeous woman, really. When Mister Nero finished with her, if she was still alive and relatively unmarked, he might keep her for himself.
***
Nicola swirled the Dom Perignon in the crystal champagne flute. Slimy David had had his hand at the small of her back all night long, and it was pure training that kept her from removing it from his body and handing it to a waiter to take out with the caviar-covered trash.
“Is something wrong, sweetheart? You look tense.”
Yeah. You keep touching me, and I want to vomit. “Of course not, Michael.” To be this man’s wife would be torture. His fingers were both cold and sweaty. How was that possible? If he dragged them over her Pucci gown one more time, she was sending him the dry cleaning bill. That was, before he was taken to a federal pen for espionage.
“Perhaps a massage is in order when we arrive at the hotel.”
Do not gag. She repeated it several times. A massage wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted, no hell, she needed information.
