Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 102071 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 510(@200wpm)___ 408(@250wpm)___ 340(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102071 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 510(@200wpm)___ 408(@250wpm)___ 340(@300wpm)
To answer me, Jake whispered a sequence of five numbers. My neck prickled a warning and I tensed, frozen as he punched in those numbers on the safe and the door popped open. Then I unfroze, spinning around within the circle of his arms, astonished and suspicious. “How did you do that?”
He shrugged with a smile that could melt panties. “Told you I could open safes.”
He bent his head and dusted another soft, barely there, almost chaste kiss onto my neck. I pressed my hand to his chest, refusing to focus on that kiss. I was curious to know how he’d pulled that off anyway. The kiss on my neck was a distant memory. “But how?”
“Ariel,” he said casually. “Two, seven, four, three, five.”
My nickname, letters translated into their corresponding number on a phone dial-pad. “But you guessed it so fast.”
His laugh was resonant and genuine. “Don’t be embarrassed. How many people have even seen a touch-tone phone?”
“I’m not embarrassed,” I lied, and nudged him away from the safe so I could reach in and grab the box with the diamond Eli had given me. “Just because you made me look stupid for thinking my code was clever.”
“As long as it’s not also your debit card,” he teased, his sunshine eyes lighting up.
“No. It’s not,” I said, disgruntled.
“People usually choose familiar words for their combinations,” he explained with a shrug, like figuring me out was nothing to him when it was something to me. I didn’t want to be obvious. “Understanding habits and human nature is part of my job.”
“So you weren’t kissing me to melt my resistance so I’d give up the code?” I asked though it sounded rhetorical even to my ears immediately. He hadn’t needed to get me to give it up. He’d guessed it, kiss or not.
Which meant the kiss was just a kiss. And credit given where credit was due.
Him—mind and mouth.
He shook his head, looking pleased. “I was just kissing your neck because you smelled so damn good and I couldn’t help myself. You looked ridiculously sexy in front of the safe.”
That was a hell of a compliment—one I’d definitely never heard before. One I enjoyed a lot. “It says a lot that a locked safe is a turn-on for you.”
“A beautiful woman in front of a locked safe,” he corrected in a voice like velvet. “Two things that are a pleasure to unlock.”
Heat crept up my neck as if he’d kissed me there again. Why did he have to be so irresistible?
Clutching the box to my chest like a shield against his charm, I brushed past him to where I could breathe without my head filling with his scent. “How about we get to work unlocking this mystery first.”
A deep, throaty chuckle followed me, then we left the hotel room and set the next phase of our plan into motion.
I drove to the diamond district, all focused. We’d strayed out of the “just business” lane last night—and when he picked me up—but now my nerves were all tied to the task in front of us. That involved trusting Jake in a more material way, so I recapped the plan, calming those nerves as best I could. “So, you’re going to take my diamond into the shop and find out as much as you can about where it came from,” I said as I looked for parking on Wayboard Street, but not too close to International Diamonds. As Jake had pointed out yesterday, I could be recognized. “You have your cover story?”
“Did I mention that I’ve done this before?” The question came out more wry than usual.
“Only a few dozen times. And showed off your skills.”
“Oh, you haven’t seen a fraction of my skills, Ariel.”
I tamped down the flutters that happened every time he used that husky, tantalizing tone. “I’m serious,” I said. With the narrow roads, I could only steal a glance at him, but his lips were quirked in a crooked smile.
“Yes. I have my cover. I’m having the stone evaluated for my sister,” he explained, taking pity on my nerves. “Whose cheating husband gave it to her to win her back. She wants to turn it into a nest egg in case he strays again and she kicks him to the curb.”
That had enough truth to be plausible and uncomfortable—Eli had cheated on my mom and given expensive gifts in place of fidelity. And then demanded them back in the divorce. It would never have occurred to Mom to hide something away in, say, a foreign bank. When she’d had money put aside, she’d given it to her husband without strings attached.
I parked the car, but was still lost in thought, hands on the wheel. Jake covered my icy hand with his warm one. “You still with me?” he asked gently.
I nodded a few more times than necessary, then gulped. “This is how we find out if Eli bought diamonds to hide his money and get it out of the mainland US, right?” I knew the answer—yes—but I had to ask anyway. I was only an amateur detective after all. But the reminder of the goal calmed my erratic pulse.