“Have a seat. The boss will be with you shortly,” Konrad indicated in a bullish tone and pointed toward the chocolate Chesterfield sofas while his buddies shut the doors with a resounding thud and sealed them all inside. Sealed Becca inside. She assessed the room. Floor-to-ceiling inlaid shelves held first editions behind panes of glass. There was a vase on a pedestal that looked to be from the Ming Dynasty, or was at least an excellent reproduction. She studied her surroundings for a potential avenue of escape. The only way out would be to jump from the large crenelated windows. Two stories up, she could break something—like her neck. Only three guards were present in the room, odds that weren’t great, but left her a fighting chance.
Konrad shifted his hand to the butt of his gun until she finally complied with his order. Even if she escaped past Konrad and his two buddies, jumped out the window and didn’t break anything when she landed, the boatload of guards stationed over the grounds were far too numerous to outrun. The odds were not in her favor in making it to the gate and beyond for help.
Becca said a silent prayer at the echoing clomp of multiple footsteps approaching. Her anxiety ratcheted up to cataclysmic levels.
The double doors swung inward. Becca wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting, but it wasn’t a relatively trim man with salt and pepper hair, dressed in gray tweed slacks and a button up navy cardigan sweater over his ivory dress shirt. He looked much more like a history professor than a criminal mastermind—at least, until you looked into his eyes. They were cold, devoid of any humanity or warmth, and calculating. Rudnikov assessed her from head to toe as she rose. That stare made her feel underdressed in her jeans and Kelly-green chenille sweater. A sense of helplessness invaded her soul. The uncertainty infused by doubt that she would live through the next hour.
Rudnikov didn’t travel alone. He had four of his paid thugs guarding him. Becca skimmed her gaze over them. They were all similar in manner and form to Konrad, as if they had come off an assembly line. But it was the last man her gaze landed on who brought her up short. She kept her jaw from dropping to the floor, but just barely.
Quinten Blackthorne was a member of Anton Rudnikov’s mob team? What the hell?
Not six weeks ago, she’d danced with the man at her brother’s wedding. Quinten was an officer with the New Orleans Police Department and one of her brother’s best friends. He’d been a groomsman in the wedding party, and had looked downright sinful in his tux, like a dark prince of the underworld.
Why was he here? What was he doing with Rudnikov?
Tonight, Quinten wore a charcoal gray suit, almost identical to the rest of the crime lord’s hired goons. Shock flitted through his warm cognac eyes the moment his gazed landed on her. The man was mister badass personified. The utter confidence Quinten exuded in his pinky made the hired goons look laughable at best in their attempts to seem imposing. He was the alpha of alphas, top of the food chain, and he knew it. The suit, combined with the ivory dress shirt, was unbuttoned at the neck and stretched over muscles that should be indecent. Becca knew that from experience. The night of the wedding, as he’d held her on the dance floor, she’d had the good fortune to feel those muscles flex beneath her hands. The man was ripped, and solid as a tank. He wore his hair, black as midnight, in a military style cut. And he had one of those masculine faces that tended to have perpetual dark stubble that, combined with his strong angular jaw, full lips and dark slash of eyebrows, only served to make him hotter. As in: five alarm fire, panties have disintegrated into ash and a woman was ready and willing to do whatever the man wanted.
“Miss O’Malley, a pleasure to meet you. I thank you for coming to meet with me on such short notice. I’m Anton Rudnikov. My associate, Sasha, speaks highly of you and your gallery. I admit, I’ve not had the chance to attend one of your showings, but I am impressed with your use of color in your art,” Anton Rudnikov stated with a friendliness that belied the underlying air of hostility in the room.
“Thank you, Mister Rudnikov. You have a lovely home with some rather spectacular artwork. If I’m not mistaken, you have an original Renoir in your entryway.” Becca redirected her attention to the mob boss. She shook his hand, hoping she was hiding the dread coursing through her.
“You’ve got a good eye. If we had more time, I would give you a tour,” Rudnikov said with a frigid smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Did that mean her time was running out?
Quinten marched up beside Rudnikov, directing a scowl her way. His fury was evident; he glowered, apparently angry that she was there. Well, that made two of them. Becca wasn’t thrilled about the fact either. But he held her gaze, trying to impart some indistinct meaning that went straight over her stunned head. If she were being fanciful, she would have said he was pleading with her.
Quinten beg someone? Yeah, right.
She imagined even the Hell’s Angels motorcycle gang moved out of Quinten’s way when he approached. In front of the entire crime entourage, he snarled, “What the fuck are you doing here, Becca?”
Rudnikov glanced between them, speculative interest and suspicion in his dead gaze. “You two know each other, Quinten?”
Quinten grabbed her hand and squeezed her fingers. Hard. Like he was trying to pass along a meaning that she still didn’t understand—mainly because her entire day had taken on a weird damn Twilight Zone bent, with danger and betrayal filtering in through every crack. Quinten, with her hand still gripped in his much larger one, turned to Rudnikov and said, “Yes, we do know each other. She’s my fiancée, sir. She doesn’t know that I work for you.”
At the pressure on her hand, and Quinten’s declaration, Becca stared at Quinten like he had gone mad. Fiancée? What the hell? What was the man playing at?
“Is that a fact? I don’t see a ring on her hand,” Rudnikov replied, his face an inscrutable mask.
That was it. They were dead. Her story would end, here, now, holding Quinten’s hand. On the bright side, Becca thought, she wouldn’t die alone. Tension oozed in the room. She froze, and even forgot to breathe. The guards had their hands in position against their firearms. Becca prayed she wouldn’t pass out or pee in her pants in terror.
“That’s because she’s miffed with me. We had a fight the other night and she took it off. But she loves me.” Quinten stared down at her from his six-foot plus height, his cognac gaze imparting a play along message while he pretended to be a man besotted.
Becca didn’t understand—any of it. Not why Sasha had betrayed her trust, or whether Quinten was a dirty cop and only coming to her rescue because he was friends with her brother, or whether the mob boss intended to let her walk out of his house alive.
“Is this true, Miss O’Malley?” Rudnikov asked like he was daring her to dispute Quinten’s outlandish claim.
Pain shot up her arm from her hand as Quinten squeezed. Becca tried to keep her expression serene. Doubt shrouded Rudnikov’s hard glare. Better to have the crime boss believe she was with Quinten than alone and at his mercy. With a silent prayer, she tossed her lot in with the devil she knew. “It’s true, Mister Rudnikov. I’m engaged to the big lug—for now, at least.”
“And why just for now?” Rudnikov’s stare made her want to squirm. But she held it together—barely. Staring Rudnikov in his eyes the color of mahogany, Becca knew what it was like to stare evil in the face. The man would have no qualms about ending her life, right here, right now. The bastard wouldn’t even flinch at the blood spilled in his ornate sitting room.