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‘Invite me to your exhibition.’
‘Non,’ he negated immediately.
Her lips tightened. ‘My talents are good enough for tracking paintings but not good enough for your crowd?’
‘Precisely,’ he parried without blinking.
His insult bounced off her. He wasn’t the first to call her character into question and he wouldn’t be the last. Reiko liked it that way. With people busy examining the glossy, showy shell of her carefully honed character, they weren’t looking underneath to the scars, the pain of loss and the constant fear that lurked there; they couldn’t see the empty darkness in her soul that she battled every waking moment to hide.
She needed the camouflage just as she needed every wit to keep Damion Fortier from finding out just how damaged she’d become.
‘I’ve been out of circulation for a while. If you want me to find your paintings quickly, don’t deny me this lead.’
The lead would also give her the chance to find the final Japanese jade statue she’d been attempting to retrieve. Her client’s last desperate call rang in her ears—one she hadn’t been able to ignore. The digging Reiko had done this past week had pointed her in the direction of a prominent French politician who’d be attending Damion’s exclusive exhibition.
When Damion’s face remained impassive, she changed tactic. ‘Your guest list reads like something out of an art collector’s fantasy. I don’t think I’ll ever get another chance to mingle with people so influential in art or come within a whisper of the famous St Valoire Ingеnue collection.’
‘Your presence anywhere near my exhibition is not something I’d term a fantasy. In fact I’d call it more of a nightmare.’
Despite knowing he wouldn’t believe her, she said, ‘I’m not a thief, Baron.’
‘All evidence points otherwise.’
‘I’m an art connoisseur, like you. Just because we took different paths in our pursuit of art doesn’t make us any different from each other.’
His haughty expression added insult to injury. ‘I highly doubt we’re anything alike. You deal underneath the black market—’
‘I retrieve art no one else can and return it to where it belongs. Isn’t that why you’re here?’
One silky eyebrow shot up. ‘So you’re the Robin Hood of the art world?’
She grimaced. ‘Green tights aren’t my style. Besides, I don’t really like labels. Invite me to your exhibition. Who knows? Your squeaky-clean patrons might rub off on me and I’ll transform into a model citizen and find your precious paintings.’
His eyes narrowed.
Reiko held her breath, fought the urge to speak. Sometimes silence was a better weapon.
‘You can work on your transformation in your own time. First you’ll agree to use your every resource to find the paintings.’
The gravity and raw need behind his words caught her attention. Glancing at him, she saw something in his face she couldn’t give a name to—although she felt his near-hypnotic eyes pin her to the spot. In that moment she was almost ready to forget everything she knew about this man and believe the paintings meant something significant to him.
Almost … if she didn’t know for a fact that Damion Fortier was a heartless bastard. He’d said it himself—anything that didn’t earn him cold hard cash was sentimental and messy.
His bloodline might be pure but the man was anything but. In the past five years, the broken hearts he’d left scattered around Europe alone—publicly denied in return for jaw-droppingly extravagant parting gifts but privately mourned—put his status as heartless in direct conflict with his family’s sanctimonious image.
As for his year-long affair with Isadora Baptiste …
‘Why do you want the paintings so badly?’ she asked.
For several minutes she thought he wouldn’t answer. A very real emotion that looked oddly like pain settled in his eyes. Her breath caught. Pain was a familiar emotion to her, along with guilt, and panic-inducing demons that haunted her nights. Suddenly the need to know clawed at her, and her heart was thundering wildly as she waited for his answer.
‘Why, Damion?’
‘I want … I need to have them back. My grandfather is dying. The doctors have given him less than two months to live. I have to find the paintings for him.’
CHAPTER TWO
DESPITE THE INDIRECT devastation Sylvain Fortier had caused her, the raw pain behind Damion’s words made her insides clench.
Swallowing the lump in her throat, she fought the sudden automatic need to offer comfort, but the words spilled out anyway. ‘I’m sorry for …’ She stopped. What could she say in such a circumstance?
When she’d been contacted to broker the sale four years ago, she’d known immediately what the Femme paintings meant to Damion’s grandfather. Her grandfather had told her the history behind them. At the time her first instinct had been to refuse the commission. But she’d convinced herself she’d moved on from Damion’s betrayal—that it was merely another business deal. Now, looking into Damion’s darkened eyes, she wondered if she’d inadvertently set herself up for this meeting, and for his displeasure when he found out just what she’d done with his paintings.
‘Damion, I need to—’
Reiko heard footsteps at the door and her heart sank. A second later, Trevor walked in.
‘Sweetheart, what’s going on? I thought I heard the guests leave—’ Catching sight of Damion, he froze inside the doorway. ‘What are you doing here, Fortier?’ he demanded, his hands leaving his dressing-gown pockets to clench at his sides.
Damion’s set jaw tightened. ‘My business is with her, Ashton, not you. And I’d think carefully before lying to me again in future.’
‘You should’ve fetched me the moment he got here, Reiko. After what he did—’
‘I didn’t want to worry you,’ she rushed to interrupt before he could finish. He was acting out of concern for her. His guardian role was one he refused to relinquish despite her insistence that at twenty-seven she was old enough to take care of herself. What she’d been through made it difficult for him to let go.
She placed a hand on his sleeve. Damion Fortier’s exquisitely sculpted features tightened as he followed the action.
‘My business with Reiko is private. You’re interrupting.’
The two men squared off, hostility bristling between them.
With a sigh, she took her guardian’s arm. ‘It’s okay, Trevor. I’ll be up shortly.’
Desperate that he didn’t reveal anything to Damion, she walked him out of the room and into the hallway. As she mounted the first of the worn carpeted stairs, she saw Damion snatch his phone from his pocket.
She tried to keep her panic down. ‘Is it worth me asking who you’re calling? Your dungeon-keeper, perhaps? Are you sending for your personal guillotine to finish us off?’
‘I was about to arrange to have a list of my guests sent to you, but my guillotine can be arranged if that is how you prefer to conclude our business?’ Dark brows winged in a mocking query.
Damion saw relief race over Reiko’s face before she concealed it.
The swiftness with which she regained her composure surprised him. The Reiko he’d known had worn her feelings on her sleeve. She’d been open, carefree and sexy as hell with it—
Correction … the Reiko he’d thought he’d known …
His jaw tightened as his gaze swung between the pair in front of him. He noted the familiarity between them, the ease with which they spoke, and the whole tableau filled him with distaste. It was obvious Ashton was her latest lover.
An annoying twinge surfaced inside Damion, tightening even further when Reiko murmured a response to Ashton as he leaned his body even closer to hers.
Damion had never craved attention, never sought it for the purpose of spotlighting himself—even though his life seemed to fascinate the tabloid press and the endlessly vacuous social media. But in that moment Damion admitted he didn’t like being ignored. In fact he hated it. He wanted to growl, to shout and draw Reiko Kagawa’s attention from the older man. Instead he gritted his teeth and watched as they mounted the stairs and disappeared into the upper hallway, not once looking back.
Swallowing the distinct taste of displeasure that coated his mouth, Damion shoved his hand through his hair. He was seriously considering storming up the stairs when Reiko reappeared alone. The upper-hallway light cast her silhouette in soft relief. Through the material of her dress, Damion traced her shapely legs to where they met at that triangular gap that had once so fascinated him.
Heat slammed into his chest as he recalled how he’d been able to slip his fingers inside her without the smallest need to part her thighs.
Lost momentarily in the past, he let his gaze drift upward, over her curvy hips to the small indentation of her waist where she’d planted her hands. His hands could encompass that small waist. Easily. She’d always melted into his arms when he’d done just that.
‘So what now?’ she asked.
‘Come down here,’ he instructed hoarsely.
Catching and killing his wayward thoughts, he shoved his hands into his pockets. She was midway down the steps when he noticed she wasn’t wearing shoes. Dainty feet with nails painted a soft peach clashed with the heavy make-up and scarlet lips.
He frowned. ‘Are you and Ashton lovers?’ he asked, before the question was fully formed in his mind.
Surprise flared in her eyes. A charge of heated energy arced between them. That familiar twinge struck deep, and for the life of him he couldn’t dismiss it.
‘I fail to see what business that is of yours.’
‘I wouldn’t want him causing problems with your pursuit of the paintings.’
‘He won’t be a problem.’
‘Bien. Give me your phone number.’
‘Why?’
‘So I can text you the list of names attending my exhibition. Be ready to leave for Paris when I return in the morning.’
‘You’re not afraid I’ll vanish once you leave?’ she mocked.
‘No. Because you’ve revealed another weakness.’
Her eyes, a unique hazel that was more brown than green, remained unreadable despite the rapid pulse beating at the base of her slender throat.
‘By all means, enlighten me.’
‘Aside from the money, you obviously care about Ashton. I can only imagine what you’ll do to prevent him from being carted off to jail once I arrange for his debts to be called in.’
A spark very much like anger heated her cheeks. ‘Careful, now. That renowned Fortier halo is looking a tad besmirched.’
Damion laughed. The realisation that he was actually enjoying besting Reiko eased the intense frustration of the past few weeks.
‘You fight dirty. I fight dirtier. Phone number?’
Tersely, she recited it. He entered it into his phone and pressed ‘send’. ‘The quicker you strike my guests off your list, the quicker you can move on to find out who has the paintings. You’ve gained yourself an invitation to my exhibition, but if you have even the faintest urge to pull anything underhand, squash it.’
‘Scouts’ honour.’ She raised two slender fingers.
The folds of her billowing sleeves fell back and Damion caught the faintest glimpse of puckered flesh before she sucked in a breath and tucked her arm against her side. Whirling, she retreated into the shadowed hallway.
Puzzled by her behaviour, he followed. ‘Reiko—’
‘I didn’t get the chance to tell you before Trevor come downstairs.’
‘Tell me what?’
‘I’ll only need to find the Femme sur Plage.’
Ice clutched the back of his neck and he forced himself to speak. ‘Why?’
‘Because I already know where the Femme en Mer is.’
‘Where is it?’
‘In a storage vault in London.’
‘Who owns it?’
‘I do.’
CHAPTER THREE
THE DREAMS CAME AGAIN … She was laughing as she pulled her father’s resistant hand, telling him he had nothing to worry about, that there was space on the crowded train. No, she didn’t want to wait for the next train. His hastily concealed concern … his familiar embrace … his strong arms around her.
Then nothing … only the heavy weight of blackness.
And screams—horrible, heart-rending screams—as carnage reigned all round her. Her father’s warm hand was clutching hers, then gradually growing cold.
But this time her dreams were interspersed with other images.
Within the chaos Reiko dreamed of dancing with the Baron de St Valoire. And not just any dance. She dreamt of the Argentine frickin’ tango.
Reiko woke with her mind filled with vivid images of train wrecks, scarred bodies … and Damion’s long, muscular legs tangling with scissor-like precision and skill against her much shorter ones, his hands guiding her with exquisite mastery.
She dreamt of short, shockingly sexy dresses, stratospheric red-soled shoes.
In her dreams the disparity between their heights didn’t matter. They fitted perfectly. And when a particular move wasn’t possible, her dark-haired, stormy-eyed partner merely lifted her up against his strong, virile body and continued dancing, their heated breaths mingling, his movements getting increasingly faster, headier, sexier—
‘What the hell, Reiko?’
Shoving off the offending hot sheets, she went into the bathroom and turned on the shower. She had just over an hour to get ready before Damion returned.
Recalling the incandescent rage that had filled his face after her revelation last night, she swallowed. Weirdly, he’d pulled himself under rigid control after that short display of emotion. He’d told her to concentrate her efforts on finding the Femme sur Plage, then he’d left.
After showering, she selected her best power suit. The severe cut of the black jacket and matching trousers coupled with a cream silk dress shirt gave off the no-nonsense vibe she wanted to project, while serving the very useful purpose of covering her up from neck to ankle.
More than anything, she wished she could catch her hair up into a tight bun to cement the outward image she craved, but the scars on her neck made that impossible, so she prayed the suit and make-up would be enough.
