Ruby slid her arm down his and intertwined their fingers. As soon as they passed Claude, she let out a shaky breath and followed Lucas’s lead toward the black hardtop Jeep waiting a few feet away. Attraction sizzled its way up his arm, the slow burn wasn’t something he could chalk up to being on operation-ready alert. He’d gone undercover as Luc too many times to count over the years and women had always been present to solidify his cover as a player, but the extra sensory awareness of another human being hadn’t happened before. The fact that it had now, with her, pissed him off.
He opened the passenger door and pushed the seat forward before helping her into the backseat. The Claude clone had moved from standing beside the Jeep to sitting in the driver’s seat. Ruby slid across the backseat, the move raising the hem of her flowy, white skirt to mid-thigh. The flash of creamy flesh had his dick arguing with his head.
Lucas had two choices: in the back next to her, or shotgun where he’d have access to the door. The argument against the door being that on this island there was nowhere to run if things went ass up. The argument for the backseat being that he’d be next to Ruby and her distractingly delectable legs. He let the passenger seat slide back into place and got in the front row. It wasn’t a chicken move. It was about situational awareness and control.
Whatever you have to tell yourself, Bendtsen.
Without a word to either of them, the driver took off down the single-lane road toward the main house. Lucas didn’t bother to try and hide his curiosity as they sped down the road. Noting the details of the gently sloping terrain and the guards posted along the dirt road fit in with his cover. Luc was many things; a trusting idiot wasn’t one of them.
Neither, it seemed, was Rolf Macintosh. They’d no sooner stepped out of the Jeep in the gravel, circular driveway in front of the stone house ten minutes later, than guards were patting them down. He expected this treatment for himself but cut a sharp look toward the guard sliding his palms down Ruby’s side.
“I told you, Luc, there’s no place like home.” An old bitterness clung to her words, but she didn’t resist the search.
After a few minutes, the guards stepped back empty-handed. No doubt there were others searching his plane top to bottom, looking for weapons or anything else of interest. They wouldn’t find anything. Not that there wasn’t a small armory on board, but he’d designed the secret compartments himself, and there was no way any of the thick-necked goons would find them.
“Mr. Macintosh is waiting in the house,” their driver said.
“Thank you.” Ruby raised her chin and took Lucas’s hand.
The sizzle was back, zipping up his arm and giving him thoughts that had more to do with finding her naked and spread out on his bed, than with discovering the coordinates of the illegal gun exchange that would give Gregers Henriksen all the firepower he needed to launch a guerrilla assault on Elskov.
His first instinct was to pull away, but that couldn’t happen, not when the front door opened, revealing Rolf Macintosh standing in the foyer looking every bit like a blond, buff, aging action-movie hero. Next to him stood a man as dark as Rolf was light. Joey Brotzka glowered at Lucas. As good with his left hand as his right when it came to guns or knives, he’d started out as muscle and worked his way up the food chain to become Rolf’s number two.
Ruby tensed beside him. Glancing from the woman at his side to the man looming behind Rolf, Lucas realized his fiancée hadn’t told him everything. Something was definitely off here.
“I understand congratulations are in order,” Rolf said as he led them through the foyer and into the living room, not looking back, simply expecting them to follow.
Two armed guards stood inside the doorway. A flash of silver underneath Joey’s black blazer when he crossed to the fireplace meant at least three shooters in the room. Taking a casual look around, he noted the solid red light above the video cameras mounted to the ceiling and the Glock lying in the center of the large wooden desk. After that, the less important details came into focus. The room was a jarring contrast to the man standing in the middle of it. Dressed in all black just like his lackeys, Rolf was the biggest dark spot in the sunny room filled with muted yellows and pinks dotted with an explosion of the soft, feminine touches of ruffles and flowers.
Ruby slipped from his grasp as soon as they’d walked through the double doors, her white skirt swirling around her long legs. Now she stood a few feet away with her hands planted firmly on her hips as she glared up at her stepfather. “Claude never could keep his mouth shut.”
“You know how I am about surprises,” Rolf said with a noncommittal shrug of his shoulders. “So does Claude, and he’d rather not get on my bad side.”
A charged silence filled the room—and not an unusual one judging by the bored expression on the guards’ faces. Still, he couldn’t miss the dark-red flush blooming at the base of Rolf’s throat or the way Joey gave him a hard look before adjusting his blazer so the butt of his holstered handgun could be seen clearly.
Dickwad.
Knowing he had to play this with just the right amount of attitude and acquiescence, Lucas gave Joey a taunting wink before turning to his pretend future father-in-law and holding out his hand. “Mr. Macintosh, it’s good to finally meet the man behind the legend.”
The older man took his hand in a grip that crushed Lucas’s knuckles together and cut off circulation to his fingers. Lucas didn’t blink. Apparently satisfied that he’d delivered his message, Rolf ended the pulverizing handshake.
“A flatterer, Ruby?” he asked, playing up the disappointed stepfather role, even though he had to know exactly who and what Luc Svendsen was. “I never would have expected.”
“Maybe you make him nervous,” she said.
“As I should.” Rolf paused and looked Lucas over as if he were a used car he was considering buying. “Then again, Luc has quite the reputation himself, especially for someone so rarely seen in person or photographed. Is it true you got ten million euro out of the Luxembourg royal family?”
And just like that the pieces clicked into place. No doubt the old man was already seeing the possibilities for his outfit if Luc came on board. Rolf had all the muscle he needed, but in today’s world, information was often more powerful than a punch to the gut, and the old man knew it.
“I can neither confirm nor deny that,” he said, letting his smirk do all the talking.
Rolf clapped a hand on his shoulder. “A man who deals in stolen secrets has to have discretion.”
“It is our stock in trade,” Lucas agreed.
“I admire a man who knows when to hold his tongue.” He narrowed his eyes at Joey, seemingly sending a specific message to his second-in-command, then turned his attention back to Lucas and gave him another friendly pat on the back. “So you fell for my little girl, eh?”
Lucas glanced at Ruby, the sunlight playing across her pink, purple, and blond hair, and softened his expression. “Yes, sir.”