Treasured by Thursday (Weekday Brides Series Book 7) (17 page)

“And I trusted him,” she mused.

“If it helps at all . . . I like Hunter. Yeah, he’s hard around the edges, and I wouldn’t have passed him as a client for Alliance, but he’s enduring all of us rather well. And considering how much that man is worth, I don’t think he’d have to pretend at all if he didn’t want to.”

“He cooked dinner.”

Meg once again linked arms with Gabi as they turned back toward the villa.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get the image of him with all that flour covering him out of my head,” Gabi said.

“It’s not the flour that’s bringing that blush to your face. It was his attempt to be your personal spandex that’s heating you up.”

Chapter Sixteen

Remington hoped the leads in Columbia would dry up quickly. Unfortunately, they didn’t. Now he was on day three in the hot, humid urban jungle, leaning against the crumbling side of a building that called itself a bank. It wasn’t the bank where Picano’s account was set up, but inside was a slightly shady teller whose tongue wagged with every fifty-dollar bill Remington flashed. It helped to have Blackwell’s never-ending wallet.

Juan emerged from the broken-down building and searched the busy street. Before his eyes found Remington, another man, this one skinny and skittish, intersected. Remington let the smoke from his cigarette drift to the sky and lifted the newspaper in his hands to observe for a little longer. Juan had said he had a friend at the Picano branch who would meet with the two of them. He had a few hundred-dollar bills on him, and a few more in the hotel room tucked behind the toilet. From the lack of cleanliness, they wouldn’t be discovered there until the next millennium.

The two men shook hands and held what appeared to be an amicable conversation. Within a couple of minutes, Juan was once again scanning the street. The answer to who might be behind the activity out of the Picano account was only a few questions away. Problem was, in Columbia, it was impossible to determine who to trust.

Remington trusted no one.

He tucked the paper under his arm, tossed the butt of his smoke to the ground, and wove through traffic, pedestrians, and a few stray dogs roaming the street. A child, no older than three, pushed against his leg, his grubby little fingers out for anything Remington might spare. He pushed past the kid without a sideways glance. If he so much as offered a quarter, the kid would multiply like a fucking gremlin in water. Attracting attention was not on Remington’s list.

“There you are,” Juan said, his lips pulled back in a grin. “Señor Remington . . . my friend, Raul, the one I told you about.”

Remington lifted a chin, offered a hand. “You speak English?”

Raul placed a sweaty hand in his, nodded as if a bobble doll had taken over his scrawny frame. “It’s the international language, isn’t it?”

Remington removed his hand as soon as possible. From the way Raul shifted on his feet, he was either seconds away from a heart attack driven from fear or was in need of a hit.

“Columbian bankers need to speak English.” Juan nudged his friend. “Right, amigo?”

“Sí, sí.”

Remington nodded toward an outside diner down the street. He’d already scoped out the area, knew of two escape routes if he needed to vacate his newfound friends’ company in a hurry.

The three of them stepped into the shade of the patio; Remington took a seat with the wall to his back, an out to his right, his amigos on his left. A waitress was on them the second they sat down. Not risking anything, he ordered a bottle of beer, waited for the three of them to be left alone.

Raul ran a hand under his nose before he spoke. “Juan tells me you’re looking for someone.”

“Could be someone, or several someones. You tell me.”

Juan rolled his fingers together; Raul kept his eyes moving around the restaurant.

“Who wants to know?”

“Maybe I do.”

Raul scooted forward, his eyes blinking. “Information isn’t free, señor.”

The waitress returned with three beers and disappeared.

“You have information for me?”

Raul rubbed his upper lip again. Yeah, the man was dipping into some of Columbia’s finest . . . or perhaps cheapest. Hard to tell watching from the outside.

“If you have money . . . I have information.”

Remington removed two fifty-dollar bills from his pocket, made sure the man saw the hundreds packed behind them. “I need a name.”

“If I told you Picano is using the account?”

Remington lifted his hand holding the money away. “Don’t fuck with me, Raul. Picano is dead.”

Raul kicked back in his chair. “What about Mrs. Picano?”

Remington stood. The man was looking for quick money. He didn’t know shit.

Juan stood, along with Raul. “Wait, wait . . . I can get—”

“You can get the fuck out of my way. I don’t deal with people who waste my time, cokehead.”

“But . . .”

Remington nudged the other man out of the way and left the two bankers behind.

Back at square one. He pushed through the kids that circled him, bumping into him with their hands out. He shoved his hand into his pocket, fisted the change there, and tossed it several feet away. Like a flock of birds to crumbs, the children scattered to pick up what they could as he jogged across the street and disappeared.

He hustled up the filthy steps of the hotel and into his room. He shoved everything into the duffel bag and retrieved the cash behind the john. He patted his right back pocket, in search of his phone.

He froze, checked his left pocket . . . front pockets.

“Son of a bitch.”

Hunter wasn’t sure who was avoiding who. Both he and Gabi all but jumped on the opportunity to spend time in the nightclub instead of retiring in their private villa.

He didn’t trust himself.

Even with his head in a hundred different places, the one place it wanted to be was buried in his wife.

A dangerous thing, that.

For the both of them.

Across the room, Gabi danced with her brother. The two of them laughed and smiled . . . obviously caring for the other. Hunter couldn’t blame the man for being such a hard-ass. If he’d had a younger sister who had said yes to a temporary marriage, he didn’t think he would sit by and watch silently.

Meg slid up beside him. “You don’t seem the wallflower type,” she told him.

He allowed his eyes to leave Gabi.

“Just watching.”

“They look good.”

He nodded.

“I haven’t seen Gabi dance since before Alonzo died. Even at our wedding, she did what she had to, but she wasn’t happy about it.”

He couldn’t help but wonder why Meg was opening up.

“I never liked the man.”

“And why are you telling me this?”

She sipped her drink. “I’m not sure.”

He ran his fingers over the condensation on his glass. “Let me guess, your next words are a warning that if I hurt her I’ll have to answer to you.”

Meg lifted her eyebrows. “I thought about it. But no. I won’t have a chance.”

“Too many people in line in front of you.”

“Exactly.”

They both watched their spouses on the dance floor for a minute before he lifted his hand, palm up. “Dance?”

Women loved to dance. It was something Hunter learned about them early on. The music was upbeat enough to engage in a few twists and enough movement to avoid a lot of body contact. Still, he felt Val’s eyes on him as he led Meg through a few moves.

When the music changed, this time slowing down, Val tapped his shoulder and they switched partners.

The tropical scent of Gabi’s hair hit him first.

When her hand gripped his, her other reaching up on his shoulder, it took every ounce of power to avoid molding his body to hers.

After a few tentative steps, she leaned in close. “You’re a good dancer,” she told him.

He moved them around with style. “I dated a theater major in college. I had to learn or get left behind.”

Gabi smiled. “And how long did you date Miss Actress?”

“Two months.”

Her hand reached around his back. The feel of her fingers flexing on his shoulder distracted him enough to where he missed a step, but quickly recovered.

“Two months is hardly dating . . . more like a fling.”

“It was college.”

“But you kept that style of dating most your life.”

He glanced down, narrowed his eyes. “Part of your background check?”

“I stopped searching for names after I reached thirty.”

“Thirty? The tabloids stretch the truth.”

“So there weren’t thirty?”

He’d never counted. And even he knew that counting past dates while dancing with another woman . . . his wife . . . wasn’t smart.

“Nowhere close to thirty.”

She laughed. “I’ll pull my notes and we can compare.”

He distracted her with a few quick circles, pushing her out of his arms and back in. Fred Astaire would applaud.

People around them offered a little more room. He glanced at Val and Meg. “Well it’s official. Everyone in your immediate family has threatened to take care of me if I hurt you.”

Gabi pulled in a breath before dropping her forehead on his chest. “I should apologize.”

“They don’t know how strong you are.”

“I’m not that strong.” Her voice was low, nearly impossible to hear over the music.

He held her a little tighter after that.

The song ended, the pace picked up, and Hunter led her off the dance floor. At some point he realized he hadn’t let her hand go. Jesus, when was the last time he held a woman’s hand?

Meg interrupted their silence. “We’re headed in,” she told them.

Gabi released Hunter’s hand and hugged her sister-in-law.

“I can’t believe you’re leaving tomorrow. We didn’t have enough time.”

“I’m an airplane away,” Gabi reminded her.

“Yeah. Let me know when escrow closes. I’ll help you furniture shop.”

Val offered a laugh. “I hope that wallet is as deep as you say it is, Hunter.”

It’s part of the deal
, he wanted to say, but didn’t. “I think I have it.”

Gabi kissed both her brother’s cheeks and watched Val and Meg walk out of the nightclub.

With the two of them now alone, he felt his pulse pick up. Nerves? Really? Since when?

“Do you want to go? Another drink?”

Gabi glanced at the bar, wrinkled her nose. “It’s late.”

He offered his arm and she took it.

The fragrant scents of the island, along with the ocean, mixed with the warm night air. Music drifted from the nightclub until they wound past the main building and down a path to their villa.

“Your brother has built something really special here,” he said.

She sighed. “After our father died, he was driven to take care of us. It wasn’t an option for the resort to fail.”

Hunter understood that . . . the drive, the determination to move forward, conquer the next hill.

“Has he ever considered expanding . . . different locations?”

Her hand loosened on his arm as they walked. “At one point he talked about it. Then . . .”

Her words caught in her throat. A universal sign that he was treading in Alonzo waters.

The outside veranda of their private villa faced the ocean. The moon wasn’t full, but the sky was clear, letting the reflection dance off the waters like brilliant diamonds of the clearest cut. Instead of stuffing themselves inside, Hunter pulled out a lounge chair and encouraged her to sit. As much as he wanted to take her inside and start up where they left off in the kitchen earlier that day, he knew acting on that now would be a colossal mistake.

With feet stretched out before him, he toed off his shoes and leaned back once he knew Gabi had done the same.

He could see her mind turning . . . memories of Alonzo? Worry about what was happening between them? Hell, he had no idea what was going on inside him. For all the planning, he hadn’t expected to give a crap about her as a person. Yet much like everyone around her, Gabi demanded attention, and protection. She did it by nature . . . not practiced skill.

“You stiffen when you think of him,” he told her.

He heard her take a deep breath.

“Earlier today, your brother and I had a little talk.”

“Oh, no.”

“No,” he said quickly. “As much as it was against every cell in my body, I didn’t ask your brother to elaborate.”

He heard her relief with her exhale.

“I have a confession to make,” he said.

“Do I even want to ask?”

“Probably not. But the way I see it . . . we’re in this for a while. For better or for worse as they say . . . I’d just assume to avoid land mines if that’s at all possible.” Some secrets he wasn’t quite ready to reveal, but others . . .

“Well don’t stop now. It can’t be called a confession without an admission of a crime.”

He watched the gentle waves on the ocean. “I hired a private
investigator to learn everything he could about you. ”