Dani Sinclair - Beautiful Beast

Gabe still wasn’t sure how he’d let the old man talk him into showing his work to Rochelle. Even more puzzling was how the stunning gallery owner had managed to convince him his work would not only sell, but sell for big bucks.

The trill of the telephone startled Gabe from his working concentration. The clock on the wall told him it was already 1:40 a.m.

Beacher! Finally.

He wiped his hands while checking the caller ID. A cell phone number, but not Beacher’s. Gabe answered anyway.

“Lowe.”

“Go ahead and say I told you so,” Cassiopia began without preamble.

His stomach gave a lurch at the sound of her stressed voice. “You okay?”

“Yes. I’m outside your front door. Is your offer of a safe haven still open?”

“I’ll be right up.”

He disconnected and retrieved his gun from its hiding place under a nearby workbench before taking the stairs in twos. Not bothering with lights, he went to the window to check the street before going to the door. Cassiopia’s car wasn’t in sight and there were no unfamiliar vehicles parked along the street. Neither of those meant a thing, but only one figure was visible on his stoop. He opened the door cautiously, weapon ready.

Cassiopia stared from the gun to him.

“If you plan to shoot me, forget it. I’ll go to a motel. I probably should have done that anyhow.”

He yanked her inside. “You’re alone?”

“No, the marching band is down the street.”

“Where’s your car?”

“I parked on the next street over. I didn’t want anyone to see it in front of your house.”

He couldn’t decide if she was playing him. “Were you followed?”

“Of course not! I was watching for that.”

Given her earlier performance, she wouldn’t have the ability to spot a professional tail.

“Stay here.”

She gripped his arm. “Where are you going?”

He gave her a hard look. She dropped her hand and followed him down the dark hall to the kitchen.

“Wait,” he commanded, heading for the door.

“Sit. Stay. We’re really going to have to work on your people skills.”

Wanting to smile despite the situation, Gabe slipped out the back door. A thorough search of the neighborhood turned up two prowling cats, one brazen raccoon and a deer munching a neighbor’s azalea bush. Cassiopia’s car was exactly where she’d said it would be. There were no signs that anyone human lurked nearby.

Returning to the house, Gabe found her still standing in his kitchen muttering under her breath. Once again, she eyed the gun in his hand.

“You took long enough. I kept waiting for shots.”

If it hadn’t been for the slight tremor in the hand she used to pull back a thread of hair, he’d have thought her annoyed but calm. She wasn’t calm. He slid the weapon into his waistband.

“Relax and tell me what happened.”

“The two are mutually exclusive.”

“Try.”

She made a face, then sighed. “I couldn’t sleep. It was your fault. I kept thinking about what you said. You know, that maybe someone would come back? So I decided to go downstairs and get a glass of wine to help me sleep. Only, instead of going to the kitchen I walked to the window that looks down on my backyard.”

She shivered.

“Someone was standing there looking up at my bedroom.”

He hated that he’d been right.

“You didn’t call the police?”

“I started to. I had the phone in my hand, then I realized how much attention that would focus on me.”

And why would that worry her?

“I went back upstairs, grabbed a couple of things, slipped out the front door and came here.”

She shivered again despite a long dark coat that exposed a pair of slim white calves. Bare feet had been stuffed into a pair of slip-on deck shoes. He couldn’t help wondering exactly what she was wearing under that coat. Her hair was a loose, velvety mass that fell around her face and shoulders. In one hand she had a death grip on a plastic shopping bag. The item sticking out of the top appeared to be her broken purse.

He flipped on the kettle.

“I don’t want any tea. Thank you,” she added as an afterthought.

Gabe shrugged. “No wine.”

“That’s okay, I’m not thirsty.”

He didn’t want her here. Even though he’d made the initial offer, he hadn’t expected her to accept and now he was stuck. He could always turn her loose. But he knew he wouldn’t.

“I’ll show you the spare room.”

She didn’t move when he turned toward the stairs.

“Are you going to bed?”

Despite the darkness he saw her trepidation. It wasn’t an act. She was afraid.

“No.”

“I’m not sleepy, either.”

Inwardly, he cursed. “I have to work, Cassiopia.”

“That’s okay. I’ve never watched an artist work. I won’t get in your way.”

It wasn’t okay. She would be in the way. She’d be a distraction and he couldn’t afford to be distracted any more tonight.

He thought of several responses but dismissed them. She was scared. So was he.

Someone had three vials of a toxin so deadly it could wipe out a city full of people in a matter of hours. The knowledge had eaten at him for nearly four years. Knowing that the authorities were concentrating on the wrong suspects had made it that much worse. Few people knew that all the toxin and all the documentation relating to it were missing.

The removable hard drives and Dr. Pheng’s research notes had vanished from inside a locked vault on the base. Only a handful of people had access to that secured area and he and Beacher had been two of those people.

They had discussed this over beers in his workroom many nights. The way they had it figured, Gabe had been the designated patsy from the start. Most likely, he’d been intended to die in the explosion along with Dr. Richards. If Major Frank Carstairs hadn’t died of a heart attack that same night, maybe they could have proved their suspicions, but as things stood, they had no living suspects, no proof and no trail to follow.

“Did you call Beacher?” Gabe asked her.

Cassiopia hesitated before nodding. “He isn’t answering his phones.”

So she had called Beacher first—if she wasn’t lying. Gabe didn’t think she was lying. Her fear was real. He scowled. Reluctantly, he motioned her to follow him.

CASSY GAVE AN EXASPERATED sigh as she tailed Gabriel’s broad back down the stairs. She shouldn’t have come. It was obvious he didn’t want her here. She had plenty of friends she could have called. Why hadn’t she?

Because he’d offered. And none of her friends would know what to do if someone came after her again. She couldn’t place any of them at risk.

But she could have called the police.

She turned the thought aside as she carefully picked her way down the narrow staircase in his wake. “Forget to pay your electric bill?”

He reached the bottom without making a sound.

“Sometime you’re going to have to tell me how you do that.”

“Do what?”

“Step on that third step without making any noise.”

She suspected he smiled, although she couldn’t see his expression as he led her off to the left. She’d turned right before.

His workroom was cluttered and brightly lit. Her gaze instantly fastened on the clay taking shape on the largest table and she inhaled audibly. Even incomplete, the piece was magnificent.

“You have so much talent.”

Looking embarrassed, he indicated the ratty old couch and un-upholstered wood chair in the far corner of the room next to an ancient, badly scarred desk and a battered filing cabinet. Exactly what she had been looking for. But if the toxin was hidden in this room, he wouldn’t have led her here now.