CHAPTER ONE
NICK MENENDEZ irritably drummed his fingers on the steering wheel of the Jeep he had picked up at the airport. He had expected to be in Lanzarote by nine at the latest. He’d arrived in his own plane and he was still late because there’d been no landing slot. Heads would roll… He was a man who got what he wanted when he wanted it, and he did not appreciate being frustrated by anything or anyone! But he should have guessed, he thought, his mouth tightening angrily. Any damn thing connected to Liza Summers, a blonde, blue-eyed siren, had always caused him frustration of one kind or another…
A wry smile twisted his firm lips. No, if he was being honest, his frustration was not really Liza’s fault. They had been good friends years ago until he had caught her kissing a young man, and overreacted. With hindsight he could admit it; he had been jealous as hell, he had wanted to be Liza’s first lover, but, as he was engaged to someone else at the time, he had been in no position to do anything about it.
Then, last night at his home in Malaga, he had been reading the latest report from one of his companies, a security firm that was doing some work for a pal of his, when her name had leapt off the page.
Last month Carl Dalk, a friend from his university days whose family owned a diamond mine in South Africa, had contacted him and asked for his help and he had immediately agreed. As students they had been white-water rafting together when Nick was thrown from the raft and knocked unconscious. It was Carl who had dragged him from the raging torrent; he owed the man his life. And though they saw each other infrequently, they’d remained good friends.
Nick had joined his father in the family firm straight after university, a small but one of the most prestigious merchant banks in Spain. Over the years Nick had expanded and diversified the business into the vast international corporation it was today. Carl was one of the few people who knew that one of Nick’s holdings was a very discreet security agency. It was an agency that had assisted in many sensitive investigations, both corporate and criminal, worldwide, and liaised on a regular basis with the Spanish government on matters of security.
Carl had called on Nick’s security firm because twice in the past year diamonds had been stolen from the mine. The clever part was after the thieves had ascertained the value of the diamonds they had been offered back to Carl’s insurers at roughly half their worth.
With the consent of the police, and in the hope of catching the thieves red-handed, the insurance company had arranged to pay up. Not surprisingly, as it meant the insurers saved money by not having to repay the full cost of the diamonds. But it had not stopped the insurance company putting up the cost of Carl’s premiums, but, worse than that, the plan had not worked…
Both times the thieves after exchanging the diamonds had managed to give the authorities the slip.
Carl’s business was in real trouble; what with the influx of cheaper diamonds from Russia over the last few years, and the invention of man-made diamonds, he had seen his firm’s profits slump to an all-time low. The drastic fall in the stock market over the same period had seriously depleted the firm and family funding. Carl had a serious cash-flow problem and now there had been another theft… Nick had offered to help him out financially, and had put the expertise of the security agency at Carl’s disposal.
Reading the last report, Nick had been confident that this time Carl with the help of the agency and the Spanish police were well on the way to catching the thieves, and then he spotted the name Liza Summers. He had called the manager of the security firm, and discovered that it was none other than THE Liza Summers, the daughter of his mother’s best friend.
Nick had promised to spend the whole weekend in Spain with his mother to attend a series of parties arranged to celebrate the golden-wedding anniversary of her brother, Uncle Thomas. That plan was seriously curtailed when he’d decided to take the place of his top investigator, and make a flying visit to Lanzarote. If anyone was going to question Liza it was going to be him. It was six years since he had seen her, but whatever else she had become he found it hard to believe she could be involved in these thefts as the report suggested.
Which was why it was now almost eleven and he was stuck at the crossing to the drawbridge in Arrecife as a group of tourists, obviously from the cruise ship in the harbour, made their way over the road. Usually he loved visiting Lanzarote, also known as Isla de las Volcanoes. The landscape was surreal, completely covered by over a hundred and thirty volcanoes, with craters and fields of petrified lava. He had owned a villa here for years on the edge of the Timanfaya National Park, as did the king of Spain and the crowned heads of a few Arab countries. It was a place that allowed him to relax out of the public eye and do his own thing. But not today, he thought grimly, his irritation increasing by the minute at the thought of what lay ahead.
The information that had brought Nick dashing to the island caused deep frown lines in his austere but strikingly handsome face as his gaze swept over the scene before him. His hard glance flickered over the kiosk café on the promenade to the taxi rank, where another hold-up was causing chaos. Then abruptly returned to the café, his dark eyes flaring then narrowing on the single female seated at one of the tables.
Long blonde hair tied back with a scarf revealed an exquisite profile, a slender throat and the soft curves of high, firm breasts exposed by a body-hugging blue cotton top. A glimpse of bare midriff, then white cotton trousers moulded long legs that were stretched out before her and crossed at the ankles in casual ease.
His great body tensed. Well! Well! His information was correct, he thought with grim satisfaction.
Carl and the South African police had managed to trail the diamond thieves up through Africa to the Sahara Desert and discovered they then made the short sea-crossing to the island of Lanzarote, where they had disappeared either at sea or on the island. Dalk could have picked up the African thieves, but that was not what he wanted. He wanted the top man in Europe to stop it completely.
The report Nick had read last night from his agency had stated, after they had done some digging on the continent, the trail led to one Henry Brown, a director of Stubbs and Company of London, a well-respected investment ho
use. The top investigator had trailed Henry Brown and discovered he had flown into Lanzarote that day with his PA.
Grinding his teeth in exasperation at the hold-up, Nick still couldn’t get over the fact the man’s PA was none other than Liza Summers. The girl he had known since the age of eight had become the woman now reclining in the chair at the promenade café looking as if she did not have a care in the world… That was about to alter if she did but know it.
Carl Dalk had received a copy of the same report and had been on the telephone to Nick late last night, jubilant as they had almost all the information to spring the trap. The middleman in Lanzarote was the only missing link. Still reeling from shock at the sight of Liza’s name, Nick had had to do some very fast talking to persuade Carl to let him get personally involved and quiz her himself. Laying it on thick about his connection with the island’s police and telling Carl that he had to go anyway to check out a business venture, Nick had made arrangements to travel here at once on his private jet.
It was a conflict of interest Nick could do without. He supported Carl a hundred per cent. It was stealing, blackmail, call it what one liked. But he did not want to believe Liza Summers was involved, and if the worst happened and she was, though he could never condone dishonesty, he had to try and keep her part in the theft low-key and out of the Press. He owed it to the family friendship and the delightful child she had once been.
Eyes black as night raked over her once again, his firm lips curling in a wolfish grin, there was nothing childish about her now. Nick was something of a connoisseur of beautiful women and this one certainly fitted the bill. Things were certainly looking up, he decided; the idea of quizzing the lovely Liza was suddenly very tempting.
Nick watched as the woman removed her sunglasses and looked towards him. No, not him but the drawbridge, he realised, and his hands tightened on the steering wheel at the same time as he felt a sudden tightening in his groin. There was no doubt about it. It was Liza Summers…
His body’s instant reaction surprised him. He had not responded so spontaneously to a female in a long time. He was famed for his cool control and he rather resented his body’s betrayal, but finding Liza so quickly was the first bit of luck he had had all morning. An accidental meeting was much more convenient than calling at her hotel. He had not seen the woman in six years, and if anything she was even more beautiful then he remembered, on the outside at least, he qualified cynically, remembering the task at hand.
Damn the law! He parked the Jeep at the side of the road and leapt out.
‘Liza… Liza Summers…’
Liza clashed her coffee-cup down on the saucer, the deep, drawling voice making her hand shake. Oh, no! Silently she groaned. This could not be happening. She hadn’t heard that voice since she was a teenager. Now, on a tiny island in the middle of the Atlantic it echoed in her head like a ghost from the past.
‘I thought it was you.’
A tall, dark shadow loomed over her, blocking out the sun. Her eyes were on a level with strong masculine thighs clad in denim. She swallowed hard and slowly lifted her head; a tapered waist flared out to a broad chest, every muscle and sinew clearly delineated by a simple black T-shirt, and up to bulging biceps, and even broader shoulders.
She tilted her head back, and her heart skipped a beat; his face was in shadow but she would have recognised him anywhere. ‘You!’ she exclaimed as her blue eyes clashed with deep dark brown. Niculoso Menendez… The years rolled back and she was eight again and meeting him for the first time.
Her father had just died and her mum’s good friend Anna Menendez had invited Liza and her mother, Pamela, for a holiday at her home in Spain. The two women had attended the same boarding-school in England. Anna was the daughter of a Spanish diplomat and Pamela was the daughter of a serving army officer. Anna had married a wealthy Spaniard and Pam had married an army man. The two women had kept in touch over the years, mostly as pen pals.