His groin tightened at the thought of her sucking him off.
Damn, she was sexy. Drop-dead gorgeous, with long, sculpted legs and a curvy hourglass figure. She’d sent his pulse into the red zone with her beautiful face, shimmering emerald irises, and those full, plump, crimson-colored lips he desperately wanted to feel wrapped around his cock.
He hadn’t been kidding when he’d told her that if he’d known what she looked like, how sultry and sassy she was, he wouldn’t have led Scarlet on a wild-goose chase. He hadn’t wanted to deal with her at all when he’d learned she was an insurance fraud investigator—and had known instinctively the exact case she was probing into.
But he really didn’t give a damn now about her profession or her cause. Now all that registered was her silky skin, the soft hitches of her breath, and the tremors along her spine when he touched her.
The woman had him hot and bothered—from the moment he’d glanced up from his phone and found her standing defiantly in front of his table. He wanted her, plain and simple.
And Michael Vandenberg was a man who always got what he wanted.
So while his COO, CGC, and CFO hashed out details of this next investment, debated contract terms and conditions, and each gave their two cents’ worth on the pros and cons of the latest acquisition, Michael let all the background noise and advice simmer in his head as he typed out an e-mail message to his personal butler at the Crestmont and shot it off, wondering if Scarlet Drake would take the bait he intrepidly offered.…
TWO
Scarlet had just walked into her hotel room at the St. Francis and was slipping off her high heels when there was a soft knock on the door.
“Delivery for Miss Drake,” came a male voice from the other side.
At nearly twelve o’clock at night?
She frowned. But her inquisitive nature couldn’t resist. She peered through the peephole to find a uniformed employee patiently waiting for her—cap, gloves, name tag, and all. Official looking enough, yet she kept her purse in hand, where her 9mm was concealed, as she pulled back the security latch, flipped the lock, and opened the door.
“My apologies for disturbing you,” he said. “The front desk alerted me that you’d arrived back at the hotel.” He handed over a formal white envelope and added, “This is for you. Have a nice evening.”
He turned to go, but she hastily said, “Wait.” And tucked the packet under her arm so that she could retrieve a tip from her clutch.
“Thank you, but that’s not necessary,” the deliveryman told her as she fished out the cash. “The gratuity has been taken care of.” He whirled around in his polished shoes and marched down the hallway toward the bank of elevators.
Scarlet closed the door and engaged the dead bolt. She set her handbag on the entryway table and then eyed the envelope with her name elegantly scrawled across it in thick black ink.
Excitement rippled through her over a secret missive as the clock inched toward midnight.
Her love of intrigue was genetic. Her grandmother, who’d raised her in the wine country of River Cross, California, after Scarlet’s parents had died, was an international best-selling mystery writer. Scarlet’s parents had been super-sleuths themselves, her father for a global law firm and her mother for a private investigator here in San Fran.
She missed them dearly but was grateful for the traits they’d passed on to her and felt equally blessed to have had her gran look after her.
Scarlet crossed to the desk, where she’d spied a silver-plated letter opener when she’d unpacked her clothes earlier. She’d had to make a reservation at the St. Francis overlooking Union Square, rather than the Crestmont—where Vandenberg was residing this evening—because that particular hotel was booked several months in advance, amidst its grand opening. And she did not possess the same influence as the real estate mogul to score a room.
Though Scarlet’s home in River Cross was little more than an hour away, she’d planned to stay in the city, not knowing how late it would be if she eventually met up with the elusive Michael Vandenberg or whether she’d need to hop on another plane to try to catch him elsewhere.
One of her best friends, wine heiress Jewel Catalano, had gotten her assistant at Catalano Enterprises to strike up a conversation with Vandenberg’s assistant, and that had gone a long way in aiding Scarlet’s attempt to pin down precisely where Vandenberg was supposed to be tonight and when, so that she could finally say she’d had a successful trip chasing the shadowy man who fascinated her beyond all belief.
And who would land her a hefty bonus if she could prove he had, indeed, pilfered the paintings from his father’s estate—or served as an accomplice to the larceny. All verifying that the claim submitted years ago had been under fraudulent terms.
Her excitement escalated as she slid the tip of the opener behind the flap and then extracted a note card in heavy stock that had one short line of text centered in the middle, in the same script and glossy ink that matched the front of the packet.
Let’s make it a date. Michael
Flames instantly blazed over her skin.
Okay, perhaps she was a bit too attracted to him. Definitely a bad thing in all capacities.
The man was so very far out of her league—a woman who hadn’t had sex in longer than she cared to admit. Not to mention, he was well out of her tax bracket. By a lot.
And then there was that tedious little matter of her suspecting he was the mastermind behind a crime that had never been solved. Not a single piece from that entire missing collection had ever hit an auction house or black market or was listed as a private sale.
So if the artwork had never been fenced, the thief or thieves wouldn’t have gained monetarily beyond that insurance check, or a portion thereof, for felonious services rendered.