Authors: Suzanne Enoch
Tags: #Fiction, #Romance, #Contemporary, #General
Don't Look Down
UZANNE
E
NOCH
DON’T LOOK DOW
N
For my mom, Joan
,
who always knows
both when I need to water my plants
and when I can use a good home-cooked meal
—
and who takes care of both for me
when I’m on deadline
.
I love you, Mom
.
Headlights blazing, a car slowed at the turn-off to the…
Richard Addison awoke before Samantha. He usually did. When most…
Samantha picked the lock of the small, nondescript house on…
Samantha, with Rick seated beside her, drove the Bentley Continental…
Richard propped his head in his hand, watching Samantha as…
Patricia Addison-Wallis lifted her sunglasses and sank down in the…
Richard stuck a finger in his mouth to lick off…
Richard stood in the library window, gazing down at the…
“I hope you’re not planning on signing this thing,” Tom…
As Richard handed his SLR key over to a parking…
“How long are you going to stare out my window?”…
Samantha hated funerals. She’d attended only three in her life—one…
The great white shark shot up through the murky water,…
Samantha parked the Mustang at the Sailfish Club at the…
By seven in the evening, Richard felt they’d nailed the…
Richard sat on the sofa in the bedroom suite, his…
“Is she home?” Richard asked without preamble as Reinaldo met…
Richard sat in one of the wrought-iron bistro chairs on…
“So let me get this straight,” Tom said, slamming a…
“You should probably quit playing around with that,” Rick suggested.
Richard was one stroke away from making a goal when…
Samantha drove into the parking structure and left the Bentley.
Devonshire, England
Wednesday, 1:51 a.m.
H
eadlights blazing, a car slowed at the turn-off to the main house, hesitated, then accelerated down the road and into the dark again.
“Tourists,” Samantha Jellicoe muttered, straightening from her crouch and watching the headlights disappear around the bend. The passersby, both native British and general fame-hunters on vacation, concentrated so much attention on the tall, ornate gates behind her and the barely visible estate house beyond that she could probably stand on her head and juggle and they still wouldn’t notice her there in the shrubbery.
Tempting as scaring the shit out of some amateur paparazzi might be,
not
being seen was kind of the point at the moment. With another glance along the dark roadway, Samantha backed up into the middle of it and took a run at the wall, shoving her toes into a chink in the mortar halfway up and using that for leverage to clamber to the narrow and nicely finished top of the stone.
When she did a burglary, she actually preferred disconnecting the gate alarms and simply going in from the ground, but she happened to know that these gates had embedded wires running through buried pipelines out to the guard house on the north side of the Devonshire property. To deactivate the gates she would have to cut the power to the entire house, which would set off the battery-backed perimeter alarms.
With a slight grin she dropped to the lawn inside. “Not bad,” she murmured to herself. Next she had to navigate past motion detectors and digital video recorders, plus the half-dozen security guards who patrolled the area around the house. Fortunately tonight was breezy, so the motion detectors would be overloaded and the guards tired of monitoring and resetting them. It was always better to go into a property on a windy night, though January in central England meant the windchill took the temperature down to somewhere around freezing.
Pulling a pair of pruners—which doubled as wire cutters—from her pocket, she lopped off a large leafy elm branch. Hefting it, she made her way along the wall to the nearest of the cameras mounted at regular intervals along the perimeter. Maybe her solution to the problem of the digital cameras was simplistic, but hell, she knew from experience that sometimes low-tech was the best way to beat the most complex of systems. Besides, she could see the headline:
CHICK WITH STICK BEATS COUNTRY’S MOST SOPHISTICATED ALARM SYSTEM
. Neaner, neaner.
Swinging the branch, she thudded it across the side and front of the camera, waited a few seconds, then did it again. Matching her pummeling to the rhythm of the wind, she smacked the side and the lens a few more times, then hauled back and slammed the casing hard with the thicker part of the branch. The camera jolted sideways, giving whoever was
monitoring it a great view of a west wing chimney. After a few more swings, she flung the branch over the outside wall and made her way toward the house.
Somebody would probably be out in a few minutes to reset the camera, but by then she’d be inside. Hauling ass out was a lot easier than sneaking into a place. Samantha drew a breath and headed east along the base of the house until she reached the slightly offset wall that designated the kitchen. Kudos to whichever aristocrat five hundred years ago had decided that the kitchen was too dangerous to be set fully into the main house.
The window frames on the ground floor were wired to the alarm system, and the glass was pressure sensitive. No punching through to get in, unless she wanted to wake up everybody in residence. Of course, no one was
in
residence, except for staff and security, but they could phone the police as easily as anybody else.
Making sure the pruners were secure in her pocket, she set a foot onto the narrow window ledge and boosted herself up. A few more careful footholds and she stood on top of the kitchen roof. Fifteen feet up and over, the library balcony beckoned to her.
Unslinging the rope she carried from over her shoulder, she pulled the pruners free and tied one side of the handle tight. On her first toss, it landed on the balcony, and she tugged on the rope to make certain the pruners were wedged tightly between the stone balustrades.
Her heart hammering with a welcome rush of adrenaline, Samantha wrapped her hands into the rope, then stepped off the kitchen roof. For a moment she hung there, swinging slowly back and forth in midair. Once she was certain the rope wouldn’t give, she twined her legs into it and shimmied up to the balcony. God, that had been simple. Frequently,
though, nerves were the only thing that divided the shirtless and smoking thieves who appeared on
Cops
from the ones nobody ever caught. Nerves and a well-made piece of gardening equipment. Totally worth the eighteen pounds she’d paid for it at the local nursery.
Hauling herself over the railing, she detached the pruners from the rope, tucking both back where they belonged. The full-length glass doors leading into the library were closed and locked, but they didn’t worry her. They were wired, of course, but not pressure sensitive. Up this high, they would catch the evening easterly breezes and set off the alarms every five minutes. Nobody wanted to deal with that, even at the expense of inferior security.
She unwound the length of copper wire that braceleted her left wrist, tore off two pieces of duct tape from the miniroll in her pocket, and carefully inserted one end under each door to intercept and bypass the electrical circuit. That done, it was simple to pick the lock and shove open the doors in near total silence. “Piece of cake,” she murmured, hopping down the shallow step and into the room.
The overhead lights flipped on, glaringly bright. Instinctively, Samantha dove sideways, crouching into the remains of the shadows.
Shit
. The servants all should have been in bed, and the owner was in London.
“This is interesting,” a cool male voice drawled in a cultured, slightly faded British accent.
She lowered her shoulders. “What the fuck are you doing here?” she asked, stepping back into the middle of the room and trying to pretend that she hadn’t nearly peed her pants. Despite her nearly foolproof, personally acquired information, obviously the owner
wasn’t
in London.
He stepped away from the light switch. “I live here. Lose your key?”
For a moment Samantha just looked at him. Tall, dark-haired and dreamy, even in jeans and a sweatshirt Richard Addison resembled every young lady’s wet dream. And that didn’t take into account the fact that he was a multibillionaire, or that he did athletic stuff like ski and play polo for recreation. “I was practicing,” she retorted, blowing out her breath. “How did you know I was coming in this way?”
“I’ve been watching you out the windows for half an hour. You’re very stealthy.”
“Now you’re just being a smart ass.”
He nodded, grinning. “Probably.”
“And you have not been here for half an hour, because I hid out by the front gate for forty minutes while some skank pretended to have a flat tire.”
“How do you know she was pretending?”
“Because she had a camera with a big-ass telephoto lens in her toolbox.” She cocked her head at him, assessing his expression. He was damned hard to read; he concealed his emotions for a living. “I bet you got here about five minutes ago, while I was climbing the kitchen wall.”
Rick cleared his throat. “Regardless of when I arrived, this is still the second time I’ve caught you breaking into one of my properties, Samantha.”
So she’d been right about his arrival time. Annoyed as she was at being caught, she had to admit to a certain satisfaction that at the moment this billionaire wet dream belonged to her. “I wasn’t trying to steal anything this time. Don’t get bent out of shape.”
“I’m not bent at all. An explanation, however, would be nice.”
With a shrug she brushed past him, heading through the middle of the enormous library for the hall door. “I spent three hours today listening to John Harding complain about
all the lowlifes and good-for-nothings who want to steal his art collection.” She snorted. “As if any self-respecting thief would want his half-assed Russian miniatures. At least he used to collect silver crucifixes.”
Bare feet padded behind her. “Correct me if I’m wrong, Samantha, but I thought you were going into the business of helping people
protect
their valuables. After all, as I recall, your last robbery ended in a large explosion and the near death of the homeowner as well as yourself.”
“I know, I know. That’s why I retired from the cat burglar business, remember. And that
was
how we met, Mr. Homeowner.”
“I remember, my love. And I thought you were interested in taking on Harding as a client.”
So had she. Apparently she was pickier than either of them had anticipated. “The preventing break-in stuff is okay. It’s the talking to the marks that makes me—”
“Clients,” he interrupted.
“What?”
“You said ‘marks.’ They’re your clients now.”
“Well, Harding
was
a mark. Once. And he’s a boring asshole, not a client. I would never have talked with him if you hadn’t asked me to.”
She heard his slow exhalation of breath. “Splendid. You might have told me you’d robbed him before I went to the trouble of introducing you.”
“I wanted to meet him.”
“Does that give you a rush, to talk to your marks?”
Sam shrugged. “Not much of one. But any rush is a good rush.”
“So you’ve said.” He ran a palm down her spine. “Why is it that you never tried to rob me until that night in Palm Beach?”
She grinned. “Why, do you feel left out?”
“In a way, I suppose so. You already told me you only went after the best.”
There were about a dozen flip responses she could make to that, but in all honesty, it was a question she’d asked herself. “I think it’s because you and your collection were—are—so high-profile. Everybody knows what you own, so if somebody else showed up with it—”
“So my stupendous fame was all that saved me from you?”
“That’s right. But before you start getting holier than thou on me, what are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in London until tomorrow.”
“My meeting ended early, so I decided to drive home—in time, I might add, to prove that you still can’t get anything past me. Maybe
that’s
the real reason you’ve never stolen from me, sweetheart.”
Her spine stiffening, Sam stopped, facing him as they reached the hallway door. “What?”
He nodded. “I caught you red-handed in Florida three months ago, and now here in Devon. It’s probably a good thing you did retire from the cat burglary business.”
Oh, that was enough of that, the superior British ass. Samantha leaned up to kiss him, feeling the surprise of his mouth and then his arms slipping across her shoulders as his body relaxed. She slid the rope off her arm and twisted it around his hands, ducking from beneath his grip.
“Sam—”
She whipped the free end of the rope around him, pulling it tight and knotting his hands across the front of his ribs. “Who’s slipping now?” she asked.
“Take this off,” he snapped, the gloating humor leaving his voice and his expression.
“Nope. You’ve disparaged my abilities.” She pushed
against his chest, and he sat down heavily in one of his Georgian reading chairs. “Apologize.”
“Untie me.”
Ooh, he was mad. Even if she’d been inclined to do so, letting him loose now seemed a supremely bad idea. Besides, she’d been working on a healthy adrenaline high that he’d managed to wreck. Before he could push to his feet, she tied him to the chair with the rest of the rope. “Maybe this’ll convince you not to confront people breaking into your house unless you have something more substantial than charm to defend yourself with.”
“You’re the only one who breaks into my house, and I’m beginning to find it less amusing.”
“Of course you are,” she mused, stepping back to admire her handiwork. “I’m in charge.”
Dark blue eyes met hers. “And apparently into bondage. Naughty, naughty.”
“Apologize, Rick, and I’ll let you go.”
His jaw twitched, his gaze lowering to her mouth. “Let’s say I’m calling your bluff. Do your worst.”
“Ah.” This was getting interesting. “My worst is pretty bad,” she commented, her adrenaline beginning to recover. Tying up Rick Addison. Why hadn’t she thought of this before? “Are you sure you’re up for it?”
“Definitely,” he returned, pushing toward her against the rope.
Slowly, Samantha leaned in and licked the curve of his left ear. “Good.”
He turned his head, catching her mouth in a hard kiss. “So is this what I should expect every time you meet with a client?”
Samantha pulled her pruners from her back pocket, amused at the sudden wariness in his eyes. “Apparently,” she returned, snipping the neck of his sweatshirt and then open
ing up the front of the material to expose his chest and wash-board abs. The first time she’d set eyes on him she’d thought he looked more like a professional soccer player than a businessman, and she still couldn’t quite control the way his body affected her.
“Then I definitely encourage you to expand this business of yours.”
“I don’t want to talk about business right now.” Running her hands up the warm skin of his chest, she followed the caress with her mouth. He moaned as her mouth closed over a nipple, and she went wet.
“How about expansion?” he suggested, his cultured voice a little unsteady at the edges.
With a chuckle she made her way back up to his mouth. At least she seemed to have distracted him from the breaking and entering incident, though if he followed his usual pattern, he’d call her on it later. It was weird, but after three months she was almost getting to the point where she didn’t mind his questions or the way they made her do far too much self-analysis, something she’d previously avoided with a vengeance.
“At least untie my hands,” he suggested.
“Nope. You lost. Suffer the consequences.”
With a shaky breath, still a little unnerved at the way he could break through every defense she had without even trying, she straddled his legs. Deepening their kiss to an open-mouthed Frencher, tongues pushing and shoving as he tried to win back a little dominance, she tangled her fingers into his coal black hair. She could feel him between her thighs, straining at his jeans, and with a satisfied sigh she wriggled her hips.