fifty paces from her hammock.
“It’s insane,” Padma went on. “Remember when we used to go there? It was so crazy perfect for its time period, but now everything’s all very minimalist. Do you think that’s the kind of place he prefers? Do you think he’s done that to his home on the island?”
“I hope I get a chance to find out.” Lisette spoke without so much as a twinge in her stomach. She’d long ago dealt with the fact that this plan—
A fool’s plan, Marley reminded her.
—meant Lisette would almost certainly find herself getting intimate with Jack Sinclair. Her mother had made such a big deal of it—
It is a big deal!
—but women had sex with men for a thousand reasons, and gaining access to Île des Deux Saints and Le Mystère was the best reason Lisette could imagine.
Besides, he was damn good-looking, too.
“Maybe he just likes staying at $3,000-a-night hotels,” Padma said with a sigh. “I’d like to live like that for a while, to know what it’s like to have the best of everything.”
“Aw, if you had that kind of money, you’d spend it saving the world.”
“Schools, water-treatment centers, clinics, sustainable growth.” Padma sighed again. Those were her passions. When she wasn’t handling electronics on their job, she used her environmental engineering degree to supply clean water around the world. It completed her in the way that returning a person’s lost property completed Lisette.
Padma abruptly swung her feet to the floor. “Come see it. Take your time appreciating it because we have an appointment to return it tomorrow afternoon.”
Lisette followed her into the dining room, where candlesticks and a vase holding a bouquet of flowers had been moved to the sideboard next to a tea set. Padma motioned that way. “The red is in the sugar bowl. And Shepherdess...”
The painting was unrolled in the center of the table, lit by the dozen small bulbs in the chandelier. It was still amazing—still gave Lisette a shiver. She studied it, her fingers itching to mimic the strokes, the colors. Mimic was all she could do. Her talent lay in stealing art, not creating it.
Tomorrow they would return it to a house like this on the other side of town. It would be lovely if Mrs. Maier could hang it in the bedroom once again, but losing a piece once made people cautious. Their recovered treasures usually went into a safe or a safe-deposit box or on loan to a museum. After all, if someone had stolen it once, then precautions must be taken to stop it from happening again.
Lisette and Padma could recover their property, but they couldn’t restore their peace of mind.
And that was a shame.
* * *
Jack didn’t like museums—they were set up specifically to avoid the intimacy needed to truly appreciate the works—but that didn’t mean he hadn’t spent thousands of hours in them. He’d seen the top collections in the world, roaming galleries the way other people hung out in malls, movie theaters and clubs.
The Candalaria wasn’t in the top of its class yet, but David intended to get there. He’d bought the Castle with the intention of housing his collections there but decided a more easily accessible spot in the city would bring in more visitors. Today it certainly had visitors.
Jack’s invitation from last night could have gotten him the VIP treatment at the private entrance half a mile down the road, but he preferred to mingle with normal folk, to wait his turn, entertain himself and count security guards—eight so far.
And, this particular morning at least, to think about Lisette Malone. Was she Bella Donna?
Her plan last night hadn’t been complicated, and it hadn’t gone off flawlessly. She’d taken too long, risking discovery, and she’d had that frozen moment on the balcony before she’d forced herself over the edge. To be fair, though, his showing up had thrown her off schedule, and she would have dealt fine with her fear. There were things he didn’t like to do, but they were easy when the only other options were capture or death.
The Candalaria had only one floor aboveground, with two floors of vaults, offices and work spaces beneath, but the roofline undulating from a mere twenty feet at one end to a hundred or more at the other made it seem huge. There were gardens of every type outside, but few people showed interest in them. Instead, they queued along the sidewalks, awaiting entrance to the museum.
Pushing his hands into his pockets, he studied the people around him. Most looked as if they could be waiting at the local cinema, but the artists stood out: accomplished or novices, young, old and every age in between, carrying backpacks, sketch pads, pencils. An aura of anticipation weaved around them, excitement and appreciation and the fervent desire to someday create pieces of art that would inspire this same feeling in others.
“You can pick the serious artists out of every bunch. They all give off pheromones of canvas, paper, oil and pastels.”
Jack turned to find Lisette—Bella?—Malone standing a few feet away. Her gorgeous black hair curled around her face and down to her shoulders, and her gorgeous legs were covered by tailored black trousers. Last night’s sexy shoes had been traded for flats, no doubt more comfortable for work but not the star of many fantasies. A white shirt topped the trousers, long-sleeved, buttoned down the front, unexpected bits of lace edging the placket on both sides. With a little silver-and-onyx jewelry, she pulled off a look of minimalist elegance.
She tilted her head to one side, studying him. Realizing long moments had passed while he’d done the same to her, he gave himself a mental shake. “Pheromones, right. Sorry. I was more interested in your pheromones at the moment.”
The intensity of her gaze dialed back to what could be described as merely curiosity. “Why are you standing in line? Your invitation gives you access to the VIP entrance.”
He gave her a pleasant smile. “I was in the VIP zoo last night. I’d rather hang out with real people this morning.”
“Really.” She didn’t sound quite convinced.
It was one of the consequences of being born into a family with more money than most nations. Everyone expected him to be spoiled and demanding, to not do mundane things, to be incapable of living daily life without an army of assistants to do the heavy lifting.
He leaned closer to her and caught a whiff of perfume. It was sweet and made him hungry. “When I’m at home, I do all the cleaning, cooking, laundry and toilet-scrubbing myself.” It was true, too, though he spent only two or three months a year in the house he considered home. The rest of the time he traveled, staying in hotels or Sinclair family homes, always fully staffed with people ready to meet his every need. “Was it as impressive as you expected it to be?”
Her forehead wrinkled, tiny lines fanning away from the delicate arch of her brows. “The party?”
A lesser man might have bought her confusion, but Jack knew how to convey perfect confusion, too, as well as perfect innocence. “Shepherdess.”
Nothing flinched, nothing twitched, her gaze didn’t shift away, her eyes didn’t grow smokier or rounder or flare with alarm. Damn, she was good.
“You must have
