Blood Knot (24 page)

Winter rolled her head to look at Sebastian, next to her. He was a still, silent, wounded form leaning against the window.

“
It’s still better to know it all,” she said softly. “Later on, I’ll be grateful you told me.”

He made a soft noise. “I hope you know what you’re doing. Right now I feel like a white hot poker is turning circles in my torso, Winter. I don’t have your internal off switch.”

Winter lifted a hand toward him. She could offer to ease his pain. Reach inside him and soothe the agony. But suddenly she did not trust herself to touch Sebastian at all. She put her hand back on the windowsill and let the silence stretch out again.

“
You two look less than happy,” Nial said.

Winter looked toward the kitchen. Nial dropped his jacket over the sofa as she turned her head. He had quietly slipped into the apartment as they wallowed in their misery.

“
Then it’s game, set and match,” Sebastian replied, standing up and heading for the table where most of the paperwork for the job was laid out. “I feel fucking wonderful, too. Let’s get this job wrapped up and done, shall we?”

Nial rolled up the sleeves of his business shirt and loosed the tie. “If you like,” he agreed easily. “I was going to suggest we all go out tonight. The three of us. Dinner and a show.”

“
For which you magically have tickets?” Sebastian replied.

“
I got them this afternoon.” Nial paused to press his lips to Winter’s. “You look pale,
dilecta
,” he added softly.

“
My mood is not spectacular either, Nial,” she warned. “Although if you went to such trouble…”

“
One of our marks will be at Sorrento’s tonight,” Nial added.

Sebastian threw the notepad he had picked up back onto the table with a sharp slap and stared out the window. “What time is our table booked?” he asked with a remote tone.

“
Six-thirty,” Nial replied.

“
I’ll go and get ready,” Winter told him, pushing herself away from the security of the windowsill with a silent sigh.

* * * * *

There was a dress bag lying on the bed when she got out of the shower, which filled in more of Nial’s afternoon activities for her.

The filmy dark green beaded concoction she revealed when she unzipped the bag was seductive and gorgeous. It suited her perfectly, which didn’t surprise her. Nial had good taste and knew what he liked, and had spent the night running his hands all over her, so he knew her sizing intimately.

It made sense for him to arrange that she have a suitable dress for the job ahead tonight. She just hoped he remembered shoes and smiled when she found them in a box at the foot of the bed.

There was a satin and chiffon stoll to cover her bare shoulders and back. Winter pinned her hair in big loose rolls at the back of her head, which hid the pins, and let the rest cascade down her back.

She couldn’t help but admire the total effect in the mirror. They were working tonight, but she was going to enjoy the stunning effect from moment to moment, anyway. Nial couldn’t have picked a better dress for her if this had been a personal date and he had been set on making her feel like a princess. But if it had been a personal evening, she wouldn’t have let him buy a dress for her in the first place.

She twirled once more and watched herself in the mirror, smiling a Cheshire cat grin. For now she could enjoy a dress she would never have bought for herself, and being on the arm of a man that most of New York would glance at twice. It would be fun, when she paused long enough to enjoy it.

* * * * *

The mark’s name was Martie Shakeel. He was a recently made junior partner in the firm and trying hard to move up and tonight, oddly, he was dining with friends, not clients.

Perhaps that’s why he felt it was okay to blow them off, because even while he and his two male friends were waiting for their table, sitting in the lounge, Martie Shakeel spotted Winter sitting at the bar with Nial and Sebastian and made a move.

That was fine. All three of them had been ready for something unexpected like that to happen. They were professionals, after all. Coping with the unexpected was part of the routine.

None of them had factored in that Shakeel was a serial date rapist, though.

WINTER GOT HER FIRST hint when Martie bought her a drink at the bar. He was practiced at separating her from her friends and establishing her precise relationship to them. He did it fast and smoothly. He spotted her ring, although that didn’t seem to bother him overly much, either.

Nial and Sebastian she explained with a quick shrug. “My friends. They’re partners. My husband is in DC on business and they’re taking me to a show tonight to keep me from going out of my mind with boredom.”

Martie grinned. “Your husband is in the House?”

“
Congressional aide,” Winter corrected downwards. Power, but not too much of it.

Martie coaxed her to a low table and armchairs inside three minutes, although she didn’t try to protest too hard. Time alone with him would give her valuable information for later, if she met him in the corridors of the Flatiron building and needed to draw him close enough to touch him. To disable him.

For right now, she could milk him for information about his company just by being interested in him. So she played the part and let him buy her a drink.

The first few mouthfuls told her something was wrong. She analysed her response to the Whiskey Sour, spotting complex acid chains and adjusting her body chemistry to break them down into harmless molecules, puzzled over the strong reaction.

After a couple of minutes, Martie leaned closer. “The blond guy, your friend…he’s staring at me like he wants to bury an axe in my chest. They’re really a couple, those two?”

Winter looked over her shoulder. Sebastian was clutching his glass. Just as Martie said, he was glaring and brooding. But Nial didn’t look any happier, either. He was just doing a better job of hiding it.

Winter sighed. “Sebastian lost tonight’s bet. Nial got to pick my dress. I’ll go mend fences and be right back. Do you mind?”

“
As long as you agree to have dinner with me,” Martie replied.

She hesitated. The traces of the chemical still swirling through her system bothered her. But this was a priceless opportunity. So she smiled at him, a warm, slow sexy smile that implied far more than she intended. “I’d love to.”

And she hurried over to Nial and Sebastian. “For heaven’s sake, Sebastian, will you pull yourself together? You look like you want to murder the guy!”

Sebastian took a slug from his glass. “I do,” he said. He looked at her, his green eyes glittering with emotion. “Deal with it,” he said flatly.

“
It’s a job. We’ve done a hundred of them,” she said, working hard to keep her voice low. She turned to Nial. “Help me out here.”

Nial lifted the glass of ruby red wine to his lips, pretended to sip and put it back on the counter. “You would have me say what, Winter? That Sebastian should calmly sit here and watch that ape paw you?” The corner of his jaw flexed. He looked at her and although his expression was calm, for a moment she glimpsed a storm of emotions in his gaze. “I have lost my taste for hypocrisy. You can thank yourself for the change in diet.”

A waiter approached them. “Your table is ready for you now.”

Winter felt the fine edges of fury touch her. “We’re
working
,” she hissed. “You’re going to make this personal?”

Sebastian drained his glass. “It is personal, Winter. It comes with the territory. There’s no separating it. You’ve just never figured that out.”

Time was ticking away. She held out her hand, feeling helpless under the pull of it. “Martie wants me to join him for dinner,” she said. “I can’t pass this up.”

“
Then you’d better go join him for dinner,” Nial replied.

Sebastian exhaled heavily.

Nial rested his hand on Sebastian’s forearm where he was propping himself on the bar and stood up. “Let’s go and get you fed, Bastian,” he said. “You need to soak up some of that whiskey.”

“
Preferably the other side of the dining room from where they’re sitting. I don’t want to watch Shakeel drooling down Winter’s cleavage while I eat,” Sebastian replied. He didn’t look at Winter as he got to his feet.

Winter stared at them, hurt slicing through her with the sharp pain of a paper cut. They were going to leave her here? Just like that?

They were stepping past her, preparing to follow the waiter. Her heart almost halted in terror.

Nial turned to her. “I would kiss you,” he said in an undertone. “But Shakeel is watching and would get the wrong impression. Enjoy your meal, Winter.” He gave her a neutral smile that didn’t reach his eyes. The blue remained shielded.

Winter wanted to wrap herself about him and seek reassurance that Nial still wanted her, that he would be waiting for her when this awful task was over. She just wanted a sign. Something, some small thing.

But Nial and Sebastian were already threading their way between the big overstuffed leather armchairs, following the waiter past the towers of bottled wine into the dining room beyond.

She made herself turn back to Shakeel and not watch them any longer. To continue to stare after them would be unnatural for someone who was just friends.

Martie Shakeel was watching her, though. His eyes were narrowed. Thoughtful.

Winter made herself smile at him. And then she remembered the chemical traces in her system. She hadn’t been able to tell Nial and Sebastian about them.

She worked over the puzzle as she walked back to her chair beside Shakeel. She had taught herself enough bio-chemistry and straight biology theory to rival a university graduate simply to know more about what it was she did when she went inside people. As her personal wealth had increase and her access to resources had become more plentiful, she had tapped into some of the world’s cutting edge sources of information on bio-chemistry and biology. She kept herself up to date and informed in these fields.

Now, as she walked back to the armchair, she recalled the acid chain she had found in her body and identified it based purely on its structure: Gamma-Hydroxybutyric acid.

Winter’s confident walk missed a beat.

GHB
. Shakeel had slipped a date rape drug into her drink. Now he was watching her for signs of it kicking in. And yes, her little stumble had brought a smile to his face.

Fear touched her. She had to keep walking toward him, although Winter really wanted to run back to Nial and Sebastian. If she did that, though, she would be jeopardising not just tonight, but the Flatiron job, too.

Shakeel sat back in his armchair, suddenly much more relaxed and cheerful.

Winter let herself half fall into her chair, rather than lowering herself into it. “Ooops.” She clutched at the arms and blinked. “Woah!” She widened her eyes and looked at him as if she were trying to focus. “I think all the flying I’ve done lately is starting to kick in.”

“
Jet lag?” Shakeel asked.

“
Must be.” She forced herself to sit up. “Anyway, where were we?” She plastered a sunny smile on her face. “Dinner?” she asked.

Martie Shakeel smiled. The smile spread slowly, like melting butter. “Are you so sure you’re in the mood to eat, Winter?”

Winter kept her smile in place, but her heart seemed to want to squeeze shut and her stomach dropped. Shakeel wasn’t even going to bother getting her into the dining room where Nial and Sebastian could see her signal them. He was going to take her from right here in the lounge.

“
I’m starving,” Winter told him, drawling out the second word. She added a giggle for good measure and tilted her head to look at him like someone who was totally out of their skull and heading into deeper territory with every passing second.

The scary part was, Winter was clearly not over-playing her reactions. Shakeel looked more comfortable and casual by the minute. He was used to this helpless, more-than-legless reaction. How much GHB had he slipped her? She had thought the Whiskey Sour was strong, but figured he’d simply bought her a double….

Martie Shakeel was too practiced at this. It was
routine
.

Winter nearly moaned aloud at the thought.

Shakeel leaned over the wide arms of the chairs, so that his handsome face with the high forehead and thick, well-groomed hair was inches from hers. “I can give you everything you need to eat,” he told her in an undertone. “You’ll love it.”

“
I will?” Winter asked, making herself sound vague and uncertain.

“
Out in my car. Outside. Out in the cool air. The cool, cool air,” Shakeel murmured. “Out where the air can play on your skin. Your beautiful skin.”

Winter closed her eyes, as if they were drifting shut in a haze of delight as she imagined a cool breeze playing over her flesh.

The needle slapped into her arm with such speed and precision Winter barely over-rode the need to jump or scream her shock.

The auto-injector squirted cold liquid into her system that immediately turned hot, before she could scramble to deal with it. She was slowed by her shock, by the unexpectedness of the attack. Shakeel had already dosed her. Why a second drug?