Smart and Sexy (14 page)

N
oah couldn’t tell if the cart was coming or going, but he didn’t take the time to find out. He just grabbed Bailey’s hand and began running. “Where’s Alan’s suite?”

“Near the spa,” she answered breathlessly. She was huffing and puffing. “It’s behind these buildings, in a separate building beyond the pool.”

They moved that way. Here, the buildings were butted up to the mountain, with only a path between them. There was heavy growth all the way down to the path, mostly manzanita bushes, so it was likely they could vanish effectively if it came to that.

He pulled Bailey along the trail, which as it rose became narrow and rocky. The view would have been breathtaking, maybe on a day where they weren’t on the run from the unknown, a scavenger hunt for God knew what. They ended up behind the first building, which opened up into a huge courtyard pool, and yes…spa.

The pool was built but not filled, surrounded by rocks and alcoves. Beyond the pool, directly against the mountainside, was a smaller building.

The spa.

“It’ll be locked,” Bailey said as they headed toward it.

But it wasn’t, because the doors had been shattered open. Noah couldn’t see what had been used to do so, but he was thinking a bullet.

And he’d bet it’d been shot from the same gun that had shot at them last night, possibly the same gun even now after them.

Not. Good.

“Oh my God,” Bailey said, coming to the same conclusion, pressing closer to his side. “That’s who we just heard.”

Probably, he thought. He pulled her away from the open doors. They moved back around the pool. “Hurry,” he urged, practically dragging her, not taking a breath until he had her behind the two large buildings of the resort, and behind some relative shelter.

“Maybe it’s not what we think,” she said. “It could be anyone.”

Yes, except there was no sign of anyone, or ongoing work, no plane other than his.

They heard the cart again.

Bailey covered her mouth with her hand to hold in her panicked gasp. He put his hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes. “Could they have already gotten what you came for?”

Distress crossed her features. “I don’t know.”

“If they did, it’s over, right?”

She bit her lower lip. “If it’s over, why haven’t they left?”

Yeah. Exactly what he wanted to know. “I need the full story, Bailey. You know I do.”

“It’s money,” she said.

“I figured that, Princess. And it must be a hell of a lot.”

“Alan screwed them out of it.”

“So they’re pissed to boot. Terrific.” Holding her hand, he stepped through the broken glass door, which tinkered at their feet. They stood in what looked to be an elegant, sophisticated reception room. Like the Mammoth resort, it was painted, half-tiled, the reception desk only half-installed. Clearly, construction had abruptly come to a halt.

Behind the reception area was a wide, long hallway, which they followed past a group of rooms for spa treatments, then several others, which opened to a hallway that had a single door at the end.

Pushing Bailey behind him, Noah flattened them both against the wall and listened.

He could hear nothing now.

“Noah?”

With their cart way out front of the two main buildings, it was possible that no one realized they were back here. He wanted to get Bailey back in the Piper, but they couldn’t leave, not until she searched the damn suite.

“Noah.”

“Yeah?”

“What do you mean, you killed her?”

He stared at her. “Are you kidding me? Look, do your thing, search the place for the money and let’s go.” The suite door was locked with a keypad. He punched in six-nine-six-nine, and it clicked open.

He entered, and shook his head. Like at Mammoth, this suite had been finished down to a fine fault, glimmering and shimmering with all the best money could buy.

He glanced at Bailey, who was still looking at him, still waiting for him to—unfuckingbelievable—discuss his “bad date.” “Seriously. We are not doing this now.”

Miraculously, she let it go, and walked farther into the spacious living room, going right up to the prints on the wall, peeking behind each and every piece. “It’s not here,” she said after a minute.

“You sure?”

“Alan loved to hide his safes out in plain sight. It always amused him to sit in his living room surrounded by company and be able to lay his eyes on his fortune and feel superior.”

“Nice.”

“Yeah, I tend to hang around real winners. Ratfink bastards. Murderers.” At this, she looked at him, baiting him, but hell no, she wasn’t getting information out of him that easily, not with the goons still on their tail and closing in, and his own pride prickling because it had taken this, yet another close encounter with gun-toting idiots, to force her to trust him.

Money.

Shit. People got good and dead over disputes with money, and he didn’t want to be one of them.

“You did not kill anyone,” she said.

He sighed again and went to move around her. But she stepped in front of him, and despite the fact that she came up to only his chin, she blocked his path and held her ground. “I just don’t believe for one second you committed murder. I do not.”

His gaze slid to hers and locked on tight. She was serious, standing there with her hands on his chest to hold him there—as if she could really hold him—her attention one-hundred-percent focused on him and not on the fact that they could be shot and killed any second themselves.

You did not kill anyone.

The words she’d spoken had far more meaning than they should, because whether she realized it or not, it meant she believed in him.

Trusted him.

“It was a plane crash,” he heard himself say.

“Oh,” she breathed, her hands softening on him, a gentle caress now instead of fists. “Oh, Noah.”

Why her horror and compassion nearly undid him, after six months of nothing reaching him, was beyond Noah. But he wanted to bury his face in her hair and hold on tight, and never let go. “Look, later, okay?” he ground out instead. “Say, after we get the bad guys off our tail?”

She nodded, but it was a moment before she let go of him, and when she did, he had to fight the urge to grab her back.

Clearly, he’d not gotten enough sleep.

She checked the other rooms in the suite, then shook her head. “It’s not here.”

That was all he needed to know. “Okay, let’s get the hell out of here.” He grabbed her arm when she would have gone back the way they’d come. “They know we’re here somewhere. We have to go out a different way…”

“The kitchen,” she said, and took them there. It led into a private courtyard. From behind the privacy fence, Noah surveyed the area. He could see the pool, the entrance to the other building…and no bad guys.

Bailey came up behind him. “Were you the pilot when you crashed?”

He shot her a look of disbelief. “What part of
later
didn’t you understand?”

“Were you?”

“Yes.”

She put her hands on his back. “I’m sure you did the best you could.”

He had. He goddamn had, but his best hadn’t been enough. And he sure as hell didn’t want to think about this now.

“I don’t see them,” Bailey whispered, looking over his shoulder. “I don’t see anyone.”

Which didn’t mean a damn thing, unfortunately. All he had to do was get them around the pool and back around to the front of the resort to their cart. Then drive it down the hill to the plane.

Without getting shot.

Flattening himself against the corner of the left main building, he peeked out front. Ah, shit. Next to their cart was another.

Empty.

And now the front doors here were broken, too, completely shattered. Someone had gone in there, probably looking for them. “Wait for my signal,” he said, gaze glued on the empty cart. “Then run like hell for our cart.” He wished the cart had a souped-up engine because their getaway was low on horsepower.

“How did it happen?” she whispered. “The crash?”

Craning his neck, he looked into her eyes. “Jesus, you have a one-track mind.”

“Maybe I just care.” She smiled, but it seemed a little uneasy. “More than I wanted to.”

Something to think about. As was the way his heart kicked hard. “Wait here.”

He dodged toward their old putt-putt cart. Reaching beneath it, he disconnected the battery cable, then for good measure, pulled out his penknife and cut through the coil wire.

That should hold them.

He hopped into the goons’ cart, started the engine, and hit the gas, heading toward Bailey. “Get in!”

She leapt over the side, and before her butt even hit the seat, he’d whipped them around and toward the road.

“Get down,” he said, dividing his gaze between the rocky road and their back. Any second now the men would appear—oh, shit, there they were, racing out of the building and toward the old cart. “Get onto the floor, head down!”

“Oh, my God.”

“Do it.” Lifting a hand off the wheel, he fisted it in the back of her sweater and dragged her off her seat and onto the floor. That done, he concentrated on driving them back down the crazy one-lane road toward his plane, which sure as hell better be in the same shape they’d left it because take-off was going to have to happen in a hurry.

From her perch on the floor, Bailey stared up at him, eyes huge. “Are they back there?”

“Yes.” They were attempting to start the cart that Noah had just “adjusted.” “But I disabled our cart so they’ll have to run.” He grinned down at her.

She blinked, then shook her head, then surprised him by grinning back. “You really are Superman.”

No. Hell, no. But if she wanted to think it…

He got them as close to the Piper as he could, coming to a skidding halt and grabbing for Bailey. “Go, go, go.”

Together they ran to the plane. He shoved her inside, then began his precheck at Superman speed, keeping one eye on the road as he did, finally leaping into the pilot’s seat just as he heard voices. The men had given up on their cart and were running down the road toward them, guns out.

Shit.

He’d never flown without a preflight check, never, but he did now, doing his best to rush the take-off without doing anything stupid. He got them in the air and then looked back to find the goons standing in the middle of the runway, clearly furious.

Noah let out a long breath, relaxing marginally. “Safe again.”

Bailey was white-knuckling the armrests, face pale, breathing a bit unevenly, but she nodded. “Yes.” She pressed her face to the window and looked back at the island. “For now,” she said quietly.

He wanted to hug her. Kiss her. Never let her go. He reached for her hand and squeezed. “You okay?”

She looked at him. “Could be better.” She dragged her teeth over her lower lip and gave him an openly coy, sexy look.

He laughed in disbelief. “I can’t—I’m flying, Bailey.”

“No.” She blushed. “Not that! I was thinking it’s a good time for the later thing.”

“Good God, woman, you are seriously tenacious.” But he sighed. “Fine. The crash.” It felt odd to say the word he thought so much about but never said. “I was flying a friend to her condo. There was a storm. I wanted to turn around—” He shook his head. Damn.

Her eyes remained solemn. “You realize this is not a normal bad date story. This is a life-affirming story.”

“Life affirming? She died, Bailey. How is that life affirming?”

“You didn’t,” she said simply.

And wasn’t that just the crux of everything that had been torturing him for six months.

Sheila had died.

And he hadn’t. He, the son-of-a-bitch who’d spent his life cheating death one way or another, hadn’t died.

And a small part of him had thought he deserved to.

Now she reached for him, touching his shoulder, his jaw. “You’re here. Alive. Do you have any idea how glad I am?”

Because that reached out and grabbed him by the throat, he didn’t speak.

Couldn’t.

He slid his sunglasses over his eyes and told himself it was because the ocean sprawled beneath them, a brilliant blue far too bright, and not because he needed to hide a moment. “Where to next?”

“Baja.”

His stomach sank. “What?” She was kidding; she had to be kidding.

“The last resort. It’s in Cabo.”

Shit.
Of course. Why would it be anywhere else than the place of his nightmares? He carefully schooled his reaction, which was a hell of a lot harder than he thought. “They’re going to be waiting.”

She looked at him a long moment, and he knew he must have given something of his nightmare away. “I know.”

He fought the useless battle against those soft, drown-in-me baby blues. “It’s just money, right?”

“
A lot
of money.”

“Whatever. Let it go, let them find it.”

“I don’t think they can find it without me.”

A muscle in his jaw ticked as he realized he still, goddamnit,
still
didn’t know the whole story. If that didn’t just make his day complete. “Fine. Then it’s off to Cabo.”

“Noah, I can’t ask you to—”

“Then don’t ask.” Turning his attention forward, he concentrated on flying and not, absolutely not, begging her to once and for all
trust him
.

T
hey landed at Sky High Air at dusk. Noah tied down the plane himself and looked up at the steel-and-glass building that was his real home.

He wasn’t at all surprised to find Shayne waiting for him. “Don’t start,” he said when Bailey had vanished inside the terminal, heading toward the ladies’ room.

Shayne shoved all ten fingers through his hair, holding it off his face while he stared at Noah. “Don’t start? You’re supposed to be throwing yourself off cliffs with skis on your feet. You’re supposed to be fucking a ski bunny.
Two
, if you’re lucky. Not flying all over the damn planet.”

“Things changed.” Noah turned to Tommy, their lineman, and gestured to the Piper. “Pull her in for the night, fuel her, have maintenance do a run through. I had the landing gear replaced last night. Check that, too. She’s going back out at the crack of dawn to Cabo.”

“Cabo?”
Shayne asked in shock.

“Yeah.” No way was he taking Bailey there tonight. He wanted the night, damn it, wanted it with her in his bed.

He had no idea what
she
would think about that, but he figured he had a fifty-fifty shot. With Shayne on his tail, he went inside the hangar. Bailey was still in the bathroom. He would have stood there and waited for her but Shayne manhandled him into his office, then glared at him. “What are you doing?”

“Waiting for Bailey.”

“Why? You flew her where she needed to go, right? Flight done. We’ll bill it out.”

“She needs another flight.”

“To Cabo, apparently, at the crack of dawn.”

“That’s right,” Noah said.

“I’ll take her.”

“I’m doing it.”

Shayne looked at him for a long moment. “What exactly happened in Mammoth? Why didn’t you ski?”

“She needed some help, Shayne.”

“And you gave it.”

“Yes.”

“You sleep with her?”

“What does that matter?”

“Because you haven’t slept with anyone since Sheila.”

“You told me to stop feeling sorry for myself, remember?”

Shayne sighed. “Okay, I know what this is. Yeah, I told you to stop feeling sorry for yourself. But I did not mean fall for the first woman who hijacked you, Noah.”

“I’m not falling…” He had to clamp his jaw shut because suddenly he couldn’t finish the sentence. Christ. He
was
falling.

Hard.

Shayne was staring at him, horrified. “Have you lost it completely?”

Yeah, completely.

The door opened. Brody came in, brow creased, a frown marring his mouth. “You’ve lost your mind,” he said to Noah as he shut the door.

Which immediately opened again, hitting Brody in the ass, sending him forward a good foot. “Hey,” he complained as Maddie let herself in, stalking right past Brody and up to Noah.

With Maddie, one could never be sure. She could be planning on walloping him or kissing him, so he braced himself, but she pulled him close in a fierce hug and squeezed tight.

Not the typical concierge, she sported purple hair today, tipped in black, spiky around her face in some artfully messed up style that had probably taken hours, wearing some silvery outfit on her grade A hard body guaranteed to make a man’s eyes bug right out of his head. The woman seriously looked like a real-life kick-ass action heroine, only where she kicked ass was in her job.

He allowed her to continue to squeeze the life right out of him because, as he discovered with surprise, she was trembling. “Hey. Hey, I’m okay.” He held her tight, and over her head met Brody’s gaze, which was nothing short of glowering.

Huh. Brody and Maddie had been like oil and water from day one, but this was new. Noah hugged her closer, and Brody’s frown deepened. Noah grinned. Brody took a step toward him, but then Maddie cupped Noah’s face. “You’re
sure
you’re okay?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, then.” And she smacked him upside the back of the head. “Have you lost your ever-loving mind?”

“That’s the general consensus,” he said, and rubbed his head. “And
ouch
.”

Now Brody was the one to grin.

“Don’t even try to tell me it knocked some sense into you,” Maddie said. “I know it damn well didn’t. What the hell were you thinking? Oh, never mind.” She hugged him again. “Just never mind. You’re back. You’re okay.”

“Jeez, don’t smother him,” Brody muttered.

Maddie shot him a glare that matched his own. “It’s called sensitivity, Brody. I know you’re missing that gene, so—”

“Point,” Shayne said dryly. “Let’s stick to the point.”

They all looked at Noah, who lifted his hands. “The point is, she’s got some trouble.”

“Dude, they’re all trouble.” For this, Shayne got his own cuff to the back of the head, courtesy of Maddie. “Well, they are,” he muttered.

“The
real
point,” she said, and once again everyone eyed Noah. “You just started flying again.
Yesterday
,” she clarified, as if he’d forgotten. “After six months of a leave of absence from flying after the accident—”

Brody sucked in a breath.

Shayne did the same.

Because no one, absolutely no one, liked to talk about the accident.

At least no one but Bailey…

“And then you go off for a break, but instead hook up with trouble. Honey,” she said gently, as if she were sixty-five and using a walker, instead of twenty-six and extremely hot. “What I’m trying to say is that on top of everything, Bailey is a walking/talking time bomb. These guys came looking for her, and—”

Noah’s heart stopped. “What guys? When?” Jesus, were they still here? With Bailey out there, unprotected? Fear blocking his throat, he strode to the door, but Brody stepped in front of it.

“They’re gone,” he said. “She’s safe here. You know that. The question is, safe from what?”

Noah tried to push past him, but again Brody blocked him. “They said she owed them big-time, that she was a thief. They said the fact that she was on the run proved them right.”

“Bullshit,” Noah said.

“Which is why we didn’t tell them where she was.”

Noah looked at each of them in turn, and in spite of being cornered, felt a swell of emotion. Yeah, these guys were pains in the ass, but they were
his
pains in the ass. “Look, she’s
in
trouble, not trouble herself, and I’m helping her. Any of you would do the exact same thing. Now, I’ve got to go. Move,” he said to Brody.

Instead, Brody shoved him.

Noah shoved back.

“What, are you guys like eight?” Maddie demanded, but Shayne gently set her aside and stepped between Noah and Brody. He looked into Brody’s eyes. “Back off.” Then he turned to Noah. “The guys are gone. We had them followed. They went to the main terminal. United. They checked on flights to…”

“Cabo,” Noah guessed.

“Bingo. So you going to tell us what we can do to help?”

He looked over Shayne’s shoulder to where Brody stood tall and fierce. Brody rolled his eyes, then nodded. Maddie scooted closer, patting his shoulder. She nodded, too.

Noah sighed. “Okay, I’ll tell you what I know, which granted, isn’t all that much. Alan Sinclair died in debt to some investors, who didn’t take too well to the fact that all their money is gone and none of the resorts are finished.”

“How much?” Maddie asked, skirting around the desk to flip open Shayne’s laptop. Perching a hip on the desk, she leaned over, her fingers fast at work.

“I don’t know.”

“Where did the money go?”

“Don’t know that either. Bailey suspects Alan has hidden a stash somewhere in one of his suites. We’re down to one last suite to check.”

“In Cabo,” Shayne said with disgust.

“I’ll take her,” Brody said.

“Good luck with that,” Shayne muttered.

“I’m taking her,” Noah said.

“See?” Shayne said to Brody. “He’s hook, line, and sinker
gone
.”

Brody made a sound that left no mistake to what he thought of
that
, and Maddie rolled her eyes. “Have you not a single romantic bone in your body?” she demanded.

Brody opened his mouth, then carefully shut it again, eyes shuttered.

Disgusted, Maddie turned her back on him and looked at Noah. “After Baja, then what?”

“Not sure,” Noah admitted. “If we don’t find the money—”

“We,” Brody muttered. “He’s saying ‘we.’”

“If
we
don’t find the money,” Noah continued, “she’s more unsafe than ever.”

“Then
we
find the money,” Shayne said.

Brody sighed. “Now Shayne’s saying
we
. Christ, this is going to get ugly.”

Shayne grinned. “Just like old times, getting ourselves out of every scrape we ever found ourselves in.”

“And there were many,” Brody reminded him. “Always ugly, remember?”

“We never lost,” Shayne said.

Maddie shook her head. “This is about Bailey, remember? Not about the thrill of the fight.”

“Right.” Shayne met Brody’s and Noah’s eyes over Maddie’s head. “For Bailey.”

Bailey stuck her head in the door of the office. “What’s for me?”

She’d clearly dived into her duffle bag of magic tricks because she’d freshened up, including changing.

Now she wore one of those filmy, multi-layered skirts that alternately clung and flew about her legs and hips, with a pale sweater in some sort of stretchy material that under very different circumstances would have made Noah’s mouth run dry. It was a scooped neck, and had a row of teeny tiny buttons down the center, with both the first few and the last few unbuttoned. She could have been going into the classroom for a day of teaching, or to a tea party. Either way, she looked every inch the wealthy, elegant, sophisticated wife of a real estate mogul that she’d once been.

Suddenly everyone who had been all up in Noah’s business scattered in a wave of busywork—Maddie saying something about the phones, Shayne mentioning he had a plane to look at, Brody not explaining himself at all—and in less than two seconds, Noah and Bailey were completely alone.

“You told them everything,” Bailey said flatly.

“Hard to do that, when I don’t know everything.” His gaze was helplessly drawn to the tiny, delicate chain of gold around her neck, which dipped into her scooped neckline and vanished from view in such a way that left him dying to reach into that sweater himself and go fishing.

“Noah…”

He waited, but she sighed and said nothing, and he felt as if someone had just run over his heart. “Forget it. Let’s go.”

“Now?” Her sandals had heels, and were the same pale, pale peach of her sweater. “Okay, good.”

Her toenails were peach too, and on her big right toe was painted a tiny little daisy. Never in his life would he have imagined a thing so flipping sexy, but he couldn’t stop looking at it.

“Where to?” she asked.

He knew she meant which way to the plane. “Do you trust me?”

“Yes,” she said, shocking the hell out of him.

Noah opened his mouth to tell her he was taking her home to his house where they were going to spend the entire night trusting the hell out of each other—naked, hot, and sweaty—but Shayne came down the hallway at a speed faster than his usual laid-back tortoise slow.

“Problem,” he said.

Noah looked into Shayne’s eyes and knew. The men were back.

Shayne whipped open the supply closet.

Noah pushed Bailey inside. “Hang tight,” he told her.

Shayne shut the door on her.

“What—” she asked from the inside, and Noah whipped the door back open, meaning to say something cool but calming. Only instead he kissed her hard and quick. “I’ll be back, don’t make a sound.”

He just hoped that for once, she listened.