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With my head lolling against Duncan’s bicep, I glance over at the light. The light I noticed upon entering the basement. I was distracted when Duncan caught up with me, trapped in physical yearning so deep that nothing else mattered. But now…I see that I was right.
There is a makeshift bed on the floor.
Noting the size of the bed, which can accommodate someone close to seven feet tall, I swallow hard. “You’ve been sleeping down here.”
Chapter 9
Thea
Duncan’s arms stiffen around me.
He doesn’t say anything.
“For how long?” I whisper.
I’m not sure why I ask that. I only know that it’s important. That when Duncan walked out into the courtyard the day of my uncle’s funeral, it didn’t feel as if he arrived by mistake. Nor did it feel like the first time we’d been in one another’s presence. That doesn’t make any sense. He’s not someone who could be easily met and forgotten. The idea is laughable. But the feeling remains, insistent.
“Nine days,” he rasps.
A pain begins in the center of my forehead. “But you arrived to pack the art. That was only two nights ago…” His accelerated breathing tells me I’m onto something. That things are not what they seem. Terribly, terribly wrong. “Who are you really?”
“I’m your Duncan,” he says, voice intense. “That is rock-solid truth, angel.”
I want to look up at his face, but I’m scared. I’m scared to move. Fearful of what’s to come. Of this perfect, if new, relationship between us crumbling to the ground. “What have you been doing here all this time?”
Duncan is silent for long moments. “I was sent to…watch your uncle.”
“Why?”
Instead of answering me right away, Duncan climbs to his feet, still holding me in his arms. Paralyzed, I let him carry me toward the light. I watch as his bed comes into view, along with several items from my bedroom. A bottle of my favorite lavender perfume, several pairs of my underwear, a picture of me on the steps of the gallery. He swallows loudly and without glancing up, I know he’s blushing to the tips of his ears.
Maybe there is something wrong with me, but I’m not bothered by the tokens he’s stolen. There is part of me, the part that is infatuated with Duncan, that craves his returned obsession. Loves it, even. I would steal his things, too, if given the chance, wouldn’t I? Objects to hold at night when I can’t hold him?
I’m far more concerned with why he’s been here so long.
And what he’s about to show me.
We move into another room and Duncan turns on the light, revealing a dozen stacked boxes. Art shipment ones, just like he’s been packing with paintings. But as we move closer, I can see there is no art nestled among the stuffing. There is a brown substance wrapped in cellophane. Many packs of it.
I might be naïve and sheltered, but I know what I’m looking at.
“Drugs?”
Duncan makes a sound. “Your uncle was transporting it under the guise of collecting and selling artwork. I’m sorry, Thea. I’m—”
I’m glad he’s holding me, because I grow dizzy enough to almost faint. “No, but…why? Why would he do that? He didn’t need to sell drugs. He…”
“Thea…” Duncan sighs. “It costs a lot of money to maintain a place this size. In his paranoia, he only allowed in two dozen collectors a year and only sold the odd painting…”
All at once, I feel like an absolute idiot.
A child.
All of the art coming in, rarely going out. Rarely being sold. I assumed Gardner had a lot of money from his work as an artist, but he hadn’t sold a personal painting in a decade. Maybe longer. Of course he was making income somewhere else. How obvious that should have been.
“But what does all of this…” I gesture to the boxes. “Have to do with you?”
He goes still as a statue, but perspiration forms on his brow.
“Duncan?”
That thick Adam’s apple slides up and down, his eyes turning to me. Imploring. “I was hired by a man who didn’t want your uncle distributing drugs in his territory. I was just coming here to do a job and then I saw you.” He exhales long and gusty, his eyelids falling. “I saw my angel being held captive in this stone prison by a madman and…I wanted to kill him all the more. But I didn’t, Thea.” He hesitates. “Not on purpose.”
My voice grows muffled in my ears, the words drowning in a turbulent lake.
Duncan isn’t here to pack the art at all. He is a hired assassin.
And I’ve given him my heart. Completely. Irrevocably.
My body. My soul. My secrets.
He took them all while lying to me.
My uncle lied to me, too. I’ve been conned by the only two people in my life.
Am I so stupid? Am I so easily duped?
