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Too late to worry about that. Now it’s time to move. Before he wakes up.
If I assumed he’d taken two since he thought they were aspirin, he’d be out all night. But I still couldn’t afford to waste any time. What if the decoder needed all that time to work?
At the threshold of the room, I looked back at his prone form on the bed. Rafe had rolled to his side, his muscular body looking like a sculpture in the soft light from the window. My hands had been over every inch of that magnificent form, and I was still tempted to go back for more. After how insatiable he’d been, I should have been tired. But there was no such thing astoomuch Rafe. The man was more than a snack—he was a full buffet.
I knew how much Rafe wanted me when it was just the two of us, but add in a dose of whatever was in the pills and the effects were stratospheric.
He’d been Rafe, but he wasn’t as gentle as he usually was with me. The desperation in him was evident, in the way he’d gripped me, the grit of his teeth when he slid inside me. All night he’d been on the razor’s edge of tension. And he’d made love to me with a desperation unlike anything I’d seen or felt before.
Maybe he knew you were leaving.
A part of me liked it. Another part of me, the saner part, was worried about how much he held back. He did that for me. Oh yes, we’d made love before. And it was so intense it made my skin burn. But he’d been deliberately gentle with me before. Refusing to let go of control. Tonight there was no more control, and I realized I’d been looking for that.
Up until I’d come here, my life had been so rigid and mapped out. I liked the sense of freedom I felt with Rafe.Well, I won’t have any freedom if I stay here. Get moving.
I shoved aside my guilt and padded down the hall to my room to get dressed. With stark efficiency, I dragged on underwear, yoga pants, and a long-sleeved T-shirt, then a pair of socks.
Five minutes later, I was in his office, pushing the painting to access the safe. I placed the decoder over the keypad and turned it on.
I went back to my room and quietly started packing, checking on the decoder every fifteen minutes or so. After the first hour, I went to the kitchen and started packing food. Once I was gone, I planned to hunker down in my hotel room and figure out my next steps.
My heart skipped a beat at the thought. What if this was it? In the next hour or so, I could be holding the Jewel of the Sea in my hands. I’d spent so long dreaming about recovering my legacy that the thought of being this close was paralyzing.
Let’s not get ahead of myself. The decoder might not even work.
I crept down the hallway toward the office and pushed open the door. Then I gasped.
It was finished. All I had to do was turn the handle.
If I do this, there’s no going back. I don’t get to keep him. I don’t get to pretend that we could have been together.
That thought kept me frozen in position for way too long. Iwantedto be with him. Iwantedto stay. Iwantedto feel his not-so-gentle kiss on my lips. Iwantedto make him lose control again, but next time without the benefit of drugs. I wanted him to be that desperate for me.
The only thing he’ll feel now is desperation to catch me.
No. It was too late for all that. I’d made my bed before I ever came here. Gripping the brushed-nickel handle, I turned it down. The safe gave way with no audible sound. The door cleared to reveal a few folders, several stacks of cash and a thumb drive.
No diamond.
And instead of disappointment, I felt a brief flash of joy that it wasn’t there.
When my thoughts stopped swirling, I reached out and took everything out of the safe. Then I grabbed the tiny laptop Charisse had retrieved for me. I needed to know what was on that drive.
There was just one problem. I wanted Rafe to be the man I’d gotten to know over these past few weeks, not the killer I’d been told he was. Either way, I was going to have to hurt him, and there was no way I was going to get to keep him.
CHAPTERFIFTEEN
Diana
I carefully connected the flash drive to my laptop. The command prompt told me it would take three minutes to decrypt the files, and I wasted no time.
I took the laptop back to my room and set it on the bed. Then I opened the closet to look for something to put my things in, finally settling on a small duffel bag. I’d gathered everything together, but I couldn’t very well carry it all in a shopping bag. Still, I hesitated before taking it, but I knew what I had to do. Funny that after everything I’d done to him, I paused at the thought of stealing his duffel bag.
He’s not going to care about the bag once he realizes what I’ve done.The annoying little voice in the back of my mind just wouldn’t stop pointing out the obvious.
While the files were still opening, I packed the rest of my things. I had to be ready to move. Rafe wouldn’t sleep forever, and I was already pushing it. Maybe part of me was hoping he’d wake early and stop me from leaving. He’d tell me that he didn’t care who I was or that I’d been plotting against him from the start, that he loved me anyway and we could take on the world together.
Yeah, right.
