For what had to be done in the meantime, he bought two cheap black suits, five white drip-dry shirts, two pairs of jeans, two sweatshirts and a forty-dollar parka. That all went into a gym bag.

He needed some walking-around money. There was $40,000 stashed away in a safe in his house in Monroe, but he had no idea if Prescott had alerted the local police, so that was out.

Right now, his staging base had to be here, in New York, where he could disappear while trying to find where Prescott had gone. Drawing cash from Axel’s card on an ATM was impossible without the PIN.

But he had an ATM card on an account in the Caymans he’d opened in the name of Nicholas Clancy. The money came from a very lucrative deal in ex-military arms sold to a rebel Ossetian group, and the bank catered to people precisely like him.

It was essentially a server in a high-rise on Grand Cayman. Its customers never visited. The bank knew what it was there for and what its customers needed, so that bank gave its customers a ten-thousand-dollar-a-day limit on its ATM withdrawals.

Axel’s Platinum card was enough for a suite at the Waldorf for however long it took to formulate his plan. Deaver was grateful to Axel for having made a fortune in the stock market before deciding to save the world by becoming a UN peacekeeper.

Everything about the Waldorf was pure pleasure, starting with the doorman in livery handing him out of the cab. Deaver pressed a fifty in his hand, figuring the word about big tippers would spread. The doorman, dressed like a Ruritanian general, handed the Vuitton and the bag to a bellboy and ushered Deaver into the huge marbled lobby as if Deaver might actually have some problems walking through a door all by himself.

Damn straight. He’d been living rough and hard all his life. Time to change all that, and the Waldorf was just the place to do it, to turn his life around. Ten very pleasant minutes later, he was being showed into his room, about three times the size of most of the quarters he’d lived in as a soldier, and about ten times the size of the house trailer he’d grown up in.

Plush carpeting, antique furniture polished to a high gloss, a big, high four-poster bed, a desk, deep burgundy armchairs, a bowl of shiny fruit, a tall flower arrangement. The Sun King wouldn’t have felt out of place.

His suitcase and bag were neatly laid on a foldup holder. He stepped farther into the room, letting the door close behind him, breathing deeply. Christ, the place smelled rich! It smelled of lemon polish, freshly laundered bed linens, the sweet smells of the flowers.

Yes, this was a perfect place to set up headquarters to hunt down Jack Prescott and get his diamonds back.

In the luxurious shower, it took him half an hour to wash Africa and the long plane trip out of his system, but he had more toiletries to do it with than he’d bought in his entire lifetime.

The sullen winter sky was turning dark when he emerged in jeans, sweatshirt and parka, exiting fast and hailing a cab a block down so the doorman wouldn’t link the sleek businessman who’d arrived an hour before with the ordinary man in ordinary clothes. By the time he came back, there’d be another doorman, and after that it wouldn’t be a problem.

Because Vince Deaver, roughneck soldier, was about to disappear forever.

Summerville

Caroline lay beneath Jack, still recovering from the climax and still astonished at herself that she’d been able to climax like that, without actually making love. Just the feel of him in her, just holding his penis deep inside her, had been enough to set her off. He hadn’t even had to move, really.

Had Jack discovered some key to her she didn’t even know herself? She was usually slow to climax, or at least slow enough that lovers complained. Well…lover. Sanders, actually, while they’d been having their on-again, off-again affair. Affairs.

Sanders considered himself an accomplished lover, she knew. Just like he considered himself a connoisseur of wine, a gourmet, a man with a good eye for art. The fact that she took a long time to come had been a source of friction between them, until Caroline had learned the fine feminine art of faking it.

She hadn’t faked it with Jack. She’d started coming, startling herself, almost before she knew it herself. Her body had just convulsed. Just from the feel of him on her, inside her.

Amazing.

He’d been sprawled bonelessly on her after his own orgasm, but now she could feel the tension of returning consciousness in his muscles. His penis in her stirred. It was just this incredible sensation, feeling him grow hard—harder, because actually he hadn’t softened much even after coming.

She ran a hand over his shoulder, down his back, reveling in the feel of him, so incredibly strong and solid. His spine was an elegantly curved indentation, dense muscles on either side. She followed the furrow down to the small of his back, where a few wiry hairs grew, and on down to his backside. She smoothed her hand over a hard buttock.

It felt so delicious, like a huge apple, and she wanted to take a bite out of it. She couldn’t, so she dug her nails into the flesh of his buttock and felt an immediate response in his penis.

Positively Pavlovian! Caroline nearly laughed with delight. He was primed to respond to her, it seemed. Every movement of her hand corresponded to a movement of his penis in her. It worked for her mouth, too, she discovered as she turned her head and kissed his neck. And when she nipped him lightly, oh my, he jolted, and the penis inside her jumped!

They were carrying on a conversation with their bodies.

Her touch said—do you like this? And his body answered—oh yeah!

His big hands moved in her hair, and he angled his head closer to hers. When he spoke, it was directly in her ear, the vibrations of the deep voice and the puffs of air as he spoke making her shiver, though from the heat of it and not the cold.

“I’m afraid we’re just going to have to stay in bed until the house warms up.”

He didn’t sound too put out. “Oh yes?” Staying in bed with him until the house warmed up sounded wonderful.

“Yeah.” He nuzzled her temple with his nose. “Might take hours.” He sighed, his voice filled with regret as his hand touched her breast. She was somehow primed for this, because all he had to do was touch her, and the skin of her breast warmed. When his thumb glided over her nipple, she felt it, intensely, between her legs. She tightened around him, helplessly. His penis surged inside her, giving her a little electric shock.

Caroline smiled and lifted her arms back around his neck. His shoulders were so broad it was almost impossible for her to embrace him.

“Might,” she answered. “Tough luck for us.”

His mouth had moved to her neck, running his lips up and down the sensitive tendons. She arched her neck to give him better access. It was beyond delightful, feeling his mouth on her neck, giving her little biting kisses.

“So…” He started nibbling on her shoulder, delicate little nips. “What can we do in the meantime? Hmm? Talk?”

“I don’t—” Caroline took in a sharp breath. He’d pulled out of her so far she could feel the huge bulbous head against the lips of her sex, then thrust slowly back into her. She laughed breathlessly. “I can’t talk while you’re doing that!”

“Doing what?” He pulled out again, slid slowly back in again. He was moving with ease. Caroline could feel the wetness of his semen and her own arousal.

In…Out…

“That,” she gasped.

“Tell me about your family. What were they like?”

It took her a moment to realize what he’d said, she was so distracted by the feel of him sliding in and out of her, so slowly she could feel every inch of him.