The First Billion

"Only with the truth." Gavallan nodded subtly for her to go along. "I told him about Pillonel's confession and that my attorney in the States will turn over the due diligence reports if he doesn't hear from us. I told him I wanted the fifty million back from the bridge loan and that we had all better be on a plane to the States tomorrow. Graf included."

Kobe Bryant swished a three-point bomb and the crowd at the Staples Center went crazy.

Cate cast her head to one side. "Did he agree?"

Gavallan heard the hope in her voice. "No. He's convinced I'm lying. Says he'll find out for himself tomorrow whether I'm telling the truth."

"What does that mean?" Cate looked away, and when her eyes returned to him they carried the dreadful intent of her father's words. "No, Jett, he can't. You've got to-"

"Shh." Gavallan nodded reassuringly. "I'll be all right. He still needs me. I have the feeling he can't walk away from this deal."

"So did I," said Cate. "There's more to this than just Mercury's continued success as a company. It's much more than a mere business matter- Mercury's grown larger than just an initial public offering."

Gavallan rose and walked to the window, drawing back the curtain and peeking outside. The view gave onto an interior courtyard where two of Kirov's Suburbans were parked. A trio of guards were busy giving the SUVs the chauffeur's professional polish, leaning their butts against the chassis, talking furtively, and smoking cigarettes. Each cradled an Uzi beneath his arm. Gavallan tried to open the window but found it locked. The frame had been nailed to the sill.

Releasing the curtain, he took a second look at his carpeted prison cell. The room was large and luxuriously decorated in shades of brown and ochre, with a wooden four-poster bed, a sofa, a desk, a wet bar, a plasma-screen television hanging from one wall, and what looked like an authentic Matisse hanging from another. Welcome to the Stalag Four Seasons.

"Looks like we're here for the duration."

"The duration?"

"Of the night." He refused to think about the next day, about Kirov's keen desire to find out exactly what he did or did not know about the Russian's operations.

"I know you wanted to get me alone," said Cate, "but isn't this a bit much?"

"Hey, you know what we Boy Scouts say: 'Take it where you can get it.' "

"Very romantic."

Gavallan slid his arm around her waist and drew her near him so that their shoulders were rubbing against each other. Turning toward her, he lifted her jaw with the tip of his finger. He looked at her eyes, serious, compassionate, and defiant, and the faint circles beneath them; at her cheeks wiped clean of blush; at her broken lip stern, uncompromising, slightly aquiver. "You don't look so bad all rough-and-tumble, Miss Magnus."

"It's Kirov. Better get used to it."

"Okay, Miss Kirov. But not for long."

"Is that a promise?"

He answered with a kiss, gentle as a candle's breath.

"Oww," she moaned, smiling. She stood. "Stay here a second." Opening her night bag, she went round the room and covered the Matisse with a skirt, the mirror with a pair of pants, and the triptych of Moscow by night with her blouse. "I don't care if my father hears me," she said, "but I'll be damned if I let him see me."

***

He always began with her shoulders. The skin there was a shade darker, more luminous, an intimation of her mysterious self. Gently, he pulled her shirt away and kissed her, breathing deeply to get the scent of her, enjoying the firm response of her flesh, feeling the muscles quiver at his touch. He kissed her neck, the cusp of her jaw, and then, unable to wait any longer, he lay her down on the bed. She threw her arms above her head and narrowed her eyes. It was a temporary capitulation, a tactical maneuver to lure him helter-skelter into her ambush. She moaned, and he could feel himself falling into her, a boundless, head-over-heels plunge into a warm, velvety abyss.

Somewhere within him he found the power to stop, if only for a second. He raised himself on an elbow to look at her. He saw not just her beauty but the sum of her self staring back at him: her strength, her courage, her will. Her humor, her obstinance, her frailty, her fear. She met his gaze, and her frank ardor roused in him a heady sensation, a cocktail equal parts respect, desire, honor, and lust that he had come to recognize as love.

"Jett."

Her voice was husky, ripe, unfulfilled. Raising a hand to the back of his head, she ran her lithe fingers through his hair and pulled him to her.

He surrendered.

***