“Thank you.” The young woman—Brittany, her name tag claimed—ran the card before giving her a bright smile as the payment went through. “Will you be staying with us the full length of the reservation?”

So much for Dawg being unaware where she had stayed.

Piper shook her head as she slid a tip to the girl. “I’m checking out tonight. Could you please have a car waiting in about an hour to take me to the train station, and send the bellhop up for my luggage?”

She should never have gone shopping that morning. There were bags of additional materials in her room that she would now have to try to stuff into the single extra duffel bag she’d packed rather than purchasing another, as she’d planned.

“I’ll make certain of it.” Brittany’s smile was too cheerful.

Piper quickly turned and headed for the elevators as she tucked her card back into the planner’s clear zippered pocket.

As she did so, a phone number caught her eye.

Jed Booker. The number was scrawled under his name in the neat, no-nonsense handwriting he used.

She should have invited him to come with her, she sighed wearily to herself. Eldon Vessante would have never tried anything so stupid if Jed had been with her. She had a feeling Mr. Vessante would have been far less likely to stuff that sock in his pants, or to make such an outrageous demand.

He would have simply told her he had changed his mind the first chance he had, which would have suited her fine.

Stepping into the elevator, she told herself it didn’t matter. If it was meant to be, it would be; it was that simple.

That phone number glared back at her, though, until she snapped the planner closed. She didn’t push it back into her purse, however. She held on to it even though she’d already both memorized the number and programmed it into her smart phone.

Yes, if she had brought Jed, she had no doubt the night would have been far less disappointing and much more interesting.

One thing was certain: Jed so did not stuff his crotch with anything but what God had given him. And God had been generous.

* * *

Rudy Genoa stared at the disgusting, bloodied face of the car rental agency manager with bitter fury.

He was tied, in a rather clichéd style, to an old-fashioned wooden office chair, because he was too damned cheap to buy the nice, if inexpensive, computer chairs that were so easy to find.

It had worked to restrain him, though.

Duct tape secured his wrists to the arms of the chair and his ankles to the legs. His face was swollen and pale beneath the blood that marred it. The top of his balding head was splattered with his blood, calling attention to the fact that perhaps he’d lost more hair since the last time Rudy had seen him several months ago.

Chester’s head lolled to the side a bit, while small, bloody bubbles filled and deflated at his nostrils with each breath.

He really was a distressing sight, but it couldn’t be helped. Rudy was furious. The loss of the delivery had the potential to do far more than just embarrass him. The loss of that delivery could bring some very nasty individuals into his town looking for him. The type of men one preferred not to piss off. Even one with Rudy’s power.

He couldn’t believe the stupidity.

This was what you got for trying to trust family to do a job right.

“Did you think I would just let this go, Chester?” Rudy asked as he straddled the chair he’d pulled over to the balding, overweight little bastard.

“Rudy, please.” Sloppy, bleeding, one eye swollen shut, his lips split by the heavy fist that had pounded into them, Chester wept pitifully. “I did like you said; I swear. It was that new girl. She rented the car out.”

“And now the delivery that came in with that car is missing,” Rudy stated softly. “We checked it thoroughly.”

“Please.” Chester choked. “You owe me, Rudy. You owe me. I’ll get them back. I swear I will.”

He owed him.

Rudy agreed with his cousin for a change.

A six-year stint in prison for a crime he had been nowhere near had earned Chester a hell of a boon. But this . . .

Rudy shook his head as he propped his arms on the back of the chair he was straddling. Six years in prison for the rape of Rudy’s rival’s mistress came nowhere close to the millions of dollars in diamonds, sapphires, and rubies that were now missing.

The slightest awareness of another presence behind him had Rudy waiting patiently, the familiar lack of sound in his son’s movements pleasing.

“I checked the security tapes. She arrived about ten minutes before we did, messed around in the backseat, looks like she knocked over a bag onto the back floorboard. We found a receipt pushed beneath one of the seats for a craft seller for colored crystals and stones. There’s a chance the woman doesn’t know what she has.” There was no opinion either way in the boy’s voice.

Well, perhaps Andre wasn’t a boy anymore, but as his mother would say, he would always be Rudy’s boy.

“And her name?” Rudy asked.

At his son’s lack of an answer, Rudy turned to stare back at him with a frown. Rarely had Rudy seen this expression on Andre’s face.

That look of concern.

Trepidation began to tingle in Rudy’s gut.

“Piper Mackay, from Somerset, Kentucky.” The words were a harsh rasp of anger from a man who rarely allowed himself to show any emotion. “The investigation I did on the family after Marlena’s disappearance says she’s James ‘Dawg’ Mackay’s sister.”

But now, Rudy knew why his son had hesitated to give him the information.

Dawg, Rowdy, and Natches Mackay had not just been instrumental in foiling Marlena Genoa’s plot to kill John Walker Jr. for breaking their engagement, but had also managed to kill Gerard Andrews, the sponsor backing her acceptance into the Genoa family.

“Coincidence?” Rudy asked.

“She’s staying at a hotel no more than two blocks from here,” his son answered. “Chester knows the manager there, from what I’ve gathered.”

Andre didn’t confirm or deny the theory of coincidence, though Rudy knew he didn’t believe in such a thing. Rudy believed, though. He’d seen far stranger occurrences in his lifetime that could be explained no other way.

“This is a complication.” Rudy sighed, turning back to glower at Chester. “Why is she here, in the city?”

“According to our contact at the hotel, she’s a clothing designer. She was here for a meeting with a backer,” his son informed him as Rudy stared at Chester, his eyes narrowed with a fury he found hard to control. “Getting into her room won’t be a problem. Once I get in, I’ll restrain her and reacquire our property. That should be the end of it.”

“Take two men with you,” Rudy ordered as he glanced at the brute standing behind Chester. “Send them in. This is a matter you oversee, not one you do yourself.”

The boy had a tendency to micromanage shit.

“I’ll take care of it,” Andre promised, and Rudy knew he could depend on him. Of all the men he commanded, it was Andre he trusted above all others to ensure the job was taken care of quickly and correctly.

“Very well.” Rudy sighed. “And, Andre, don’t let your men kill the girl. Make it look like a random burglary. We don’t need the Mackays and their government sidekicks in our town.”

“Agreed.” Andre nodded shortly before turning and leaving the room once again.

Rudy turned back to Chester.

“See, it wasn’t my fault, Rudy. It was that girl you hired. She let the car out and I told her not to,” Chester whined. “You don’t have to kill me.”

“True,” Rudy agreed, ignoring the hope that suddenly filled his third cousin’s abused features. “This is very true.”

The girl was Rudy’s illegitimate daughter. She was his favorite child, and this incompetent fool thought to place the blame on her? The poor bastard had just signed his own death warrant.

His gaze flicked to the heavily muscled ex-boxer, the Brute, as Rudy called him, standing behind the other man. The one whose fists had made hamburger out of Chester’s face earlier.

The large head nodded as the ex-boxer, Jones Morley, read the silent look in Rudy’s eyes. The weapon he carried with its silencer attached came up as Rudy moved away from the other man.

A second later, a heavy pop sounded behind him, and Rudy knew he would never have to worry about Chester screwing up again.

The nerve of him anyway, blaming an innocent child for a mistake that should have never happened.

“I hardly think my precious little Asta was at fault in the least,” he said as Jones followed him from the room. “What do you think?”

“Asta’s no dummy,” the other man stated, bringing a glow of pride rushing through Rudy. “I kind of doubt she would have rented the vehicle if she was told specifically not to do so.”

Moving ahead of him, Jones quickly opened the door leading from the office and stood back as Rudy stepped through.

“Get rid of the body,” Rudy ordered the two men waiting outside. “Then return to the house.”

Striding from the office, Rudy left the building and walked quickly to the black SUV his driver, Danny, was standing beside.

The moment the doors to the office had opened, his nephew, Danny, was striding around the vehicle. Tall and imposing, Danny was as much a bodyguard as a chauffeur. Dark Italian heritage was reflected in his features, while strong American stock was reflected in his tall, stout body. Before Rudy could reach it, his door was open, the comfortable leather interior and an even more comfortable silk-skinned mistress awaiting him inside.

The mistress held no appeal for him tonight, though. The potential for disaster was rising with each minute that Andre hadn’t called him to report he had the gems. Every second those jewels were out of his possession, the closer disaster came in the form of some very nasty members of the Russian Mafia.

The Mackay woman would end up destroying Rudy’s base of power if he wasn’t extremely careful.

Or rather, the woman’s family would.

That damned brother, Dawg, and her cousins, Rowdy and Natches, and the men and women they called friends who were part of the Department of Homeland Security were dangerous. Especially that little misfit Timothy Cranston.

They were a force no criminal wanted to call the attention of. Rudy’d lost a very influential lawyer and a rather promising family member he was very fond of to the Kentucky natives.

His niece Marlena Genoa, and her sponsor back into the family, Gerard Andrews, had been taken out with such efficiency it had been shocking.

They had gone to Kentucky to seek retribution against Marlena’s ex-fiancé when he had broken their engagement five years before. Neither had returned, and Marlena’s body had never been found.

Poor Marlena. First her father had turned against the Genoa family, effectively ensuring she was no longer part of the base of power and wealth Rudy controlled. Then, she had let the prominent fiancé she had managed to snare slip from her fingers. Which wouldn’t have been so bad if she hadn’t promised to secure him, and his father’s prestigious law firm, for the Genoa family. When a promise was made, it must be kept. Or retribution must be established and restitution made. Once John Walker broke their engagement, the Genoa family demanded restitution, a small portion of the promised funds and prestige John Walker would have brought to the family, or Marlena had to seek retribution to prove she was strong enough to be part of the Genoa family in an age of betrayals, double dealing, and technological deceptions.

The family needed insurance that she would never do as her father had and turn on them—turn evidence over to the authorities and attempt to destroy the family. She was to have killed John Walker and Sierra Lucas before the life insurance policy she had taken out on him, and he had forgotten about, expired. The funds would have been given to the Genoa family, and the blood on her hands would have given at least a small assurance of her loyalty.