Her Alpha Avengers [The Hot Millionaires #7] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (10 page)

Sabine suppressed a sigh and resisted the urge to open her knees and give Gabe greater access. “I understand,” she said.

“I think she likes what you’re doing to her, Gabe,” Fin said. Needless to say, he’d correctly interpreted her reaction, damn him.

“Where do you find all these people to do your checking for you?” Sabine asked, tossing a frown Fin’s way. “I need to pay for their services.”

“No, you don’t,” Fin said. “We’ve been hired by another client who wants to get Pearson, remember.”

“You never did tell me who that is.”

“A woman who was going to buy one of Gabe’s paintings,” Otto explained. “She had to pull out at the eleventh hour because she suddenly found that she no longer had a boyfriend, and all the spare cash from her account has disappeared right along with him.”

Sabine sat forward. “I need to talk to her.”

“She’s feeling pretty stupid right now,” Gabe said, “which is why she hasn’t called in the police. He hasn’t left her penniless, but everything else she has is tied up in investments.”

“She probably wouldn’t have told us about the guy, except that she felt bad for letting Gabe down and so she explained why she had to,” Fin said. “Gabe, being a sucker for a sob story, said we’d try to help her.”

“Anything for a sale,” Gabe quipped. “Besides, we’d never have met you if we hadn’t taken this on.”

“Good point,” Fin said.

“I understand how she must be feeling.” Sabine’s heart swelled with sympathy at the thought of the poor woman’s plight. “Perhaps if she realizes she isn’t the only one to be conned by the bastard it might cheer her up a bit.”

“I’ll mention it to her, see if she’s up to meeting you,” Gabe promised.

“Okay, that would be good.”

“In the meantime, Otto’s got people running down some other leads,” Fin said.

“Oh, yes, what leads?”

“Well, Spencer had a cell phone with him,” Otto said, “which Fin kindly relieved him of.”

“And there are numbers in it that might help us.” Sabine felt energised. Suddenly, things were happening so fast that she could barely keep up with developments.

“One number only,” Fin said.

“You think it might be this Al Cavendish’s?” she asked.

Fin shrugged. “Could be anyone.”

“Probably a pay-as-you-go, but I’m still hopeful,” Otto said. “I’ve got a buddy—”

“Don’t tell me,” Sabine said, smiling. “He has access to phone records.”

Otto grinned. “No point having friends and not making use of them.”

“We think it was the number he used to contact whoever hired him,” Fin said. “We also think that person can’t know that Spencer had a cell phone, and
if
the number is attached to a contact, then we have him.”

“You guys certainly make things happen,” she said, encompassing all three of them with a grateful smile.

“Isn’t that what you said to Fin earlier?” Otto asked, sounding aggrieved.

“There’s no need to feel left out,” she said, smiling sweetly. “There’s enough of me to go round.”

“You serious?” Gabe asked.

“Never more so,” she said, realizing that she was. She transferred her attention to him. “Oh, and I’ll pose for you, if you still want me to.”

“If I want you to!” Gabe’s smile was broad and infectious. “Ready when you are.”

“Not so fast. I’m hungry.”

“And I’m on kitchen duty tonight,” Fin said, standing up.

“Do all you guys cook?”

“Yep, otherwise we’d starve.”

“There is such a thing as takeout.”

“Not the same,” Otto said and the other two nodded decisively. “We prefer to know what we put into our bodies.”

“What with their being temples, and all,” Gabe added.

Sabine rolled her eyes. “Just in case you were planning to add my name to the kitchen rota, you should probably know that cooking has never been my thing.”

“That’s okay, babe.” Fin leaned over her and planted a kiss on her lips. “We’ll think of other ways you can contribute to the chores.” He grabbed another bottle of beer for himself and headed inside. “Another ten minutes,” he said over his shoulder.

“Okay.” Otto stood as well. “Just enough time for another drink, then.”

He did the honours and then returned to his seat beside Sabine. Gabe, still ensconced on her opposite side, ran a finger down her thigh.

“Don’t imagine that you have to play with us,” he said. “I’d hate you to feel coerced, and we’ll still try to track Pearson down, regardless of your decision.”

“You trying to talk her out of it?” Otto demanded, doing the same thing to her opposite thigh.

“He won’t succeed,” Sabine said, no longer able to keep her knees delicately pressed together and allowing them to splay. “If you’re chasing down all the leads on Pearson, how else am I supposed to pass the time?”

“First thing tomorrow morning, in my studio,” Gabe said, his lips brushing against her ear and sending tingles of anticipation down her spine. “We’ll get right down to work.”

Sabine smiled, wondering if he was actually referring to painting. “You’re on,” she said, suddenly in a raging hurry to find out.

“Come on, then.” Otto extended a hand to Sabine, helping her up from the low patio furniture. “I daresay the master chef is ready for us by now, and he doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

Sabine placed her hand in Otto’s, no longer surprised when his touch affected her profoundly. It happened whenever any of them touched her, which they appeared to feel free to do since her afternoon with Fin. Good! Having three Adonises vying for her affections was just the boost her flailing confidence required.

“Ah, right on time.” Fin looked up from a pot he was stirring when they entered the kitchen. “Gabe, offer the lady a seat, why don’t you? Otto, you pour the wine.”

“He’s so masterful,” Gabe said in a mincing tone.

“Yes, I found that out for myself this afternoon,” Sabine said, laughing at their banter.

Fin produced an appetiser of avocado mousse and an entrée of whitefish poached in a delicious sauce. There were baby potatoes and crisp asparagus that melted in the mouth. How he’d found the time to do it all after spending most of the afternoon in her bed she had no way of knowing. All she did know was that she hadn’t felt so hungry in almost two years. She even managed a double helping of chocolate-chip ice cream, much to the guys’ collective amusement. Mulligan hovered, looking hopeful, and it seemed that Fin hadn’t forgotten his requirements, which was more than could be said for Sabine. She allayed her conscience as she watched Mulligan wolf down a huge plateful of food in several swallows by reminding herself that she’d had a lot on her mind.

They’d just taken coffee and brandy out on the terrace when one of Otto’s computers pinged. He dashed in to see what was happening and returned to them grinning.

“That number
was
for Al Cavendish’s phone,” he said, rolling his eyes. “When will criminals wise up?”

“Good job for us that they tend to be cerebrally challenged,” Fin said. “I assume you have an address to go with the name.”

“Whadda you take me for?”

Fin grinned. “Just checking.”

“He’s in Bradenton.”

“What a surprise,” Gabe said.

“I’m gonna run a full check on him right now, but then I’d say it was game on, wouldn’t you?”

“Okay, gotcha,” Otto muttered to himself a short time later.

He knew the area and thought the guy must be small-time if he lived in such a dump. He pressed more keys, needing to know who owned the building where Al Cavendish resided and who his neighbours were. It was possible that the elusive Pearson hung his hat there as well and that the two of them had linked up that way. Stranger things had been known to happen.

“How’s it going?”

Otto looked up to find Sabine leaning against the doorjamb, arms folded beneath her breasts, watching him avidly.

“How long have you been there?”

“A while. You were kind of preoccupied.”

“Yeah, that happens when I get engrossed.” He smiled at her. “Where are the others?”

“Gabe’s gone up to his studio—”

“He often does at this time of night, but I’ve never been able to understand why. Artists bang on about the right sort of light all the time, so how can he paint at night?”

“He said something about having stuff to finish up.”

“And they call me obsessive.” Otto rolled his eyes. “Has Fin deserted you, too?”

“He volunteered to take Mulligan for his late-night constitutional.” She wandered farther into the room. “What have you found out?”

He scooted his chair back from the desk and patted his knee. “Give me a kiss, and I’ll tell you.”

He expected her to blow him off, but instead she slid onto his knee, like she’d done it a thousand times before, and wrapped her arms round his neck. Otto got the impression that Sabine didn’t make a habit out of coming on to strangers. It was like Fin had unlocked something inside her, some deep-seated need to be…well, needed. Otto was more than happy to feed that need. There was an indefinable something about her that appealed to him, and not just because he was anxious to get her in the sack. He felt protective toward her, a stark determination to right all the wrongs that she’d suffered over the past two years and earn her respect.

On a more basic level, he guessed she was lonely. Lonely and scared. She’d shut herself off from everyone she knew, quit her job, and come to a foreign land in the vague hope of tracking down one man in a population of over three hundred million. She was either
the
most determined person he’d ever met, or she was a prime candidate for the cuckoo farm.

Either way, having her sitting on his knee felt pretty damned good. She needed to be cherished and made to feel better about herself. Otto was more than happy to deliver.

His lips met hers softly, experimentally, determined to take things slowly. But it seemed that Sabine had other ideas. She sank her fingers into his hair and yanked his head closer, her lips more tempting than they had any right to be as they fused with his in a kiss that blew his mind. She’d thrown him off balance, but Otto quickly got with the programme. If she was trying to tell him that she needed fast and urgent, as Fin had said was the case with her earlier, then he’d be happy to oblige. Acute desire washed through his bloodstream as he deepened the kiss, his tongue tangling with hers in an exotic dance that rocked his world. His hands splayed across her back, sliding down to her ass, Otto’s favourite part of any woman’s anatomy.

“Al Cavendish lives in a down-market condo in Bradenton,” he said, briefly breaking the kiss but continuing to explore her ass with one hand.

“How does that help us?” she asked, breathing heavily.

Otto found her zipper and yanked it down. He pushed the dress from her shoulders, and it fell away. She was wearing a bra this evening, a pretty pink lacy one, and he took a moment to pay homage to her tits through it. With one hand still fondling the crack in her ass, he used the other to caress a breast through that flimsy lace whilst his lips homed in on the rock-hard nipple. Fin said she liked to play, and it was time to test that theory. He bit at the nipple hard enough to be rewarded by a soft moan and the feel of her fingers digging deeper into his scalp.

“It means he’s not a big-time crook,” Otto said, now sucking that nipple but managing to speak round it.

“Oh, God, that feels
soooo
good!” Her fingers clawed at his head. “That means Spencer must have been even smaller-time. How come he had a computer if he was just out of jail and didn’t have much money?”

Otto unbuttoned his shirt and threw it aside. Sabine focused her eyes on his naked torso and grinned, clearly liking what she saw. Otto was suddenly glad of all those hours he forced himself to endure in the gym.

“That’s the beauty of anonymous cyberspace,” he said, unfastening her bra, tossing it aside, and pulling her closer. She sat sideways on his lap, and the side of one breast collided with his chest. “You have lovely tits,” he said, rubbing his thumbnail hard across one swollen nipple.

“Thanks.” She returned the favour by circling one of his nipples with her forefinger and then pinching it hard. “You mean that the person I had e-mail contact with probably wasn’t Spencer at all?”

“Right.” She wanted to play rough, Otto would give her rough. He turned his attention to her lovely long neck and sucked and nipped his way down its length. She tilted her head sideways, giving him easier access to it. The harder he nipped the louder she groaned, clearly loving it. Otto finished at the pulse that beat at its hollow and sucked hard enough to produce a frustrated growl as she wriggled about on his bulging erection. “It was probably Pearson, setting you up.”

“Oh, that hadn’t occurred to me.”

The fact that she might well have been in e-mail contact with the man she’d spent all this time trying to track down didn’t seem to faze her. Otto had obviously done a good job diverting her attention. She lifted her ass clear of his knee and felt for his belt. Otto smacked her hand away.