Say You Need Me (6 page)

His answer had seemed to pacify her, especially when he returned the jewelry a few days later. But only days after that, Tamara started acting suspicious. She wanted to know where he’d brought the jewelry, and had wondered aloud if it didn’t look a little different. Cecil didn’t have any answers for her, so he’d started avoiding her.

Her call to his home in Coconut Grove a week later confirmed that she knew the jewelry was fake; she’d sensed something was wrong and had brought the pieces in to have them appraised. At first, Cecil had panicked, not sure what to do. However, shortly afterward, he’d relaxed. The way he figured it, Tamara would have to keep her mouth shut about the theft, because if she told her old man about it, she’d have to admit that she’d not only had a lover, but she’d had him
in her husband’s bed
. Surely, if she did that, her husband would kick her out in ten seconds flat, cut her off from the lifestyle to which she’d become accustomed—
and
cut her out of the will.

No, Tamara was too smart to let that happen.

But naturally, she was pissed. And while Cecil no longer worried about her snitching on him, he did miss
the sex. And he got the impression that Tamara wasn’t as upset about him stealing her jewelry as she was about the fact that he obviously didn’t care about her the way she had hoped.

Sylvia, at least, had been an easy, less complicated target. She’d liked him, but she hadn’t gotten possessive the way Tamara had. As far as he knew, she was fairly happily married to a man a few years older than her. But he’d been having affairs for the last ten years of their nearly thirty-year marriage, and Sylvia had decided it was payback time.

Who better than a man nineteen years her junior?

Sylvia hadn’t missed the jewelry Cecil had taken from her. So after a month, he’d taken more. He’d scored big with Sylvia; her jewelry had been worth over two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. The only downside to the whole scam was that Eddie took fifty percent of everything Cecil brought him. That was his cut, he’d told Cecil, take it or leave it. It didn’t quite seem fair, considering Cecil was the one putting himself at risk to get the jewelry, but Eddie was adamant.

There wasn’t much Cecil could have done at that point besides accept Eddie’s terms. Eddie was the one with the connections to sell the jewelry and have the fakes made, so Cecil needed him. Fifty percent of a big chunk of change was better than fifty percent of nothing.

But now he was in deep shit. A couple months after being with her, Jan, another woman he’d been involved with, had learned that her expensive jewelry had been replaced with fakes. With Jan, Cecil had tried a different approach, a plan he’d thought was foolproof. After complimenting Jan’s jewelry and casually asking her how
much it was worth, she’d told him she didn’t know; her husband, who was currently in jail, had never told her.

Cecil had then given her a line of bull about having a friend who was a jeweler, and offered to have her jewelry appraised. Because Jan didn’t know the value of the pieces, she’d agreed to Cecil’s suggestion. And she hadn’t questioned him when he’d returned the jewelry. Another successful hit.

Jan hadn’t been like the others, though. She didn’t want to continue seeing him once her husband, Rex, was out of jail. She’d wanted him only to keep her warm at night until her husband could once again. Which suited Cecil fine—given the fact that he’d gotten what he truly wanted from her.

So no one was more surprised to hear from Jan weeks after her husband had gotten out of the pen than Cecil. Jan had called him, quite worried and distraught. She asked what he’d done to her jewelry. Cecil had played dumb. Jan had gone on to explain that Rex had suspected something was wrong when he’d noticed the diamonds in her tennis bracelet were a little too shiny. So Jan had told him that she’d had a friend appraise it, but Rex had been immediately suspicious. He’d had all her jewelry checked out and learned that most of the pieces were fakes.

Rex wasn’t buying the “friend” line, and ultimately, Jan had admitted to her husband that she’d gotten involved with another guy while he’d been in prison.

“You did
what
? Cecil had asked, horrified.

“I had to tell him, Cece. He knew anyway.”

Cecil panicked. “Does he know who I am?”

“I told him everything. It was the only way he would forgive me. God, I’ve never seen him so upset. Except for
that time he went after that guy who made a pass at me with a tire iron. Which is what landed him in jail…”

Cecil swallowed—hard. Great. This was just great.

“Listen, Cece, I’m sure he’ll get over the affair—as long as you get the jewelry back. Can you go back to that jeweler friend of yours?”

“Uh…” Cecil had hedged. “Sure. I’ll see if he knows what happened.”

Jan had called him days later, asking if he’d had any success finding out what happened to her jewelry. Cecil had told her he was still working on it. Jan had reiterated that Rex could forgive her indiscretion—as long as she got the jewelry back. If Cecil couldn’t retrieve her jewelry, and subsequently Rex didn’t forgive her, he wouldn’t forgive Cecil, either.

That was a bit of life and death pressure Cecil could have lived without.

When Cecil hung up with Jan, he had immediately called Eddie. Eddie confirmed what he already suspected: the jewelry had been sold months ago and he had no idea of how to get it back at this point. The best Eddie could do was look into it.

Cecil had figured he’d had some time—until Rex had called him and promised to break every one of his bones before throwing him into a canal if he didn’t get the jewelry back ASAP. During this time, Cecil had gotten to know Serena, and he knew she had a necklace worth a quarter of a million. Serena was sweet, not like the other women he’d scammed. She was genuine, not flaky like the women who’d come into his life. She was the kind of woman he occasionally daydreamed about settling down with—
if
he was the type to settle down. But even if he was, deep in his
heart, he knew he didn’t deserve Serena. Still, he liked her, and he didn’t like the idea of hurting her.

But he’d remembered what Eddie had told him about not letting your emotions get involved. So he’d planned to take Serena’s necklace the moment he could, because it was worth a pretty penny—and that would certainly help him out of his bind with Rex.

However, after learning that the necklace had been in Serena’s family for aeons and that the history of the necklace had spawned her dream of opening an antiques store, Cecil had decided against taking it.

But Rex grew more impatient with each passing day.

As a result, Cecil had given in to temptation and taken Serena’s necklace, offering it to Rex as a replacement. But days after FedExing Rex a picture of the exquisite antique necklace, Rex had called with the shocking news that he didn’t want a replacement. He wanted the jewelry Cecil had hawked because it had sentimental value. He’d given Cecil forty-eight hours to get it back before he taught him a very painful lesson.

By then, Cecil knew Rex meant business. The only other thing he could figure to do was get enough cash together to buy the jewelry back—provided he could find out who’d bought it in the first place. But forty-eight hours wasn’t enough time to sell any of his swanky properties to get the necessary cash.

Eighteen hours into his forty-eight-hour deadline, Rex had laughed his head off at Cecil’s offer of ten thousand dollars—the money he’d taken from Serena—as a measure of good faith that he’d get the jewelry back.

Right on time, Rex had started calling with death threats. Cecil had promptly disconnected all his numbers, except
for the one at his condo, which was his main number—and the one only a few people knew. Jan didn’t have that one—at least, that’s what he’d thought, until Rex had left a message for him there. Cecil didn’t return any of the calls, hoping Rex would figure he’d skipped town. But he knew it was only a matter of time before Rex caught up with him. In the meantime, he was hoping to get some money together. However, even if he could sell one of his places in time, he couldn’t show his face at either of his homes without the risk of getting a bullet in his back.

That’s why he’d tried to reach Darrell, to see if there was any way Darrell could come up with the money. But he’d had to hang up on his brother when he’d realized someone had been following him.

With that thought, Cecil took another look around. Men, women, and children filtered in and out of the grocery store. Thank God, he didn’t see anyone suspicious. But he’d best get out of this public place now—just in case.

Heading back to his van, Cecil cringed. A Pontiac. God, could life get worse than this? He missed his Jaguar and his Viper, but there was no way he could drive them. Anyone who knew him would recognize both flashy cars.

Well, at least the Pontiac’s windows were tinted. No one should spot him in this vehicle. Still, as he opened the door to the boring van, he couldn’t help exhaling a frustrated breath.

Hopefully, he’d hear from Eddie soon and find out who’d bought the jewelry. And hopefully he’d get his hands on some cash so that he could buy the jewelry back.

Because this time, he’d crossed the wrong person. And if he didn’t make this situation right—and soon—he was as good as dead.

Thirty seconds into the short drive to his brother’s
condo, Darrell couldn’t help wondering if he’d made one of the bigger blunders of his life.

The woman beside him was clearly crazy. He should run, not walk, in the other direction. Five minutes in her presence last night had cost him his pride, and had given him a miserable night in Miami that he would never forget. Hell, maybe her insanity had rubbed off on him. Otherwise, why on earth would he have agreed to work with her? She’d given him a hellish twenty-four hours. What else could he honestly expect if he spent more time with her?

All right, maybe he wasn’t being fair. She’d thought he was Cecil, so her wrath hadn’t actually been directed toward him. Now that she knew who he really was, he shouldn’t have to worry that she’d up and go berserk on him again.

He glanced at Serena. Feeling his gaze, she angled her head toward him and gave him a half-smile.

Darrell opened his mouth, but after a moment, he closed it. As much as he wanted to tell Serena to forget this arrangement, he couldn’t. She
did
have a point; two heads were better than one. But she was a feisty little thing, and that attitude of hers might get them both into trouble.

Then again, maybe it would get them out of a snafu or two. Which he expected, given his brother’s reputation.

Darrell’s mind wandered to Cecil and what he possibly could have done wrong this time. Though the younger twin by a few minutes, Darrell had acted as Cecil’s older brother his whole life. While Darrell had been responsible, Cecil had been irresponsible. Darrell had been studious and well behaved in school; Cecil had been a pain in almost every teacher’s butt. Not to mention other students’ butts. He fought so much as a young child that one might have guessed he was preparing for a career in the boxing ring.

Darrell had no doubt that Cecil’s problems started when their mother abandoned them. He misbehaved as a way to get attention because negative attention was better than no attention at all. At first, he must have hoped their mother would hear of his antics and return. When she hadn’t come back, he’d continued to act up, probably hoping to get a rise out of their father, who’d become despondent after their mother’s disappearance and had turned to booze. But their father hadn’t had the patience to deal with Cecil’s antics, and in an attempt to control his son’s bad behavior, he’d beaten him every time he’d done something wrong.

Darrell would comfort his brother at night after such beatings, having taken on the role of surrogate father almost from the moment their mother had run off with that filthy rich CEO she’d worked for. Time and again, Cecil promised Darrell he would do better, not their father. And as he held Darrell and cried and made all these promises, he sounded completely sincere. But no matter how much Cecil said he’d try harder to do the right thing, he never did.

At age thirteen, when Cecil got caught stealing a Walk-man from a K-Mart store, their father had beat the living daylights out of him, then disowned him.

Since then, Darrell had officially taken over as father, and had tried to get Cecil out of each of his messes, all the while hoping Cecil would one day smarten up. He never had.

“Darrell?”

Serena’s voice startled him. “Huh?”

“Which building?”

“Oh.” Darrell looked outside the slow-moving car and pointed to the tall multi-colored condo at the end of the strip. “That one.”

Serena gave a low whistle. “Wow.”

“Yeah.” Darrell paused. “Wait a minute. You’ve never been here?”

“No.” Serena slowed the car to a crawl.

Why had she never been to Cecil’s condo? Darrell wondered.

“Where should I park?” Serena asked, interrupting his thoughts.

“There’s got to be…” Serena turned right, going
around another side of the building. “Ah, there’s valet parking. Let’s pull in there.”

Serena did as instructed. A gentleman wearing black pants, a white shirt with black bow tie, and a red vest stepped in front of the car as she stopped.

The man was at her driver’s side door before she put the car into park. He opened it for her. “Morning, ma’am.” His eyes went past her to Darrell. “Ah, good morning, Mr. Montford,” he said brightly. “Haven’t seen you here for a little while.”

Darrell had never seen this man in his life before, but he didn’t know that. And right now, Darrell wasn’t about to clue him in to the fact that he was Cecil’s twin before he had a chance to go upstairs and look for clues.

“Uh,” Darrell began, glancing beyond Serena at the man’s nametag. “Hello, Miguel. I know, I haven’t been around much. I’ve been busy.”

“I see.” Miguel raised a suggestive eyebrow and looked at Serena, as if to say he understood what had been keeping Cecil away. “Well, glad to have you back, sir.” Then, he extended a hand to Serena, helping her out of the car.

Darrell gripped the handle and started to open his door.

“Please, Mr. Montford,” Miguel said, rushing around to that side of the car before Darrell had the door completely open. “Allow me.” Miguel took the door handle and opened it.

“Thank you,” Darrell said, feeling somewhat awkward. He was used to opening his own doors, but could imagine his brother lapping up attention like this.

Miguel gave Darrell a brief once-over, his slightly wide eyes the only indication that he was surprised at Cecil’s
attire. Then he turned to Serena, who had strolled toward Darrell. “I’ll take your keys, ma’am.”

Serena was about to ask how much the valet service would cost, then thought better of it. Anyone who lived here or visited friends here wouldn’t be concerned with such petty things as the cost of parking.

She passed him the keys.

“Great.” Miguel smiled. But he didn’t move. Instead, he looked from Serena to Darrell, an easy grin playing on his lips.

“Oh,” Darrell quickly said. He dug into his back pocket and withdrew his wallet. He took out a ten and passed it to Miguel.

“Thank you, sir.” His grin widened. “I’ll make sure to take good care of this car. Hold a second for your ticket, ma’am.”

Miguel returned with Serena’s half of the valet ticket, then opened the front door of the condo for her and Darrell.

“Morning, Mr. Montford,” the concierge greeted Darrell once they were inside.

Darrell gave the elderly man a nod. “Morning.”

Serena felt weird in this opulent place, as if she expected the
Rich and Famous
police to come running from the back rooms screaming, “Imposter!” and kick her butt out of here before she could say Robin Leach. But she flashed the concierge a confident smile and held her head high, then walked with Darrell to the elevators. They stood behind an older woman who carried what at first seemed to be a gigantic fur ball. On closer examination, Serena saw that it was actually an enormously fluffy white poodle.

The giant fluff ball let out a low growl as it stared at Darrell and Serena.

“There, there,” the woman cooed. “You’ll be okay. They’re not going to hurt you, Buttons.”

A tongue appeared from the puff of white fur, lapping at the woman’s mouth. The woman giggled as she kissed the dog back.

Serena rolled her eyes.

The elevator arrived moments later. Serena, Darrell, the woman, and her white fur ball got on.

“What floor?” Serena asked Darrell.

“Penthouse.” Serena reached past the woman and pressed PH.

Though the woman was closer to the brass numbers than Serena or Darrell, she asked, “Honey, can you hit the tenth floor for me?”

Serena complied, mildly annoyed. What would the woman have done if she weren’t here? Was Buttons too precious to stand on the elevator floor?

“Buttons is a champion show dog,” the woman boasted, almost as if she’d read Serena’s mind. “Aren’t you, Buttons? Huh?” Buttons enthusiastically licked her lips again. “That’s right, sweetie. Mommy loves you.”

The woman continued to talk to Buttons as if it were a baby until they exited on the tenth floor.

Darrell and Serena shared a look, but continued to the penthouse level in silence. Serena wasn’t quite sure what irked her so much about the woman, other than that she seemed to be the pretentious type who expected the world to wait on her and frou-frou hand and foot.

Yeah, that’s what bothered her. The reality that women like her who lived in a place like this clearly had
money; Cecil clearly had money. So why had he stolen from her?

It didn’t make any sense.

And it made her angry.

There was a soft
ping
when the elevator arrived at the penthouse floor. Serena followed Darrell out of the elevator. He glanced down one end of the hallway, then started off in the opposite direction.

Moments later, Darrell stopped in front of PH2. Key already in hand, he inserted it in the lock.

The moment he and Serena stepped inside, Serena gasped. “Good God in heaven. This place is
huge
.”

Stepping further into the condo, Serena looked around in wonder. Huge was an understatement. The place had to be five times the size of her apartment, which was a pretty good size. The window stretched across the entire length of the living room and solarium, which was shaped in a semicircle. With the blinds open, bright sunlight streamed into the condo.

To her right, there was a hallway with at least six doors. Good Lord, how many bedrooms were there? To her left, there was a lavish black marble bar, beside which was the kitchen. She guessed the dining room was somewhere through there. Serena slowly descended the three steps that led to the sunken living room. While the entranceway and hallway were adorned with gleaming hardwood floors, the living room boasted a cream-colored carpet. As Serena made her way across the room, she noted that the carpet was almost as thick as the mattress on her bed. Stunning paintings of vast landscapes hung on the walls. A black lacquer coffee table and end tables matched the
black leather sofa and loveseat. The entertainment center was extensive and gave Serena the impression that Cecil loved to entertain. Absolutely everything in the room spoke of money and taste.

Serena didn’t doubt Cecil had money, but she’d never dreamed he had
this
kind of money. This was the kind of place featured on
Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous
.

Serena continued on to the floor-to-ceiling window. Not very practical if a hurricane hit, but she was certain Cecil had hurricane shutters outside.

She took in the view of the Atlantic Ocean. She’d never seen it from this height before, except once when she was in the air, and the view was breathtaking. She thought the lake behind her property was beautiful, but there was simply no comparison. To wake up to this every day would be like not having a care in the world.

The thought burned her, and she whirled around, unable to take anymore. If Cecil was this loaded, why steal from her?

“I knew Cecil had fancy clothes and drove a fancy car, but I never dreamed he had this kind of money,” Serena commented.

Her mention of money immediately rubbed Darrell the wrong way; he’d had too many experiences with women who’d been interested only in his pocketbook.

Not that she’d done or said anything to make him think she was a gold digger, but the feeling wouldn’t subside. “You had no clue?” he asked doubtfully.

“None.”

She wouldn’t look at him. “You mentioned his car and clothes. You had to know…”

“Like I said, I was sure he had a good lifestyle, but this?” She gestured a hand around the room. “This is opulence beyond anything I ever expected.”

Whether or not she had actually been interested in Cecil for his money, Darrell couldn’t be sure. He let the matter drop. “Yeah, this place is pretty amazing.”

Serena surveyed the room a moment longer, then looked Darrell squarely in the eye. “Does your family own a
Fortune
five hundred company or something?”

“Not even close,” he assured her.

“Then I don’t understand.”

Approaching her, Darrell said, “My brother has lived off gullible women for years.”

The words were like a knife in Serena’s heart, because they were true. She
had
been gullible—all because Cecil had been charming.

Yet she’d had reason to trust him. He’d taken her to many different properties that could house her antiques shop. She’d had every reason to believe he was a legitimate real estate agent. How was she to know he’d rip her off?

“Hey,” Darrell said softly.

Serena lifted her gaze to his, somewhat unnerved to find he was standing mere inches from her.

“What I said…I didn’t mean it like that. I’m not saying you’re gullible. You seem like a nice person, and my brother no doubt saw that. Believe me, I know how charming he can be. So don’t take it personally.” Darrell grimaced, then shook his head. “My brother…practically from the beginning, he’s been determined to stay off the straight and narrow path. I tried my best to show him the right way, but he was never interested.”

Serena nodded grimly.

“You’re not the first woman he’s taken advantage of, but hopefully you’ll be his last.”

“I just want my property back.”

She was putting on a brave face, but Darrell could see that his comment had struck a nerve. He wanted to ask her outright how she’d gotten involved with Cecil, because she was so not his type, but he didn’t really want to know the sordid details. “Like I said, I’ll do what I can to help you get your property back.”

“Mmm hmm.”

“I’m gonna take a look around, see if I can find anything.”

“Sure.”

Darrell didn’t like her sudden despondency, but he didn’t know what to do or say to make her feel better. All he could do was try and find Cecil, the only hope to getting her necklace back. “Go ahead and make yourself comfortable,” Darrell told her.

“Yeah.”

Darrell watched Serena sink into the soft leather loveseat. Hunching forward, she rested her elbows on her knees and buried her face in her hands. He couldn’t help thinking that she seemed so small and frail in this huge space. It was a sight that disturbed him, and he quickly turned and walked out of the living room.