“What is he working on now?”
The rest of his confession wasn’t an admission of any guilt, and the words flowed. “I promised to work toward removing your name from Picano . . . from the bank accounts. He’s working on determining who is behind the offshore money.”
When his words met with silence, he ventured a glance and found Gabi staring. Her eyes softened, her smile easy and inviting.
Genuine.
She opened her lips to say something, then closed them.
“What?”
She hesitated. “Why? Why remove your investigator away from the information you seek?”
The answer came in one word. Trust. He wanted her to trust him. Only revealing that now . . . this early in their contract gave her too much power. If she knew he wanted her trust, she could pull out now and where would he be? No . . . as much as it killed him, he left that word out of his explanation. “You’ll tell me when you’re ready.”
He heard her legs shifting on the lounge.
“You’re impossible to place a finger on . . . you know that?”
He felt a smile on his lips. “I try.”
“See . . . I don’t believe that. I think it’s natural. Like a God given-right born unto only you.”
“I’m like everyone else . . . just a little more driven to get what I want.”
“Even if you have to blackmail to get it.”
He winced. “It sounds so ugly when you say it that way.”
She laughed. “It is ugly.”
He shrugged. He wouldn’t change it . . . and in light of the past week, didn’t think he did the wrong thing.
The conversation waned until he thought maybe they had exhausted all their words for the night.
“He was a manipulative bastard.”
Hunter practiced the fine art of silence.
And the gates opened.
“Our chance meeting, which I learned later wasn’t so chance, happened on the mainland. A fundraiser my brother and I were a part of. He was attentive and Val liked him. I liked him.”
Hunter heard the hurt in her voice.
“I was sheltered . . . as Meg has pointed out . . . living on this island. Not that I cared. But when Alonzo landed in my life I was more than ready to explore shores other than these.”
Hunter knew the story ended badly, and searched for words to keep her talking. “So you did.”
“I did. He would sail to the island, bring crates of quality wine as a gift to my brother. Val didn’t need the wine, but the guests seemed to enjoy it.”
The pieces of the puzzle in his head started to fall into place.
“He was supposedly setting up our future home in the vineyards of the California coast. His land in Italy was already prosperous . . . or so I thought, so when he suggested we start our life together in the States, I couldn’t be happier. I’d spent time in Italy, but the thought of being that far away from my family didn’t sit well.”
“Let me guess, Alonzo banked on that.” He was watching her now . . . the play of emotions on her face . . . the drop in her voice when she spoke of herself.
“I was such an easy target. It wasn’t until Margaret and Michael arrived on the island that everything came unraveled.”
There was a name Hunter had yet to hear. “Michael?”
“Michael Wolfe . . . the movie star.”
For the first time in the conversation, Hunter was stunned. “What do Meg and Michael Wolfe have in common?”
“Meg is best friends with Judy. Michael is Judy’s brother.”
He tried to catch up, and just went with the names and hoped he could connect the dots later.
“So Michael and Meg were here on vacation and Meg ended up with your brother?”
Gabi was smiling now . . . some of the earlier tension having left her body. “Meg was here checking out the privacy of the island for clients of Alliance.”
“Ohhh . . . got it.” That made sense. “So Meg and Michael hit the island . . . then what?”
“Michael knows a lot about wine.”
“So he heard of Picano’s wine?”
“No. The opposite. And when Alonzo figured out Michael was on to his misleading label, Alonzo made their stay here very difficult,” Gabi said.
“Misleading label?” Hunter was lost.
“Alonzo may have owned the land in Italy, that did in fact grow grapes, but he didn’t make wine. He used his supposed status as a winemaker to smuggle drugs.”
“Ohh . . .” He followed along with relative ease. “He smuggled the drugs with the wine he brought onto the island.”
Gabi was silent for a few moments. “I could have destroyed everything my brother built here with my fiancé’s deceit.”
“I doubt you knew anything about the drugs.”
“Still my fault.”
The desire to reach for her was huge.
She’d all but curled up onto herself as she spoke, giving no indication that she needed comfort.