Free Locked and Loaded by Alexis Grant

right now. He’s not in the frame of mind for trivial—”
    “So now I’m trivial? Is that what he said about me?”
    “No, no, no, no, no—you are taking things all wrong, Camille. The man wouldn’t have sent a security detail over here looking for you if you were trivial. Think about it.”
    Power was in the eye of the beholder. She loved watching panic dance in Bruno’s helpless eyes. The man had killed more people and broken more kneecaps than probably the DEA even knew about, and yet he was twisting in the wind over a recalcitrant woman who didn’t want to get into his car. Priceless.
    “Call him and let me talk to him, pleeeaaase?’ Sage cooed. “I promise that I won’t give him any grief about the dogs or what you guys were saying … and you can just have one of the drivers bring me my Mercedes so I can get around South Beach and can come home easy-breezy when I’m ready … You guys can also take the boat back from the marina. I mean, really, what’s the big deal?”
    She gave Bruno a look that told him, short of bodily carrying her out of there, which he knew full well that he couldn’t do without causing a scene and thus a police issue, she would not be moved. He was also not stupid enough to put his hands on the boss’s woman, so it was a standoff, pure and simple.
    “All right!” he said, clearly peeved, and then whipped out his cell from his pants pocket. “But you’ll owe me.”
    “Bruno … you’re the best,” she said with a sexy smile.
    “Yeah, well, no telling if he’ll go for it—and if he doesn’t, don’t shoot the messenger. I’m just doing my job.” Bruno put the cell phone to his ear. “Found her, boss. She’s just eating an early dinner over here and been shopping all day, judging from the bags.”
    She watched Bruno nod.
    “Yeah, but see that’s the thing … she wants to go to the spa to get a manicure and pedicure … a massage and stuff, and get all beautiful for you … then maybe she was gonna meet up with a coupla her girlfriends for a drink before coming back.” He turned to the side and lowered his voice. “She’s kinda giving me the blues about leaving right this second and wants to talk to you.”
    Bruno pivoted in his chair and held out the cell phone to her. “Here. He said to put you on.”
    “Baby…” she cooed, spinning in her seat so that Bruno could only see her right side, and not giving Roberto a chance to fire the first salvo. “You will not believe my day! Thank God Bruno came over here and got me to not be so mad. Oh, the county is so inept and allowed mongrels to run over the property—and what happened after that, well, I just couldn’t stand to pass by it, let alone watch it. So I left. I needed to be on the water to shake the sights and the sounds out of my mind. It was just so … so … oh, I cannot even describe it.”
    Still not allowing Roberto a chance to get a word in edgewise, she went on in theatrical feminine fashion. “Then I fell .”
    She paused for dramatic effect, which would give Roberto his first conversational entrée, and she hoped it would earn her a dose of sympathy. The plan worked. What was sure to be a stern directive from him mellowed when he asked how she had fallen.
    “I was on the patio when one of the scraggly strays came up there and I almost fell trying to get away from it. I guess I was already off balance when I went running across the slippery grass in my heels and another one of those hounds scared me and I tripped. I bruised my arms, I bumped my cheek, and then I was so upset that I got into one of the small boats just to get away. Then I slipped again trying to get into the stupid boat and banged my shin,” she added, allowing tears to rise and her voice to warble. “That’s why I just want to go to the spa and unwind a little … maybe stay at the Ritz until you come home. And after all that upset, Bruno said you had business to take care of and weren’t even coming home