Page 44 of Gabriel: Duke of Bencalor

Gabriel fit­ted the cap to his head so his hair cov­ered his ears. Then he flipped his hood up over the cap and slid on the sun­glasses. Quinn had fid­dled with her hair, too, re­leas­ing it from its pony­tail so the ear­piece was no longer vis­i­ble. Her knuck­les showed white where her fin­gers wrapped around her cell phone.

That sign of her ten­sion helped him to let go of his. He had to be calm so he could take care of her. He brushed his fin­ger­tips over the back of her hand. “It will be fine,” he mur­mured. “Mikel knows what he’s do­ing.”

She gave him a crooked smile. “But I don’t.”

A car pulled into the park­ing space be­side them. Ivan got out, leav­ing his seat empty so Mikel could slide into it. He turned in the seat to pass Quinn a hand­ful of eu­ros. “You’re go­ing to buy some fish. An­neliese will tell you what to ask for through the ear­piece once you’re in the restau­rant. Some of it they won’t have, which will add to the time you spend there.” His gaze shifted to Gabriel. “The restau­rant is small, so you can wan­der a lit­tle dis­tance away from the counter, star­ing at your phone like you’re bored while your girl­friend is shop­ping for din­ner. You’ll be able to see Ko­dra at a ta­ble in the far right cor­ner, his back to the wall. He’s wear­ing a Barcelona soc­cer jer­sey. Ma­roon and blue stripes. His con­tact hasn’t shown up yet.”

“Is that sur­pris­ing?” Gabriel asked.

Mikel’s mouth tight­ened. “I would have ex­pected him or her to ar­rive first to check out the restau­rant. But maybe they want to make sure Ko­dra wasn’t fol­lowed be­fore they show them­selves.” He shrugged. “Maybe Ko­dra’s early. Or maybe he just likes this restau­rant.”

Mikel leaned into the gap be­tween the front seats. “Quinn, do not look at Ko­dra un­less it would be un­nat­u­ral not to.” His voice snapped with quiet com­mand. “Gabriel, do not speak to him or ap­proach his ta­ble for any rea­son what­so­ever.” His gaze drilled into Gabriel’s eyes. “Even if he begs for your help be­cause he’s chok­ing to death, ig­nore him.”

“Do you think he’ll rec­og­nize me?” Gabriel asked, pulling his hood closer around his face.

“No,” Mikel said. “Back then, he kid­napped a blond kid whom he’d been track­ing. You’re a dark-haired man in the wrong con­text. But I don’t want to take any chances.”

Quinn au­di­bly sucked in her breath, and Mikel’s gaze re­fo­cused so that Gabriel knew they were lis­ten­ing to the ra­dio.

“A man just sat down with Ko­dra,” Quinn whis­pered. “They’re send­ing vi­su­als to Mikel now.”

Mikel set­tled back in his seat with his tablet. The an­tic­i­pa­tion in­side the car was like a fer­mata over a whole rest in mu­sic, a breath­less pro­long­ing of the si­lence un­til the sus­pense was al­most un­bear­able.

“Madre de Dios!” Mikel swore. “It’s Jean-Pierre Dupont.”

“Holy shit!” Quinn said as ex­cite­ment lit her face.

“Ev­ery­one back off ex­cept An­toinette,” Mikel com­manded.

“Who is Jean-Pierre Dupont?” Gabriel asked.

“Some­one who could have car­ried out the job,” Mikel said. “He’s got the brains and re­sources.”

“Also, his where­abouts were hard to pin down dur­ing the pe­riod around your kid­nap­ping,” Quinn mur­mured.

A roil of emo­tion surged in Gabriel’s gut. Fear. An­tic­i­pa­tion. Anger. Ex­ul­ta­tion. The po­tent mix sent a wave of nau­sea through him.

“So are we go­ing into the restau­rant or not?” Gabriel asked. His adren­a­line was surg­ing, and he needed an out­let for it. He kept his voice and face neu­tral, though, be­cause Mikel would say no in an in­stant if he thought Gabriel might take some rash ac­tion that would foul up the op­er­a­tion.

Mikel piv­oted in his seat again, his gaze mov­ing from Quinn to Gabriel with­out any sign of what he was think­ing. Af­ter sev­eral mo­ments of si­lence, he nod­ded. “Dupont’s got a cou­ple of his thugs with him. Maybe you’ll rec­og­nize some­thing about one of them. Don’t get too close, though. We don’t want to spook them. They’ve got highly de­vel­oped self-preser­va­tion radar.”

Gabriel wanted to bare his teeth to snarl like a wolf about to pounce on his prey. Fi­nally, his cap­tors would pay for the ter­ror and suf­fer­ing they had in­flicted on him.

Mikel swiped at his tablet be­fore hand­ing it to Quinn. “Casa do Peixe. Turn left around the cor­ner, and it will be on your right. Swipe left for the in­side video feed.”

Quinn shifted so Gabriel could see a dingy street much like the one they were parked on. The fish restau­rant was half­way down the block, its blue and white sign lit even in day­light. It looked like it had once been a two-bay garage. Now, one big door was a win­dow, and the other the en­trance. Quinn swiped left to show a small room filled with beige Formica-topped ta­bles and brown wood chairs, most of which were empty. The walls had luridly col­ored mu­rals of ships and sea crea­tures. Three cus­tomers stood in front of a long glass-fronted re­frig­er­a­tor case filled with glis­ten­ing piles of fish.

Gabriel’s at­ten­tion snagged on the striped soc­cer shirt Ko­dra was wear­ing. He couldn’t see the man fully be­cause Dupont’s leather-cov­ered back blocked his view, but the feral an­tic­i­pa­tion ratch­eted up again. Dupont’s body­guards sat at a nearby ta­ble, their gazes sweep­ing the restau­rant con­stantly.

“Let’s go,” he said, open­ing his door to step out into the smoggy air.

Quinn joined him, scan­ning him from head to toe with a fo­cused but dis­pas­sion­ate stare be­fore she nod­ded. “Put your left arm around my shoul­ders and shove your right hand in your hoodie pocket with your phone.”

“I thought you didn’t know what you’re do­ing,” he said, even as he fol­lowed her in­struc­tions. His height­ened aware­ness made him no­tice the way her small, curvy body felt against his side.

“I know how to blend in,” she said as they started to­ward the cor­ner where they would make the turn.

“Mikel taught you?”

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