Page 2 of The Virgin Clause (Caprice Langden)

After eight years, he still looked for the bastard who killed our father. We both were, but I moved in different circles than Gabriel did. Whoever ordered the hit was good at hiding. But that was all right. Neither one of us was going anywhere. Gabriel would prefer the guy just fell from the sky into his lap so he could kill him and move on with his life. Me? I didn’t mind drawing it out. The anticipation of the moment was part of the allure. Either way, the bastard was going to die at one of our hands.

“Always a man of my word,” I said as Lilly slipped from my grasp and Gabriel and I shook hands.

“Can always count on you,” Gabriel replied.

“Oh, my gawd.” Lilly gagged. “If the two of you are done, I need to know something.” She crossed her arms and glared at me. “Where were you?”

“Spain,” I lied. Sort of.

Lilly’s eyes lit up. “So... did you bring me anything?”

I reached into the inner pocket of my leather jacket and pulled out a

small velvet box. She clapped her hands together and practically started dancing. I didn’t buy it on this last voyage, but I had a trinket I picked up on a previous trip. I had a few items stashed from a few different places I’d been. Lilly was used to getting the best and this shiny object cost me a little less than eight grand. It was time to let it go.

“Ooo, is it real?” Lilly gasped when she opened the box housing the diamond and sapphire fan-shaped pendant necklace.

I didn’t answer but snapped the case shut and pulled the box back.

“No!” she cried. “Please! It’s beautiful! I want it.!”

When I didn’t hand it back to her, she pouted. “Please, Dante. I’m sorry. Can I have it back?”

“Do I get you junk?”

“No,” she answered contritely.

“Do you think I travel around the world and bring you fakes?”

She shook her head. “No. I’m sorry.” She looked up at me with those brown puppy dog eyes of hers. “Can I have it now?”

“Sure.” I teased, holding the box above her head. “But now you have to reach for it.”

Being a foot taller than her, the box was well out of her reach. I let her jump up and down for a few seconds, pawing at my arms, laughing her head off like she was fifteen again.

“When you get done torturing her, can we talk in your office?” Gabriel asked as he laughed.

I lowered my arm and Lilly snatched the necklace box from my hands.

She didn’t open it again but clutched it to her chest. “Thank you,” she sang as she raised up on her toes and kissed my cheek. “You’re a good brother.”

“The best,” I modified.

Gabriel grunted.

I shrugged and turned to follow him from the kitchen to the library, the room I used as my office. Not that I did much business there. I had a condo where I conducted most of my affairs, but I did a lot of my research and quite a bit of day trading from home. I still lived in the house I bought for my family after my father died. The old house had too many memories. My mother needed a home that didn’t remind her every day of what she had lost when my father was killed.

I followed Gabriel down the hall, past the den he used as his office. He did work from home on occasion, phone calls and shit like that. Nothing important. Nothing that could come back to haunt him. Like me, he kept the work that got his hands dirty out of the house. He ran his empire from a club he owned downtown.

“What? I’m not being summoned to the don’s office?”

“Shut the fuck up,” he growled. “You know I hate that shit.”

I shrugged, sitting in the leather chair behind my desk, not caring whether he liked my teasing or not.

“At least I don’t play that spy crap.” He paused at the bar and waved a bottle of my best Scotch in my direction. I nodded as he poured us both a glass of the smoothest whiskey I’d found anywhere in the world.

Gabriel knew nothing about how I made my money, except what little I told him about my dealings on the stock market. While that money was significant, it didn’t comprise the bulk of my income. Gabriel had his suspicions and he never point-blank asked me anything, but he threw out those little digs every chance he got.

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