Donovans 02 - Jade Island

He’s a facilitator for SunCo.”
    “I didn’t know SunCo had any deals going with Farmer.”
    “They don’t. Yet. I suspect the bowl is part of a rather complex and very Chinese courtship ritual.”
    As Lianne spoke, she stood on tiptoe and tried to look over two men to see the Sung bowl. When her view was cut off by a casual shift of shoulders, she made a frustrated sound.
    Then she made a startled one as the floor dropped beneath her feet until she was head and shoulders above the crowd, suspended between Kyle’s big hands.
    “Better view?” he asked blandly.
    “Much. Um, thanks.”
    “All part of the stuffed-elephant service.”
    Lianne laughed even as she wondered if he felt the sudden drumming of her heart the way she felt the warmth of his hands locked around her ribs. She hoped he would assume that the sudden speeding of her heart came from surprise, rather than from a simple feminine response to the heat and strength of the man holding her.
    After the first few breaths, Lianne decided that she liked the view very well indeed. Just below her, a woman’s intricate hair ornament dipped and swayed like a pearl ballerina as the woman tilted her head from side to side, studying the elegant Sung bowl. Just over her shoulder, a man’s head revealed a bald spot on top, a natural tonsure he tried to conceal by combing hair over it. A delegation from mainland China stood to one side of the case. In defiance of Seattle civic law, they had cigarette smoke like a permanent fog over their heads.
    And when Lianne looked over her shoulder, she saw that the same man who had followed her in lockstep from her car was still behind her. He was trying quietly, quickly, urgently to fade out of her newly enhanced line of sight.
    Gotcha.
    Lianne smiled with grim pleasure even as anxiety prickled hot and cold over her skin. No doubt the man had thought keeping track of her discreetly would be easy—just follow the tall Anglo, and short, little old Lianne would never be far away.
    “Don’t worry, I won’t drop you,” Kyle said, feeling the sudden tension in Lianne’s body. “I’ve carried packs heavier than you over high mountain passes.”
    “I’m not worried about you.”
    The man who had succeeded in pulling the crowd around him like a multicolored fog was another thing entirely. He worried Lianne. She stared at the people behind her for a minute longer, but didn’t see him again. He had vanished as though he was no more than a product of her imagination.
    And maybe he was. Maybe she was just jumpy about wearing nearly a million dollars in jade jewelry that wasn’t hers.
    “Thanks, I’ve seen enough,” Lianne said.
    Kyle lowered her to the floor, leaned down, and asked against her ear, “Did you recognize him?”
    The flinch of surprise that she couldn’t conceal told Kyle that he was right: her attention hadn’t been on jade.
    “I don’t know what you mean,” Lianne said.
    Disappointment and impatience flared in Kyle. Apparently the little lady thought he was as stupid as a stuffed elephant.
    “Right,” he said, opening a path away from the Sung bowl. “What’s next on your jade agenda?”
    “The auction won’t begin for two hours. What exhibits haven’t you seen?”
    “The buffet,” Kyle said bluntly. “Or did you eat dinner before you came?”
    “No. I was too nervous,” she admitted.
    “About what?” he asked casually, leading her out of the atrium toward the buffet that had been set up in the ballroom.
    “The Jade Trader exhibit,” she said, only half the truth. But she wasn’t about to admit to Kyle that the thought ofhaving to approach him had tied her stomach in knots. “It was my responsibility to choose the jades.”
    “I thought the patriarch would have done that.”
    “Wen?”
    “Last time I checked, he was the grand old man of the Tang clan.”
    “He is. It’s just that he’s…awfully busy.” Lianne finished weakly.
    Kyle gave her a sideways look that said he wasn’t buying that one, either.
    She told herself that Wen’s health was an open secret, one that Kyle would be sharing as soon as she introduced him into the Tang family.
    “Wait,” she said, pressing against Kyle’s arm. Standing on tiptoe, she leaned close enough to speak without being overheard. “Wen’s eyesight is very bad. Even his touch isn’t reliable anymore. Arthritis, I guess, but no one speaks of it. Yet he still took part in the exhibit. Joe passed Wen’s suggestions on to Harry or