Midnight Jewels

Gladstone's valuable collection. You're an innocent dupe."
    "I've already played that role once too often around you. Croft, listen to me, I think you should reconsider your plan tonight. There are bound to be a bunch of people downstairs in the gardens and the pool. Any one of them might notice you sneaking into the vault room."
    "Nope." He smiled genially at a striking young thing who was wearing hair dyed to match her green, skintight dress. The woman smiled back and floated on past as she inhaled deeply on a long cigarette.
    "What do you mean, nope?" Mercy wanted to slap him in order to get his full attention. There was a distracted quality about him that was alarming.
    "No one downstairs in the pool room now. I just went down and checked. Place is empty."
    "I didn't see you leave."
    He winked wickedly. "Trust me. It's empty." He took another sip of the red wine he was holding. "Did you try the salmon canapes? They're great. I've had several."
    Mercy shook her head. She hadn't been able to eat a thing or drink anything besides water since the perilous evening had started. There was something not quite right about Croft's mood. She had never seen him like this. Why was he chatting about salmon canapes at a time like this?
    If she hadn't known him better she would have sworn he had had too much to drink. But that was impossible. Croft never drank to excess. He was as restrained about his drinking as he was about everything else. Something else must be going on…
    "Dallas and Lance probably cleaned out the pool room during the last hour," Mercy noted thoughtfully. "Gladstone's insurance might not have covered twenty or thirty artists getting drunk and falling face down in the swimming pool. On second thought, I don't see a man as wealthy as Gladstone being overly concerned about his insurance policies. Where is Gladstone, anyway?"
    "Over there by the window, talking to that guy with the beard."
    Mercy glanced across the room and saw Gladstone involved in what appeared to be a serious conversation with an intense young man. Isobel stood politely beside the two men, listening with an expression of what Mercy assumed was artistic interest.
    "That's Micah Morgan. I met him earlier," Mercy told Croft. "Gladstone says he's going to be the hottest thing on the art market in three or four years. Needless to say, Gladstone is collecting him now. Those pictures in the sitting room are Morgan's."
    "Why don't you join them?"
    Mercy stirred the ice in her glass. "More camouflage? You want me to distract Gladstone and Isobel while you go downstairs and play cat burglar?"
    Croft beamed at her. "Will you do that for me, sweet Mercy? Dallas and Lance are so busy up here running the bar and the buffet that I don't think they're likely to wander downstairs unexpectedly."
    "I don't think you need my help in this project," she retorted. "You seem to be able to appear and disappear without any assistance from me."
    "It never hurts to have a little extra insurance."
    "Oh, all right." Resentfully Mercy started to move toward the window where Gladstone and Isobel stood. But something made her turn back once more to confront Croft. "Are you sure you're up to this tonight? How much of that wine have you had?"
    "Half a glass. Just enough to look sociable." He smiled again. "Stop worrying, honey. I'm in complete control."
    "I wonder why that doesn't reassure me." Without waiting for a response, she plunged into the crowd, heading toward Gladstone and Isobel. .
    Croft thought about the expression in Mercy's eyes as he made his way through the jungle of plants in the pool room. She didn't approve of what he was doing but she was going to help him. She was committed to him, he decided. That pleased him enormously. He liked having her feel committed. When this was all over, he intended to have a long talk with her about her sense of commitment. She was the kind of woman who would stick with a man through thick and thin. For richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health...
    Damn it to hell, he knew for certain now he wasn't feeling normal. Marriage rarely—if ever—crossed his mind.
    Another wave of queasiness jarred him and he yanked his thoughts back from Mercy to his stomach. This was the third time during the past half hour that he had been aware of a wave of nausea. Nothing bad yet, but potentially dangerous. Nausea could stop a man as effectively as a fist in the face.
    Croft couldn't remember the last time he was sick to his stomach. What