The Best of Friends Read Free

conspired to ruin her day.
    First, she heard someone put a key in the front door. Trying to get rid of the armful of flowers before David walked in, she started to run… only to catch the side of her right foot on the leg of a small, curved sofa. She was moving too fast to stop her forward momentum, and scrambling only caused her to skid like a cartoon character. Then her fingers slipped on the wet glass of the vase. She threw herself forward in an effort to keep it from falling.
    The vase went up, the flowers rained down, and Jayne was caught in the middle. She stared helplessly at the soaring glass vase. Even as cold water and flowers drenched her, her only thought was to keep the vase from hitting the marble floor and shattering. She reached up and grabbed it. The unexpected weight caused her to stagger back, where her heel came down on a lily stem. Her foot shot out from under her, and she fell, just as David walked into the house. She landed on her hip and her left wrist. The unfortunate cracking sound didn’t come from the glass… it came from her.
    David Worden, tall, handsome, blond, and blue-eyed, immediately rushed to her side. “Jayne? Is that you? Are you all right?”
    She sat in a puddle of water, wet flowers and greenery hanging off her, the picture of humiliation. If only she could believe the pounding in her chest was a result of her fall and not his crouching next to her, looking all concerned and drool-worthy. Even the sharp pain in her wrist, regrettable proof that she’d probably snapped a bone, wasn’t enough to jolt her out of her longing for up-against-the-wall sex.
    So much for being over her crush, she thought sadly as he took the vase from her arms. So much for the sophisticated first impression she’d planned. She probably looked like a drowned rat.
    “Where does it hurt?” he asked.
    “My wrist. I think it’s broken.”
    “Then we’d better get you to the hospital,” he said, helping her to her feet. “Can you walk?”
    “It’s my arm, not my leg.”
    “You have wet flowers in your hair. Do you really think attitude plays well with that look?”
    Despite her humiliation and the pain and the fact that she would never be able to look David in the eye again, she smiled. “Attitude is all I have going for me right now.”
    “Rebecca would tell you to work your strengths.” He pulled a couple of flowers out of her hair, then put his arm around her. “Let’s go get you X-rayed.”
    Rebecca waited while the limo driver carried in all the luggage she’d brought, but her attention was on Hans. The security expert had disappeared into the second bedroom of her rented space to check out the safe she’d purchased. Only after he’d declared it acceptable would she get possession of her little beauties.
    The driver finished, and Rebecca walked down the short hall to the spacious spare bedroom.
    As her landlord had promised, it was prepared for guests. A queen-size bed sat opposite a sliding-glass window with a view of the beach and ocean. There was a flat-screen TV on the wall, a private bath, and a big closet. And sitting right in the middle of that closet was a black 980-pound safe.
    “It will survive two and half hours at over twelve hundred degrees,” she said, leaning against the doorframe. “There are twenty-six locking bolts securing the door and a drill-proof steal plate.”
    “I know,” Hans said in his lightly accented voice. “I read the specs.” He closed the door and locked it. “Tell me the combination.”
    She smiled. “I might be a natural blonde, but I’m not stupid. No one knows that combination but me.”
    One dark eyebrow raised. “Very good. I give you your diamonds now.”
    “Lucky me.”
    He unlocked the briefcase from his wrist and set it on the bed. Rebecca moved closer as he opened the case and unfastened the protective covering. Inside, 387 diamonds glittered and winked in the afternoon light. Her cost—three million. Retail value once she set