When the Shadows Fall: A Romantic Thriller (Blackwood Security Book 14) Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1 - Sky

  Chapter 2 - Sky

  Chapter 3 - Sky

  Chapter 4 - Alaric

  Chapter 5 - Alaric

  Chapter 6 - Sky

  Chapter 7 - Sky

  Chapter 8 - Sky

  Chapter 9 - Alaric

  Chapter 10 - Sky

  Chapter 11 - Sky

  Chapter 12 - Emmy

  Chapter 13 - Sky

  Chapter 14 - Emmy

  Chapter 15 - Sky

  Chapter 16 - Emmy

  Chapter 17 - Sky

  Chapter 18 - Alaric

  Chapter 19 - Sky

  Chapter 20 - Sky

  Chapter 21 - Sky

  Chapter 22 - Sky

  Chapter 23 - Sky

  Chapter 24 - Sky

  Chapter 25 - Sky

  Chapter 26 - Sky

  Chapter 27 - Sky

  Chapter 28 - Sky

  Chapter 29 - Sky

  Chapter 30 - Alaric

  Chapter 31 - Sky

  Chapter 32 - Sky

  Chapter 33 - Sky

  Chapter 34 - Sky

  Chapter 35 - Sky

  Chapter 36 - Sky

  Chapter 37 - Emmy

  Chapter 38 - Sky

  Chapter 39 - Sky

  Chapter 40 - Emmy

  Chapter 41 - Sky

  Chapter 42 - Emmy

  Chapter 43 - Sky

  Chapter 44 - Alaric

  Chapter 45 - Sky

  Chapter 46 - Alaric

  Chapter 47 - Emmy

  Bonus Chapter

  What's coming next?

  Want to Stalk Me?

  End of Book Stuff

  Other Books by Elise Noble

  WHEN THE SHADOWS FALL

  Elise Noble

  Published by Undercover Publishing Limited

  Copyright © 2020 Elise Noble

  v4

  ISBN: 978-1-912888-27-6

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organisations, places, events, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

  Edited by Nikki Mentges, NAM Editorial

  Cover design by Abigail Sins

  www.undercover-publishing.com

  www.elise-noble.com

  All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

  - George Orwell

  CHAPTER 1 - SKY

  I FELT HIM before I saw him. A dark shadow materialising behind me.

  “Your knife’s showing,” Rafael whispered as he took his place by my side.

  I’d never seen him in a tux before. He scrubbed up well. One might even mistake him for civilised, but I knew the truth. Tonight, he was a mountain lion forced to play the part of a pussycat, but those claws would pop out at the merest hint of trouble.

  As the string quartet in the corner began to play, I glanced down at my dress. Dark grey silk with a tight bodice and a long, flowing skirt edged in black lace, it was easily the most beautiful thing I’d ever worn. And since I’d borrowed it from Emmy, my new boss, it was undoubtedly the most expensive thing too. But sure enough, the edge of a carbon-fibre handle was peeking out from my cleavage. Shit. I shoved it farther into my bra and rearranged the girls.

  “Better,” Rafael said.

  Was that a hint of a smile flickering at his lips? Yes, I do believe it was. A momentous occasion.

  “Stop looking at my tits.”

  “Just doing my job.”

  Unfortunately, he wasn’t kidding. As one of my mentors at Blackwood Security, the company I’d somehow ended up working for, Rafael’s role—perhaps even his passion in life—involved telling me what to do. Run faster, jump higher, hit harder, get that bullet in the centre of the fucking target, Sky. This morning, we’d started at five o’clock with a ten-mile run, then spent three hours in the gym, another two on the shooting range, and finally got to my favourite part—learning how to ride a motorcycle. After two weeks of practice, I could do wheelies with the best of them.

  But tonight? Tonight, we were going to dinner. Three courses plus wine at a flashy awards show, complete with tasteful music, dancing, and—if everything went according to plan—the capture of an art thief we’d been hunting for months.

  And when I say we were going to dinner, we weren’t going far. The whole event was nothing more than an elaborate sting operation being held at Riverley Hall, Emmy’s husband’s ancestral home. Most of the time it was her home too, but a month ago they’d had a bust-up and she’d moved into the house next door. Little Riverley, although that was something of a misnomer seeing as it had six bedrooms, seven bathrooms, a swimming pool, and a movie theatre.

  Why all the pretence? Because Killian Marshall, the guy we were after, was a hard man to talk to. Firstly, he lived in a secure compound in the town of Penngrove, Virginia, and he didn’t go out much. Secondly, when he did leave his home, he had a habit of travelling with trigger-happy heavies. Plus research showed he had a concealed-carry permit. Emmy and Alaric, one of her exes, had been on the receiving end of Team Marshall’s firepower when an operation went wrong eight years ago, and nobody wanted a repeat performance.

  A dozen of Blackwood’s finest had spent the last week sniffing around Penngrove, including staking out Casa Killian, and what they’d initially thought would be a simple job got trickier with every new snippet of information they unearthed. In fact, they’d been about to hop over the wall for a sneak-and-peek when Mackenzie Cain, Blackwood’s number-one IT geek-slash-hacker, pushed the proverbial panic button. I’d been in the gym with Emmy when the call came, and she put it on speaker.

  “Has the team gone in?” Mack asked.

  “They’re on—”

  “Stop them.”

  Emmy didn’t hesitate, not even for a second. She just picked up another phone and did exactly that.

  “Dan? Stand down, and Ravi too. … No, I don’t know, not yet, but Mack’s found some sort of problem. Call you back in five.” Then to Mack, “Okay, what’s up?”

  “I did a little nosing through the records at the sheriff’s office, and I found notes of an incident that took place seven years ago. There’s not much in the way of documentation—it looks as though they tried to hush things up, probably because Killian Marshall sponsored Sheriff Braunton’s daughter to study drama at the Juilliard School in New York.”

  “And?”

  “Two kids decided to snoop around on the Marshall property one night. Local teenagers. They claimed it was a dare because the house is kinda creepy and Marshall doesn’t exactly welcome visitors. According to the notes, they were meant to take a selfie on the front steps as proof they’d been there. Except a storm came over, so they thought they’d shelter in a barn, but when they crossed the threshold, one of them stumbled over a tripwire and got blasted by a shotgun.”

  “Marshall booby-trapped the place? What were the consequences?”

  “Legally? None. The kids were trespassing, and Marshall claimed he was only taking precautions because he’d disturbed an intruder late one night when he went out to check on the horses. The alleged intruder ran off, and of course, the incident wasn’t reported. Marshall paid the kid’s medical bills, the sheriff made it cle
ar he wouldn’t take any action, and the mother of the injured boy actually said she was grateful for Marshall’s help and his understanding in the aftermath.”

  “Wow. He really brainwashed her, huh?”

  “Sure did. But I’ll bet anyone else thought twice about sneaking onto the property.”

  “Time could’ve made him complacent, but if he rigged the place in the past, he might’ve carried on doing so. Look at Black—once a security fanatic, always a security fanatic.”

  “Black doesn’t rig up tripwires, does he?” I whispered to Emmy.

  I’d been merrily traipsing around the whole fucking estate. Had I been in danger of losing my head? Would’ve been nice if someone bothered to mention it.

  “Nah, we have sensors and cameras. If he spots an intruder, he’ll go out and shoot them personally.”

  Was that supposed to be comforting?

  “So if a team goes in, they’ll need to take extra care,” Mack said. “I’ll keep digging, but I haven’t managed to find a personal email address for Marshall, let alone get access to his computer. His PA seems to deal with all his work-related communications. And if he has a second cell phone, it isn’t registered in his name.”

  “Thanks, Mack.” Emmy tossed her phone back onto a weight bench. “I hate this fucking job. Alaric’s right. Emerald’s jinxed.”

  The emerald in question wasn’t a gem but a stolen painting—The Girl with the Emerald Ring—and Alaric had been trying to retrieve her since his days as an FBI agent. Along with Blackwood, he’d recently recovered another painting stolen from the Becker Museum in the same heist—a rescue operation that had left four people dead and two more traumatised—but Emerald herself remained elusive, a malevolent presence hiding in the shadows. I’d seen a photo of her. A half-naked siren reclining on a bed of roses as her enigmatic smile lured men to their doom. I could understand her destructive attitude. The artist who painted her had been male, and if I’d had to lie there for all eternity with thorns stuck up my arse, then I’d want revenge on mankind too.

  So far, she’d been responsible for Alaric and Emmy facing a hail of bullets when they tried to buy her from the thieves eight years ago, for Alaric losing his job when the pay-off vanished along with the painting, and for Emmy and Black’s current marital problems. Why? Because I very much suspected Black was the one who’d disappeared the pay-off.

  And where did Marshall come in? Well, he’d been the artnapper who showed up to collect the booty. Ten million bucks in cash and untraceable diamonds.

  Which led us to our current predicament.

  With the possibility of more booby traps plus Emerald’s curse hanging over our heads, nobody wanted to chance a raid on the property. Besides, we’d set up cameras to watch the place. Marshall had two armed guards stationed there at all times, twenty-three security lights, a plethora of motion sensors, and a groom who came morning, noon, and night to take care of his horses. He sponsored the sheriff’s department’s summer barbecue, which meant deputies did regular drive-bys. Oh, and he was an insomniac.

  The conclusion? We’d have to target him away from the property, but that presented its own challenges because when he did venture out, he favoured events with crowds of people present. Nobody wanted to involve innocent bystanders in a shoot-out. A couple of weeks ago, we’d gathered in one of Riverley’s conference rooms and brainstormed ideas to capture Marshall safely, but they were few and far between.

  “Doesn’t he eat at restaurants?” Black asked.

  Dan, Black’s number two in Blackwood’s investigations division, shook her head. “He orders takeout, and one of his men collects it.”

  “What about visiting the mall? Where does he buy clothes?”

  “Online, I guess. He gets a lot of packages delivered.”

  “So can’t someone pose as a FedEx guy?”

  “Nobody’s allowed through the gates. A goon walks down the driveway to collect everything.”

  “Paranoid little fucker, isn’t he?”

  “Hardly surprising—the FBI’s been after him for years.”

  “You give the FBI too much credit.” Black glanced sideways at Alaric. “Sorry.”

  “No, you’re not,” Alaric replied.

  No, Black wasn’t, but he was feigning civility because he wanted to get back into Emmy’s good graces. She hadn’t confirmed what he’d done, not in as many words, but I didn’t have to be a mind reader to work it out. I was the one who’d first voiced concerns that Black had taken the pay-off, you see, although when I told Emmy of my suspicions, she’d not-so-kindly informed me that I was dead wrong. But she also hadn’t spent a night with him since their big fight. Go figure.

  “Doesn’t he go out anywhere?” Emmy asked.

  “I spoke to one of the assistants in the Marshall Gallery.” Dan paused to take a sip of her coffee. Whatever faults Emmy might have, she ensured her coffee machine was stocked with the best. If I failed my probation and got my ass kicked back to London, perhaps the biggest disappointment would be having to go back to instant. “She told me that eight years ago, Marshall ramped up security and cut back on his travel. The local gossipmongers said a gang of thieves targeted him for his money.”

  “Eight years ago?” Emmy echoed. “Other people’s money, more like. He’s nothing but a dirty thief himself.”

  “I’ve asked around, and Mack’s scoured the local newspaper archives. The only thing that seems to lure him out of his lair is arts-related events. Rumour says he’ll be at the opening night of the Penngrove Community Theater’s production of King Lear, but that isn’t for another two months. And he always attends new exhibitions at the gallery, but the current show runs for another six weeks.”

  Killian Marshall was a keen patron of the local theatre in Penngrove. He paid the rent on their building as well as providing funding for props and costumes. Plus he ran his eponymous art gallery as a social enterprise, donated to the local animal sanctuary, and sponsored summer camps for the town’s kids. An all-around great guy. A pillar of the community. When he wasn’t busy fencing stolen paintings or shooting at people, that was.

  “Any music concerts?”

  “Battle of the Bands takes place in September, and he’ll probably present the prizes, but that’s seven weeks away. The rest’s just small change—a local duo playing Simon & Garfunkel’s greatest hits, a Whitney Houston tribute act, a fundraiser by the high school glee club… And the concerts take place at the Penngrove Pavilion. Guess who owns the place?”

  “Couldn’t we turn that to our advantage?” Alaric asked. “Have someone act as an event organiser and go visit him? You’re practically married to a music producer, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, and I already reached out to the Marshall Foundation on Ethan’s behalf. Killian takes his meetings by Skype only, so I backed off. Agatha researched online and compiled a list of his known public appearances beyond Penngrove for the past eight years, but there’s not much—a mention that he attended the premiere of a movie he helped to finance in California, a trip to London for the opening of an art exhibition he lent a painting to—”

  “What painting?”

  “A Modigliani. Legally purchased from Christie’s. He also headed to Paris for a charity concert, to New York to attend a special performance of Swan Lake, and to Miami for a jazz performance by Shabaka Hutchings.”

  Bradley, Emmy’s assistant, bustled in with a plate of freshly baked cookies. Yet another advantage of living at Riverley. I’d grown up on the breadline in London, where even a Mars Bar was a luxury, and now there was all this food… Yeah, the ten-mile runs weren’t necessarily a bad thing.

  Today, Bradley’s hair was black at the sides with a pale-pink stripe down the middle, like a skunk that took a wrong turn into a candyfloss machine. And then got into a punch-up with a flock of flamingos. His boa was shedding feathers everywhere, and they floated around the room on the breeze coming in through the windows.

  “How did Marshall get to those places?” Bla
ck asked. “By private jet?”

  I might have been the new girl, but I still knew where his thoughts were heading. We could replace the pilot on his next trip and fly Marshall somewhere else. Somewhere isolated. Or possibly snatch him at the airport before he even took off.

  “We’re still looking into that. And also researching other possible events he might be interested in. There must be some way we could engineer him onto a guest list.”

  “It’s simple, isn’t it?” Bradley said. “Duh. Just hold our own shindig here and invite him. Come on, somebody needs to take an oatmeal and raisin—they won’t kill you.”

  Everyone stared at Bradley in silence. At least thirty seconds passed before Emmy spoke.

  “It’s not a terrible idea.”

  “Excellent! I’ll start the planning. Izzy and Tia can help.” Bradley made it to the door before anyone thought to hog-tie him. “I do love a party.”

  And that was how I ended up as Rafael’s “date” for the evening. A role that made me…uncomfortable. When we were training, he must’ve burned off his testosterone or something, but now that he was standing around in a penguin suit doing that lip-twitchy smile, pheromones seeped out of every pore and sort of hung around him in a cloud, leaving me edgy. I shouldn’t have been nervous. After all, it wasn’t Rafael who’d violated me in the worst possible way. Yes, he was tough when we worked together, but he’d never knowingly hurt me, of that I was confident. And he wouldn’t let anyone else hurt me either. Hadn’t he cracked my previous trainer’s ribs when Alex unwittingly scared me? And hadn’t he kept quiet about my resulting panic attack? Yes and yes. So why did I feel uneasy?

  The job. It was the job, right? Although I’d gotten tangled up in two previous Blackwood efforts—one where I managed to break Emmy’s nose and another where I might or might not have assisted with a man’s nosedive off a building—this was the first fully planned operation I’d been involved in.

  As undercover operations went, it was a pretty tame one. Every person in the ballroom was connected to Blackwood in some way. All the guests, the waitstaff, even the freaking concert pianist playing the grand piano on the stage at the far end of the room. I didn’t know much about classical music, but she sounded pretty good to me.