Joe leaned back in the seat as the car turned into the driveway of the Ferrare estate. Time to put on his game face. The Blackjacks’s staff psychologist had said Joe needed to appear capable of controlling his new wife’s behavior while still being caring and considerate of Cari. However, he also needed to come across as being not bright enough to pose any kind of threat to Ferrare’s organization.

He could still hear the wry note in Doc Porter’s voice as she suggested he appear to get the job of controlling Carina done with mind-blowing sex. The shrink had gone on to comment dryly that being a superb lover by no means translated into being clever at anything else.

Colonel Foley’s window slid down and a burly man leaned down to stare in aggressively. “Whaddiya want?” the guy snapped.

Foley answered evenly, “Miss Ferrare and her guest would like to go inside.”

The furor that erupted was impressive. Cell phones rang, radios crackled, and a dozen men converged on the car.

Joe readied himself to fight when the first guard all but came through the window in reaction to Foley’s casual announcement, snarling, “Where the hell has she been?”

Foley threw up his hands. “Don’t ask me. I’m only the driver.”

Cari leaned forward and spoke to the thug hanging in Foley’s window. “Rico, it’s late and I’m tired. Let us in.”

Thankfully, the guard waved them through. Four men toting machine guns jogged beside their car as they drove slowly to the house. Joe eyed the escort cautiously. Wow. Eduardo must be apoplectic for those guys to be acting like this.

One of the thugs opened his car door and Joe stepped outside. No surprise, the guy called Rico slammed him against the side of the car and frisked him thoroughly and roughly. Asshole.

Carina was ushered out of the car much more politely, but Joe noticed her guard had a bruising grip on her arm. He caught Cari’s wince before she masked it.

“Get your hands off my wife,” Joe growled at the guard over the trunk of the car.

That froze them all in their tracks. The looks on the guards’ faces would have been hilarious if Joe hadn’t been so busy being shocked over how genuinely mad he was that the guy was manhandling Cari. As it was, he had to take a couple of deep breaths and forcibly tell himself to cool it.

He stepped around the car and put a protective arm around her shoulders. “Get my suitcase out of the trunk,” Joe snapped to the guard who’d frisked him. “And don’t break anything when you search it.”

He led Cari toward the house and made a point of not bothering to check over his shoulder to see if the guard had done as he ordered. He was aware, though, that Foley had prudently stayed inside the car.

Freddie and Neddie came charging outside just as he and Cari reached the front steps. The two giants screeched to ungainly halts, scowling ferociously at him. They were dying to get their hands on him, but with his arm securely around Cari, they would have to wait. Frustration danced on their ham-like features.

“You in big trouble, boy,” Freddie growled in broken English.

Joe shrugged. “I brought her home, didn’t I?” He might have added that it was more than Freddie had managed to do tonight, except there was no need to antagonize Ferrare’s people more than he had to. He was going to have to get along with these goons if he planned to stay alive here for any length of time.

Behind them, Joe heard the car start and then pull away. Thank God the colonel was out of here safely. Oh, and there went his last escape route. He was committed, now.

Cari piped up, “Relax, you two. We just wanted to get married in peace and private, for goodness’ sake.”

Freddie and Neddie’s jaws sagged.

“C’mon,” Cari continued brightly, “you can help us break the news to Daddy.”

Not surprisingly, the two men declined to follow them into the house.

Joe threw Cari a speculative glance. She’d pushed exactly the right button to get rid of her watchdogs. He revised his estimate yet again of just how smart a cookie she was.

At a glance, she came across as more concerned with the latest fashions and having a good time than anything serious. Except she kept showing these subtle flashes of calculated brilliance that called her airheaded-party-girl act into serious doubt.

Now, if only she could handle her father as smoothly as she’d just played her bodyguards.

“Do you know the layout of the place?” Cari murmured under her breath.

“Most of it,” he replied under his breath. They were headed for what he believed was Ferrare’s office now, in fact. For years, the Blackjacks had been trying to penetrate this inner sanctum of Ferrare’s crime empire. And to think, he was about to stroll into the place itself. Well, maybe walk in gingerly. It was still hard to grasp.

A gray-haired man with the roving gaze of a trained security expert stopped them at the door to Eduardo’s office. This guy was no beefy flunky. He looked hard and fit. Smart. Carried himself as if he were ready for anything to come his way. A legitimate warrior. Probably one of Eduardo’s personal bodyguards. Someone to reckon with.

Don’t react physically. Shoulders down. Hands relaxed. Don’t show recognition of this guy as a threat. Stay loose. It took concentration, but Joe managed not to fall into a defensive fighting stance in front of the guy.

“Hi, Gunter,” Cari said cheerfully. “I…we…need to see my father when he has a moment.”

“Given that you are the reason he is busy, I expect that will not be a problem,” the man said with a German accent.

Eastern German, if Joe didn’t miss his guess. The inflection sounded like it came out of the region toward the Polish border. This guy was old enough to have been Stasi trained. If so, he was one tough dude. The East German secret police had been one of the scariest bunches out there in their day.

Gunter put a finger to his ear and spoke quietly into a microphone clipped to his shirt collar.

He reached for the door handle but paused with his hand on the knob. In an undertone, he said to Cari in English, “I haven’t seen him this worked up in a long time. Not even after Julia—”

Joe completed Gunter’s sentence in his own head. Not even after Julia stole Ferrare’s entire cash fortune and handed it over to the Blackjacks. She’d wiped out every liquid asset her father owned. And Eduardo was madder now than he’d been over that? Whoa.

Joe might have been in threat mode before, but now his body kicked into imminent threat-of-death mode. Adrenaline ripped through him, and he kept wanting to settle into a fighting stance. Safe, dammit. Think safe and unassuming!

The door swung open before them. Through his private battle, Joe was vaguely aware of Cari reaching out to grab his hand. He gave her fingers a reassuring squeeze and they stepped inside.

The ceiling soared three stories overhead, and floor-to-ceiling glass windows—bulletproof, no doubt—lined the far wall, letting in what would be a spectacular view of the ocean during the day. The room was ultramodern, decorated in pale woods and shades of white.

He caught sight of the large glass-and-steel desk across the room, or rather the man seated at it. Eduardo Ferrare. In the flesh. And suddenly, this giant room seemed barely large enough to contain the man to whom it belonged. The sheer presence of the guy was incredible. Joe’s eyes narrowed. God, what he wouldn’t give to have a pistol in his hand right now.

While the urge to blow her father away roared through him, Joe tightened his arm around Cari’s shoulders protectively. She glanced up at him sidelong, a quick look that was equal parts grim, grateful and scared silly.

Joe braced himself for Eduardo to bellow like a bull. But instead, the guy leaned back in his desk chair, waiting and watching as they approached. And with each step closer they took, Cari was getting stiffer and stiffer underneath Joe’s arm.

Man, she really was terrified of the bastard.

The two of them came to a stop in front of Eduardo’s desk. Up close, the guy’s eyes were blazing mad. He looked like some sort of lunatic.

But all he said was, “Explain yourself.”

The silky, soft slide of the guy’s voice made Joe’s skin crawl.

A shudder passed through Cari.

But she said lightly, even casually, “You’ll never believe what we did this evening, Daddy. Oh, and this is Joe, by the way. Joe, my father, Eduardo Ferrare.”

Joe nodded politely, but daddy dearest ignored the introduction, his gaze fixed on his daughter with unblinking, reptilian intensity. Joe half expected the guy’s tongue to flick out at any second, tasting the air.

A shaky breath jerked into Cari’s lungs, but she continued gaily, “We got married! Isn’t that the coolest? We decided to just do it, so we jumped in a car, drove over to Judge Cabot’s and had him marry us.”

Score one for Carina. Eduardo’s jaw sagged and his stunned gaze passed back and forth between Joe and Cari several times. Joe did his absolute damnedest to keep his expression happy. Stupid. Patently besotted with his new bride.

Helpfully, he pulled out the rumpled copy of their marriage license and handed it across the desk to Ferrare.

Eduardo studied it intently for several seconds.

And then the man found his voice. All of it. And expressed his opinion of Joe eloping with his daughter at the top of his lungs. “Do you have any idea who she is—who I am?” he bellowed, exactly as Joe had expected him to.

Time for him to go into his surfer dude act. The idea was for Joe to throw Eduardo off balance by acting too dumb to possibly be a threat to the man.

“I sure do,” Joe drawled in English, which he happened to know Eduardo was fluent in. “This here’s the prettiest little lady this side of the Panama Canal, and you’re her daddy.”

Eduardo stared at him, momentarily silenced and apparently a bit flummoxed by someone who didn’t seem to know him by reputation.

Joe met Eduardo’s scowl head-on and nodded knowingly. “Yo, dude, I told Cari you’d be mad if we up and got married without asking your permission. I mean there’s a right way to do these things. The guy—that’s me— asks the old man—”

Eduardo’s brows slammed together and Joe corrected hastily “—I mean, the father—for the girl’s hand. And then you get married. But, hey, at least I didn’t sleep with her first—”

That brought Eduardo up out of his chair. “Whaaat?” he bellowed.

Hmm. If he kept up this line of conversation, maybe he could give Eduardo a stroke and kill him that way. The guy looked positively apoplectic. Joe shrugged. “What can I say? I’m an old-fashioned kind of guy. You marry the girl first and then you boink her.”

Eduardo choked. And then spluttered. And then choked some more.

Meanwhile, Cari’s shoulders shook beneath Joe’s arm. He looked down in alarm but was relieved to see her stifling laughter. Even Gunter was coughing conspicuously behind them.

Eduardo came out from behind his desk and stormed over to the two of them. Cari’s shoulders stilled abruptly.

Eduardo leaned forward, his face no more than a foot from Joe’s. “I should kill you where you stand. Give me one good reason not to, you little prick.”

Joe looked Eduardo straight in the eye and answered matter-of-factly, “I love your daughter.”

Eduardo studied him with the intensity of a laser. The man’s ability to sniff out a lie was legendary. It was part of why he was such a successful criminal boss. Nobody pulled any stunts on him and got away with it.

“Does she love you?” Eduardo snapped back.

Joe shrugged. “Well, yeah. Why else would she have married me?”

Eduardo’s gaze narrowed. The man could obviously think of a bunch of reasons why this arrangement benefited Joe. Like getting a hold of some of the Ferrare millions. Or riding a fast train to the heart of the Ferrare crime empire. Or simply the thrill of sleeping with the daughter of one of the most powerful men in this part of the world.

But clearly, Eduardo was perplexed as to what Carina had to gain from marrying Joe. Ferrare spun away and paced a lap of the huge office before coming to stop once more in front of them.

“Let us be clear, young man. The only reason you are alive right now is because of the respect you have shown my daughter over the last several weeks. If, for any reason, I find out you are playing with her affections, I’ll feed you to the sharks. In little pieces. Do you understand me?”

A speech worthy of the most devoted father. Too bad the precious child the bastard was protecting was his business and not the flesh-and-blood woman plastered against Joe’s side.

“I get ya,” Joe mumbled. “Nothin’ to worry about on that score. I’m not ever going to get tired of her. I mean, what a babe. Your daughter’s so hot—” He broke off as if realizing he was rushing headlong yet again into dangerous waters. And Cari’s shoulders were shaking under his arm again.

Eduardo snapped, “Gunter, escort these two upstairs and see to it they don’t wander around and get into trouble.”

The German nodded impassively.

Cari turned, dragging Joe with her.

Lord knew, Joe was more than ready to escape.

He let Cari pull him out of Eduardo’s office and, as they stepped out into the dim hallway, he let out a relieved breath. They’d done it. They’d gotten past the first interview with Eduardo and were both still alive.

The Blackjacks’s psychiatrist had made it clear that the greatest danger lay in that first confrontation, when Ferrare was most likely to erupt into sudden violence. She’d been the one to recommend that Joe use Cari as a physical shield between himself and Ferrare. Of course, he would’ve put his arm around Cari anyway to support her and protect her.

The two of them followed Gunter upstairs and down the long hallway to the east wing of the house and Cari’s room. Joe noticed she became more tense with every step closer the two of them got to her room.

Gunter stopped beside the last door on the left. He opened it and stood there, waiting, while they stepped inside. The room, a study in white lace, was dim, lit only by a small bedside lamp. Joe spun at the clicking sound behind him.

Not a pistol cocking, but not much better. Gunter had just locked them in. Carina gave the door a defeated look and turned to step further into the room.

“The bathroom’s through that door,” she said, pointing. “Oh, and I see the goon squad is done searching your suitcase. Nice of them to bring it up here since they probably figured they’d be carrying you out of my father’s office in a body bag.”

Joe scanned the room quickly. Damn. In a single glance, he spotted a dozen places to hide a camera or an electronic bug. He moved swiftly to Cari and put a finger on her lips. He touched her ear and then tilted his head slightly at the walls. Impatiently, she nodded her response, as if it was a given that her room would be bugged.

He moved over to the balcony door and lifted aside the curtain to look out. “Great view,” he commented.

“Go on out. You’ll like it,” Cari replied.

“Show me.”

A tiny smile flitted across her drawn features. Poor kid was a nervous wreck. In those first weeks when he’d watched her around the clock, she’d spent a lot of time out on this balcony. He’d gotten the impression she drew strength from the ocean. Maybe it would help her relax, now.

He opened the French doors and held them for her. As she brushed past him, he caught a whiff of her perfume. Exotic. Mysterious. It reminded him of a night-blooming orchid in the jungle.

The ocean was restless tonight, and waves pounded the shore, flashing whitecaps catching what little moonlight filtered through a thin layer of clouds.

Cari assumed her usual position, elbows resting on the stone balustrade, gazing out over the backyard and pool to the ocean beyond. Joe leaned on the balcony beside her, their shoulders brushing lightly. “How much privacy do we have out here?”

“Plenty, especially at night. The ocean is too noisy to hear anything over it. There are cameras watching us 24-7, but during the day, there’s less privacy because Gunter can read lips.”

A lip-reader, huh? Good to know. It was a hell of a note to have the civilian protectee lecturing the commando about security precautions in this little shop of horrors. It said a lot about the life she’d lived. And it said a lot about her that she wasn’t all bitter and shriveled up inside.

She continued, “I would still exercise caution at all times, if I were you. One never knows who’s watching around here.”

“Or listening,” he added dryly.

“Or listening,” she agreed.

Silence stretched between them. He gazed out to sea. Ironic that such a wide-open expanse should be so tantalizingly close to this gilded cage.

“Well, we got through the hard part,” he commented.

“I don’t know about that,” she replied.

He looked over at her quickly. “You think we’re still in danger?”

“I think every moment we spend in this house is dangerous,” she retorted.

He would love to reassure her, to tell her to be patient and that he’d have her out of here as soon as possible. But he dared not. There was no guarantee that a microphone couldn’t pick up what they were saying. He settled for mumbling, “Hang in there. He’ll come around.”

Joe did give in to the temptation to loop his arm around her waist, though. Gently, he drew her slender frame close. She was shivering. Even though it was a warm night, balmy and comfortable. Not that he blamed her. The girl’s father was a terror.

“Cold?” he murmured.

She made a noncommittal noise.

“Let’s go inside and get some rest. It has been a big day.”

Her mouth twitched. “Indeed. My wedding day.”

“Our wedding day,” he corrected.

Her gaze lifted in surprise to meet his.

“You’re not alone anymore, princess. I’m in this with you now. Till the very end.”

Their eyes met.

Something passed between them.

It was more than shared relief that they’d lived through the confrontation with Eduardo. They were in this together. And it drew them close in a way that reminded him of how he felt about the rest of the guys in the Blackjacks. Facing danger together bonded a bunch of guys faster and stronger than anything else in the world.

Good Lord, the same damn thing was happening between him and Cari.

Cold alarm coursed through him. This wasn’t about bonding; it was about getting her out of here alive!

A momentary but genuine smile touched her lips. “You’re a good man, Joe.”

He was a lot of things, but good was not one of them. Dangerous, yes. Smart, calculating, good in a fight, maybe. But in his line of work, men didn’t have a lot of time for emotions like empathy or compassion—the things that made them truly good or even human. He measured himself by skills mastered or missions accomplished. But good was definitely not part of that equation.

And to prove the point, he said, “C’mon. Let’s go to bed. Time to put on a show for your old man. This is our wedding night, after all.”