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here, I’ll go get them.’ He winked and moved off the couch, leaving his Coke on the small coffee table.
    Jaz didn’t waste any time. She got up quickly, ignoring the niggling pain, and stepped to the kitchen as Marcus disappeared around the corner, past his dad’s office and up the stairs to his room.
    Jaz was after one thing only. Carl’s briefcase, which he’d left on the kitchen bench. Her heart began to race. She only had a few seconds. Since the moment Carl had flung it there, she’d been thinking of ways to check it out. Would there be anything important lurking inside? Had Carl left it behind because he’d been distracted by them or did he not keep anything special in it? Maybe he didn’t think his family would find it ‘important’ but Jaz wasn’t family. Any little thing could be crucial.
    Marcus’s footsteps were heading up the steps as she flipped open the leather case. She prayed Carl had his door shut tight so that if he opened it she would hear.
    Jaz had seconds.
    Act fast.
    She slid out the papers inside. Her eyes running over the contents as quickly as possible. Invoices, customs documentation and forms, but nothing she thought helped. Unless he had a man in customs? Jaz quickly sought out the name on the paperwork. Daniel McNally. And filed it away in her memory.
    Next she checked out the business cards he had slotted in the leather. ‘Jameson Figlomeni, Figlomeni Enterprises. AFMA member.’ There was a phone number and an address in Hillarys.
    There were none for De Luca Industries, maybe she was a bit naive to think Carl would cart that around on him. But what good would that do? She already knew Carl was tied up with De Luca.
    Heavy footsteps dropped against the steps. Marcus was on his way back. The pounding of her heart and the fear of being caught made her giddy with adrenaline. So much that her hand was shaking badly as she tried to slide the paperwork back in. It was almost impossible to stay calm, knowing Marcus would be walking towards her and she was still trying to close up his dad’s case. But if her training and fencing had taught her anything, it was how to stay cool under pressure. She could do this.
    ‘I think you’ll like these,’ said Marcus from right behind her. His converse shoes barely made a sound against the marble floor.
    Swallowing her fear, Jaz flipped the cover on the case, picked up her can of Coke and forced a smile as she turned around. ‘Why? Are they of me?’ she said, hoping the words didn’t rush out with all the nervousness that she felt. She sipped her Coke to hide her discomfort.
    Jaz turned to offer up the table space so they could spread out his drawings, and doing so she slid Carl’s case further behind her and with any luck, pushing it further from Marcus’s mind.
    He laid out three white pages with lead pencil sketches on them.
    ‘Oh wow.’ Jaz leant over to see one of her. They way he’d captured her hair, so free and beautiful, was amazing. ‘It looks so real.’ Her lips were drawn plump and the detail crazy. ‘You have such a talent, Marcus. I just wish your dad could see it.’
    Marcus placed his hand low on her back and he leant over to kiss her neck. Automatically Jaz tilted her head, giving him easier access to her skin.
    ‘So do I.’
    When he finished kissing her, Jaz pulled the other two drawings closer. One was of the ocean outside his bedroom window and the third … the third caused her heart to skip.
    Every night in her dreams that face haunted her. Tommy.
    ‘What’s wrong?’ said Marcus.
    Jaz cleared her throat. ‘Nothing, it’s just sad,’ she managed to whisper. It was hard to talk when her body was frozen in terror. That night she’d shot Tommy, she hadn’t seen his face in the dark, but in her nightmares it was clearly visible. So seeing his face now was like living her bad dreams. ‘Did he have a family?’ she asked.
    ‘He has a daughter that he doesn’t see. I think the mother has sole custody. Other