Read A Scarlet Cord for Free Online Page B

again …
    The main dining room of Ciao! was bathed in warm candlelight. Strains of Mozart offered a soft accompaniment to the hushed voices of a few late evening diners, punctuated by the faint clatter of dishes that drifted from the kitchen each time the wide double doors parted to let a tray-bearing waiter pass through .
    He thrust his hand deep into the pocket of his suit jacket and nervously fingered the small square box hidden there. Across from him at the linen-clad table, Victoria Payne was intent on the steaming plate of pasta in front of her. He studied her delicate features in their frame of golden curls .
    She took a sip from her water goblet, but when she caught him staring at her, she set the glass back down and flashed him a quick smile. “What?”
    “Nothing …” He stifled a grin and turned his attention to his own entrée. But he had trouble keeping his eyes off of her. She had never looked so beautiful. In the flickering light of the single taper on their table, her porcelain skin was flawless. The cream-colored dress with its high ruffled collar and long lacy sleeves made her look almost like an angel. Or a bride .
    Suddenly nervous, he wrapped his hand tightly around the box in his pocket and willed his heart to slow down. He was certain she would say yes . Almost certain .
    A crash from the kitchen made them both jump. Victoria laughed at their skittishness and put another bit of pasta on her fork. He’d wanted everything to be perfect tonight. He had tried to secure a table away from the noise of the kitchen, but it was late, and the other sections of the restaurant were closed for the day .
    Now the dining room was nearly empty, the only other diners two businessmen at a nearby table. A lilting Mozart air faded away, and the room filled again with the sweet strains of a Handel sonata .
    Victoria looked up, fond remembrance in her gaze. “Oh, listen. I used to play the flute part for this piece—with my high school symphony. It’s so beautiful.” She closed her eyes, listening, obviously enraptured .
    He took a deep breath. It was now or never. He took the velvet box from his pocket and set it casually on the linen tablecloth .
    A sudden commotion at the lobby entrance was followed by a loud shout and a stream of curse words from the older man at the table near them. Then, as though it all happened in slow motion, he and Victoria stared in horror as a fashionably dressed man stood calmly at the nearby table, pulled a gun from beneath his suit jacket, and methodically fired six shots into the angry diner’s chest .
    The ring box was forgotten. They froze in their chairs, unable even to breathe, unable to believe that what they had just witnessed was reality . Then, seeing the horror in Victoria’s eyes, he forced himself to act. He lunged across the table and covered her body with his, then pushed her down to the banquette beneath it. He scrambled toward the kitchen on all fours, pulling Tori along with him, until they sat trembling against a wall .
    The gunman turned then and strode quickly toward a rear exit. As he passed, hard, deep-set eyes glared at Victoria .
    Less than six feet away from the man, he frantically memorized the dark eyes, the wavy brown hair, and the jagged-edged port-wine birthmark on the left side of the gunman’s face. Though only three or four people had actually witnessed the shooting, the few workers remaining in the restaurant quickly learned that the gunshots had left a corpse at table 4B .
    Panic took over. In the kitchen, a woman sobbed hysterically. The headwaiter shouted, trying in vain to calm the small group now being herded toward the exits. Several cooks and a trembling waitress peered cautiously through the steamed-over window. As he and Victoria sat on the floor just outside the kitchen, he watched them, fear clenching his stomach .
    “He’s gone, man … he’s gone now,” a waiter whispered, shaking his head in apparent disbelief. “But that guy