“The damn dinner,” he muttered. “Take her into the other room and keep her quiet. I’ll handle this.”

“A pleasure.” Linda took the gun Gumm handed her and gestured Mel into the next room.

Smoothing back his hair, Gumm went to the door, then gestured for the waiter to roll in the room-service tray. “Don’t bother to set up. Our guests haven’t arrived yet.”

“Yes, they have.” Sebastian strolled in. “Jasper, I’d like you to meet Special Agent Devereaux. FBI.”

In the next room, Linda swore and Mel grinned. “Excuse me,” she said politely, tramped hard on Linda’s foot and knocked the gun aside.

“Sutherland,” Sebastian said with restrained fury from the doorway. “You’ve got some explaining to do.”

“In a minute.” To please herself, she turned and rammed her fist into Linda’s astonished face. “That one was for Rose,” she said.

*  *  *

He wasn’t happy with her. Sebastian made that abundantly clear through the rest of that evening, through all the explanations. Devereaux wasn’t exactly thrilled himself, though she thought it was small-minded of him, since she’d all but wrapped the evidence in a bow and handed it to him.

Sebastian had a right to be annoyed, she supposed. She’d acted on her own. But she was the professional. Besides, it had worked out exactly as she’d planned, so what was his problem?

She asked him just that several times, as they packed up for the trip home, as they flew back to Monterey, as he dropped her off at her office.

His only answer was one of his long, enigmatic looks. The last thing he said to her left her miserable and silent.

“I kept my word, Mary Ellen. You didn’t. As a matter of trust, it comes down to that.”

That had been two days before, she thought as she brooded at her desk. And there hadn’t been a peep from him since.

She’d even swallowed her pride and called him, only to get his answering machine. It wasn’t that she felt she owed him an apology, exactly. But she did think he deserved another chance to be reasonable.

She toyed with the idea of going to Morgana or Anastasia and asking them to intercede. But that was too weak. All she wanted to do was to put things back on an even keel between them.

No, no, she wanted much more than that, Mel admitted. And that was what was killing her.

Only one way to do it, she told herself, and kicked back from her desk. She would hunt him down, pin him to the wall if necessary, but she would make him listen to her.