Not For Sale by Sandra Marton Page A

right now.
    Gradually, the streets changed, went from commercial to residential until, finally, he was in Caroline’s neighborhood, then on her street.
    It wasn’t what he’d expected.
    A handful of streets had not been converted from careworn to chic. This was one of them.
    Overflowing trash cans lined the curb. Gang names and symbols adorned graffiti-filled walls. A fetid breeze sent bits of debris scattering along the sidewalk. All the buildings looked tired, Caroline’s, in particular. It was a five-story pile of age-darkened red brick that seemed held together by a century’s worth of grime.
    A police car was parked in front of it.
    Lucas felt his heart thump.
    He knew some cops. They were, for the most part, good people. Still, thanks to his childhood in Rio, there were times when the sight of a police uniform or police car still made him uneasy.
    This was one of those times.
    And that was ridiculous. The cops were here. So what? It was not his problem.
    The building’s front door was not locked. His mouth thinned. Unlocked front doors were never a good idea but on streets like these, they were an invitation to trouble.
    Not his problem, either.
    The vestibule smelled bad. Dirt, cooking and something more pungent that was probably better not identified, hung thick in the air.
    Again, not his concern.
    There was another door ahead and, to his left, a panel of labeled call buttons. The one for apartment 3G read
C. Hamilton.
    At least Caroline had the good sense not to use her first name. Not that it mattered all that much. Using only a first initial was pretty much a giveaway that the name belonged to a woman.
    He thought of the women he’d taken out over the weekend.They all lived in buildings with security cameras, locks and what looked like retired wrestlers as doormen.
    So what? Caroline’s security—or the lack of it—came under that same not-my-problem heading, as did the fact that the interior door yawned onto a dim hall.
    How she lived meant nothing to him.
    It just ticked him off that an intelligent woman—and she was smart, he had to give her that—would live in a place like this. It certainly couldn’t be because of money, not when she made her living as she did.
    Lucas frowned.
    Then, why had she let him pay her only a thousand dollars for that night in his bed? God only knew what being with her should have cost him. He’d never put a price on such things but if he had—if he had.
    Lucas spat out a word that was as ugly in Portuguese as it would have been in English. Who gave a damn? Not him.
    He took the sagging stairs and paused on the third-floor landing. Apartment 3G was directly ahead. That feeling of unease, an icy clenching in his gut, swept through him again.
    Something was definitely wrong.
    The police car at the curb. The unnatural quiet of the old building, broken now by the barely imperceptible
snick
of the door to the apartment adjoining Caroline’s opening an inch, then quickly closing again.
    He moved forward fast, pressed his hand, flat, against her buzzer, then hammered his fist against the door.
    “Caroline?” He grasped the knob, rattled it. “Damnit, Caroline—”
    The door swung open. Caroline stood before him, wearing sweats, no makeup, her face pale, eyes reddened, her hair damp and wild on her shoulders.
    “Mother of God,” he said hoarsely,
“querida,
what is it?”
    “Lucas,” she said, “Lucas…”
    Every logical thought, all the rage, all the bitter desire for payback, flew out of his head. He opened his arms and she flew into them.
    He gathered her to his heart, held her close, whispered soothing words to her in Portuguese. She was trembling; he thought of a puppy he’d once found in an alley in Rio, how it had whimpered and trembled, how he had held it in his arms until it was silent and still…
    “Caroline. Sweetheart.
Que aconteceu?
What happened?”
    “A man,” she said. “A man…”
    “Excuse me, sir.”
    Lucas swept her behind him at the