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Chapter 1
Gabriel, el Duque de Bencalor, had come to say goodbye.
He lifted the leather case onto the trestle table and opened the lid. The guitar’s polished wood glistened like satin in its red velvet bed. He traced the graceful spirals of inlaid marquetry with his finger. For a moment, he let his hand hover over the strings, wishing, longing.
He yanked his hand away and slammed the lid down with less care than the exquisite instrument deserved. He stood it upright beside the five other guitar cases that lined one wall of the octagonal tower room. Even though he rarely came here anymore, the palace staff kept the stone floor gleaming and the rough-hewn walls free of cobwebs.
Gabriel closed his eyes, trying to hear again the wild, passionate sounds of flamenco that he had once conjured from these guitars. Nothing but the muted roar of the waves smashing against the cliffs at the tower’s base penetrated the closed windows. He had composed a piece in evocation of that sound while at the music conservatory two years ago. His strongest work, he’d thought at the time.
He raised his hand to touch the lobe of his damaged ear. The top plastic surgeon in the world had reconstructed its outer whorls in a six-month-long series of operations. It looked perfect to the casual observer, and he had no trouble with hearing all the sounds of normal, everyday life.
Yet, when his teacher and mentor had listened to him play, Antonio de la Cueva had shaken his head in sorrow. “It’s muddy. The notes aren’t pure. You’ve lost the nuances.”
Gabriel could no longer perceive all the subtleties a virtuoso musician had to be able to hear.
He opened his eyes. The mute guitar cases shot a bolt of guilt through his gut. He yanked his cell phone out of his jeans pocket to call the musicologist who had acquired Gabriel’s rare instruments for him. “I want you to sell my guitars.”
“Are you sure?” the man asked, his voice almost anguished. “It took five years to obtain the Torres instrument. Once you sell it, we may never be able to get it back.”
“These instruments are meant to be played. I’ve been selfish to keep them silent for so long,” Gabriel said, the truth of it jabbing at him again. “You know who wants the Torres… Marisela Alejo.”
“I’ll contact her.” The musicologist’s distress faded to resignation.
“Give her a break on the price,” Gabriel said. “She will make it a voice of beauty again.”
He and Marisela had played a duet once—an arrangement of “Asturias” by Albéniz—for a charity event in New York City. He had been only fifteen, while Marisela was already a famous flamenco guitarist—a tocaora—at the age of twenty-four.
It wasn’t her fame that made his hands shake before the performance, but her blazing talent. He knew he wasn’t worthy to play with her—yet—but the charity’s organizers had wanted his name on the star-studded program because having a royal duke perform added cachet to their event. He had rehearsed with Marisela by videoconferencing to get his cues down, but it hadn’t felt like nearly enough preparation.
As he stood in the wings of the stage, pretending to watch the act before them and taking deep breaths to calm himself, Marisela walked up beside him. She was dressed in her signature black trousers, black vest, and white shirt, the thick braid of her deep red hair falling over one shoulder. He’d already stripped off his tuxedo jacket and bow tie and rolled up the sleeves of his shirt to allow his arms and wrists to move freely. She flicked a gaze over him. “Your first performance in New York?”
He nodded, not sure he could speak in an even voice.
“New Yorkers are a tough crowd. Forget them. Wrap yourself in the music.”
Their names were announced, and they walked onto the stage where a spotlight blazed down on two simple black chairs and two guitars. The applause was tepid. He could hear conversations continuing at the tables where the donors were finishing their dessert and sipping coffee.
He was grateful that the spotlights blinded him so he couldn’t see the faces of the audience as he sat and cradled his guitar.
Marisela lifted her eyebrows at him in a wordless question, and he once again nodded, watching her position her hands on the strings and play the first urgent notes of the piece. After that, he forgot everything except following her into the music, their guitars singing to each other, asking and answering, her brilliance lifting him to a level he’d never reached before.
When they finished, the huge ballroom was dead silent for a long moment. Then the applause rolled through the room like thunder, and he could see a ripple of movement as people stood and shouted, “Encore!”
He desperately wanted to keep playing with her, to drink more deeply from her well of genius. He looked at Marisela with a plea in his eyes.
But she shook her head and murmured, “Always leave them wanting more.” She gave a brief bow and strode from the stage with Gabriel trailing behind her while the next performer stepped into the spotlight.
He remembered the way he had felt that night, as though he’d glimpsed a mountaintop he might someday be able to reach.
Now all he did was work the lily fields and discuss leaky roofs and cow diseases with the manager of his estate. The manager had run his estate without any help for years before this, but Gabriel had needed to fill the time he had once spent practicing the guitar.
He brushed his fingertip over the useless, insensate whorls of his ear. It was time to seek out a new direction for his life. His stomach turned to lead as he considered what it would be.
Chapter 2
“It’s el duque on line one,” Emilia, the company’s receptionist, hissed in a stage whisper as she leaned through the doorway of Quinn’s office.
“Oh, shit!” Quinn didn’t deal with clients. She was the way-behind-the-scenes computer nerd, and she preferred to keep it that way. She had also been employed by the security firm Seguridad Silva for a mere six months.
