Homeport

eyes and milky white skin, the deep red of her mouth, she resembled an efficient and sexy fairy. “She was robbed?”
    “I didn’t get the details.” Elizabeth’s lips tightened briefly. “She’ll arrange to have them replaced and reschedule her flight. It may take several days.”
    Elise started to ask if Miranda had been hurt, then closed her mouth on the words. From the look in Elizabeth’s eyes, either she didn’t know, or it wasn’t her major concern. “I know you want to begin testing today. It can certainly be arranged. I can shift some of my work and start them myself.”
    Considering, Elizabeth rose and turned to her window. She always thought more clearly when she looked out over the city. Florence was her home, had been her home since the first time she’d seen it. She’d been eighteen, a young college student with a desperate love for art and a secret thirst for adventure.
    She’d fallen hopelessly in love with the city, with its red rooftops and majestic domes, its twisting streets and bustling piazzas.
    And she’d fallen in love with a young sculptor who had charmingly lured her to bed, fed her pasta, and shown her her own heart.
    Of course, he’d been unsuitable. Completely unsuitable. Poor and wildly passionate. Her parents had snapped her back to Boston the moment they’d learned of the affair.
    And that, of course, had been the end of that.
    She shook herself, annoyed that her mind had drifted there. She’d made her own choices, and they had been excellent ones.
    Now she was the head of one of the largest and most respected research facilities for art in the world. Standjo might have been one of the arms of the Jones organization, but it was hers. Her name came first, and here, so did she.
    She stood framed in the window, a trim, attractive woman of fifty-eight. Her hair was a quiet ash blond discreetly tinted by one of the top salons in Florence. Her impeccable taste was reflected in the perfectly cut Valentino suit she wore, the color a rich eggplant, with hammered-gold buttons. Her leather pumps matched the tone exactly.
    Her complexion was clear, with good New England bone structure overcoming the few lines that dared show themselves. Her eyes were a sharp and ruthlessly intelligent blue. The image was one of a cool, fashionable, professional woman of wealth and position.

    She would never have settled for less.
    No, she thought, she would never settle for less than the absolute best.
    “We’ll wait for her,” she said, and turned back to Elise. “It’s her field, her specialty. I’ll contact the minister personally and explain the short delay.”
    Elise smiled at her. “No one understands delays like the Italians.”
    “True enough. We’ll go over those reports later today, Elise. I want to make this call now.”
    “You’re the boss.”
    “Yes, I am. Oh, John Carter will be coming in tomorrow. He’ll be working on Miranda’s team. Feel free to assign him another project in the meantime. There’s no point in having him twiddle his thumbs.”
    “John’s coming? It’ll be good to see him. We can always use him in the lab. I’ll take care of it.”
    “Thank you, Elise.”
    When she was alone, Elizabeth sat at her desk again, studied the safe across the room. Considered what was inside.
    Miranda would head the project. Her decision had been made the moment she’d seen the bronze. It would be a Standjo operation, with a Jones at the helm. That was what she had planned, what she expected.
    And it was what she would have.

two
    S he was five days late, so Miranda moved fast, pushing through the towering medieval doors of Standjo, Florence, and striding across the floor so that the clicks of her practical pumps were like rapid gunshots on the gleaming white marble.
    She clipped the Standjo ID Elizabeth’s assistant had overnighted her to the lapel of her jacket as she rounded an excellent bronze reproduction of Cellini’s figure of Perseus displaying Medusa’s severed head.
    Miranda had often wondered just what the choice of art in the entrance lobby said about her mother. Defeat all enemies, she supposed, with one swift stroke.
    She stopped at the lobby counter, swiveling the logbook around and dashing off her name, noting the time on her watch, then adding it.
    She’d dressed carefully, even strategically, for the day, selecting a suit of royal-blue silk that was military and trim in style. Miranda considered it both dashing and powerful.
    When you were to