The Armstrong Assignment (A Janet Markham Bennett Cozy Thriller Book 1)

by Diana Xarissa

  For a moment, Janet was afraid she was going to have add reading English to her job description, but as Lucy and Theodore shot daggers at one another, Dixie reached over and picked up the menu.

  No one else spoke as Dixie went through the menu. She read only a handful of the options, muttering things like “you don’t like that, or that...” as she skimmed her way down the list. When she was done, Bobby laughed.

  “I’ll have the chicken,” he said. “And I’ll bet Dixie knew I was going to say that before I did.”

  She nodded. “Of course I did. I know you better than anyone else does.”

  Lucy made a noise, but didn’t say anything.

  “It’s nice weather for December,” Neil said after an awkward pause.

  “It’s better in Texas,” Lucy snapped.

  “Everything is better in Texas,” Bobby laughed. “Bigger and better.”

  Lucy nodded.

  “Have you always lived in Texas?” Janet asked Lucy.

  She shrugged. “I was born there. I lived a few other places as a child, though.”

  “My former wife thought that Lucy should have an opportunity to spend some time in North Dakota, where her family lived,” Bobby said. “I thought that was child cruelty.”

  “North Dakota wasn’t all bad,” Lucy countered. “My grandparents adored me. I was completely spoiled.”

  “I believe I spoiled you rather more completely,” Bobby argued.

  “In different ways,” Lucy replied.

  “In bigger and better ways,” Bobby said.

  “What about you?” Janet asked Neil. “Do you live in Texas?”

  He shrugged. “I have a house in Texas, an apartment in New York City, and a flat in London.”

  “Which one do you consider home?” Janet wondered.

  “For tax purposes, my home is in Texas,” he said.

  Which wasn’t an answer, Janet thought but didn’t say. “And do you live in Texas as well?” she asked Tony.

  “I do now,” he replied.

  “Where are you from originally, then?” she asked.

  “I wasn’t expecting an interrogation,” he replied.

  Janet let herself look shocked. “I was simply trying to be friendly,” she said, trying to sound hurt rather than suspicious.

  “Lighten up, darling,” Lucy told him. “He grew up in Cleveland, Ohio. He came to Texas for college and never left. Apparently it snows a lot in Cleveland.”

  “That bring us to you,” Janet said to Theodore. “Have you always lived in Texas?”

  He nodded. “I was born and raised in Dallas. This is the first time I’ve been outside of Texas, actually.”

  Janet nodded. “How long have you been working for Bobby?”

  “Six months,” he said. “Although it feels a good deal longer,” he added under his breath.

  “And, Dixie, you’ve always lived in Texas?” Janet asked.

  “Not always. I was born and raised there, but then I decided to see the world. My first husband was an Italian count. We got married when I was nineteen and divorced when I was twenty. By that time, I’d met my second husband. He was Russian, and when we were married, we lived in Siberia. That marriage lasted twenty-two months only because I was too cold to think straight for most of them.”

  Janet chuckled. “My goodness, you’ve led an interesting life.”

  “That wasn’t the interesting part,” Dixie told her. “After I left Igor, I moved to Mexico. My third husband turned out to be part of a major drug cartel. My parents had to send in the US Army to get me out of that marriage after two and a half years. They dragged me back to Texas for a few years. I got married again, to a man I’d known as a child. We quickly discovered that we had shared history but no interest in sharing our future. I ran away from that marriage on our third anniversary.”

  “And if you’re thinking she’s doing better because each marriage lasted a bit longer, don’t be fooled,” Bobby interjected.

  Dixie laughed. “My next husband was a man I met in Las Vegas. I’d gone there to drown my sorrows after my fourth marriage fell apart and I ended up marrying him the day after I met him. We were divorced six weeks later.”

  “My goodness.” Janet didn’t know what else to say.

  The waiter interrupted Dixie before she could tell the rest of the story. Janet ended up ordering for everyone, as the waiter either couldn’t or wouldn’t understand English. As soon as he’d left the room, Dixie continued.

  “At that point, I decided that I was done with men,” she told Janet. “So I flew to a private island, one that was owned by a friend of mine. He was very happily married when I arrived. Six months later, he was divorced and we were planning a wedding. I changed my mind the day before the wedding and flew home. He’s still angry, but I imagine he’ll get over it one day.”

  “I doubt it,” Lucy said. “I was there in the summer and he still wouldn’t allow anyone to say your name.”

  Dixie shrugged. “If we had married, we’d be divorced now anyway, and the situation would be much the same.”

  “That’s very true,” Lucy agreed.

  “I’m afraid to ask what happened next,” Janet said after a moment.

  “After that near miss, I’ve managed to keep myself single,” Dixie replied. “With the benefit of hindsight, I’ve realised that I simply should have married Bobby back when I had the chance. He’s the only man I’ve ever met who can keep up with me, and the sex is incredible.”

  Janet nearly choked on her water as Lucy made a face.

  “Too much information,” Lucy said firmly.

  Dixie grinned. “I talk too much,” she laughed.

  Bobby nodded. “It’s part of your charm,” he told her.

  “The food is very good,” Edward said after a moment.

  “It’s not that different to what I can get at home,” Bobby complained.

  “You should have read the menu yourself and ordered something exotic,” Lucy said.

  “Like you did?” Tony asked, eyeing the plate in front of her. Lucy had ordered the same chicken dish about which Bobby was complaining.

  She shrugged. “I’m enjoying my meal and I couldn’t care less that it’s similar to what I could get at home.”

  “Mine’s very good,” Theodore muttered.

  “What did you do before you came to work for Bobby?” Janet asked him.

  He stared at her for a minute and then shrugged. “After college, I worked for a bank for a few years before moving into recruitment. I was working as an executive recruiter, but when I saw the job with Bobby, I decided it was time for a change.”

  “How’s that working for you?” Lucy drawled.

  Theodore flushed. “It’s a very different sort of job, but I’m enjoying the challenge.”

  Lucy laughed. “Of course you are.”

  “How did you and Tony meet?” Janet asked the woman, changing the subject.

  Lucy looked at Tony and shrugged. “In a bar or restaurant or something like that.”

  “You don’t remember?” Dixie asked. “Even after everything that’s happened, I still remember the first time I met every one of my former husbands.”

  “Tony was part of the crowd for a while before we started dating. I don’t remember the first time we met,” Lucy said with a shrug.

  “Tony, you must remember the first time you met Lucy,” Dixie said.

  He frowned. “Lucy and I have several friends in common. I’m sure we were introduced at some party or something, but we’d known one another for some time before we began dating.”

  “Did he propose in some terribly romantic way?” Dixie asked Lucy. “Surely you remember that?”

  “Of course I remember that,” Lucy snapped. “It wasn’t very romantic, though. He just asked me in the middle of dinner one night. When I said yes, he gave me the ring and ordered a bottle of champagne.” She waved her left hand. The huge diamond caught the light and sparkled brilliantly.

  “It’s a nice ring,”
Dixie said. “My favorite of my engagement rings was from my second husband, but my last proposal was the most romantic one.”

  “The man with the private island?” Janet asked, hoping she’d remembered Dixie’s complicated romantic history correctly.

  Dixie nodded. “We didn’t have a typical courtship because he was already married, and I refused to have an affair with him. I actually really liked his wife. She was lovely and she deserved better.”

  “You broke her heart,” Lucy said.

  “I didn’t mean to hurt her. I flirted with her husband, but I flirt with everyone. I didn’t expect him to take me seriously, but when he did, I told him that I didn’t sleep with married men, or rather, I only sleep with married men who are married to me, that is. I thought that would be the end of that, but he wasn’t deterred.”

  “You could have left,” Lucy suggested.

  Dixie laughed. “But I was having so much fun. It’s a little slice of paradise there. You’ve been there.”

  Lucy nodded. “It is a magical place where the real world can start to feel unimportant.”

  “Exactly. I stopped caring about the rest of the world and just got lost in being spoiled twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. It was intoxicating,” Dixie replied.

  “How did he propose, then?” Janet had to ask.

  “Sweets?” the waiter asked as he walked back into the room. He handed Janet a menu written in English before giving the others menus in French. Janet quickly read through the options and everyone ordered. The waiter cleared away a few of the empty plates and then left the room.

  “You were going to tell Janet about your last proposal,” Lucy reminded Dixie as the door shut behind the man.

  “I still hadn’t slept with him, but he’d sent his wife back to the States,” Dixie replied. “Then he threw out all of his other guests so that it was just the two of us staying there. We had dinner together, with champagne, and then he took me for a helicopter ride over the island. He had ‘Will You Marry Me’ spelled out in rocks on the beach below us and, as we flew over it, he pulled out a ring.”

  “That’s very romantic,” Janet said.

  “I might not have said yes otherwise,” Dixie admitted. “I wasn’t certain how I felt about him, but I managed to convince myself that I was in love. As I said earlier, I didn’t make it down the aisle, though.”

  “Did your husband propose in some wildly romantic way?” Lucy asked Janet.

  She hesitated and then shook her head. “He really just asked,” she replied. “That was romantic enough for me, though.”

  “That’s exactly what I did,” Bobby said. “I just asked. I only did it once, and it didn’t take me long to realise that I’d made a huge mistake, but I still tried to make it work.”

  “You and Mom were only married for six months,” Lucy said flatly.

  “Which was five and a half months longer than I wanted to be married to her,” Bobby replied. “I discovered on our honeymoon that your mother and I weren’t at all compatible, but I did my best to make it work anyway.”

  “For six months,” Lucy muttered.

  “They were the longest six months of my life,” Bobby told her. “The only good thing that came out of those months was you.”

  “And I was born eight months after the marriage ended, so you and mom must have had some good times towards the end of the six months,” Lucy suggested.

  Bobby shrugged. “The only place we got along was in the bedroom.”

  “Theodore, have you ever been married or engaged?” Janet asked, breaking the uncomfortable silence that followed Bobby’s words.

  He shook his head. “I’m quite happy on my own. My career is more important to me than anything else right now.”

  “Neil, do you want to tell Janet about your marriage?” Dixie asked.

  Neil flushed and then shook his head. “I don’t believe my private life is any of her business.”

  Dixie laughed. “Ten years ago, your private life was everyone’s business.”

  “It’s ancient history,” Neil replied. “Where is dessert?”

  “Neil’s engagement, marriage, and subsequent divorce filled the American gossip magazines for a few weeks around ten years ago,” Dixie told Janet. “Not because Neil was anyone important, but because of who he married.”

  Neil stood up. “I’m going to go and find the waiter,” he said, clearly angry.

  He took a few steps towards the door, stopping when it suddenly opened and the waiter walked back in carrying a tray full of delicious-looking puddings. As the waiter began putting plates on the table, Neil sat back down.

  “Wonderful,” Janet sighed over her chocolate mousse.

  “What shall we do this afternoon?” Bobby asked.

  “You need to rest back at the hotel,” Theodore told him. “We’re meeting the nurse there soon.”

  Bobby nodded. “I’m fine, though. We have more business to discuss, and I want to see some of the sights, as well.”

  “I think it might be best if we leave sightseeing for another day,” Edward said. “Head injuries can be serious.”

  Bobby looked as if he wanted to argue, but after a moment he pushed his half-eaten pudding away and stood up. “Let’s go back to the hotel, then,” he said angrily. “We can talk there,” he added, giving Edward a dark look.

  Janet frowned as everyone immediately got to their feet and headed for the door. She still had two bites of mousse left and she didn’t want to rush her enjoyment of them. As she listened to the others heading for the stairs, she took another bite and shut her eyes. So very good. When she opened her eyes again, everyone else had gone. Quickly scraping up her last bite, she swallowed it as she grabbed her handbag before rushing after the others.

  Chapter 8

  Janet needn’t have worried. The group was standing right outside of the restaurant, arguing loudly about whether they should walk back to the hotel or take a taxi. Edward looked as if he was about to lose patience with everyone.

  “The nurse will be waiting,” Theodore said. “We should get a taxi. Otherwise, you’re paying her for simply standing around.”

  Bobby frowned. “Good point,” he said. “Let’s get a taxi.”

  Theodore nodded and then looked at Janet. “How do we get a taxi?” he asked.

  “Allow me,” Edward said. He stepped forwards and hailed a passing car. When it stopped, he looked at Janet. “There is room for four. Does everyone else want to ride back, too? I can get another taxi,” he said.

  “I’ll walk,” Janet said quickly.

  “I’ll walk, too,” Lucy said. “With the traffic, we’ll probably be back at the hotel before you, anyway.” She turned on her heel and strode away. Tony rushed after her.

  After a moment, Dixie shrugged. “I’d rather not walk,” she said.

  “This is ridiculous,” Neil snapped. “I’ll see you all back at the hotel.” He set off towards the hotel at a brisk pace.

  “That’s four for the taxi, then,” Theodore said. “Let’s go.”

  He climbed into the car. Bobby got in next, followed by Edward. Dixie slid into the front passenger seat, thanking the driver, who was holding the door for her, as she went. Janet turned and began to walk back to the hotel at a leisurely pace. She was only a few steps away from the building when the taxi pulled up to the door.

  “Hello,” Edward said in a low voice when she reached him.

  “Hi,” she replied before following the others into the hotel’s lobby.

  A young brunette was sitting in the lobby, but she got to her feet as they entered. “Mr. Armstrong?” she asked. “I’m the nurse from the agency.”

  Janet translated her words for Bobby and Theodore.

  “Do you speak English?” Bobby demanded.

  “A little,” she replied in English with a shrug.

  “I told them we needed nurses who speak English,” Theodore said.

  “But it is difficult with urgent cases,” the nurse told Janet in French
. “They thought it was best to have someone here right away. Perhaps the next nurse who comes in later will speak more English.”

  Janet repeated what she’d been told.

  “But what is wrong with Mr. Armstrong?” the nurse asked. “The agency didn’t have much information.”

  “He fell and hit his head,” Janet explained. “The doctor who was there when it happened was concerned about a concussion.”

  The nurse nodded. “So I must monitor him. I see.”

  “Let’s go up to my suite,” Bobby said. “I have some things to discuss with Edward.”

  They headed for the lifts. Janet wasn’t certain if she was included in the invitation to Bobby’s suite or not. She reached out to push the button for the fourth floor.

  “We’re going up to ten,” Bobby said. “But you need a keycard for that floor in order to select it.” He waved his keycard across a reader and then pushed the button for the top floor. “You’re going to have to come along and translate my conversations with the nurse for me,” he told Janet.

  She nodded. She’d expected as much.

  When Bobby opened the door to his suite and ushered them all inside, Janet had to swallow a gasp. The nurse didn’t bother to hide her reaction.

  “My goodness, this is luxury, isn’t it?” she asked Janet, speaking in French.

  Janet nodded as she looked around the huge sitting room, which was furnished with modern furniture that looked as if it had been ridiculously expensive.

  “I saw that couch in a magazine,” the nurse told Janet in a whisper. “It cost more than my flat.”

  “It doesn’t even look comfortable,” Janet replied.

  The nurse laughed. “I’m going to find out,” she said.

  As Bobby walked to the bar in the corner, the nurse sat down on the couch.

  “It’s actually very comfortable,” she told Janet. “Maybe I’ll start saving my pennies.”

  Bobby picked up a bottle and poured an amber liquid into a glass.

  “He shouldn’t drink with a concussion,” the nurse said quickly.

  Janet repeated her words to Bobby.

  He sighed. “Just the one,” he said, taking a sip from the glass.