Rockwell Agency: Boxset

by Dee Bridgnorth

  “Help you?” Jordan said. “You want me to help you with your wild goose chase?”

  “It’s not a wild goose chase. I’ll go back to that bar, and I’ll listen. I’ve never tried hearing someone’s thoughts before. If I tried to hear them …I’m sure I could. Couldn’t I? I usually try not to hear them, and then some break through anyway.”

  Jordan looked wary. “You shouldn’t go trying to hear people’s thoughts.”

  “But it would work,” Wes said. He grew quiet, focusing on Jordan. He hadn’t heard any of her thoughts at all, which wasn’t that surprising given how brief their earlier encounter had been and how nervous he had been during it. But now, they were both relaxed. “Let me try,” he said, leaning forward. “Let me try to see if I could hear your thoughts if I tried.”

  “No,” Jordan said, getting up and carrying the pizza box back to the kitchen. “That’s not a good idea.”

  Wes did it anyway. He focused on Jordan entirely, staring at the back of her head and straining his ears, opening his mind, and searching for her thoughts. He didn’t know if he was doing it right, or if he even had this ability, but then he heard something.

  I said no. You’d better not be trying to hear me.

  Wes blinked in surprise, then laughed. “I did! I heard you! You thought that I’d better not be trying to hear you.”

  When Jordan turned around, her expression held none of the amusement or excitement that Wes felt.

  “Don’t do that,” Jordan said. “That’s an invasion of people’s privacy. It’s rude, and it’s wrong. You either stop, or you can get out.”

  Surprised by her anger, Wes held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. “I’m …sorry. I didn’t mean anything by it. I just wanted to see if I could do it.”

  “Well, now that you know you can, don’t,” Jordan said. “People are entitled to the privacy of their thoughts. You never know what a person might have good reason to keep to themselves.”

  Her intensity and her forcefulness led him to one conclusion—Jordan had something that she very much did not want him to know. He wouldn’t imagine that it was anything terrible, but it must be something interesting. He couldn’t help but wonder about it.

  “I think you should probably go,” Jordan said, walking back towards the couch. “There’s nothing more we can do here tonight. You need to go home, get some sleep, go to work, and come to my office at three o’clock tomorrow, as planned. If you’re still concerned about this, we can talk about it then.”

  She had gone all business on him again, her more easygoing self who had laughed was long gone. Wes regretted that loss, but he also knew that he had brought it on by offending her. “I’m sorry I upset you,” he said sincerely, getting to his feet and following her towards the front door. “It wasn’t my intention.”

  “Tomorrow we’ll talk more about what might have triggered your transposed thoughts,” she said, not replying to his apology. “And we’ll go from there. Try to get some sleep.”

  “Thanks for letting me stop by,” Wes said, wishing that he could find the right thing to say to bring back the Jordan who had smiled and bantered with him. “I’ll be there tomorrow—three o’clock sharp.”

  She nodded. “All right then. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Wes walked out of her apartment, and she closed the door behind him. He sighed, leaning up against her wall and closing his eyes. Whatever nerve he had just hit with Jordan was unfortunate, and he regretted it, but it changed nothing about what he was now determined to do. He had overheard someone plotting to murder another human being, and he wasn’t just going to pretend he hadn’t. He wanted Jordan to help him, but if she wouldn’t, he would do it on his own. Tomorrow night, he would be back to that bar, hoping to find the person again.

  Chapter 9

  Jordan

  The speed was almost killing her. She was running as fast as she could, pouring sweat, and her legs were screaming in protest. Her lungs were on fire, burning her from the inside out as she gasped for air. But she refused to stop. This was a battle between her body and her will, and she was determined that her will would win.

  Only ten more seconds to go. She counted them down, forcing herself to run faster and faster and faster with each one, until finally—finally—the sixty-second sprint was up. She reached for the controls on her treadmill and bumped the speed down to a comfortable loping run, her head hanging down low, as she tried to catch her breath.

  “I’ve never seen you go that fast before,” Quentin said, running at a comfortable speed beside her. “These sprints you work into your routine are a little wild.” He laughed, lightly. “Not to mention, anyone who walked into the gym and saw you nearly flying on the treadmill might have a few questions.”

  Jordan picked her head up, grinning at him. “But the rush, Quentin—the rush.”

  “I’ve got a nice runner’s high going on, and I didn’t have to take myself to the brink,” he said. “You’re extra intense today, J. Something going on?”

  She checked her watch. “Yeah, I’ve got a client meeting in an hour, and I’m not looking forward to it.”

  “Rough case?”

  Jordan shook her head. “No, it’s just a transposed thoughts case. The guy is hearing other people’s thoughts, and he came in yesterday because he wanted to stop hearing them. I sent him away as quickly as I could, in case he started hearing my thoughts and caught on to the whole dragon thing. But, it turns out, that was a mistake, because he went out to a bar and overheard someone thinking about the murder they’re planning.”

  “Oh shit,” Quentin said, adjusting the incline on his machine so that he was running uphill.

  “Yeah, so now he’s gone vigilante on me,” Jordan said. “He wants to keep his transposed thoughts until he can figure out the crime. And he’s discovered, apparently for the first time, that he can actually specifically listen for someone’s thoughts.”

  “How’d he figure that out?”

  “He tried it on me,” Jordan said. “After I told him not to, by the way.”

  “Oh shit,” Quentin said again. “And he’s showing up at the office in an hour?”

  Jordan nodded. “Yeah. One of the reasons my post-lunch workout is a little more intense today. I even had him blocked last night. I was wearing a dried pig’s foot around my neck, which is supposed to make it harder for him to access my thoughts. Not looking forward to dodging him for another hour today.”

  It was unfortunate that this was the problem that Wes had, because Jordan had discovered last night that she actually liked the guy. When he was more relaxed, he bantered well, and he didn’t pull any punches. He seemed like a nice guy with a good heart and quick wit. And, of course, he was gorgeous. He had a lot going for him. But when he had pushed his way into her thoughts, he’d undermined all of that.

  In fact, she was considering turning him over to another investigator.

  “You want to take his case?” Jordan asked Quentin. “You know I have a hard time keeping my thoughts to myself as it is …”

  “Sorry, can’t help you,” Quentin said. “I’m headed out of town tomorrow on an out-of-state case—helping a friend up north.”

  Jordan was surprised. “Really? Since when?”

  “Talked to Barrett about it this morning. It’s nothing big. Really just an excuse to catch up with an old friend. You remember Ben?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Jordan said, nodding. Ben was a healer that they had met years ago when he’d made a brief stop in Louisiana for a few months. He and Quentin had particularly hit it off, and the two had stayed in touch. “Hold on ...” Jordan bumped the speed up on her treadmill again. “Time for a sprint.”

  She pushed herself to her absolute limit, her feet flying on the treadmill so fast that the human eye would be unable to detect her actual movements. She would simply be a blur. When the sixty seconds had passed, she lowered the speed and engaged the cooldown mode on the treadmill, so she could wind down her workout.

  “I
t’ll be fine,” Quentin said, picking up their conversation where they’d left off. “This guy with the transposed thoughts. All that really matters is that you don’t think about shifting around him. Keep your mind occupied. That’s all you’ve got to do.”

  “Yeah,” Jordan said, wiping the sweat off her forehead. “I know. I just don’t like editing myself.”

  “Part of life,” Quentin said, switching off his own machine. “I gotta hit the shower. I’ll see you back at the office probably.”

  “Okay, well if I don’t see you, happy travels,” Jordan said. “Enjoy that northern tundra you’re about to head into.”

  Quentin laughed, hopping off the treadmill and grabbing his gym bag from the cubby behind him. “See ya, J.”

  Jordan finished her own cooldown, then hopped off her machine and grabbed her bag as well. She headed for the women’s showers, and she quickly stripped off, washed off the sweat she’d built up, and got dressed in clean clothes. One of the things that she loved about Louisiana was that it was warm enough most of the year to wear shorts. It helped that, as a dragon shifter, her blood ran a bit hot, anyway. But even without that part, it was still in the low sixties in December. She felt freer in her cut-off denim shorts that she was well known for. She pulled on an oversized sweater with them, another look she was known for wearing in the winter. Plus, it hid the pig’s foot that was hanging around her neck. Tugging on her tennis shoes and ruffling her hair into place in the bathroom mirror, she considered herself presentable for work. Her look was low- maintenance—just how she liked it.

  Walking out of the gym, bag over her shoulder, she walked the three blocks down to her office. When she got there, she grabbed a protein bar from her desk and bit into it, replenishing some of the calories she had just burned. Then she sat down to go over some files and streamline her game plan for tackling Wes’s case. As usual, she became immersed in her work, and it took her a minute to hear Wes’s light knock on the doorjamb.

  When she looked up, he was standing there in her doorway, looking slightly hesitant again.

  “Come in,” she said, gesturing toward the chair he had sat in yesterday. “Hangover today?”

  “No,” Wes said, sitting down. “It was only three beers. I was tipsy, but I wasn’t drunk.”

  Jordan nodded, leaning back in her chair and watching him. God, he really did look gorgeous. He looked like he had just taken a shower as well. His hair was slightly damp as it framed his face, and his skin glistened. His T-shirt, gray this time, fit his upper body like a glove, and she wondered if he even realized what a display he was putting on for all those around him.

  Then she wondered if he had heard her think that, and she locked her thoughts down, her eyes narrowing warily.

  “Look,” Wes said, breaking the awkward silence between them. “I would like to apologize for last night. First of all, I shouldn’t have called you so late or come to your house. What I had to tell you could have waited. And I definitely should not have tried to hear your thoughts, especially after you asked me not to. I did a little bit of research on my break at work today, and I actually found some stuff about …you know …transposed thoughts. It had never occurred to me to look it up before. I guess I thought I was the only person in the world who has ever done this. Anyway …there are things I can do to keep from hearing your thoughts, and I want you to know that I’m doing them. I’m keeping you blocked out, because I realize that I violated your privacy.”

  His little speech was quite unexpected, and Jordan had to admit, equally as effective. She found herself softening towards him, which was an unusual feeling for her. “Thank you,” she said, simply. “Apology accepted.”

  Wes smiled, and it lit up his whole face. “Okay, good. Man, I thought you were going to make it harder than that.”

  Jordan hid her own smile, determined to keep this professional even if she did continually find herself liking this guy. “We need to figure out what it was that triggered the beginning of your transposed thoughts. That’s the first step. To do that, we need to …”

  “Wait,” Wes said, holding up a hand. “Before we do all of that …I want to ask you to reconsider what I asked you last night. About trying to figure out what I’d heard last night.”

  Jordan held back her sigh. She had thought they were making progress, but apparently, he was still hung up on investigating a murder that had not yet and might not ever happen. “Wes …”

  “Hear me out,” he said, holding up a hand. “I’ll make a deal with you, and I’ll pay you for your time. For the next three nights, you go with me to the bar I was at last night. We stay there for three hours each night. And if I hear something again, then we can figure out who it is and what to do about it. If I don’t hear anything else about it, then I promise, after the third night, I’ll let it go, and we can do whatever it is we’re supposed to do to keep me from hearing other people’s thoughts.”

  Her lips pressed together as she contemplated his offer. It was a reasonable compromise, she supposed. But on the other hand, she thought the chances that the person would show back up at the same spot and that Wes would hear more mental musings about murder were relatively slim. On the other hand, if the intended victim was a regular patron or a bartender …or if the potential murderer happened to like that bar and frequented it …well, then there might be something to the idea.

  But she wasn’t completely convinced. This meant spending her evenings in a bar with Wes, for three hours at a time. He had promised not to try to listen to her thoughts again, and she believed him, but there was still a significant risk of him getting hints of what was inside her head. She shouldn’t risk exposing herself and her friends as dragon shifters to a stranger just to follow some overly optimistic plan for apprehending a murderer.

  “Wes, I don’t know …”

  “Please,” Wes said, watching her. “I know it might not make sense to you, but I heard it, and I can’t get it out of my head. I know there’s probably nothing I can do, but I need to try. Maybe that’s why I’m hearing voices. I don’t know.”

  Jordan knew she was going to agree, even though she probably shouldn’t. She understood what it was like to just need to follow through on something, and in spite of herself, she liked Wes. It sounded like an enjoyable enough job, sitting around a bar with him and seeing if anything popped into his mind.

  “Fine,” Jordan said, relenting. “We’ll do it your way. But when three days pass, then we do what we need to do to make sure that you’re not hearing voices anymore.”

  Wes grinned at her, the smile spreading across his whole face. “Deal.”

  Chapter 10

  Wes

  They waited until eight o’clock that night to head to the bar. Wes wanted to go earlier, but Jordan had pointed out that bars didn’t really pick up business until eight o’clock at the earliest, and if there was someone who was there to either stalk or murder one of the patrons, he probably wouldn’t do anything until well after dark.

  It made sense, but Wes was itching to get started. Ever since he had heard that whispered thought in the parking lot, he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it. He felt drawn to the mystery, like it was his to solve.

  As he sat down at a table with Jordan, he looked around the room, trying to get a feel for each person within it. The person who had run away from him the night before had been wearing a hoodie. It had been a person slight enough that he couldn’t determine gender from his or her frame alone, and the voice that he’d heard was also unhelpful. He really didn’t have any idea who he was looking out for, but he knew that when he saw the person, he would know.

  “What do you want to drink?” Wes asked Jordan, signaling to the server as she walked by.

  “Guinness, if they have it on tap,” Jordan said.

  “Make that two then,” Wes said, when the waitress confirmed that they did have it on tap. “And an order of seafood dippers.”

  The server walked away, and Jordan lifted an eyebrow. “What are
seafood dippers?”

  “Fried seafood,” he said, shrugging a shoulder. “I ordered them last night, but Bree and her friends kind of took them over. I want to actually try one.”

  Jordan sat back in her seat, looking around. “So, do you remember anyone else from last night, other than the people you were talking to?”

  “Vaguely,” Wes said, looking around as well. “I don’t see anyone I recognize right now, but if we’re looking for the victim, then we know it’s a woman. The voice called her a bitch.”

  “Which is why you’re worried it might be Bree, one of her friends, or Alana,” Jordan said, nodding. “You know, the person whose voice you heard was probably in the bar at some point. They were in the parking lot, right? What are the chances that they just hung out in the parking lot all night and didn’t even get up the guts to come in here?”

  Wes hadn’t thought about that, but it made sense. “Damn … So, this person could have been right next to me. We could have gone to the bathroom at the same time. I didn’t go to the bathroom here last night, but if I had …”

  Jordan laughed, slightly. “Unless it’s a woman.”

  The server came by with their drinks and promised that their appetizer would be ready soon. Wes took a long draught of his Guinness, enjoying the rich malty flavor. But then he was back to work, scanning each face.

  Thoughts began to pepper into his brain.

  God, her breath is bad. I’m still going to kiss her later, but damn—what died in her mouth?

  Two burgers, one well done, both with fries, and one without pickles. Which one is without the pickles?

  I hate you, I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.

  That guy is so totally checking me out right now. Oh my God, he’s staring right at me.

  Wes realized that he was making direct eye contact with the girl whose voice he had just heard, and he quickly averted his eyes, clearing his throat and grabbing his drink. He took a swig of it, then went back to listening.