She laughed. “Are we trying to get upstairs, or be the cliché in every spy novel?”
“Do you have a better idea?”
“The twelve-year-old boy living next door to me would have a better idea.”
“Good. Maybe you can call him.” He was sure a twelve-year-old wouldn’t have a better idea, but it was worth a chance. He was lawyer. Not a diabolical thief.
Jessi’s brows arched as her attention coasted across the room. He could almost see the wheels spinning. A smile pulled her lips up. Her eyes brightened.
Those eyes should be a registered weapon.
“I have an idea.” She maneuvered him in front of her as she pressed her back to the wall. Her hand slid beneath the short skirt. Slow. He should turn away, but nothing could get his eyes to cooperate. Her hand. Was under. Her skirt. Oh, how he wanted that hand to be his.
She raised the back of her skirt, revealing a thin black strap running down her thigh and leading to the top of her stocking. A garter belt. Stockings. For fuck’s sake. He was only human. Then she undid the clasp, freeing the strap. “Stay here.” Like he could go anywhere with a sight like that burned into his brain.
She stepped around Enzo and slid her index finger over her lower lip. “Excuse me, sir. I could use your help.” Her lips pouted around the finger she was molesting with her mouth.
The guard stared at those lips. He looked hungry—not for food. And didn’t that just piss off Enzo. Those were his lips. Well…not his lips, but he wanted to taste those lips, feel those lips. He sure as hell didn’t want anyone else getting a taste.
Enzo shook his head and turned away. Watching her was a distraction he didn’t need, and completely blew the whole reason she was letting her garter loose. He moved closer to the elevator.
“I’ve tried to fix my stocking, but I can’t reach. Could you help a girl in distress?”
Don’t listen to the words. He found the button and pressed it while Jessi’s hand crawled up her skirt. Again. It was still hot.
“Ummm.” The guard looked ready to blow. His eyes bulged as she raised that little skirt higher and higher and higher.
A scream behind them pulled Enzo’s attention toward the dining room.
“She’s choking.”
“She’s turning blue.”
The gawking security guard ran away from the elevator and into the dining room just as the elevator door opened.
“Come on.” Jessi stage-whispered from inside the car.
People multiplied in the doorway, drawn by the commotion in the dining room. He and Jessi had to get upstairs quick before the entertainment died down—that came out wrong, he didn’t want anyone to die—until the entertainment got the food dislodged.
Enzo jumped in as the door closed.
The car rode up to the second floor. Given the distraction and that no one stopped or commented on his fast flee, they might have gone undetected. The second floor was quiet, dark. Silence followed by a large cheer barreled up the stairwell. They must have saved the distraction. Thank goodness.
Enzo took a right down the hall, and opened the door to the room at the end. He slid inside and pulled Jessi in after him. “There’s supposed to be a guard patrolling the floors, so we need to keep it down.”
“Now you tell me,” she said, and he practically heard the eye roll.
“Well, I didn’t get a chance to tell you with all the skin showing,” he grumbled.
“What does skin showing have to do with telling me about the guard situation?”
He had no answer for that, so he raised his finger to his lips. “Shhh.” Cop-out? Yes. But telling her that her skin had a way of making his brain malfunction wasn’t on his list of things to do. In fact, there was only one thing on that list.
He listened at the door. No sounds. The only light came from outside the windows, coating the room with a soft glow.
“Where do we look?” Jessi whispered.
“I’ll look in the desk. You be on the lookout.”
She pointed at the door. “Out there?”
“No. Right here.”
“What am I supposed to be watching for? By the time the door opens it’ll be too late. Wouldn’t it be more productive for me to help look? Twice as fast.”
He hated to say it, but she was right. They were sitting ducks in this room. Only one way in and nowhere to really hide. “Okay. Take the left side drawers. I’m looking for a list. Names and dollar amounts or just numbers.”
He pulled out his cellphone and shone the light into the middle drawer. Pens. Stapler. No paper. He closed the drawer and moved to the right-side of the desk. The first drawer held a gun and a pile of paperwork. He took out the gun and laid it on top of the desk.
“Anything?” Jessi aimed her own cellphone light at a stack of file folders while she sifted through them.
“So far, no.” He opened the first file. Bingo. Pages and pages of names and numbers. Dates. It was all here. And halleluiah, his client’s name was nowhere to be seen. He liked when clients told the truth. That rarely happened.
But the witness? Nope, he’d been a bad boy. His name was all over the list, accompanied by large numbers. The sleazebag probably had quite a nice nest egg, considering how long this had been going on. Or he was broke, with a horrendous drug habit.
“What about this?” Jessi held up another list.
He leaned over the desk to take a closer look. Some of the same names, but it was different. “Yeah, we’ll keep that one, too.”
“Are these admissible?”
The fact that she knew to ask that was a huge turn-on. “No. But the witness has fabricated some information and we need him to take back what he’s said.” The fact that he had to say that was a huge turn off.
He knew the client would suffer if they didn’t do something drastic, but this… He wasn’t sure this was the best way to go. His boss, however, thought this was the only way. So here he stood. He liked his boss, but sometimes Enzo wondered which way his bosses moral compass swung.
Enzo folded the sheets in his hand as the door to the office flew open.
One of the large security guards threw on the overhead light. He looked just as surprised as Enzo felt. Although the big guy got his wits together faster, because he drew his gun. “What are you doing in here?”
Enzo said, “Looking for a bathroom,” at the same time Jessi said, “Making out.”
“Making out and looking for a bathroom?” The gun-holding giant didn’t seem to believe them.
“Well.” Jessi audibly gulped as she raised her hands above her head. The common stance for those faced with a gun. Enzo’s hands were currently stuck above his head, too.
Jessi winked. “I asked him to clean off the desk. I always wanted to do it on a desk.”
“I just wanted to find a bathroom.” Enzo stuck with his original story. At this point it was all bullshit, anyway. The mayor’s thugs probably wouldn’t let them live through this. There had been a story or two about people who’d crossed the mayor and ended by washing up on the Chicago lakeshore. Of course, those were just stories. He hoped.
The guard kicked the door closed and inched further into the room. “What do you have in your hand?”
“Nothing important.” Enzo dropped the folder onto the desk before he thought better of it. Guys with guns generally didn’t like sudden movements. Not that he’d come in contact with guys with guns very often.
“Don’t move.” The goon pointed the gun and swung his thumb along the side. Enzo might not know a lot about guns, but he knew when the safety was being disengaged. Fantastic.
Jessi gasped. She must have seen the move as well. Her eyes were wide. She didn’t deserve this. This wasn’t her fight. He had to get her out of there.
But he no clue how.
Four
“Move over to the couch.” The gun-toting he-hulk stood in front of the closed door. Another bald no-neck Gigantor. With a gun. Pointed at her. And Enzo, but mostly at her.
Jessi had never seen a gun, let alone had someone point one at her. And it scared the crap out of her. She never understood the whole peeing oneself they were so scared. She could now see how that would happen, although she hadn’t really wet herself. She wanted to.
“Move.”
When the he-hulk flipped the safety thing, she about freaked. All the words died in her throat. All the excuses ran out the door petrified. She wanted to run out the door, too.
She sidestepped to the couch and sat down. The couch creaked as Enzo sat down beside her. His face was calm, but a twitch at the corner of his mouth told Jessi he was afraid too. At least she wasn’t alone.
It looked so simple in the movies. The gun was pointed, the good guy gave lip and then performed some ninja-tsu thingy. Then the good guys got pie.
She just wanted to get pie.
Gigantor spoke into a radio at his shoulder. “We have two people in the office…ten-four.”
Whoever he’d just talked to was probably on their way up. Hopefully, they wouldn’t have a gun. Hopefully, they wouldn’t care that her and Enzo had been rifling through the desk. Hopefully wasn’t going to cut it here. They needed divine intervention.
A few moments later a pale man in an expensive suit walked in the door, surrounded by two more goons. He was probably in his thirties. Nice looking. Brown hair. Blue eyes. He looked like he should be a dancer in Magic Mike. He looked vaguely familiar. Television?
Jessi and Enzo were now officially outnumbered. Even if Enzo had some ninja moves waiting in his back pocket, they weren’t going to do much good with three no-necks and Evil Suit Guy.
“What’s going on?” Evil Suit Guy asked, eying Jessi and Enzo. Definitely television, but not prime-time. The news. Where had she seen him before?
“Sir, I found these two going through the mayor’s desk.” The original goon walked over to the desk and picked up the folder. “He had this in his hand.”
Jessi realized she was scowling when Enzo glanced at her and his eyes widened. They were really nice eyes. She looked back at Evil Suit before Enzo distracted her from—oh. Evil Suit Guy was the deputy mayor. Robert? No, Richard…Something. Quick? Swift. Richard Swift. Uh-oh.
The deputy mayor took the folder and flipped through the pages, frowning a little. “Donations?”
Jessi wasn’t a lawyer or an accountant, but she’d taken a few classes in accounting—she’d taken a bunch of classes in a lot of things. The lists they’d found might be donations but the numbers were catastrophically high. Donations that high usually came with strings.
If they lived through this, she’d have Leti, the accountant mastermind at Busted, take a look. Her new job. Shit. She was going to die, her first day of a new job. Who died the first day of a new job? She’d thought losing her job would be bad. She could just hear her mom, now. “I knew those people were no good when I heard that awful music playing. See what happened?” Of course, her mom would be saying all of this over Jessi’s casket, but it would still piss her off.
She hadn’t lost her job and dammit, she was not going to get killed on her first day, either. “I’m so sorry, sir. This is all my fault. We heard there was an outbreak of mail fraud. I’m looking into it for a class I’m taking.” If they got out of this, she was going to declare a major. She promised.
“And where do you go to school?”
“University of Illinois at Chicago.” Jessie tried to keep her tone even. Don’t give them any reason to doubt what I say. Oh, and pray he doesn’t really have any issues with mail fraud that he might be hiding. If so, they were screwed.
“Don’t blame her, it was my idea,” Enzo added, and Jessi nearly wilted with relief. “I told her to come up here and look for false contracts or unusual bills.”
“And you are?” The deputy mayor took the folder and sat behind the desk. He opened a drawer, looking side to side, and closed it with a thud.
“Lorenzo Borelli.”
“And Lorenzo, who do you work for?” Deputy Mayor Swift stared at the drawer Jessi had opened. Crap. Hopefully he wouldn’t realize anything was missing.
The door to the room slammed open and the mayor flew in. His name was easy. Juan Ramirez was on the news every day for some reason or another. He seemed like a nice enough guy. Always smiling.
Except for now.
“I have a house full of guests. Can’t you handle this without me?” Ramirez glared at the deputy mayor, who closed the drawer with a bang and stood up, guilt scrawled across his pale face. His job didn’t leave a lot of time for sunshine, apparently.
“Sorry, sir. We found these two going through your desk. He had these in his hands.” The deputy mayor handed over the file folder. “The girl says she’s looking into mail fraud for a college assignment.”
Mayor Ramirez glanced at the contents and handed the folder off to a bodyguard. “My campaign doesn’t have a problem with mail fraud.”
“Oh. I’m so sorry to have bothered you.” And Jessi was really sorry she had bothered him. If she could just move on and not bother him anymore, she’d be good. “I just needed something exciting for my political science teacher. I think he hates me. I’m failing the class.”
The mayor had a fatherly air about him. Nurturing. Too bad his goons still had guns waiting to shoot her and Enzo or push them out of the second story window. Not that they’d shoot anybody in here or send them airborne. There would totally ruin the vibe of the party downstairs. “Who’s your teacher?”
“Bendelson.” Thank God she’d taken poly-sci last year—and her teacher hated her. It was almost like she was telling the truth.
“Darren Bendelson. He gave my daughter a hard time, too.” The mayor laughed before addressing the goons. “Please personally escort these two off my property.” He sighed and shook his head. “You two will not come back. Get your story somewhere else.”
Escorting them off the property. That sounded ominous.
“But sir…” The deputy mayor looked appalled that the mayor was letting them go.
“Relax, Richard. It’s a party.” The Mayor turned to walk out the door but paused. “I won’t press charges, but if I see you again, I will.”
Charges? The last thing Jessi was worried about was charges. She was more worried about what would happen when these armed escorts escorted them away from the party—and all the witnesses at the party.
The mayor left, but Dick the Deputy Mayor stayed behind, his nostrils flaring. He leaned into one of the guards. “Make sure they get the special treatment.”
Special treatment normally meant nice things like foot soaks and head massages. Somehow this special treatment sounded ominous. Maybe even deadly.
“Get up.” The original guard came over to them.
Jessi jumped up from the couch. She didn’t need to be told twice. She wanted to leave really bad. And if she wasn’t going to be leaving headfirst through the window, that was a bonus.
Now, with all the goons and their guns following them out, she and Enzo just had to stay alive.
Enzo wasn’t embarrassed to admit he was scared as hell. The security guard at his back made a point of bumping Enzo with the tip of his gun, just to remind him that it was poised and ready to shoot. Jessi was still in danger.
She had been brilliant, though. Talking about mail fraud was a stroke of genius, especially since the current mayor had no black cloud from that particular issue. It wouldn’t spook him into wanting to get rid of them mafia-fashion.
He had no desire to sleep with the fishes.
The three body guards walked them down a set of stairs at the back of the mansion. His snitch must have missed that little detail. Not that it mattered; getting upstairs hadn’t been a problem.
The stairway ended by the kitchen. Not one of the kitchen staff so much as paused as their little parade of people walked through and headed out the back door. No one at the party would know they’d left. Or with whom. That was probably the plan.
Either way, he’d feel better whe
n they were back in his car and far away from the mayor and his goon squad.
The backyard was dark and cold. He at least had a wool suit jacket on. Jessi had a thin short leather jacket and an even shorter skirt. “Are you cold?” She had to be freezing.
“A little.” A plume of white air accompanied her whisper.
A little? A few more minutes outside and she’d be a pudding pop. Enzo went to remove his jacket. It was the least he could do.
“No moving.” One of the goons shoved him forward.
“She’s cold.”
“That’s the least of her problems.”
They followed a winding walkway until they hit the back fence. It hadn’t been a big yard, but with the gun and the cold it felt like miles. One goon opened the gate leading out into the alley.
Jessi wobbled and slid, probably on the gravel. Enzo reached out and caught her before she hit the ground in front of the approaching headlights. Her skin was ice. “Are you okay?”
She nodded as Enzo’s car stopped in front of them. Another car pulled up behind it. Shit. This didn’t look good.
Head guard pointed to his minions. “Wait for them to get in the car. I’ll go with them. Follow behind us.” He opened the passenger door. “You. In.”
Him? This was his car. He wasn’t going to passenger in his own car. “I’ll drive. It’s my car.”
“Did I ask whose car it is?” The guy pressed his gun to Enzo’s temple. “Get in.” Enzo slid into the car and watched as another of the guards opened the driver’s side. “No seatbelts. If you want to stop fast, we all go flying.”
Jessi got behind the wheel, and then the goon sat in the back seat. No one buckled their seatbelt.
“You’re going to go where I tell you.” He aimed the gun at Jessi. “Don’t be a hero. I have an itchy trigger finger.” He nudged Jessi with the gun. “Take a right when you get to the end of the alley.”
She started the engine and put the car in gear. Right before the end of the alley she hit the horn.
“What are you doing?” The guard poked her with the gun.
Busting In (Busted Series Book 1) Page 4