"So I made good and came out here, got started as a private investigator. That's where I met Larson. After a while, I got sick of peepin' at cheaters and helpin' out divorce lawyers. Larson hooked me up with my first protection gig and I liked it a hell of a lot more than snoopin' for bucks."
"Sort of to make up for all the times people needed protection from you, huh?" She watched for his reaction, wondering if he'd feel like she'd accused him, or if he'd understand she approved of the career change, exchanging good karma for bad.
He nodded, but didn't reveal anything about how he felt. "Yeah, guess you could say that too."
She decided to let it go. "What about family? Do you miss them? What about your mother?"
"She died a while back."
"Sorry to hear that. Any other family?"
"Don't have any to speak of." He shrugged, the subject obviously of no interest to him. "But listen, I've set it up so we can do some target shooting. You want to go to the range, or straight to see your mother?"
Jess had only agreed to go see her mother because she thought it was expected of her. In reality, she was all mixed up about seeing her in a coma. She didn't know what to do, or how she'd feel, or if she'd come unglued. Last night, she'd had a terrible dream, one that woke her up and made her call home. Her father hadn't been sleeping, and he hadn't sounded surprised when she'd given him the details.
Memories of that long ago time, memories she didn't know existed, until Mitch came into her life, were surfacing and they left her all…discombobulated. Outwardly, she was still Jess, a grown business woman with a gift for motorcycle repair and tattooing, but inside, she shrank a little every day, turning into this desperate child craving for an unknown love.
"What?" Mitch stepped close as if he meant to drape an arm around her shoulder, but stopped and shoved his hands into his pockets instead. "You okay?"
"Yeah, let's go let off some steam before we go see my mother. I'm not…ready yet."
He nodded. "Okay. Wait for me in the foyer, I'll be there in a minute. Just gonna find our friendly FBI escorts and tell them we're ready."
She nodded and he left her alone in the dining room. Today, even though she'd delayed their visit, she'd still see her mother. Goose bumps rose on her arms. She hopped off the table. Worrying herself into a riot of nerves wasn't going to help her or anyone else. Especially at a shooting range.
Jess found the bathroom off the foyer, one Mitch had shown her the night before, and gazed at her reflection in the mirror. The blue of her shirt brought out the color in her eyes, but didn't help the smudges at their corners. Tired, she wondered if her eye-color came only from her father, or if her mother shared the color as well.
I'm not gonna find out today unless I peel back her eyelid to check.
She'd searched for a photograph around the common rooms in the house, but either her mother didn't have her picture taken often, or didn't display them. The place was practically sterile. Each room looked like something from a magazine. The servants–three maids, an estate manager, and a chef she hadn't yet met, filled out the staff. They stayed out of sight and if you didn't spend more than a few hours in the house, you weren't likely to see them. It felt odd to have strange people holed up around you–like they were playing a game of hide and seek, but never wanted to be found.
She ran cold water in the basin and refreshed her face. Maybe she could ask Jared for a photograph. The idea of asking him for anything felt weird and she decided against it. She'd just have to wait until her mother woke up.
God, what am I going to say to her today? She could count on having a one-sided conversation, but could she say the things she'd fantasized telling her mother? Could she say those things to a woman hanging onto life by her fingertips?
Jess didn't think so. Maybe it would be better this way, in the end. Get her physically comfortable with the woman who was her mother, and then later, hopefully, get emotionally and mentally comfortable with her when she woke up.
With a plan in place, she felt better and dried her face. Not seeing any reason to ask Mitch, she retrieved the pistol he'd given her from the nightstand drawer in her room, then returned to the foyer to wait.
* * *
Mitch found Mordstrom and Davis in the kitchen, eating a late breakfast. Their suit coats were draped over the backs of their chairs. Without them on, they looked like armed boys too naughty to sit in class at their private school.
"We're ready to head out to the range. Afterward, Jess wants to see her mother." Mitch leaned on the back of a kitchen chair, hands wrapped around the high back. "I expect you'll be tagging along?"
Mordstrom nodded, wiping his mouth and standing. "We'll follow at a discreet distance. Give you two some space."
Mitch clenched his hands tighter around the back of the chair. "I know what you both think about Jess and me. You're wrong. It's not like that."
Davis raised a brow at Mordstrom and stood. His gaze, when it fell on Mitch, was veiled. "Officially, we're only investigating Grady at this time. But if you have anything you'd like to tell us, we're interested."
"My history in New York is just that–history. Don't drag Jess into anything because you two can't see what's as plain as day." Mitch straightened, held his hands up and showed them both palm and back. "They're clean. Keep your focus on those who pose a threat to my client and her family."
"We'll decide who the threat is and who isn't, Mr. Conner." Davis stood. "Now, if you don't mind, we'd like to get this over with and have your client returned safely to the house as soon as possible."
The dig didn't go unnoticed. In the back of his head, he'd worried about Jess being armed ever since he'd given her the Glock. It wasn't his practice to arm his clients, but each case was different. With everything so backward, so stacked against him this time, his instincts couldn't be second-guessed. It felt right to have her armed.
Somewhere, further back in his head, he hoped that Beth, hearing Jess's voice, sensing her daughter's presence, would wake up and be able to answer questions no one had been able to ask since she'd been shot. The coma kept any information she might have beyond his reach and he prayed she knew something. Had she seen the face of her attacker?
There were three shots fired that night, yet no casings had been recovered, nor any traces of the assailant. The only hope left was that Beth had seen something. Now, with the FBI breathing down his and Jess's neck, discovering the truth wasn't just important, it was mandatory.
"We'll drop it. For now." As much as he wanted to fight the FBI, an argument at this point would be foolhardy.
"We'll meet you around front." Davis shrugged into his coat. Mordstrom did likewise.
Mitch strode back to the foyer. He spotted Jess sitting on the bottom steps of the wide staircase and jerked his head to the door. "Ready?"
She nodded, stood, and looked at the gun in her hand. Mitch, understanding she didn't know what to do with it, took it from her, checked that the safety was on, and snugged it into the back of his pants.
"Thanks." Jess straightened her shirt, tightened her ponytail, and blew her bangs out of her eyes. She stuffed her hands in the front pockets of her jeans. "I'm ready."
At the door, Mitch depressed a button in the security panel and spoke into the speaker. "Pullman, we're leaving now."
Pullman came back clearly through the new speakers Mitch had had installed. "Gotcha covered. It's a go."
Mitch opened the door and blocked the exit. Out of habit, he checked the guard shack at the end of the long drive–the outline of the guard in residence barely discernable at such a distance. He glanced right, found the uniformed guard with the watch dogs patrolling the perimeter, and on the left, spied the pair of guards sitting in the security company's jeep along the trail that led to the stables. He wondered in passing if Jess knew her mother kept horses, or if that was another thing she still had to discover.
He stepped outside and led her to the waiting limo. The driver held the door open. She ducked
in and across the seat.
She was right, there was so much she didn't know. He wasn't sure if he could have handled suddenly knowing everything about his father–who he was, what kind of man he was, where he lived, who he called family. The idea was so strange, he couldn't guess at his reaction.
"Sir?" The driver asked, still holding the door open.
Mitch snapped back. "Sorry, I was just thinking."
"That's all right, take your time." The driver smiled, revealing a gold tooth far back on one side.
Mitch looked at him. He appeared to have had a colorful life. Mitch hadn't noticed it before, mostly because he didn't find it that odd. After a few days with the feds and seeing the difference between a Milwaukee tribe of bikers and the L.A. estate, he'd become more aware of the differences.
Struck by the realization that while Beth had been giving rough and tumble folks like him and the limo driver decent, honest work, her daughter had been in another state, doing the same thing for her father and his friends.
His friends?
Did Jess have any friends of her own? He frowned, unable to recall a single gel-pen message addressed to Jess.
"You work for the Kramer's a long time?" Mitch asked the patient driver. He'd read the man's dossier and cleared him months ago, but didn't remember the specifics–just that his first name was Mike.
He nodded. "'Bout six years now."
"You got a record?"
Mike nodded slowly. "Everyone knows it. I ain't got nothin' to do with their troubles though. I told the cops and the FBI too. They don't listen too good though."
"I know what you mean." Mitch patted him on the arm. He remembered now, a three-year sentence, out in one–for a brawl with his foreman at a factory. "You're doin' good work."
"Thank you, sir." Mike's gold tooth flashed.
Mitch slid into the limo and the door closed behind him. He caught Jess's scent. That underlying sweet aroma filled the small enclosure and he adjusted to a less painful position. God, he'd have to find roomier pants, or carry an ice pack with him.
The privacy screen was closed and he debated opening it to keep him noble. First, he needed to talk to her. He twisted in his seat to see Jess's face, wanting to test her reaction when he told her about their new placement on the FBI's list of suspects. He wouldn't play her that way. No friend would keep that secret.
"What is it, Mitch?" Her eyes clouded with worry.
He wavered. To tell her here, in this confined space, where he was all too tempted to lessen the shock she'd surely have when hearing the truth, was not a good idea. He'd tell her when they got to the police station. "You ever shoot indoors before?"
She shook her head. "We usually go out of town and shoot cans or bottles–whatever we've collected that month."
"We're gonna use the underground range at the police station. It's probably different than what you're used to."
"Okay," she answered slowly, as if she didn't believe this was all he'd meant to say.
She was too damned quick. He wished she didn't read him so well, unnerved that she could. He switched to the opposite seat and opened the privacy screen–eager for a chaperone.
As they fell silent, he realized that he was about to drop this bomb on her while she had a loaded gun in her hand.
I've completely lost my mind.
* * *
Jess found it strange, standing in the stall, a headset muffling the gun shots. She took aim and fired at the targets. First, Mitch started her out much too close. She'd almost teased him and asked if she looked like Mr. Magoo, but the serious scowl he'd worn since Larson left had kept her silent.
Now, he stared over her shoulder as she fired on the shadowy humanoid shape printed on the paper twenty-five yards away. Hand steady, she found it easy to block out the face of the thug from the diner. She was surrounded by six floors of police officers, backed up by two FBI agents–both sitting near the entrance to the underground shooting range– and crowded by one big bodyguard in a really bad mood.
The last four bullets remaining in the pistol flew rapidly, punching home and she knew, even before Mitch pressed the button to retrieve the target, that she'd done well. She pulled off the headset and held her breath. As it neared, lights brightened it intermittently. She'd managed two in the chest, one in the chin, and one higher and off to the left, giving it a single eye. She exhaled, satisfied.
"I'm impressed." Mitch murmured, pulling it down. "You must be dead on back home."
"Rarely, Miss." Jess agreed, handing him back the gun. Although she'd been pleased he gave into her request, she didn't have a holster or a glove compartment in which to carry the weapon and walking around with it stuck in the back of her pants felt too wild-west for her.
He nodded, but just glared at the gun in his hand, as if by thought alone he could disintegrate it completely.
Jess heaved a breath. "What's wrong with you? You should be relieved that I've proven I can handle myself."
"It's not that," he glanced up at her, then quickly cut his eyes away, toward the agents, as if he didn't want them to hear what he next said. When his gaze returned to her, his dark eyes were troubled, tempting. "I've got something I need to tell you."
She crossed her arms. "Go ahead, I'm listening." He shook his head. "Give me a minute."
Mitch approached the agents and gave them the gun to carry back through the station for them. Davis took it and started out the doors and up the stairs. Mitch spoke quietly. Mordstrom cast an unfathomable look toward her, nodded at Mitch, then followed Davis up the stairs.
Mitch returned, touched her elbow and steered her toward a caged area where a desk and supplies for the range stayed under lock and key. "We've only got a few minutes."
Jess braced herself, ready to hear the worst. Oh God, he's going to tell me my mother's dead. That's why we came here first.
"They," Mitch jerked his head toward the FBI agents, "have decided we're suspects, that we're working together to get your inheritance."
"What!" This was the last thing she'd expected, but it was a heck of a lot easier to take. It still ticked her off. "For cryin' out loud, up until two days ago, I didn't even know if my mother was still alive. I suppose I just shot at myself in front of George Webb."
"They think we're guilty. Those guys we took down," Mitch began, "were well-connected. They think my time in New York is coming back to haunt me, that I'm using you to pay them off."
She started to defend him, but he held up a hand. "They got it all wrong. I'm not on the take and I don't jeopardize innocent people for my own gain."
She studied him, though she didn't really need to. She trusted him, already knew that, she just hadn't taken the time to realize it fully. He'd saved her life. "I believe you."
"Good." He smiled. "That saves us both a lot of trouble. What about you? Got something you want to tell me?"
"You mean like, did I mastermind everything while tattooing J.D. and fixing Tiny's Harley?" She couldn't help her grin, the idea was so ridiculous.
Mitch chuckled. "I take it that's a no."
"You take it rightly so." She chimed back. Maybe she should march over to the agents and give them a good scolding–but she didn't want to give them any reason to believe she was the sort of psycho who would attempt to kill off her own mother for money.
Mitch smiled, tilting his head as if happily surprised she wasn't going to fly off the handle. She liked this friendship developing between them. It turned the unfamiliar into the familiar, made the strange endurable. Except every time he smiled at her, her heart stuttered. Hands off, she'd been ordered. Following orders wasn't her strong suit.
"What are you grinning at?" he asked.
She shoved her hands into the back pockets of her pants. "Non'ya business."
He looked back at the door, then glanced back at her, arms crossed against his massive chest. "You see why we gotta keep it cool between us? We can't give them anything to get suspicious about."
Not only did Mitch s
ay he wanted to wait, but now the FBI added a second obstacle. She didn't like obstacles, liked the people who put them there even less. Just the idea that Mitch was suddenly off-limits made him all the more attractive. Just like Jack. Dating him, if she wanted to admit the truth, had been in defiance of her father's interference in her love life. Her dad had lain off after that, but not by much.
Was getting involved with Mitch something that came from true attraction? Or was it a mixture of being alone and rebelling against the forces that wanted to keep them apart? Was she pursuing him simply to get back at those who implied it wasn't a good idea?
"You do understand, don't you, Jess?"
She nodded. "I get it."
"Good." He looked relieved. "Now, let's go see Beth."
Guilt flooded her. Her thoughts hadn't been on her mother at all. Mitch was right, nothing could happen between them, they should just be friends until this whole mess could be cleared up. Maybe I don't have any self-control at all. "Yeah, let's get it over with. Maybe it'll take my mind off…things."
They joined Mordstrom and Davis and started for the waiting limo. As they walked behind the agents, it hit her again. The FBI thought she wanted her mother dead, was risking everything for Mitch. If she let on that she was romantically interested in him, they're suspicions would only be confirmed.
"Are you sure you're ready for this?" he asked as held the door open for her, worry in his eyes. "We can still go back to the estate if you want."
"No, that's okay." She lifted her chin to show she had no reservations about seeing the woman who'd abandoned, neglected, and left her alone for not just five days, but her entire life. "I'm as ready as I'll ever be."
* * *
Mitch watched her fingers knot and unknot in her lap and had to resist the need to hold her hand. The silence became more uncomfortable as the seconds ticked by. He searched for something to say. "I'm going out on a limb here, but Jared says her docs think Beth will come through just fine. I'm hoping, if she knows you're there, she might be snapped out of it."
Jess kept her gaze out the window as the limo turned toward the road, following Mordstrom and Davis in their car. "I don't think anyone just snaps out of a coma. Remember, my mother wouldn't recognize my voice if she heard it. You could hire one of the nurses to pretend to be me and get the same result."
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