A little gift to take the sting out of failure. Yours, Roger Hamilton.
I laugh for longer than I probably should, but honestly, showing a man his weaknesses after he’s insisted he doesn’t have any is a perversely satisfying part of this job. I can’t wait to demonstrate to the vastly overconfident CEO of GenCeuticals—Roger Hamilton, my client—exactly how much of a non-failure today was.
The bigger they are, the harder they fall. And nothing is ever completely secure, no matter what fail-safe systems you think you’ve put in place.
I kick off my heels, strip out of the loathsome tailored suit I wear only on jobs, ignore the champagne, and pour a sparkling water into one of the crystal flutes beside the ice bucket. I get into the bathtub, where I luxuriate in victory and soak until I’m almost a prune. Then I climb out, dry off, wrap the fluffy white towel around my body, and head to the bedroom.
Where I find a man—a huge, tanned, dark-haired beast of a man, clad all in black—sprawled in the middle of my bed with his arms propped behind his head and his giant booted feet crossed at the ankle.
I scream and drop the glass. It shatters against the marble floor.
The beast grins, revealing a set of perfect, gleaming white teeth.
“Howdy, sweet cheeks. It’s nice to see you again too.”
Two
Connor
“Son of a bitch!” Tabby shouts, red-faced, and I just can’t help myself.
I burst out laughing.
It becomes immediately apparent that’s the wrong thing to do when she picks up a glass paperweight from the coffee table and hurls it at me. It smashes into the wall inches above my head, dislodging a shower of plaster, and then lands on the spot where my face was half a second ago.
“Temper,” I chide, now standing beside the bed with my arms folded over my chest. “Tsk, tsk.”
“I’ll give you a fucking tsk,” she growls, grabbing a cut-crystal ashtray.
“Whoa!” I throw my hands up. “Jesus, sweet cheeks, who shit in your cornflakes?”
She does this puckering thing with her whole face—like a scowl only times ten—that’s supposed to look menacing but instead is cute as fuck.
“That would be you, jarhead! I hoped I’d never see you again!” She cocks her arm, readying her aim. “And what the hell are you doing in my hotel room?”
The last part is shouted so loud, people in the lobby can probably hear it.
“To talk business.” My gaze drops to the towel she’s clutching against her chest. Her grip is so tight, her knuckles have turned white. I let my eyes drift farther down, taking in dangerous curves and lean legs and bare toes—painted black, naturally—and drawl, “Though if you had any other ideas, I’d be open to hearing ’em.” I meet her gaze to find her glaring at me. I crack a cocksure grin. “That bed’s mighty comfy.”
The ashtray sails through the air. It misses my left ear by a breath and smashes into the wall. I turn and inspect the damage, and then turn back to her with my cocksure grin still firmly in place.
“You’re a shitty aim, sweet cheeks.”
Her nostrils flare. Her chest heaves. She says in a low voice with an edge like a blade, “Call me sweet cheeks. One. More. Time.”
I laugh again. I’d almost forgotten how much fun it is to piss this woman off.
Red hair and long legs flying, Tabby darts over to the dresser next to the bed, grabs a lamp with an inconveniently heavy-looking ceramic base, whirls around, and brandishes it at me like a weapon. She yells, “Get out!”
I rest my hands on my hips and look down my nose at her. “You would bash me with a lamp after I got you the GenCeuticals job?”
She freezes. Her expression registers horrified disbelief. “What?”
“Seriously, Tabby. You think a guy like Roger Hamilton would pay a woman eighty thousand dollars to conduct a penetration test if someone he trusted implicitly hadn’t suggested it?”
“You’re the Special Ops guy he mentioned he had on retainer?”
I nod.
Tabby closes her eyes. “Motherfucker.” Defeated, she lowers the lamp to the dresser.
I feel kinda bad for how hard she’s taking the news, so I add a bit of truth to lessen the sting. “If it makes you feel any better, I thought walking right through the front door and pretending to be an executive was a ballsy move. Brilliant. And unexpected. Hamilton will shit his pants.”
“Why didn’t he just have you do the job? I’m sure you could’ve rappelled onto the roof from a black helicopter or something macho and melodramatic like that.”
I shrug. “I’m out of the pen testing game. Not enough money in it. Metrix has moved on to higher-level stuff.”
She narrows her eyes at me. Another thing I’d forgotten in the three years since I’d last seen Tabitha West is how brilliantly, lucidly green her irises are. Like an emerald held up to the sun. Like a big cat stalking its dinner in a tangled, primeval jungle, its eyes illuminated in a slanting shaft of light.
Fuck. Now is so not the time to get a boner.
“Such as?”
“Extractions.”
She processes that for a moment, her thumb working the knot between her breasts where the towel edges are joined.
Never thought I’d be jealous of a knot.
“People,” she guesses correctly. “Politicians, royalty, wealthy businessmen, like that?”
I nod.
“Makes sense,” she muses, turning her attention to the view of the city outside the windows. “Kidnappings, natural disasters, hostage situations… There are a million different scenarios where rich people might need their asses saved.”
“Most people think I’m talking about teeth when I say extractions.”
She snaps her head around and stares at me. “I’m not most people.”
“No,” I agree, holding her fierce gaze. “You’re not.”
We stand in silence for just longer than is comfortable, while I wrestle with a surprisingly strong urge to stride over to her, whip off the towel, throw her over my shoulder, and then throw her down on the bed.
My thoughts might show in my expression, because she turns abruptly away.
“I’m going to get dressed. Meet me downstairs in the bar in ten minutes. And don’t touch anything on your way out, jarhead.”
She heads into the bathroom. I call out after her, “Don’t put clothes on for my sake. Make yourself comfortable, sweet—”
The bathroom door slams shut with a window-rattling bang.
Half an hour later, I’m about to go back upstairs and pound on Tabby’s door when she walks into the bar like she owns the fucking place. She stands in the entrance, looking around with her nose in the air. The old guy on the stool next to me spots her and does a double take that might cause him whiplash.
I have to put a hand over my mouth to hide my smile.
I’ll start from the feet up.
Black stilettos that don’t say “fuck me” as much as “fuck you.” Bare legs, tattoo of a green fairy decorating the inside of her left ankle. Black leather miniskirt with suspenders attached. A midriff-baring sleeveless T-shirt the color of Barbie puke that has, stretched out of shape over the fullness of her breasts, the words “Deal With It.” Belly-button piercing with some dangly stuff, like a piece of jewelry. Colorful left arm tattoo sleeve that ends at her wrist. Studded necklace that looks exactly like a dog collar. Hair the color of a fire engine, drawn into a sleek ponytail that shows off aristocratic cheekbones and a long, elegant neck.
Over her right arm is slung a white purse with a giant logo of a cartoon cat on the flap. Because nothing shouts I’m an adult with serious emotional baggage better than Hello motherfucking Kitty.
Tabby spots me. Her lips twist into something that’s probably disgust. I chuckle, watching as she makes her way across the bar toward me while a dozen heads turn in her wake.
Damn. Knows how to use those hips.
She stops next to me and drops her bag on the bar with a ho
stile thunk.
“You could’ve used this newfangled invention called a phone to contact me instead of wasting your time coming all the way to DC, jarhead.”
“But then I wouldn’t have gotten to see you in all your glory, sweet—”
She gives me a look that could wilt crops.
I amend it to, “Tabby.”
The bartender, a dude with one of those pansy-ass overgroomed mustaches that are all the rage and I fucking hate, walks up smiling.
“What can I get you?” he asks Tabby’s tits.
I growl, “Johnny Walker Blue Label and a strong length of rope.”
The bartender frowns at me. “Rope?”
I lean closer to him. “For a noose.”
His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. He laughs—sounds like he’s coughing—and scurries off.
Beside me, Tabby sighs. “Charming as ever, I see.”
“Asshole was being disrespectful,” I mutter, glaring at his retreating back.
There’s a shrug in her voice. “Men can’t help themselves, Connor. Boobs are your gender’s Kryptonite. I don’t take it personally.”
Still bristling, I look at her. “Well, I do. You could be mine, for all that asshole knows.”
She arches one elegant eyebrow. “Sure. In an alternate universe where I don’t have an IQ approaching two hundred points and you’re not a knuckle-dragging Neanderthal with a god complex and one too many pairs of cargo pants, I suppose that could be a possibility.”
It’s my turn to raise a brow. “You’re in no position to diss my wardrobe, sweetheart. The fuck is that thing dangling from your belly button, a fishing lure? You trolling for largemouth bass?”
I suspect she wants to laugh. Her lips press together as if to keep a rogue grin at bay. Instead, she says coolly, “Hey, I’m not the one who always dresses like he’s going to a military funeral. You realize they make clothes in colors other than black, right?”
“I’ll wear something other than black when they make something darker.”
The bartender returns with my scotch. His gaze firmly affixed to the bar, he politely asks Tabby, “And what may I get for you, miss?”
She shoots me a sour look. I grin.
“Ice water with lemon, please.”
“Ice water?” I ask once the bartender has left.
Something odd crosses her face, there but quickly gone. “I don’t drink alcohol.”
“Lemme guess. Vegan?”
She curls her lip. “Please. I eat so much meat, I’m practically a meatatarian. And what does drinking ice water have to do with being vegan?”
“The fuck should I know?”
She inspects my face for a moment, and then says, “One of these days, I’ll ask what you have against the words ‘what’ and ‘how.’ Until then, why don’t you tell why you’re here.”
She slides onto the stool next to me, crosses her long legs, props her chin on her hand, and waits.
I can almost feel the old guy behind me having a heart attack. Must be staring at her legs. They’re pretty fucking spectacular, if I do say so myself.
“Got a client,” I say. “High level. With a delicate situation. Knew you’d gone freelance after Victoria, heard through the grapevine you were killin’ it. Today proves I heard right.”
She tries not to look smug about that last part but fails. “What’s the situation?”
I shake my head. “That’s classified unless you’ve signed on the dotted line.”
“What’s the job?”
“See my previous answer.”
She looks at the ceiling as if for divine intervention. After a moment during which I imagine her counting to ten to control the urge to stab me in the eye with the shiny lure attached to her navel, she says, “Can you at least tell me who the client is?”
“Miranda Lawson.”
Tabby’s eyes widen. “The Miranda Lawson?”
I knew that would get her. There’s nothing Tabitha West likes better than another ball-busting woman who had to claw her way to the top over a pile of male corpses. “Yep.”
The bartender sets a glass of water in front of her and leaves without a word. She takes a sip from the glass, thoughtfully crunches on an ice cube. “So the job’s in LA.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.”
“Will I be working at her movie studio?”
“Can’t tell you that.”
“What else can you tell me?”
“That’s it.”
She stares at me like I’m a complete idiot. “You expect me to commit to a job based on no information other than a name.”
“Pays half a million.”
That stops her cold. She freezes with her glass halfway to her mouth, and then slowly sets it down and looks at me. “Nobody pays half a million for a pen test.”
“Never said it was a pen test.”
She studies my face, but she won’t find anything I don’t want her to see.
“You have to give me something else, Connor. I don’t go into situations blind. It’s not how I work.”
She’s serious. I can see that much. Stalling, I take a swig of my scotch. I relish the burn for a moment, considering my answer. “You have a particular skill set that’s necessary for this job. None of my guys can do what you can do.”
“You can’t do what I can do,” she shoots back, challenging me.
I know a lot of men who’d never admit a woman was better than them at anything. But I’m man enough to admit the truth. “Nobody can do what you can do, Tabby.”
She blinks.
I sense a chink in her armor and press my advantage. “I’m flying out in the morning. Got a meeting with Lawson tomorrow. If all goes well, we’re looking at maybe a week before the job’s done. Then you can go back to your life and you’ll never see me again. Only you’ll be half a million bucks richer.”
She sniffs. “I don’t need the money. I never have to work again if I don’t want to.”
It’s another challenge. So I challenge her right back. “Okay. But I’m betting you’d go out of your fuckin’ mind if you didn’t have a puzzle to solve. Right?”
She doesn’t answer for a second. Then she turns away and mutters, “Bullshit doesn’t suit you, jarhead.”
I lightly grasp her chin, turn her face, and look her right in the eyes. “You’re the smartest person I’ve ever met. I’m including myself in that statement, and I’m one smart motherfucker. I want you on this job. I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t know you were perfect for it.”
She stares back at me silently. A furrow forms between her brows. When she pulls her full lower lip between her teeth, I realize how close my face is to hers.
She has a beauty mark near her right eyebrow, a tiny, perfect spot of velvet brown. Otherwise, her skin is flawless. Creamy, I think you’d call it. And those eyes, sweet Jesus, those eyes that can turn a man to stone can also light his imagination on fire.
Smelling her skin, sitting so close, looking into those jungle cat eyes, my imagination is definitely ablaze.
Tabby abruptly withdraws. She licks her lips, swallows, turns her attention back to her glass of water. In a flat voice, she says, “Well. Thanks for that, but I work alone. Also I just remembered I hate you.” She downs the water all in one gulp like it’s whiskey, stands, and, without looking at me, says, “See you in another life, jarhead.”
She turns and walks away.
Fuck.
I call out after her, “Think about it, Tabby. I’m at the Carlisle until six tomorrow morning if you change your mind.”
She keeps walking, making no indication she’s heard me. Feeling a little desperate, I add, “You got something better to do, sweet cheeks? Go back to New York and work on your Hello Kitty handbag collection? Get a few more tattoos?”
Over her shoulder, she flips me the bird. The old guy on the stool next to me cackles.
I turn around and give him my signature death glare, the one that always shuts dumb motherfuckers up.
But he’s a scrappy old goat, not easily scared. He just cackles again, shaking his head. He says, “Don’t worry, son. I’m sure someday you’ll figure out how to talk to a woman.”
I growl, “Mind your business, Grandpa.”
Another cackle. Must be his signature thing, like my death glare. He says, “A little finesse wouldn’t kill you, boy.”
The fucking balls on this geezer! “Excuse me?”
“Convincing a woman to do something you want her to do isn’t like Operation Desert Storm. You can’t go in all shock and awe, balls to the wall. Trust me, I been married four times. You gotta make her think it was her idea. You know.” He wiggles his fingers in the air. “Finesse.”
I look back to the entrance of the bar just in time to see Tabby disappear around the corner, her shoulders stiff, her head held high.
Finesse, he says. Not exactly my strong suit.
Fuck.
Three
Tabby
When I get back to my room, I lie on the sofa and do deep-breathing exercises for ten minutes before the urge to break something passes.
What. The hell. Was that?
Just seeing him was strange enough. Out of the blue after three years, Connor Hughes materializes from thin air in my hotel room like fucking Cowboy Dracula, all Hiya! Howdy, pardner! Have I got an offer for you!
As if we don’t have history.
As if he doesn’t know I hate him.
And then the mysterious, cloak-and-dagger, I’d-tell-you-but-then-I’d-have-to-kill-you job offer.
I admit I was tempted by the thought of meeting Miranda Lawson. I’ve always admired her. She’s a true genius, and those are rarer than unicorns. Graduated MIT—my alma mater—at seventeen, then attended USC film school and received an MFA in film and television production. Became the youngest female studio head in any movie studio’s history at twenty-five. Founded her own studio at thirty. In the decade since, she’s churned out blockbuster after blockbuster, attributed to a proprietary statistical analysis software she developed which can apparently predict what the movie-viewing public will enjoy with frightening accuracy.
Wicked Sexy (Wicked Games Series Book 2) Page 2