Private Investigations

by Tori Carrington

  He freed the hand trapped between them and ran his fingers through her hair, pulling it back and holding it there. “You have no idea how I feel about you, do you, Ripley Logan?”

  She blinked. She felt evidence of how he felt growing thick and hard between them. She pressed her hips into his and smiled. “Oh, I think I have an idea.”

  His eyes darkened, but she wasn’t convinced desire was completely to blame. “I don’t think you do.”

  His gaze flitted to her lips, her ear, her hair where he held it, then to her eyes. “Sure, I’ll be the first to admit that when you popped into my bed that night, all that was on my mind was sex.” He smiled faintly. “I am only human, you know.” His fingers lowered to rest at the base of her neck. “Then I got to know you. Spent some time with you. You asked me questions I would never have dared ask myself. Made me take a closer look at my life, at what I was doing with it. Or, rather, what I wasn’t doing with it.”

  “Joe, I—”

  “Shh.” He pressed his fingers against her lips, appearing to have a difficult time not kissing her. “I’m trying to be serious here.”

  “That’s what’s scaring me,” she whispered.

  He frowned at her.

  She dropped her gaze to his chest, pretending a phenomenal interest in the whiteness of his shirt. “There’s so much going on now…happening… Joe, I don’t know which end’s up.”

  He stared at her long and hard. “Then I think I should show you.”

  He launched an all-out assault on her mouth that left her knees buckling under her and her body screaming in sheer pleasure. Even as her mind called out, no, no! her limbs melted against his and her heart countered with an even louder, yes, yes! His erection pressed hard and insistent against her stomach, and a need to have it pressing inside of her, pushing everything else from her mind, overwhelmed her. Her fingers were in his hair, on his chest, over his tight rear, as her mouth fought to keep up with his.

  “Where’s the bedroom?” he asked, his hand up her blouse and under her bra and stroking her nipple to aching hardness.

  She licked her lips, then kissed him again. “Behind you. To your left.”

  She fumbled for his belt, pulling it loose as he backed them toward the closed bedroom door.

  Closed…

  The word rang in her passion-filled mind, but she couldn’t seem to grasp the importance of it. Not when there were other more pressing needs clamoring for attention.

  Joe reached for the handle and opened the door, and she reached for his zipper, then an ominous metallic click told them they weren’t alone.

  RIPLEY HAD NEVER felt so violated, so helpless. Just a short while ago she’d been questioning the wisdom of arranging a meeting at her apartment for the simple reason that she wasn’t comfortable with Christine Bowman knowing where she lived. Suppose something went wrong? Suppose the FBI didn’t catch Christine with the diamonds red-handed and she got away? Suppose she blamed Ripley for the close call and came back looking for revenge?

  Of course as Ripley sat with her hands tied behind her back, Joe sitting next to her, none of that made a bit of difference. Christine had been in her apartment all along, waiting for them, probably even before their plane had touched down at Lambert Airport.

  They should have come up with a way to alert the FBI when they were in trouble. Another moot point because Ripley couldn’t have moved if she’d tried.

  Seeming satisfied with her handiwork, Christine pulled a dining room chair out and sat down, looking at them where she’d tied them up on the tiny kitchen floor. Heat seemed to radiate from Joe. She glanced to find his jaw flexing angrily, his eyes steadfastly on Christine. She nudged his leg with hers. Anger wouldn’t get them anywhere but dead.

  “Where’s the box?” Christine asked, looking directly at Ripley.

  The other woman wore black leather pants, a black Lycra tank top and black leather gloves. Her blond hair was pulled into a twist, and the gun looked right at home in her hands.

  Why hadn’t Ripley noticed what a con artist she was when they first met? It could have been the plain flowered dress. The fluffy blond hair that looked like she’d just come from the hairdressers. Her horror at having nicked a nail while hiring Ripley.

  Now she looked like she could play the starring role in a vampire flick, right down to her blood-red lipstick.

  Ripley purposely cleared her throat. “Clarise, what are you doing? I don’t understand—”

  “Cut the crap, Logan,” Christine said, sighing. “I know you’re on to me. I also know about your new little friends sitting outside your apartment right now.”

  Interesting how everyone kept referring to the FBI as her friends when they were anything but. Any law enforcement friends worth their salt would never have let this woman gain access to her apartment.

  “You know, if you hadn’t run from us outside the pawnshop, we probably never would have figured it out,” Joe said.

  “Then there’s the little matter of your phone being disconnected,” Ripley added.

  Christine lifted a finely penciled brow. “Who are you kidding? Neither of you would have figured out anything if not for the Feds.” She cocked the gun, a 9mm similar to Ripley’s, except in gunmetal black. “The box.”

  Ripley had never wanted to hit, really hit, anyone before. But oh, boy, did she want to sock it right to Christine Bowman in her red-painted mouth.

  Then she remembered that the box didn’t hold the key Christine was looking for. The key was in Ripley’s back pocket.

  “Over there,” Ripley said. “In the bag near the door.”

  Christine stared at her for a long moment.

  “What?” Ripley asked. “I’m tied up, remember?”

  Christine pushed from the chair, trying to keep them in sight as she went to the door and rifled through Ripley’s duffel. Unfortunately for her, and fortunately for Ripley, Christine had picked the one blind spot in the apartment to tie them up.

  Awkwardly maneuvering her hands, Ripley slid the locker key out of her back pocket and began working the jagged edge against the thin rope that bound her wrists together. She winced when the rope cut into her flesh.

  “What are you doing?” Joe whispered harshly.

  She glanced at him, then at Christine, who had her back to them trying to find the box, which Ripley had wound in clothing and tucked way at the bottom of the bag for safekeeping.

  “Shh.” She hushed him.

  The damn key wasn’t accomplishing anything. But her movements trying to saw the rope had. Somehow she’d managed to work the ropes a little looser. She winced as the binding cut into her wrists again. There. All she had to do—

  Christine found the box.

  Ripley urgently leaned over and slid the key into Joe’s front pants pocket. He stared at her.

  “The key.” Christine appeared in the kitchen doorway, such as it was, the gun at her side, her expression clearly exasperated.

  “You know, when I picked your name out of the paper, I really never saw you getting this far.” She smiled, her teeth white against her red lips. “No, the other two overpaid idiots were the ones who were supposed to get the job done. But surprise of surprises, you’re the one who came through. Good thing I’m a woman who likes to cover her bases, isn’t it?”

  Ripley didn’t know if she should feel complimented or insulted. She decided on insulted.

  “The key,” she repeated.

  “In my pocket,” Joe said. “The left one.”

  Ripley glanced at him, not missing the message he was trying to send her not to do anything.

  Christine stood stock-still, then motioned for Joe to scoot forward. He did. She reached into his pocket and took out the key, then waved her gun for him to back up.

  The grin that spread across her face would have been attractive, if only Ripley didn’t know she was a murderer. “Bingo.”

  Ripley swallowed hard. “What about my fee?”

  Christine stared at her as if she wer
e speaking a foreign language.

  “You still owe me money, whether you’re Christine or Clarise,” Ripley said. “Do you have any idea how much I lost tracking down that box?”

  Christine laughed so hard she nearly dropped her gun. Nearly, but unfortunately not quite.

  “Oh, you’re priceless.” She tossed the key in the air then caught it. “But not nearly worth as much as what’s in this locker.”

  Ripley opened her mouth to say something when Christine cocked the 9mm and stepped forward to settle the muzzle against Ripley’s forehead. The strangled cry that filled the kitchen very definitely came from her throat.

  Joe jerked next to her. “You got what you wanted.” He ground out the words. “Now why don’t you just get the fuck out of here?”

  Christine glanced at him.

  “We’re tied up. Just what do you think we’re going to do? Scoot on our asses and follow you?”

  She appeared to consider that as Ripley stared beyond the barrel of the gun, the metal cold against her skin. A crazy prayer wound around and around her mind. Please, please don’t let her shoot me and get gray matter all over Joe’s nice white shirt.

  Christine stepped back, taking her gun with her. Ripley nearly dissolved into a puddle of relief at her feet.

  “You’re right,” Christine said. “I’ll be long gone before either one of you has the chance to tell anyone what went down here.” She smiled. “Besides, I suppose I do owe Ripley, here, for getting back my property.”

  “Does that mean I’m going to get paid?”

  Not even Ripley could believe she’d uttered the words as Christine and Joe stared at her.

  “You know, in another lifetime, you and I might have been friends.” Christine laughed, then turned and was gone, the apartment door clicking closed behind her.

  Ripley refused to give in to the incredible desire to close her eyes and instead tried to come to terms with all that had just happened. It wasn’t every day someone held a gun to your head, threatening to kill you for a job you did right. Of course, she didn’t think very many people got that type of reaction for messing up, either, but that was neither here nor there.

  Instead, she scrambled to her knees as she shrugged her way out of her bindings. In no time flat she had Joe freed, as well. She scrambled to the phone and called the number Miller had given her.

  “She’s got the key. Christine Bowman’s got the key.”

  13

  JOE DIDN’T LIKE THIS. Everything felt…wrong.

  “Come on,” Ripley said, getting out of her Mustang and running across the street, her raincoat blowing behind her like a cape. Joe shook his head, not liking the superhero imagery that came to mind at the vision.

  Of course, it didn’t help matters that he hadn’t been able to get down a decent swallow since Christine Bowman had stood with that damn gun pressed against Ripley’s flawless forehead. Within a blink of an eye, it seemed that everything important to him was about to be taken away. Both the realization that Ripley had grown to be so important to him and the fear that he’d never get to tell her that was enough to knock any guy’s legs out from under him.

  Add to that Ripley’s need to go to the bus station to see Christine’s capture, despite what had happened at her apartment, and he was operating solely on autopilot. Half of him wanted to pin her down with his body weight and make her admit what she felt for him was more than sexual, while the other half was filled with the desire to tie her up again and leave her to sit in her apartment, alone, until all this was over with.

  The rain came down in a torrent, an all-out summer shower that turned dusk to midnight. He rushed after Ripley across the street and to the bus station entrance, earning himself a honk from a driver coming from his left.

  How did you like that for discreet?

  The instant Ripley had placed the call to Miller, they’d watched through her apartment window as two cars pulled from parked positions on either side of the street and roared away, obviously positioning themselves for Christine’s arrest. Of course, had they been doing their jobs right, Christine would never have gotten into Ripley’s apartment in the first place. But right now, that was neither here nor there, was it?

  Ripley ducked to the side of the bus station door. Joe sidled up next to her, uncomfortable in the T-shirt she’d given him to wear—something purple with a picture of Winnie the Pooh on it, and a Cardinals ball cap—while she wore a floppy beige rain cap that covered the hair she’d tied into a knot on top of her head, and a trench coat that made her look like the detective she was.

  “You know, we could both just go back to your place, order up some pizza and read about this in tomorrow’s paper,” he said.

  She gave him a long-suffering look and led the way inside. Well, he thought, it was worth one last try, anyway.

  They paused just inside the door. The station was bustling with the traffic Polk had told them about. Joe kept his head down as he scanned the stark interior of the station. In fact, Polk himself had taken up residence on one of the benches, a brief wink all the acknowledgment he gave Ripley.

  “I knew he wouldn’t be able to pass this one up,” she said to Joe, yanking her collar up.

  “What in the hell are you doing here?”

  A homeless man had come up behind them. Joe eyed him, noticing he didn’t smell the way Polk did. Then he realized it wasn’t a homeless man at all, but Agent Miller. He glanced around them, then held his hand out and asked for a dollar for a cup of coffee, speaking with a slurred voice slightly louder than the one he’d first addressed them with.

  Joe began digging in his pockets as Ripley looked around.

  “I want…no, I’m ordering you to turn around and go right back out the way you came in,” Miller fairly growled. “Bowman spots you, this is all over with before it starts.”

  Joe looked at Ripley hopefully. Pizza and her were sounding mighty good right about now.

  “No way,” she whispered harshly, that stubborn look on her face. “I’m in this till the end.”

  “End being the operative word, Ms. Logan,” Miller said. “Look, I don’t know how in the hell you found out where the locker was—” Ripley flashed him a smile “—but I want you out of here. Now. If you don’t leave willingly, I’ll see to it that a couple of men will—discreetly, of course—escort you out.”

  Joe placed a dollar in the agent’s hand to go toward the change for coffee he’d asked for, and Miller stuffed it immediately into his pocket. He began to say something more when another guy dressed as a street person who was probably an agent motioned to him. Miller looked distracted, then with a dark scowl in Ripley’s direction, he ambled toward the other man.

  Between the real street people and the FBI disguised as the same, the place was abundant with odor and color. Joe had to give the agents credit. He couldn’t tell them from the real deal, the baggy clothing allowing for plenty of room to hide weapons without telltale bulges. And the rain was certainly working in their favor. Had it been a nice day, it would have been a little difficult to pull off so many homeless men in one area at the same time.

  “Looks like Polk spread the word,” Joe murmured, steering Ripley toward the ticket window.

  She stared at him. “At least we know Christine hasn’t shown up yet. If she had, Miller wouldn’t still be here.”

  Joe grimaced, not finding that bit of info the good news she obviously did.

  He honestly didn’t know what she hoped to accomplish here. But the fact that she wanted to do something only emphasized the differences between them. The longer he was around her, the more distanced he became from his own life. While that appealed to him on various levels and for various reasons in the beginning, now he felt more like a freshwater fish swimming in an unfamiliar sea. And he was starting to view Ripley as leading him straight into a school of sharks.

  Somehow he’d never imagined when he eventually found someone to fall in love with that he would have to compromise. He’d always figured it w
ould be the other way around. He had the successful company. He had the assets, the houses, the cars. He’d assumed the woman he’d want to spend the rest of his life with would have to compromise to be with him.

  Instead, he was finding that everything he’d ever held dear was at risk. And he didn’t know how he felt about that.

  Yes, he did. He didn’t feel very good about it at all. It was happening too fast. He felt like he was on an endless roller coaster that kept building up speed, going faster and faster, swinging through loops and careening around corners and shooting down slopes that left him gripping the bar in front of him for dear life. Never mind that he’d left his stomach somewhere in Memphis. All he wanted was for it to end so he could get off the sucker.

  And the difference between him and Ripley was that she had her hands up in the air and was demanding that the ride go on and on….

  THE LOCKER WAS to the right, second from the end and two rows from the floor. In the block of lockers closest to the side exit.

  In the minute Joe had taken to give a dollar to Miller, Ripley had completely scoped out everything and everyone and was pretty sure she knew who was who in the crowded station. Miller she’d pegged immediately, even before he’d swooped down on them. He looked too healthy to be homeless. Too…hulky.

  She stood behind a guy in line for tickets, trying to ignore the buzz of blood through her veins, fear and excitement a very heady mix.

  Joe, on the other hand, looked ready to bolt for the door.

  She squashed a smile. He looked so adorably sexy it was all she could do not to thread her fingers under that too small hat, then run them down the front of the only T-shirt she’d found that would fit him—a gift for Christmas from her parents that she wore as a night-shirt.

  The man in front of her moved, and she stepped forward, scanning the schedule on the wall behind the attendant.

  “I’m going to go get a newspaper,” Joe grumbled beside her.

  She smiled at him. “I’ll be right here.”

  As she watched him walk away, she had to remind herself to tear her gaze away from his nicely shaped tush and give the station another once-over.