by Nina Pierce
“Deirdre, I thought I saw you come in here.”
The sound of Shawn’s voice echoing through the stillness startled her. She jumped, coming up hard on the flange of the chipper.
“Shit.” She had the grace to blush as she turned and saw Austin standing next to Shawn. His presence was like a swift kick to her gut, which was stupid since she was the one who had walked out on him two nights ago. “Shawn. Hope you don’t mind. You said we could store our equipment in the garage.” Her words came out in a staccato burst of noise. “We have a small maintenance issue with the wood chipper, and I needed to park it in here to fix it.”
Both men’s gazes slid down the length of her body, blazing a hot trail. Their eyes settled momentarily on her heaving chest before lifting back to her face. She felt very exposed. How stupid of her not to throw her T-shirt back on over the damp tank top. But then modesty hadn’t been foremost on her mind as she’d stuck her head in the infernal engine.
“Not a problem. You all right?” Stepping forward, Shawn’s fingers replaced hers, rubbing through her hair. “Oh, you already have a lump. Let me get you some ice.”
She moved away from him. He’d actually found the spot where she’d hit her head on Saturday. “No, I’m fine. Happens all the time.” Her gaze skittered to Austin, then back at Shawn.
“Oh, forgive me. Austin Schaeffer, my business associate, meet Deirdre Tilling, landscaper extraordinaire and…” He stretched his hand out to Mark.
“Mark Pearson,” she said, heat filling her cheeks again. She’d forgotten Mark was even there. “Mark Pearson is the coordinator for the Kids at Risk curriculum at Delmont High School. The three young men you’ve seen working with us today are in his program.”
She had never known Mark to be intimidated by anyone, but he stepped forward with an awkward hesitancy and a tremulous smile as they all shook hands.
“I just walked with Austin down the length of the driveway. The trees are really shaping up. I didn’t realize how badly they needed work until I saw what an artist you were with that chainsaw. I’ve been watching you climbing all morning,” Shawn said as he flashed a killer smile. “It’s amazing the way you move. I have to admit, my heart was in my throat as you jumped through the limbs with all that heavy equipment. You’re not afraid?”
“Not much scares this one.” Mark wrapped an arm around her shoulders, pulling her possessively against his side. “She’s been through a lot and come out stronger for it. One of my few success stories.” He bumped his fist on her chin.
Whoa. There was way too much testosterone filling the air.
What was it about a woman’s presence that switched men into a competitive mode? She was getting attention from everyone but the one man who mattered most to her, Austin.
“If Mark can handle this on his own, perhaps Deirdre, you could show us your plans for the property?” Shawn asked.
“Actually, Jameson, I think we’ve concluded our business for today.” Austin checked his watch. “And as much as I’d like to see the rest of your beautiful estate, I have another meeting.” He kept his eyes on Shawn unwilling to meet her confused gaze. “We’ll set something up for later in the week.”
The men shook hands, her heart pinching when Austin acknowledged her and Mark with nothing more than a cursory nod. “Nice to meet you both,” he said before turning and walking back to the Jag, the door’s heavy bang snapping her out of her bewildered stupor.
No doubt she deserved Austin’s arctic disregard. After all, she’d been the one who’d officially declared it a one-night stand by slinking away in the dead of night. Still, Austin’s apathy stung.
Ignoring the pang in her chest, Deirdre forced a smile. “I’d love to show you what we’ve been up today, Shawn.”
Chapter 6
Ayden downshifted his weathered Saab, taking the curve of the coastal road with the tires squealing. He really wished he had the Jag, but he hadn’t wanted to be followed to the command post. He’d left the DEA rental at the condo, snuck out the backdoor and hightailed it through three yards before reaching his Saab parked at the twenty-four hour 7-Eleven.
He checked the rearview mirror. Only twisting road and autumn foliage met his gaze. He could only hope he hadn’t missed anything over the last twenty miles.
Ayden had worked up a full head of steam and wasn’t thinking straight. Not a good situation for a DEA agent, especially one undercover.
He double clutched throwing the Saab into overdrive and careening around another tight corner. Ayden wasn’t sure what was pissing him off more, the fact that he’d gotten what he wanted—or the fact that he hadn’t.
Deirdre had been everything he’d hoped for on Saturday night, an easy mark and a good lay. No, make that a compassionate and sexy woman with spunk. Seeing her today had thrown him. The woman had made it perfectly clear by her actions that she didn’t want anything more than the several hours they’d spent together in his bed. And wasn’t that just a hit to his ego?
He pounded his fist on the steering wheel. Damn. When he’d taken her to the condo, all he’d wanted was to loosen her tongue with alcohol, ply her for information on Jameson and screw her brains out.
Instead, Deirdre had stunned him with the personal revelation about her father, and later after he’d taken her to his bed and completely rocked his world, she’d snuggled in his arms telling him about her broken relationship. That night he’d wanted nothing more than to choke the living shit out of the guy who put all that hurt in those soulful brown eyes.
Those eyes that glazed over just before Deirdre…frig, he couldn’t go there.
Why was he so pissed off she’d run away into the night? Wasn’t it exactly what he’d wanted? He wasn’t sure why he wanted to prove to her not all men were lecherous, cheating cads. Or why it seemed to be bothering him now, that in reality, he wasn’t any better than the guy who walked out on Deirdre two months ago.
He’d convinced himself everything was fine, right up until he found that damn lacey thong tangled in the bed sheets yesterday morning. They’d smelled of her, a heady bouquet of flowers mixed with the musky scent of her sex.
Even as he’d sat around with Ryan and Dave, planning out how they’d handle their meeting today and blindly watching the Sunday football games on the tube, all he could think about was sliding the lacey piece of material over Deirdre’s cute ass and down those long, muscular legs. It didn’t take much to conjure up her body, soft and warm, twisting under him.
Then today, when his head was completely in the game, endorphins sparking through his system from the undercover job he was doing, she’d materialized in the garage. His fantasy in the flesh had looked sexy as hell in the drab green cargo pants, heavy work boots and the damp tank top clinging to her tits.
Deirdre had told him she was Jameson’s employee and he’d immediately thought bedmate not landscaper.
He’d been too stunned at finding her in the garage to switch gears and chose ignoring her over making a foolish mistake by admitting to Jameson they knew each other—intimately.
But then, the woman had run out on him.
So why had it surprised him when she’d preened like a cat in heat and batted those long, sooty lashes at Jameson? And what was up with the old geezer in the garage groping her like he owned her?
Didn’t really matter anyway. He was such a dumb-ass for not hitting the right mark on Saturday. He should have found the blonde bimbo who might have unknowingly shed some light on Jameson’s drug cartel, not the landscaper who’d probably gotten nothing more than a polite invitation to the house-warming party. No doubt the blonde wouldn’t have gotten under his skin and made it impossible for him to stop thinking of her.
But Deirdre had done just that.
“Well, Ayden, ol’ boy, get the right head back in the game. You’ve got a job to do.”
Mentally he switched gears, even as he downshifted the Saab, taking another curve at a reckless speed. He needed to cull the cobwebs of Deirdre from his bra
in. The woman had rejected him, big deal. His team had a lot of work ahead of them and he needed to focus. He shifted gears again, feeling the power of the vehicle as it chewed up the miles, but it was nothing compared to the smooth handling of the Jag. Maybe he’d buy himself a Jag some day. Yeah, and maybe some gorgeous redhead would show up on his doorstep, screw him senseless and bull’s-eye an arrow straight through his heart again. Right, like that would happen again.
Two hours later a dozen men on his teams were dragging ass out of the office space over the convenience store. The pow-wow with the head honchos definitely had not gone well.
Despite the new intel Ayden had provided on Jameson, the conference call with his superiors in Boston hadn’t been filled with high-fives and back slapping. Quite the opposite in fact. They were still grumbling about pulling him from the operation and bringing someone else in to complete the bust. Ayden suspected it would be that way for the rest of the week, and didn’t that just suck?
It was hard enough collecting solid evidence, organizing the sting and keeping his men safe without having to juggle his bosses’ trepidation and doubts. But he needed this one to go right too damned much to hand the reins over to someone else. He’d take their shit and bring down the drug cartel here in Maine, even if it killed him.
Ayden looked over the map of Cutler and its surrounding towns riddled with a half dozen colored thumbtacks and dozens of numbered flags. He mentally checked once again the positioning and jobs of his four teams for the operation. Granted, Jameson hadn’t been a fountain of information back at the estate earlier in the afternoon, but when he’d told Ayden he was expecting a shipment of heroin on Sunday night and that he’d be happy to have him in on the action, Ayden had felt another piece of the puzzle drop into place.
Though the debonair business man had been purposefully vague about the how or where, Ayden was sure it wasn’t because Jameson didn’t know the information. No way in hell the asshole was being manipulated by someone higher up. He was the squeaky clean man with the financial backing and power to be pulling the strings. The guy that in the past—had always gotten away.
Well, not this time. Jameson was their guy all right. The way Ayden was popping antacids to cool the fire in his gut told him he was right on track and to trust his instincts.
But DEA stings didn’t operate on gut feelings. They required cold, hard facts, backed up by more credible facts and solidified by even more substantial facts. Only facts turned a conviction into jail time. And getting drug-dealing swine off the streets was Ayden’s primary mission.
The keys on the computers behind him clicked as recording equipment whirred. Harriman and Jones were the only two left and they’d be here until the men relieving them showed up in six hours for the midnight shift. Both men were intently listening in on the phone and wire taps at Jameson’s estate.
Everything there was still working and that just sent Ayden’s ulcer into overdrive. Seemed stupid to think he wanted them to find the sensitive equipment, but something about it just wasn’t sitting right with him. Ayden flipped two more antacids into his mouth from the pack he kept in his pocket and studied the surveillance photos again.
Grainy photos of guys making deals on the street littered the board. He knew a high number of the two-bit players, but the only one Ayden cared about was the man at the heart of the operation pumping heroin into the streets of Maine and right into the hands of the teenagers. Drug addiction on the Maine coast was rampant. Shutting down the street thugs wouldn’t stop everything, but apprehending Jameson, the greedy asshole looking to expand his drug cartel, would certainly staunch the flow.
Until Jameson gave them more information on the how and where, Ayden had set up contingency plans. He had teams ready to go at a small airstrip in Wesley, just outside Cutler. But Ayden didn’t think they were going to fly the drugs in, not with the mansion sitting pretty right next to the ocean. More likely, they’d route the heroin shipment from South America, through Canada and bring it into Maine by boat. He was banking on that.
Ayden had no idea how big a haul they were making, Jameson hadn’t been willing to discuss that detail either. They were still parrying, like two fencers with swords, dodging and striking, neither willing to give up too much information.
Ayden had marked Jameson as their guy and he was putting all his eggs in that basket. Reluctantly, the guys in Boston agreed to the plan as he’d laid it out.
“Hey, Scott,” Harriman yelled from the bank of computers. “We’ve got a situation in Cutler. It’s coming across on the police scanner.”
* * * *
Glenn Lafflin, the Cutler chief of police, ushered Ayden in the backdoor of the small precinct and straight to his office. It was imperative none of the other officers see Ayden here. There was a high probability at least one of them on the small force was on Jameson’s payroll. The guys in Boston had done a thorough background check on Lafflin before they decided to bring him in, so only he was aware the DEA was in town. Sometimes it was good to have the cooperation of the local police.
Ayden hoped he didn’t end up regretting the decision.
In hindsight, he probably should have sent over one of the other guys so there was no chance of blowing his cover. But after Harriman heard the Cutler officers touting the arrest over the scanner, he needed to find out for himself who else was in the game. Ayden would be pissed if this arrest turned up nothing more than a teenage punk getting ready for the weekend.
“I don’t know, Scott.” Lafflin said. “The suspect looks pretty shaken up. Either there’s been a setup, or it’s one hell of an act.”
“Tell me again how you found the heroin.”
“We got a call into the switchboard at…” The chief consulted his notes. “Approximately five-thirty. An unidentified caller told us a street dealer was headed out of Cutler with drugs. Gave a detailed description of the vehicle and the time frame it would be on that particular road.”
“Did you ID the caller?”
“The only thing that showed up on the switchboard was some disposable cell phone number. Can’t be traced back to the owner. Probably ditched the thing after reporting to us.”
“How much was confiscated?”
“Five glassine envelopes. We’ve had it verified. It’s pure heroin all right.”
“That’s barely a hundred bucks, maybe a little more if the guy sold it on the streets in Bangor, less, if he planned on using some of it himself,” Ayden said. With the fish he was hoping to land, this small amount was hardly worth making a fuss over. But the Cutler police were no doubt slapping themselves on the back. It was probably the most action they’d seen in years.
“You think we got some turf war going on? Some dealer stepping on another’s toes?” the chief asked. “Does seem pretty weird someone had all the information about the drugs.”
“Not sure.” Ayden hoped that wasn’t the case. He didn’t want anything to blow the deal with Jameson. “Other than the arresting officers, anyone talk to the guy?”
“It’s a woman. And no, I called you when they were bringing her in. I figured it couldn’t be a coincidence that the DEA is investigating heroin in our pretty little town and this happens.” Lafflin’s sizeable chest inflated. “I’ve been letting her stew while I waited for you. Figured you’d want to hear it firsthand.”
“I appreciate that.” Ayden was becoming more and more convinced that the arrest was nothing of consequence. “I’m comfortable with you handling the interrogation. I assume you’ve got somewhere for me to watch?”
“Just had it installed beginning of this year.” Lafflin walked over to a small television and begin fiddling with the knobs. “You can sit right in my chair and see everything.”
Ayden settled in the high back office chair, thinking about the work he still had left to do when he got back to the condo. Lafflin continued to make adjustments on the television.
“There, best seat in the house.”
Ayden nearly swallowed his tongue wh
en he saw Deirdre Tilling handcuffed to the table.
* * * *
Nausea rolled through her stomach and clogged her throat. Deirdre was in some kind of nightmare.
They’d brought her coffee, but her trembling hands weren’t able to pick up the cup without spilling the contents all over the marred table. So she sat in the metal chair, worrying her fingers, staring at the handcuffs on her wrists. How the hell had this happened?
They’d read Deirdre her rights at the truck, or had that been her imagination? She was having a hard time believing she couldn’t just pinch herself and wake up from this nightmare. Deirdre wasn’t sure she’d been charged yet, no one had taken her fingerprints or taken pictures, but she figured it was only a matter of time. Unfortunately, she had no idea what crime they thought she’d committed.
And to top it all off, no one knew she’d been arrested.
Mark had taken Rachel with him in the van back to the high school in Delmont while Deirdre had cleaned up in the garage. She’d been at least thirty minutes behind them leaving the estate. She wouldn’t even be missed until morning when she didn’t show up for work.
And the Cutler police refused to let her use the phone. Wasn’t she allowed one phone call? Or did that only happen in the movies?
Deirdre had no idea how long she’d been in the little room. She’d lost all sense of time since the four police cruisers had come at her with lights flashing and sirens wailing. They’d appeared out of nowhere, nearly running her one-ton off the road.
The officers had charged the truck cab with guns drawn, yelling incoherent sentences at her. One of them hauled her from the truck, throwing her to the ground. Absently she rubbed at the bruise on her cheek where it had slammed into the road.
The other three officers swarmed the truck like ants at a picnic. She was too frightened to protest even as the arresting officer groped her body a little too intimately. Deirdre had no idea what they were looking for until one of them produced something from beneath the driver’s seat. They waved the packets in her face accusing her of selling drugs. Pot didn’t come in crinkly cellophane packages. She still didn’t know what the bundles were. Whatever it was had been enough to have the police slapping cuffs roughly on her wrists, shoving her into a cruiser and bringing her to the police station.