Wouldn't he laugh, if he knew what she was thinking now.
Lili leaned close and kissed him full on the lips. "I want to make love by the fire."
His smile widened to a grin. "I was hoping you'd get the hint."
"Mmmm. And it was such a subtle hint, too."
He laughed softly, eyes gleaming as he dropped his shirt, shoulder rig, and gun on the rug. "We don't have time for subtle. I want every minute I can have with you before I put you on a plane back to New York."
Despite her sudden chill she managed to smile, even as an inner voice whispered: We'll see about that…
*
Three in the morning, and Matt couldn't sleep. Not surprising, considering he'd been operating on pure adrenaline for days. When he came down off this one, he'd crash hard. Once it was over and Lili was safely home again, he'd take out his sailboat despite the choppy October winds, drop anchor off shore, stay put for a few days, and try to forget.
Forget.
Fat chance. A guy didn't just forget a woman like Lili Kavanaugh.
He shifted on the bed, careful not to dislodge Lili, curled up against his back, her bare skin warm against his. In the darkness, he listened to her breathing, slow and even, and tried not to think about never waking up beside her again.
Between the late hour and making love with her, he should be wiped out, but he couldn't forget his talk with Conroy. Too many questions were running through his mind, and every time he drifted toward sleep, another one grabbed him, and shook him back to wakefulness.
Restless, uneasy, he shifted again. Lili sighed in her sleep, and he went still until she settled against him.
What had Conroy meant, about Mancuso always liking a good joke? And what was he missing about the shoes? Lili had pulled up the insoles, checked the hollow heels, and found nothing. Joey Mancuso had done something to them, but he and Lili had looked in every possible place –
Matt bolted upright in bed, rolling Lili backward.
"What?" she deman-ded in a sleepy, anxious voice. She sat up, clutching the sheet against her breasts. "Is something wrong? Is somebody outside?"
"No," Matt muttered. He shoved the sheet back, ignoring the slap of cold air against his bare skin as he stood. "Dammit, we looked at the shoes exactly where Mancuso expected us to look."
He snapped on the lights, blinking against the brightness, and pulled the shoes out from where Lili had hidden them under the bed.
"Matt, I have no idea what you're talking about."
He sat on the bed and held up a shoe. "The top, Lili. We didn't look in the top."
"The vamp? I never thought … damn." All sleepiness fled, she took the shoe and examined it. "He could've hidden a small piece of paper between the lining and leather. The lining's hand-stitched on both vamps."
Forgotten, the sheet fell to her waist, baring her breasts. "Oh, my God," she said in a hushed tone, her eyes shining with excitement. "It's this shoe! Right here … see? The black thread is more brownish, and the stitches are a little larger than the others."
Matt retrieved the pocket knife he'd bought at Wal-Mart, intending to rip the thin fabric away, but Lili took it from him.
"Let me do that. Please." She sighed and carefully loosened several stitches. Once she'd done so, she pulled out the others. Slowly, she peeled back the fabric to reveal a scrap of yellowed, brittle paper, its edges uneven, as if it had been hastily torn from a larger piece. "Thank you, Joey."
"Careful," Matt warned as she eased it out and handed it to him.
Gingerly, he took the small piece of paper, straining to read the faded ink and scrawled words crushed together.
"What does it say?" Lili asked after several seconds had passed.
He read: "'I left you a bit of money under them mums. If you can't get it, don't worry. I take care of my own. My last joke's ON YOU. Hold that dance for me, baby. Goodbye. I love you.'"
Slowly, Matt looked up, and met Lili's wide eyes. She wore an expression of confusion, and tears glimmered in her eyes. God, she was such a soft touch.
Good-bye. I love you…
Still, a sense of sorrow touched him as well. Maybe even killers like Mancuso had a saving grace, and his had been his love for a woman.
It was something Matt could understand, after all.
"My last joke's on you," he repeated at length. "He emphasized 'on you.'"
"Does he mean the actual shoes?" Lili asked, her gaze sharpening.
The rhinestones, sparkling in the low light, caught and held his attention. For a split second, Matt struggled against the obvious, then he said quietly, "Mancuso, you sonofabitch."
"What?" Lili snapped in frustration. "Dammit, Matt—"
"Diamonds," he said, tapping the broochlike decorations on each shoe. "I noticed a while back that a few of the rhinestones were loose in the fittings. I figured it was just due to wear, but I bet you Mancuso replaced some of the rhinestones with diamonds."
Eyes wide, Lili asked, "You mean I've been walking around wearing a small fortune in diamonds?"
He turned the shoe, smiling grimly. "Conroy never knew about the note, but he knew Rose's shoes had the diamonds."
"Did she know?" Lili asked, and Matt glanced at her. Damn; she looked sexy like this, naked and intense with concentration, her skin flushed with emotion.
Forcing his thoughts back to the immediate problem, he said, "Not everything, or else Mancuso wouldn't have left her instructions. Not that the 'under them mums' part does us much good."
"Why wouldn't he tell her? What were the chances she'd figure it out?"
"He didn't tell her for her own protection. She couldn't tell the cops what she didn't know, no matter what they did to her." As Lili's face paled, he added, "Back then, the law was fuzzy on civil liberties. Getting their man – or woman – was all that mattered to the lawmen of the day."
"My God," Lili whispered.
"They'd have let her go eventually." Matt looked away. "Joey figured his partner might turn on him, and he planned on using those diamonds as a financial cushion. If he lived. I don't think Conroy ever said anything about the shoes to the cops, seeing as no hint of the truth ever went public, but Riley and Graziano must've known."
"So Joey stole jewelry, not money?"
Matt's gaze strayed toward her bare breasts again. "He made off with money, but he also took a wedding ring and, obviously, diamond jewelry. Maybe more, I don't know. Conroy might. I'm guessing the jewelry had some personal value to Mike Riley."
"Or Lou Graziano. There has to be a reason for his son to want the shoes."
Matt tiredly rubbed at his eyes. "Me and Willis Conroy are going to have a talk tomorrow. That old man's telling me the truth."
Lili looked at him, suddenly wary. "You won't hurt him? He's old and—"
"A killer," Matt interrupted harshly. "He doesn't deserve your sympathy."
It angered him that she even asked – but disappointment cut even deeper. "No, I won't hurt him." He hesitated, then asked quietly, "Do you really think I'd do something like that?"
"I think you'd do whatever you felt was necessary to keep me safe, whether you should or not," she said after a moment. "It's what we're paying you for – as you've told me so many times before."
Except he wasn't in this for the money anymore. After he sent Lili home, he wouldn't take a dime of the fee. To hell with his plans for his agency. Everything would go to Dal and Manny. Christ, it was the least he could do.
"You said you made the monsters disappear," she said suddenly, not taking her gaze from him.
Unsure how to respond to this abrupt change in subject, or where she was going with this, Matt only nodded.
"By becoming just like them? Is that how it's supposed to work?"
Her words hit hard, physical as a blow. Heat rushed over him, blood roaring in his ears. Stunned, he stared at her.
"Jesus, Lili," he managed to get out. "How can you say that to me?"
Sudden tears welled in her eyes. "The trut
h, you mean? I told you I hate your job, but more than anything else, Matt, I hate what it's doing to you. Maybe your other clients never cared what you had to do, or what you had to be, in order to keep them safe. But I care. And I won't have it."
"You won't have it?" he repeated, and moved toward her on the bed.
She leaned away, something very like fear flashing across her face, and he froze.
"I'm not apologizing for doing my job or keeping you safe," he said after several seconds had passed, somehow keeping his voice calm and even. "And I'm not doing this for the money, Lili, but because I love you."
Her eyes went wide in shock, and as she opened her mouth, he slid off the bed. He grabbed his shirt and boxers, and stalked into the bathroom.
"Matt, wait!"
Despite her protest, he slammed the door. So it wasn't mature or cool or sensitive. Fuck it. He didn't want to hear what she had to say. Excuses, explanations, apologies. He pulled on the boxers, and as he straightened, glimpsed his face in the mirror.
Suddenly he was sixteen again – back in Pittsburgh, in that stinking hole of an apartment, listening to his father outside the bathroom door shouting at his mother, his sisters bawling – and hating what he saw in the mirror.
Take away his expensive house, car, and clothes, and he was still that angry kid who'd learned, too early, to use violence to survive. Lili saw it in him, despite everything he'd done to rub out the stain. It didn't matter to her that he was one of the good guys – he frightened her.
Closing his eyes tightly, Matt lowered his forehead against the cool glass of the mirror.
He loved her.
How could he have let himself be so stupid? Bad enough he'd done the unthinkable by falling for his own client, but then he'd gone and told her so.
And she'd looked stunned.
What had he hoped for? One of those Hollywood moments, when she said I love you, too and everything was magically all right?
No matter. He still had a job to do, and he'd finish it and get them both the hell out of here, alive and unharmed. The sooner she was back in her world and he was back in his, the better.
Opening his eyes again, Matt pushed back from the mirror.
Conroy had hit a nerve earlier, too. Matt didn't want to admit that maybe, without even realizing it, he'd come here expecting to meet up with the men who'd shot Dal and Manny. The thought of emptying a clip into the bastards for what they'd done to Lili, to his friends, filled him with a dark, cold satisfaction – and scared him. God, it had been so long since he'd known a fear like this.
A light rap cut across his thoughts, and he turned toward the door. His earlier anger had vanished, leaving nothing behind but a heavy weariness.
"Matt? Open the door, please."
Fighting with Lili was the last thing he wanted, but it wasn't like he could just walk away … he was her damn bodyguard, after all. Taking in a long breath, he said, "It's not locked."
He watched the knob turn, the door ease open. Lili had put on a shirt, and her face was pale and full of regret.
Oh, Jesus. He didn't need any pity party, either.
"I'm sorry," she said softly, her gaze unwavering. "I didn't mean it as criticism, Matt. I know you're defensive about your work, but I only said what I did because I care about what happens to you."
"Do you mean that?" Matt asked bluntly, tension tightening his muscles. "I'm not some little experiment in excitement? A new flavor of fun?"
She didn't look surprised by the question. "At the beginning, yes, but not anymore."
Not sure what to say to her honesty, he looked away. At length, he asked, "Why me, Lili? What in hell can I offer you?"
Now she looked surprised, and hot embarrassment filled him. He should've let the subject die quietly. Easier for them both to walk away in the end.
"There's a thousand little things, Matt, all part of who you are. I love your dedication, how you think, and the way you put pieces together into something that makes sense. I admire how you take chances, never letting fear hold you back. You're so physically powerful, but you're never arrogant or careless about it. You're so in control, so self-confident … I can't help but be attracted to that." She paused. "I love how you take care of me, but not in a way that makes me feel like arm candy. You ask for my opinions. You listen to me."
She colored slightly. "And making love with you … you're rough and gentle, serious and playful, you treat me like an equal, and still make me feel like a woman. You thrill me, alarm me, worry me, and I want to take care of you and protect you—"
"Protect me?" he interrupted. "I don't need protecting, Lili."
Anger sparked in her eyes, then she said quietly, "Somebody must've hurt you very badly in the past."
He looked away from her too-knowing gaze, amazed and humbled that, with all his skill at masking feelings, she could so easily see through to the heart of him.
"You can't let the past hold you down," he said finally, looking up again. "I look forward, never back."
"A good idea," she said. "In theory, anyway. But what's behind us, the good as well as the bad, makes us who we are now. Even if I could, I wouldn't go back to change a single mistake I've made in my life. Would you?"
It was a question he never expected. Always surprising him, his Lili. Making him think, making him work harder than was comfortable.
"I don't know," he said bluntly. "Some mistakes are just bad, and I've made my share of those. Lili, I'm not the man you think I am—"
"Of course you are," she interrupted, moving closer and brushing against him. "You just won't let yourself believe it."
She was all warmth and softness, perfume and woman. He couldn't think straight when she was against him like this; all he could do was pull her close and slide his hands under her shirt to bare skin, a purely primal satisfaction shooting through him at her low sound of pleasure.
Matt guided her back to the bed, still locked in an embrace, and eased her onto her back. Sighing, she twined her arms around his neck and whispered, "I have a question, too."
Matt looked down, meeting her gaze.
"What is it you see in me?"
The expectation and hope in her eyes was almost more than he could bear.
Without even having to think about it, he said, "You believe in me."
Twenty
Early the next morning, Matt and Lili – with her backpack holding Rose's shoes – got into the car, and headed to Big Moccasin Lake Lodge to play "tourist." They were given the full tour, complete with bullet holes, blood stains, and the bedroom where Joey and Rose spent their last night. An entire wall of the first floor's common room was devoted to framed portraits of gangsters, vintage Wanted posters, and photos of lawmen standing outside old-fashioned cars, rifles in hand. Several pictures taken shortly after the shootings showed Joey's stolen sedan, thoroughly ransacked, and another showed two of Graziano's men lying on a dirt road like lifeless heaps of rags. The owner – not shy about playing up his lodge's single claim to fame and very knowledgeable in gangster lore – relished telling the gorier parts of the tale.
All the while Matt asked questions – focusing on the timing of the lawmen's arrival, the locations of blood trails and spent shells, closely examining the 1930s photos of the lodge – Lili kept watching him, almost as if she were seeing him for the first time.
Like he couldn't figure out why. He'd spent all morning acting like nothing had happened last night, as if he hadn't said what he had to her – but he knew better than to expect her to let it lie for much longer.
As they walked in silence back to the car, Lili said abruptly, "Did you mean what you said to me last night?"
No doubt about it, he knew this woman, inside and out. Matt sighed as he fished the keys from the pocket of his jeans. "You know I did."
"I guess I needed to hear you say it again."
He knew what she wanted, but he didn't respond. Once, a mistake. Twice, a fool … and the once was bad enough.
As he drov
e back toward the resort, Lili's gaze remained speculative. When she took a breath to speak, he braced himself for a confrontation.
Instead, she asked, "What's the deal with those old pictures you kept looking at?"
Relief rushed through him at the reprieve. "I was checking out flower gardens. Mums in particular."
Lili briefly closed her eyes. "Of course. Damn, Hawkins, you're good."
He gave her small smile. "Except there were flowers planted all around the lodge. That doesn't exactly narrow down the search area."
"And the cops? Does it matter what time they arrived?"
"It might not; I'm just coming at the problem from different angles." Then he added, "The story the guy told us puts only fifteen or twenty minutes between the shooting at the lodge and the shoot-out on the road. That wouldn't be enough time for Graziano to dump any bodies."
"So what are you saying? That Joey and Rose just walked away?"
The thought had occurred to him, but if Joey or Rose had survived, somebody would have found out eventually. Habitual career criminals like Joey didn't just go straight. Besides, none of the facts supported the idea.
Matt shook his head. "The blood loss indicates at least debilitating wounds, if not fatal ones. A body was definitely dragged down the front steps. That's plain from the crime scene description. Graziano's men could've split up, a couple of them taking the bodies into the lake and then, when they heard the gunfire on the road, escaped into the woods. It's either that, or someone besides Graziano's thugs dumped the bodies."
"We have enough of a problem with Willis Conroy and Tony Graziano," Lili said flatly. "We don't need to add a mysterious third party to the mix."
"I know," he said. "But it's an angle, Lili. I look at all the angles."
Matt parked outside the cabin. With his band on the small of Lili's back, he walked with her toward the porch – and suddenly slowed, grabbing her arm, as his instincts screamed in warning.
The front door was ajar.
"I shut and locked it," Lili whispered.
He'd already pulled the gun, and pushed her behind him. "Stay close."
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