Men at Work

by Karen Kendall, Cindi Myers

  That is, if Hawk was the thief.

  She drove back onto the street, parked half a block down, then walked back at a leisurely pace as though she were a tourist, enjoying the sunny weather, ocean breezes, trendy restaurants. Like she’d ever be caught dead in one. Give her a hole in the wall with a great pork sandwich any day over one of those yuppified establishments.

  Today she wore a light green T-shirt, khaki shorts and, of course, her fanny pack. When on surveillance, she typically wore dark clothes, but this job demanded more role-playing, specifically looking like a tourist. The black running shoes didn’t fit the part, but she never knew if she’d have to move quickly, or even run, and flip-flops could be a disaster.

  She strolled onto the Captain Cook property, down a short asphalt delivery road and through some palm trees to the section of rooms where Hawk was staying. Winds were picking up, not unusual as mid-August kicked off hurricane season. But as she always checked weather reports before heading out on a job, she knew the weather would be warm, mostly sunny with possibility of afternoon rain.

  She passed an older man mowing a strip of lawn next to the motel swimming pool. Gina nodded, strolled past as though she were a guest heading to her room. The older man nodded, smiled. The Captain Cook was low-key, unobtrusive, almost quaint—very unlike the rest of hip, happenin’South Beach. But very like Hawk. In a way, he seemed out of step with the twenty-first century, a throwback to another time when life was slower, gentler. The thought made her wonder why he didn’t spend more time with his people in upstate New York than constantly be on the road working construction.

  Of course, being on the road made sense if he had a side business like fencing goods on the black market. In her research this morning, she’d had a friend run a check on Hawk in the National Crime Information Center database. Nothing came up, which either meant he was clean or that he was very slick covering his tracks, possibly using other IDs.

  Room three, Hawk’s room, was at the end of the L-shaped motel configuration. She sauntered down the sidewalk, stopping to smell a flower as though she had nothing in the world to do except, well, nothing. As she approached room three, she saw its drapes were open. Fantastic.

  Outside his window, she halted, pretended to answer her cell phone.

  “Hello? Oh, hi, Margie.” While talking, she casually surveyed the area. Only people in the vicinity were the guy mowing the lawn and a woman sunning at the pool. Both preoccupied.

  This work was turning out to be sweeter than one of Teresa’s brazos gitanos.

  “You’ve got to be kidding, Margie. So what did Bob do after that?” Gina turned back to face room three. The drapes were about two-feet open, offering a decent view. Unfortunately, sunshine sparkled off the glass, making it impossible to see inside. She needed to get closer.

  “Yeah, Marge, tonight would be great for dinner….”

  She stepped forward, peered into the darkened room. Difficult to see much in all those shadows. Although, she could make out the shape of a bed, chair, dresser, what appeared to be a TV in the corner. Looked neat. If she had motel maid service every day, G K Investigations would look neat all the time, too.

  Roger Bowen’s e-mail had itemized the most recently stolen property, several expensive welders and drill bits, which could easily have been transported in the back of a pickup to this room. She moved closer, peered inside. Looked like a large suitcase at the foot of the bed. And what had appeared to be the TV seemed bulkier, more oddly shaped than one. Could be one of the stolen tools. Although, why wouldn’t Hawk have hidden it in the bathroom or closet?

  A cloud passed overhead, blocking the sun, making it a little easier to see inside—

  Something squeezed her shoulder.

  She gasped, turned.

  Hawk stared down at her, his face a mask of darkness.

  4

  “YOU’RE FOLLOWING ME AGAIN.” Hawk’s voice cut right through her and, despite the summer heat, it chilled her to the core.

  Effing great. She’d been burned, caught red-handed while actively investigating a target, such as when someone became aware they were being watched, or their motel room was being spied on. Like when Ted, a junior investigator, had been burned by a neighborhood kid who, after peering in Ted’s SUV, loudly asked, “Mister, you’ve been parked here for hours—you a P.I. or somethin’?”

  Gina had always laughed when one of her cohorts told stories of being burned. Call her cocky, but she always thought she was too smart to be caught.

  Ha. Think again.

  “Hardly following,” she said, trying to sound droll and together, the last defense of a burned woman, “considering you weren’t supposed to be here.”

  His eyebrows pressed together, forming a dark inverted V over his piercing black eyes. “What do you mean, I wasn’t supposed to be here?”

  She shrugged. Might as well go for broke. “I figured high-rise construction workers wouldn’t waste their lunch hour descending twenty stories and fighting Miami traffic just to slap together a sandwich at home.”

  Although, a motel room hardly seemed like a home. For that matter, neither did a P.I. office with a folding cot for a bed. It hit her how she and Hawk, in their own peculiar ways, were homeless.

  But only I will end up jobless. She couldn’t blow an interview one day, then get burned the next—worse, by the target himself—and expect Bowen to not find out and dump her.

  She mindlessly adjusted her fanny pack, quickly calculating how much of Bowen’s retainer she’d earned—a little—and lost—a lot. Shit. Might as well make a mea culpa call to Bowen right now and start beating the bushes for new work. At least she had that cheating-spouse case in the wings, thanks to Teresa.

  Sucking in a breath, she started mentally preparing her goodbye speech when the look on Hawk’s face stopped her. “What’re you smiling at?”

  Not only was she taken aback at his suddenly going lighthearted on her, but this big, semiferocious looking man had dimples when he smiled. Grooves down both cheeks that proved he didn’t always take life all that seriously.

  “You spend too much time figuring and not enough time living.”

  She had several defensive responses on the tip of her tongue, but decided to keep them to herself. Mostly because he was right.

  “Every Tuesday, I come back here for lunch before heading out to volunteer at Frameworks for the Future. You’re a P.I., thought you’d have known that.”

  “I haven’t been on your case all that long.”

  “How long?”

  “A few days.”

  “Meaning you haven’t had enough time to study me completely.”

  She flashed on his naked body at the photography studio, the images she pleasured herself to last night. “Right,” she whispered, feeling heat creep up her neck.

  “Who hired you?”

  “That’s privileged information.”

  He gave her a questioning look.

  “P.I.-client privilege,” she explained. “I could lose my license if I divulged my client’s name.”

  “Don’t need to divulge anything,” he said solemnly. “We all know it’s Roger Bowen.”

  We. It surprised her that Hawk would be tight with his coworkers considering Bowen claimed Hawk was a loner.

  “Which I’ll neither confirm nor deny,” she responded. “I’ll cut to the chase—”

  “Which you seem to do a lot.”

  “Yeah, well, it saves time.” What’d he do, memorize everything she said yesterday? “As you know, several hundred thousand dollars worth of equipment has been stolen from your work site. My job is to determine who’s doing it. Not where the goods are being fenced, or even who the middleman is. Just who’s the thief. So, help me help you prove you aren’t the guy.”

  At the pool, several young children ran squealing and laughing toward the water. A man with pasty-white skin and bright yellow shorts—typical Miami tourist—ran after them, admonishing them to stop running.

  “As I
told you before, I didn’t do it.”

  He sounded open to proving as much. Time to pitch the deal.

  “If you’d let me see your room,” she said slowly, “I can verify there’s no stolen equipment in your possession and get my client to back off.”

  She thought he’d bite on that tasty morsel, but nothing. Hawk just stared at her, his face a study in inscrutability. Where the hell were those dimples when you needed them?

  “Otherwise,” she continued matter-of-factly, “all that will be mentioned in my report is what I saw through your window—”

  “Isn’t that against the law?”

  “Not if what’s seen is in plain view.”

  “You know, something else has been in plain view, but nobody’s talking about it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We had an accident yesterday at the work site. A guy got hurt. I think it’s due to shoddy construction supplies.”

  “You should bring that up to management.”

  He snorted something under his breath.

  “Is the worker okay?” She wasn’t sure why they were discussing this, but it felt awkward to just blow over it.

  “Yeah, he’ll be back on the job in a few days. Guy could’ve been killed, though.”

  She nodded. “Let’s get back to our conversation. If I don’t go into your room, all I’ll be able to report having seen are several masses of dark, unidentifiable shapes that could be anything from suitcases to expensive welders.” She paused for effect. “Such vague descriptions will only inspire the feds to get a search warrant.”

  “Feds?” His eyes searched hers. “You’re threatening me.”

  She doubted anything threatened Hawk Shadow Bonaparte, except maybe extreme forces of nature, hoards of thundering beasts, maybe an alien invasion.

  “I prefer the word encouraging.”

  He crossed his massive arms over his chest. “No.”

  “It’d benefit us both, Hawk.”

  She’d never called him by his name before. A look she couldn’t decipher flitted across his face.

  “What’s your name?” he asked quietly.

  Duh. She’d forgotten to give him her card yesterday, forgot to introduce herself today.

  “Gina Keys.”

  His gaze dropped down her neck, to her chest, back to her eyes. “You wear rose perfume.”

  Didn’t make sense why he was asking, but this was a far better conversation than his asking again for a union rep to be present.

  “Not perfume, really. A lotion.” A rosewater lotion that she slathered on every morning after her shower. Her favorite indulgence, something she hadn’t done without even when she’d been counting pennies between cases this past year.

  “But it’s roses,” he said.

  “Yes, roses.”

  He smiled even as a thinly masked pain flashed in the depths of his eyes. Probably something to do with a woman. A wife back home? A former girlfriend? An emotion sliced through Gina, something she hadn’t felt in so long, she almost didn’t recognize it. Jealousy.

  Shit.

  That was the last thing she wanted to feel. Lust, okay. She fully accepted that feeling last night, but jealousy was a whole other beast. It tied into the heart and emotions, meant she was caring in ways she shouldn’t, and wouldn’t. Not now. Not with Hawk.

  She was in this deeper than she’d realized, which wasn’t good. Whenever she started the mind-machine churning with questions and theories and concerns over what was happening with a man she hadn’t even yet kissed—nighttime fantasies aside—she might as well give it up.

  Oh, yeah, this was bad. The last thing she needed, but, if she were totally honest, not the last thing she wanted.

  He moved slightly, and, for a crazy moment, she thought he was going to touch her.

  Worse, she knew she’d let him.

  Right here.

  Right now.

  She closed her eyes, her body on edge, waiting. An ocean breeze wafted past, its tangy scent meshing with his masculine one. She imagined his touch to be at first hesitant, awkward. Then, perhaps a little anxious, the touch of a man who’d been alone for a while…maybe, like her, alone for a long time.

  She licked her lips, waiting…

  Nothing.

  She opened her eyes.

  He was gone.

  She didn’t look around, just stared at the spot where he’d stood, feeling embarrassed and, well, pissed-off. Part of her couldn’t believe he’d do that, just leave. And yet part of her knew that’s how he dealt with life’s decisions. Quietly, completely.

  The soft click of his room door confirmed the latter.

  She stared out at the chalky blue walls of the motel, felt the shimmering heat of the day, heard the short bursts of children’s laughter from the pool. So much space and light and activity, and yet it all felt empty.

  Time to go home, call it a day. Call it a job. Well, at least she had that cheating-spouse case to make ends meet.

  “Gina.”

  She blinked, turned.

  Hawk stood on the threshold to his room, his hand holding the door open. “Come inside.”

  FOR A MOMENT, Hawk thought she was going to refuse to come in. She stood her ground in those black running shoes, her blue eyes cloudy. Like sea smoke. He shouldn’t have just walked away, but standing that close to her, engulfed in the scent and memory of roses, he knew what would happen next if he didn’t.

  And then, standing on the other side of the closed door, he’d cursed himself for leaving her like that. Since nine-eleven, he’d made a habit of walking away from anything that made him feel too much, care too deeply, because being numb made the world bearable. Some people drank to be numb. Others took drugs, or worked to excess. But Hawk had learned to walk away, leave it behind.

  But standing behind the closed door, he’d suddenly felt disappointed in the life he’d made. A string of empty rooms, new towns, nameless acquaintances that came and went like ghosts.

  He wasn’t ready to let Gina fade away, too.

  A few feet inside, she halted. “What is that spicy smell?”

  “It’s an herb. Sage.” He closed the door and the room fell deeper into shadow.

  “What were you cooking?”

  “Nothing. I was cleansing energies.”

  “Huh?”

  “I sometimes burn sage. It drives out negativity.”

  After a pause, she muttered, “Could’ve used that back at the D.A.’s office.” She raised her voice. “Mind turning on a light?”

  He flicked a switch. The lamp next to the bed turned on, warming the room with a hazy glow. “You were a lawyer before being a P.I.?”

  She turned, and he was momentarily struck with how much softer she looked in this light. Her clothes were like the earth, a sea-green T-shirt and sandy-colored shorts. Her hair, startling white under the sun, had taken on the color of soft clouds.

  “Lawyer?” Her mouth twitched. “I was pre-law for a year in college, but then I came to my senses.”

  “You said you worked at the D.A.’s office, so I thought—”

  “Oh, I see why you’re asking. I was an investigator for the Dade County D.A. Lead investigator, actually.”

  “Sounds like a good job.”

  “Sure, if you like being railroaded.” She looked around the room. “Either the maids already cleaned today, or you’re the neatest man on the planet.”

  “Probably both.”

  She slid him an approving look. “I’m impressed. I hate picking up after myself, but I have to or risk turning off potential clients.” Catching the question on his face, she added, “My office is also my home. Not the best situation, but at least it’s temporary.”

  “Everything is temporary.”

  “Only if you’re lucky.” She crossed to the open black duffel bag at the foot of his bed and peered inside. “You keep your dirty clothes in here?”

  “Thought you were looking for stolen tools.”

  “Hey,” she said
with a laugh, “trash hits can reveal the best stuff—”

  She straightened just as Hawk walked past and their arms accidentally brushed. The electric touch of skin on skin stopped him in his tracks. Their gazes caught, and he was suddenly too aware of their bodies in the small space, the nearness of the bed, the heady scent of roses.

  His lips itched for more than talk as his gaze swept over her. This close, he caught the spark of curiosity and interest in her blue eyes. Her lips parted, slightly, and he imagined how it’d be to kiss her. Warm, moist, sweet. His groin ached as he imagined more. His hands on her pale, smooth skin, his mouth tasting her…

  He lurched away. Too much. Not ready.

  With a swipe of his brow, he stopped at the closet. Placing his moist palm flat on the door, he shoved it open with one jerk of his arm. He sensed, more than heard, her footsteps across the motel room carpeting. When he caught the rose scent again, he knew she was standing next to him.

  “I’ll just look inside,” Gina whispered as she leaned farther into the closet.

  His gaze traveled down her trim body, over the green shirt, past the rounded shorts, down the length of her bare legs. Her skin was as pale as apple blossoms. She’d probably rarely worn these shorts—outside, anyway—to have skin that fair. He noticed a long scar, at least three inches, on the outside of her thigh. The scar whiter than her hair. He wondered what had happened so long ago.

  “Ahem.”

  He looked up. She was staring at him over her shoulder, her face flushed, her eyes glistening.

  “Skiing accident,” she said simply, glancing down at the scar, back to him.

  “Where?”

  She leaned back out of the closet, which brought their bodies in close proximity. He saw her breasts strain through the light fabric of her shirt. Could make out the light, intricate pattern of her bra.