by Joanne Rock
“You’re not going to see that dirtball by yourself.” Her partner would show up for something like that, right? Sean didn’t appreciate the way Mick’s attention was fracturing when Donata needed him most.
“I don’t know.” She slid out of bed, her naked body making his mouth water in spite of the tense nature of their conversation. “I might be more effective in wresting information from him if I go alone. After all those counseling sessions I sat through to untwine my head, I’m pretty good at asking probing, open-ended questions that initiate dialogue.”
She put her clothes on in quick order and something about that hasty speed made him wonder if she already regretted getting close to him. The realization pinched more than he would have guessed.
“You’re not racing out of here just to put tonight in the past, are you?”
His question must have caught her off guard because she spun on her heel and stared at him with the deer-in-the-headlights freeze for all of two seconds before she darted out the door, only to return with her purse and her coat. She jammed her arms into the sleeves of the jacket, her movements abrupt.
Unsteady?
“Honestly, you know as well as I do that sleeping together while working together doesn’t usually make for success on either front. But that’s not why I’m leaving.” She tugged the strap of her leather purse onto her shoulder and then approached the bed.
She was silent for so long, he had to nudge her along.
“So what gives?” He stroked the back of her hand, hoping he hadn’t blown it with her when he’d barely gotten the chance to know her.
“You’ll think it sounds stupid, and it probably is. After I helped send Serg to jail, I promised myself I wouldn’t wake up to another man’s head on my pillow unless he was The One.”
It took him a minute to fully digest the inherent romanticism in the sentiment, a fact that surprised him coming from a woman he considered to be street-smart and tough.
“Technically, this is my pillow.” He tugged the rumpled headrest closer to the edge of the bed. “So I don’t think you’d be breaking the rules.”
“Thanks, Sean. But since you’re already the first man I’ve slept with in four years, I don’t think you want to add that kind of pressure to the mix.”
And without another word, she was gone, leaving Sean to wonder if he’d already waded in over his head where Donata was concerned.
* * *
“SO DOES Mrs. Chapman think the boyfriend planted the webcam in Sara’s bedroom for his own benefit, or does she have reason to believe he planned to sell the footage?” Donata made an effort to focus on the conversation with her partner the next afternoon even though thoughts of Sean and their night together were creeping into her head at every turn.
She wondered if she had that goofy, good sex afterglow today. She knew she shouldn’t place too much emphasis on what had happened with Sean when she needed to keep her guard up around him, but that hadn’t stopped her from reliving every delicious moment in his bed and in his arms.
But while she was glowing like a teenager, Mick looked as though he hadn’t slept in a week as he shuffled through the notes on his desk. His hair stuck up in the back and the two cups of sugar-loaded java she’d made for him hadn’t come close to erasing the lines around his eyes.
“She doesn’t have anything concrete. The first time I talked to her she seemed to think the boyfriend—” he scanned the notes “—Terrance Russell, was a great guy. But apparently since the case broke, Terrance dumped Sara and both the Chapman women are upset about it.”
“Upset?” She’d thought he hesitated over the word choice so she tracked back to it.
“More mad than you’d expect over a high school breakup, but maybe that’s because they’re convinced the boyfriend planted the webcams. They sort of hounded me about when I’d arrest the kid.”
“You think they conspired to direct the blame now that mother and daughter have had time to discuss it? Maybe Sara put her own webcams in place and doesn’t want to admit she liked giving the kid a free show, so now that he dumped her, she’ll get even?” It was possible, and the girl might not realize the bigger blame rested with whoever made the Web images into a film for profitable distribution.
“I don’t know. I’ve had a tough time tracking down this Terrance kid and maybe he’s ducking me because he’s guilty as hell. I’m just telling you there was some definite angling going on at the Chapman household.”
Nodding, Donata understood how it felt to be betrayed by the guy you’d given yourself to. Some anger and resentment—and yes, a desire for revenge—were all common reactions.
Donata refused to think about the fact that she’d set herself up for betrayal all over again last night by sleeping with Sean. Not that Sean had anything in common with lowlife Serg, but even a prince among men could break a woman’s heart and Donata knew if she wasn’t careful, she could wind up hurt.
The thought helped her focus on the case. She wouldn’t let any more girls make the same mistakes Sara Chapman had.
“I’ve got a lot of electronic leads I’m following up and then I thought I’d interview Sergio about the pictures to see if he gives anything away.” She hesitated, biting the end of her pen as she debated how to tell her partner the latest on that front. “My photos are on the Internet now, so it made zero sense to blackmail me. I’m sending the link information to the tech guys and maybe they can trace who posted it.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Tell me about it.” She’d been stripped of all her defenses last night—personal and professional. There was no place to hide the vulnerable girl she’d once been. Her mistakes were available to view for anyone with a computer and an Internet connection.
And, oh God, the roiling in her stomach told her she needed to resurrect some boundaries soon. Now. Immersing herself in the investigation seemed like the wisest solution.
“You don’t need to submit the link as part of the case file, Donata.” Mick’s eyes looked fully alert for the first time all day as he reached over his desk to slap one big palm across the manila folder she’d brought into the precinct today.
Phones rang and officers laughed, yelled and cursed all around them, but for a moment, she and Mick shared a moment of intense staring, each trying to fathom where the other was coming from.
“Why wouldn’t I share this information?” She knew why she didn’t want to, but she didn’t understand how holding back could be ethical.
“Have someone else track it. Jesus, woman, let Sean track it. He’s made a small fortune tackling Internet crimes for corporate execs the last few years. It’s been his bread and butter to support himself while he pursues his own personal crusade. He’s got great resources for this.”
“How do you know what kinds of cases Sean takes?” She’d been under the impression they’d only just met. And why didn’t she know about Sean’s area of specialty?
Still, an idea sparked in the back of her mind for bringing their perp to justice.
“The longer you stick around here, the more you realize what a small world the NYPD is. There are thirty-nine thousand of us in all, but those numbers narrow quite a bit when you’re looking only at detectives and, in particular, detectives who’ve worked in Manhattan.” A tired grin brightened his weary face. “Wait until your first stakeout. You’ll realize how well gossip and doughnuts go together when you’re dog-ass tired and want to go home. You’ll know the scoop on everyone who ever walked through this precinct.”
“Somebody else might get away with not filing a piece of evidence, Mick, even if it’s peripheral. But I’ve got a background that makes a lot of people around here uncomfortable.”
He shook his head and scooped up his notes.
“I’ve seen the arrests you’ve made, Casale, and I know if you were a guy I’d say you had balls of steel on the street. When are you going to bring a little more of those guts into the precinct with you?”
She hadn’t expected a response
that bordered on angry, but then she knew her partner wasn’t at his best today. She felt bad she hadn’t gotten around to asking about his daughter.
He rounded her desk on his way out to continue his two cents that was quickly adding up to ten.
“It’s no different in here than it is out there. You hold your head up and let the shit slide right off you or they’ll bring you down to their level until the brass is filling your shoes with another rookie next fall.”
He stalked toward the front doors, ignoring the handful of greetings on his way through the desks and causing a few heads to turn toward her as if to see the source of the problem.
She didn’t appreciate Mick’s tone or his delivery, but she trusted his take on police politics. So she politely flipped off one of the younger guys who cast a censuring look her way and turned her attention to her own computer.
While she debated what to do about reporting her online photos, she was pretty sure she heard a couple of the older guys laughing while they took turns razzing the officer she’d been rude to. At least no one was glaring at her anymore.
Maybe the time had come to stop praying for acceptance here. She had enough on her plate without worrying about her popularity in the 10th precinct. Because after a sleepless night at home, she’d figured out the best way to bring down the adult filmmaker passing off private webcam footage as reality porn would be to go undercover with herself as bait.
CHAPTER 7
“HELL NO.”
Sean didn’t know how else to respond to Donata’s suggestion the next day as they drove out to the Hamptons. He’d agreed to go with her when she said she was headed to Long Island since he’d assumed she wanted to interview Sara Chapman’s boyfriend or some other suspects in the case.
But then she’d spelled out an insane plan to gather evidence against the perp planting webcams by making herself a potential target.
“Don’t shoot it down until you hear how limited our options are at this point.” Donata never took her eyes off the road as she steered her no-frills Ford sedan over Interstate 495 toward glitzy South Hampton, far from the more residential Massapequa where Sara Chapman lived. Traffic was light on a weekday, the commuters already safely at work while Donata and Sean made their way east.
“Your options aren’t as limited as you think.” He didn’t know how to break the mix of good news/bad news to her since she probably wouldn’t appreciate his sleight of hand with her online photo.
“What do you mean?” She did turn to glance at him then, her eyebrows knit in worry.
Guilt rattled him for all of a second since he hated the idea of being another guy who let her down, but damn it, this was for the best.
“I gathered a good piece of information yesterday but I unearthed it in the course of taking down your picture from that Web site.” There. He’d admitted it. Even as he waited for her anger, he felt a weight off his shoulders. “I made a copy of the relevant pages with a time stamp so you can still submit them as evidence, but I had a tech guy reroute the link to a self-help site for pedophiles.”
Her short bark of laughter wasn’t exactly full of good humor. More like a shout of disbelief.
“You took down the picture you knew I was going to submit as evidence?” Accusation permeated the words.
“Yes, but I knew the way I gathered the evidence would protect it in court without making it continually available. I’ve had good luck with Internet crime cases at my firm, and I know what will hold up in front of a judge. There was no need for you to let that image stay live on the site if you were uncomfortable with it.”
Seeing that picture had made him want to throw a blanket around her naked self. It didn’t matter that he also wanted to unveil her in private. No guy should see this woman in the altogether without earning the right to her bed first.
“I’m not sure what I think about those tactics when I clearly asked you to let me handle it.” Her fingers gripped the steering wheel harder, her knuckles clenched. “What evidence did you find?”
“For starters, we found some file coding associated with the photo that matches part of the screen name for one of the people who sent me a webcam.”
“I don’t get it. What kind of file coding?”
“The name someone used to save the digital image. Part of the name contains the letters f-s-t-g-r-l-z and one of the donators to my online wish list was ‘fastgirlz.’ Seemed a close enough match to warrant further investigation.”
They turned off the interstate onto a smaller highway heading south toward the coast. The houses were a hell of a lot bigger here, with more green space. Some snow remained in patches on a few of the lawns, but the weather today was clear and cool.
“You said that was just for starters?”
“I checked my record log for sites I’ve visited in the past year, and Fast Girlz productions was a site I hit five months ago. It’s gone now, but my notes at the time were that the girls looked close enough to legal age that I wouldn’t bother checking into them. Obviously, I didn’t realize the videos they advertised were probably made without the subjects’ knowledge.”
“You didn’t make a copy of that Web page the way you did with the site my picture was posted on?”
“Just so happens, I did.” He waved the folder in his lap, damn proud of himself for keeping good notes. “Turns out there are benefits to obsessive vigilantism.”
“I never said you were obsessive.” She frowned and didn’t seem to realize he was kidding. But then, Donata seemed like a woman well-accustomed to being on guard all the time. Maybe her sense of humor had fallen to the wayside the past few years.
Her looks sure as hell hadn’t. Once again today her lips were outlined in a perfect red Cupid’s bow that made him want to kiss her and mess up that sleek veneer of hers.
“I know. But the vigilante accusation hit home. Maybe I’m just trying to assure myself the efforts have been worth it.” He’d been so determined not to miss any criminal business that the case had been open a hell of a long time after they’d caught the guy who molested his sister. Sean had turned the hunt for online predators into a four-year mission. He recognized the time had come to start tossing guys in jail.
“Thank you for opening your files to me.” She paused as she pulled up to a T intersection. “And although I wish you’d talked to me about taking down my picture first, I am glad it’s gone.”
She took a left on a road that ran along the coast, the view of the water occasionally obscured by tall trees and landscaping or privacy hedges, but he glimpsed the ocean waves now and then as they sped past one spectacular property after another.
“Sorry. It’s been a long time since I’ve had to worry about checking my methods with anyone else and I guess I got out of the habit.” It was one of the coolest perks in his private investigator work. No jumping through someone else’s hoops.
“That’s okay. I’m starting to see the wisdom of occasionally forging my own path at work, which is why I’m going through with using myself as bait.”
She slowed down near a sign for a bed-and-breakfast and put on her turn signal.
“That’s different.” He couldn’t let her do this when there had to be ten other ways to make arrests on the case.
“It’s not different.” She pulled into the small parking lot that held four other cars and turned off the engine. “I’ve got the best connections to bring down whoever’s behind this ring. If some of the people behind this are friends of Sergio’s they’ll be all the more likely to screw up in their haste to get even with me. It’s a perfect plan and nothing you say is going to make me change my mind.”
* * *
THEY DROVE ALL THE WAY back to Manhattan that night after Donata checked into the bed-and-breakfast—alone. She wanted the word to spread in the small Southampton community that she was back and staying in the small B&B in the hopes that whoever wanted to make trouble for her would jump at the chance to plant cameras around her hotel room, using the prominent laptop o
n the desk as a source to hook up illegal webcams.
What the perp wouldn’t know was that she and Sean had hidden a smaller, wireless laptop in the closet and connected two webcams to that device so they could see who came into the hotel room when she wasn’t there. That last part was Sean’s idea and Donata had to admit, it made the ruse safer. She just hoped they’d covered their butts every way possible to avoid any chance of their guy pleading entrapment.
But after going over and over their plans on the ride home, she still had nearly an hour of sitting quietly next to Sean in the intimate confines of the smaller car she’d bought for its gas mileage rather than roominess. By the time she pulled onto the West Side Highway, she was antsy to break out of the car so the cool air could blow over her overheated body.
“You’re going back to my place?” He sprawled in the seat beside her, his knee protruding far enough into her personal space to make her aware of him and how long it had been since he’d touched her.
Not that she was keeping track of those forty-two hours.
“I thought I’d drop you off. Save you cab fare from the Upper East Side.” She assumed he’d want to go home at this hour—well after dinner. “Would you rather I stop off somewhere else?”
“No. My place has good karma for us.”
His voice carried as much meaning as his words, the tone low and laced with the same longing she’d been feeling all day.
And while she couldn’t deny a rush of relief that he wanted her as much as she wanted him, she didn’t know how much more time she could risk with him without getting her heart stomped on.
“You’re awfully quiet on that subject,” he observed lightly when she didn’t respond.
“I’ve never been one to jump into relationships lightly—contrary to my decision to move in with a gangster when I was a teenager.” Would she ever be okay with that part of her life? Mick had told her she needed to stop feeling guilty about it, and she wanted to. But how did you go about ignoring your emotions?