by Debra Webb
I’m human.
The single most overused excuse on the planet for doing the absolute wrong thing.
My eyes rolled so far back in my head I could see the roots of my hair—which, by the way, still needed a touch-up. Yeah, right. I’m not merely human. I’m a woman. Forty-five in female years (which is about a hundred and thirty in male years—bastards). It wasn’t so much the fact that Dawson had seen me naked that drove me absolutely bonkers. It was the idea that he had been exposed to certain unveiled details. Like my face without the aide of make-up and the stretch marks on my abdomen. And, of course, my damp, matted hair. There was a reason the gossip rags paid big bucks for candid shots of celebrities out of star disguise. Not to mention the cold water had ensured my nipples stood as erect as a Ken-size penis. (Ken should be so lucky...or maybe it was Barbie who’d be lucky.)
Why did I care what Dawson had seen?
Now that part was solely because I’m a woman.
I pushed up from the floor and smoothed a hand over my white mini. I picked it specifically because it showed off my surveillance on the beach tan and made me feel waaaay better. Beneath my tight white jacket I wore my favorite pink camisole. The stiletto sandals were an amazingly realistic looking pair of Jimmy Choo knock-offs.
I checked for chocolate on my teeth and reapplied my lip gloss. Scrutinized my hair. Determination roared inside me. By God maybe Dawson did see me naked without my usual female veneer in place, but that didn’t diminish how damned good I looked this morning.
I tossed the gloss and compact back into my Birkin which sat on the floor next to my self-esteem emergency resuscitation drawer. A smile tugged at the corners of my mouth. It was an amazing thing what a dose of chocolate could do for one’s confidence, as well as a hangover. My head hardly hurt at all now.
A light rap on my door drew my attention in that direction. Apprehension had my heart ramming against my sternum. I squared my shoulders and kicked it back down. I was a woman. If I could bear a child or stare down an armed bail jumper, I could damn sure face this head-on.
I didn’t have to bother with come in, the door opened just far enough for Hobbs to poke his head into my office. “Is it safe to enter?”
If Hobbs weren’t the best assistant in the business I would have fired him then and there. But he was the best. My professional life would be a living hell without him. I didn’t know how he did the things he did, didn’t want to know how. I only wanted him to keep doing them. For that reason alone he would live long and prosper—despite my frequent ponderings as to whether I should kill him or not.
“Don’t waste my time, Hobbs,” I said, copping an attitude that screamed of borderline personality disorder, as I shuffled my messages. I’d returned most of them that morning. The rest could wait.
He pranced up to my desk, his gaze flitting about the room, refusing to light on mine. “Any idea who would have wanted to throw a rock through your window?”
No, I hadn’t forgotten about the rock or my broken window. The cops had shown up shortly after Dawson’s dramatic entrance. I’d managed to get a robe on in the nick of time.
The rock had been bagged as evidence. (Lucky for me I’d had some gallon size freezer bags left over from a school project I’d done with my son nearly a decade ago or one of the patrol cops would have been rushing down to the 7-Eleven.) My statement had been taken and the promise that an investigator would call given.
I felt confident the rock, which had come from the neglected flowerbed in my own yard, would reveal numerous clues. Like the soil type in my yard. The GreenChem man had recommended lime to neutralize the acidic soil years ago. I doubted the diagnosis had changed since scarcely any weeds, much less anything else, grew there to this day.
The glass company had promised to get the window repaired first thing this morning. I could only hope. Alita was housesitting for me until that was accomplished.
I sat down in my chair and screwed a smile into place. “I have no idea, Hobbs. Maybe some kid in the neighborhood.” I shrugged. “A dare maybe.”
Hobbs picked a piece of nonexistent lint from his crisply pressed J.Crew button-down shirt. As usual, he looked perfect. I hated him.
“I wondered if perhaps it was a warning of some sort,” he noted casually.
I couldn’t say I hadn’t considered that possibility myself since God and everybody else had been warning me off the Disposable case. Which made about as much sense as the rock now lying in a lab waiting for analysis. The case was a decade old. No one appeared to know anything about it, which was way more than I knew.
“Well, if whoever did it hoped to make a point, it was lost in translation,” I groused. There was no discernable message, nothing.
My assistant’s gaze finally settled on mine. “You’re feeling all right this morning?”
My eyes narrowed. If Dawson had told him...I retracted my claws and restrained the need to dive over the desk and shake Hobbs until he came clean. “I’m fine, why wouldn’t I be?”
His expression turned somber. “Jackie, I’m worried about this case.” He glanced over his shoulder as if he didn’t want anyone else, Dawson included, to hear what he said next. “I can’t find anything on your mystery man. Nothing. It’s as if he doesn’t exist. Someone is playing a game with you and using your connection to him.”
He was right on that first part. Between Max, Hobbs and me, we’d checked out every routine avenue I knew to ID the guy. There was nothing. If he’d ever possessed a driver’s license, the photo wasn’t triggering a match. Highly unusual.
Why hadn’t I asked his name?
Because we’d been too busy...too caught up in each other to care about anything else. A treacherous place to be. Clearly.
There had to be a way to find out who he was. I wouldn’t give up until I did.
But the other...the so called game...that part I still wasn’t sure about. Someone apparently wanted to send me a message with the photograph. But why? I could only assume he or she thought I knew something based upon my father’s and uncle’s involvement in the old case. But I knew nothing.
“What about Alita’s case?” I asked, remembering the conversation she and I had the other morning...what now felt like forever ago. With me up to my ears in Disposable I’d asked Hobbs to do the search on Alita’s former lover.
“I’m working on it,” he assured me. Usually with uncomplicated requests like tracking down names and addresses I let him handle the case. Most of the time all that was involved was a little cruising on the World Wide Web or making a few phone calls.
“Let me know when you find him.” Maybe I’d even go check the guy out when we had a name and address. I wondered if he had himself a wife and kids now since he hadn’t known Alita was pregnant and hadn’t heard from her in years. That would break her heart I felt sure...but she had a right to know.
The telephone rang. “I’ll get it,” I said when Hobbs would have reached for the receiver. “Mercer.”
“Mrs. C?”
Speak of the devil. “Hey, Max, what’s up?” I exchanged a look with Hobbs who would understand the significance of a call from Max. He’d found something.
“Can you come to my office? I think I’ve found something you’ll want to see.”
“Be right there.”
I hung up the phone, reached for my purse and pushed out of my chair. “Check with Alita and make sure K&K Glass gets my window taken care of,” I said to Hobbs as I rounded my desk.
“Will do. You know,” he said, waylaying me when I wanted to get going, “the rock could have been Willis out for revenge.”
Shit. I’d almost succeeded in erasing him from my thoughts entirely. A couple of flashes of hot sex filtered through my mind before I could stop them. “I guess it’s possible.” I hadn’t thought of that. Asshole. Maybe I’d rattle his handler’s cage. Brooks had better keep his pet felon off my back.
“It was just a thought,” Hobbs said, evidently noticing my displeasure at the idea.
“Yeah,” I murmured.
This time we both started for the door, but hesitated when we encountered Dawson.
I felt my stomach hit the floor and all other thought fled my lethargic brain (alcohol induced comas always left my thinking processes a little slow). I definitely was not ready for this moment.
The two men exchanged the usual morning greeting as Dawson stepped aside for Hobbs to exit.
There was no escape now. Dawson came fully into my office and closed the door behind him.
My breath evacuated my lungs as usual and my fingers tightened like a vise on my purse strap as if the Birkin was an emergency shoot for this emotional free fall.
“Morning, Dawson,” I managed to push past my stiff lips.
His eyes took a tour of my body, also as usual. I hated it. Hated even more that he was likely remembering how I looked without the white suit and feminine little cami peeking between the lapels and doing an admirable job accenting my cleavage. Why, oh why, did things like this always happen to me?
To distract myself I did the same to him. The jeans were par for the course and, as usual, made drawing any air back into my lungs almost impossible. Today he wore a short sleeved blue vee neck pull over with a white crewneck tee under it. Even through the double layers of blended cotton that muscled chest would not be concealed or its appeal detracted from. His hair gave the impression of having just climbed out of bed. My fingers itched to run through it.
He looked amazing.
How the hell did I get myself into this?
“Good morning,” he said.
That was it. All it took to send heat searing through my limbs and cinch my fate as a complete and pathetic idiot.
“I’m in a bit of a hurry,” I said, pissed off now. How the hell could I have reverted to such adolescent behavior after thirty years of experience dealing with a lemon of a husband and dozens of guys who weren’t worth the trouble of remembering? Well, discounting my mystery lover. Though I’d blocked him from my memory, he was exceedingly memorable.
“I wanted to apologize about last night,” he said, the amount of sheer humility in his tone making his voice even more sensual. How in the hell was that possible?
“For what?” I cocked my head and glared at him. “Breaking down my door? Or stalking me?” Oh yeah, I’d almost forgotten that part. Once I’d gotten over the initial Dawson-saw-me-naked shock, I’d demanded to know what he was doing loitering outside my house. He’d insisted that he just happened by to talk to me, but after further interrogation had admitted he’d been watching my house. Had chased the guy who’d thrown the rock for a few blocks before the asshole had disappeared. It had been too dark for him to get a decent description.
As I waited for his answer now he set those long-fingered hands on his hips, drawing my unruly attention instantly to his crotch. I looked away. Why was it every time I was in the room with him my attention inevitably zeroed in on his dick?
“Hobbs was worried about you,” Dawson said, wrenching my attention back to his face...which was almost as bad as looking at his crotch...both proved far too distracting. Donna’s advice that I should just take him to bed and get it over with kept flitting through conscious thought.
“Hobbs put you up to spy on me?” If I sounded incredulous it was because I felt exactly that way.
That truck I’d noticed across the street from my place the other night when the girls were over, it was Dawson. He’d been keeping an eye on me at night. Was worried about my safety. The question was, why? Until last night there had been no reason for anyone to worry about my safety. But I had no intention of arguing the point with him. Spending any more time than necessary in his presence was asking for trouble.
Dawson lifted his shoulders in one of those male moves that defied emotional motivation. No way in hell could you figure out what the gesture meant much less what he might be thinking. “No. It wasn’t like that. He mentioned that you were seriously shaken by this case and I thought I’d keep an eye out for you.”
How sweet. Didn’t you just hate a guy who looked this damned good and who could pull off the sweet act too? I saw the trap immediately. The guy likely didn’t even realize he was giving off the I’ll-be-your-hero vibes. He was young...maybe he thought chivalry wasn’t dead. I knew from experience that it was not only dead but buried way, way too deep to ever be resurrected. Besides, I was no damsel in distress.
“Thanks, Dawson.” I just couldn’t fabricate the requisite polite smile. “But I can take care of myself.”
Max was waiting. I had to go. With my declaration still ringing in the air I headed for the door.
I really needed this I-put-you-in-your-place exit. Needed it so bad. All I had to do now was walk out, leaving him speechless and feeling inept. But fate was not on my side.
Just when I would have passed him, head held high, on the way to making the perfect exodus happen his next statement halted me in my tracks. “There’s no question that you can take care of yourself.”
Maybe it was the deep, smooth way he uttered the words or maybe it was the way he looked at me, a kind of admiration in those bedroom eyes. We stood shoulder to shoulder, me headed for the door, him just standing there staring down at me. I stared right back...felt helpless to do otherwise.
“You are one incredible woman.” He let go a heavy breath that fanned my lips making me literally ache to kiss him. God dammit. “I couldn’t sleep last night,” he murmured. “Couldn’t think about anything else...just you. And, just so you know, I’m not easily impressed. But you impressed me.”
Endless seconds passed before I could move or speak. I spent that entire time fascinated with his lips...dying to taste him. And then, somehow, using a super-duper power that had evidently rubbed off on me after years of working with the wise-cracking, sharp-witted Hobbs, I said, “I know. I impress myself sometimes.”
Then I walked out without looking back...in spite of how badly I’d wanted to run back into my office, lock the door and fuck Dawson’s brains out right there on my desk.
I sat on that same rickety, uncomfortable metal folding chair in the dungeon Max Caldwell called an office, and stared at the image on the computer screen.
Warren Rayburn.
My long lost lover. It was as if he were standing right in front of me...just like that night. My fingers shook as I reached for the pages Max had printed for me.
He tapped the screen. “This is one highly classified dude. There isn’t much on him. DEA. Deep cover agent. That’s about it. Apparently DEA sank his file, professional and personal, about a decade ago.”
I nodded mutely, then somehow managed to tear my gaze from the screen to study the pages in my trembling hands. Warren Rayburn. Age thirty-six. Deceased. Any other information was classified. But Max was right. He was DEA.
The newspaper articles I’d reviewed the day before zoomed into 3-D focus. Joint task force including the FBI and DEA.
I felt sick.
Warren Rayburn had come to Houston to work the Disposable case. He’d spent that night with me and somehow the next morning he was gone...dead.
My gaze dropped back to the words on the page. If this was correct he had died the same day the two suspects were gunned down. The day before DEA Agent McElroy had offed himself. Did one death of a DEA agent even have anything to do with the other? Jesus, just how many people died in that forty-eight hour period?
“Cleaning house.”
I hadn’t realized I’d murmured the words aloud until Max said, “I know I need to straighten up but...” He shrugged. “Who cares? I kind of like it this way.”
I shook my head. “No. I didn’t mean you needed to clean house.” Though he did. Pizza boxes and Chinese take-out containers were still scattered about, giving off the odor of long-expired eatable substances. “I meant...” I shook my head again. “Nothing.” I patted his arm. “Thanks, Max. This really helps a lot.”
He grinned shyly. “Any time, Mrs. C. I...” He ducked his hea
d bashfully.
I smiled and gave him another appreciative pat, this time on the back. “Let me know if there’s ever anything I can do for you.” I stared back down at the pages, tried to gather my wits. This...had shaken me. I didn’t like to admit that often, but this time it was undeniable.
Max sent his chair banging into the file cabinet as he hurried to get to his feet when I stood. “Come by and see me again sometime,” he rushed to say. He glanced around the dimly lit room. “Gets pretty lonely down here.”
I couldn’t help myself. I had to hug him. “I’ll do that, Max.” I drew back and smiled. “You know you’re always welcome for dinner at my house.”
“ ’kay.” He ducked his head again, shuffled his feet. “I always did think you were the hottest...mom.”
I left the dungeon certain of one thing...somehow I was a beacon for trouble with men. Even the ones whose skinned knees I’d once bandaged.
My cell phone punctuated the epiphany with a blast of musical notes as I climbed into my Jeep.
I fumbled around in my bag until I found it. “Mercer.” A single twist of the key in the ignition had the engine humming. Hot air from the air conditioning vents blasted my face.
“This is Nance.”
Uh-oh. This sounded like more trouble. Just what I needed. I slumped back against the seat. “Yeah, Nance, what can I do for you?” I kept the first suggestions that popped to mind to myself. Shove chop sticks up your nose? Kick your ass? The pictures he’d posted on that unofficial webpage flickered across my mind, making my teeth clench.
“I need you to come down to the station. We have a little problem, Ms. Mercer.”
Ms. Mercer? Now I knew I was in trouble.
“What kind of problem?” I didn’t like having my chain yanked. Definitely not by a shit like Nance. If he had business with me he should just spill it.
“You know that rock that crashed through your window?”
Duh! What was wrong with this guy? I bit back what I really wanted to say...what is yes, Alex?