Deadly Valentine

by Davis, Justine; Davis, Justine

  She wondered if he was trying to flatter her. If this was all some story concocted to win her trust, all part of the plan to gain her cooperation.

  “You have to see you were a likely suspect.”

  An almost pleading note had come into his voice, as if it were important beyond this moment that she understand.

  “It makes sense, yes,” she admitted. If his claims were true, then from his outside perspective, not knowing the depth of the connection between she and her boss, she was indeed a likely possibility for Arlen’s mole.

  He seemed relieved at her answer. As if it had mattered to him that she not be angry.

  Because then I won’t cooperate?

  She wasn’t sure she believed any of this, despite the ring of truth. But she also knew her perceptions were foggy, stirred up by his touches, his kisses, and turned inside out by the fact that his voice had taken on a rough, husky note that was just enough to make her wonder how cool and calculating he actually was.

  “A little cooperation now wouldn’t be amiss,” he whispered against her ear.

  That he echoed her own thoughts made her suspicious all over again.

  “If you think I’m going to march in there and download Watchdog for him—”

  “I was thinking more along the lines of you touching me back,” he said. “Albeit reluctantly, of course.”

  She flushed as she realized he’d meant cooperation in the facade of seduction. For it was a facade, and she’d do well to remember that. Nevertheless, she put her arms around him, sliding them from his shoulders down his back to his waist. He let out short, compressed breath, as if that relatively innocent caress had somehow interfered with his normal breathing.

  After a moment, he continued.

  “I thought,” he said against her throat, “that he’d just want me to steal the plans, and the supporting data and research.”

  She shifted, unable to stop herself; he might be able to compartmentalize and keep himself thinking coolly while he pretended to seduce her, but it was getting more difficult for her with every passing second. And she told herself that his quick intake of air as she moved beneath him meant nothing. It was all for show, for the man still too close by, and who would no doubt be back momentarily, watching them with an avidness that was beyond creepy.

  “But?” she said, keeping it at the single, short word in an effort to hide the tangled emotions she was afraid might echo in her voice if she tried to say more.

  He lowered his head to rest on her shoulder, his back to Arlen. “I had to stall him, try to find out if he’d already recruited his mole. But that gave him time to work his way into this self-righteous lather about how badly WhitSys—and you in particular—had treated him.”

  “I never—”

  He hushed her with his mouth on hers again. It worked, too well, as heat rushed through her yet again. What the hell was wrong with her? She had no idea if any of this was even true. And even if it was, it didn’t change the fact that this was faked. No matter which scenario was true—that he was a willing accomplice lying to try to get her to help them, or that he was indeed working for J.W.—this little seduction scene was all for show.

  “I know,” he said finally, after breaking off the kiss with every appearance of reluctance. “He’s got a warped view of everything. You were the woman who spurned him. Also the woman who happens to have more access than anyone short of John Whitney himself. So when we met in the parking garage tonight, and he saw you…”

  “Are you saying,” she hissed against his throat, “that he just up and decided to grab me just because I was there?”

  For a moment he didn’t answer. Oddly, he’d tilted his head back, as if to offer his neck up to her mouth. Lucky for you I’m not a vampire, she thought.

  The lame joke didn’t banish the unwelcome wish that he would really want her mouth on him the way his had been all over her.

  “Pretty much,” he finally said. “He was fully pissed by then. I wasn’t moving fast enough to suit him, and he was tired of waiting. And then you walked out of the elevator.”

  “Impulse.”

  “Yes. He’s not a great thinker anyway, when you add in impulsive and season it with revenge, it’s a dangerous mix.” He gave that same half shrug. “Better me than him in that case.”

  It hit her then. “You…what? Volunteered?”

  “It was the only way to make sure you didn’t get hurt.”

  “But I thought you suspected I was already in on it.”

  “It was only a possibility. And not a strong one. So part of my job had to be making sure you didn’t get hurt. John would kill me if anything happened to you.”

  She wasn’t sure J.W. would ever kill anyone for any reason, but the words warmed her anyway. She wanted to ask more, know more, but at the moment processing his honorable actions was all she could manage. Arlen was so strung out over this that she had no doubts he would have done worse than backhand her if she’d made him angrier, which she seemed to be able to do without much effort.

  As if her thoughts had produced him, she heard a sound that told her he was back in the doorway, watching again.

  “Mmm,” Kincaid said. And only then did she realize she’d reached up to brush her fingers over his cheek. He turned his head slightly and kissed her hand. She shivered. The awkward nerd was a distant memory, burned away by the sizzling presence of this lean, sexy, competent man.

  This man she wanted to kiss again. And again.

  He stared down at her, his eyes suddenly hot, his gaze even more intense, as if he’d somehow read the need building in her.

  She brushed a thumb over his mouth. His tongue flicked out to taste it. She lifted her head, seeking. He lowered his. The air between them seemed to quiver, like some intimate mirage. She—

  “That’s enough!”

  Arlen had moved, more quickly than she would have thought possible. Or she’d been more oblivious. She knew which one was more likely. Even Kincaid seemed caught off guard, jerking upright.

  “Dammit,” Kincaid muttered as one hand shot to the small of his back and came up empty. It wasn’t clear if the curse was aimed at Arlen, or himself. And in the next instant Taylor realized it was probably both. Because Arlen wasn’t just standing over them, his face contorted with rage.

  He was standing over them with Kincaid’s gun.

  Chapter 11

  T aylor eyed Arlen apprehensively. She was still rubbing at her arm where he’d grabbed her and yanked her off the couch and back into the big office. Apparently watching Kincaid “work” on her had been well and good—until she started to respond. The simple gestures of sliding her hands down Kincaid’s back, touching his cheek, then his mouth, of her own volition had lit the fuse of the man she’d once spurned.

  Kincaid didn’t seem to be treading warily himself.

  “Give me my gun,” he said, and it was nothing short of an order.

  “You’re not running this show, Kincaid,” Arlen said. “Time you remembered that.”

  “I’ve never forgotten this is completely your idea and your operation,” Kincaid said, flicking a glance at Taylor, telling her silently that those words were for her as much as Arlen. “But nobody else handles that weapon. It’s precisely balanced and sighted for me. Anybody else would likely miss what they were aiming at.”

  Taylor didn’t see how anybody could miss anything at a range of six feet. The thought didn’t help any.

  “You’ll get it back. When she does what she’s told.”

  “Take it easy, Arlen,” Kincaid said. “She’s going to cooperate.”

  Like hell, Taylor thought.

  “Sit down,” Arlen told her, gesturing toward the executive chair he’d been sitting in.

  She did so, reluctantly, but embarrassingly aware her knees were a little wobbly at the moment. She found herself facing the screen of the laptop she’d noticed before. It was on, a screen saver shooting oddly twisted and bizarrely colored shapes that sort of resembled spiders
doing gymnastics at her. It was a larger model, with a wider screen, making the images even more unsettling.

  Arlen leaned over her and hit a key. The screen saver vanished. He used the touch pad and clicked on an icon. A familiar log-on screen appeared.

  “Sign in,” he ordered.

  Pointing out that he shouldn’t have the WhitSys internal software seemed a silly idea under the circumstances. Besides, this was a turn of events she didn’t mind at all. But she decided it would be better if she didn’t let that show.

  “Why?” she asked instead.

  “You’re not that stupid. Sign on. It’s going to take time to download Watchdog.”

  “It won’t work.”

  “Just do it.” He nudged her with the barrel of the gun. She flicked a glance at Kincaid. He gave her a barely perceptible nod. She typed in her system name and a password. For a moment she held her breath. When the anticipated response came, she breathed again.

  Arlen leaned in, staring at the chaos on the screen, window after window of random numbers and letters popping up. “What the hell is that?”

  Taylor looked up at him, letting a bit of her satisfaction show in her face and echo in her voice. “You’re a fool, Arlen. Did you really think we wouldn’t install Watchdog on our own network? I told you this wouldn’t work.”

  Kincaid leaned over her chair to take a look.

  “What did you do?” Arlen demanded.

  “It’s all a matter of the right—or wrong—password.”

  She didn’t hide the smugness she was feeling that Watchdog had worked perfectly. Kincaid moved closer. She glanced up at him, saw the tiny smile that lifted one corner of his mouth. While Arlen gaped at the laptop, he winked at her.

  “Stop it!” Arlen shouted, gesturing wildly at the screen.

  “Can’t. This computer is locked out. Permanently. And even if you could get it to download, the program would be completely corrupted.”

  He glared at her. “That’s not how Watchdog works.”

  “It is now,” she said. “Mark programmed it to learn. Any new attempt at a breach and it automatically builds a new defense. No waiting around for updates, for other people to come up with threat solutions. Watchdog is more than you could ever in your pitiful life begin to imagine.”

  She was feeling more confident by the moment, inspired by her success at foiling any chance Arlen had of getting Watchdog, at least for now. And by the solid presence of Kincaid, who had once more managed to position himself in between her and the obviously furious Arlen.

  “You don’t know anything about how Watchdog works,” she said, unable to resist the chance to needle him even further now that she knew Watchdog was safe from him. “What little you had to do with it, what tiny contribution you made turned out to be useless and was removed. Just like you.”

  Arlen moved then, another string of foul names spewing from him as he straightened up and turned to point the gun at her again, this time with deadly intent gleaming in crazed eyes. He moved fast, but Kincaid was faster. In the instant that Arlen moved, so did he, lashing out quickly, powerfully, with his forearm, driving Arlen’s hand upward just as he pulled the trigger.

  The shot echoed off the walls, louder than Taylor had ever imagined a shot could be. She barely stifled a scream in reaction to the sheer volume of it. Or in reaction to the reality that if not for Kincaid, Arlen would have actually shot her. Any lingering doubts she had about what side he was on vanished.

  The two men grappled, Kincaid trying to wrest the weapon away from Arlen, who was struggling desperately to keep it. Taylor wasn’t sure he realized yet he’d been betrayed, and in the next moment she knew he hadn’t.

  “What the hell are you doing, Kincaid?”

  “Putting an end to this.”

  He sent an elbow upward, ramming it into Arlen’s throat. The man gagged, stumbled back, still hanging on to the weapon. Taylor jumped back as he sprawled across the desk.

  Arlen brought the gun up, this time aiming it at Kincaid, but still looking puzzled; slow as ever, he hadn’t completely comprehended his so-called partner was anything but.

  Kincaid eyed Arlen. Taylor hoped he wasn’t fool enough to charge a loaded weapon in a nervous and untrained hand. It suddenly occurred to her that while Arlen was focused on Kincaid, he wasn’t looking at her. In fact, she was behind him.

  She grabbed up the laptop, shutting it in the same motion. Arlen glanced toward her at the movement, but the gun was still trained on Kincaid.

  She slammed the heavy laptop into his face.

  The impact was oddly satisfying. So was the sight of Arlen sliding to the floor with a groan. Even more satisfying was the startled look Kincaid gave her, followed by a grin that nearly took her breath away.

  “Nice work, elf,” he said.

  And as he bent to retrieve the pistol Arlen had dropped, Taylor thought that maybe she didn’t really hate that nickname as much as she thought she did.

  Chapter 12

  “Y ou’re sure you’re all right?”

  Taylor looked at her boss and nodded. “I’m fine.”

  “You’re not angry with me?”

  He sounded so anxious, Taylor couldn’t help but smile. “No.”

  “I never, ever suspected you. And I hated lying to you. But he—”

  “I know.” She hesitated over what to call him. Then settled on formality. “Mr. Kincaid told me he was the one who wouldn’t let you tell me what was going on.”

  “He was pretty adamant. I kept telling him there was no way, but…” At least this explained the sense she’d gotten that J.W. felt guilty; he had. About lying to her, if nothing else.

  “I imagine in his line of work he has to be suspicious of everyone.”

  J.W. nodded, appearing relieved that she understood. She wasn’t sure she did, not really. There had been so much chaos afterward that she and Kincaid had barely had a chance to speak. Not that he had shown any inclination to speak. To her, anyway. He dealt with the mess, the police and their seemingly endless questions, the damage to the building, and notifying the owner of said building who had made the mistake of believing Arlen Sanders was actually a potential tenant. He did it all efficiently and professionally.

  The police, she noticed, handled her with tact and gentleness. She was the real victim in all this, they said. They even kindly assured her that the shaking she couldn’t seem to stop was a normal, typical reaction. Adrenaline crash, they called it. She’d done amazingly well, they said. Heroically, they said.

  “Kincaid told us,” the detective she spent nearly an hour with had said. As if that were enough.

  “You…know him?” she’d asked.

  “Of him,” the woman had said. “He’s got a reputation for honesty. And for getting things done.”

  Unless he has to lie to you to get those things done, she thought, but without any real anger.

  That had been about all she’d been able to glean from the cops more bent on getting the facts sorted out. And to be fair, making sure she was all right.

  She hadn’t seen Kincaid at all. He’d been closeted with the other detective assigned to the case, or else they’d been keeping them separate to make sure their stories jibed, she wasn’t sure which.

  Or maybe Kincaid just doesn’t want to see you, so he’s hiding out, avoiding any emotional fallout.

  In her weariness, the glum assessment had seemed the most likely. In any case, she clearly wouldn’t get any answers from the man himself. So she turned now to her boss to answer her myriad questions. “What is his line of work, exactly?”

  J.W. shrugged, as if he were at a loss to explain. “He just…helps people out now and then.”

  “He said he wasn’t exactly a private investigator.”

  “No. He’s not. It’s not that…formal, or official. He’s just really good at solving puzzles, at figuring things out, and occasionally he does it for people in need.”

  “Occasionally?”

  J.W. nodded. “He doesn
’t have to work unless he wants to. He made a lot of money, backing a friend who had an idea for a new kind of video-conferencing system. You know it as VirtualBoardroom.”

  Her brow furrowed. “Max Planter?” she asked.

  “Yes,” J.W. said. “They went to school together. Kincaid loaned him part of the money he used to get started.”

  She could only imagine how that had paid off; the system had become almost ubiquitous.

  “That’s who referred me to him,” J.W. said. “That’s the only way he works, referrals from others he’s helped.”

  “But why?”

  “He says he does it,” J.W. said solemnly, “because years ago, when he was little more than a kid, he did some foolish things and got in some serious trouble. But somebody helped him when he needed it, and he straightened his life out. He’s just passing it along.”

  You should be ashamed of yourself.

  Time was, I have been. But no more.

  The exchange that had occurred what seemed like eons ago echoed in her mind. She wondered who had helped him.

  And she found she wasn’t in the least surprised that he had, in the end, saved himself. It fit with the quiet strength she’d seen in him.

  Later, as she sat in her office—door closed to stem the flow of stunned and curious people wanting to talk to her about what had happened—she allowed herself to think about it. There hadn’t really been time before. J.W. had arrived at the police station shortly after 2:00 a.m., and had taken charge of her, seeing that she got out of there to get some rest. She’d been so exhausted by the time she’d gotten home that she’d fallen into bed and slept for nearly ten hours.

  J.W. had told her not to come in for the rest of the week, but her curiosity had been too strong and she’d come in this afternoon anyway.

  “Not that you know much more than you did before,” she muttered to herself.

  She turned to her computer and called up a search engine, barely noticing the day’s gorgeous photograph and the attendant links to the tidbits of knowledge she usually enjoyed reading.

  She entered his name.