Authors: Diana Duncan
For the rest of the afternoon, Tessa assigned Gabe every menial, despised job in the office. To his credit, he performed each awful chore cheerfully, without a single complaint.
At
, she exited the vault. Not sure why, she stopped. The eerie feeling of being watched crept over her. She glanced around. A well-dressed businessman and a tall, dark-haired teenage boy were the only customers. Everything else was quiet. Shrugging off the heebie-jeebies, she entered her office, where she'd sent Gabe to examine each of Darcy's nearly four hundred transaction slips for a nine-dollar discrepancy.
"How's it going? Enjoying working under me?" she trilled.
He glanced up, flashing his lightning grin. His eyes twinkled. "Ah, sweetheart, you know how I love it when you're masterful with me."
She pretended to ignore the suggestive comment, and the resulting wash of heat. Gad, he was impossible! "It's closing time."
An hour later, all the tellers had balanced out and left. Tessa set the timer on the vault, turned on the main alarm and then exited, locking the front door behind her. Gabe waited up the block in the yellow Pinto. He didn't want anyone to see them leave together. Dodging the evening commuters on the crowded sidewalk, she hurried along. Once she passed Gabe's car, he would follow her around the corner so she could slip inside.
Once again, a stranger's intent gaze crawled over her. She stopped to peer into a store window, watching passersby in the reflection. Nothing odd, only the usual crowd of tired people hurrying home after a long workday. She continued on, catching a glimpse of Gabe's angry scowl in the side mirror as she scurried past. Her nerves jittered. She'd never seen him angry. Was someone following her after all?
Safely around the corner, she stopped in front of the courthouse. Gabe pulled up and she climbed into the Pinto.
"Of
all the
idiot—" His low voice shook with controlled fury. Nostrils flaring, he clamped his lips shut and stared out the windshield for several heartbeats. "Somebody out there wants to punch your ticket, and you stop to look at
shoes?"
He jerked his head in her direction, his cold gaze drilling into her.
"I wasn't. I thought…" Uncertain, she trailed off.
"That you needed a matching purse?" he snapped. "I told you exactly what to do. You'll damn well do it, or else."
This was a different Gabe, one she didn't recognize. She should tell him what she suspected. But she didn't have anything concrete, only a creepy feeling. She'd been under a lot of pressure, and stress triggered anxiety.
When Tessa didn't answer him, Gabe rammed the Pinto into gear and stomped on the gas. His heart was pounding like a jackhammer, cold rage churned in a greasy ball in his gut, and his chest was so tight he could barely breathe. What the hell was wrong with him? He never lost it. Ever.
He flicked a glance at the mute woman in the passenger seat. When she'd stopped to look in the store window and presented her back like a neon target, the possibility of anything happening to her had made him grip the steering wheel so hard he'd nearly broken it.
She wasn't in any real danger; he didn't think the counterfeiters would risk undue attention by whacking her in public. If he had any doubts, he wouldn't allow her out.
So what was his problem?
He'd never let work, or anything else, get under his skin. His picture was in the dictionary under calm, cool and collected. His usual MO was to shrug and stroll on. Emotional involvement of any kind had no place in his life.
But here he sat, shaking like a raw recruit in his first firefight.
Control kept him sane, kept him alive. But his control was slipping.
And Mr. Calm, Cool and Collected was scared
spitless
.
Chapter 7
T
he next morning, Tessa flicked an uneasy glance at Gabe as he parked the Pinto in front of the courthouse. The heavy gray clouds glowering on the horizon mirrored his unusually sober face.
Dressed in a powder-blue polyester leisure suit and hot pink shirt, he returned her puzzled stare with narrowed, inscrutable green eyes. "Don't stop for any reason today. If the world comes to an end, you keep walking. You're not offering your brains for target practice on my watch, is that clear?"
A chill skittered up her spine, and she shivered, gulping down a lump of fear. Had he seen something yesterday after all?
Gabe jerked his gaze away and rammed on the nerdy glasses. "Get going." The rough edge to his satin voice told her she only imagined the tenderness in his expression.
As she scurried around the corner, the weight of someone's attention prickled along the back of her neck, making her feel like a hunted animal. Prey. Safely inside the bank, she heaved a sigh of relief and flipped on the lights. It had to be tension. She was one big raw nerve. A minute later, she let Gabe in the door, more reassured by his presence than she had a right to be.
His alert gaze probed the corners and roved over each cubicle. "Nobody else here yet?"
"I arrive early to review the schedule, check memos, and answer the phone if anyone calls in sick.
Trask
stops by around ten,
then
has meetings the rest of the day."
"What about his administrative assistant?"
"Lorna usually slips into her chair at nine, but the other employees arrive at eight-thirty, and expect me to be here. The executives on
Trask's
floor trickle in then as well."
"Perfect time to search his office."
She chewed her lip. "I don't have a key."
His five-hundred-watt grin flashed, banishing the storm clouds from his face. "Who needs a key?"
Her stomach churning, she followed him as he bounded up the stairs to the fourth floor and strolled down the gold-carpeted hallway to
Trask's
office as if he owned the place.
He tucked his glasses in his jacket pocket before bending to study the doorknob. He extracted a leather case from inside his blue jacket, and chose a slim metal tool. His competent, graceful fingers slid the pick into the keyhole. He jiggled the knob and popped the lock with a twist of his wrist.
"You've done that before."
"Who me? I've never been to
Trask's
office."
She shot a nervous glance down the hallway. "Keep your day job, Mr. Bond," she whispered. "You'll never make it as a comedian. Let's get this covert operation over with."
He swung the door wide with a flourish. "After you."
The butterflies in her stomach morphed into jumbo jets as she entered the dark room and crept past Lorna's desk to the inner office. She tested the brass knob. "This is locked, too."
Gabe again made short work of the lock, and she tiptoed into
Trask's
huge office behind him. The thick gold carpet swallowed up the sound of their footsteps. He eased the door shut. "Open the
blinds,
I don't want to use the light." His low voice vibrated through the darkness, jolting her charged nerves like lightning dancing along a high-voltage wire.
The breath she didn't realize she was holding exploded out of her in a silent rush, and she commanded her frozen feet to walk to the bank of windows on the far wall. She groped for the wand that slatted open the ivory vertical blinds.
He let out a low whistle. "That's quite a view."
Sometime in the last few minutes, the glowering sky had split, and sheets of rain poured down. The
under
five bridges starkly silhouetted against the gray horizon. Lighted windows from surrounding multistory office buildings strained to break the gloom.
She glanced at her watch. "We've got less than twenty minutes."
"Okay, you check the file cabinets for the vault logs."
"But I can get legitimate copies by submitting a request."
Gabe shook his head. "We don't want to alert the
perps
." In seconds, he picked open the file cabinet. "I'll search
Trask's
computer for the endorsement codes. We need to know who processed the checks we intercepted."
"The computer is password protected and has a security program."
His smile as broad as a kid at the circus, he slid into
Trask's
plush leather chair and leaned back. Linking his hands in front of him, he cracked his knuckles. "Want me to approve your promotion and give you a raise while I'm at it?"
"Why do I bother?" She wiped her sweaty palms on her black wool skirt. "You act as if you're at a cocktail party. Doesn't this scare you at all?"
"Tessie, my sweet, you've got to learn to enjoy life and not sweat the small stuff."
"We're breaking into federal bank records," she muttered, heading for the file cabinet. "Hardly
small stuff."
The computer hummed on. She heard Gabe's fingers dancing over the keys as she sorted through folders inside the oak drawers. She quickly located the file. "I found them."
He glanced up from the screen. "Copy machine?"
"Down the hall and around the corner."
"Great. Make copies of the last six months, longer if you've got time. Meet me here when you're done. We'll replace the files and get back downstairs in time for coffee."
"Coffee." Her tight, dry throat couldn't swallow anything if her life depended on it. She again wiped her damp palms on her skirt before peering into the hall. The empty corridor loomed before her. Leaving the door open a crack, she scurried down the hall and around the corner to the copy room.
She managed to make copies going back almost six months, and was rearranging the logs when the elevator's low hum shattered the thick silence. Her heart thundered into a gallop, and she shot a frantic glance at her watch. Eight-ten, too early for anyone to arrive on these floors. Maybe the passenger would go further up. A loud ping announced a disembarking passenger.
Oh, no!
If anyone noticed
Trask's
partially opened door…
Think!
Cover Gabe's butt! She rushed around the corner and down the hall. Lorna stepped out of the elevator, sorting keys in one hand, juggling a briefcase and a paper cup of espresso in the other. Of all the days for
Trask's
admin to break habit and show up early!
Tessa's chest constricted. She slid the incriminating folder behind her and shoved it up under her jacket. "Hello." Her greeting emerged slightly shaky.
Lorna's head snapped up. "Hi, Tessa. What are you doing here at this hour?" Keys at the ready, she stepped around Tessa.
Stall! Something! Anything!
"I, um, the employee banquet. Do we have anything special planned to—to show Mr.
Trask
how much we appreciate his inspiration?"
The tall brunette lurched to a halt, and turned to face her, looking puzzled. "
Okaaay
. I planned to catch up on paperwork before
Trask's
vacation, but I can spare a minute. Come on in."
Tessa deliberately slowed her rapid breaths.
Don't panic. Speak normally
. "Let's go to the cafeteria and discuss it over coffee."
Lorna held up the espresso. "I have coffee." She turned her back on Tessa, making a beeline toward
Trask's
office.
Now what?
Tessa's desperate gaze darted in every direction, finally locking on a bright red box.
FIRE. Pull in case of emergency
. This was definitely an emergency. She reached up and pulled the lever.
Bells, buzzers and whistles blared. The hallway chimed like
Times Square
on New Year's Eve. Lorna screeched and jumped, dumping espresso all over her briefcase.
Tessa hurried toward her. "Quick, we better evacuate." She grabbed the stunned brunette, propelling her toward the stairwell. "Not the elevator, they shut down during a fire."
"You're so calm," Lorna panted as they hustled down the stairs.
Tessa shoved the slipping file folder more firmly up the back of her jacket. "I've become used to dealing with emergency situations lately." The other woman frowned in puzzlement, and Tessa shrugged. "Never mind. Long story."
Outside, she glimpsed Gabe standing in the drenching rain with the other staff. He gave her a bucktoothed grin and discreet thumbs-up. A relieved sigh whispered out of her. That had been way too close for comfort.
The fire drill turned out to be the least chaotic incident of the day. By the time the firemen cleared the shaken employees to reenter, cranky customers had lined up around the block. They streamed into the lobby in a never-ending rush, and Tessa ran from one end of the branch to the other, trying to keep distracted tellers working, and soothing wet, irritated clients.
Surprisingly, Gabe turned out to be a huge help. He slid into his teller role as though he'd been born to it, processing twice the transactions of even the most experienced employees.
Blessed
finally arrived. She locked the door and rested her forehead on the cool, misty glass.