Eeny Meany Miny Die (Cat Sinclair Mysteries) (3 page)

"Oh, Cat, thanks. You're the best. I knew I could count on you." She leaned over the table and drew me into a hug. I sneezed as a cloud of perfume and hair product penetrated my nostrils. "I told the others all about you," she said, returning to her seat.

"The others?"

"In Play Group. Angel of course, and Taylor and Corey."

"They're the two guys right?"

"Yes," she said on a laugh. "Haven't you seen our show on TV? It's on every weekday at eight."

"I have to confess I haven't. I don't usually watch TV at eight in the morning." I'm not usually out of bed at eight, unless I've stayed at Will's and he's dragged me out by my ankles, and not in a kinky way. He believes in being at the office no later than nine. I believe in beauty sleep.

"So what are they like?" I asked her. "Do you all get along?"

"They're the best! We have so much fun when we're touring. I adore the guys. They're so funny, and Angel is a living doll. She's so sweet and kind." She frowned at her latté. "That's why I don't want to say anything to her about Frank. I don't want to hurt her feelings. She trusts him."

"So what sort of investment did he make for you?"

"It’s in a computer software company, DataLink. No, DataTech. No, wait, it’s DataSync. Yeah, that’s it. He said they're working on some new technology to do with shopping. I think."

My phone rang in the depths of my bag. I rummaged through the makeup, water bottle, and other junk until I found it. The screen lit up with Will's name.

"I thought you were only going for lunch," he said when I answered. His voice sounded tight, like he was holding back his grumpiness.

I had to hand it to him. Since we'd started seeing each other, he'd curbed his attitude problem. Of course, I didn't give him too many reasons to get angry. I more or less did my work, I was eager to learn, and I hadn't gone behind his back. Not lately.

I checked my watch. Holy crap! It was three o'clock already. "I'll be right back." I hung up. "Jenny, I have to go." I pecked her on the cheek. "Send me a text with Frank's details and I'll let you know the outcome of his background check."

We said our goodbyes and left together. She folded her spidery limbs into her Porsche rental and I jumped into my Civic hatch. She was dust before I'd driven out of the parking lot. I headed back to the office to face the music.

CHAPTER 2

Will wasn't waiting for me at the front door tapping his foot like I thought he'd be. Gina was. We'd known each other for years. I'd even stayed with her for a few weeks while my apartment got refurbished after Carl toasted it. She's gorgeous and wonderful but unlucky in love. She'd just broken up with boyfriend number five for the year, a rather sweet computer programmer. He wasn't her usual type—he could count past ten—but I'd liked him. I thought Gina had too.

"Where have you been?" she demanded, arms crossed under her bosom. She wore a classic white knee-length dress that offset her mocha skin beautifully and would have looked ordinary on anyone who didn't have a Marilyn Monroe figure like Gina.

"Will? Have you taken over Gina's body?"

She cracked a smile. "Sorry, I didn't mean to stick my nose in, but I wanted to find out who she is." She nodded at Knight's front door.

Through the glass I could see Faith working at the reception desk's computer, her shoulder bones forming two points on either side of her bowed head like goal posts.

"That's our new office manager, Faith McIntosh."

"Will finally employed someone?" She squinted at Faith. "She looks so fragile. I hope she can stand up to him."

"I doubt it. Will seems to already know her, and I don't think he'd make the same mistake twice."

"If you're a mistake, then it's the best one he's ever made."

That's why I loved Gina. She was loyal and had a heart as big as the breasts cushioning it.

"Although, you have made his life difficult, and he really didn't need the extra work load brought on by Carl leaving."

She was also brutally honest.

"So how does he know Faith?" she asked.

"Not sure, but when I find out I'll let you know."

"You'd better."

Gina loved gossip. No doubt she'd pass any information about Faith on to the waiters at Trendz Café across the road, and in turn they'd tell Larry from Pots 'n More and so on. Gossip is what made the High Street trading precinct buzz. That and the rumble of large trucks roaring down the busy thoroughfare. There'd been precious little gossip in the weeks since Carl's arrest. Although to be fair, Knight Investigations had provided its share.

Gina followed a customer into her shop and I opened the office door. Faith looked up, her lips pursed in a prim, polite smile. When she recognized me, it slipped and she returned to what she was doing.

"Hello," she said stiffly.

"Hi." I started to head past her up to Will's office but stopped. If I had to work with her, I might as well get to know her, even though she didn't appear to want to make it easy for me. "So how was your first day?"

"Fine." She tapped away at the computer. When I didn't move, she added, "Yours?"

"Busy. Very busy. I had lunch with a new client to nut out some details of her case." It wasn't a lie—Jenny
was
a client, now.

She nodded but didn't look convinced. "Will's in his office."

Guess that was the end of that little chat. I knocked on Will's door and entered before he said, "Come in."

He looked up from his paperwork, his dark eyes not focusing on me straight away. From experience, I knew that meant he was up to his neck in work. "Hey. You're still alive."

"Don't be sarcastic," I said lightly, "especially when I'm out getting us a new client."

"Really? Who?" He leaned back in his chair and stretched his long legs out under the desk. A few strands of hair fell across his forehead, and he impatiently pushed them back. Goddamn, he was sexy when he did that.

"My friend Jenny. She's invested in something shady and wants me to prove it."

"Why did she do that?"

"You mean apart from the fact she trusts everyone and functions on half a brain cell?"

"There's another reason?"

"Her manager talked her into it."

"Manager? Ah, right, she's your actress friend."

I'd told him all about Jenny earlier, but he'd obviously filed that conversation into the part of his brain labeled
Blah Blah Blah
. "She is. She's also one quarter of Play Group."

"Is that the new show on HBO?"

"No, they're a kids entertainment group. They're doing a series of live shows in Renford at the moment. She heard I was a P.I. and—"

"How? You only just became a P.I. this morning."

"—she asked me to look into it."

He rested his elbows on the chair arms and steepled his fingers. "How will you do that?"

It was a test to see if I was ready. Okay, I could do this. Time to prove I'd learned something from chapter one. "I'll check out the manager's credit history, see if he has a criminal record, that sort of thing."

He nodded. "Seems like a harmless case. It's yours. I'll help if you need it of course."

I'd passed! I leaned over the desk and kissed him deeply on the lips. He made a gurgling sound then grabbed me and pulled me across the desk. Papers fluttered to the floor, but neither of us cared. We were both lost in the moment, the kiss taking over, the heat rising between us and warming me all the way to my toes.

Will could be funny that way. He seemed like such a stickler for rules and doing things right and then he'd go and mess up his workspace for a kiss.

We pulled apart before I ended up giving him a lap dance. That might have been okay when there was just the two of us in the office, but it would be kind of embarrassing if Faith caught us.

Which reminded me. "What's Faith's story?"

He bent down to pick up the scattered paperwork off the floor. "Why don't you ask her?" he said without looking up.

"Because I want to hear it from you first. How do you know her?"

He straightened and replaced the papers on his desk. His dark hair hung over his forehead, not quite meeting his eyebrows. It was sexy in a brooding kind of way and I liked it, although I'd threatened to cut it more than once. If he wanted to attract new clients, he needed a respectable short back and sides. A decent haircut and a clean shave would give him the edge over the other P.I.s of Renford. Most of the ones I'd met could have gotten parts as extras in
Gorillas in the Mist
.

"I don't know her very well," he said.

"Well enough to give her the job here."

He conceded the point with a tip of his head. "Look, Cat." He came round from behind his desk and placed his big hands on my shoulders. "I know this will just about kill you, but I can't tell you. I don't have that right. Let's just say Faith and I met under…unfortunate circumstances which she might not want you to know."

Great. A mystery woman. I hated mysteries.

He rubbed my shoulders with his thumbs. Maybe he thought I needed calming down. God knows why.

"Okay," I said, starting to enjoy the massage.

He dropped his hands. "Okay? Really? That doesn't bother you?"

"No."
Liar
. "Why would it?"

"Because you like to know everything that goes on around here."

Someone has to
, I wanted to say but didn't. I adored Will and what had happened with Carl was only partly his fault. I would never rub his nose in it.

"It's a healthy curiosity, that's all," I said, defensively.

He drew me into a gentle hug and rubbed the back of my neck. It was a tactic he often used in the middle of an argument, because he knew it lowered my barriers. I was a sucker for a tender cuddle.

"You know what they say about cats and their curiosity," he murmured into my hair. "That's what scares me about you sometimes, Cat Sinclair."

"Sorry." I breathed in his intoxicating scent, a blend of sunshine and the day's toils that I never tired of.

We drew apart and I moved toward the door only to stop before I reached it. How did I end up being the one to apologize? "You're good, Knight."

He flashed that grin which was totally at odds with his mostly serious nature. It was his best weapon, but thank God he didn't know that. "My place or yours tonight?" he asked.

"Mine." Packing half my bathroom cabinet and choosing my outfit a day ahead wasn't my idea of fun, so I'd decided to buy duplicates of all my makeup and other essentials to leave at his place. Since my budget was tight, I only bought a few items at once and had a long way to go. Until I'd claimed at least three quarters of his cupboard space, I preferred my own apartment for our overnighters. "I'll cook."

He winced. "I think it's my turn."

Fine by me. If he didn't want to eat my TV dinners, that was his problem. Besides, he was a great cook. Why waste the talent?

"I've got a few things to finish off here," he said, reclining in the large leather chair behind his desk. "Say around seven?"

"Seven it is. I might as well get started on Jenny's case."

"Finally! It's only taken six months to get you to do overtime."

I wasn't carrying anything to throw at him so I poked my tongue out.
Very mature, Cat
.

I headed down the hallway to my office, Will's chuckle chasing me. I smiled to myself. It was great to see him loosening up. Laughter had been a rare commodity at Knight Investigations until recently. Thank God he'd proven most people wrong—including me—by having a funny bone after all. I could never be with someone who didn't have a sense of humor. It's amazing how dynamite sex can relax a person.

Back in reception, Faith was packing away her things. It must have been five already. "See you tomorrow," I said chirpily.

She gave me a wan smile, the one people use for strangers or annoying children. Instead of leaving, she headed up the hallway to Will's office. She returned a couple of minutes later with a genuine smile on her face.

Hmmm, definitely something suspicious between them. Why the hell couldn't Will tell me how he knew her? What was the big secret? She wasn't the sort of woman he would associate with socially. She looked insignificant with her pale skin, lank hair and drab clothes. I just couldn't picture them together romantically, but then I'd been wrong on that score before.

So if he hadn't slept with her, was she a friend of a friend? A distant relative? If so, then why not tell me? What was the big deal?

I'd get an answer out of her one way or another, even if I had to sit through endless discussions on the weather. In my experience, getting people talking about anything at all often led them to open up about themselves. It was a tactic I'd used in Hollywood when I wanted to needle my way into a particular celebrity's little black book. It had worked like a charm. Their egos never allowed an opportunity to talk about themselves pass by. Faith might be a harder nut to crack, but almost everyone could be broken eventually using that tactic.

Sitting at my desk, I switched my thoughts to Jenny's problem. If I'd stayed in L.A., would she have gotten into financial trouble? She usually consulted me before she did anything stupid, but since I'd moved away, we rarely spoke. I guess it was just one of those friendships that wasn't destined to survive the tyranny of distance.

I opened the top desk drawer and pulled out a notepad and pen. The office still contained traces of Carl, even though the police had given it a thorough going over and I'd packed his personal belongings in a box. A small box. He didn't have any photos or other things that people hung around their workspaces. The box, stashed in the storeroom with all the other junk, held a mug with a Far Side cartoon on one side, a blank postcard of the Sydney Opera House, and a yellow stress ball.

I hadn't gotten around to personalizing the room yet, but I had plans, starting with a potted plant and a few framed photos of me with my Hollywood friends. I think that called for a shopping excursion later in the week.

First, Frank Karvea. Jenny had sent me a text with her manager's details, and I wrote them down on a notepad. I wasn't sure if it was enough for a background check, so I flipped open
The P.I.'s Manifesto
and skipped to the relevant chapter. After half an hour, I had a page of notes on what I needed to find as well as phone numbers and websites to start my search.