Authors: Coreene Callahan
And bing-bang, just like that he wanted her hoodie gone. The cotton was too goddamn thick. He couldn’t feel a thing through it and—
Shit. What was he doing? The plan was to distract her. Not give himself a massive case of blue balls.
“Ah, Angela?” Breathing hard, he nipped her as he drew away.
“Hmm?”
“Got something for you.”
“What?”
“It’s a surprise.”
Suspicion glinting in her gaze, she murmured, “Uh-huh.”
Christ love her. She was smart. But then, he was too.
With a quick shift, he slid out of her arms before the urge to spread her beneath him took over. One more session like that and…hell. Hoodie, no hoodie, he’d peel her out of those yoga pants and be deep inside her in under a minute flat. But that was a big no-can-do. At least today. Tomorrow? Who knew, but for the moment the plan didn’t include making love to her. It was all about the string-along. Keep her guessing, and his female would follow him.
No questions asked.
Okay. Maybe not
no questions
.
Angela was built to interrogate. She’d pepper him with questions the whole way, but she’d be walking while she did it. And that was the point.
Swinging his legs over the side of the mattress, Rikar stood and glanced at Angela over his shoulder. Raising a brow, he held out his hand. “You coming?”
Her eyes narrowed. “You’re fighting dirty.”
“Did you expect anything else?”
Her lips pursed, she glared at him. Rikar fought a grin, waiting her out and…jackpot. Curiosity grabbed hold, making her eyes sparkle as she accepted his offering. As her hand slid into his, he pulled her to her feet, but held tight, lacing their fingers together. She murmured a protest, tried to shake free. He held firm, and she gave in. Hallelujah. A small victory, but hell, he’d take it.
Grinning like an idiot, he tugged her toward the door. All the while thinking…
Fucking A.
Holding her hand felt good. Right. Everything it should be and more.
Now all he needed to do was persuade Angela to stay. To become a permanent part of his life after he took Lothair down.
Chapter Nineteen
White-knuckling the steering wheel with both hands, Tania drove into the SPD’s parking lot. And straight into a war zone. Yellow police tape crisscrossed the far end. Bits of glass and steel littered the asphalt. A telephone pole, snapped midshaft with tangled wires, lay in the middle of a super-duty truck that had seen better days. And wow, the uniforms were everywhere: cops, firefighters, and tow-truck drivers, all working to clear the debris and damaged cars. Some were beyond repair, lined up in a haphazard row with smashed-in roofs, blown windshields, and flat tires. Others had escaped the pileup with little more than a scratch or two.
Jeez, Baghdad had nothing on this place.
And that was before she saw the huge hole in the side of the building. Holy crap. It looked like the precinct had been bombed.
Taking her eyes off SPD’s little shop of horrors, Tania wheeled her ’64 Mini Cooper into a tiny spot between two big all-terrain vehicles. The huge four-by-fours obviously belonged to wannabes. Every woman knew the type. Guys with inferiority complexes, more concerned about what they looked like than how they acted. Yup. Men like that always went for the “monster” rides.
Compensating for what they lacked behind their button flies, maybe?
Tania snorted. Probably. Today, though, she was happy to take advantage of the testosterone-induced stupidity. She’d just had her Mini repainted—cherry red with white racing stripes…sweetness personified. No sense risking her girl getting dinged by the load of muscle getting flexed at the other end of the parking lot.
Taking a deep breath, she stared out through the windshield at the chain-link fence, doubting the viability of her plan. Detective MacCord wasn’t a pushover. The guy was like cyanide. Painful. Persistent. Annoying as heck. Infecting her like slow poison.
God, why couldn’t she get him out of her head? She’d tried everything. Had even eaten a boatload of chocolate—before ten a.m.! Gone for a run at lunchtime. Left work early, complaining of a headache, to take another swim at the Y, pushing herself so hard she could barely lift her arms by the end. But oh, no. Nothing worked. MacCord stuck like gum to the bottom of a shoe. And no amount of mental shuffling scraped him off.
Leaning forward, Tania rested her forehead against the steering wheel. The urge to thump herself—just crank her head back and take her anxiety out on her frontal lobe—warred with self-preservation for a second. But giving herself a goose egg wouldn’t help. She’d just end up looking like a bad version of Frankenstein when she saw MacCord. ’Cause…yup. She was going in there. To hammer him over the head with the fact she’d been doing his job. Had dug up some new information about her missing best friend. The case MacCord was supposed to be working on solving. Flipping jerk.
He
was supposed to be keeping
her
in the loop, not the other way around.
With a sigh, she pushed away from her perch, took the keys from the ignition, and reached for her handbag. The Coach purse came when called, settling in her lap while she dug inside for her iPhone.
“Please, please, please,” she murmured as she scrolled through her missed calls.
Nothing from Angela Keen, partner extraordinaire to the jerk. Crap. She’d left…what? Seven messages? Yet Detective Keen hadn’t called her back. Which seemed strange since Tania got the feeling the cop never missed a beat. And especially since she’d laid out the new lead in the voice mail.
Myst was alive. Still MIA, but
alive
.
Tania knew because she’d discovered the damp towels. Okay. So that just sounded crazy, but someone had used her best friend’s shower. Left shampoo bottles in disarray. Makeup strewn all over the bathroom countertop. Ransacked Myst’s dresser drawer—the one where she kept her hospital scrubs—and left a pile of terry cloth behind. Proof positive. Myst had been in her loft sometime in the last twenty-four hours.
She knew it like she was sitting in her Mini, her handbag clutched in her lap. Why her friend hadn’t called she didn’t know. Maybe the kidnappers had a tight leash on her.
Tania shook her head. She didn’t want to think about it or any more awful scenarios. It was now or never. Time to oust the detectives from their roost.
Popping the latch, she swung the door wide, careful not to hit the truck parked beside her, and stepped out onto cracked pavement. The click of her three-inch heels disappeared beneath the high whine of a buzz saw, getting swallowed up by men’s shouts as firefighters cut through steel. Tania watched the sparks fly, arcing into the air as she crossed the lot. Slipping between cars, she bypassed the downed telephone pole and headed straight for the front doors: shoulders back, head held high, acting as though she belonged. The last thing she needed was for someone to stop her, turn her away…tell her to come back when the SPD was done cleaning up the mess.
Not gonna happen. Not today. Myst needed her.
Her pace even, she reached the front entrance. Cold metal settled in her hand, chilling her palm as Tania swung the door wide and stepped inside the lobby. The smell of sulfur and floor cleaner made her nose twitch. Ignoring the toxic mix, she nodded to the janitor, skirting his mop and the yellow
Caution! Wet Floors
sign, and hightailed toward the front desk.
A bleached-out blonde already occupied the real estate, updo teased within an inch of its life. The closer Tania got, the more details jumped out at her. Yikes. The woman looked like a racing stripe. Red lacquered lips tipped up, she leaned against the high countertop and flirted with the cop on desk duty. Black skirt painted on tight. A severely cut leather jacket over a frilly, barely-there top that left nothing to the imagination. And the shoes? A pair of leopard print Louboutins. Hmm…very
nice
footwear. And about the only classy thing about Ms. Man-Eater.
“Look, Ms. Newton, I’d love to—”
“Clarissa,” the woman murmured as she leaned in to straighten the officer’s tie, giving him what amounted to a free peep show. “We’re on a first name basis now, aren’t we, Clark?”
And jackpot.
Clark’s eyes dipped, diving straight into Ms. Man-Eater’s cleavage. He swallowed. Tania’s lips twitched. Sexual manipulation at its best. The woman knew what she was doing.
Fiddling with his tie pin, Clarissa glanced at him from beneath her lashes, acting demure. “Now, Clarkie-baby…what can you tell me about what happened here?”
Tania almost rolled her eyes. She stopped herself at the last second, curiosity getting the better of her. She settled in behind Ms. Man-Eater at the countertop instead. She wanted to know what had happened, too. And if riding on Clarissa’s coattails got her the information without her having to lift a finger, so much the better.
“Look, Clarissa.” The cop glanced around, shifting as though his bottom half had just woken behind the desk. “Captain Hobbs’ll have my ass if he sees you here. We’re not supposed to be talking to reporters and—”
“No harm, no foul,” Clarissa murmured. “Meet me after work? At Deuce’s across town?”
Oh, boy. Match. Set. And Game.
Clarkie-baby
was toast. Deuce’s was a hotspot known for dark, cozy corners, under-the-table antics, and a lot of backroom dealing. Tania had never been, but…wow. The rumors abounded. Especially since membership into the club came with a hefty price tag.
The cop nodded and glanced around again.
“Good.” Clarissa smiled, smoothing her hand down the front of his shirt before letting him go. “See you there, baby.”
As the blonde turned, she arched her back a little, posing for the guy before she put the beautiful Louboutins in gear and, with a finger wave, headed for the exit. Tania shook her head and watched her go. Jeez. Man-Eater was right. A real student of the game. And the cop’s dumbstruck expression? Testament to the woman’s skill. Clark had bought the act, was 100 percent on board.
“Excuse me?” Tania said, hoping to snap the cop out of his blonde bombshell fixation.
“What?” His eyes narrowed on her.
Oh, snap. What was the load of pissed off and nasty all about? “Ah, I’m here to see Detective Keen and—”
“No one’s coming in or out today, miss.”
“But—”
“The precinct’s closed to visitors. Only essential personnel allowed.”
Frig. He sounded like he was reciting a direct order or something. Not good. On any level. “I have some important information about a case they’re working on and—”
“So call ’em. Leave a message.”
“I did that already.” Cupping the lip of the counter with both hands, she leaned in, using her big, brown eyes to effect. “If you’ll just let me go up for a minute, I won’t take—”
“N. O.” He gave her a stern look.
Tania blinked. Nuts. For the first time in her life, she wished she was blonde. Things obviously got done when a woman possessed the right hair color. “Please, Officer Clark? Detective Keen told me to come see her
anytime
. All I need is five minutes.”
“Off you go, miss.” With one last head shake, he waved his hand, dismissing her as he picked up a stack of paperwork. “Come back when there isn’t a hole in the side of our building.”
Tania sighed, disappointment hitting her chest-level. No way was she getting in today. Not with a couple of cops flanking the elevators and watching the stairs. Turning toward the exit, Tania wrenched her handbag from the crook of her elbow. As she slung it higher, the leather dragged at her shoulder and…God. She’d been carrying the thing around forever, but today was the first time it felt heavy.
Crossing the lobby, she pushed one of the doors open and stepped out. The air smelled fresher outside, without the taint of lemon and sulfur in the crisp autumn air. She stared at the tips of her Manolo Blahniks, racking her brain for a new plan.
So…what next? Follow Detective Keen home like a lost puppy? Corner her in an underground parking lot? Tania snorted. Yeah, like she wanted to sneak up on a woman with a loaded gun on her hip. That kind of stupidity would only get her shot.
A lighter snicked nearby. Cigarette smoke drifted, perfuming the air a second before a husky voice said, “You in trouble, gorgeous?”
Tania glanced toward the shadows to the right of the front doors. Oh, lovely. The Man-Eater, sucking on a cancer stick, lying in wait for her next victim.
But…wait. Maybe that was a good thing. The cops wouldn’t listen. Didn’t seem to care that her friend was still out there. All alone. Or that Tania had information that could save her life. Myst might be alive now, but for how much longer? Whoever had kidnapped her wanted something. And as soon as they got it, her best friend would be found with a bullet in her skull.
Her grip tightened on her handbag. Over her dead body. No way would she let that happen.
Tipping her chin at Ms. Man-Eater, she asked, “Are you an investigative reporter?”
“For KING-Five TV.”
Hmm. Seattle’s biggest local broadcaster.
“Got a story to tell about missing women and police incompetence,” Tania said, laying it on thick. Normally, she didn’t like lying, but with Myst’s life at stake, she considered it just another bump in the road. Holding the reporter’s gaze, she raised a brow. “Are you interested?”
“Interested is my middle name,” Clarissa murmured, coming out from her natural habitat—the shadows.
Tania smiled. Excellent. Ms. Man-Eater had bitten. Hook. Line. And sinker. Plan B was officially deployed and on track. If the cops wouldn’t listen to her story, greater Seattle would…on the six o’clock evening news.
Chapter Twenty
His head half buried under a pillow, Mac woke up so fast he flinched. Blinking to clear his vision, he wondered where the hell he’d landed. Big bed. White sheets. Nope, definitely not his.
Oh, hell.
He didn’t like waking up in strange places anymore. A decade of one-night stands had been quite enough, thank you very much. He’d lost interest in that kind of arrangement a while ago. Now he had his favorites. His go-to girls: the type who liked to have fun without any strings attached. Worked for him. Worked for them. No harm, no foul.