She thumped at Turner’s chest. “Shut up?” she asked. “Where were you anyway? I’ve—”
He moved closer, his face expressionless, hazel eyes cold. “Be quiet for a minute. Please.” He gripped the hand that had done the thumping. “Play along.”
Her heart raced, and she was unsure if the burst of adrenaline was because of his closeness, or the insinuation of danger. Soap, deodorant, and light citrus after-shave tickled at her nostrils. Then it struck her, he’d showered and she’d sat down here like an idiot, for hours. About to tell him what she thought of him, she inhaled and realized she liked his scent. The tinkle of china on the glass tabletop disturbed the moment. Jake released her hand, and turned.
“So, what was—?”
“Darling,” Turner said. He turned back to her, his hazel eyes softened, smoldered, so they looked almost green. “You haven’t had breakfast yet?”
Amy shook her head.
Darling?
She didn’t even know his first name, but he seemed to have a game plan, which was more than she had. And he’d made no comment about her bagel choice. Maybe if she played along, they could be partners. God he smelled sexy. Maybe they could be even more.
“I tried to wait for you, sweetie,” she said, her voice husky. She leaned into him, stroked his upper arm. “But you know how grumpy I get when I don’t eat.” She ran the tip of one long, well-manicured fingernail down his forearm. He didn’t flinch.
“Will you be having anything, sir?” the waiter asked.
“A flat white, and raisin toast,” Turner said. “Make it two orders. Thank you.”
Amy frowned. He’d ordered Aussie style, and he’d affected a darn good accent, but she’d bet he didn’t even like flat white. He looked like the type who would prefer black coffee, and bagels. And why two orders?
“A mate is joining us,” Turner said, as if he’d read her thoughts.
The waiter glanced from one to the other. “A gentleman found a wallet belonging to an American. Is it yours? He said he’d turn it in to the front desk.”
“Not us.” Turner stood and withdrew his wallet from his back pocket. He waggled it at the waiter. “Got mine, mate. But thanks, anyway. Go ahead, darl, don’t wait for me.”
With a flicker of a frown, the waiter retreated toward the coffee bar. Amy poured the steaming liquid into her cup, adding a drop of milk.
“The name’s Jake.” Turner extracted a few bills from his wallet and tossed them on the table, then pocketed the wallet and sat back down.
Huh. Jake. It suited him.
“Why pay in cash? Sign the check to the room. I’m sure Daddy’s covering your expenses.”
“Never leave a paper trail.”
“Oh.” She watched him over the rim of the cup.
“What?” he asked, without turning his head.
Her body pulsed with the memory of his touch. She was here on a vacation, of sorts. A fling would be okay. They’d never have to see each other again. She sighed. It would never happen. She’d go back to being ordinary, serious, non-trusting Amy, the smart psychologist. And she’d steer clear of men. She put the cup back on the saucer, slipped Fray’s photograph into her purse, and straightened her shoulders.
“I think explanations are in order, Turner.”
Chapter Two
Minutes later, Amy still awaited an explanation. She looked up and her breath locked in the back of her throat.
Oh hell, another bad guy.
She waved a hand toward Jake, and then toward the burly man who strode toward them. “Ahhhh—”
“Great,” Jake said, swiveling his head and leaping from his chair. “Good to see you.” He gripped the older man in a bear hug.
“Yeah, you too,” the man said. “Bloody beaut.”
“Amy, this is my mate, Sarge,” Jake said. “He was a sergeant in the Australian Army for years. Served in ’Nam, retired now. Known to everyone—family included—as Sarge.”
“Hello.”
Sarge peered around Jake. “So, this is your lady?” He reached over, shook her hand.
“My employer’s daughter, Amy Helm.”
“Well, I’ve heard of kissin’ up to the boss, but the daughter?” Sarge laughed.
Jake shook out the fingers of his right hand. “It wasn’t a…it was a shield…a cover.”
Amy smiled at Jake’s obvious discomfort. It had been an almost kiss. There had been a moment; she was certain of that.
Sarge sat on the couch next to her, slapping his naked knee with his hat, mindless of the red dust that flew everywhere. “A cover?” He hooted with laughter. “Yeah, too bloody right it was. You sure had her covered
.
”
“Where were you?” Jake asked, and frowned again.
“Hidden.” Sarge laughed.
He was larger than life. Noisy. Colorful. At least thirty years older than Jake. His hairy legs stuck out from beneath khaki walking shorts, which he’d topped with a yellow tropical shirt that sported parrots in reds and purples, and all were nestled in bright green palm fronds. He wore dusty brown sandals, and pulled a pair of dark aviator sunglasses out of the front of his shirt, and then perched them on the top of his thinning hair.
“Hides the hat hair,” he said with a wink.
There wasn’t enough hair to leave a hat impression. Amy smiled. She liked Sarge. “I just asked Jake for an explanation.”
“Better be a bloody good one.” Sarge slapped Jake’s thigh with his hat. “Old man might fire your arse, mate, for groping his daughter. I would.”
“I’ll explain in a sec.” Jake gave a quick flick of one eyebrow.
Amy and Sarge sank back in their seats. The waiter returned with toast and coffee. He fussed around, arranging things on the table. “Can I get you anything else?”
“No. Thank you,” Jake said.
The waiter glanced at Amy, and then walked away. She wasn’t interested. She’d only flirted for information. Her recent response to Jake flooded her body. Now that was a surprise. She shoved those feelings aside. Who had time for sex? She was on a mission.
“I got your message,” Sarge said softly. “How’d you know the bloke was ever on the third floor?” He kept his head down and stirred a couple of spoons of sugar into his coffee.
“Made friends with a gal…got into the room.”
“Good. Then what?”
“Room had been vacated. Not much evidence left. Got a couple of sterile samples for the boys, went through the trash bin. Found scratch paper with flight info, couple of other bits and pieces. Housekeeping disturbed me. I zipped out onto the terrace, and then took the long route down.”
Sarge grinned. “Rappelled?”
“Yep. Thank the boys who sent the backpack.”
Unimpressed with the testosterone talk, Amy was about to remind them of her presence. She stopped herself in time.
Jake rappelled down the side of the hotel?
She took a covert glance in his direction. Now that was hot
.
Jake brought Sarge up to speed, and Amy wondered who “the boys” were. She had to admit, she was impressed. If Jake had determined that much in the few hours since he’d arrived in Sydney, he was good at his job.
Damn good
. Jake Turner was no sleazy, second-rate dumpster diver—not that she expected her father to hire such a person—but that had always been her understanding of private investigators.
Out of several hours of habit, she scanned the lobby. The hotel had come to life in the last half hour.
“So, Steven Fray, alias, Stuart Firth, has left town?” she asked.
Jake gave a curt nod.
She hadn’t thought of Fray having a new alias, he’d been Stephen Froman in Paris. Strange how aliases were, why did people use the same initials? “So, why’d you try to shut me up? If he’s gone, he’s gone.”
“Had to—”
“Why?”
“Trail’s hot.”
Amy glared at him. He did the same thing all the men in her life did, treated her like she wasn’t intelligent enough to understand, or like she was some damn princess who played dress-up all day.
“That’s all I can tell you. Employed by your father.” Jake reached for the second piece of raisin toast, folded it over, took a huge bite, and chewed.
The man was irritating, and he offered nothing, except to Sarge. Well, not nothing, she supposed. He had a gorgeous line-backer frame, with broad shoulders and narrow hips. He wasn’t much taller than she was, maybe five-eleven.
“You told
me
, at some ungodly hour of the morning”—she said firmly—“that if I did surveillance of the lobby, you would explain all. I do believe those were your
exact
words.”
Sarge laughed, reached for his coffee.
Jake wiped his fingers on a napkin. “Firth bolted in the early hours.” He rubbed at his right hand. “Someone tipped him off. The guy I shielded us from, let’s just say I’ve met him before. He’s bad news.”
“It could have been Fray’s original plan to leave today,” Amy said. Something stunk, like perhaps police, or FBI, involvement. Steven always managed to give those people the slip. She figured he could smell them. “What’s with the bruised knuckles?”
“Bar brawl. And Fray’s name is now Firth. Either way, he’s gone. The tail is still here. We ran into each other. I had a face mask on, not sure if he could I.D. me. That’s why I pretended we were a couple.”
Okay, that makes sense, sort of.
“For your safety, it’s important you don’t get involved,” Jake said. “Your father asked me to protect you, to locate you first, Firth second.”
So, he can speak in complete sentences. Not that she liked what he had to say. “I don’t need protection.” She eyed him again. “Was that you earlier, pretending to be a parking attendant?”
He nodded.
“You had a good time with the receptionist,” Amy said dryly.
“All in a day’s work.”
Jake’s hair was short, dark, and he’d put gel in it. It had seemed softer, and not as dark, when he’d had the beard stubble and was dressed as a parking attendant. His eyes were greenish hazel, wide-set. They’d smoldered when he’d stood close. Now they were all business. A tiny shiver shot through her at the memory of the smoothness of his jaw grazing her cheek, and the lips…well she wasn’t going to think about them. Heat prickled her skin and she stared out the glass doors to the fountain.
After a moment, she turned back with a sigh. “Do you know where Firth’s headed?”
“Yeah, he’s gone troppo,” Sarge said.
Her head ached. She frowned. “Gone what?”
“Troppo. Tropical. Headed north, they all do. The saying can mean simply that, or it can mean gone mad from living in the tropics.” He chuckled, and then turned serious again. “Best place to hide out, get a job, not too much nosing about into your past.”
Amy blew out a huge puff of air. Gone tropical, where exactly did that mean? And why would Firth need a job?
Oh yeah, a cover
. He’d get lost in some god-forsaken part of the country, grow a beard, wear a hat and shades, and keep a low profile. “Any ideas on location?”
“He was here with an Australian woman, ah, assumed to be his wife,” Sarge said, and looked apologetic. “Not sure though, they registered separately.”
Amy almost laughed. Firth could have ten wives. All she wanted was to get her father’s money back. And to see Steven behind bars. And to prove a point to the men in her life, but that was another story. She felt Jake watching her. Let him wonder. He worked alone, she could tell.
“Steve had an affair with an Australian woman,” she said, and faked the right tone of sadness when she met Jake’s eyes. “I believe her name was Meg Thompson.” She glanced over at Sarge. “Are you a private investigator, too, Sarge?”
Sarge pursed his lips and gave an abrupt shake of his head.
“He became Daddy’s financial manager. He cheated on me, and I filed for divorce. The woman disappeared. He said the affair was over. Daddy forgave him, I didn’t.”
“You didn’t believe him that it was over?” Sarge asked.
Jake’s eyes were on her, but she didn’t look at him. “I didn’t care if it was, or it wasn’t. I didn’t want to be with him.”
“Fair enough,” Sarge said. “So how’d he get to the company money?”
“He stayed in Daddy’s employ. Daddy trusted him. I didn’t care about that, because we were no longer living in the same city.”
Sarge nodded several times.
“Daddy belongs to the old boy’s club, and he thought it was my fault the marriage failed.” Amy glanced away. Daddy made his choice. He chose Steven. Why she was convinced she needed to set it all right, was another story entirely.
“Firth embezzled the company out of five million dollars.”
Sarge jutted out his lips and nodded. “You have siblings?”
“Two brothers, but they live on the East Coast.”
“What type of company?” Sarge took a slurp of his coffee, and winced. “Who ordered flat white?”
“I was preoccupied,” Jake said, with a quick shrug.
“It’s a coffin company,” Amy said.
Sarge raised his eyebrows, and put his cup down. “Did you say
coffin
?”
“Yes. It’s in Los Angeles, and it’s called A Perfect Sleep.”
“Damn. Who’d go into that business?” Sarge muttered. “And it’s that lucrative?”
Amy flicked an eyebrow. “Yeah, people die. So, what’s the plan here?”
Sarge fiddled with his hat for a few minutes. “I’m thinking they’re headed for the Daintree—the tropical rainforest—the girlfriend, Meg, her parents live up near Cooktown.”
Something didn’t stack up. Why wasn’t Jake working with the authorities in Sydney? And why was Sarge doing investigation work? Could he be a federal agent? Did they even have Feds in Australia? “Where exactly is this Daintree, or whatever you call it?”
“Northern Queensland. Bloody beautiful country, exotic resorts that entice the young adventurers, best beaches in the world, miles of rainforest, and it’s close to the Barrier Reef. Nothing not to like up there, it’s where I make my home. Rugged though, need a four-wheel drive.”
“Oh.” She glanced over at Jake, who was busy worrying his bottom lip. She narrowed her eyes for a second. Sarge couldn’t have driven from Northern Queensland to Sydney overnight. “How did you get to Sydney?”
“I’m a pilot. Have a Comanche Piper. Flew out of Townsville, that’s where me sugar cane farm is. We’ll go there and get supplies, then north to Cairns and the Daintree Rainforest.”
“And we’re flying?” Amy asked, looking from Jake to Sarge. “In a small plane?” Small planes and helicopters, well, she refused to travel on either one.