Authors: Nora Roberts
“You get a lot of that?”
“Only from the women. They can’t keep their hands off me.”
“Ha-ha.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he noted the Yankees ended the inning on a strikeout. “No, we don’t get a lot of it, but it happens. Some guys cross lines when they drink. They only cross them in my place once. The crowd starts getting thick after eight. Entertainment starts at nine. You’ll be busy.”
He got to his feet, walked to her, walked around her. “You’ve got a nice cover over the cop in you. You have to look hard to see it. I like the skirt.”
She waited until he’d come around and they were face-to-face. “I’ll need work schedules for all employees. Or do I need a warrant?”
“No, I can help you out there.” He liked the scent of her. Cool and clearly female. “I’ll have printouts for you by closing. Anyone I hire who I don’t know personally—and even some I do—goes through a full background check. Not everyone here’s been lucky enough to come from a nice, tidy family and live a nice, tidy life.”
Jonah picked up a remote, switched the angle of the cameras so the bar area popped on-screen. “Kid just coming off shift at the bar? Grew up with his grandparents when his mother ran off. Got into a little trouble when he was fifteen.”
“And what kind of trouble was that?”
“Got tagged with a joint in his pocket. He straightened out, they sealed the records, but he was up front with me when he wanted the job. He’s putting himself through night school.”
At the moment she wasn’t interested in the young man going off shift at the bar. She kept her eyes on Jonah. “Is everyone up front with you?”
“The smart ones are. That’s Beth.” He tapped the screen.
Ally saw a little brunette, about thirty, come in through a door behind the bar.
“Bastard she was married to used to kick her around. She can’t weigh a hundred pounds. She’s got three kids at home. Sixteen, twelve and ten. She’s been working for me on and off about five years, used to come in every couple weeks with a black eye or split lip. She took the kids and left him two years ago.”
“Is he leaving her alone?”
Jonah shifted his gaze to Ally’s. “He was persuaded to relocate.”
“I see.” And she did. Jonah Blackhawk looked after his own. She couldn’t fault him for it. “Did he relocate in one piece?”
“Mostly. I’ll take you down. You can leave your bag up here if you want.”
“No, thanks.”
He pushed the button for the elevator. “I assume you’ve got your gun in there. Keep it in there. There’s a secure employee area off the bar. You can lock it up in there. This shift Beth and Frannie have keys. Will and I have keys or codes for all areas at all times.”
“Tight ship, Blackhawk.”
“That’s right. What’s the cover?” he asked as they stepped into the elevator. “How’d I meet you?”
“I needed a job, you gave me a job.” She shrugged. “Keep it simple. I caught you at your sports bar.”
“Know anything about sports?”
She sent him a smile. “Anything that takes place off a field or a court or outside an arena is just marking time.”
“Where have you been all my life?” He took her arm as they stepped out on the main floor. “So, Jays or Yankees?”
“Yankees have stronger bats this season and rule the long ball, but their gloves are sloppy. The Jays chip away with reliable base hits, and their infield’s a ballet of guts and efficiency. I go for guts and efficiency over the power stroke every time.”
“Is that a baseball statement, or a life statement?”
“Blackhawk, baseball is life.”
“Now you’ve done it. We have to get married.”
“My heart’s all aflutter,” she said dryly and turned to scan the bar area. The noise level had bumped up several notches. They were two-and three-deep at the curved black slab now, the after-work, before-dinner crowd.
For some it was unwind time, she thought, for others a casual mating ritual. But for someone it was a hunt.
People were so careless, she mused. She saw men leaning on the bar, back pockets ripe for picking. More than one handbag hung vulnerable on the back of a stool or chair. Coats and jackets, some likely to have car or house keys in their pockets, were tossed aside.
“Nobody ever thinks it can happen to them,” Ally murmured, then tapped Jonah’s arm, inclined her head. “Check out the guy at the bar—six down, with the news-anchor hair and teeth.”
Amused, Jonah tagged the guy from Ally’s description and watched him flash his wallet, choked with bills and credit cards.
“He’s trying to lure the redhead there, or her pretty blond friend. Doesn’t matter which. Odds are he hits with the blonde,” Jonah concluded.
“Why?”
“Call it a hunch.” He looked down at Ally. “Wanna bet?”
“You don’t have a license for gambling on the premises.” As she watched, the blonde sidled over and batted her lashes at the man with the wallet. “Good call.”
“It was easy. And so’s the blonde.” He steered Ally back toward the club area where Beth and Will huddled over the reservation book at a black podium.
“Hey, boss.” Beth plucked the pencil out of her thick curls and made a note in the book. “Looks
like we’re turning most tables over twice tonight. Big dinner crowd for midweek.”
“Good thing I brought you some help. Beth Dickerman, Allison Fletcher. She needs training.”
“Ah, another victim.” Beth shot out a hand. “Nice to meet you, Allison.”
“Ally. Thanks.”
“You show her the ropes, Beth. She’ll bus tables until you figure she can wait them.”
“We’ll whip her into shape. Come on with me, Ally. I’ll get you set up. Got any experience in food services?” she asked as she plowed through the crowd.
“Well, I eat.”
Beth let out a bright cackle of a laugh. “Welcome to my world. Frannie, this is Ally, new waitress-in-training. Frannie’s captain of the bar here.”
“Nice to meetcha,” Frannie called out, flipped a smile, dumping ice into a blender with one hand and shooting soda into a glass with the other.
“And that gorgeous specimen down the other end of the bar’s Pete.”
The big-shouldered black man sent them a wink as he measured Kahlúa into a short glass.
“Now, no flirting with Pete, ‘cause he’s my man and nobody else’s. That right, Pete?”
“You’re the one for me, sugar lips.”
With another laugh, Beth unlocked a door marked Employees Only. “Pete’s got a beautiful wife and a baby on the way. We just tease. Now, if you need to get in here for any reason— Hey, Jan.”
“Hey, Beth.” The curvy brunette on the other side of the door had her waist-length hair pulled back with combs from a lovely, heart-shaped face. Ally gauged her as mid-twenties, and a fashion plate. She’d gone for a skirt the approximate size of a table napkin, and a clingy shirt with small silver buttons. Silver winked at her wrists, ears and throat as she freshened her lipstick in a mirror.
“This is Ally. Fresh meat.”
“Oh, yeah.” The smile when she turned was friendly enough, but there was a measuring gleam in her eye. One female sizing up another, the competition.
“Jan works the bar area,” Beth explained. “But she’ll pinch-hit in the club if we need her.” There was a wild burst of laughter from outside the door. “Tom-toms are beating.”
“I’d better get out there.” Jan tied a short, many-pocketed black apron at her waist. “Good luck, Ally, and welcome aboard.”
“Thanks. Everybody’s so friendly,” Ally said to Beth when Jan strolled out.
“You get to be kind of a family when you work for Jonah. He’s a good boss.” She pulled an apron out of a closet. “You work your butt off for him, but he lets you know he notices and that he appreciates. Makes a difference. Here, you’ll need this.”
“Have you worked for him long?”
“About six years, give or take. I handled tables at Fast Break, his sports bar. And when he opened the club here, he asked me if I wanted to switch. It’s a classy place and closer to home. You can leave your purse in here.” She opened a narrow locker. “You reset the combination by spinning around zero twice.”
“Great.” Ally set her purse inside, palming her beeper out of it and hooking it on the waist of her skirt under the apron. She shut the locker, set the combination. “I guess that’s it.”
“You want to freshen up or anything?”
“No, I’m fine. A little nervous, I guess.”
“Don’t worry. In a few hours your feet are going to ache so bad you won’t think about nerves.”
* * *
Beth was right. About the feet anyway. By ten, Ally felt she’d hiked twenty miles in the wrong shoes and lifted approximately three tons of trays loaded with dirty dishes.
She could have marched the trail from table to kitchen in her sleep.
The live band was considerably louder than the recorded music that had played until just after nine. The crowd shouted above it, crammed the dance floor and jammed together at the tables.
Ally piled dishes on trays and watched the crowd. There were plenty of designer clothes, expensive watches, cell phones and leather briefcases. She saw a woman flash a lightning-bolt diamond engagement ring for three friends.
Plenty of money here, she noted. And plenty of marks.
Hefting the loaded tray, she headed off for the kitchen, detouring toward an attractive couple when the man signaled her.
“Sweetheart, can you get me and my lovely companion a refill here?”
She leaned closer, pasted on her sweetest smile and made a quiet and crude suggestion.
The man only grinned. “Cops have such filthy mouths.”
“Next case I’m going to be the one sitting on my butt, Hickman, while you work out,” Ally replied. “See anything I should know about?”
“Nothing’s popped yet.” He grabbed the hand of the woman sitting next to him. “But Carson and I are in love.”
Lydia Carson gave Hickman’s hand a vicious squeeze. “In your dreams.”
“Just keep your eyes open.” Ally aimed a stare at Hickman’s glass. “And that’d better be club soda.”
“She’s so strict,” she heard Hickman murmur as she walked away.
“Beth, table … ah, sixteen’s looking for a refill.”
“I’m on it. You’re doing good, Ally. Go dump those and take your break.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice.”
The kitchen was a madhouse, full of noise and shouted orders and heat. Gratefully Ally set down her tray, then lifted her eyebrows as she spotted Frannie slipping out the back door.
Ally stalled for ten seconds, then followed.
Frannie was already leaning against the outside wall and taking her first drag from a cigarette. She blew out smoke with a long, relieved sigh. “Break time?”
“Yeah. I thought I’d grab some air.”
“Zoo in there tonight. Blackhawk’s really packs them in.” She pulled the cigarettes out of her pocket, offered them.
“No, thanks. I don’t smoke.”
“Good for you. I can’t kick it. No smoking in the employee lounge. Jonah gives me a break and lets me use his office if the weather’s lousy. So how’s your first night?”
“My feet are killing me.”
“Occupational hazard. First paycheck you buy yourself one of those bubbling footbath things. Put some eucalyptus in it and go straight to heaven.”
“I’ll do that.”
An attractive woman, Ally noted, though the lines around Frannie’s eyes made her look older than twenty-eight. She kept her dark red hair cut short and the makeup subtle. Her nails were short and unpainted, her hands ringless. Like the rest of the staff, she wore black, and finished off the simple shirt and slacks with sturdy yet trendy black shoes.
The only touch of flash was the silver hoops that swung at her ears.
“How’d you get into tending bar?” Ally asked her.
Frannie hesitated, then puffed on her cigarette. “I guess I hung out at bars a lot, and when there came a time I was looking for what you could call gainful employment, Jonah asked me if I wanted a job. Trained me over at Fast Break. It’s good work. You need a decent memory and people skills. You interested?”
“I’d better see if I make it through one shift busing before I start raising my sights.”
“You look like you can handle whatever comes along.”
Ally smiled into Frannie’s considering eyes. “You think so?”
“Observation’s one of those people skills. And on short observation, you don’t strike me as the type who expects to make waiting tables her life’s work.”
“Gotta start somewhere. And paying the rent’s a priority.”
“Don’t I know it.” Though Frannie had already calculated that Ally’s shoes equaled half a month’s rent on her own apartment. “Well, if you want to climb the ladder, Jonah’s the one to give you a boost. You’d have figured that.”
Frannie dropped the cigarette, crushed out the butt. “Gotta get back. Pete pouts if I go over break.”
The ex-hooker, Ally decided, was proprietary when it came to Jonah. They were probably lovers, she thought as she went back inside. When you factored in his defensive attitude toward her, it added up.
As lover, as trusted employee, Frannie was in a prime position to cull marks, to pass the information along. The bar faced the entrance. Whoever went in or out passed by her station.
People handed her credit cards, and the names and account numbers led to addresses.
It would pay to look at her most closely.
* * *
Jonah was doing his own looking. From his office, from the floor. He knew enough about cons, short and long, to calculate who the targets might be. He pegged three possibilities that would have topped his list if he’d been running the game. And since he’d also spotted the cops at table sixteen, he wandered over.
“Everything all right tonight?”
The woman beamed up at him, swept back her short swing of streaky blond hair with one hand. “Everything’s terrific. It’s the first night on the town Bob and I have managed in weeks with work keeping both of us so busy.”
“I’m glad you picked my place.” Jonah laid a friendly hand on Bob’s shoulder, leaned down. “Next time ditch the cop shoes. Dead giveaway. Enjoy your evening.”
He thought he heard the woman snort out a laugh as he walked away.
He headed for the table Ally was busy cleaning. “How you holding up?”
“I haven’t broken any of your dishes yet.”