Kitabı oku: «Get Blondie», sayfa 4

She wanted to protest. What she really wanted to do was curl up in bed and sleep for about ten hours. She’d stayed up most of the night studying the information in the file, then had gotten up before dawn to study some more.

“I feel like a college student cramming for finals,” she said.

He rose from his chair. “Yeah, but in this case if you flunk your final, you might lose your life.”

“I know…I know.”

“So what are you hungry for?”

“I don’t care as long as it isn’t another hamburger.” He’d brought her a burger and fries for lunch. “Surprise me.”

She immediately wanted to call the words back as a muscle in his jaw ticked and his eyes darkened.

“I’ll be back,” he said and left the room.

Cassie rubbed the center of her forehead where a headache threatened to take hold. Surprise me. How many times in their past relationship had they said those words to each other…a hundred? A thousand?

“If we get out of this alive, want me to tell you what I’m going to do to you?” he whispered when they’d been trapped in a cooler on a ship smuggling explosives to the Philippines and left to die.

“No, don’t tell me. Surprise me,” she’d replied.

“Want to know what I’m going to do with you when we get back to your place?” he’d asked, his eyes lit with fires that had burned her from the inside out.

“Surprise me,” she’d whispered breathlessly.

She now got up and began to pace once again in an attempt to erase the past from her mind. So far, Kane certainly hadn’t acknowledged that they’d shared any kind of a past. He hadn’t asked her why she’d left. He apparently had moved on.

It was important that she do the same.

All she had to do was get through these three days in the motel room. After that she’d be undercover and immersed in the job. There would be no time for thoughts of Kane, no time for entertaining any regrets that might plague her even temporarily.

He was back within twenty minutes, bringing with him Chinese takeout. He opened the containers as she got out the paper plates and chopsticks.

Moments later they were seated at the table across from each other, eating in silence that quickly became oppressive and heavy.

“Has the agency kept you busy in the last couple of years?” she asked, unable to stand the silence any longer.

“Fairly busy.” He speared a piece of sweet and sour chicken with one chopstick. Cassie swallowed a smile. He was adroit at almost everything else, but had never mastered the art of chopsticks.

“Domestic or foreign?” she asked, trying to draw him into something that resembled a normal conversation.

“Both. Did you follow the Brahm’s case?”

“The guy in New York selling arms to Iraq?”

He nodded. “We were in on that. It took almost a year to build the case.”

“Tell me about it,” she urged, eager to keep the silence at bay.

To her relief, he did. As he told her the details of the operation that had taken place two years before, his eyes lit with animation and he appeared to relax.

Cassie found herself relaxing as well as the tension between them disappeared at least for the moment. As Kane explained the various operations he’d been a part of for the past five years, Cassie asked questions to keep him talking.

She had always enjoyed Kane when he spoke with passion and conviction, and that’s what he exhibited whenever he talked about the job. The darkness left his eyes and his features softened.

Clad in a pair of tight jeans and a black T-shirt, there was a look of danger about him. His dark hair was carelessly mussed, but that only added to his attractiveness.

As he filled her in on his work over the last five years, she found herself wondering about his personal life. He told her where he’d been and what he’d done for the job, but he didn’t mention anything about the days, weeks and months that he wasn’t working on an operation or in recovery from his bullet wound.

When they’d been together, they’d spent much of their off time in Hawaii indulging in their passion not only for each other, but for scuba diving.

“You still diving on your downtime?” she asked.

With that simple question she shattered the mood. Shutters dropped over his eyes and he shoved his plate away from in front of him. “No, and that’s enough idle chatter. Time to get back to work.”

If she thought he’d been relentless in his drilling of her before, there was a new intensity now. He fired question after question at her, his expression revealing satisfaction when she answered and disapproval when she faltered.

He was a hard taskmaster, pushing her harder and harder until she finally cried uncle. “Enough,” she said and collapsed on her bed. “That’s enough for tonight. I’m exhausted and my brain shut off about an hour ago.”

“Actually, an hour and a half ago according to my assessment.”

To her surprise, one corner of his lips curved upward in a half smile. It was like a gift after their grueling hours of work.

She felt herself responding to his smile, not just with a smile of her own but with a warmth that suffused her entire body.

“You did better than I expected with just a night of study,” he said as he got up stiffly from his chair and stretched his arms over his head. “I have no doubt at all that by Saturday morning you’ll be ready to go.”

“I appreciate the vote of confidence,” she said, pleasantly surprised by his words.

“I’ve never doubted your abilities when it comes to the job.” He dropped his arms and held her gaze. She held her breath as she waited for him to say something more. There were unspoken words in his tired eyes and her heart quickened as a new tension sprang up between them.

“I’ll see you in the morning,” he finally said, then opened the door and disappeared out into the night.

She locked the door behind him, then took a long hot shower and pulled on her short-sleeved nightshirt. She kept her mind carefully blank as she sat on the edge of the bed and applied the lotion to her arms, legs and throat. The scent of pears filled the air and her heart filled with a loneliness she hadn’t experienced in years.

As she crawled into bed and shut off the light, the air conditioner kicked on. As she listened to the monotonous hum, the loneliness swelled inside her.

It wasn’t an emotion she’d experienced often in her life. She could only remember two other times. The first had been on that initial day and night she’d found herself alone on the streets of L.A. At eleven years old she hadn’t understood the deep ache and in any case it hadn’t lasted as the need to survive was far more important.

The second time she’d experienced this kind of lonely had been in the days and weeks after she’d walked away from Kane and the agency that had brought them together.

Even though she’d known she’d made the best choice for herself and for him, that didn’t stop her from missing him. She’d missed his smell, the cast of his smile and the way he looked at her when he wanted her.

She’d missed him, but she’d gotten over it. She’d gotten over him.

Maybe she was just feeling lonely because she missed her house, her things and her life. Surely it was a temporary emotion and would go away once this crazy job was done. The job, yes, that’s what she needed to focus on. Getting it done without getting killed, then forgetting Kane and the agency for good.

With this reassuring thought in mind, Cassie fell into an exhausted sleep.

Chapter 5

“Go away!” Cassie shouted the words from her comfortable burrow in the bed. The room was dark and her sleep had been dreamless and she sure wasn’t in the mood to face a new day.

The irritating knock fell again on her door and she fought the impulse to grab one of her knives, throw it, and see if she could impale Kane’s fist on the other side of the door. It would be wasted effort. Even if she succeeded he’d only knock again with his other hand.

“All right, all right,” she yelled and pulled herself upright in the bed. She looked at the clock, shocked to discover it was almost ten. She’d grown quite fond of the puke-green curtains that blocked the light of day in the early mornings.

She stumbled from the bed and to the door. She unlocked the chain and bolt, opened it to see Kane, then turned and hurried into the bathroom. She didn’t want to hang around and greet him in her nightshirt.

Shock rippled through her as she saw her reflection in the mirror. She still wasn’t used to the new look.

At the moment it wasn’t the new look that startled her, it was the fact that she looked like a zombie.

Red eyes stared back at her from the mirror, eyes that felt gritty from lack of sleep. The T-shirt she’d slept in bore tomato sauce testimony of the 2:00 a.m. piece of pizza she’d both eaten and managed to slop down the front of her.

For the past twenty-four hours she’d been on a marathon cram session, but unlike college students who crammed for an exam, she hadn’t resorted to junk food and caffeine pills to keep the adrenaline flowing. As far as she was concerned pizza wasn’t junk food and massive quantities of liquid coffee beat pills any day of the week.

Yesterday had been like the day before, with Kane spending hours in the room drilling her with questions about the woman she was about to become and about Adam Mercer. He’d been relentless, cold and demanding as a drill sergeant.

Under normal circumstances, she would have protested, but she knew he was working her hard to save her life. Along with trying to stay focused on the job and the questions he asked, she had to keep her mind away from him as a man.

She’d been almost grateful when he’d finally left the night before near midnight. At least with him gone she relaxed a bit more. She’d continued to go over the file for several more hours.

By 5:00 a.m. she had crashed, falling into a hard, dreamless sleep. Groggy and cranky were the two words that came to mind as she assessed her current mood. She changed into a pair of shorts and a T-shirt she’d left in the bathroom the night before. She washed her face, brushed her teeth, then ripped a brush through her hair to tame the errant blond strands. There, she felt better ready to face the day.

She left the bathroom and walked to where Kane sat at the table. Before him was manna from Heaven, two large foam cups of coffee and half a dozen various kinds of doughnuts.

Sinking into the chair opposite him, she reached for one of the coffees at the same time. He didn’t say a word to her until she’d taken a couple of sips. Smart man.

“Good morning.”

“I think it will be once I get about a gallon of this coffee in me,” she replied.

“You were never much of a morning person,” he said and reached for the only chocolate frosted doughnut in the bunch.

“If you take that one, I’ll have to kill you.”

He quirked a dark eyebrow up in amused indulgence and grabbed a glazed instead. “Drink your coffee, it will make you human.”

The problem was at the moment she felt far too human. Seeing Kane again, spending time with him brought to the surface memories of the often playful, always hot sex they’d shared years before.

“So what’s the plan?” she asked, needing to keep her mind focused on the present and not on the past. That’s the way she survived all the pain and hurt of her childhood…day by day.

The half smile that had lifted one corner of his mouth disappeared and he leaned forward, his eyes glittering as he studied her intently. “The plan is up to you. If you need a day or two more to prepare that can be arranged.”

Cassie shook her head. “No.” She gestured toward the thick manila folder on the nightstand next to the bed. “I know the material backward and forward. You know that. I didn’t miss a single question yesterday when you were grilling me. Another day or two won’t make me any more prepared. I’m ready now.”

Kane reached for another glazed doughnut, then apparently changed his mind and dropped his hand on the table. “You realize you’re going in utterly alone. No wires, no cameras, and no real backup. If things go south you’re on your own unless you can contact me and, depending on the situation I might not be any good to you.”

An edgy adrenaline rush pumped through her veins, a rush she hadn’t felt since the last time she’d worked for the agency. “Things won’t go south,” she said with a touch of bravado. “But if they do I can take care of myself.”

For a moment their gazes remained locked, their past a haunting specter between them. She broke the eye contact. “I can take care of myself,” she repeated.

“Then we proceed with the plan.” He pulled a set of keys from his pocket. “This is the key to your new set of wheels.”

“I don’t suppose it just happens to be a Jaguar.” She already knew it was that crappy old blue car in the parking space in front of her motel unit.

“Dream on. It’s a ten-year-old Ford Escort with a hundred forty-five thousand miles on it.”

“Des Moines, Iowa plates?” she asked, even though she knew it was a dumb question. Of course SPACE would see to it that every aspect of her new identity held up.

Kane nodded. “Licensed and tagged to Jessica Sinclair.” He held up the next key on the ring. “The key to your apartment. You already know the address from the file. This third key is to a safe house. I’m staying there. It’s a fifteen-minute drive from the safe house to your apartment. I can make it in seven.”

“You must not be driving a ten-year-old Escort,” she said dryly.

“I’ve got news for you. Not only are you driving an old clunker car, your new apartment isn’t exactly the Ritz, either.”

“Somehow I figured as much,” she replied and once again reached for her coffee cup.

Kane pulled a small spiral notebook from the breast pocket of his navy shirt. He ripped off the top sheet of paper and handed it to her. “This is the address to the safe house. Memorize it.”

She took the paper from him and looked at it: 7207N. Oak. The safe house was only a couple of miles from her home address. Home. She hoped her neighbor wouldn’t do anything to her property before she got back to her home base.

She gave the paper back to him and watched as he placed it in the ashtray then struck a match and lit it on fire.

“A bit dramatic, don’t you think?” she asked as flame transformed the paper into ash.

He grinned, the first full grin she’d seen from him. “You know I love this covert stuff.”

She laughed, unable to help herself. The grogginess that she’d awakened with was gone, swallowed by the rush of anticipation. Although she would never admit it to Kane, she still loved “this covert stuff.”

“You start your waitress job at Night Life at eight tonight.”

“Don’t remind me,” she groaned. “Nothing Adam Mercer can throw my way can possibly be more dangerous than me trying to juggle a tray full of drinks and serve them to patrons. It’s been years since I did any waitressing.”

“You’ll be fine,” he assured her, then stood. “You can leave here whenever you’re ready.” She stood as well. “You have the cell phone to get in touch with me if necessary.”

She nodded and walked with him to the door. Once there he turned to face her once again. “Take care, Cassie. We don’t know for sure what Adam Mercer is capable of, but we do know that nobody has seen his last girlfriend for a little over a month.”

“Nice of you to leave that little tidbit of information until now. Why wasn’t that in the files?”

“We were hoping to locate her whereabouts before we handed the file over to you. But so far that hasn’t happened. I just want you to remember that Adam Mercer is a crazy man on a mission and that makes him dangerous. Get in, get the information we need and get out.”

He hesitated and Cassie felt herself holding her breath, unsure what to expect from him. The moment stretched taut between them, then he reached up and touched her cheek with the pad of his warm fingers. “Be careful and I’ll be in touch.” He dropped his hand abruptly and turned and left.

She closed the door, her cheek burning from his touch as her breath whooshed out of her. She scrubbed at her cheek as if to erase the warmth of his touch.

It was time to move. No time for introspection, regrets or fear. Once again she headed for the bathroom, this time to shower and dress and prepare herself to crawl into the skin of Jessica Sinclair.

An hour later she stood once more in front of the mirror studying her reflection. Her makeup was perfect, hair all in place, and glittering green contacts weren’t hanging off the end of her nose or on her eyebrow but were where they belonged.

Jessica Sinclair was twenty-five years old and from Des Moines, Iowa. She’d been raised in a rough part of town and at eighteen when her mother and father had died had become the soul guardian for her eight-year-old brother, Jimmy.

Brother and sister were close but struggled with poverty, few opportunities and bad breaks. The final bad break had come six months earlier when Jimmy had been caught between warring drug dealers in a drive-by shooting.

He’d been shot in the head and had died instantly, leaving Jessica alone, grieving and with a burning antidrug sentiment in her soul. She’d moved from Des Moines to Kansas City to put the past behind her and start a new life.

Playing the role of Jessica wouldn’t be much of a stretch for Cassie. In many ways their lives mirrored one another’s. Cassie knew the grief of losing a brother, had known early on the heartache of being alone along with the anger over how completely drugs could destroy lives.

She smoothed a hand down the worn sundress that had been in the suitcase as part of Jessica’s wardrobe. “Hello, Jessica,” she murmured to the reflection of the green-eyed woman in the mirror. “Get in, get the information needed and get out.” Sounded simple.

Fifteen minutes later she was in the car, cursing the fact that the air conditioner blew hot air as she drove to the apartment in the riverfront area.

The area where her apartment was located was a part of Kansas City that had suffered an identity crisis for years. When the first settlers had arrived, it had been in the riverfront area where they had built the first city buildings and the place had been the hub of the city.

As years passed and Kansas City grew, the city moved south, leaving the river front area to eventually become eight blocks of abandoned buildings.

In more recent years there had been several attempts at rejuvenating that part of town. In the late seventies the riverfront area had thrived with a new resurgence of popular nightclubs and restaurants.

For about four years the River Quay had been “the” spot in Kansas City, then several organized crime factions moved in and fought for control. The area died a dramatic death as shootings occurred in bars and there were murders daily.

As recently as ten years ago a group of businessmen tried to breathe in new life. Lofts were renovated and unique little shops opened, but the people didn’t come and once again the riverfront was abandoned.

The only constant in the area was the city market vendors who set up each morning in a common area to sell their fresh fruit and vegetables. People came from all over Kansas City and beyond to buy the wares, then returned to their safe suburban neighborhoods.

The building where Jessica lived was across the street from the city market area. The four-story brick building extended little welcome, but rather radiated an air of abandonment and hopelessness. It would be a place where neighbors didn’t visit and didn’t ask questions. It was the kind of place Jessica could afford. It was the perfect cover.

A small parking lot in the back of the building offered parking for tenants only and Cassie pulled her car into one of the many empty spots.

She grabbed the suitcase from the back seat, and after discovering the back door of the building locked, headed around to the front door.

The lobby was minuscule with a single elevator door next to a set of stairs. She punched the up button and heard the elevator whine and creak, squeal and rumble ominously as it approached. When was the last time it had been inspected?

Stairs. She didn’t mind the stairs. She headed up. The stink of age and despair clung to the walls, along with the scent of urine, smoke and stale cooked food.

On the third floor she found apartment 3B and used the key to enter what would be her home for the next few weeks.

It wasn’t as bad as she’d anticipated. It was a studio apartment with a large closet, a kitchenette and a tiny bathroom.

The few pieces of furniture were obviously thrift store offerings. The blue flowered sofa was faded and worn in spots and cigarette burns and nicks decorated the coffee table. Bookcases built using the plastic cubes from discount stores lined one wall and held an array of knickknacks that drew Cassie’s attention.

A life. That’s what the bookcases held. The life the agency had formulated as Jessica’s life. There was a picture of a young boy who could only be Jimmy in the center case. A little stuffed teddy bear, a porcelain angel figurine, several romance books and candles filled the rest of the cases.

Cassie set her suitcase down on the sofa and checked out the closet, where a meager wardrobe awaited her. In the bathroom she found cheap shampoo and soap and a jug of strawberry bubble bath.

She hung the clothes from the suitcase and put the suitcase itself into the closet floor, then placed her make-up in the drawer in the bathroom. The next thing she checked out was the cabinets in the small kitchenette and the refrigerator.

Cheap TV dinners and boxed macaroni and cheese and bologna sandwiches looked as if they would be the meals of choice. Not exactly terrific cuisine, but exactly what a woman like Jessica could afford.

From the refrigerator she walked over to the single window in the apartment and peered outside. The apartment window offered a bird’s-eye view of the city market area. At this time of the day the place was busy.

Trucks were pulled up, their back doors open to display their goods. People crowded the market place, bartering with vendors and picking over fruit for the biggest and best.

Her gaze not only took in the city market, but the general area that surrounded her apartment. She didn’t look so much as she assessed.

A drain pipe ran up the side of the building next to her window. Good. If any nefarious character came to her apartment door, she’d have an escape route. The city market area was littered with Dumpsters and in a matter of life and death, Dumpsters could make good hiding places. Although it would take a dire situation to get her Dumpster diving for cover.

She turned from the window. She had the afternoon to wait until her job at Night Life. Maybe she’d rearrange the furniture, make the place feel more like her own. At least doing that would help her work off some of her nervous energy.

The afternoon passed swiftly and it was just after seven when she once again stared at her reflection in the slightly distorted mirror on the back of the bathroom door.

It was Jessica Sinclair that stared back at her. Clad in a simple cotton dress that was slightly faded from too many wash days, she looked the part of a young woman struggling to survive. She hoped to Adam Mercer she looked like the woman of his dreams.

It was vital that she capture his attention, stoke his desire for her. She wouldn’t be able to help stop him if she couldn’t entice him into a personal relationship.

Cassie had never done the bar scene, but she knew that the club called Night Life was a popular singles hang-out. Some of the other single women cops had talked about it, said that despite the club’s uptown atmosphere and high-dollar drinks, it tended to draw slick guys who were players and well-to-do alcoholics.

“Time to go to work, Jessica,” she said softly to the woman in the mirror.

She had only taken a step out of the bathroom when she froze, her gaze riveted to the opposite wall of the room. Icy currents slithered up her spine, bringing with them a horrifying chill of terror.

The bug was huge…a leathery-shelled dark monster with long antennas that could easily pick up a New Jersey radio station. It cast a shadow on the wall as big as her fist. A cockroach.

Breathe, her brain commanded, but the sight of the creepy insect had stolen her breath and frozen her in place. It was a monster from her dreams, a horror from her past. Breathe.

She drew a deep breath through her nose, then released it slowly through her mouth. At the same time her hand crept to the knife in her pocket.

There were few things that could make Cassie’s knees weaken and her blood turn cold…bugs of any kind was at the top of the list. She knew it was a silly phobia for a woman of her credentials. But if she had her wish, she’d kill every last one of them and screw up the ecosystem.

With a snap of her wrist she released the knife and it hit the wall with a sharp thud, giving an instant autopsy to Mr. Cockroach the intruder.

The only good bug was a dead one. She walked over to the wall and removed her knife, then wiped the end clean with a tissue and tucked it back into the sheath.

“Hell of a life you have, Jessica Sinclair,” she muttered as she grabbed her purse and car keys. By day she killed cockroaches and at night she served them drinks.