“Something tells me that you wouldn’t be that lucky.” I opened the folder containing the partial list and browsed the names. “Any calls yet?”
“Oh yeah. We have the answering service answering the phones right now. How do people find out these things?”
“I’m sure his publicist has already started the ball rolling, and you did book the suite in his name?”
“No. I booked it in the gallery’s name. I figured he would demand privacy. A man can’t live on a mountain in the middle of nowhere and actually crave a lot of human contact.”
“Good thinking.” I looked toward her, and she was frowning. “What?”
“There was a message on your voice mail this morning that was…unpleasant.”
“From Charlie?”
“Yeah, he certainly wasn’t acting his best. It’s still there if you want to listen to it.”
“Give me the highlights.”
She cleared her throat. “I’d rather not. As I said it was unpleasant.”
I took a deep drink of coffee and glanced toward my phone. “Delete it and inform security that he is no longer allowed in the office areas. If he causes a scene they are authorized to remove him by any means necessary.”
Standing, I straightened my jacket and handed her the list. “I’m going to go check out the new guy and then I’ll be ready to meet with Mercy.”
“She’s currently in a phone conference, but I’ve been given strict instructions to rescue her in ten minutes.” She cleared her throat. “The people from the lab are set up in the small conference room on two. Each employee has an appointment time.”
“Reactions?”
“A few here and there. Mostly they seem to be personally affronted by the whole process, but that’s to be expected. No one has refused the testing.”
Connor Grant stood about 6’5” and was a tight 195 lbs. Dark brown hair, blue eyes, and a wicked smile completed the picture. He had a voice like melting chocolate—soft, warm, and delicious. I wasn’t remotely attracted to him, and I blamed Mathias.
“How long have you been in the U.S.?”
“I met up with Mathias a few years back when he was doing some wet work for Interpol.” He glanced me over and smiled. “I think the hair suits you.”
“You tell Shamus Montgomery that my hair is not too short.”
“I sure will.”
“Where is Mathias?”
“He’s in the security office.” He jerked his thumb behind him. “Last door on the left.”
“Yes, thank you.”
I walked down the hall toward the office quickly and found Mathias sitting alone at a bank of cameras. “Hey.”
He turned and raised an eyebrow. “Get a good look at Connor?”
“Yeah.” I shut the door and leaned on it. “We have this many cameras?”
“We do now. I had them installed last night.”
“Cool.”
“Am I going to have to fire him?” He motioned toward the camera that showed Connor at his station.
“Well, he does have the sales staff all wound up, but I have it on good authority that he’ll be off limits soon enough.”
“The guys tell him all the time that he’s too pretty for security work.”
“But a good choice for the gallery. I know plenty of bored housewives that would come down here if he were giving out tours of the place.” I leaned against the edge of the table and looked over his face. “When I got home last night my answering machine was brimming with messages from Charlie.”
“I see.”
Sighing, I couldn’t figure out why I was telling him this, but I felt like he should know. “I’m not filling you in on this because I want you to do something about it. It’s just that I’ve asked Casey to pull him from the authorized list of visitors to the office level and I figured you would see it. I didn’t want you to think I was keeping secrets from you or anything.”
“Okay.” He plucked up one of my hands and kissed my palm. “What did he say?”
“Basically that I wasn’t allowed to call things off with him.”
“And?”
“And that he’d spent the last year training me to be his wife.”
“So I take it you plan on punching him square in his mouth the next time you see him.”
“You bet your ass.”
Mathias tugged gently, and I sighed as I went willingly into his lap.
“I can go find him and kick his ass. He’ll never know what hit him.”
“No. He’s just not used to things not going his way. I’m sure he’ll get over it and go on. I mean, he’s hot tempered but I wouldn’t call him stupid.” I hoped. But then I’d also never believed him the kind of person to leave psycho-stalking messages on a woman’s answering machine either.
“As long as he keeps his distance.”
I was so wrong, and that irritated me. My knuckles whitened on the handle of my briefcase as I walked toward my car. Charlie was leaning against it and offered me an easy-going smile once he caught sight of me.
Glaring, I pushed the button on my remote that unlocked the doors and went directly to the driver’s side door. “Obviously one of us needs to bone up on our conversation skills.”
“I came on a little strong last night.” He reached out to touch me, and I jerked back. “Hey, I’m not going to hurt you.”
I tossed my briefcase into the passenger seat, gaze centered on him. “I won’t make that same promise, Charles.”
“Janie, I’m trying to be good about this, you know. I spent several hours convincing my mother to overlook your background and get to know you.”
“My background is nothing to overlook.” I slammed my car door shut and glanced around the empty parking lot. The last thing I wanted was a big scene anywhere near my job, and he knew it. “It isn’t like I did drugs or spent time in jail. I put on a badge and served others. If that somehow makes me deficient in your mother’s eyes, I feel sorry for her. Living with that kind of narrow thinking must make for a miserable life.”
“My mother is not narrow minded. She gives to the underprivileged and volunteers annually for various children’s charities.”
I stared at him for a moment, and then frowned. “So?”
“What do you mean so? If she felt poor people were beneath her, she wouldn’t work so hard to help them.”
“For the love of God, Charlie, the woman had me investigated because she wanted to make sure I was good enough for her baby boy!”
“She was looking out for me.”
“Sure she was.” I jerked open my car door and looked at him. “It doesn’t matter anyway. Hell, if she hadn’t come over to your apartment uninvited she never would have met me at all.”
“You really mean that. I was nothing more to you than an occasional fuck?” His face flushed red with anger. “I invested too much time and money into you. What am I going to tell my friends?”
“I don’t care.”
He grabbed my arm and jerked me toward him. “The people I work with expect to meet you on Friday night. I won’t have you embarrassing me like this.”
“You can let me go or you can explain to the people you work with how you got a black eye. It’s really up to you.” I glanced toward the gallery and sighed as Connor came through the front doors at a near run. “Let me go before the security guard gets here.”
Charlie looked over his shoulder and released me quickly. “We aren’t finished.”
“Ms. Tilwell.” Connor looked pointedly at Charlie until he backed up a few paces. “Mr. Montgomery wanted me to make sure you didn’t need any assistance.”
I looked between the two of them and then slid into my driver’s seat. “No, but thank you, Connor.”
Locking the door, I turned on my car and whipped out of the parking space without looking back at Charlie. In the rearview mirror, I watched him slink away toward his vehicle.
My cell phone started to ring before I was even a block away. I picked it up and sighed.
“Thank you for not coming out.”
“I told you that I wouldn’t give anyone in the gallery reason to believe that we are more than coworkers.” His tone was clipped, even, and very angry. “Just make sure that’s the last time I have to watch him touch you.”
“Okay.” I pursed my lips wondering exactly how I was going to control them both.
Honestly, I had no chance in hell of ever controlling Mathias, and I was at a loss as to what to do with Charlie. He was hurt and angry, despite the fact that I’d always been very clear about how I saw our relationship. Obviously, he’d never really paid much attention to what I said or even wanted.
“I’ll be at the gallery until late,” Mathias said.
“Then I’ll see you tomorrow?” Did that question sound needy coming out of my mouth or eager?
“Yeah, lunch?”
“Sounds good.”
After our good-byes, I closed my cell phone and tossed it into the passenger seat. Relationships are too complicated, that’s why they should be avoided at all cost. Did I even want a relationship with Mathias? Would I be able to live with myself if I turned him away without exploring it?
I parked my car in my slot, walked to the corner deli, and bought dinner. It was a crowded little place but had great food and I enjoyed the atmosphere. I also wasn’t all that interested in going home to an empty apartment, which was disconcerting. My apartment had been my haven from the world for a long time and now it was just a bunch of empty rooms. That was Mathias’s fault as well; before him, my life had seemed full and I’d been content.
My answering machine was full again when I got home. Frustrated, I unplugged the thing and tossed it in a closet. I wasn’t about to let anyone use something that belonged to me to invade my space and insult me.
I woke up suddenly, reaching out and into the nightstand drawer. With the comforting presence of the 9mm in my hand, I reached out and flipped on the light. My gaze settled on Charlie, sitting in a chair on the opposite side of the room.
“What the fuck?”
He held up a key ring. “I took your keys a couple months back and made duplicates. I guess that’s another reason you aren’t a cop anymore. You aren’t very observant.”
“You’re right.” I shoved the covers back and leveled my gun at him. “I certainly never realized how freaking weird you are.”
“I thought I’d come over here and find you with another man.” He tossed the key ring on the carpet between us. “There is someone, right?”
“Yes, and you’re fortunate that he’s not here. He probably would’ve shot first.” I stood from the bed and pulled my robe on. “You shouldn’t have come here.”
“I know.” He picked up a glass I hadn’t noticed before and drained the contents. “Good whiskey, by the way.”
Glaring, I took a deep breath. “You come into my home uninvited and help yourself to my alcohol?”
“I’ve certainly had better judgment. I didn’t realize how invested I was in you until you decided we were finished.” He put the glass down and stood from the chair. “I have every right to be here.”
“The hell you do,” I ground out through clenched teeth, freaked out because I had no idea how long he’d been in my bedroom watching me sleep. “I decide who I see and don’t see.”
“This isn’t done, Jane. I don’t lose when it comes to anything.” He picked up his coat and motioned toward the keys. “Those are the only ones I had made.”
It hardly mattered. The first phone call I was going to make would be to a locksmith to have the locks on my door changed. “Don’t come around anymore, Charlie.”
“I don’t plan to give up on you.”
“Your plans don’t matter.” I followed him to the front door and watched patiently while he pulled on his jacket. The drama of the whole situation was beyond absurd. If it were happening to someone else, I might’ve laughed. Mama’s boys do not make good stalkers.
He opened the door. “About my mother?”
“Yes?”
“I hope you won’t remove her from the gallery’s preferred guest list.”
“She was on it before we met, and I don’t let personal matters get in the way of business.” I rested my gun against my leg; the cool metal actually felt reassuring.
Charlie paused and then gestured toward the phone. “I plugged the answering machine back in and deleted all of my calls. I’m sincerely sorry for that; it wasn’t my intent to verbally abuse you. I was just angry.”
“Okay.” But deleting the evidence didn’t make that behavior disappear. “What are you now?”
“Determined.” He reached out to touch me but backed up when I jerked and lifted my gun. “You have two messages that aren’t from me.”
He pulled the door shut carefully, leaving me alone in my apartment.
I went to it, flipped the four bolts, and then put on the chain. Leaving the chain off on the off chance that Mathias might show up was foolish, and it was the only reason that Charlie had gained entry to my apartment without my hearing it.
I hit play on the answering machine and put my gun down on the table beside it.
“Hey, kiddo, you’d best call before one of us hops a plane to Boston. Some cop outside of Boston ran a check on you. Right now, Wes and I are drawing straws to see who gets to come up there and kick some ass. You’d better hope he wins. Call me!”
I laughed and shook my head. Stan was the oldest of my brothers and certainly the most protective. He’d been there, strong and determined, the day our father had told us quite simply that our mother had bailed. Bailed on her job, her children, and her husband.
Wes and I would’ve been at a loss without Stan to pick up the slack and keep our world spinning. I don’t think any of us ever thanked him properly for that.
Stan had gotten us all fed and put to bed that night and every night after that until he’d moved out on his own. I glanced toward the clock; it was probably close to five in Savannah. Picking up the phone, I dialed his phone number and walked into the kitchen to rummage through my cabinet for breakfast.
He answered on the fourth ring. “Detective Tilwell.”
“Good morning, detective.”
“Jane, what the hell is going on? I got word that you were involved in a domestic dispute. If some guy you’re dating messed with you…I swear to God—”
“No, no, it was nothing like that. I was at a friend’s house and her ex-husband showed up.” I poured myself a glass of milk and went looking for a snack. “I kicked his ass.”
Stan laughed. “Well, okay, as long as you came out on top. What took you so long to call back?”
Frowning, I wondered how to address that question without revealing the fact that I’d been involved in something of a domestic issue myself. “I had a few problems with my answering machine. Why didn’t you call my cell?”
“We all figured if it was really bad you’d have already called one or more of us.”
“You were just looking for an excuse to come to Boston.”
He laughed. “Maybe. I haven’t seen you in a while. Will you be home for Christmas this year?”
I wrinkled my nose as I considered the last Christmas I’d spent at home. “That depends, is Mom bringing a date?”
“Gawd, I hope not. That was a disaster. I kept waiting for a brawl to break out.” He sighed. “So, what’s up?”
That’s a loaded question. “I’m arranging my first show solo.”
“That’s good?”
“It’s excellent.” I grinned as I sat down at the table. “The promotion is working out great, and I’ve met someone.”
“Wow.” He was silent for a moment. “I don’t think you’ve ever mentioned your love life to me, ever. I mean, there was that kid you dated in high school, but I can’t really call that a love life since we had him scared half to death. He probably didn’t even breathe hard on you.”
“I always assumed so. Come to find out, he was just gay and didn’t know it.”
; Stan chuckled. “Yes, I got an invitation to a housewarming a few months back.”
“Did you go?”
“Yeah, even found a company to do his and his towels.”
“How perfectly modern of you.”
“I try.” He paused. “So about this guy?”
“He’s a security consultant. Army and FBI background.”
Deanna Lee Page 18
