by Nancy Warren
She rose and turned, giving Neville the most dazzling smile she could manage. He gave her his usual bland anchorman smile. “Whatever were you doing down there, my dear—your exercises?” He said it with a kind of gentlemanly leer.
“No,” she giggled, and batted her eyes. She was actually getting pretty good at this, judging from his reaction. “I was just fixing my stockings.” She did her best imitation of a pretty pout. “My diamonds were crooked.”
She walked toward him, putting as much distance as possible between her and the crate she and Jake had opened.
Neville watched her legs the entire way. “Yes, I see what you mean,” he said when she arrived in front of him. “Allow me.” And before she knew what was happening, he was on one knee before her, running his hands up and down her legs.
She swallowed the impulse to kick him in the chin with her snazzy ankle boots, while she kept the smile stuck to her face—even though it had gone rigid, due to her clenched teeth.
He rose, his cheeks a little flushed. “What brings you back here this morning?”
It was an opportunity for her to finesse details out of him, interrogate him without him even knowing she’d done it. With only one week left before Jake was pulled off the case, she couldn’t let any opportunity pass.
She shot Neville a demure little smile. “I just wanted to check that I had the correct number of crates for this packing slip, that’s all.”
A slight crease formed between Neville’s brows. “The boys do that, my dear. You don’t have to count crates.”
She giggled again. God, she was starting to get on her own nerves. How could men stand women like this? It seemed to be working for Neville, though. His bland smile was back.
“I know I don’t have to, it just seemed like something was wrong on the computer, but probably it was just me.” Would one more giggle be pushing it? She pushed it.
He relaxed against a crate. “It’s wonderful to have someone so thorough. And dedicated.”
“Well, I try. I’m just so interested.” Here was her chance. She’d keep her ears open for any nuance of guilt, any accidentally spilled clue. “I mean, how do you decide to bring in…” she fluttered her hands vaguely “…chopsticks from South America?”
He smiled at her and settled his arms across his chest. “Business strategy. The South Americans grow trees rapidly because of their climate, as you know, and since their currencies are devalued, we get very good prices. We then sell those same chopsticks to our clients all over the U.S. and make a nice profit.”
“Oh.” She was so disappointed. She’d expected him to fidget, at least, but his explanation made perfect sense.
After last night, she wanted to bring Hank’s killers to justice almost as much as Jake did. But it was looking more and more like Jake and she were searching in the wrong place. Oceanic just wasn’t all that sinister. It had some problems, sure, but nothing criminal.
The company’s pension plan, for instance, sucked. They had so many retired employees that the plan was overburdened, and management had to keep topping it up just to stay afloat. She doubted there’d be enough left in the plan to support people like Agnes when their time came. If Cynthia stayed for any length of time, she’d have to do something about helping management improve the longevity of the plan.
It wasn’t as exciting as catching criminals, she thought with an inner sigh, but she was awfully good at accounting. She knew she could help them fix the problem. At least then she’d leave Oceanic knowing she hadn’t been a complete fraud.
She tried a different tack. “Your ships must go round the world. I find that so thrilling. I’ve always wanted to travel.” That at least was true.
“I imagine you’d have quite a few adventures.”
She didn’t want to talk about her nonexistent adventures, she wanted information about his ships. Honestly, the man could be so thick. “Do they go all over the world? Your ships?”
“Our ships?” Aha, was it her imagination, or did a shifty expression cross his face? Hard to say; the bland smile was back in a flash. “We don’t have our own ships. We contract shipping companies to carry our cargo.”
Her brow furrowed. “But I’m sure I saw a ship listed in the company’s assets.”
“Ah, you have been diligent. You must mean the Pacific Princess, a pleasure boat we use to take clients out fishing. You’ll get a chance to see it next summer when we have our annual staff trip. Or perhaps, if you’re a good girl, I might arrange to take you out myself one of these days.”
Oh, gag.
Once again her excitement plummeted. The Pacific Princess obviously wasn’t the fishing trawler Jake’s friend had been aboard when he was killed.
If she could just find some evidence, anything at all…
She’d witnessed Jake’s grief last night, and had come to understand how important this investigation was to him. She wanted to help him bring Hank’s killers to justice.
If a part of her was panicked that once she was off the case, Jake wouldn’t be part of her life anymore, well, she just wouldn’t think about that.
Neville glanced at his watch. Oh, no. She had to come up with something to keep him talking. She’d get him to drop a clue if she had to shake it out of him. “I really want to understand how this company works. I’d just love it if you could explain it all to me,” she gushed.
His chest puffed up like a preening seagull. “I’d be happy to. I’ve got to run to a meeting now, but why don’t I answer all your questions when we have more time?”
She hid her chagrin. “That would be wonderful.”
“Say over dinner, Saturday night?”
She jerked backward a step, jabbing her hip against the rough corner of a crate. “Dinner?” She cleared her throat. “Saturday night?” Well, she wanted to interrogate him, didn’t she? “Uh, sure. Thanks.”
As she stumbled numbly back to her desk she mentally kicked herself all the way. Why hadn’t she made an excuse? She didn’t want to date Neville Percivald on Saturday night. She wanted to date Jake.
However, a few hours of uninterrupted time with Neville Percivald could be a perfect opportunity to try and get information that might help the FBI. She wouldn’t seduce Neville, of course, in spite of what Jake had once proposed. But when her boss was relaxed, maybe having a couple of drinks, he’d be much more likely to reveal secrets.
She wondered what Jake would think about her “date” with Neville. A few weeks ago, she’d have laughed if anyone told her she’d have two men showing interest in her.
She flopped into her desk chair and noticed she had a voice-mail message. She played it and then groaned. It wasn’t two men interested in her.
It was three.
Walter had asked her to have dinner with him on Saturday night.
Aargh!
She dropped her head in her hands. “I can’t date three men!” she wailed aloud.
“I hope this isn’t a bad time, Cynthia.” Agnes’s apologetic tone interrupted her.
“Not unless you’re asking me for a date.”
“Oh. The very idea!” Agnes chortled. “Well. I suppose I am, in a way. I’m referring to our hair appointments. Did you make them?”
“Hair. Right! Of course I haven’t forgotten. I’ll pick you up at ten Saturday morning.”
“That would be wonderful. I just feel…oh, never mind.”
“Agnes, I thought that was your voice.” An older man Cyn didn’t recognize stood just outside her door.
As Cynthia watched, Agnes’s face transformed. She turned red, then white, and put a trembling hand to her mousy hair before assuming her usual placid, apologetic expression. She turned and said, “Hello, George. We weren’t expecting you until next week.”
“Had to make sure you hadn’t run off with a sailor while I was gone,” the hearty voice boomed.
Agnes smiled her sad smile. “Really, George.”
So this was Neville’s stepfather. Cyn liked the look of the man. He remin
ded her of a character actor on the British stage, with his snow-white hair and military mustache, the piercing blue eyes—a much deeper blue than those of his stepson—and his weather-beaten countenance. His dress was dapper, his manner jocular. He was as full of personality and verve as Agnes was lacking. And unless Cynthia was very much mistaken, the poor woman harbored a gigantic crush on the older man.
“And who’s this?”
Agnes edged back into Cyn’s office as Mr. Percivald senior came through the door, his hand held out in greeting.
“I’m Cynthia Baxter,” she said, taking his hand automatically and receiving a firm shake. “The new accountant.”
“Hmm? Where’s Harrison?”
“I believe he’s in Hong Kong. I got the job after he left, so I never met him.”
“Hong Kong. What on earth for? Met a woman, I expect,” he said, answering his own question. “Well, he was a good man, but you’re much easier on my old eyes.” He twinkled at her and she found herself grinning back. He might be years older, but she liked him better than his bland stepson.
“And where’s Percivald the younger?”
Since Agnes was gazing at him and seemed to be in her own world, Cyn answered. “Neville? I think he’s in a meeting.”
“Ah. Well. I’ll just wait for him in his office, then. Agnes, my dear, might you take pity on a lonely old man and have dinner with me Saturday night?”
“Hmm? Oh, yes. Thank you.”
“Right-o. I’m off.”
Cynthia could barely contain her excitement until Mr. Percivald senior had moved out of earshot. “Agnes! You’ve been keeping secrets.”
“I don’t have any secrets. I wish I did.”
“But that Laurence Olivier knockoff just asked you for a date!”
“What? Oh, no.” She sighed—a long, heartbroken sound that stirred all Cyn’s sympathies. “He usually asks me for dinner when he’s in Seattle. I keep him up to date with Oceanic, and—” her voice became brittle “—he usually asks my advice about his current lady friend.”
“Current lady friend? How many have there been?”
Agnes smiled thinly. “I’ve lost count.”
“But that’s so…wrong! You’re in love with him. Any fool can see that.”
Pink blotches mottled Agnes’s skin. “In love with him? That’s ridicul—” She flopped into Cynthia’s single visitor’s chair and burst into tears.
Cynthia shut the door and dug out a pack of tissues.
“He doesn’t even see me. All these y-years I’ve been the one he trusts, discusses things with. I h-helped him pull himself together when his wife d-died. And I waited. I hoped at last…” A sob shook her. “I might as well be a piece of office furniture.”
The poor woman was so desperately unhappy, and once again Cyn had the uncomfortable feeling this could have been her, had her life not taken an unexpected turn. Maybe it was too late for Agnes, but then again, maybe it wasn’t. “Agnes, it’s time you let Mr. Percivald know how you feel about him.”
“He’d just think I was a pathetic old woman.”
“Desperate times call for desperate measures.” Agnes hiccuped.
“We’re pulling out the big guns.”
Agnes sniffed.
“It’s not just a makeover anymore.”
Agnes blew her nose.
“We’re bringing in Raunch Magazine.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“We have to get Mr. Percivald to notice you, see you as an attractive woman.”
“He didn’t see me as an attractive woman thirty years ago. How are you going to make him see me as an attractive woman now?”
“Sex.” Cynthia ignored the choked outburst from the chair. “It’s all about sex.”
“But sex is so…” Agnes shuddered delicately, and a picture of Walter popped into Cyn’s head.
“Awful? It doesn’t have to be. I’ve just figured that out.”
Agnes’s eyes popped. “You’ve just…? But you’re so… Well, pardon me for saying this, but you’re so…sexy!”
A little chuckle escaped Cynthia. She couldn’t help it. “Take a look at this.” And she hauled out her driver’s license. “Do you know who this is?”
Agnes dabbed her eyes before squinting at the little photo. “Looks like me when I was young.”
“It’s me.”
“Stop making fun of me when I’m miserable.”
“I’m serious, Agnes. Look at that picture, and look at the name on the license. I got a makeover and that helped. But I got a new attitude, too.” Also some mind-blowing sex, but she didn’t want to startle her new friend too much all at once. Maybe she’d discover her own “personal orgasmic drama of legendary proportions” with the elder Mr. Percivald—who looked as if he’d be only too happy to play most of the games in Raunch’s fantasy issue—and maybe she wouldn’t. The important thing was that she’d gain enough confidence to believe it was possible.
If Jake Wheeler found Cynthia Baxter irresistible, anything was possible.
“Come on, Agnes. Saturday, we’re getting you a makeover along with that new hairstyle. After that, I have a…store I want you to see.” She decided not to let on it was a sex shop, or that they’d be buying a copy of Raunch—Agnes could only take so much.
Cyn needed to go there, anyway; she wanted to pick up a couple of things herself.
10
CYNTHIA DROVE SLOWLY past Jake’s house, just two doors down from her own. It was dark and quiet, which was odd. His car was always parked in the driveway when she came home. Darn. She needed to see him, to tell him the latest development—that a suspect had asked her out for dinner.
Oh, who did she think she was kidding? She just wanted to see him.
Never for one second did she think the information that she had a date with Neville might make him jealous. But if it did… She grinned slyly. He’d just have to make sure he booked ahead next time he wanted to see her.
Yes, things were definitely looking up in her dull life. Neville had invited her for dinner Saturday, and when she’d returned Walter’s call she’d discovered he wanted to take her to a restaurant she’d been dying to visit—also on Saturday night.
Walter, forking out for a pricey restaurant? After she’d picked herself up off the floor, he’d explained he was seeing a woman who believed you had to make peace with your past before you could move on.
It wasn’t something Cynthia had thought much about, but in a way it made sense. Perhaps she needed closure on the Walter stage of her life as much as his new girlfriend obviously thought he needed it. Just the fact that he now saw her as a woman to be taken to fancy restaurants, instead of someone to cook for him at his convenience, made Cynthia feel like forgiving him and wishing him happiness. So she’d agreed to dinner on Sunday. Now she had two dates coming up this weekend, with two different men.
Only trouble was, the man she really wanted to date wasn’t asking. Come to think of it, Jake had never asked her out. Mind-blowing sex in the shower this morning aside, she admitted to feeling a little peeved. Sure, he was a spur-of-the-moment kind of guy, but she might like a little advance notice on when he expected to see her.
At this very moment, for example, he could be waiting in her darkened home for her, planning to surprise her with another sexual fantasy, without even bothering to check with her first. She sniffed a little in indignation, and sped the remaining short distance to her house.
A curtain flicked in Mrs. Lawrence’s front window and Cyn waved, knowing her arrival had been duly noted by her neighbor.
Her stomach tightened in anticipation as she opened the door and deactivated the alarm. Where might he be hiding? What delicious wickedness did he have planned? But that excitement faded as a quick search of her house yielded nothing. Jake wasn’t there.
Well, good. That was fine. She wasn’t a 7-Eleven, open at all hours for his convenience. A quiet night at home was just what she needed. She’d cook herself an omelette, then get to bed ear
ly. Maybe she’d even have time for a nice hot soak in the tub.
Perhaps she’d better check her messages before dinner.
There weren’t any messages.
A sense of ill usage seeped through her bones. She had important information to divulge to Jake. A key suspect had invited her for a date.
She’d probably have to wear a wire!
Such things must involve advance planning.
She gnawed her thumb for a moment, trying to decide if this counted as a real emergency. Saturday night was an opportunity to listen in on both Percivalds, senior and junior. She’d wear some state-of-the-art recording device and, through skillful questioning, have them dropping hints left, right and center. With time running out, it was the big break this case needed.
Phoning Jake on his emergency number seemed a little extreme. Anyway, she’d rather see him in person. All she needed was a plausible excuse for going over. She thought for a minute and then inspiration struck. Hadn’t the man been pestering her for a Bundt cake? She turned to her cookbook shelf. She was a woman in charge of her life, and this time she was going to make the first move on Jake, thank you very much.
While the cake was cooking, she made her omelette and ate it, knowing she’d need to keep her strength up for what she had in mind.
Mmm. She couldn’t believe she was thinking sexy thoughts again. Parts of her body were still sore from her recent escapades, but all she had to do was imagine Jake touching her there and they began to throb with desire. She felt like someone who’d been starved for so long, she couldn’t help but binge every time she saw food.
She was turning into a sex addict.
She shrugged. So what? It wasn’t hurting anyone. At least not yet. She knew she was in for a big dose of hurting when the Oceanic case was over and Special Agent Wheeler moved on to his next assignment.
She knew the score, and she wasn’t going to complain. In only a few weeks, she’d had more fun and more excitement than in the previous thirty-one years put together. She wasn’t going to whine when her joyride was over—she was going to revel in every wild and joyous moment while it lasted. And if she had a broken heart at the end of it, well, it would be worth the pain just for the treasured memories.
