He caught Bobby searching his room instead of answering him. When Bobby pointed at Mario's dresser, he turned in that direction, seeing them at the same time that Bobby walked to the dresser.
"Wait!" Mario jumped across his room, pushing Bobby away from the dresser before he could pick up the small case of flash drives. "Why are they there?"
"I don't know, Boss. Maybe you left them there." Bobby dropped his hand and stepped away from the dresser, shrugging at the same time as if it weren't a big deal where the flash drives were.
"Maybe I left them there?" Mario hissed, turning an evil glare on the blond American. "And maybe I just lost my fucking mind, too, eh?" he roared, with the urge to wipe that smug look off the face of the man who simply stared at him, looking mildly tolerant at best. "Do you think I'm a damned moron?"
Mario grabbed the flash drive case, mumbling in Italian that some people had a lot of nerve questioning the hand that fed them, clothed them, and kept a roof over their heads. Either Bobby understood Italian better than he let on or he just had the good sense to start behaving. His expression turned humble as he followed Mario back to his desk.
"I'll check the security cameras to see who was in here, Boss. Whoever moved them will be reporting to you before the hour is out."
"Good." Mario opened the case but then simply gawked at the empty container. "They're gone." His head started spinning. The board game was on backup on one of the flash drives. His personal financial information was on another. No one ever entered his home, not without him present. Only the few house servants, of whom all were family and too damned ignorant to understand how to use a computer, were ever in his house. Bobby was the only man with free reign of Mario's house who had any computer knowledge at all.
Mario hurled the empty case at his bedroom wall. It made a loud racket and shattered in several pieces as it crashed to the floor. As satisfying as that was, it wasn't enough. He picked up his gun, wrapping his fingers around the hard metal, and wished it were colder. A fever ignited inside him, and it climbed in a mad rush as he took in the contents of his room, looking for anything else that might be out of place.
"Where are the flash drives?" he asked, keeping his voice low, cool, collected.
Bobby stood there like a fucking moron, with that relaxed expression on his face mocking Mario. "I don't know, Boss. I told you--"
"You were here. Are you going to stand there and tell me you don't know without looking at the fucking security tapes if someone was in my bedroom or not?"
"I would say no one was in here."
"Which obviously isn't the truth now, is it?" Mario turned his attention on the man, staring him in the eye and searching for the deception that would peg the man as guilty.
Bobby had the good sense to back up toward the doorway. "I'll go look right now."
"You don't have to look, do you? No. I think you don't have to look." There was no way Bobby wouldn't know what had happened in this house. He'd been with Mario all this time and always knew everything that went on around the place. At first it had unnerved Mario, but then he grew to rely on the man's intuitive nature. Mario grabbed the gun and released the safety. He stared down at Bobby's surprised reaction. "Where are my fucking flash drives?" he demanded.
"I don't know." Bobby walked backward, reaching the doorway and moving into the hallway. "You aren't thinking right and I'm not going to die for you." Bobby took off down the hallway.
Mario raced into the hallway, pulled the trigger, and put a hole in his wall at the end of the hall. God damn, Bobby was quick.
"Find another scapegoat!" Bobby yelled, his voice coming from the bottom of the stairs.
Mario staggered, the realization hitting him as to the extent of the damage if his personal files landed in the wrong hands. Every file on those flash drives, along with the ones on his computer, was password protected. It would take the best of computer hackers a lot of time to access any of his files.
Now he had to figure out who took his goddamned flash drives and figure out how to rebuild his army with the feds watching him. There was no way he'd forfeit the game. Once he won, not even the feds would be able to touch him. Instead they would answer to him. The whole goddamned world would answer to him. Mario turned around in his room slowly, snapping his fingers as he did.
"That's it," he whispered to himself. "One of them tipped off the law." It was the only explanation. His two opponents in the game both knew they hadn't stood a chance against him. But if his army disappeared, Mario couldn't continue with the game. It was one of two people. And it wouldn't take him long to figure out which one.
Mario walked over to his bedroom door, closed and locked it. Then moving to his closet, he pushed the large closet doors, causing them to roll sideways and open his large, organized closet. Mario stared at the five rows of clothes, all of his suits and formal wear hanging in orderly fashion on each bar. There was plenty of space between each row to step into the closet, choose what he wanted, and try it on while standing, facing the row. Mirrors and proper lighting were the finishing touches for what Mario would have to say was the perfect closet.
He stepped between two rows and moved to the back of his closet where shelves held pair after pair of shoes, and casual attire he had folded on the opposite wall. Ignoring his clothes, Mario knelt in front of the large cage pushed back in the corner.
"Hello, puttana. Would you like to come out and play?"
The beautiful young woman lifted her head, her long, thick black hair streaming over her shoulder and her bare back. She didn't answer but stared at him, her dark eyes round and blank. Mario wondered what she'd be like if he took her off the slave juice. She was young, very young by the looks of her body. He'd had a piss-poor night, though, and wasn't feeling as scrupulous as he usually did. Maybe she was old enough to fuck.
"How old are you, my precious puttana?"
She continued staring, her mouth opening to answer, but she closed it. Mario was patient. "Come here," he ordered, softening his voice as if he were talking to a small child.
Mario opened the cage door and reached inside to help the woman when she began crawling toward him. She stumbled when she tried to stand, which was probably a result of his leaving her in there too long.
"Lean on me, sweet puttana," he instructed, offering his arm gallantly.
She wrapped her cool, slender fingers around his arm but remained hunched over, walking like an old hag as she took baby steps toward his closet door. They made it into his room as far as his bed before Mario picked her up by her waist and tossed her on his bed. She crumpled, appearing deflated, and didn't move from the position in which she'd fallen.
Mario scratched his head. She didn't look like she'd be much fun to play with right now. Maybe if he fed her something. Under different circumstances, Mario would order food sent to his room. His puttana was his secret, though. No one knew he'd pulled her out of his army, except Bobby. Mario had instructed him to personally see to moving the young puttana to his bedroom closet.
"Don't move," he instructed, and fought off the urge to laugh at his own joke as he made sure he had the key to his bedroom, let himself out, then locked the door again. He would feed his puttana, wash her, and dress her.
Putting something slutty on her would lift her spirits. Mario remembered how she'd walked with pride, wearing practically nothing, the evening she'd ordered those two morons to drive into the side of the nightclub wall in Los Angeles. She liked wearing clothes that showed off how much she wanted a man to play with her body.
Mario rummaged through the kitchen, made a meat and cheese sandwich, and grabbed a beer. No one was around as he hauled his food back to his room.
"Be my good little puttana and I'll feed you some of my sandwich," Mario offered after locking his bedroom door behind him and placing the sandwich and beer on the table by his bed.
The woman hadn't moved, not an inch. If only his men would follow his orders as well. Maybe he'd be smart to put all of the assholes on
slave juice. Mario stared at the woman. Her hair fell down her back, draped over her arm, and successfully covered almost half of her naked body.
"Puttana, sit," he ordered, still keeping his voice calm and peaceful.
Her arms moved and she pushed against the bed, making the effort to push herself into a sitting position. Mario couldn't remember what Evelyn had said about feeding his people while they were on the slave juice. He'd been busy most of this week and hadn't had time for his puttana. Maybe he had left her in her cage for too long without food and water.
If he was going to feed her, she was going to get a bath first. "All right, puttana. Let's go. We'll get the stench off of you and then have some fun." He took her by the arm, lifting her as a child might lift a favorite doll, and dragged her into the bathroom.
Chapter Seventeen
Angela's heart pounded so loud it created a rushing sound in her brain. She couldn't steady the laptop in her hands.
Jake backed out of the closet. "Shut that thing down," he whispered in her ear, grabbing her arms and pulling her out with him.
"Okay." She shot a furtive look at her bedroom window.
It was the worst sensation in the world, being the one who was hunted. Jake kept arguing neither of them had done anything wrong. It was true. They hadn't. The FBI had asked her to come with them to answer questions, and she'd snuck out and fled. That was her only crime. Angela hated being accused of anything, though, and despised even worse actually being guilty.
Jake walked over to her bedroom window and stared outside. "Looks like several cars. It's hard to say how many are out there, though."
"I guess I'll go let them in before they wake the neighbors." Angela shut down her computer, closed it, and left it on her bed.
"Don't let them intimidate you," Jake said, glancing back at her laptop before following her out of her bedroom. "We're going to have to work with them, though," he mumbled, gripping her shoulders and massaging them as he and Angela headed toward the stairs.
"If they'll let us work with them," she whispered.
"Don't worry." Jake followed her down the stairs, then managed to step around her and reach her front door first. He gripped her door handle and touched her chin with his other hand. "There is a lot to do with this case," he said, still whispering. "They want our information or wouldn't be here. But we're all on the same side."
"Yes, we are." She straightened, sucked in a deep breath, and smoothed her hair with her fingers before nodding at the door. "Better let them in," she said.
Another hard pounding vibrated the living room wall and made the picture she had hanging next to her door vibrate. Jake ignored it, his stare hard on her, when he took her arm and yanked her up against his virile body.
"Whether they take us off this case or not, we're still going to work together." His eyes had never burrowed deeper into her soul than they did just now as he held her arm, almost lifted her off her feet, and held her close for another moment before releasing her.
Angela barely managed not to stumble to the side when Jake turned his back on her, unlocked the door, then opened it. Of all times for Jake to tell her he had feelings for her.
"Gentlemen," Angela said, nodding and staring at a tall blond man. There were two men behind him, both in white collared shirts with thin black ties.
"What took you so long to answer the door?" the blond man asked. He didn't look like FBI.
Angela wouldn't let him, or any of these men, unnerve her. "We were busy." She kept a straight face and didn't blush. Let them form their own conclusions over her statement. She and Jake really had been busy. "You might as well come in before you wake my neighbors."
"Why are you in the dark?" The blond was full of questions.
"Because we didn't want anyone knowing we were here." Jake spoke before she could.
Angela closed the door and caught Jake giving the blond an appraising stare. "Bobby," he grunted.
Angela shot her attention to the blond. "The Bobby who works for Mario?" she gasped, instinctively taking a step toward Jake. She'd assumed the other two men were FBI. They looked like FBI. Had Mario sent them over here?
"I've been living in Mandela's home, working undercover, for a year now," Bobby said, giving Angela a punishing stare. "Mandela isn't an easy man to build trust with and I pulled it off, but it took months of enduring his rants and pretending to be humble and assuring him he was right about everything. It wasn't a job many men could have pulled off."
Angela stared at the badge he produced, then forced her insides to calm down. If this Bobby character wanted to blame her or Jake somehow for busting his operation wide open, he would just have to get through his tantrum. She wasn't about to take the fallout because his life might have just been made into more of a living hell.
"You've been working this case almost as long as I have," Angela informed him. "I was in Mexico when the FBI took out Marty Byrd's mansion. I had spoken with an agent while in Tijuana."
"When you were in Mexico you used the name Angela Huxtable."
She nodded. "My mother's last name is now Torres. I borrowed it from her." She wasn't about to feel sorry for an FBI agent if he couldn't figure out she was the same person.
"When Mandela's uncle stumbled upon an old picture on the Internet showing private investigator Huxtable and his daughter, I became suspicious of you using a cover to get close to Mario. Obviously blowing your cover would have been as advantageous as you blowing mine."
"Neither one of us has blown your cover," Jake informed him.
"And it's going to stay that way," Bobby told them, his voice rough and demanding.
Angela hit the light switch on the wall, savoring a moment of pleasure when Bobby and the others squinted until their eyes adjusted to the light. "Have a seat, gentlemen," she said, walking between all of them to the couch. "There isn't anything in the house, since I haven't been here for a while, but we can at least be comfortable. I'm dying to hear your findings after the bust Jake set up for you."
"We aren't here to share information with you." Bobby didn't sit, and although the two other agents looked as if they might have taken her up on her offer, they held their ground when Bobby didn't budge.
"That's a shame." Angela got comfortable at the corner of her couch.
Jake walked past the men, moving to stand at the edge of the couch behind her. If any of the FBI men had wondered if there was something going on between her and Jake, he removed all doubt. He rested his hand on her shoulder, then brushed his thumb up and down the side of her neck. All three agents dropped their attention to the small action before shifting their gazes elsewhere.
"You've interfered with our investigation," Bobby began, "as I'm sure you're both aware by now. You're both professionals." Bobby's eyes were an almost transparent shade of blue, the light color unique and at the same time almost disturbing. "I'm sure you would react the same way if someone tried stepping on your toes during one of your cases. Not to mention, King, bounty hunting isn't legal in the state of Illinois. You here just for moral support?" he sneered, his eyes darkening.
"Hardly," Jake growled.
Angela reached for his hand and gave it a tight squeeze as she stood. The others weren't sitting, and the charge of adrenaline that suddenly filled the room was as fierce as if she'd just been seriously shocked by electricity. She managed a smile at Bobby, getting the oddest impression he was a bad guy instead of a good guy.
"Why are you here?" Bobby demanded, looking as if he'd love to start trouble.
Jake pulled his hand from Angela's and appeared to grow in size as he faced all three agents. "You're more than welcome to check the validity of my PI license."
"I take it, since you're ordering us off this case, that you have all the information you need off Mario's computer?" she asked, softening her tone. "The game board, the names of the other players, the locations of the next attack?"
"I have everything I need except the flash drives," Bobby stated, then held his hand ou
t to Angela. "Hand them over."
She had no idea what he was talking about. "Flash drives?" She shook her head. "What flash drives?"
"Don't play stupid with me," he snarled. "You took Mandela's backup flash drives off his desk in his bedroom. You were the only one in there. Mandela is certifiably insane and paranoid. There are hidden cameras in every room of his house. And I went through the security tapes. You took something next to his computer the other night when you were there, and, darling, that is exactly where the flash drives were. If you don't hand them over I'll have you arrested for interfering with a serious FBI investigation."
Bobby stared past Angela at Jake, who in turn watched Bobby. There was a calm, almost eerie expression on Jake's face when Angela shifted to see both men. One thing about being a private investigator, as well as self-employed, was that it was imperative to know every law out there. Angela didn't doubt Bobby was equally versed in what he could and couldn't do right now. Angela and Jake weren't criminals, they hadn't broken any laws, and implying they had infringed on an investigation would be pushing it. They sure as hell hadn't stolen anything off Mario's property.
"Neither one of us took any flash drives," Jake informed Bobby.
Bobby ignored Jake and stared at Angela. "The gig is up," he said, his voice too smooth and soft-spoken. "Any evidence you have now isn't going to do you any good. And I'm sure you don't want our jobs hindered and the game to be allowed to carry on a minute longer than it has to. Give me Mandela's backup flash drives."
Angela shook her head. "Jake is right. I don't know anything about flash drives. You're right also. Neither of us would do anything to allow the game to carry on. I would be thrilled if it ended right now, no matter who ended it."
"I'm sure that isn't the case." Bobby turned toward the door, and the agents behind him stepped out of the way, then also started to leave. "If I find you've lied to me just now, Miss Huxtable, you will go to jail. If you suddenly remember where those backup flash drives might be, turn them over to the police. I might then let this moment of insubordination go unnoticed."
Bounty Hunters: 03 Stay Hungry Page 31
