by Wendy Byrne
“This might sound crazy, but maybe some time you and I could…” Her voice trailed off, as if she thought better of her suggestion as soon as it popped out of her mouth.
“Spar?”
“Probably a bad idea. But…” She drew in a breath. “I miss my dojo, and I’m getting out of practice.”
The phone at her waist rang. “Sammie Murphy.”
“You’re in trouble, sweet cheeks. And you know what you need to do to stop it,” a man grumbled on the other end of the line.
With the volume still turned up, Enrique heard every word and watched as the color washed out of her face in a heartbeat.
“What are you talking about?” Her fidgety movements came to a resounding stop. She stood, walked away, and reduced the volume, making it impossible for him to hear the entire conversation. Her face seemed ashen when she returned moments later.
“Who was that?” His emotions were still running high from the earlier altercation, but his senses went on alert.
She glanced down at the screen and shook her head. Her fingers shook as she tugged the end of her braid. “Not sure.”
“What did they want?” Enrique felt a need to stop the swell of new information relative to Jack Murphy and his case. He’d had the whole damn thing tied up in a nice fuckin’ bow one minute, and the next it was blown to hell and back. “What did the guy mean by ‘you know what you need to do’?”
Her head wobbled a little until she straightened her shoulders. “It must have been a crank phone call.”
“If they threatened you, you should let the police know.”
“I don’t trust the police. They arrested my uncle when he didn’t do a damn thing.”
“But—”
She sucked in a deep breath. “This is family business. Please keep any suggestions you might have to yourself.”
Chapter Five
The whole craziness with Jack had spilled over onto Sammie. But that voice—altered in a way that made it unrecognizable, that weird choice of endearment—scratched and clawed at her nerve endings, leaving her breathless.
Creepy. Had Robert De Niro used that endearment in Cape Fear? She couldn’t remember, but it still raised the hairs on her arms.
There was only one explanation: it had to be the cop who busted her uncle. No doubt he wouldn’t be in this alone. The guy had to be knee-deep into this and wanted her to back off and leave town. Which explained Jack’s behavior.
With trembling hands, she bolted the front door, but nothing quelled the fear. Chills raced up and down her arms as she fought against the urge to flee. She couldn’t allow whoever they were to scare her off.
Instead, she latched the flimsy interior window shutters even knowing it wouldn’t keep anyone out. For the second time in her life, she wished she had a gun. But could she pull the trigger?
She couldn’t tackle this problem alone. But who could she trust? Jack’s employees? His lawyer, Jonathan Crane? Enrique?
…
Enrique sidled up to the bar the following afternoon. He nearly forgot he was wearing sunglasses until Sammie brushed the rims with her fingertips and slid them off. The fingers of her left hand pressed around the edges of his eye, measuring and calculating the damage. With her right hand she held the beer she’d drawn for him.
“I know. It looks worse than it feels,” she said. Her face hovered inches from his. A hint of peppermint intermingled with a lemony fragrance and wafted around her like a sultry kind of perfume.
Enrique shook his head. “Hell, no. It feels worse than it looks.” He must be getting old, because not only did his face hurt like hell, but his whole body ached. He’d been downing Motrin like it was candy to take the edge off.
“You angling for some sympathy?” The corner of her lips turned up slightly as she hid a smile.
“Maybe I’m hinting around for a workman’s comp settlement.” He folded his arms across his chest and rocked back on his heels. “There is the embarrassment factor.”
“I’m sure by the time you retold the story at work today, you managed to give yourself hero status.” She twisted the end of her braid in her fingertips. “As for the workmen’s comp settlement, haven’t you heard? This coffer is empty.”
“I’m sure you could figure out a way to pay me off.”
No sense being on this assignment without doing a little flirting. He was attracted to her. The fact she’d probably end up on the other side of a set of bars after this was finished allowed him to keep his distance.
“How about a beer on the house?” She motioned to the glass she’d put in front of him. “Here you go.”
“Not exactly what I was shooting for, but I’ll take it.” He took a sip, letting the coldness run down his throat. “When’s Jack’s trial scheduled for?”
“June.” She drew a shaky hand across her forehead. “It seems like years away when I think of it now. Stuck here forever in this land of heat and sun.”
“Some people think of Key West as paradise. Not you?”
She gave him one of those get real looks. “Where do I start? The weather, the bugs, the heat, the people, and did I mention the weather?”
“It takes a while to adjust to the heat and humidity. But the people?” Putting his hands on his chest, he huffed. “Should I be insulted?”
She shook her head as her face reddened. “Bars and barflies. Some sort of unseen force drags me back to the last place in the world I want to end up. Tending bar.”
“Is it that bad?”
“I didn’t spend four years in college to do something I could have done without it. All that money spent in tuition down the drain.”
“What’s your degree in?”
“Liberal arts. I majored in art history.” She held out her hand. “I know. I know. Not one of my better decisions. What does one do with a degree in art history?”
“Besides work at a bar?”
“Exactly. I’ve dug my own grave, so to speak.” A smile hinted at the corners of her mouth. She drew a draft for her waitress, Chloe, and then came back.
“What would your dream job be?” He might as well continue with this chat as far as he could. If he kept her talking, eventually something might slip.
She fought a smile. “It’s foolish.”
“I swear to God, if you say you’ve always wanted to be an exotic dancer, I will drop to my knees right here, right now, and beg for a preview.”
She glanced down at her diminutive breasts. “Besides the fact that working as a stripper would be contrary to my feminist beliefs, I don’t believe my A cups would bode well for my success.” She hesitated long enough for him to believe she was trying to decide whether or not she should divulge something to him. “Truth is, I’ve always wanted to work in an art gallery. Maybe even try to sell some of my own paintings.” Her face turned bright pink. “I can’t believe I just told you that.”
Where the hell had that come from? Her remarks seemed genuine. Would it be another method for transporting drugs? “What’s stopping you?”
“It’s hard to break into a gallery, especially with no experience. It’s not like they’re on every street corner. I worked my way through college tending bar, and when I couldn’t find a job I stayed on.”
If she was deep into the drug trade, would she obsess so much about money? Of course, she could be playing him like a fiddle. God knew that had happened before.
Suddenly this whole thing was getting a lot more complicated. If Sammie was as innocent as she was leading him to believe, what did that mean about Jack? Could he be innocent as well? And what about that phone call last night? Did it have to do with a drug deal gone sour or something else he didn’t even want to consider?
“You’ve decided you’re over the hill?”
“In one of those what-the-hell moments, I entered one of my paintings in an exhibit.” Her face flushed. “Not only did it sell, but the gallery owner wanted more of my works. But I started to think that one painting was a fluke. What if…well…I�
�m not that good?”
“Someone obviously thought so.”
“Except creating artwork requires time, and it’s something I don’t have much of. Jack and I fought over that a couple of weeks ago. I told him about the offer, and he was all over me to accept. But”—she twisted the white towel in her hands—“it seems so risky. I mean, I don’t want to be one of those starving artists—or more than likely, ones that aren’t famous until they’re dead.”
“You should follow your passion and see where it leads you.”
One minute Enrique thought he had her all figured out, the next minute she surprised with this kind of reveal. Despite her allure, he refused to get involved with her. He couldn’t let Sammie’s good looks and smooth ways get him back to that dark place he’d lingered in after Teresa had screwed him over.
“Easier said than done.” Her words brought him out of his thoughts. When he looked at her she was surveying the crowd like she was looking for something or someone. “Jonathan told me about an undercover DEA agent making the bust on my uncle. I was wondering if he might hang out here.”
“Who’s Jonathan?”
“Jack’s lawyer. He came in the other night. Blond hair. Wire-rimmed glasses. About thirtyish.”
“Yep, I remember him.” So that was the guy who seemed to be all flirty with her the other night.
“He thought maybe the undercover DEA agent who arrested Jack might be a regular or at least hang out at Murphy’s. What do you think?”
Enrique gulped. “I guess it’s a possibility. Why? What are you thinking?”
“I’d like to talk to him.”
“No doubt he knows who you are, so that probably won’t happen. I imagine that’s the whole idea about being undercover.”
“Maybe you’re right about that. But I’d sure like to set him straight on what he thinks Jack did.”
“I don’t think telling him your uncle is innocent is going to sway him.”
She didn’t seem to be paying any attention to him as she glanced over the crowd. “I’m going to work the crowd and see if I can sniff him out. Can you handle the bar?”
“Sure.” He had to wonder just what she thought she was going to do.
…
It hadn’t been Sammie’s intent to tell Enrique about her pie-in-the-sky hopes for the future. He was a stranger. She’d known him all of two days, but she’d let him in on something that had been clanging around her brain since she’d graduated college. Yes, she’d won awards for her paintings. But that was then. This was now. Eating on a regular basis was always nice.
She never wanted to grow old working in a bar. But in many ways couldn’t see herself anywhere else. Jack had always told her to dream big, but how could she when reality kept slapping her in the face, keeping her down?
Slightly uncomfortable now that she’d let down her guard, Sammie busied herself straightening the glasses. She didn’t want to stand there and talk anymore. God only knew what other secrets she’d divulge.
Besides, she had every intention of mingling with the crowd tonight when she could. Picking up tidbits of information about what happened to Jack. She needed to know what other people knew. And, most of all, she needed to figure out the identity of that undercover cop.
She’d start with the guy who sat near the door, who’d been in every night. He always came in alone. Always people watched. A few patrons here and there would stop to talk to him, but otherwise he didn’t mingle too much.
Femme fatale she wasn’t, but she sucked in a breath and pulled out a get-it-done attitude as she walked up to the table. “You look thirsty.” With the pitcher in her hand, she refilled his draft.
The man glanced up, piercing her with a pair of deep blue eyes. His hair was brown and closely cropped; he had a small pair of wire-rimmed glasses he kept in his pocket. While nothing about him so far screamed cop, it did scream nerd, but Sammie remained optimistic. No doubt the whole point of working undercover was not to look like a cop.
“How perceptive of you.” His lips turned up in a kind of smile, but the kindness never quite made it to his eyes. Since her ick radar started blaring, he might be a cop. Either that or a sociopath—one in the same in her book.
“That’s our motto at Murphy’s—we aim to please.” What should she do next? She couldn’t exactly ask him if he was a narc. “Do you live on the island?”
“Just around the corner.” He took a sip of beer from his mug. “You’re Jack’s niece.”
Nodded. “Helping out my uncle.”
“Family is important.”
“Especially when they’re being charged with something they didn’t do.” She fidgeted with the ends of her hair while she spoke. This whole conversation made her nervous. Then again, this spy thing was new to her.
“You believe in your uncle.” His lips seemed to turn up into a smirk that was more than a little creepy.
“He’d never sell drugs.” Wait a minute. She was supposed to be pumping him for information, not the other way around. Her sleuthing shtick needed serious help.
“But you weren’t around to see what happened.”
The look he leveled at her made her feel a little queasy, although she couldn’t pinpoint why. Maybe it had something to do with guilt for not being there when Jack needed her. Then again, cops always made her a little nauseous, so that could be the reason, too.
“True, but I’ve known Jack my whole life. He’s always been aboveboard and honest. Never would he get himself mixed up in selling drugs. It’s not in his character to do something like that.” While she couldn’t recite facts and figures, she could speak from her heart.
“But what if he was desperate? What if he needed to do it for one reason or another?” He cleared his throat. “Hypothetically speaking, of course.”
“He wouldn’t. I know he wouldn’t.” She drew in a breath, trying to assuage her nerves. “I’d better get back to work.”
The man laughed, the sound rubbing her the wrong way, like nails along a chalkboard. “My name’s Michael. Stop by and visit any time. In fact, maybe sometime we could do lunch or something, Sammie.”
That same ick sensation slithered along her spine. Was he asking her on a date? With no clear sense of how to interpret what he’d said, and no real desire to probe any further, Sammie headed toward the back room.
While that hadn’t exactly been a stellar success, and he did creep her out, she’d made some progress. She’d put good old Michael in the maybe column for the weirdness factor alone. One regular down, now she only had about fifteen or so yet to approach. If they were here all the time, they might have sensed a change in Jack. Anything that might give her a clue to help pinpoint what happened. By the time she finished with number fifteen, she’d be a pro at it. But first she needed to rethink her strategy. The stumbles with Michael hadn’t been the way to find out information.
Pushing the swinging door to the back room with her hip, she plunked down the pitcher. Lost in thought, she didn’t notice Tony bent over the table in the corner of the room until she bumped into his chair.
“Excuse me,” she mumbled. The fog of preoccupation began to lift as she recognized the evidence he scraped into a plastic baggie.
“It isn’t what it looks like.” His voice was uncertain, laced with the rush of adrenaline accompanying his high.
Using drugs in the back room of her uncle’s bar? How could he be so cavalier?
The straw. The razor. The mirror.
“Cocaine?” Emotion rocked through as reality hit. Tony was a junkie. She should have seen the signs. And everybody knew junkies would do anything for a buck. Even set up somebody, especially if it meant they’d get more money to stay high.
Had she missed the obvious culprit?
“You did it, didn’t you? You set up Jack.” Anger pulsed inside her. “He trusted you.” In order to get anything accomplished, she needed to act rationally. But how could she when everything inside her wanted to shake Tony until he admitted what he did?
Tony fumbled. “I needed it today.”
“Are you kidding me?” This jerk was getting high while Jack was rotting away in prison. “I’m calling the police.” She reached for the phone clipped to her waist. Sometimes she had no choice but to involve the authorities and hope for the best. But would they believe her?
He eyed her as he brushed past. “He’ll make you pay.”
…
When Tony stormed out of the back room, knocking over a chair on his way out the door, Enrique felt compelled to investigate. He hustled toward the back and cracked open the door enough to get a clear view of the small space. He spotted Sammie whimpering in the corner with her arms across her midriff.
What the hell. Tension raced through his body. Because he couldn’t ignore what he saw and was curious enough to investigate further, he slipped through the door.
“What happened?” He lightly touched her arm.
She shook her head and glanced at him. Her chin quivered while tears darkened her eyelashes. With a swipe of her hand, she whisked them away.
“Sorry. I’m not normally this emotional. But…I…found him”—she hiccuped back a sob—“back here snorting cocaine.”
“You sure?” For a drug dealer, something like this had to be an everyday occurrence. So why was she trembling? Then again, maybe she was a world-class actress and he was a fool.
“Unless folks have started snorting powdered sugar, I’m pretty sure it was cocaine.” She drew in a shaky breath. “I didn’t trust Tony from the start, but since Jack hired him, I let it slide. Maybe I should tell—”
“The police?”
She nodded, but he spotted the reluctance in the way her gaze shifted away from him. There was something she wanted to add, but couldn’t or wouldn’t.
He cupped her chin. “Is there anything I can do to help? Maybe I could beat him within an inch of his life or something to make you feel better.” Might as well play this whole knight-in-shining-armor thing to the hilt, especially since she was sniffing around looking for the undercover officer who nailed her uncle.
She gave him a cautious smile. “I don’t think that will help.” She sucked in a deep breath. “Now that it’s only Chloe and me, would you mind filling in? Just for tonight?” She sniffled. “It shouldn’t take too long to find a replacement.”
