Thirty minutes later, Lizzie looked over at Ted's empty plates. All she could see was a bare bone. Her expression was full of awe. "I cannot believe you ate all that food. What good are you going to be to me if you're sluggish all afternoon?"
"This? Don't worry about my being sluggish. My body doesn't know that word," Ted said, pointing at the empty plates. "This was just an appetizer." He looked at Lizzie's salad plate, which looked like it hadn't been touched. The goat cheese had one corner missing. The eclairs and the wine spritzer, on the other hand, were just memories.
"So, what's our next move?"
Lizzie looked up to see a handsome young man approaching their booth. "Miss Fox?"
"Yes."
"Judge McPherson asked me to deliver this warrant. Is there anything else I can do for you while I'm here?"
"No, this is fine. Thank you for coming all the way over here from the courthouse. Tell the judge I owe him a big favor."
The attractive young man smiled, showing an incredible array of glistening white teeth that were bright enough to light up a dark night. "The judge said you would say that. He said to tell you he can never repay you for what you did for him."
The young man left, and Lizzie smiled as she slipped the warrant into her handbag.
Whoa, Ted thought. This woman was going to drive him to his grave. "I suppose that favor is none of my business."
"Right, it's none of your business. I told you I know people who know other people who know still other people. Don't even go there, Ted."
"Yeah, right."
Lizzie looked down at her one-of-a-kind Patek Philippe. "Time for a little repair work, then I'll meet you out at the car." Lizzie tossed the Rover key to Ted, who caught it in midair.
He felt smug as he sauntered out to the parking lot. He knew what repair work meant. Lip gloss, a little tweak with the mascara brush, a spritz of perfume. Then what women did was to lean over and shake their hair so it looked wild and sexy. He was certain he was the only man in the world who knew what women did in restrooms when they were preparing to slaughter some unsuspecting guy.
Sure enough, Lizzie had fresh lip gloss on those kissable lips, and her eyelashes, which were like little feathers, glistened with fresh mascara. Her wild mane of silver hair looked even wilder when she climbed into the car. He was again rewarded with the knowledge that the all-powerful Lizzie Fox wore panties. He felt smug all over again.
The car in gear, Lizzie asked, "What is Maggie saying?"
"Judge Easter and Elias Cummings should arrive this evening. Wong and Emery are coming to judge a free martial-arts exhibition to be held at the Babylon. Your. . .uh. . .Sisters are preparing for their trip out here. Someone broke into the FBI lab and stole the beaker of ashes that were being tested to authenticate whether they were human or not. They were. Those guys at the Bureau are a bunch of clowns. Navarro has a lock on the nomination, and the announcement that he will be installed immediately is imminent. Espinosa is working on my stuff as I feed it to Maggie. I have to share a byline, but that's okay. The media, with the exception of the Post, has suddenly gone low-key on the ninja activity. Orders from the White House is the scuttlebutt.
"By the way, where are you going to stash Miss Marble Rose?"
"What makes you think I'm going to stash her anywhere? She has a home. She strikes me as a very independent kind of gal. She can stay with us if that's her choice. Okay, we're here," Lizzie said as she pulled into the same parking slot in the marked VISITOR PARKING that she'd used before. She looked over at the car parked next to hers. Her brow knitted in a frown.
"What?" Ted asked, an edge in his voice.
"See this car parked next to me? It's a Bugatti Veyron. It costs $1,700,000. There's a guy that lives here in Vegas who's a car freak. He owns the ten most expensive cars in the world. He built a special climate-controlled warehouse to store them. He has armed guards who live on the premises to monitor his cars."
"And I need to know this. . .because?"
"Because the owner is on his way into the police station. Do you see him?"
"You mean that human tank whose feet are as big as canoes?"
"Yes."
Ted sucked in his breath. "Who is he aside from being the owner of that fancy set of wheels?"
Lizzie turned to look at Ted. She smiled, and Ted shivered. "He's the mouthpiece for the Nevada Gaming Commission. I think he's here to see me."
"No shit! Are you saying he's the eight-hundred-pound gorilla?" Worry crept into Ted's voice. "You can take him, can't you, Lizzie? You know what I mean, you can outlawyer him, right?"
Lizzie smiled again. Ted started to shake all over. His fingers kept hitting the wrong keys as he valiantly tried to text message Maggie with the new information. After he sent his message, he looked over at Lizzie, and asked, "Are we deliberately sitting here so you can make an entrance, or are we sitting here because you don't want to go up against this guy?"
Ted got the evil smile again. His stomach tied itself into a knot when Lizzie asked, "What do you think?"
"What I think is you can take that big guy down just by batting your eyelashes. Good thing you smeared more of that stuff on back at the Silver Horseshoe. What's his name?"
"I can't believe you don't know his name with all that reading and researching you do. His name is Cosmo Cricket."
Cosmo Cricket. "You shitting me, Lizzie? No one would name a kid Cosmo Cricket."
Lizzie laughed again. "His parents did. Close friends and associates call him Kick."
The knots in Ted's stomach tightened as he climbed out of the Rover. "Just tell me one thing, Lizzie, do you know this guy?"
"No, never laid eyes on him before today. Never spoke to him. I know people who know him, if that's your next question."
Lizzie slid out of the Rover and looked at herself in the side-view mirror.
"You look great, Lizzie. Your lip gloss is shimmering." Maggie was absolutely going to love this. "I think you're good to go. Let's just get in there and fry that guy's ass, Lizzie Fox style. What the hell is he doing here, anyway?"
"That's a good question, Ted. I'll make sure I ask."
"Do you know anything about the NGC?" Ted asked.
"Probably as much as you do. It was founded in 1959 by the Nevada legislature. It's involved in the regulation of casinos throughout the state, along with the Nevada Gaming Control Board. They're responsible for administering regulations, granting licenses, and ruling on disciplinary matters brought before them by the Nevada Gaming Control Board. It's made up of five members appointed by the governor. Commission members serve for four years in a part-time capacity.
"Their big gun is Cosmo Cricket. One has to wonder why the NGC would send someone like him to deal with little old Marble Rose Barnes. She must be more important than we originally thought. I think we can make our entrance now." Lizzie looked down at her watch. "Being fifteen minutes late is quite fashionable, even in police stations. You ready, Teddie?"
"Hell, no, but I'm game."
"Your recorder set? Camera ready? Flex your fingers, and let's take this show on the road."
"Yes, ma'am."
Chapter 12
With one exception, nothing much had changed since their exit almost two hours earlier. The walls hadn't been repainted, they were the same ugly shade of puke green, the smell was the same, Pinesol gagging. The slight difference was that the room appeared to be more crowded. Not with people but with one person, who seemed to be taking up all the space in the room. There were other people in the room, but at first glance they all seemed to be hugging the sickly looking walls, staying well out of the way of the big man who was chatting up a tall, lanky, bespectacled gent carrying a briefcase. Another lawyer.
Seated at his high platform desk, Officer Dewberry looked anxious. His gaze went from one man to the other, then to Lizzie and Ted and what was happening in his station.
"He looks like a goddamn tank," Ted mumbled under his breath.
Lizzie ignore
d him as she waltzed up to the platform and tilted her head to the side as though to say, I'm here, what's our delay? What she said was, "I'm here to pick up my client. I said ninety minutes, Officer Dewberry. I didn't mean 120. Time is money."
A husky voice from behind her said, "You're late, Counselor, we've all been waiting quite patiently."
The cadence in the big man's tone was almost hypnotizing. At least Ted thought so. The lanky man standing next to him cleared his throat, but he didn't say a word.
Ted saw everything in slow motion as Lizzie turned, the skirt separating to reveal her shapely thigh. And then time stood still as Lizzie gazed intently on the man standing in front of her. To Ted's eye she looked like a beautiful Greek goddess—maybe Nemesis, a goddess of vengeance. Cosmo Cricket stood frozen in his boat-sized footwear, his mouth open, but no words were coming out.
Shit! Shit! Shit!
Ted's fingers hit the keys on his BlackBerry, not knowing if they were the right ones or not. Maggie would have to figure it out. He watched as Lizzie's come-hither eyelashes danced. Cosmo Cricket closed his mouth. And then the goddess spoke.
"When one is having lunch with the leaders of the free world, one does not rush."
Ted pounded the keys. He felt like he was at a tennis match.
Cosmo Cricket stared at the beautiful woman standing in front of him. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. Everything he'd heard about the Silver Fox appeared to be true. He tried to take a deep breath but couldn't. For the first time in his long, illustrious career, he was totally speechless. He wasn't sure, but he thought he might be falling in love. The man standing next to him cleared his throat again. Cosmo's canoes shuffled as his hand moved in greeting.
Every nerve ending in Lizzie Fox's body twanged as she stared at the ugly man. His broad face looked like a slab of concrete full of cracks and craters. A honker for a nose more or less dominated the chiseled chin, with its dimple in the middle. But it was his ears, shaped like minipancakes, that drew her attention. He was so ugly he was beautiful. She looked down at hands that were bigger than catchers' mitts. Everything about him was custom-crafted—from his suit to his extralong tie, to his shirt, big as a tent, and the shoes. No way could this man buy off the rack. Ted was right, the man was as big as a tank.
A worthy adversary? Easy does it, Lizzie, she cautioned herself. Just remember, it's you versus him. You play to win, remember that. This isn't the time to let emotions come into play. Besides, every woman in the world knows the man hasn't been born you could trust. Just another man smitten with her? At that precise instant, she couldn't decide, so she smiled, and the room suddenly became lighter.
Ted kept hitting his keys, really pounding on them when he heard a strange noise that sounded like it was coming out the tank's ears. He recognized the sound because he'd uttered it too many times not to remember. A groan of pure pleasure. He relaxed as he continued to relay the real-time action to Maggie. Lizzie had it in the bag. Beauty and the beast. Like he had one iota of doubt which of the two was going to be the underdog. Not Lizzie. No way, no how. The guy was toast.
Finally, finally, the tank decided to speak—to the relief of everyone in the room. "I know what you mean, I had lunch with those same leaders yesterday. You just can't rush them when they're sharing their secrets. Cosmo Cricket. My friends and colleagues call me Kick." He held out his hand.
Lizzie laughed, the musical sound bouncing off the walls. It was the evil laugh Ted recognized and feared. Shit! Shit! Shit! He kept punching the keys as fast as he could. Another point for Lizzie. The eight-hundred-pound gorilla was never going to know what hit him when the canoes gave out under him and he was flat on his ass.
"Elizabeth Fox," Lizzie said, a smile in her voice.
Whoa. Whoa. Elizabeth? Maggie was going to salivate over that one.
Lizzie knew the pile of granite in front of her was going to give her a bone-crushing handshake. She braced herself and gave it back to him until his eyes narrowed, and he nodded to show she'd one-upped him. Cricket wanted to suck on his closed fist to make the hurt go away.
The devastating eyelashes fluttered. "And you're here. . .because?"
The canoes moved backward a step, then another. He felt dizzy from the scent of the woman's perfume. He'd never had trouble with his vocabulary before. Ordinarily words just flew from his lips. Important words. Profound words. Right now he felt like he was in the third grade and unprepared for the make-or-break year-end test. Lizzie's feathery lashes continued to go up and down like window shades. Her lip gloss shimmered as her tongue flicked out, then went back in. She looked amused.
"To make sure Miss Barnes's release goes off on schedule and to apologize for any and all inconveniences suffered by your client. My colleague here, Alvin Lansing, is chief counsel for the Babylon. He's prepared to drop all the charges against your client. I'm here to write up a summary for the NGC. End of story."
Ted looked up at the fussy-looking attorney. He was no gunslinger. He had nitpicker written all over him.
Lizzie wagged her finger playfully, the wicked smile still on her face. "No, it's not the end of the story. The end of the story is a long way down the road," she said in a singsong, lilting voice that sent chills up and down Ted's spine.
Lizzie turned to Officer Dewberry and snapped her fingers. "My client, please. Now!"
The tank moved forward. Lizzie's arm shot out for him to keep his distance. The finger went up again, wagging in warning as her left hand reached into her bag. She held out her business card. The tank reached for it, his face hard, his slate-gray eyes hooded. "Hold on here!"
"What does that mean?" Lizzie murmured. She sounded like she didn't care one way or the other what it was about.
The tank's lips thinned to a straight line. "It means the Babylon is dropping all charges against your client. They're prepared to be reasonable."
"The word reasonable is not in my vocabulary, Mister Cricket." Out of the corner of her eye, Lizzie detected movement. Marble Rose Barnes was walking toward her, still dressed in her hospital-type scrubs.
Ted's fingers continued to dance on his BlackBerry. He stopped long enough to step backward and snap a few pictures.
Cricket's canoes moved suddenly. "Who is that guy?" he demanded.
Panic rippled across Ted's face, but he continued jabbing at the keys. He wondered if it was possible to get carpal tunnel syndrome of the fingers. Lizzie allowed her eyebrows to shoot upward. The lashes were working overtime, as were the glistening lips. Ted rather thought it was time for a fresh application. He held his breath while he waited for Lizzie's response to the question.
"He's whoever you want him to be, Mister Cricket."
Perfect response, Ted thought as he tapped more words down the line to Maggie.
"Come along, dear," Lizzie said, taking Marble Rose's arm and leading her toward the door. "These gentlemen will take care of all that nasty paperwork."
"Who. . .who was that monster?" Marble Rose asked as she took one last look over her shoulder.
Lizzie laughed. "Isn't the circus in town, Ted?"
"Jesus, Lizzie, that took some balls," Ted said, getting into the front passenger seat. Marble Rose climbed into the back. Lizzie slid behind the wheel, gunned the engine, and turned the wheel a little too hard to the left. Ted almost blacked out at the loud crunching sound.
"Ooops, did you see what I just did?" Lizzie powered down the window and stared at the mess she'd just created. She shifted gears, moved forward, then shifted into REVERSE. A second loud crunching sound boomed in the quiet morning. She hopped out and stuck her business card under the windshield wiper, but not before she scribbled down her insurance information and snapped a picture on her cell phone. "Damn, I just can't seem to do anything right this morning." She was back in the Rover a second later and dialing the number of the office she'd just exited. She made a breathless report and ended up with, "Call me anytime, I will cooperate fully." A second later she barreled out of the parking lot.
"That was pretty ballsy," Marble Rose chirped from the backseat.
Ted almost got whiplash as he craned his neck for a better look at the damage Lizzie had done to the 1.7-million-dollar car. Oh, man, the tank was going to be one pissed car owner. Then he started to laugh. His money was definitely on the woman racing down the road.
"You think? Where to, honey?"
Marble Rose looked out the window to get her bearings and started to give directions.
Officer Dewberry scrunched his eyes in concentration as he copied down the information one Elizabeth Fox was calling in. Sooner or later the owner of the car would come storming through the door. And he had just ten more minutes until it was time to go off duty. Let Mitchelson, his replacement, deal with it. He was so relieved to see the two lawyers leave, he skedaddled to the men's room.
Forty minutes later Lizzie pulled into a residential neighborhood, took two left turns, then pulled into a driveway next to a small brick house with a front porch and tons of flowers everywhere. Lizzie got out of the truck and looked around. It all looked so very normal. Out on the street, two little girls wearing helmets were riding their bicycles, their mothers hovering nearby. Somewhere a dog barked, another barked in return.
Marble Rose frowned. "I don't have a key. It was in my wallet. Do you think you could call a locksmith for me?"
"I can do better than that." Lizzie rooted around in her purse until she found what she wanted and went to work. The door opened, and she led the way inside. "Now you call a locksmith to change the tumblers, Miss Barnes."
Marble Rose walked out to her kitchen to look for her address book.
While her client called from a landline, Lizzie called her insurance company and reported the accident. "Yes, Mr. Richardson, it was my fault, but the owner's car was parked over the white line so I didn't have enough maneuvering room. I really don't know who the owner is. I left my card and your number. I also called the police and reported it. I was in their parking lot but was late for an appointment, so I couldn't wait. Fine, you know how to reach me."
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