“What?” he asked.
“You need something more. Go sit down somewhere.”
Slightly taken aback, he did what he was told. Jack raised the hatch of the SUV and sat on the back.
She looked him square in the eye and said softly, “Now, I need you to spread your legs.”
“Is there anything more you want me to do?” He grinned.
Cassie was very aware of how close she was to him when she stepped in next to his muscular thighs. “I’ll let you know.”
He held her gaze, and her heart skipped several beats. This was a different Jack than what she was used to. And then it hit her. He was flirting with her as she was with him, and he didn’t seem to mind.
“What exactly are you planning to do?” he asked, almost smirking.
“You’ll see.”
Attached to the hair spray can had been a thick black eyeliner pencil. Concentrating on his brows, she darkened and broadened them. Cassie leaned back and studied his face.
“Not quite.”
Next, she took the side of the pencil and darkened his beard along his cheeks. Gently, she took her fingers and smoothed his cheek for an even look. Last was the area above his mouth. She smeared the black pencil on her fingertip before applying it. Her fingers traced the outline of his lips, stopping on the lower lip. She had never really noticed his mouth, always his eyes, but she did now. Her pulse kicked up several notches, and it was hard to breathe. Cassie stepped back away from his thighs.
“I’m finished.”
The air sizzled, just like her skin.
His eyes locked into hers. “Darn.”
Jack Wyatt had never flirted with her in her entire life. Why now? Could it be something simple like Montana had explained? A redhead? Her face felt hot, and an amused look crossed his.
Montana stepped over to survey Cassie’s work. “Wow. Now I see what you meant that he needed something more. Jack, go look in the mirror.”
Her friend Alexa was a pro, but Cassie thought she’d done a good job. Gone was the man from Colorado; Jack now resembled someone from the Mediterranean.
He returned, adjusting his hat and smiling at Cassie. “You did a great job. Obviously you have experience in creating a disguise.” He raised his brows at her, but she gave a noncommittal shrug back. Finally, what seemed like forever to her, Jack made a sweeping gesture toward the beach. “Ladies, after you. Try to keep your profile so your full face is never seen.”
The tides were out, allowing for an easy walk. Montana stepped ahead, walking close to the water’s edge. From a distance, it appeared exactly what they wanted: people strolling along without a care in the world. At times, she called for Cassie to join her and would point out something in the sand. A few moments later, Jack joined them. This continued until the culprit house came into view.
“We’re almost in front of the house,” Montana said into her wool poncho to Ray. “There’s a driftwood log that Cassie and Jack can sit down on. I can get their picture.” Montana called to them. “Okay you two, I need you to sit on the log, look like you’re sweethearts, and I’ll get your pic.”
“That shouldn’t be too hard.” He looped his arm around Cassie’s shoulder and brought her in close to him. Jack leaned down with his face almost in her chest and said to Ray, “This is fun. I get to talk to Cassie’s chest.”
Ray laughed. And then it hit her. Jack was enjoying himself, having a good time. With her.
“Remember to shield your face,” Jack reminded Montana.
Montana fussed and took pictures up close and stood further back. She had Jack and Cassie position themselves in different poses on the log. “Well, you are never going to believe this, but I am pretty sure the couple, who are lip-locking on the deck, are Margery Anne and Rob Armstrong.” Montana continued to snap away.
“So that’s why all the interest in the minister’s wife. She’s having an affair with the man in the photo.” Cassie double checked Jack’s face and saw confirmation.
“Hmm.” Jack pulled her in close, with his face next to hers. Montana grinned and continued to take shots over their shoulders. “It has that appearance, doesn’t it?”
“Lots of people have affairs, but it must be whom she’s having one with. So he is a person of interest, and this has to do with I.C.E.” Jack’s expression verified her thoughts. “So what’s he doing here?”
“When he arrived on Hartz Island last spring, he claimed he was here on a sabbatical to write a novel.”
“And you don’t believe hi… How in the world did the minister’s wife get hooked up with him?” People probably said the same thing about her and Sergei.
“They’re long lost friends.”
“Well, at least she has an excuse.” It was more than she had. Cassie pushed up from the log and started walking down the beach.
Jack jogged past her, and then turned back, making a loop around her. “By the way, I like you as a redhead.”
Surprised, she stopped and stared at him. “Me too. I’m thinking of chopping off my hair and dyeing it this color.” Cassie watched his reaction.
He nodded his head. “Then you wouldn’t be Princess Sassy Face any longer.”
“No, I wouldn’t.” And she rather liked that idea.
They continued to walk down the beach, almost at her family’s house.
“You can’t even see where we lay in the sand last night.”
“Hey, I can hear you,” said Ray. “Montana just said for you to turn around and head back her way. The lip-lockers retreated inside.”
Montana waved and pointed to the water. Cassie couldn’t tell if something was really out there or if she was pretending. Jack picked up a handful of stones and tossed them in while they walked along, something Cassie remembered him doing a long time ago with her brother. If it wasn’t rocks, it was a football. Jack had played football for the Huskies at the University of Washington until he was injured. Even though she was only fourteen, she remembered how upset her Dad had been for Jack.
When they arrived back at the vehicles, Ray and Montana were clicking through the photos on the small digital camera.
“This confirms MAMW is still hanging out with Armstrong. Not good.” Ray handed the camera and Montana’s borrowed cellphone to Jack.
“MAMW?” Cassie asked.
“Margery Anne, the Minister’s Wife,” Montana said. “Ray, can’t you do something?”
“What? She’s not breaking any laws that I know of. Yet. People hang out with scum all the time.”
“But still…”
“At the moment, it’s a domestic issue. Until he touches her, I can’t do a damn thing.”
“She’s in over her head. Clueless to what’s happening.”
“That’s never stopped people before,” replied Ray.
Cassie assumed nonchalance, though she felt Jack staring at her. It took all her concentration not to fidget and remain calm. They could have been talking about her. He handed the camera back to Ray and asked him to e-mail the photos.
“All this spying has made me hungry. Anyone interested in getting lunch?” Montana asked, zeroing in on Ray.
He returned her smile. “Sure. A man’s gotta eat. Jack?”
“No. Cassie and I need to get over to Anacortes on the next ferry.”
That was news to her. Jack opened the passenger door for her, and she climbed in. He quietly said, “We need to talk,” before shutting the door. A sudden queasiness settled in her stomach.
Chapter Fourteen
Jack pulled in next to the house and parked. “Gather some things in case we don’t make it back here tonight. I just want to get this stuff washed off, and then I’ll be ready to go.”
“If we’re not here, where would we be?”
“My place in Seattle.”
“Oh.”
His place in Seattle. She had no idea where that might be. In fact, she had very little knowledge of Jack’s life now. Cassie followed him into the house and headed upstairs to remove her disguise. When she finished, she took her small duffel, stuffed it with the few things she owned, and returned to the kitchen. Jack had his head under the kitchen faucet, scrubbing his hair with bar soap. He rinsed off, and then toweled his hair and turned to her.
“Where’s your stuff?”
She held up the bag.
“That’s all you have?”
Cassie nodded. She didn’t even want to guess what he was thinking.
“Do you have anything to read or do while I’m busy?”
Without bothering to answer, she went in search of a book. Her mom had always kept a box full of paperbacks in the storage closet under the stairs. Now with lights, it was easy to see everything in the closet. One of the walls now had shelves filled with books, puzzles, games, and photo albums. Cassie recognized the photo albums from her parent’s home in Bellevue. Mike had brought them up here. She reached for an album and opened it. Her grandmother as a young woman stared back at her. Some of her best memories of her childhood were spent with her grandmother.
“You look like her,” said Jack, peering over her shoulder.
She swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded her head. “It’s my Irish grandmother. I wish I was more like her. She was a force to be reckoned with.”
He grinned. “And you’re not?”
She looked at him to see if he was making fun of her. He might have been grinning, but his eyes were serious.
“Believe it or not, when you were a teenager, you scared the bejesus out of me.”
Astonished, she stared at him.
“You still have it, just find it.” He waited until she put the album back and found a book before turning out the light. “We need to get going so we don’t miss the ferry. If you’re hungry, we can get a snack on the ferry or wait until we get to Anacortes.”
Jack locked the doors behind Cassie and joined her in the truck.
He stopped at the end of their drive.
“I know, I know. By the way, how long do I have to do this?” She ducked down.
“Until I nail the asshole.”
“When is that going to be?”
“Soon, I hope.”
During the thirty minute ride to the ferry terminal, Cassie stared out the window and thought about Jack’s comment. Alexa had made a similar one to her. Her grandmother would never have allowed herself to get into this situation. If it took scrubbing floors to stay independent, Gran would have. And that was the difference. Cassie had wanted the easy way out. She had become so self-absorbed that she was clueless to what was happening around her and to her.
The ferry had just docked. How different it looks during the day than last night, thought Cassie. Last night it seemed spooky because of all the tall evergreens and firs. The last car exited, and then they were waved on, directed to the right, parking up front with the best view. Going eastbound, the ferry stopped at one other island before Anacortes, which allowed enough time to get a drink or snack.
“Are you hungry?” Jack asked.
“I am, but I can wait. Coffee sounds good though. What about you?”
“Coffee does sound good.” His smartphone dinged. “I need to check my messages first.”
“Then I’m going to go ahead and go on up, if that’s okay with you?”
He nodded to Cassie with his cellphone to his ear. She grabbed her purse and headed to the upper deck.
Jack’s first message was from his FBI source updating him on Sergei Koslov and any persons of interest attached to that case. So far, Cassie was still in the clear, which was good because Jack didn’t want to have to arrest her. The second message was from Kip, saying to call him, which he did. Kip had put some feelers out to his sources in Los Angeles about Cassie, and one of them had gotten back to him.
“Jack, evidently Cassie took something of value from that Russian, and he wants it back. No one is saying what it is, but my source said she needs to be worried.”
“Ah, shit. What could she possibly have? She showed up with nothing but a few clothes. Not even a cellphone. How worried?”
“Extremely.”
“Ah, hell.”
“I’ll keep digging.”
“Thanks. I’ll see what I can find out from her.”
In one sense, Jack wanted to storm up to the ferry deck and demand she tell him what the hell was going on, but he also knew that would cause her to clam up. He saw fear in her eyes when he said he was staying behind and not walking the beach.
Jack headed to the upper deck and found her on the outside rail, staring out. He noticed she’d been doing that a lot. Even though her hair had been tied in a ponytail, the breeze had loosened much of it and curled it around like licorice curls, one of his favorite treats.
“Hey, Cass.”
She turned, and smiled. All the licorice curls blew around her face. “Did you get some coffee?”
“No, I was waiting for you.”
“Let’s go inside and sit. It’s chilly out here.”
Jack pointed to a table near the windows, away from people, and started to walk toward it.
“Wait, Jack.”
He stopped.
“I’m buying. How do you like your coffee?” she asked.
Taken aback, he paused, and then replied, “This seems like a two sugars and cream sort of day. If they have flavored creamers, pick out Irish Crème.”
Now he had to be a butt and try to get personal information from a woman buying him coffee with gorgeous licorice curls for hair. Cassie returned with a handful of flavored creamers, including Irish Crème. They both took their time prepping their coffee, then sipping away. The silence between them was filled with the sounds of the ferry chugging along.
In unison, they both said the other’s name, and then chuckled.
“Ladies first.”
“I don’t know anything about you now, if you are married, have kids, or anything.”
“No and no.” He grinned. “Not that I’m aware of.”
She smiled faintly at his humor. “Have you ever been married?”
“No. I was engaged twice, but she called one off, and I called the other off.”
“Oh. Why?”
“I suppose it’s the nature of my work. I was gone a lot. What about you?”
She took her time answering. “No. I was very caught up on being an actress and all the trappings.” She shrugged and glanced away but then looked at him square in the eye. He swore he saw a glint of anger from the old Cassie days. “Do you know there’s a classification in Hollywood? I’m not even a B-grade actress.”
“I saw you on your series. I thought you were pretty good.”
“Oh, right. Now you’re being patronizing.”
“No, no, I’m not. I don’t know anything about this stuff, but I thought you were good.”
“Thank you.”
“What about the man you were living with? What happened there?” Oddly, he really wanted to know.
She bit her lip and concentrated on her coffee. Jack sensed she was trying to sort through it. He knew he judged people to a higher standard, and this could be one of those times. Bob and Marie Ryan had raised their children with moral fiber, so he wondered how she justified it all.
“Half the job in Hollywood is being seen. You need to go to the top nightclubs, be at the best parties, wear the right clothes. I had a few commercials, got my hair gig, and then landed my daytime series, but still I was never considered hot, where your agent has so many offers they don’t know what to do. But I kept trying. After Mom and Dad died, I just fell apart.” S
he took a deep breath and closed her eyes. After a few moments, she looked at Jack and shrugged, but then bit her lip. He had an idea of what she was thinking about and nodded his head.
“Dad had leveraged everything, including our home in Bellevue. But no one knew, not even Mike. Payroll had always been met. The morning after the funeral, the nightmare started unfolding. Marliss had gone on home to sleep, but Mike had stayed with me at the house. At seven in the morning, the doorbell just kept ringing. Mike came and got me out of bed and told me to get dressed in a hurry. I didn’t have a clue what was going on. My mother’s Mercedes Benz was being repossessed. Mike didn’t want the neighbors to see, so he drove it out and I followed in his car. My parent’s cars had been leased, and no payments had been made for some time. Dad’s was totaled from the accident, so they came for Mom’s. From then on, it just got worse. Without my dad and his wheeling and dealing, the construction company couldn’t go on. The creditors were like piranhas. Everything was liquidated. At that point, Mike just wanted to save my parent’s reputation.”
“I knew it had been bad, but you still had the island house.”
“Only because a trust had been created years ago for the island house and the two rentals Dad and Mom had. Dad put my name and Mike’s on the trust as a protection in case he went belly-up. Trust me, the creditors and bankers tried to get it all.”
“So you were twenty-eight and everything you knew and the life you’d been raised with was taken away from you. And with it, your parents.”
Cassie didn’t speak, just nodded, and wiped away a tear. Jack left and returned with fresh coffee.
“Tell me the rest,” he said quietly.
“Money was tight, but I didn’t quit. One of the guys who lived in my apartment building worked as a doorman at one of the hottest clubs, and he’d let me in for free, otherwise I couldn’t get in.”
“Why not?” If she’d stood at his nightclub, he’d let her in in a heartbeat.
Deep Into The Night (Hartz Island Series) Page 10
