We didn’t exchange words until we were inside my office. I gestured for him to take a seat as I made my way around the monstrous desk, dumping the bag I carried the extreme amount of paperwork required for this job every day on a side table. I settled in my chair and dug out a legal pad and a pen before focusing on this stranger again.
“So, amnesia?”
The man nodded. “I was in an accident a little over a year ago. I woke up in a hospital in a small town not far from Austin and had no memory of the accident, the town, the hospital … nothing. They told me I had a security pass on me when they brought me in, but no one could find it when it was time to let me go.”
“A security pass? Did they say for what?”
He shook his head. “No one could remember. It had been a little over a month by the time I woke up. I guess no one really took that close a look at it.”
I made a note on the pad and then sat back, my eyes moving over that scar again. “Is that where you got the scar?”
He reached up and touched it. “Yeah. They said I crushed my skull and this eye socket. They did their best to repair it, but couldn’t quite remove all the scars.”
“Do you have any information on the accident? A police report or anything like that?”
He nodded, digging in a bag I hadn’t even seen him carrying. He pulled out a file folder and slid it over the desk to me. “Everything I know is in there.”
I opened the file and was immediately greeted with a picture of a man—this man, I assumed—covered in bandages, lying on a hospital bed. His face was bruised and swollen, blood visible on his skin and soaking through the bandages. Whatever the accident, it had been serious.
There were several pages of notes from the hospital and then the accident report from the cops. It was the responding officer’s opinion that it was a one car accident, caused by driver error. He suggested that the driver—again, the man sitting across from me—had fallen asleep while driving, causing him to miss a curve at high speed.
I glanced through the rest of the information, but there didn’t seem to be a lot there.
“Have you ever hired a private investigator to look into any of this?”
The man held up four fingers. “Four different investigators. The first while I was still in the hospital, the second just after I was released. And again a month ago. But none of them could find anything more than what’s in that file.”
I closed the file and sat back. “What about the people at the hospital? Did you say anything when they brought you in that gave them any indication of who you might be?”
He shook his head. “The only clue was the name on the security badge. Richard Chandler.”
“Does that sound familiar to you?”
“No. It doesn’t mean anything to me.”
I glanced at his file again, thinking Waverly might be able to work a little computer magic and find something more, but it was a long shot. His best bet would be to go back to the hospital where he was taken after the accident.
“We could assign an investigator, but it would cost quite a bit.”
“That’s not a problem.” He shifted a little in his chair. “But I wasn’t really as concerned with the investigator as I was with some sort of protection. Do you think I could hire one of your people to kind of follow me around? Just to be there?”
“Do you think you’re in danger?”
The man chuckled uncomfortably, his eyes dropping to his lap. “It sounds really stupid, but I think someone’s been following me.”
“What makes you think that?”
He sighed. “There’s been the same dark SUV outside my apartment three days in a row. And the same man has been in the crowd around me when I’m out in public.”
“For three days? This hasn’t been happening since you got out of the hospital?”
“No. Just the last three days.”
“Okay.” I tapped my fingers on the computer, thinking things over. “I can give you a bit of a discount and let you have an operative for a few days. But after that—”
“I have money. I told you.” He stood up and dug in his jeans pocket. He pulled out a roll of money that was as thick as my fist. “That should cover most of it, but let me know. There’s more where that came from.”
I picked up the roll, a little shocked, to be perfectly honest. We’d never had a client pay our fees in cash.
“This should be more than enough.”
“Good. I’d like to start immediately.”
“Of course.”
I woke my computer and scanned through our system, checking to see who was available for a new case. Rhett Dennings, one of our best investigators, had just finished a case. She’d love this one. She was an ace at finding missing people. It shouldn’t be that difficult for her to find this guy’s past.
“We have an operative who is a former cop. Rhett worked with the missing people’s unit of the San Diego police department before we made an offer. And, as a cop, Rhett learned all the skills necessary to keep you safe.”
“Great.”
“I’ll just give her a call, get her up here.”
“Her?”
The guy looked surprised by the pronoun, but not offended. I studied his face for a second. Sometimes we had clients who were offended by having a woman assigned to their case, as if a woman couldn’t protect them as well as a man. But Chandler didn’t seem offended. Just surprised.
“Rhett is a very capable operative. Her gender has never been an issue.”
The guy just shrugged. “Okay.”
I nodded, picking up the phone before he could change his mind again.
This case was going to be interesting, that was for sure.
Chapter 2
Rhett
I dropped my bag on my desk in the middle of the pit, cursing when I caught my finger in the damn strap. It’d been a long damn night and I really wasn’t looking forward to another eight hours stuck at this desk catching up on my reports. Who liked writing reports, anyway? And why did people insist on them? I knew what happened out in the field. The client knew what happened out in the field. Why did we have to write it all down? It wasn’t like any of this was going to court like it would be if I was still on the force.
I quit the force with the hope that I wouldn’t have to do any of this bullshit anymore.
Well, that obviously wasn’t the only reason I quit the force. But it was part of it.
“How’s it going, Rhett?” Brian, another of the operatives around Dragon, asked as he took my shoulders in his hands to slide past me to his own desk.
“Just great. Another freaking day of paperwork!”
He laughed. “Well, if you finished your reports after each case …”
I threw a pen at him. He just caught it and tossed it back, much to the amusement of the other operatives sitting at their desks, entertaining themselves with solitaire on their computers while they waited for the morning meeting.
I sat in a huff and laid my head on the desk. Last night had been a long night, one of those nights that was fun while it was happening, but not as much fun the next morning. What made me think I could drink that much and not regret it the next day? I knew going out with Jesse was a mistake, but who could resist those big, doe-baby eyes?
Someone touched my shoulder, trying to get my attention. I shrugged, thinking it was Brian again. But it wasn’t.
“Hayden wants to see you, Rhett.”
I sat up, groaning as Amelia backed away. She was another operative, one of those little, petite things that packed a hell of a punch when you pissed her off enough. But even she knew not to get up in my face.
“What does he want?”
She shrugged. “He didn’t say. He just said for you to go upstairs.”
Probably going to yell at me for not having my reports ready.
Hayden was more than a fair, reasonable boss. He earned his employees’ loyalty by always going the extra mile for them, so they turned and did the same for him whenever possibl
e. But he had a thing for getting paperwork in on time, and I … didn’t.
I sighed, pushing my chair back hard as I stood, forcing it into the desk behind me. Kasey, the operative who sat behind me, jumped a little as his desk vibrated. I flipped him off, not really in the mood to be nice.
“Thanks, Rhett. But some other time, ’k?”
I stormed off, catching an elevator as it started to slide closed. Luke, the boss’ man, was standing at the back, leaning against the wall. I inclined my head respectfully—wouldn’t pay to piss him off—and jammed my finger into the appropriate button.
“Bad day?” he asked.
I shrugged. “I think I’m about to get in trouble.”
“For what?”
“Not doing my reports.”
He shook his head kind of casually. “I don’t think so. You have a new case.”
I looked over at him, not sure how he knew that, since cases were assigned at Hayden’s discretion. But, again, he was the boss’ husband.
He shrugged, a dark cloud brushing over his face as the elevator stopped on the first floor and the doors opened. He didn’t say anything else as he stepped off the elevator and strode across the marble floors. I watched him until the doors slid closed and the elevator headed back upstairs. There was something odd about that guy, but it wasn’t really my place to try and figure it out.
I gathered up my confidence and, once the elevator vomited me out, walked with my head held high down the hall to Hayden’s office. The door was open and he was sitting behind his desk, leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed.
He wasn’t alone. There was a man sitting in a chair in front of his desk. I could only see his back. He was wearing a leather jacket that stretched nicely over wide shoulders. His hair was cut short, tapered along his neckline.
The man cared about his appearance, but that wasn’t terribly shocking in regards to a client of Dragon. Most of the people who came in here had pockets full of money and reputations to uphold. What a difference from the scum I often had to associate with at the SDPD.
“Rhett,” Hayden said, standing as he gestured for me to come into the room. “I have a new client for you to meet.”
The stranger stood and turned to face me, his hands buried in his jeans pockets as he rocked back on his heels, a little awkward as he smiled at me. I stared at him, feeling as though a shockwave had just washed over my body.
The man was … the only word was hot! He was dark—Italian, maybe?—with that stylish black hair and dark, smoldering eyes. But it wasn’t just that. He had these long, luscious eyelashes that gave his eyes even more depth and heavy brows that should have been unattractive but weren’t.
He had a long jaw and high cheekbones, full lips, and a narrow patrician nose. There was a five o’clock shadow even though it was only nine in the morning, a scruffy look that worked with the jeans and the leather jacket.
Hot. There was definitely no other word for it.
“Rhett Dennings, meet Mr. Chandler.”
I inclined my head slightly, wanting to offer a hand but not sure I could stand to be touched, even in such a mundane way, by this hunk of a man. And he didn’t seem too eager to shake my hand either. His hands remained stuck deep in his pockets.
“Mr. Chandler was in an accident a year ago and cannot remember who he is.”
I tilted my head slightly. I’d assumed I was being called in because he was missing a family member or he required some sort of simple bodyguard service. Those were basically my specialties here at Dragon. I’d participated in a couple of undercover cases, but usually with other operatives. But I’d never helped a person find themselves.
Hayden gestured for us to take our seats. I settled in a chair beside Mr. Chandler, giving him a little side-eye, trying to figure this stranger out. I’d never met anyone who had amnesia. In fact, I’d kind of assumed it was a condition that creative writers had made up years ago to sell books and television shows. Who could actually forget their entire lives, especially for a whole year? It didn’t seem logical.
“Why don’t you tell Rhett what you know?” Hayden said, gesturing to our guest.
Mr. Chandler shrugged, pulling his hands out of his pockets and clutching them in his lap. He had big hands, long fingers that my grandmother would have said were ideal for a pianist. There were no scars on his hands, no calluses that might have suggested he worked with them for a living. An executive, maybe? Or some sort of accountant? He didn’t seem the type.
“I woke in a hospital in a small town outside Austin a little less than a year ago. They told me I’d been in a serious accident and had been in a coma for over a month. They told me that when they brought me in I had a security badge on with the name Richard Chandler on it, but nothing else. They said I had fractured my skull and that likely caused the memory loss. They thought it would come back within a few weeks, but it didn’t.”
He had this really deep voice that made my belly quiver and my bones turn to liquid. It was a struggle to pay attention to what he was saying.
“I hired a few private detectives to help me find out who I am, but they weren’t able to find a thing.”
“What about the car you were driving when the accident happened?” I asked. “Was it registered to you? Was it registered in Texas or elsewhere?”
“It was a rental.”
“Rented by whom?”
“Richard Chandler.”
“Where?”
He frowned, drawing out a small dimple in one cheek. “It was a place at the airport in Dallas. DFW.”
“Then you drove from Dallas to Austin. That’s something we can go on.”
Hayden opened a drawer and pulled out a set of keys and a credit card. “Take these. I want the two of you to go to Austin and speak to the people at the hospital, the cops who investigated the accident, anyone who might know something about him or who might help him jog his memory. You have my permission to go and do whatever you need to do to follow up on leads.”
One of the things that I—and everybody else—liked about Hayden was how practical he was about job-related expenses. He didn’t like spendthrifts, but he also didn’t nickel and dime us. In our line of work, money often had to be spent to get the job done, and Hayden understood that.
I grabbed the keys and credit card off his desk and stood.
“Mr. Chandler, could you wait outside for a moment?”
“Of course.”
I watched him go, unable to ignore the way his ass moved under those jeans. He had long legs and a wide stride, giving power to his movements. This man couldn’t sneak in and out of a room, because he was a spectacle just in the perfection of his body. It sent shivers of pleasure up and down my spine to watch him. That was the most pleasure a man had given me in quite some time.
“Rhett,” Hayden said after Chandler closed the door and I was still standing there, probably drooling quite disrespectfully.
I turned, clearing my throat. “Sir?”
“I want you to be very careful on this case.” That was another classic Hayden trait: constant worrying about his employees’ safety. “It makes me nervous that we don’t know much about this guy and we can’t do a search on him. For all we know, he’s some sort of serial killer.”
I smiled, the idea that that man might be a killer amusing to me for some reason.
“He thinks he’s being followed. It could just be paranoia, but it could be real. Keep him close to you. When you get a hotel room, make sure it’s a suite or a single room so you can keep tabs on his comings and goings. Stay close to him during the day, watching him for signs of mental instability or deception. At the first sign of trouble, I want you to call for backup. Understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
He handed me a file folder. “This is all the information he’s been able to gather about himself. Keep it, study it.”
I nodded.
“Take him to Waverly and have her talk to him for a few minutes. See if she can get anything fr
om him that she can use to do a search. Maybe she can do her magic and find something.”
Hayden winced slightly as he spoke her name, and I was reminded that Waverly was working the same position that Sam had once held. Hayden could have been an ass about the new woman on the job, one who undoubtedly reminded him constantly of his dead love, but typically Hayden, he remained the consummate professional.
“The code name for this one will be Echidna,” he added.
“Echidna? Is that even a word?”
“A name. She was a snake-headed woman who was the mother of most of the Greek monsters.”
I snorted. “Why would you think mother when you think of me?”
“Maybe it was more the monster part,” Hayden said, dropping a wink at me. “Now get out of my office and get a move on. And be safe.”
“Yes, sir.”
Chandler was waiting out in the hallway, his back against the wall.
“What do I call you?”
He shrugged. “Most people just call me Richard.”
“Okay. You can call me Rhett.”
“Nice to meet you, Rhett.” His eyes sparkled a little with amusement. “Your mother a fan of Gone with the Wind?”
“Rhett Butler? Yeah.”
He smiled. “She has good taste.”
I bit my lip, deciding not to tell him that my mom was a foul mouthed drunk who would have preferred to sit and watch movies all day to raising her children. Or that she ran off with the mailman, the milkman, and the barber at different times in my childhood, but my dad continued to welcome her back with open arms. Not the kind of impression I wanted to make on a client this early in our budding relationship.
“Hayden wants you to speak to our computer expert, so I’ll drop you off there, go home and pack a bag, then pick you up and we can stop to get your stuff on the way to Austin.” I watched him for a reaction, but didn’t get one. “Does that sound good?”
He shrugged. “Whatever you think is best.”
A non-committal kind of guy. Great.
Waverly was happy to spend a few minutes locked in her office with him—but who wouldn’t be?
I found myself dawdling over my packing in a way I hadn’t done before. But it wasn’t every day I found out I was going to be spending some long, intimate hours with a hot guy, either. Not that there was much in the way of sexy clothing in my closet. I was a jeans and T-shirts kind of girl. Or sweats. That was my favorite thing to wear.
DRAGON SECURITY: Volume 2: The Complete 6 Books Series Page 17
