Taking Care of the Target

by Cindi Madsen

  Vince’s gaze automatically moved across the street at McCarthy’s. Yeah. Good thing he’d never been in love, or who knew what he might do. Maybe something crazy like dodge bullets, spend a day on surveillance looking out for a silver car-shaped needle in a haystack, and consider how far he could get if he tried to run away from his family…

  The answer to that last one immediately popped into his head: not very far before Carlo came after the both of them.

  “Sounds like a real pain in the ass,” Vince said. “Guess I’ll keep on avoiding it.”

  “Ah, there’s good days, too. Gotta remember the good days. So, did something change with the girl? Angelo said you didn’t come in today.”

  Vince knew he purposely didn’t use Cassie’s name in case they were being listened to. “I needed to take care of a few things, and the restaurant runs fine without me, right?” Before Carlo could answer, because it’d inevitably end in a back and forth about which side of the business he should be in, he moved on. “Things are the same.”

  How long would they have to stay that way until his uncle would forget about Cassie, and she could live a normal life?

  “Good, good,” Carlo said. “You can back off. No need to waste your time.”

  Vince’s lungs tightened. Easy enough… if someone else wasn’t tailing her. “She’s got a follow-up doctor’s appointment next week. I told her I’d go with her for moral support.”

  There he went, digging the hole a little deeper so it could cave in later and bury him. Yes, he was looking out for her, but his reasons were selfish as well. He didn’t want to let go. The simple nights at her place, her laugh, the way she moved around the kitchen, and the kisses that made him crave more…Those were the things he’d miss most.

  “Keep me updated,” Carlo said. “And make sure you find out how likely she is to regain her memories.”

  “I will. I just want to be as thorough as possible.”

  Might as well dig deeper while I’m at it. At least after next week I can tell him the doctor told her they are gone for good, and she’ll be safe again.

  “As soon as you wrap that up, we’ll talk other options. You know, if you were my number two, you’d have even more protection. Bobby would fall under it, too.”

  And there it was. Another reason to delay.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “Can you take my table their food?” Tyra asked Cassie. “The guy is such a perv, and I can’t take his staring anymore. I’m sure you won’t have any problems.” The Queen of the Backhanded Compliments raised dark eyebrows. “Yes or no?”

  “Sure,” Cassie said, taking the extended tray. Her thoughts were too consumed with worrying about Vince to debate Tyra. Maybe I shouldn’t have told him about the car.

  She delivered the food and approached an elderly couple who’d just been seated in her area.

  The woman, who had to be in her seventies at the least, wore a brightly colored halter-top and a red skirt shorter than the one Cassie had on. The tiny strap keeping her top in place stretched tight as she leaned forward. Wow, the woman had confidence, Cassie would give her that. She just wasn’t sure she wanted to witness her confidence, especially if that strap gave way.

  As she ran through the specials, she couldn’t help wondering if the husband bragged to all his friends that his wife still dressed sexy. Working to keep a snort-laugh from escaping, she focused on their order.

  “I’ll have the shrimp pomodor,” the man said.

  His wife frowned at him. “You don’t want that. It’s got chili flakes. You’ll get heartburn.”

  “I’ll just take my pills.”

  “He doesn’t want that,” the woman insisted, turning to Cassie. “Bring him the trout with the honey butter glaze.”

  “I think I know what I want! And I want the shrimp!”

  They went back and forth, with the wife pointing out other menu options the husband continued to shake his head at.

  Funny enough, this happened a lot, mostly from couples who’d been together a long time. In a strange way, Cassie supposed it was nice to have someone who knew if you got heartburn after certain dishes. She wondered if the two of them started out arguing about the little things, day one, or if it happened with age.

  Maybe he used to demand he drop her off and pick her up from work. Maybe he said he’d trust her judgment, kissed her until she forgot she’d ever been mad, and then turned around and did the opposite.

  How did you get from point A to point B? She couldn’t help wondering how long this couple had been together. If they had kids and grandkids. Since her parents died young—her mom after only five short years of marriage—couples who’d grown old together had always fascinated Cassie. Sometimes she wondered if you got crazy-strong love for a little while, like her parents, or you got a lower but steady flow that lasted decades.

  Which would I choose if I had the choice? She’d seen how much Dad mourned Mom, even years after. He said there was no point in ever dating anyone else. Cassie alternately wanted and vetoed having that kind of all-consuming love.

  She and Vince definitely had passionate fireworks, both in the attraction and disagreeing, and it was already so intense. But is it too intense?

  Here I am turning a couple’s fight over food into a huge analysis of Vince’s and my barely relationship, when I should be focusing on the dilemma at hand. It’d be much easier to solve, anyway.

  “How about I put in an order for the shrimp, but ask them to leave off the chili flakes?”

  That seemed to satisfy both parties. Later tonight, she’d have to use those same compromising skills on Vince. Maybe she’d use her other powers of persuasion, too. Cassie discreetly checked the time. Just one more hour to go.

  About twenty minutes later she set the food down in front of the couple, and the woman wrinkled her nose. “What’s this green stuff?”

  “Basil,” Cassie said. “The salmon comes in a basil cream sauce.”

  The lady poked at it with a fork. “I wish it was rosemary.”

  Funny that she read the entire description of her husband’s meal, but hadn’t bothered to read her own.

  Well, at least the crowd’s colorful tonight. While Cassie didn’t mind that, she thought again about Vince’s culinary school suggestion. She constantly had to put herself out there as a waitress, and she’d love to be in the back, creating the dishes instead.

  That way someone could be complaining I’d used basil instead of rosemary, she thought with a smile.

  “I can get you some rosemary if you want,” Cassie said.

  “That’d be lovely.”

  On her way to the kitchen she ran into Tyra, because that was how this day was going.

  “Why don’t you ever wear contacts to work?”

  “I have issues with sticking my finger in my eye, so I don’t own contacts.”

  Tyra gave her a condescending, aren’t-you-precious type expression. “I just think it would amp up your whole look. I bet you’d get better tips, too.” With that, she took off.

  Culinary school was looking better by the second.

  ***

  Fifteen minutes after Cassie’s shift ended, and Vince still wasn’t there. She wasn’t sure if she should call or assert her independence by showing she was perfectly capable of walking home alone.

  Tyra glanced at her sitting in the waiting area, and Cassie decided either way, she needed to get out of McCarthy’s. She’d spent her break and the last few minutes looking into culinary institutes.

  Her mind was still spinning with the information she’d found when she stepped outside. She scrolled down to Vince’s name in her phone as she started toward her apartment.

  At the sounds of yelling, she froze. Adrenaline surged and she frantically glanced around.

  “I’m not here to hurt her, I swear!”

  The voice was coming from…there. Vince had a dark-haired guy halfway out the window of a silver car, his fists gripping the guy’s collared shirt.

  “
Oh, crap,” she said, breaking into a jog.

  She only caught fragments of the conversation.

  “… a P.I,” the struggling guy said. “I’ve just been hired…find her.” He looked about Vince’s age, with similar features. Dark hair, olive skin. Not nearly as ripped, though, which didn’t bode well for him right now.

  “Vince!” she yelled, and he glanced at her.

  “Hey, baby. I found out who’s been following you. Should we find out who asked him to do it?” He leaned closer to the guy’s face, menace dripping off him. “Who hired you?”

  “I can’t disclose the name.”

  Vince lifted the guy higher, the muscles in his arms flexing, and his voice turned hard as steel. “Wrong answer.”

  “Okay, okay. It was one of her classmates. She stopped showing up, and my client hired me to see what happened. I guess they were friends.”

  Vince turned to her. “Who were your college friends?”

  Cassie stared at him. Was this seriously happening? Any minute, someone was going to call the police. “Um, hello? Memory challenged, remember?”

  Vince loosened his grip on the man’s collar, and he slid into the car. “Right.”

  “Look, I’ll tell my client whatever you want,” Mr. Private Investigator said. “If you don’t want to be found, that’s fine.”

  Cassie leaned in to talk to the guy, and Vince held his arm out, keeping her back. “You can give your client my number, and I’ll decide.”

  “No, I’ll decide,” Cassie said, but the guy handed the notepad to Vince for obvious reasons. She turned her hard stare on Vince, adding crossed arms she hoped conveyed that she was serious.

  “Fine,” Vince muttered. “But they still call my number first.” He handed the notepad back to Mr. Private Investigator and gave him a grin that was more intimidation than humor. “You can never be too careful these days.”

  Mr. Private Investigator nodded. “Sure.”

  “And if I see your car again—”

  “You won’t. Can I…go now?”

  Vince jabbed a finger through the open car window. “You better not be lying, or our next meeting won’t go as well.”

  The man nodded again and started his car, obviously in a hurry to get away.

  Cassie grabbed Vince’s arm and pulled him back to the sidewalk. “So, how was your day?” she asked, throwing as much sarcasm into her words as she could.

  “Productive. Yours?”

  “Sucky. And then I come outside and find you being a total caveman. Was it really necessary to haul him halfway out of the car like that?”

  “Yes.” He put his hand on her back and guided her into the Jeep.

  She wasn’t sure how to feel about dating a Neanderthal, but she had to admit she felt pretty damn safe. Well, she’d admit it to herself. Vince didn’t need encouragement.

  When they pulled up to her apartment complex, Vince kept the engine running. “I told you from the beginning I wasn’t the do-gooder type and that my life was messy,” he said. “I’m not denying it. But I do know how to take care of problems, even if my methods are a little—”

  “Archaic? Caveman-esque? Crazy pants?”

  His eyebrows drew low over his eyes. “I was going to say unconventional.”

  She shook her head. “Unconventional barely scrapes the surface of describing you.”

  “I don’t think I’ve ever used the term crazy pants, either.”

  A laugh slipped out before Cassie clamped her lips shut.

  “Did I screw it up?” Vince asked, imploring her with those brown eyes she had such a hard time resisting.

  “I think…” His intense gaze and the way it made her heart hammer her rib cage made it hard to get words to come out right. She cleared her throat. “Well, I think security is a good field for you. And honestly, I would’ve died that night we were shot at if you hadn’t been there, and it’s good to know I wasn’t just paranoid, thinking someone was following me.”

  “But?”

  Cassie swallowed hard. The truth was, Vince terrified her. Not because she was scared he’d hurt her—not physically, anyway. Emotionally, though? She already relied on him too much, and she’d opened up to him more than she ever had with anyone else. She was starting to fall for him, and she didn’t think she could simply recover from a guy like Vince. Their vast differences made her wonder if they were crazy to even attempt a relationship. But the other option was ending things, and the thought of that made her lungs constrict.

  She ran her fingertip down the muscled line of his forearm. “But maybe we should try a little harder to have days not involving bullets or pulling people out of cars.”

  A lopsided smile spread across his face. “And I could trust your judgment a little more?”

  “Exactly. No demanding I have to wait for you to pick me up. And how about just ask guys why they’re following me before threatening them.”

  “People are so much more motivated to answer that way, though.”

  Cassie raised an eyebrow at him.

  He held up his hands. “Okay. For you, I’ll try a little less…archaic methods. Are you happy?”

  She nodded. “Skeptical, but happy.”

  “Smart girl,” he said. “Now, did you eat? Because as much as I love watching you cook, I think I owe you dinner out. Somewhere nice.”

  “Do I get to change first?”

  “Like any good apology dinner bribe, you get whatever you want.”

  She started out of the Jeep, then abruptly turned back and put her hand on the side of his face. “Just so you know, Vince DaMarco, I see you. The real you. Even if you don’t.”

  ***

  Jim sat in a corner booth facing the door of the restaurant so he would see Mancini come in. His gaze bounced from the bright colored sombreros to the sunbursts and pictures on the golden walls and then back to the door.

  When his partner called and said they needed to meet up, he sounded like he’d downed a case of Redbulls. Since they were both in Trenton, they’d decided on a local Mexican joint instead of making the drive to headquarters in Newark. The trip was an hour in good traffic, and it was getting old day after day, especially when they still had nothing to show for it.

  The door opened, and Mancini walked in. He charged over and sat across from Jim. “I screwed up. I think I screwed up big.”

  Jim automatically set his hand on the butt of his gun, checking it was there, even though he knew it was. “Is someone following you?” he asked, glancing at the door.

  “No. I made sure. But I…Well, you mentioned the waitress, and so I’ve been poking into her past here and there. Today I was in her neighborhood around the time she goes to work, so I followed her…” Mancini reached for the basket of chips and took one, but he tapped it against the table instead of eating it.

  “And?”

  “I thought I was being careful; I was so focused on her. I think she might’ve seen me this morning, so I backed off. But when I was waiting for her to get off work…” He went to tapping the chip until only crumbs remained.

  Jim clenched his jaw, trying not to shout at the kid to spit it out. “What happened?”

  “I was sitting there, my window down, and out of nowhere, this guy hauls me halfway out of the car and starts grilling me about following Cassie. I was so thrown it took me a few seconds to realize Cassandra was Cassie, and the guy yelling at me was Vince DaMarco.”

  Jim leaned forward, his heart quickening at the possible lead. “Vince DaMarco’s watching Cassandra Dalton?”

  “I…I’m pretty sure he’s dating her. I was fumbling through a story about being a P.I. when she came out of McCarthy’s. Yesterday I tracked down some of her classmates and asked them a few questions, so when he demanded to know who hired me, I told him it was one of her friends from college who just wanted to find her.”

  “That was good, thinking on your feet like that.” Jim tossed a chip in his mouth, trying to make heads or tails of the information. “Officer Duffy met
with her today and claimed she still didn’t remember anything. You think she and Vince have been dating the whole time? That she’s just got the cop fooled, along with the rest of us?”

  “I don’t think so. When Vince asked about her college friends, she mentioned not remembering them. None of her classmates knew much about her. They just said she was quiet and got good grades. A few of them mentioned her job at Rossi’s—they’d obviously heard rumors—but when I asked if she ever mentioned anything strange, they said she got mad if anyone implied her boss was connected.”

  “Think she was covering for them?”

  Mancini shrugged. “I don’t know. But she looked pretty worried for me when she ran over. I’m actually glad she showed up, because I’m not sure Vince would’ve let me off so easily otherwise. She calmed him down, and I got the hell out of there. He did give me his number to give to my imaginary client. The question is do we have someone call?”

  “You trust one of those college kids to not screw up the story?”

  Mancini sighed and shook his head. “No. One sharp word or look from Vince and they’d crack and confess all, and then we’d really be screwed. And if he sees me again…” He swallowed, making it clear the guy had shaken him.

  Vince DaMarco was clearly capable of following through on threats, but he spent all of his time at the restaurant, which made Jim doubt he was very high up in the chain of command, if he was a made man at all.

  Maybe he was in the process of changing that. His hours at Rossi’s had tapered off, and he was either dating or watching Cassandra Dalton. Possibly both. The question was, how much did she know about him?

  Nothing made sense. It was like they had all the pieces to the puzzle, but they still didn’t fit together.

  “Do we bring her in?” Mancini asked.

  “If we do, we might just end up getting her killed.” Jim grabbed another chip, the loud crunch mixing in with his loud thoughts. “Hell, I don’t know which way is up anymore.”

  “Did our undercover agent get anything from Dante Costa’s girlfriend?”