Karin woke tangled in sheets. Alone.
From the now to the morning after. Nice letdown.
Didn’t matter. She still owned the memory. Her skin still tingled from his touch, and his scent still lingered in her hair. She spent a moment savoring the sensations, and then she flipped back the sheets and headed for the bathroom.
Today was Dave’s turn to be outfitted. Karin put her hair back in a high ponytail and dug into her courier bag, into the depths of the pocket that wasn’t quite a bona fide hidden compartment. She flipped through the Brooke Ellington ID, satisfied that she’d grabbed everything, including alternative IDs. If Dave thought she’d made up the name on the spur of the moment, he was in for a surprise. Brooke was an old standby who “lived” in Florida but who’d done a lot of traveling for Karin.
She patted the paperwork and plastic and tucked it back away, then packed her new belongings in the new suitcase, ready to go. She reached the dining room just in time for the second serving, and she was spreading chunky spiced apples over her French toast-thick bakery bread, oh yum-when Dave arrived.
She thought he looked tired. It gave her some satisfaction; she had a pretty good idea how he’d gotten that way. He pulled out one of the wooden tapestry-backed chairs and sat down.
“Fruit?” she said, offering him her bowl of melon cubes.
“Ate at the early serving,” he told her, and then popped one of the juicy orange chunks into his mouth anyway. He wore jeans and that Red Wings sweatshirt this morning, though he still carried himself as if they were designer duds. His expression was far more pensive than melon-chewing could account for, and more remote than a man greeting his lover ought to be.
“Second thoughts?” she asked him. She forked the toast and apple mixture into her mouth and then had to close her eyes so she could absorb the wonderfulness of the combination.
When she opened them, there he was. Waiting. He nodded. “Second and third. But no better ideas. And Rashawn…” He scruffed up his hair. It didn’t look as if this was the first time, and the day was young. “They found him under a water tower across the tracks from North Glendale. Just dumped. Just like an-” He stopped himself, shaking his head. The words were there; Karin could all but see them. He just couldn’t bring himself to say them or perhaps to trust himself to stay calm about it. Instead he said, “No, I don’t like it. But I want to stop this bastard. If this is what it takes…”
There was no need to say that Karin’s scam was Dave’s only way in. Officially, he wasn’t even here anymore.
Karin said, “Hey.” She waited for him to meet her gaze and then she said, “I want to do something about it, too.”
He stole another piece of melon. “I’d feel better if I understood why.”
Clink. She put her fork down too hard; the couple seated a table away glanced over in surprise. Karin said drily, bitterly, “You mean because I’m such a soul-sucking money-grubbing thief, why would I do a decent thing?”
He winced. “I would have used different words, thanks. And the offer of the safe house is open regardless-I’m the one who got you into this mess. I’m not going to leave you hanging.”
She chewed another piece of her sublime concoction, but this time she didn’t really taste it. “How about, if it wasn’t for me, Ellen might have stopped this guy a year ago. Maybe I owe her this. Maybe I owe it to Rashawn and all the others who are still in danger. Maybe I just care.” Maybe I owe it to who I was as a child, needing my own rescue. But she didn’t say that one out loud. She waited for him to digest her words and said, still bitter, “Guess you never thought of that.”
He didn’t respond right away. Then he shook his head. “Caring,” he said distinctly, “is a lot different than actually putting yourself on the line.”
She snorted. A nice emphatic noise, not meant for the breakfast table in the cosy dining nook of the Woodward House. “Hey,” she said. “If there’s one thing I know, it’s how to walk that line. This guy is ripe for the scam, and in the end I don’t even have to pull it off.”
“And how many times in the course of your…career…have you been investigating and poking around in well-protected places where you don’t belong? It’s not the same, Karin.”
“And it’s not so different.” Okay, she wasn’t so sure of that. She was just mad. First the insult for who she was…and then to imply she wasn’t even good at it? “This started out as a tasty little breakfast,” she told him, and pulled back her melon bowl. “Get your own.”
He was silent, one of those moments at which he seemed to be so good. He said, “I didn’t mean to turn this conversation into this conversation. I just need to understand.”
Still grumpy, thank you very much. “And if you’ve listened, then you do.” But he wasn’t the only one who’d been thinking about it all, and she was ready enough to move on. “Here’s what I don’t understand-none of the others were found.”
Not a new thought to him. He tipped his head in affirmation. “Only Rashawn.”
“So Longsfo-” She broke off, glanced around and decided not to finish the name out loud. “He’s really spooked, then. He wasn’t done…or ready. He got sloppy. Now’s the time, Dave. Now’s exactly the time.”
He regarded her with skepticism. “When he’s all stirred up and unhappy?”
“Yes.” She leaned forward, pushing her plate aside. “Think of who he is. What he is. You’ve worked with enough profilers, right? Well, profiling is just a fancy name for assessing your mark. I bet your people have said he’s taking these boys-building some kind of strange relationship with them-to create a situation where he’s in complete control. Over his young self-that’s the boy-and even his mother. Don’t even try to tell me she’s not overbearing.”
Bemused, Dave admitted, “She’s a strong woman.”
“She’d have to be, to reach the Senate. So he’s creating situations in which he has complete control. When the rush grows old, then the relationship changes…it escalates. The boys are molested, killed and discarded. But this time, he lost control. He wasn’t able to complete his little ritual. He must be furious and confused. So here I come, offering him a way to make money and build face at the same time. To regain control. He’s going to grab it.”
Dave drummed his fingers on the table. He checked around the room-no one was paying attention to them now. “You’re not so bad at this profiling thing.”
She sat back in her chair, crossing her arms in a dare-you gesture. “I’m a people watcher.”
She saw it instantly; he wasn’t going to take that dare. The subject of her past was, for the moment, closed. “What I’d like to know,” he said, “is how you’re going to layer in this extra irresistible face-building opportunity.”
Karin was suddenly hungry again. She pulled the plate over, stabbing up a chunk of toast and apples. “Okay,” she said, hesitating with the fork halfway to her mouth. “But I get to finish this first. I’ll tell you on the way to the thrift store.”
“To-” Dave started, but stopped himself to cover his face and emit a reluctant groan. “This is going to be a nightmare, isn’t it?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Karin said cheerfully. “I’m looking forward to it.” And she tackled her breakfast with renewed anticipation.
Dave walked away from the tiny thrift store with beat-up black jeans, a variety of tight, dark T-shirts and a stonewashed denim jacket with enough styling to give it interest if not class. His gratitude when she declared them ready for checkout was short-lived, for then she declared her intention to drag him into the Fairfax Fair Oaks Mall-and after an hour on the road, she did just that.
The Polo suit fit him right off the Macy’s rack. She frowned at the price tag-normally a scam this big would pay for itself, but this one would never get that far-and smoothed the fit of the material over his shoulders. “I hope you need a new suit.”
“Your farm took care of my last one,” he said. “Now talk. Details, I mean.”
He’d been patient at that, and she didn’t hesitate. “Simple,” she said. “There’s some land in Florida, owned by developers. Let’s call it Ranchwood Acres.”
“Florida? You must be kidding.”
She grinned. “That’s the beauty of it. I’m not. It’s an actual property in Palm Beach County-truly gorgeous-but it’s surrounded by swampland. Perfectly usable, if you don’t mind mosquitoes the size of pterodactyls or boating in and out during heavy rains. Five hundred acres, cypress trees, sweet gum, slash pine, palmetto…can’t get any greener than that.”
He looked at her askance and unbuttoned the three suit buttons, checking the fit of the low-rise slacks. “When did you check this out?”
“Just old habits,” she told him. Not to mention the need to keep an eye on what might be of interest to Rumsey. “And trust me. The pants fit perfectly.” Trust me, it turned out, weren’t the best words she could have used. But she ignored his expression and said, “It’s a million-dollar parcel. And the Florida Conservation Coalition is itching to get their hands on it to establish more territory for the Florida panther.”
He slipped out of the jacket and vest, then headed for the changing room. Karin, jacket and vest slung over her arm, followed him right up to the open entranceway.
“I’m not getting it yet,” he said from the changing booth. Keys and change jingled in his jeans pockets as he pulled the pants up, snapped, and zipped.
“I’m the roper,” she said. “I approach our guy with this deal, playing middleman for the development company that hasn’t been able to unload it. They’re tired of the bugs, the snakes, the gators. So they-meaning I-present it in a single parcel for less than the valued price of the combined individual parcels, but at a decent profit for our developers. Once Longsford’s got the property, he can sell off lots of small parcels at actual market price to recoup his investment, and then sell the rest of it to the coalition cheap. Guaranteed buyers. He more than makes his money back, and he gets great PR points while thumbing his nose at the development company.”
“How’s that?” Dave emerged, now wearing his newly acquired denim jacket and the black jeans. It seemed to Karin that he handed over the suit pants with some regret. Definitely not a boy used to dressing down on the job.
“The developers-and this is for real-have been refusing to deal with the coalition for years. They’re all full of manifest destiny, and anything else that might want to live in that area-the panthers, the Indians, the snakes-is unfortunate inconvenience. So our guy gets his profit, gets his conservationist karma, and shows the developers that he makes his own decisions. Which, as we’ve established, is important to Longsford.”
She let him ponder it as he put the suit on AmEx. Once they were out of earshot of the clerk, he moved in for a more confidential conversation, bumping shoulders as they headed for the mall exit.
She bumped against him on purpose, just to do it. If it puzzled him, he didn’t dwell on it. He asked, “Exactly what else are you going to need to pull this off?”
Didn’t even take a second thought. She held out her hand, ticking off items on her fingers. “Hotel with suite amenities-not five-star. Three or four will do. It’s okay if I give the impression of being careful with money-we want him to trust me with his money. I’ve got to set up a phone number, and someone to be the inside man, because he’s going to check with the development company, and we’ll have to intercept that call. But most of the work with this one is up-front. I need a good printer-the right printer-to work up the real-estate documentation. Finding that printer and getting the information we need…those will be the hardest parts. But I do believe I intend to be invited to a party.” She paused, tapping her lower lip. “Could mean more party clothes.” And then she laughed at the noise Dave made deep in his chest, snatching her elbow as if she might turn around on the spot and head back for Macy’s.
They made it to the car in a silence that Karin didn’t mind at all. Not on a beautiful spring day with the zing of job planning rushing through her body. In the real grift, Longsford would purchase land that Karin had no right to sell, and his deed would be worthless. And even though this one wouldn’t get that far…
Yeah, there it was again.
She could still feel it.
Karin easily spotted Dave’s Maxima and pulled out to reach it before he did, waiting for him to pop the trunk with his remote. The car beeped in response, and Karin quickly rearranged their purchases so they could smooth the suit along the top of the rest of it. Dave straightened, one hand on the lid and ready to push it back down, hesitating long enough to say, “I’m not sure where I fit in that plan. Or do I?”
Karin grinned, and he gave her a wary look. He’d figured out that grin already, had he? “Plenty for you to do,” she assured him. “For starters, I need you to find someone we can trust for the inside man. And I need to know Longsford’s friends, his party circle, his hangouts. I especially need to know which of those friends is close enough to see that I get a special invitation to one of his parties, but it’s got to be someone who’s also conveniently off on a cruise somewhere. And that’s just for starters. I’ve got legwork to do, and I want you there for most of it.” She caught the question in his eyes, and said, “I don’t know this city well enough. It’ll go faster if I have help from someone who does, and backup along the way. I’m going to be poking my nose into nastyville in order to get some of this stuff set up.”
He shut the lid. “And you’re sure-”
“I’ve been to nastyville before, Dave.” She gave him her flattest voice, the one that meant this conversation had been over the last time she ended it.
He shrugged and let it go, coming around to open her car door out of what seemed to be undeniable force of habit. “Okay, then. We’ll start with the safe house. We’ve got maps and phone books there, and you can scope out the city while I see about your inside man. As for the rest of it…I’ll follow your lead.”
Yes, she thought. That you will. Let’s just hope I don’t take you too close to what I really am.
Late afternoon found them at the safe house, tucked into a little neighborhood of cul-de-sacs on the southern edge of Alexandria. Total urban-suburbia, with minivans, cultivated landscaping and a high school behind them. The house itself was a modest Victorian with a corner turret and an unusually open first-story floor plan. The upstairs held three bedrooms and a huge bathroom, but Karin dumped her stuff in the smaller middle room, deliberately avoiding the master bedroom, a room that pushed into the turret space and boasted three large windows.
Dave tossed his stuff into the third bedroom in the back corner, then came to her door.
Karin looked up from where she tested the twin bed. She sat on the edge of it. “I won’t share my closet, but I never did need much space in a bed.”
He didn’t say anything, but she saw his eyes change. A smile hinted in the corners, and she thought he might come to her then and there. Eventually he said, “Good.” And then he glanced over his shoulder toward his bedroom. “Done booting up. I can start in on that research for you right away. There are take-out lists in the kitchen if you want to pick your favorite.”
“Humph.” Karin leaned back on her arms, sinking into the bed. “And what do your neighbors think of this little house? Occupied by a stream of different people, sometimes vacant, and lots of takeout. Doesn’t exactly fit into the neighborhood.”
He shrugged. “Ostensibly, this place serves as temporary dwelling for travelers coming in for training and special projects out of D.C. It works. By the way, you’re a civilian worker with the Army Corps of Engineers, contracting on a land-assessment project. I thought it might fit your sense of irony.”
“Yes indeed.” Smart-ass. She gestured him away. “Go play with your notes. I’m going to take a shower, and then I’ll order something pizza-ish. I’d like to get an early start tomorrow.” If she could locate the right printers…if Dave could locate the information to put the finishing touches on her approach…
By all rights she should have had weeks to gain Longsford’s interest and his confidence. But this was the time to strike. Longsford was at his most reactive, his most vulnerable. And she had an ace she could play any time she wanted.
Ellen.
With this new makeover she didn’t truly resemble Ellen anymore; he’d probably see nothing in her but a puzzling familiarity. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t let Ellen’s mannerisms peek out. Puzzling him. Enticing him. Reeling him in.
Now that was a line she didn’t intend to tell Dave she’d walk.
She waved him out, then dumped her purchases from the morning-underwear, a slew of casual shirts, a lightweight hooded jacket. She plucked up a few items and headed for the shower. She could hear Dave tapping away, but when she looked inside his room she found he’d forgone the small desk to sit on the floor, his back to the wall and his feet braced high against the side of the bed. Total guy mode. He’d pulled the pillow from the bed for a lap desk and now was frowning in concentration over the laptop display. Upset about something, she would have said.
Longsford, no doubt. But this research was the one thing he could do, quickly and extensively, better than she could. And it left her free to concentrate on her own role. She walked Brooke’s walk down the hall to the bathroom. A saucier walk than her own, yet not slutty. No, not at all. More a runway walk than a street walk.
She showered as Brooke would do…as Karin herself might have chosen, before a year of living on a farm where the well water sometimes ran low. Luxuriating in the halfway decent hand lotion, using the provided blades and shaving cream on her legs. She let her hair air-dry in a tousled bed-head look and left the Brooke makeup unused on the sink counter, ready for the morning.
She emerged from the steamy room to the enticing odor of pizza and followed her nose down the stairs. The formal dining area had been converted to a small but completely functional office, and the desktop computer now hummed to itself along with the printer. Dave and his notes had been busy.
She found them all-Dave, the notes, the pizza-at the back of the house in the kitchen breakfast nook. A pizza slice hung crookedly in his grip, looking forgotten. The papers spread out over the small table, pushing the box into a precarious position at the edge. When he saw her, he dropped his piece back into the box and pulled it to a safer spot, making way for her to sit opposite him. “Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t wait. But you said pizza-ish, so I hope this is okay. It’s their meaty version.”
All perfectly normal. Dave, deep in thought, surrounded by his notes in hard copy, ordering the pizza he thought-rightly so-that she’d like.
Then why had something inside her stumbled when he looked up at her? Why did she have that little warning trill in her head, the one that always told her when a scam was going off course? The difference being, this time she didn’t try to hide it. She didn’t try to smooth things over or retreat to reassess. She didn’t try to pretend nothing was wrong at all. She asked, “What’s up?”
He didn’t quite look at her. “Just wishing I could have caught this bastard years ago. Looking at him in the society pages, living his privileged life…” He shook his head. “There’s nothing right about any of it.”
Uh-huh. Very true. But not the reason for his change in demeanor. She told him, “Well, we’re here to change that,” and slipped into a chair to help herself to a couple of pieces of pizza. He nudged the notes her way and she glanced at them with approval. Just what she needed-a neat list of contacts with details. Dave had highlighted two couples who were currently out of town, but who usually appeared in Longsford’s personal orbit. She ran her finger over the green highlighter. “You’re such a nerd,” she said. “This is great.”
“Good,” he said, but his voice was studiously neutral.
She looked up at him, eyes narrowed. This was more than anger at Longsford. Definitely more. “If you’re thinking I can’t carry this off-”
He shook his head before she even finished. “I have no doubt you can do this,” he told her. “I’m not so sure I can do it.” He scraped his chair back and took the pizza box, stuffing the leftovers into the fridge.
He’s not just talking about the scam.
She couldn’t even remember a moment when there hadn’t been some sort of spark between them, from the first moment she’d watched him deal with Ellen’s dog. Sometimes it flared to rocket-fuel intensity, sometimes it merely glimmered. But it had always been there.
Not now.
“You’ll do fine,” she said. Lame, so lame.
“I’m headed up for bed.” He gestured toward the front of the house. “We’re all locked up and the alarm system is engaged, so don’t go for any midnight walks if you have trouble sleeping.”
“You’re-” she started, and again he didn’t let her finish.
“Early day tomorrow, you said. Let’s be ready for it.”
“Okay. Sure. That makes good sense.” Lame and lamer. She should have been demanding to know the problem, digging away at it.
But she wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer.