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Authors: Ronda Thompson

Tags: #Romance, #Fantasy, #Vampires, #Mystery

Confessions of a Werewolf Supermodel (8 page)

BOOK: Confessions of a Werewolf Supermodel
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Kane stares at me from across the desk. His eyes are not actually muddy brown. They're more the color of whiskey. Which is ironic. This whole situation is my fault. I had responded when he called me Sherry on the phone. I should have played dumb instead of hanging up in a panic like I did.

“Okay,” he finally says. “What information will you give me that I don't have to go digging to find?”

I'd sigh in relief if Kane wouldn't pounce on that reaction, as well. “I have the name of the agency I was adopted through. The agency claims all their files are sealed. They also say they would have to have written permission from the birth mother to release the information. They supposedly have no known location for her.”

“Typical response,” Kane says. “And that is why people hire private investigators.”

As much as it irks me, I came prepared. Lifting my beauty bag, I remove fifteen thousand dollars in cash. I place it on his desk. “That should get you started. One rule. Don't contact my adoptive parents. Like I said, we parted on bad terms and neither of us wants anything to do with the other. Got that?”

“Makes my job harder, but yeah, I got it.” He slides the money across the desk and into the same drawer where he keeps his whiskey. He looks at me and shakes his head again.

“What?” I ask tersely.

“I just wonder how much of what I see is what I get with you.”

I rise. “Stop wondering. You're not getting any of me.”

He laughs as I walk toward the door.

“I'll be in touch.”

Not a comforting thought. I have a feeling I just opened a can of worms I'd be better off to have left buried.

CONFESSION NO. 6

Forrest Gump's mother had a lot of catchy sayings. I never really understood any of them. Life is not like a box of chocolates. Life is more like a wad of gum stuck to the bottom of your favorite pair of shoes. The more you try to clean up the mess, the stickier it becomes.

Manolo Blahnik on Fifty-fourth is heaven on earth. Just the smell of fine leather footwear soothes my battered soul. I'm living in the moment, leaving everything behind. No worries about werewolf outbreaks. No pictures of murder victims being thrust at me. No nightmares. No Morgan Kane sniffing around in places he shouldn't sniff. Just shoes. Mules. Pumps. Sandals. Like I said. Heaven.

“What do you think of these, Lou?”

Karen models a pair of red Mary Jane pumps with three-inch heels. The heels make her look about six eight. Karen is six two and proud of it. Height is not an issue with her. She dates tall men, short men, fat men, skinny men, it doesn't matter. I've even seen her dancing with men who appear to be suckling at her breasts because of the height issue. I admire her for not giving a damn. I, in contrast, give too much of one.

“Wicked bad,” I assure her.

“Cindy, what do you think?”

In a surprise move, Cindy decided to come shoe shopping in normal shoe stores with us today. Since she's a little starstruck by Karen, I think I know why she agreed to tag along.

“They look good,” is about all she can manage around the slobber in her mouth.

“I think I'll get them,” Karen decides. She frowns at me. “You're not into the spirit of the shoes, Lou. You've only tried on one pair.”

Even shoes can't take my mind off my troubles. I'm a bit distracted. “Just enjoying new shoe smell,” I tell her. “It's almost as good as new car smell.”

Karen sniffs. “I never fully appreciated the new shoe smell before.”

“It's really strong at Red Wing,” Cindy offers. “Lots of leather in those stores.”

“We're not going,” I mutter to her. “And stop drooling. It's embarrassing.”

Runway style, Karen flounces over in the killer red pumps. “Leave her be, Lou. She can drool if she wants. I don't mind. I'm used to it.”

Have I mentioned that Karen doesn't have a humble bone in her body? She was born beautiful. I've seen baby pictures of her. She carries them with her. Karen has no conception of what it's like to be unattractive. Or even normal looking.

“I'm starving,” I say. “Let's go have lunch.”

Even frowning, Karen is nothing short of stunning. “But I've only decided on this one pair. I've never gone home with only one pair of shoes.”

“We can always stop back on our way home,” Cindy suggests. “Truth is, I'm starving, too.”

Karen shrugs. “Okay, but only on one condition. You buy these shoes, Lou. You'd look great in them.”

The shoes aren't made for walking. They're sex shoes. The kind of shoes a woman wears with a strapless corset, garter belt, and thigh-high hose. Due to current circumstances, they'd go wasted in my closet. On the other hand, the shoes might get a reaction from Terry Shay should our paths ever cross again. Those shoes would get a second look from a priest.

“Okay.” I cave. “But only because I'm hungry.”

I leave the shop wearing the shoes. I'm nearly as tall as Karen in them. Poor Cindy looks like a midget as we stroll down Fifty-fourth toward a little café the models frequent. The place has wonderful soups and salads. As we walk, Karen whips out her cell and makes a call. She says she's headed to the café and hangs up. I lift a brow.

“Just letting my service know where I'll be,” she explains.

That's odd. Wouldn't her service just call her if they need her? Would her agency actually grab a cab and come running to the café if they had to discuss business? Mine wouldn't. Maybe I should switch.

It's a lovely day for winter in New York. The Christmas lights still twinkle in the trees. It's chilly, but not freezing. I'm envisioning the Cobb salad smothered in blue cheese I'll have, when it happens.

The unthinkable.

I step in gum.

Gum!

On my brand-new pair of four-hundred-and-seventy-five-dollar shoes!

Rarely do I say the F word. Where I come from, the F word is not like saying “oh, shoot” like it is in New York. I say it now.

Karen's head swings toward me. We had this rhythm going, the three of us walking down the street like Charlie's Angels. I've thrown the whole line out of sync. Cindy stumbles. She actually trips over the F word. She
never
heard that word growing up in her house.

Karen repeats the F word. “He must have been at the Starbucks on the corner to have gotten here so fast.”

He? Starbucks? What's Karen talking about? I slide my shoe along the pavement as we walk, hoping to dislodge the wad stuck to the bottom. Then I see him. Stefan stands outside the café, looking suspiciously like he's waiting for us to join him.

We haven't spoken since I called him a bozo and slammed the car door in his face. Guiltily, I realize I haven't thought about him for a couple of days. I've been too busy thinking about Shay, and the fact he's written me off as a total loony bird. I've also been thinking about Morgan Kane, and what kind of information he's digging up now.

“You just called him.” I frown at Karen. “This is a setup.”

She doesn't bother to deny it. “I thought you two should kiss and make up. He's been hell to work with the past couple of days.”

Due to murders and mayhem, I haven't worked since the cowboy boots shoot. I'm not scheduled to work again until Friday. I have yet to convince myself that Stefan's grimy one-night stands are none of my business. I'm not sure if I'm ready to forgive and forget. At least he's not wearing the orange stocking cap I despise.

He smiles as I gimp along, dragging the bottom of one of my sex shoes on the pavement. When Stefan smiles, it's hard to stay mad. He has this naughty-little-boy thing going for him that women find impossible to resist. And therein lies the problem.

“Hi, Lou,” he says when we reach him.

“Hi,” I say back.

Stefan glances down at my feet. He laughs. This is not the four-hundred-and-seventy-five-dollar response I had hoped to get while wearing the shoes.

“You have paper stuck to the bottom of your shoe.”

Glancing down, I'm tempted to cuss again. A Snickers bar wrapper is now stuck to my shoe. I place a hand on Stefan's shoulder, lean down, and pull it off. There's a waste receptacle in front of the café. I walk over and try to throw the candy wrapper in the trash. It sticks to my fingers. I say the F word again.

When I turn around, Karen, Stefan, and Cindy all grin back at me like village idiots. Grumbling, I march past them into the café. The burst of warm air improves my mood. Beneath my jacket, I wear a short-sleeved blouse. Shopping often leads to sweating, depending on how serious a woman is about it. I dressed to layer down.

The café is seat yourself. I spot a cozy booth in the back and head that way. I don't wait for the others. I'm focused on the fact I have gum on the bottom of my shoe and I'm careful where I walk. A discarded napkin isn't getting a free ride from me.

Once I reach the booth, I plop down and immediately lift my shoe to assess the damage. With luck, I might be able to scrape off the mess with a knife. Karen, Stefan, and Cindy scoot in from the other side. Cindy sits beside me, then Karen and Stefan take the outside across from me.

“I need a knife,” I mutter. “Stupid gum.”

“If you put ice on it first and freeze it, I've heard it's easier to get off,” Karen suggests. “Or, you could just throw them away. That's what I do.”

Okay. I'm a little tight with my money. I'm not trashing these sex shoes even if I'm never going to wear them again. They can sit in my closet, a little red ray of hope that at some future date, I can have a normal sex life again. Or an abnormal one. I'll take anything.

As soon as our perky waitress sets water glasses in front of us, I dig a piece of ice from the glass. I slide the ice along the bottom of my sticky shoe. The street cleaners must be on strike because in one short walk I have enough grime stuck to the bottom of my shoe to make mud, which of course gets all over my fingers. I pause long enough to grab a napkin.

“Lou, honey, I'll buy you a new pair of shoes if you'll stop flashing your panties at everyone sitting across the room from us. You are wearing panties, right?”

I glance up and across at Stefan. His words register a moment later and my head swivels toward the other side of the room. There are a number of people staring at me. One of them is Detective Terry Shay. Or I think it is. He's not looking directly at me. He's looking up my skirt. I uncross my legs and bang my knees together. My face is on fire. I know a million men have seen me in my underwear, but this is different. I'm not sure how exactly it's different. It just is.

“What are you doing here anyway?” I ask Stefan, totally unglued by seeing Shay looking up my skirt. By seeing Shay period. “I don't remember inviting you.”

Stefan smiles despite my bad mood. “Karen invited me.”

His admission warrants another glare at Karen. She picks up the menu and looks at it. “I can bring a friend,” she informs me. “You brought one.”

I would argue that Cindy is a mutual friend, but then, she would just argue back that Stefan is also a mutual friend. But enough about Stefan. What in the hell is Terry Shay doing here? I can't picture the café as one of his usual haunts. He doesn't look like a soup and salad kind of guy. He's meat and potatoes all the way.

Is he following me? But wait, he was already here before I walked in. In a city this size, it's hard to believe this is a coincidence.

Karen wears a rather sly smile she tries to hide behind her menu.

“You didn't,” I say.

She shrugs and places her menu aside. “He contacted me through my service. Said something about checking your credibility. To me, sounded like a lame excuse to get information about you. I said he should meet me here today during lunchtime if he wanted to talk to me.”

“What and who are you talking about?” Stefan looks around the room. He zeros in on Shay. “What's that cop doing here?” He turns the puppy-dog eyes on me. “You said he talked to you about identity theft, Lou. Why would he check your credibility with Karen?”

This situation is as sticky as the gum on the bottom of my shoe. I like having friends, but only Cindy is allowed into the personal side of my life.

“I get the impression Detective Shay thinks I stole my own identity. You know, charged my cards up and cried foul to get out of paying them. I'm sure that happens all the time with supposed identity theft problems.” This lying stuff is getting too easy for me.

“Takes his job a little seriously, doesn't he?” Stefan grumbles. He charges to the rescue. “I can set him straight if you want me to.”

What I want is for everyone to stay out of my business. And I certainly don't want Terry strolling over to talk murder in front of my friends. Where does he get off contacting Karen to ask questions about me anyway? I glance across the room to give him a dirty look. I come face-to-face with his crotch. It's a nice crotch.

“Mind if I join you?” he asks.

Now that's a loaded question. Before I can assure him that I do mind, Karen pipes up. “No, there's plenty of room. Just scoot in next to Lou.”

If she were closer, I'd snatch Karen bald. Terry scoots in beside me. Too many bodies crammed together makes wearing a coat unbearable. I shrug out of mine. Cindy suddenly puts an arm around me and slaps her hand against the top of my arm. I glance at her. She leans in close to whisper, “You have some fur on the top of your arm.”

Oh, great. I'm having another outbreak. I can do one of two things. Run from the café screaming, or howling, whichever the case may be, or act as if there's nothing odd about my best friend suddenly getting too chummy with me. I decide on the latter.

“I'd prefer you not to discuss my business with my friends,” I tell Terry. “It's between you and me and I'd like to keep it that way.”

Terry stares at Cindy's hand pressed against my arm, as if he didn't hear my comment. Finally he glances up at me. “Checking credibility is standard procedure.”

BOOK: Confessions of a Werewolf Supermodel
9.2Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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