My Spy: Last Spy Standing (9 page)

“But you’ll let me know?”

Why? They weren’t friends. They were nothing to each other. And yet, she nodded.

“I have to go on patrol.”

“Go. There’s nothing you can do here right now. It’s all over.” She hoped.

He didn’t look convinced. He left her with a dark look on his face. Through the window, she could see him check over her yard and talk to Delancy before he got into his car and drove away.

“Everything’s okay,” she told Katie. “We’ll fix this. We always fix everything, right? We’re the superteam.” They’d gotten through worse, like their parents’ deaths in the fire.

Yet whatever they’d faced in the past, they’d never been in physical danger.

She went to the kitchen and started preparing dinner. Regaining normalcy was the key. “How about you set the table?” she asked Katie again. They needed to get back to the mundane. She needed to settle Katie down before she could start thinking about how to solve their problems.

She wanted to be out there, securing the crime scene, taking tire casts, looking for prints and clues. But her sister would always come first.

She could hear her front door open. Probably Delancy. She called out, “Back in the kitchen.”

“Just me.” Her neighbor, Eleanor, shuffled into view, wearing one of those ankle-length flowery dresses she preferred. She was in her sixties, kind faced with pixie-cut hair and lots of artsy jewelry.

She always cheered Katie up, as she did now. Katie stopped rocking as soon as she saw her.

“How are you, Katie, sweetie?” Eleanor asked her.

“Somebody killed my unicorns.”

“Oh, I don’t think so, honey. Unicorns are magic. I bet they’re just sleeping.”

The distress on Katie’s face didn’t ease. “Magic doesn’t work. It’s a trick.”

“Sweet mackerels, did you hear that nonsense on TV? You just wait. Unicorn magic is special.” She winked, pulling a bag from behind her back. “Guess what I brought you?”

“Chocolate-covered pretzels!” Katie sounded excited at last. Then turned to Bree. “I can’t eat dessert before dinner.”

“That’s right.” Not that she wouldn’t have let Katie eat absolutely anything to cheer her up, but rules were an important thing for them, something that provided Katie with stability in a world she didn’t always understand.

“Here.” Eleanor gave Katie the bag. “You keep this safe until after dinner. You’re in charge. Somebody has to be the boss, right?”

Katie looked pleased about that.

Eleanor walked out into the kitchen. “How can I help?” she asked Bree.

“I think we’re good. She’s calming down. But I’m not looking forward to her going outside tomorrow morning and seeing the destruction again. She’s going to Sharon’s house to hang out.” Sharon was Katie’s oldest friend. They’d grown up together, and now they worked together.

She looked from Katie back to Eleanor. “Thank you for calling the station.”

Eleanor reached a hand to her chest. “He was crazy. Shook me up.” She shook her head. “Plowed right through the lawn with his big pickup. And then back and forth, back and forth. Sweet mackerels.” She sank into a chair as if just thinking about it drained the strength from her. “Had to be drunk as a warthog.”

“Did you see his face?”

“Young guy. I already told Officer Delancy. Honestly, I was too far away to get a good look at him. And he was turning back and forth, backing over things. Was he on drugs, do you think?”

“I don’t know. But we’ll definitely find him.” Bree pulled a pizza from the freezer and popped it in the oven. “Why don’t you stick around for a slice?”

“Don’t want to be in the way.” But she looked pleased as peaches at the invitation.

She lived alone, not that she was lonely. She had a flock of girlfriends and they were always off to some garage sale here or a flea market there. They had big dreams of finding something rare and making a big splash on
Antiques Roadshow.
Half of them were in love with the furniture-expert twins.

“You know we love you. And we love your company,” Bree told her.

So she made the pizza, tossed a salad to go with it and they all ate together, and shared the chocolate-covered pretzels before Eleanor went home. She liked to turn in early.

Bree watched Katie’s favorite prime-time crime shows with her and opened a new puzzle to keep them busy during commercial breaks. When Katie remembered the statues and got upset again, Bree gently guided her back to the picture they were putting together piece by little piece, a modern-art painting titled
Sisters.

Not until Katie was asleep did Bree go out to Delancy. The others were gone by then, Delancy taking night shift for the protection detail. She didn’t have much information, just that the forensic teams had done a good job and they should have something by the next day.

So Bree went back inside. She wanted to stay close to Katie. Sometimes, when she went to bed upset, Katie had nightmares.

Bree thought about the attack, about how serious the danger was that they were in, about what she could do if things escalated further. While she’d been telling the truth when she’d told Jamie she didn’t expect this to get any worse, she was smart enough to know that it paid to have a plan B, just in case.

If they needed to go somewhere for a while... She needed to make plans ahead of time, start talking to Katie about it now, prepare her that they might be leaving. Jamie would approve. He seemed to have been genuinely worried about them.

He seemed to always be here, whether she wanted him to or not. Not that long ago, she’d found that aggravating. But today, his checking up on her had felt nice, actually.

And then, since she’d thought about him just before bed, of course, she dreamed about him. In her dream, she definitely wanted him. She wasn’t even surprised that he was the first person she saw in the morning when she looked out her window as she brushed her teeth.

Chapter Eight

It looked as if he’d come here straight from his shift on the border. He’d definitely been there for a while, because half the statues had been repaired and were back in one piece. The front yard no longer looked as if someone had swung a wrecking ball around. Huge, huge improvement compared to the night before. Bree couldn’t believe her eyes.

She ran a brush through her hair, then checked in on Katie, who was still fast asleep. They didn’t have to get up early on Saturdays since neither of them worked. She threw on a pair of jeans and her favorite red tank top, jumped into flip-flops and hurried outside.

Boy, it was getting hot already. But with Jamie there, she didn’t spend much time thinking about the weather. He had a way of commanding a person’s full attention.

“Thank you,” she said as she reached him. He didn’t have any new bruises, didn’t look like he’d been in any fights last night with smugglers.

“You’re messing up your lines,” he said as he straightened, his clothes covered in dust. “Usually you ask me what the hell I’m doing here.”

She made a face. “It’s so unmanly to cling to the past like that.”

And he almost smiled, which was big progress for Jamie Cassidy. He wasn’t exactly the type one would expect to break out in a song and dance. Although if he did, she’d definitely watch.

“Thank you,” she said again as she examined his handiwork. She could barely see the cracks. He’d fitted everything back together nearly seamlessly. There was something sexy about a man who knew how to do stuff. As far as she was concerned, competence had always been an aphrodisiac. “How do you know how to do this?”

“My grandfather was a mason, came over here from Ireland. I helped him build all kinds of things when I was a kid. He used to hire me in the summers. We worked on a couple of old churches together.” He brushed a mortar-looking plop of white off his knee. Not that it made a difference. He was pretty much covered in grime.

She was a Texas country gal. Dirt never bothered her.

He wore dusty blue jeans and a black T-shirt with a sweat stain on his chest. Who knew sweat could be so sexy? Her gaze caught on his bulging biceps as he lifted a chunk of unicorn back onto its pedestal.

A decade ago, the kitchen fire that had killed her parents had taken the house. A tragic, freak accident. Katie had been on her first sleepover at Sharon’s place. Bree had been away at college.

The fire marshal had said afterward that it looked like their mother had been overcome by smoke at the top of the stairs. And their father wouldn’t leave the house without her. He was found with his arms around her, protecting her to the end.

The house had been the least the Tridle sisters had lost that day.

Everything had to be rebuilt, an exact same replica of the old house for Katie’s sake. Bree had even replaced the furniture with similar pieces. She’d done a fair job, but it was only the statues that were part of the original property. Katie treasured them. They provided good memories and continuity.

Bree watched Jamie as he worked without pause, his focus on the job. “This will make Katie happier than I can tell you.”

“It’s good to be moving a little after sitting in the car all night on patrol. I don’t have to be at the office until noon. I should be able to finish here.”

She was pretty sure between night patrol on the border and office duty he was supposed to squeeze some sleep in there somewhere. Yet she didn’t have it in her to send him away. Having the statues fixed would mean the world to Katie.

“I’m making breakfast,” she told him. “Why don’t you come inside in a little while and have something with us?”

He watched her for a second. “Will Katie be okay with that?”

She smiled. “She will when she sees this.”

And then she walked back toward the house, her heart a little lighter. She walked by Delancy’s cruiser and thanked the bleary-eyed officer for her help, then sent her home to rest.

“Are you sure?”

“Jamie will be here for a while.”

Delancy shot her a curious look.

“It’s not like that,” she said.

“Sure it isn’t. He’s obviously just a concerned bystander,” Delancy said with a suddenly saucy grin, then drove away with a wave.

Bree went inside and cooked breakfast: scrambled eggs with salsa mixed in, home-style bacon and skillet cakes. She put on some coffee, too. Lord knew she needed some, and she had a feeling Jamie probably did, too.

Katie came downstairs just as Jamie was entering the house.

“You’re Bree’s friend,” she said thoughtfully. “Your name is Jamie Cassidy.”

“Yes it is. Is it okay if I visit?”

“Jamie is fixing Mom’s statues,” Bree told her sister, and watched as Katie ran to the window, her eyes going wide. She clapped her hands at the sight that greeted her.

Bree could barely talk her into coming to the table to have some pancakes. “Come on now, or they’ll get cold and you don’t like that.”

That did the trick. Katie ran to the table and plopped onto her chair. “Unicorns sneeze Skittles,” she said, her gaze snapping back to the window every five seconds.

“Mom used to say,” Bree explained. Katie had loved unicorns for as long as she could remember. Because unicorns were different, but great. Just like Katie. Not worse than other people at all, just different and special. Her mother used to say that to her when she’d been younger and asked why some kids at school made fun of her.

There wasn’t much bullying. For one, Katie’s teachers simply didn’t stand for it. And also because they’d had a neighbor kid at the time who was in the same grade and always stood up for her. Bree had been too many years ahead of Katie to be of much help. They had never been in the same school building together.

“Skittles come from unicorns? That’s awesome.” Jamie was playing along.

“Only not these ones,” Katie explained with all seriousness. “Because they’re made of stone. And also because unicorns are imaginary. They sneeze Skittles in our imagination. Having imagination is a good thing. And Skittles are real.”

“Well, thank God for that,” Jamie countered, not a trace of his dark looks and surliness in evidence.

Katie nodded as she ate. During breakfast her gaze kept straying back outside, then returning to Jamie again. They stuck to small talk, mostly Katie asking questions. She was good with questions. She wanted to know everything.

She would have made a good detective. Maybe that was why she liked crime shows. She followed a different one every night, had a TV schedule she stuck to religiously. She could usually guess the killer halfway through the story.

“What kind of car do you have?” she drilled Jamie.

He told her. “It’s the blue one, out by the curb.” He nodded toward the window.

Katie looked, nodded, then turned back to him. “Where do you live?”

“Are you married?”

“Do you have kids?”

“Do you have a sister?”

The questions kept coming. She was impressed with the seven-brothers-and-a-sister thing.

Then it was time for Bree to take her to Sharon’s house, just a few blocks away.

Jamie was still working in her yard when she came home. He was pretty close to finishing. The improvement he’d made was amazing. With some minor cleanup on her part, the front yard would be back to normal in no time.

“I’m so grateful that you’re doing this,” she told him. “Katie is very impressed with you, by the way. She couldn’t stop talking about you to Sharon.”

He shot her a questioning look.

“Sharon is a friend from work. They hang out Saturday mornings together. We don’t have a big family. I want her to have friends.” Especially since she worked for the police. She wanted Katie to have a support system if anything happened to her.

He put the last chunk of concrete in place and smoothed down whatever white cement mixture he was using to glue the pieces together. The unicorn looked fully recovered. Even jaunty. Her mother would approve, she thought out of the blue, and the thought made her smile.

“Why don’t you come inside to clean up?” she offered.

He looked down on his clothes. “Okay. That might be good. Thanks. I’ll just go out back and clean off these tools with the garden hose first.”

She went with him, helped then they walked inside together. She led him to the sink in the laundry room and brought him a towel. “Anything interesting happen out on the border? I see nobody whacked you,” she teased. “Must have been a slow night.”

“It was pretty quiet,” he said as he cleaned himself up, taking the jab in stride. “Every night is not a full-blown monkey circus, thank God.”

She had stepped to the window when she’d shown him in, which she now regretted. The space was too small for the two of them and he blocked her way out as he peeled off his T-shirt, washed it under the water then hung it on a peg while he cleaned off his amazing upper body.

Oh, wow. He was incredibly built. And scarred. She tried not to stare, but was pretty much failing miserably. Water droplets gathered on his dark eyelashes, making them look even darker.

When he was done, he shrugged into the wet T-shirt.

“I could toss that into the dryer for you,” she offered, finding her voice.

“In this heat, it’ll dry as soon as I go back outside. Actually, a little cold feels nice. I don’t mind. It’s been a hot morning.”

It was still pretty hot, as far as she was concerned.

He finger combed his wet hair back into place. “How is the counterfeit investigation going?”

“The CIA agent is doing his stuff. How about your op?” She was so proud of herself for still being able to think. She definitely deserved a pat on the back for that one.

“More dead ends than you can shake a stick at. I got a lead, kind of.” He shrugged, the movement of his muscles accentuated by the wet T-shirt. “It’s a long shot, but it’s better than nothing.”

Quit staring. Say something intelligent. Semi-intelligent. Okay, anything that doesn’t have to do with rippling muscles.

“Did I see your car up by the mission yesterday? I was up there at the tackle shop to pick out a pole for one of the officers who’s retiring. Mike. We’re doing a group gift. He likes fishing,” she added inanely.

He watched her for a moment as he hung up the towel to dry.

Oh, right.
“You probably can’t say what you were doing up there.”

But he came to some sort of decision, and said, “I was running down a lead on a prison hit. Someone from the outside brought the hit order during a visit. I need to find out who. Father Gonzales was on the visitor log so I checked him out. Do you know him?”

The thought of Father Gonzales being involved in any kind of criminal activity made her laugh out loud and distracted her from his body, at last. Okay, partially distracted.

“He’s as antiviolence as they get. He would give his life for you, but participate in murder?” She shook her head. “No way. I’ve known him all my life. I’d stake my career on it that he didn’t have anything to do with an ordered hit.”

“Pretty much the impression I got.” He nodded, frowning. “Except, here’s the thing—there were only two visitors, the priest and the girlfriend. Every instinct I have says she’s clean, too. So where does that leave me?”

“The message could have been transmitted through a third party. It might have gone to another inmate first, then he passed it on to the actual hit man.”

“That’s what I’ve been thinking. I need to follow up on that today. Man, that’s gonna be a time killer. It’s a big prison with a ton of inmates.” He didn’t look happy. “We don’t have extra time on this.”

“What does your ordered hit have to do with the border?”

“Nothing you need to worry about.”

She stepped forward, her dander rising. “I thought we’ve been over that. Everything that happens in my county I worry about. Does this have to do with smuggling? I could help you with that. I have a pretty good grip on the usual suspects. I know the players. Look, I’ve been doing this for a long time before you got here.”

His gaze dipped to her lips, and she realized she might be standing too close, but she didn’t want to step back and have him interpret the move as her backing down.

“It’s smuggling related,” he said after a moment, with a good dose of reluctance.

Oh,
she thought as she recalled his team’s purpose here. She narrowed her eyes. “Does this have anything to do with terrorists?”

And then he kissed her.

For a brief second, she wanted to shove him away and demand answers. And then suddenly she didn’t have it in her to pull away. A small part of her knew he was probably kissing her only to distract her, but most of her didn’t care.

It was sooo good.
Oh, sweet heaven.

His lips were firm and warm on hers. She hadn’t been kissed in a long time, and it’d been even longer since she’d been kissed by a guy who could make her skin tingle just by being in the same room with her.

One second it was just kind of a brushing of lips, then his mouth slanted over hers and he went for it.

Sweet mackerels,
as Eleanor would say.

The heat was crazy sizzling. She wouldn’t have been surprised if her hair started smoking.

Why now? Why him? He was anything but uncomplicated.

She wasn’t the instant-attraction type. She didn’t fall for every handsome face. She was friendly when it came to...friendship. But when things went past that... It took her forever to warm up to a guy that way.

All the instant heat now caught her by surprise.

He tasted her lips, slowly, carefully, doing a thorough job of it. By the time his tongue slipped in to dance with hers, her nipples were tingling. She was helpless to do anything but open up for him. He sank into her with a soft growl that was out-of-this-world sexy.

As he tasted her fully, all her blood gathered at the V of her thighs. And he hadn’t even put his hands on her yet. She was in so much trouble here.

Her head swam. Ridiculous. Deputy sheriffs didn’t swoon. It had to be against regulation. Maybe the eggs she’d made for breakfast were bad. She’d rather consider food poisoning than admit that Jamie Cassidy could undo her like this.