Tara Holloway 01 - Death, Taxes, and a French Manicure (22 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

That Morning-After Glow

The next morning I woke in Brett’s arms, sweetly sore and with a satisfied smile. Brett proved to be an incredible lover, giving me just what I needed precisely when I needed it, taking me to that tantalizing edge of oblivion, then carrying me over it, time and time again.

I climbed out of bed and sneaked into Brett’s bathroom, examining my face in the mirror. My cheeks shone with a morning-after glow. If I could bottle this radiance, I’d make a killing in the cosmetics market.

But now the qualms kicked in. Had making love with Brett been a colossal mistake? Had I made love with a criminal, slept with the enemy? Had the pleasure Brett gave me been a guilty pleasure? Was I no better than Gustavo and Hector, stupidly giving in to my carnal needs?

No. I refused to believe any of that. At worst, Brett had been an unwitting delivery boy for Shelton and Gryder. Nothing more. Surely a criminal wouldn’t have been such a generous, giving lover. And give he had. He’d given me not one, not two, but
three
orgasms. A new record and a testament to the depth of my feelings for Brett. Any distrust or doubts I’d ever had were nothing more than the result of an overactive imagination, an overdeveloped sense of skepticism by an overzealous, rookie federal agent. And Gustavo and Hector were no more than horny men looking for a quick lay. What I had with Brett was so much more than that.

While Brett got ready for work, I whipped up some scrambled eggs and toast. It was the least I could do after the dinner he’d made the night before. One of these days I should learn how to cook.

Brett drove me home after breakfast. I took a quick shower and dressed in my running shoes, lightweight pink sweatpants, and a short-sleeved white hoodie, a comfy, easy-to-move-in outfit. I needed to be ready in case Joe showed today. Packing up my long-neglected tax records and forms, I headed out to meet Christina.

*   *   *

When Christina pulled up in front of the IRS office, I hopped into the pink Cadillac. Today she wore a teal baby-doll top that was tight at the bust and loose at the waist, perfect both for distracting Joe and concealing a hip holster. She’d pulled her long hair up into a ponytail where it couldn’t get in her way during the bust. Her scarf was tied around the ponytail.

The dog stood on the backseat, wagging his tail. I gave him a good-morning pat on the head.

I fastened my seat belt.
Click
. The car didn’t move. I glanced over at Christina to find her focus locked on my face.

Her eyes narrowed and she tilted her head, a questioning look on her face. “You look different today.”

I shrugged. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

A sly grin spread across her face. “You got some last night.”

Was it that obvious? “Did not.”

“Did, too. You’ve got that satisfied, morning-after sparkle.”

No wonder she was such a good agent. She had incredible intuition.

“You’re right!” I cried, unable to contain my joy. “Brett and I did it. Three times.”

She rolled her eyes, but continued to smile. “Well, I don’t have to ask how it was.”

Definitely obvious.

She slid the car into gear. “I just hope you saved some energy for Joe’s bust.”

“No need to worry. The way I’m feeling today, I could take down ten men with both hands tied behind my back.”

She eased away from the curb. “Were your hands tied behind your back last night?”

I crossed my arms over my chest, feigning outrage. “That’s none of your business.”

She chuckled. “You’re right. Besides, nobody ever does the kinky stuff the first time.”

*   *   *

The tax deadline was fast approaching, but I only got as far as line thirteen on my tax return before I was forced to stop, distracted by my partner. Christina paced the floor of the crack shack in her sneakers, watching the clock and chewing on the white tips of her nails.

“Stop that,” I said. “You’re destroying the manicure I gave you.”

“Can’t help it,” she said, shoving her hands into the front pockets of her jeans to try to control her nail-biting. “I’ve got the prebust jitters again.”

I did, too, feeling tingly all over with a raw, nervous energy.

For lunch we nuked a frozen pasta primavera, light enough so the food wouldn’t weigh us down when we’d need to be fast on our feet yet loaded with carbs for the quick energy we might require later. Joe wasn’t likely to resist arrest, especially when he wouldn’t see it coming, but it never hurt to be prepared. Even if Joe did resist, a scrawny guy like him wouldn’t pose much of a challenge for two well-trained, armed federal agents. With everything I’d faced on the job, that mullet-topped doofus didn’t scare me a bit. Or at least that’s what I told myself.

After lunch, Christina and I performed stretches and jogged in circles around the living room a few times to get our blood flowing and our bodies warmed up. The huge dog lay on the floor, happily gnawing the bone-shaped chew toy we’d bought at the pet store that morning.

Like she had the day before, Christina opened every window in the house so we’d be sure to hear the ice-cream truck music as soon as Joe entered the neighborhood.

A faint stench drifted through the windows. Ew. Garbage day. I’d noticed bags at the curbs on our way in.

Christina sat on the dusty windowsill and stared out the grimy window. “Joe better show today. The guys back at the office gave me all kinds of crap this morning. Guess I shouldn’t have bragged that we’d be bagging Joe yesterday.”

“I told you not to count your chickens—”

Christina put up a hand to silence me and cocked her head toward the open window. Sure enough, the faint warbling bars of ice-cream music came through.

We slid our loaded guns into our holsters. Christina scrambled to spread the pieces of her field test kit on the kitchen counter where she’d be able to access them quickly after we bought the drugs. We stepped out on the front porch and sat down on the steps, trying to rein in our adrenaline, act nonchalant. It wasn’t easy.

The minutes crept by like a bad date as we waited for our pimple-faced prey. The ice-cream music grew gradually louder and, finally, Joe’s orange truck turned onto our street a few blocks down. It eased slowly toward us, stopping twice for women with small children. Eventually Joe rolled to a stop in front of our house.

We made our way to the truck. Christina leaned in close, resting her arms on the window ledge, and looked up at Joe. “Where were you yesterday?”

Joe’s gaze darted to the blouse drawn taut across Christina’s chest. “Fucking health department,” he said to her breasts. “Damn inspector chased me down yesterday morning and issued me a citation for an expired permit.”

Another government employee taking crap from an asshole for doing his job. Been there, done that.

Joe emitted an irritated huff and finally looked up at Christina’s face. “I spent all day in line downtown getting the permit renewed.”

If he didn’t like standing in line all day, he certainly wouldn’t like what we had in store for him—five to ten in the state pen.

Christina drummed her fingers on the window ledge. “Got something special for me today?”

Joe bent down, putting his face close to hers. “Got some cash for me?”

Christina reached into the neck of her shirt, pulling a folded, and marked, hundred-dollar bill from between her breasts. She handed it to Joe.

His eyes flashed. “It’s warm.”

Sheez. Joe Cool needed to cool off.

We watched through the window as Joe went to the front of the truck and pulled a large metal toolbox from under the driver’s seat. He retrieved a set of keys from the glove compartment, unlocked the box, and removed a small paper bag. He handed the bag through the window to Christina. “It’s good stuff.”

“It better be.”

I could feel Joe’s eyes on us as we walked up the steps and back into the house, forcing ourselves not to run. We heard Joe put his truck in gear behind us and pull away from the curb.

In rapid motion, Christina dashed to the kitchen and dumped the contents of the paper bag onto the countertop. A small plastic bag slid out. Inside was a substance that looked like tiny shards of ice. I could see where crystal meth got its name.

Christina ripped the clear bag open and dropped a small sample of the substance into one of the tubes from her field test kit. She shook the vial and the water turned from clear to orange. “Bingo. Let’s roll.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Hot Pursuit of Joe Cool

We dashed out the door and down the street after Joe’s truck, walking fast but not running, not wanting to alert him to the fact that his minutes as a free man were numbered.

Joe’s brake lights flashed red as he eased around a turn a block ahead, the tinny music still blaring through the neighborhood.

With Joe now out of sight, Christina sped up and I followed suit, the two of us now bolting after Joe like overzealous contenders in the fifty-yard dash on field day. With her long legs, Christina easily hurdled a pile of garbage bags in a front yard, gaining a small advantage since I had to maneuver around a shopping cart, assorted lawnmower parts, and a chipped lawn jockey.

We continued our pursuit and were only a dozen feet behind Joe’s truck when he spied us in his side mirror. He stuck his head out the window and looked back at us. “What the fuck?”

“DEA!” Christina hollered, running up to the side of his van, her gun now drawn. “Come out of your truck with your hands up!”

He hesitated for a split second, a dumbfounded look on his face. He pulled his head back inside, the van’s tires screeching as he floored the gas pedal and roared off, leaving us in his dust.

“Shit!” Christina spat.

The two of us took off after Joe again.

Joe careened down the street, one eye on the road, the other on his side mirror, narrowly missing a chubby black teenage boy who’d stepped into the street wearing nothing but a faded pair of teddy-bear-print pajama bottoms and waving a dollar bill. “Get your ass back here, ice-cream man!”

When we passed the kid he joined in, running after us as fast as he could in his bare feet, his boy-boobs and Buddha belly jiggling with the effort.

Christina hollered back at the kid. “Shouldn’t you be in school?”

“Missed the bus.”

“Go home, kid,” I shouted. “This could get ugly.”

“I seen that ice-cream man,” the kid called back. “It’s already gotten ugly.” The footsteps behind us slowed as the boy ran out of steam. That’s what happens when you skip too many gym classes.

Joe turned another corner, taking the turn much too fast, jumping the curb. His tires kicked up a spray of dust and pebbles from the yard. He floored the gas pedal, banging down off the curb and roaring out of sight.

“He’s getting away!” I yelled. I was tempted to pull out my gun and shoot out his tires, but then I’d have to fill out another firearm discharge report and face another internal investigation. I’d managed to keep my job last time, but I wasn’t sure I’d be so lucky if I fired my gun again.

We were losing ground when an enormous green garbage truck rumbled into the street ahead, spewing black smoke and looming over the intersection, blocking Joe’s escape. Joe swerved to miss the garbage truck, his van tilting first to one side then the other, tires squealing as he overcorrected. He hit the curb. The van bounced up into a yard and—
POOM!
—crashed into a tree stump, the back tires of the vehicle leaving the ground as momentum caused it to rock forward. The van slammed down and bounced to a cockeyed stop straddling the curb, half in and half out of the street.

Christina bounded up the right side of the truck, while I took the left, approaching the driver’s window with my gun clasped at the ready in case he tried to escape out the driver’s door. Joe was no longer in his seat. I reached out and yanked the side mirror inward until it gave me a view inside Joe’s van. I saw him standing hunched over in the middle of the van, hands in his mullet, turning one way then another, trying to figure out what the hell to do. Thank goodness he wasn’t holding a weapon.

Christina stepped up to the open window on the other side and peered through it, both of our Glocks trained on Joe.

“Don’t move,” Christina ordered, “or we’ll blow that greasy mullet right off your head.”

Her threat was a lie, for two reasons. One, Joe had yet to use deadly force and all federal agent manuals prohibited the use of deadly force unless faced with the same. Second, with agents on both sides of the truck, if either of us shot at him there was a risk we’d end up taking out each other. Nothing like shooting your partner to ruin a perfectly good working relationship.

Joe probably wasn’t savvy enough to make this logical connection, but the guy still wasn’t willing to go down without a fight. “Fuck that shit!” Joe jerked the freezer door open and ducked behind it to shield himself from Christina’s view. “And fuck you, too!”

I could still see Joe plainly from my side, but apparently he hadn’t noticed me. Moron.

“Hey, Joe,” I called through the driver’s side window. “What she said.”

His head spun around so fast he risked whiplash. He spotted my face in his window and banged his fists on the rim of the freezer. “Fuck!”

That was Joe’s third “fuck” in less than fifteen seconds. “You really need to expand your vocabulary.”

Desperate, Joe reached into the open freezer, grabbing armfuls of frozen treats and hurling them at the windows, raining a hailstorm of ice cream down on me and Christina. I ducked, but not before I took a Drumstick to the forehead. Damn! Who would’ve thought a frozen ice-cream cone would make such an effective weapon?

When I stood back up and looked through the window, Christina had Joe by the hair, and was attempting to yank him out the service window by his mullet. Bent over, he slapped at her hands, trying to free himself from her grip. Sheez. He fought like a girl. But we girls didn’t.

I ran around to the other side of the truck, grabbing him by his shirt and the seat of his jeans to help Christina drag him from the window to the ground. He twisted as he fell, and I felt the fingernail on my index finger rip. Another manicure biting the dust. Dang.

While I checked my nail, Christina wrangled with Joe on the asphalt. For such a runt, he was putting up a pretty good fight now. They rolled over a couple of melting fudge bars, the ice cream leaving wet, brown stains on the back of Christina’s top.

I watched the two of them grapple, looking for an opportunity to jump in and help my partner. Just when I’d decided to try grabbing Joe’s arm, the two of them rolled over again and his arm disappeared into the mix of wriggling bodies. Should I try grabbing his ankle? When Joe bucked under Christina, tossing her a foot in the air, I saw an opportunity I simply couldn’t pass up. Christina now lay sideways across Joe’s chest, her hands wrapped around his wrists, trying to pin him to the ground. But Joe’s lower body, including his groin, was exposed, accessible. Heck, the guy was practically begging to be kicked in the nuts.

A swift punt to the crotch was all it took to put an end to Joe’s resistance. Christina climbed off him and he pulled his legs up, rolling onto his side in a fetal position, his hands on his groin, retching. We gave him a few seconds to finish writhing in agony before Christina rolled him onto his stomach, sat on his lower back, and pulled his arms up behind him. Under other circumstances, Joe probably would’ve loved this.

She held out her hand and I handed her my cuffs. Once he was properly cuffed, she ruffled Joe’s hair playfully and climbed off him. “You made this fun, Joe. Thanks.”

Joe turned to look up at us, his face red and spotty with road rash. “Bitches!”

Christina knelt down then, putting her face in Joe’s and—dear Lord—the guy still couldn’t resist looking at her breasts. “You have the right to remain silent,” she began. “Anything you say can be held against you in a court of law. You have the right to a decent haircut.”

She continued on. By the time she finished reading Joe his rights, local police had arrived, alerted by a concerned resident who’d reported “two skanky hos trying to rob the ice-cream man.” Officers shoved Joe into the backseat of a cruiser and kept onlookers at bay as we explained the situation to the sergeant in charge.

As the cruiser pulled away, Joe looked back at us through the rear window, eyes narrowed in fury, his mouth forming unheard curses behind the glass.

“He never saw this coming,” I said. “Part of me almost feels sorry for him.”

Christina sighed. “Me, too.” And with that, she lifted her blouse and bra, giving Joe a glimpse of the last set of boobs he’d see for years to come.