Game On (The Bod Squad Series Book 1) (2 page)

She was surprised, knocked off her center, and the kiss was so brief she almost thought she imagined it. His lips simply brushed hers, and then they locked eyes. A whole story passed between them, a full truth, a sure challenge. Then she grabbed the back of his head and pulled him to her again.

This kiss was real. Deep. Searching. On both parts. His tongue entered her mouth and she gasped. She could feel it all the way to her toes. Just as her knees were about to buckle, he lifted her onto the desk, edged between her legs, and came straight into contact with . . . her .380.

He broke the kiss and looked down. “Hmm. Nice equipment. And the gun’s not bad either.”

She breathed a sigh and tried to collect herself. “Well, it’s always good for a girl to be prepared, I say.”

“Indeed. I’m intimidated, but excited too.”

“Glad to hear it,” she said, beginning to slide off the desk. “Well, Chas, this was a lot for me, having come up from DC for the party. I think maybe it’s time I make my way to my hotel.”

“May I see you again?” he murmured softly.

“Sure,” she said, retrieving a card from her purse and tucking it into his shirt pocket. “I’ll be around all weekend.” And with that, she tried to walk gracefully out of the room, but she was still weak-kneed from his kiss. She took a massive fall—an indignified crumple, really—and was once again hoisted off the ground by Chas’s strong arms.

“You okay?” he asked, a smile in his eyes.

“Just great,” she said. “Classy as always.”

Another moment passed between them. Then he spoke up. “One question. On the holster of your gun there was a pair of legs. Your moniker, perhaps?”

She grinned. “You might say.”

“Gee, I wonder why.”

She brushed herself off and edged away from him toward the door. “Well, thanks, Tex. It’s been a fun night.”

“Sure thing,
Legs
. I look forward to the next one. And one more thing . . .”

“Yes?” she inquired.

He paused a moment before replying. “My gun’s bigger than yours.”

As she walked out of the room and down the corridor, all she heard was Jackson’s uncontrollable laughter ringing in her ear.

3

SUSANNAH WOKE UP
the next morning slightly hungover and unable to move her feet. “Damn heels,” she cursed. Then she tried again. She gingerly touched a foot to the ground, stood up, and crumpled into a heap. “Oh, for fuck’s sake!” she exclaimed. It was at just that moment that she heard a knock on the door.

“Room service,” said the familiar jocular voice, a moment before a key card got put into the lock, the door opened, and Jackson walked in with a large pitcher of coffee and a plate of bacon. He always looked like he had stepped right out of a music video, and had a cool hipster style all his own, wildly appealing to women. Today he was wearing a pair of jeans and a vintage vest that he matched with a conductor’s cap reading “I Am The Man” on the brim. Eyeing her contorted position on the floor, her rumpled robe, and her bedroom hair, he smiled and said, “Ah. Just what the Boss ordered.”

“Very funny,” she replied, trying to get up without flashing Jackson, “and you could have knocked, asswipe.”

“He did knock,” said a throaty bass with a touch of laughter in it. “He knocked for four minutes and thirty-seven seconds.”

Fuck. The Boss was here. And she was on the floor, tangled in her hair, her robe, and the remaining shards of her dignity.

“Well,” she mumbled, “you could have at least given me a chance to have some coffee before being interrogated.”

“Taken care of.” Jackson chuckled. “Coffee and a side of bacon.”

This did make her smile. It was her favorite way to start a morning. She was famous for ordering “Eggs and toast with a double side of bacon—hold the eggs and toast.” So she figured if Jackson was doing his best to make her happy, she’d better do her best to please the Boss.

She made her way up and glanced over at Bossman. He was rakishly handsome; his current look was slightly grown-out hair and a five o’clock shadow. He always had different looks, seeming to delight himself with ways he could “out-undercover” his undercover operatives. Susannah couldn’t tell what made the Boss tick. He never dated anyone, only slept occasionally, and had an undying lust for Chipotle and old movies, often at the same time.

Bossman smiled and cocked his head to the side. “New robe? I wasn’t aware you liked paisley.”

“It’s a gift from my mother, dickhead.”

“Don’t you mean ‘Boss Dickhead’?”

“Sorry,” she said, genuinely chastised, “you know I’m not good in the mornings.”

“Well,” said a snarky female voice with a Southern twang, “that’s not what I heard.”

Lisa Bee, five feet two inches in heels if she was having a “tall day,” poked her head around the bedroom door, a wide smile painted on her cherry-red lips.

“Oh, hell, you guys!” Susannah exclaimed. “Why didn’t you let me know I was having a party for breakfast?”

“Well, it’s your own goddamn fault,
ma ch
érie
,” Lisa Bee chirped in her N’awlins French. “You’re the one who made the mistake of telling our mark that you were around all weekend.”

“Oh shit,” Susannah replied, “did I really?”

“Yes, Legs,” said the Boss with a sarcastic tinge. “We know he’s your type and all, but we weren’t really planning a weekend in New York. That being said, it gives us all a chance to do a little more legwork. Not that your leg work isn’t quite astounding, but . . .”

“All right, all right,” she grumbled, “let me get some clothes on, and I’ll meet you in the living room.”

“Actually, you’ll meet us in your new suite, upstairs.”

“New suite?”

“Well, Legs,” Jackson said pointedly, “if we have the chance to have him over, we’d like him to be impressed.”

“WE?” Susannah yelled.

“Can it, Legs,” said the Boss suavely. “Meet us upstairs in five. Have your stuff packed. Someone will move it for you. And we’ve bought you a new dress for tonight.”

“Really? I must’ve impressed you last night. What suite?”

“The penthouse,” he replied with a smirk. “And after you pick your jaw up off the floor, you could start with a ‘thank you.’ ”

‡‡‡

THE TRIBECA GRAND’S
Penthouse 8 looked more like a music producer’s apartment than a hotel suite. Susannah looked around the rooms and gaped at the fully stocked bar, banquette seating, and private rooftop terrace. She let out a small sigh when her gaze landed upon the sexy bedroom layout: king-sized bed with a white duvet, hot tub, the Art Deco glass chandelier, the New York skyline. For a small-town Virginia girl, this was eye-opening, to say the least. Though she wasn’t a hick—as a child, she’d spent every summer visiting her French grandmother in her farmhouse cottage in the Dordogne—she still felt provincial in her roots. And this place was as cosmopolitan swank as it got. She grinned, imagining staying here for two whole days! Completely awestruck, she sat down on the leather banquette next to the coffee table where everyone had organized the morning’s meeting. She knew which place was hers from the large pitcher of coffee and the larger plate of bacon.

“All right, Legs,” Bossman began, “what did you get off the hard drive?”

“Well, I don’t know yet,” she replied, already aggravated before the meeting had even begun. “My contact hasn’t had time to get back to me.”

“And you didn’t think to look yourself?”

“BOSSMAN! I came in and went to bed and the next thing I knew Jackson had his bacon in my bedroom!”

“Now in all fairness,” Jackson piped in, “if it’s my bacon we’re talking about, it’d be a much larger plate.”

Lisa Bee giggled. The Boss and Susannah glared. Jackson looked smug. The Boss began again. “Susannah, have some coffee. That’s an order. Jackson, shut up. Bee, check out the hard drive. Legs, give her what you’ve got.”

Susannah looked confused for a moment, then remembered where it was. “Right,” she said, reaching into her bra and pulling out the USB drive. “Sorry, Bee. I slept on it.”

“Well, if I had a nickel . . .” Lisa Bee said, laughing, taking the stick and inserting it into her laptop. “Gimme a couple minutes and we’ll see what we’ve landed.”

Susannah poured herself a cup of coffee and took a long sip. Then she snarfed down three pieces of bacon. Jackson gave her a long look. “At least you’re the one in the penthouse,” he said with envy. “Because of you I gotta sleep in the car.”

‡‡‡

JACKSON WAS TRYING
to make jokes again, but in truth, he couldn’t keep his eyes off Lisa Bee. It was getting worse and worse, this crush he had, and he was trying desperately to defuse it with humor. Or dick jokes. Or talking about other women. Instead, he just seemed like an asshole, and he knew it. He had known Lisa Bee for the better part of five years, and they had become friends. Jackson was a self-professed ladies’ man, a new-age gigolo, a lover of women and sensual delights. Which is why it startled him to feel things for this curvy little Southern delight that he’d never before known. He felt protective of her, but she also excited him to no end. She was every bit his match, in more ways than one, he’d bet. He could feel himself getting turned on just imagining what she’d be like in the bedroom. But it wasn’t time for that now, he reasoned, if it ever would be. For now he’d better keep himself on task and keep their relationship platonic. She laughed again and he drew in a deep breath. It was going to be a long night.

‡‡‡

CHAS PALMER SAT
frozen at his computer screen, waiting for Windows to reactivate. Someone had tinkered with his hard drive and made a rookie mistake doing it. His mind flashed on the sexy redhead from last night. Could she have been in here toying with his equipment? No way—the only equipment she was toying with was hers for the asking. Still, she did carry a gun . . . a nice one at that. It turned him on something fierce. He could barely sleep, imagining what it would be like to remove her holster and have access to the rest of her. It’d sure be interesting if she was looking for information about him—that would turn him on even more. She wouldn’t find it, of course. He’d never leave his real hard drive anywhere it could be found. The computer that sat on his desk was just for show. All his real information was stored on an external hard drive kept in the safe beneath the scotch, only opened by spinning the globe and putting a finger first on Paris, then on Tangier, the two cities where he hunted his father’s killer.

Hmm. Susie Quinn. Friend of Peter Graves. Didn’t really make sense to him. Peter was an aging, dull, homely businessman. Susie was like a fire engine on high speed, revved up and ready to go. Still, couldn’t hurt to ask Peter for information. It might get him closer to knowing a bit more about the lady he currently had his eye on. Picking up his cell, he dialed Peter’s private line at the hedge fund he worked for, hoping to catch him in the office on a weekend.

“Graves,” Peter said, picking up on the first ring.

“Peter! Chas Palmer. Glad to see you’re still working 24/7. How goes it?”

“Well and good, Chas, well and good. You? How’s business? How was the party?”

“Party was dull as always. Except for that lovely lady you sent my way.”

“Ah, yes. My friend John’s secretary. Thought you might like her! Small-town girl from Virginia. Never gets to New York. You know the type.”

“Sure,” Chas replied, skeptical of the information. “I’d like to send her flowers. Do you happen to know where she works?”

“Oh sure,” Peter said, “some kind of management company. Hang on a sec. Initials, I think. I have John’s card—right, here we go. FTP. FTP, Inc. Office is on Fifth Street, SE. Capitol Hill. Right next to a fantastic dive of a diner called Jimmy T’s. Best grits in DC.”

“Got it. I’ll hunt her down. And the grits! Thanks, Peter.”

“No problem. Talk soon.”

Chas hung up feeling partly excited and partly confused. There was no way that woman was anybody’s secretary. And small-town? Really? Now that his computer was back on track, he plugged in his external hard drive and began a new search.

‡‡‡

SUSANNAH LOOKED DOWN
at the intel folder with the FTP letterhead. The Boss had come up with the company name as well as the logo, a businessman holding a briefcase filled with money. The logo was double purpose. It quasi-indicated what the company was about—white-collar investigations—but it also worked as a decoy for the decoy company: a financial management firm in which Susannah was the secretary. They were all playing secondary roles that they used to hide their true identities unless it was okay to drop cover. The Boss told people that FTP stood for “Financial Trust and Protection” but in truth it stood for “Films Take Priority,” as he was really much more interested in Bogart than banking. On a bad day, when tangling with law enforcement, the Boss would say it stood for “Fuck the Police.”

She was looking at a collection of information about Chas. While Lisa Bee downloaded everything from the thumb drive, Bossman, Jackson, and Susannah went through all the information they had so far: Chas’s upbringing, his family, and the cases he was said to have been instrumental in. By the time they had discussed everything, Lisa Bee was ready with her two cents.

“Well,” Lisa Bee said, customary optimism gone, “we’ve got fuck all.”

“What does that mean?” Susannah rounded on her. “I worked my ass off for that.”

“You worked your ass, all right,” Jackson mumbled.

“Shut up, Jackson!” Lisa Bee and Susannah said at the same time.

There was a pause. The Boss looked somewhere between confused and infuriated. “Hang on,” he stated, “correct me here. We got his hard drive, right?”

“Right,” Susannah said.

“And there’s nothing on it?”

“It’s not nothing,” Lisa said, “it just doesn’t seem like his. It seems like a fake. Or like a cover, frankly. I bet he’s got a hidden hard drive.”

“Oh, fuck ME.” Susannah sighed. “I mean, what’s a girl gotta do?”

Jackson shifted in his seat. “I think you just said what you gotta do.”

The Boss made a noise that sounded like a provoked bull. “Jackson, seriously. Shut up. It’s not helping. Bee, any other recourse? Legs, calm down. You’ll see him again; you’ll find a way to get the intel with integrity. You always do.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

“Nothin’, Bossman,” Lisa Bee said with a shrug. “He’s an ordinary guy according to this. I think Legs has her work cut out for her.”

“I didn’t mean to be an asshole, Legs,” Jackson said, leaning forward, “and I didn’t mean to question your integrity. The truth is that I’m worried about this guy. I think he’s shadier than we realize, and I don’t like it.”

Lisa Bee looked at him. “Why can’t you just speak like that normally instead of all the stupid dick jokes?”

“I dunno, Bee. Just how I roll, I guess. I joke around when I’m nervous about something.”

“Then you must be one anxious dude,” the Boss said. “That’s all we ever get to see.”

They all laughed at that, except for Jackson, who looked uncomfortable. Then there was a moment’s silence.

“It’s okay, guys,” Susannah finally said. “I can handle it.”

“You sure?” the Boss asked. “We don’t have to do it this way.”

“I’m sure,” Susannah replied, smiling. “Truth is, I wouldn’t mind seeing the guy again.”

‡‡‡

A FEW HOURS LATER,
Chas had everything he needed to know. It was tricky, getting to the real agency, with their bogus cover story about financial management. But Chas was no ordinary hacker. He knew the ways to find information. He had been schooling himself since he was ten, and had later learned a bunch from a professional hacker he met through his high school gaming club, the Kombat Mortals. He knew the backroads, the inroads, the secret hidden places of the Intraweb. It was like a spider’s web, the thin filaments of information, of connection, of entry into the inner sanctum.

So his new challenge was Susannah Carter, undercover operative for FTP, “Financial Trust and Protection,” whatever bullshit that was. She was thirty-two, she was damn good at her job, and like him, her father had been killed when she was a teenager.

Also like him, she was an excellent shot and an excellent tracker.

Just his luck.

The lady he finally wanted to hunt was hunting him.