Girl Undercover 6 & 7: Emma's Secret & The Truth (9 page)

“Oh.” I guess talking about Janine would be a waste of time then. We’d better get back to Emma’s emails instead. I told Ian that we should.

“Okay,” he said and instantly clicked on Emma’s account, much to my surprise. “Is there something specific that you have in mind? Something we should be looking for in the emails?”

“I have a few ideas, but nothing that I can verbalize. Well, she does talk about Zurich a lot. We should look into emails that seem to touch upon that city and Switzerland in general.”

Zurich was the city where The Adler Group had their European headquarters. I might as well use this fact to my advantage. As expected, Ian brightened.

“Really? Hmm.” He rubbed his chin that was once again full of stubble while slowly scrolling through the emails. “I wonder what role she could play in this conspiracy then…”

I emptied my wineglass and held it out to Ian. “Would you mind getting me some more wine?” I really preferred going through Emma’s email on my own, not with Ian breathing down my neck, not to mention controlling the computer.

He popped to his feet. “Coming right up.” He winked at me before leaving for the marble island where the bottle he’d opened when I got there stood.

I gave him a smile, then returned my gaze to the computer screen where Emma’s emails showed. At first glance, I saw nothing of interest. I grabbed the mouse on the desk, scrolled through more emails.

Ian returned much too soon and put the refilled wineglass down beside me. I turned my face to him and smiled. “Thanks.”

I had a big swallow to show just how much I had wanted that wine. He really had a great taste in wine; not once had he opened a bottle that wasn’t simply exquisite. This last one might be the best of the crop. I had another sip and let it linger in my mouth before swallowing.

“You like it?” Ian asked, putting his hands on my shoulders. He began to massage them. It felt incredible. I leaned back toward him to encourage him to continue. It occurred to me that I should get him in bed as soon as possible and tire him out so much that he fell asleep. That way I could go through the emails alone finally.

“Yeah, it’s delicious wine,” I replied. I tried to focus my eyes on the screen and Emma’s emails, but the way Ian was touching me, kneading my sore shoulders and upper back, felt so good I couldn’t help but closing them and letting out a quiet moan.

His fingers immediately responded by digging deeper into my tight muscles. I felt like I was in heaven, relaxed, all warm and fuzzy on the inside. Shivers of pleasure raced up my skin, my spine, my scalp. “Mmm…”

I let my head fall back so that Ian could see my face.
Okay, sex first, emails later then…
I bit my lower lip and moaned. I’d quickly come to learn that Ian found this combination to be particularly exciting. Before I knew it, his mouth was on mine.

I didn’t resist.

Chapter 7

As I so often did when I didn’t take my heavy-duty sleeping pills to crash, I woke up in the middle of the night, needing to visit the bathroom. The pattern stayed the same this night, so around three in the morning, I was fumbling through Ian’s apartment in search of his bathroom.

When I found it and did my business, I was again amazed at how easily I’d fallen asleep once we were done making love. Or fucking, I should say. Because Ian and I weren’t making love. The only person I’d ever made love to was Nick.

I shoved uncomfortable thoughts of my dead husband aside and left the bathroom, scolding myself for having allowed myself to close my eyes for even a few seconds after Ian had brought me pleasure that had lasted for more than an hour. I should have known that I’d pass out, having done so every time now.
Well, no use in beating yourself up about it,
Gabi,
I thought. Now I was awake again and would do what needed to be done at last.

So instead of heading back to Ian’s warm bed, I tiptoed over to his elaborate computer station and sat down before the screens there. Things had gotten so hot and heavy between us so quickly that he’d never had time to turn off the computer. All I needed to do to get into Emma’s email account was stir the mouse on his desk a little.

The screen lighting up as I did so, I began scrolling through all the messages. It wasn’t until I got to one that said
My pregnancy
in the subject line and was addressed to a Marissa Reineman a few minutes later that I stopped.

I clicked the message open. It was sent over a month ago.

Dear Marissa,

I just wanted to let you know personally that the pregnancy is progressing well. I know how busy Janine can be so wasn’t sure if she keeps you in the loop. Anyway, things are great and I can’t wait to be a mother! Thanks for letting me participate in this endeavor.

Best, Emma.

I stared at the words, reread them over and over. That just had to be Janine Eastwood Emma was referring to, and it had to be the same Marissa to whom Janine had sent an email with the subject line
Emma Patterson
on it that I never got a chance to open
.
I couldn’t remember if the Marissa in Janine’s account had had the last name Reineman, but surely she had. Marissa and Janine weren’t exactly common names, and Marissa had also been the main part of Janine’s password. It seemed the name Marissa meant something to the senator. But what? Was Marissa her lesbian lover? Excitement rushed through me. Surely that was so! But what had either of the two women got to do with Emma’s pregnancy? And what endeavor was Emma referring to? Was the pregnancy itself some kind of “endeavor”? I thought about what little Emma had said to me about her pregnancy when she’d revealed it to me a few weeks ago:

“I’m using a sperm donor… I’m having great doctors helping me and they keep assuring me everything will be fine.”

Maybe Janine had paid for Emma’s sperm donor and the entire process. Or perhaps this Marissa Reineman had, which was why Emma was emailing her with an update. Maybe the two women were splitting the costs. I couldn’t imagine using a sperm donor was cheap nor was the assistance of great doctors. Someone else paying for it all would explain how someone like Emma could afford expensive assisted reproductive technology in the first place.

Of course, why would Janine sponsor Emma’s pregnancy? Even if I had reason to believe the two knew each other after my most recent conversation with Emma, what had made them become so friendly that Janine had chosen to help Emma become a mother? They sure didn’t seem to like each other. Or at least Emma was terrified of the senator for some reason. Ariel hadn’t seemed as scared, but it had been clear that day out on the sundeck that the senator wasn’t one of Ariel’s favorite people, nor could Ariel be someone the senator thought highly of, either.

It struck me that Ariel might have been part of the “endeavor” Emma was talking about and that maybe something had gone wrong…

Had Ariel been pregnant as well?

I quickly discarded that notion. If that had been the case, I doubted the senator would have shaken her so violently no matter how angry she’d been with the younger woman. Plus, there had been no mention of Ariel being pregnant in any of the police reports I’d read about her afterward. The medical examiner would surely have discovered an early pregnancy postmortem.

The questions were racing through my head as I tried to figure out the connection between Janine, Emma and Ariel. As soon as I came up with an explanation that seemed feasible, I thought of something else that forced me to discard it.

The hardwood floor behind me creaked, shaking me out of my head. Quickly, I clicked the email shut and scrolled up the screen. My hand was still on the mouse when Ian ran his fingers through my hair.

“Did you find anything interesting?” he asked softly.

“Not really. And I’ve spent almost half an hour here!” I made my voice sound a lot more outraged than I was. I wasn’t about to share what I had found out about Emma and Janine, not yet at least.

I got to my feet and wrapped my arms around his neck. His hair was messy and his eyes heavy with sleep. Gazing into them, I noted a twinkle of desire there, tiny but potent. He leaned his face toward mine and pressed a light kiss to my lips. As always when our lips met, I was instantly turned on. Too turned on. Out of control turned on. I sighed inwardly. This man would be the end of me if that kept happening. This strong, almost animal-like attraction I felt for him was still not showing any signs of fading. When would it finally do so?

“Let’s go back to bed,” he whispered and kissed me again.

He didn’t have to ask twice.

***

I spent the entire next day at Nikkei in search of Emma. I was determined to pull her aside when I saw her, then demand to know what Janine and Marissa Reineman had to do with her pregnancy. It might be a bit aggressive, but she was really giving me no choice. Something was eating badly at Emma and she needed my help that much was clear. If confronting her more strongly was what it would take to let me help her, so be it.

When I didn’t see her at all and it was seven o’clock at night I began asking around among the other trainers who also spent Wednesdays at the club.

“Have you seen Emma today?” I asked two of the new trainers, both gorgeous girls in their mid-twenties that were standing at the fitness desk, talking. “Isn’t she usually here on Wednesdays?”

“Yeah, I think so,” the first girl said. “I haven’t seen her at all today, though. But I’ve been pretty busy, so I can’t say I’ve paid that much attention to my surroundings.”

“I haven’t seen her either,” the other girl, a willowy strawberry blonde, said. “And I’ve been here all day. She’s always on the fifth floor with her clients at the same time as me in the mornings, but today I thought about how one of her clients was working out on her own. Maybe she’s out sick. Why don’t you go ask Rolf? He should know
.
”

“Good idea,” I said and walked over to his office. Gazing through the glass that made up the upper half of his door, I saw that he was at his desk, typing on his phone. I walked inside.

He looked up, face bright. “Oh, hey, Jamie. How are you?”

“Great,” I replied, smiling. “Have you seen Emma today? She’s usually here on Wednesdays. Is she out sick?”

He looked at me for a long moment with an unreadable expression.

“Yes, she is out sick,” he said finally.

“Oh. Is she okay?”

His lips disappeared into a thin line. “She’ll be fine. If you don’t have anything you need, you’re going to have to excuse me. I have lots of work to catch up on. ”

“No, that was it. Thanks.” I opened the door and left his office.

Okay, what was that all about?
I thought. It was as if I’d struck a sensitive nerve in him by asking about Emma.

I hurried over to my locker, found my bag and headed home. I needed to call Emma and check on her. Judging from the weird way Rolf had behaved, I worried that she may not be okay. It was of course possible that I was reading too much into the way my manager had acted—maybe I caught him at a bad time—but it was best to be sure. For some inexplicable reason, I preferred checking on Emma while alone at my house, not while at the club. Luckily, I had her number programmed into my phone.

As soon as I stepped into my apartment, I threw my bag on the floor and dialed her.

She picked up right before the call could go into voicemail, her voice sounding weak.

“Hello…”

“Emma, it’s Jamie. I heard you were sick. I just wanted to make sure you were okay and see if you needed anything.”

An oppressive silence followed and then it sounded like Emma burst out in tears. I couldn’t be sure, though, so I asked, “Emma, are you crying?”

After a few seconds, it was so obvious that she was that she didn’t have to answer. But she still did. Or tried. “Y…Y…Ye…” Her stuttering was followed by a mixture of choked sniffles and loud sobbing.

What the hell?
No one who sounded like that was okay.

I took her not hanging up on me as a sign that she wanted me to know that she was very upset.

“Emma, do you want me to come over? Do you want to talk?”

More loud bawling followed. Somewhere in the middle of all the crying, I heard what sounded like the word “okay.”

“Can you text me your address?” I asked her.

It didn’t take long until my phone buzzed. Removing it from my ear, I checked the screen. And there it was, a street address and an apartment number. She didn’t live that far away from me, so I told her that I’d be at her place shortly, then hung up.

I turned around and left my house, jumped into the subway station by my house. A train soon arrived, taking me to Emma’s neighborhood. When I was back on the street, I stopped at a deli a few blocks away from her building and bought some chocolate bars and ice cream. In my experience, either or both those items were helpful when you were as upset as Emma had sounded.

Holding the goodies close to my chest in a paper bag, I jogged over to the six-story walkup where Emma lived. I pressed the buzzer and was let inside without any questions asked.

Rushing up the stairs, I soon determined which out of the four doors on the third floor was hers and knocked on it lightly. It was already open, I discovered, so I entered.

“Emma?” I asked as I walked tentatively into a dimly lit apartment with a small kitchen immediately to my right and what had to be a bathroom to my left. There was no answer.

I dropped the paper bag on the floor and continued farther inside, my hand instinctively reaching for the gun at my hip. I found myself in what appeared to be an L- shaped studio because one of the living room walls ended long before the other, leading to an alcove or similar on that side. In front of me was a comfortable-looking but old couch, a small TV and a round coffee table. Rows of windows covered by frilly curtains outlined the wall at the other end of the living room I was moving toward. I assumed Emma’s bed was in the part of the apartment that I couldn’t see.

“Emma, are you here?” I asked again. Again, no answer. I pulled out my Glock from my hip holster as I continued deeper into the apartment. I’d better not take any chances. Holding the gun to my chin, I slid up to the corner that hid that other part of the studio and carefully peeked around it.