Undercover Colorado
Undercover Colorado
Cassie Miles
UNDERCOVER LOVERSDetective Mac Granger was in trouble. The Colorado mountain-man-turned-city-cop had incensed a drug lord, and now someone was setting him up, making his peers doubt his loyalty and forcing him on the run from a mysterious killer. His only hope lay in FBI Special Agent Abby Nelson, the fed assigned to investigate him. Could he trust the woman who'd gone undercover in order to expose him? He couldn't deny his attraction to the beautiful blonde–or the opportunity to pose as her lover in order to fi nd the killer. But he'd be damned if he fell for a woman whose commitment to duty might make her his worst enemy….
“According to this cover story, I’m supposed to be falling in love with you. Right?”
“That’s the story.”
“That might be more believable, if it was more true.” He rose from the bed and took one step to stand in front of her. “Both times when we kissed, it was a lie.”
Her breath caught in her throat. She knew what was coming next.
He took her hands and pulled her to her feet. “Kiss me now, as yourself.”
“That might not be wise.” Even as she spoke, she knew resistance was futile. With every fiber of her being, she wanted to kiss him.
“Kiss me, Abigail Nelson.”
She melted into his arms. When their lips met, it was different than their other kisses. Instead of fierce and demanding, he was oh-so-gentle.
Her arm encircled his torso. Their bodies skimmed against each other. Sensation built gradually, slowly. Oh yes, this kiss was very different.
Undercover Colorado
Cassie Miles
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Linda Hull and Jan Gurney,
the powers that be. And, as always, to Rick.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
For Cassie Miles, the best part about writing a story set in Eagle County near the Vail ski area is the ready-made excuse to head into the mountains for research. Though the winter snows are great for skiing, her favorite season is fall when the aspens turn gold.
The rest of the time, Cassie lives in Denver where she takes urban hikes around Cheesman Park, reads a ton and critiques often. Her current plans include a Vespa and a road trip, despite eye-rolling objections from her adult children.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Mac Granger—The cynical Denver cop, wounded in the line of duty, becomes part of a bigger sting operation.
Abby Nelson—The FBI Special Agent goes undercover as sex bomb Vanessa Nye to entrap a dirty cop.
Sheila Hartman—Mac’s partner is always in the wrong place and the wrong time.
Hal Perkins—Mac’s lieutenant at the Denver PD.
Vince Elliot—The vice cop has been on the trail of a drug lord for months.
Nicholas Dirk—The high-powered mogul in Vail is involved in shady dealings.
Leo Fisher—Abby’s former fiancé, the FBI undercover agent obsesses about his suspects.
Julia Last—FBI Special Agent in charge of safe house operations.
Roger Flannery—The rookie FBI agent always gets the worst assignments.
Paul Hemmings—Eagle County Deputy Sheriff and Mac’s boyhood friend.
Jess Isler—Member of the Vail Ski Patrol and Mac’s buddy.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter One
The gun weighed heavy in his hand. The last time Detective Mac Granger unholstered his piece was three months ago at the shooting range when he drilled the heart of the paper target nine out of ten shots.
It was a Thursday night in September. Mac and his partner, Detective Sheila Hartman, had been on their way to a homicide investigation in north Denver when a squawk came over the radio in their unmarked car: “Officer in need of assistance.”
Headed north on Park Street, they had just passed the homeless mission with the red neon Jesus Saves sign. They were close to the location given and arrived first on the scene—a dark, deserted city street lined with two-and three-story buildings. The crumbling bricks were stained by years of greasy soot from the nearby railyards.
Three other cars were carelessly parked near a run-down warehouse. The door to the loading dock gaped open. Inside the warehouse, it was pitch-dark.
As Mac emerged from the car, gun in hand, the night breeze whipped around him. A crumpled sheet of newspaper rolled down the street like a tumble-weed. From ten blocks away, he heard a resounding cheer from the baseball fans at Coors Field where the Rockies were playing a night game. Home run.
From inside the warehouse, gunfire exploded. Several shots in rapid succession. A semiautomatic weapon. This sounded like something bigger than he and his partner could handle. “Stay back,” he ordered Sheila. “Other patrol cars will be here in a minute.”
She shot him a glare. Sheila was inexperienced and willful. She could be a real pain in the ass.
“Police,” she yelled. “Throw down your weapons and come out with your hands up.”
“Come and get us,” was the response.
“Us,” Mac said pointedly. “There’s more than one.”
Ignoring him, Sheila yelled again. “You’re surrounded. Give up now.”
He cursed under his breath. If the bad guys came onto the street, they could see at a glance that the only cops on the scene were the two of them. Frankly, he and Sheila weren’t real impressive when it came to firepower.
“Stay here,” he said to her.
“Maybe I could circle around and—”
“Stay.”
The woman was impossible. They wouldn’t even have been in this area if they’d gone directly to their crime scene in north Denver instead of stopping once because Sheila had to pee, then again because she wanted a latte.
Mac ran toward the loading dock and flattened himself against the brick wall. If anybody came out, they’d be caught between him and his partner.
A bulky figure charged through the open maw of the loading dock and leaped down from the ledge. He landed on the pavement only a few yards away from Mac.
“Drop your weapon,” Mac ordered. “Raise your arms.”
Immediately, the man obeyed. Mac grabbed his arm and flung him face-first against the brick wall. It was Vince Elliot, an undercover vice cop.
Vince gave no sign of recognition. Even in the heat of confrontation, he didn’t break cover.
As Mac cuffed him, he whispered, “This is a drug sting gone bad. Be careful. I want to take these guys alive.”
Sheila abandoned her position and came toward them. Dumb move. The worst thing they could do in this situation was to stand together and get mowed down by one blast.
Angrily, Mac motioned for her to go back. He could hear the sirens of approaching patrol cars. Backup was on the way.
Sheila made a confused gesture. Then she stamped her foot and checked her wristwatch as if she were late for a manicure appointment.
Four armed men emerged from the dark warehouse. The one in front aimed directly at Sheila.
Mac had to protect his partner. He fired once, point-blank. The man with the gun went down.
Time froze. Everything went into slow motion. Mac shoved Vince Elliot to the pavement and stepped in front of him. He looked into the faces of the armed men who turned toward him. He saw panic in their eyes. When they returned fire, he imagined the bullets poised in midair. The thunder of gunshots resounded against brick walls.
It occurred to Mac that he might die right here on this cold city street. A fitting place. Though he had been born and raised in the mountains, this was where he belonged.
He got off another shot, aiming low. He didn’t want to kill these guys. Another man fell with a scream.
The others ran toward their car.
“Freeze,” Sheila yelled. “Police. Freeze.”
The two remaining men dropped their weapons as several patrol cars arrived simultaneously. It was over.
Mac felt a sharp pain in his shoulder and looked down. Blood seeped through his tan sports jacket. He’d been hit.
ABBY NELSON leaned her back against the slender white trunk of an aspen tree and looked up through a canopy of sunlit golden leaves. A fresh wind rustled the boughs, and she glimpsed the clear, blue Colorado sky. Fantastic! This was a truly cherry assignment.
Her last undercover job as an FBI special agent had been in an inner city back east where she was supposed to be a pregnant runaway with a drug habit. Needless to say, her companions were the dregs of society—slimeballs, creeps and heinous criminals, many of whom were going to be locked up for a very long time thanks to Abby’s efforts.
But this time? Way better! When she was told that she was going undercover to an FBI safe house in the Colorado Rockies, Abby couldn’t believe her luck. She inhaled the crisp clean air and reveled in the spectacular scenery. This was practically a vacation.
Her undercover identity was Vanessa Nye, a protected witness who was waiting to testify at a high-profile case in Los Angeles involving the Santoro crime family. The real Vanessa was an unabashed gold digger who traded on her outrageous sexuality, and Abby had disguised herself accordingly. She dyed her hair platinum blond, heaped on tons of makeup and slithered into skintight clothes. The worst part of her Vanessa outfit had to be these wretched spike heels that were digging holes in the soil beside the aspen trees. She wasn’t looking forward to the mile-and-a-half hike back to her bedroom at the safe house.
Her solitude was interrupted when a sturdy-looking woman on horseback rode toward her. Julia Last was the special agent in charge of the FBI safe house known as Last’s Resort. She was the only person on site who had been informed that “Vanessa” was a cover for Special Agent Abby Nelson.
Julia gave a friendly wave. “Want a ride?”
“You bet I do.”
Julia stared pointedly at the purple high-heeled shoes. “When you get into an undercover role, you don’t kid around. How do you stand in those things?”
“Not very well,” Abby admitted. “It’s not something they teach at Quantico.”
Julia flicked the reins and directed her dappled gray mare close to a granite ledge. “Climb on the rocks, then throw your leg over the rear behind the saddle.”
Abby moved carefully. Her snug designer slacks were partly spandex, but she didn’t want to take a chance on stretching them out and ruining her look. “If I were the real Vanessa, I’d never do this.”
“If you were the real Vanessa, I wouldn’t have let you wander off by yourself.” As soon as Abby was settled, Julia nudged her horse into a steady, rolling walk. “We take security for our protected witnesses very seriously.”
“Have you had problems?”
“Not from outside,” Julia said. “Our location is remote enough to provide natural protection. As far as anybody knows, this safe house is just another mountain resort. The problems come when witnesses get bored.”
“Cabin fever. They want to take side trips to Vail, right? Or invite a friend to visit.”
“That’s right.” When Julia nodded, her curly brown ponytail bounced. “Sometimes we indulge them with supervised outings.”
“And you’ve only got the other two agents working with you?”
“On a rotating basis. This safe house is considered a prime assignment until they get here and find out that their responsibilities include chopping wood, mucking out the stalls for the horses and making beds.” She tossed a grin over her shoulder. “I take a certain amount of satisfaction seeing these macho agents doing housework.”
“I’ll try not to gloat when I see them with feather dusters. What’s the name of the young one?”
“Roger Flannery. Nice kid.”
Abby tucked a wisp of platinum hair behind her ear. “How many other people are staying here?”
“Two,” Julia said. “We refer to them as guests. Both older guys. They’ve been here for nearly a month.”
“I thought the protected witnesses got shuffled more frequently so nobody can get a bead on their location.”
“I didn’t say they were both witnesses.”
Abby already knew that the safe house was used for more than protected witnesses. Sometimes, the feds held high-level meetings here. Sometimes, this idyllic mountain setting provided a place for rest and recuperation for injured agents and cops. “The guy I’m interested in will show up this afternoon.”
“The homicide detective from Denver.”
Mac Granger was Abby’s assignment. He was a Denver cop who had been wounded in a drug sting and was suspected of being on the take which—in Abby’s opinion—made him the lowest of the low.
According to her information, he’d wounded an undercover FBI agent at the sting—an agent Abby knew very well. Leo Fisher was her former fiancé.
Though their breakup had been exceedingly nasty, she didn’t wish Leo dead. At least, not most of the time. She’d been glad to hear that he was expected to recover from the bullet wound in his leg.
As she rocked on the rump of the horse and watched the landscape unfolding around her, a familiar twinge of regret brushed through her. Too bad things hadn’t worked out with Leo. For a while, she’d thought she loved him.
But she wasn’t sure. Because they were both undercover agents, it was possible they were both playing at being in love—acting the way they thought people in love ought to behave. With all her undercover identities, she sometimes forgot what it meant to be real.
Her thoughts returned to her current assignment. In addition to shooting Leo in the leg, Mac Granger had gunned down and killed a drug dealer who had been watched by the FBI and Denver vice cops for months in an unusual cooperative investigation. Usually, the death of a drug dealer was no cause for mourning, but this particular guy had indicated a willingness to talk about higher-ups in the drug distribution chain and about dirty cops. Now he was dead, thanks to Mac Granger. It made sense that Mac had killed the dealer to keep him from talking.
Because Mac was off duty during the obligatory Internal Affairs investigation into the fatal shooting, his lieutenant had agreed with the FBI plan for Mac to go to the FBI safe house—the location of which was, of course, undisclosed except to Mac who was supposed to relax and take time for his wound to heal.
That was where Abby came in. Her job was to befriend Mac Granger and to ultimately offer him a bribe.
Julia glanced over her shoulder. “Is there anything you can tell me about your assignment?”
“I can guarantee that you’re going to hate the way I’ll be acting around Mac Granger.”
“As Vanessa?”
“The high-powered sex-bomb,” Abby said. “I want to attract his attention.”
“With the way you’re dressed, that shouldn’t be a problem. Roger started drooling the minute you arrived.”
“We won’t tell Roger that I have a third-degree black belt in karate.”
“Lethal,” Julia said. “And I’m glad. If you were the real Vanessa, I’d worry about keeping you in line.”
“It’s all an act,” Abby assured her. Always an act.
At the top of a rise, they looked down at the safe house which was at the end of a graded gravel road. The two-story cedar structure had a large covered porch at the front. On the opposite side was a sundeck that overlooked a barn and two storage sheds.
“I see an unfamiliar car,” Julia said.
“Must be Mac.”
“That’s odd.” There was a hint of irritation in her voice. “We usually don’t allow our guests to have their own transportation.”
Part of the plan was to allow Mac some mobility in the hope that he might implicate himself. “I promise to keep close surveillance on him.”
When they entered the safe house, Abby made an immediate detour to her upstairs bedroom. The first thing she did was kick off the spike heels and flex her aching toes. Why would anyone wear these things on purpose?
In the bathroom, she repaired the dramatic makeup that made her brown eyes look huge and dewy. She applied a fresh coat of fire engine-red lipstick. Putting on all this sleazy glamor wasn’t nearly as difficult as maintaining a believable attitude for a gold-digging bimbo.
Though she had no intention of seducing Mac Granger, she wanted him to notice her. She plumped up her boobs inside her fuzzy pink sweater. With her feet wedged into the high heels again, she sashayed down the staircase toward the kitchen.
From inside the kitchen, she heard Julia giving Mac the rules of the house.
“You’ll need to make your own bed,” Julia said. “And keep your room tidy. We aren’t a maid service, but we do provide three square meals a day. If you have any special dietary requirements, you need to tell me.”
“No problems.” The deep male voice sounded cranky. “What else?”
“No weapons. No visitors. Don’t leave without notifying me or one of the other agents. And, obviously, tell no one that this is a safe house.”
“Fine,” he said. “I’m going into Redding tonight. I grew up here and have a couple of buddies who live nearby. We’re going to meet at the tavern.”
Interesting, Abby thought. From her brief bio of Mac Granger, she knew he was born near here and attended the local high school. But she hadn’t been aware that he still had ties in the area.
She slithered into the kitchen and took her first look at Detective Mac Granger. He stood just over six feet tall and was very nicely put together with a broad chest and narrow hips in button-fly Levi’s. He wore a loose-fitting, fisherman’s knit sweater in the same dark blue as a policeman’s uniform. His sandy blond hair was neatly trimmed and combed straight back from his forehead. Though Mac had grown up in the mountains, his blue eyes showed the world-weary expression of an urban homicide cop who had seen too much. It wasn’t going to be easy to outsmart him.
Julia introduced them, using first names only, and asked, “Vanessa, would you like to help prepare dinner?”
“Cooking?” In her role as the spoiled hussy, Abby gave an appalled gasp. “Oh, honey. I don’t cook.”
“Never?”
“I barely even eat. But I do mix a great martini.” She zeroed in on Mac. “I’m ever so pleased to meet you.”
He turned toward Julia. “I’d be glad to help with dinner.”
Abby scowled. Mac hadn’t shown the least bit of interest, hadn’t even glanced at her cleavage which—thanks to a WonderBra—was as significant as the Grand Canyon.
As Julia set Mac to work, slicing fresh veggies for a tossed salad, Abby sidled up beside him. Rubbing against his arm, she purred, “Let me help you with that.”
“Grab a knife,” he said as he rolled a cucumber across the countertop toward her.
She picked up the cucumber and caressed it—a hopefully unsubtle innuendo. “Tell me about yourself, Mac. Where are you from?”
“Denver.”
“I thought you were from around here.”
He shot a suspicious glance in her direction. “Why would you think that?”
“I heard you talking before I came in.” She fluttered her fake eyelashes. “Is it true? Are you a mountain man?”
“Not anymore. I left Redding when I was eighteen.”
“But I bet you still ski. You look athletic.” She squeezed his bicep. “I bet you’re real good at sports.”
He shrugged off her grasp and concentrated on slicing a tomato. Talk about unresponsive! This disregard had to stop right now. Abby purposely sliced too close to her index finger and nicked it.
“Ow. Ow. Ow,” she wailed. “I cut myself.”
She held up her finger so Mac could see the drop of fresh blood beside her French tip manicure. In a baby voice, she said, “Would you kiss it and make it better?”
He glared. “That’s not going to happen.”
At least, he was looking. Maintaining eye contact with him, she placed her cut finger on her tongue, closed her lips around it and sucked.
His eyebrow lifted. Though he said nothing, his expression showed utter disdain. Calmly, he returned to his chopping.
She pulled her finger out of her mouth with a pop and glanced at Julia who was doing her best not to smirk.
Apparently, the sexy vamp act wasn’t going to work on Mac. So what kind of woman did he like? Somebody cute who made him laugh? A helpless damsel in distress?
Julia asked, “Want a bandage?”
“I guess I’ll be okay.” Abby didn’t bother with a sexy pout. Mac wasn’t looking. “I don’t like this cooking. I want to set the table.”
After Julia showed her the plates and silverware, Abby carried them to the dining room. She turned a task that should have taken a few minutes into a big production, moving a dried flower display from the great room to the center of the long oak table. Maybe Mac liked the “happy homemaker” type.
When he appeared in the kitchen doorway, she fussed. “These flowers aren’t right. You know what would be really beautiful? I saw some golden aspen leaves outside. We should pick some and put them in a vase.”
“Great idea,” Julia called from the kitchen. “While you’re outside, you can bring in a few more logs for the fireplace.”
Abby made one more attempt to get Mac’s attention with her sexy disguise. Since he didn’t seem impressed by her boobs or her fluttering eyelashes, she figured he might be the kind of guy who liked to look at bottoms.
As she shuffled the dinnerware, she purposely dropped a fork to the floor. Turning strategically, she bent down to pick it up, giving Mac a full view of her rear end in her snug purple slacks.
She peeked over her shoulder. He wasn’t paying the least bit of attention. Geez! What did it take to get this guy interested?
Chapter Two
The blonde had “high maintenance” written all over her, and Mac had made the mistake of getting involved with that kind of woman before. Not this time.
Carefully averting his gaze from any of her body parts that jiggled, he followed her outside to the deck behind the safe house. The sun had set, and the afterglow gilded the underbellies of the clouds. A wide valley spread before him. The buffalo grass had faded to dusty brown and the forested hillsides were pocketed with groves of brilliant yellow aspen.
He’d grown up here. This land was his home. And he hated being back. There were too many memories, too many regrets.
“Oh, Mac,” Vanessa called. “I need a big, strong man to help me reach these high branches.”
What she needed was a muzzle and a sheet to drape over that delectable body. He trod heavily down the steps from the deck, and stood beside her.
“Up here,” she said, handing him the snippers Julia had provided. “This is a pretty branch.”
When Mac reached up with his left arm, he experienced a throbbing ache in his shoulder. It was only three days since he’d been shot, and the wound wasn’t close to being healed. The doctors told him he’d been lucky. No bones had been broken, but ligaments and muscles were stressed. The bullet had lodged against his scapula, requiring a surgical incision to remove it. The scar required twenty stitches.
He’d lost some blood and was still weak. His AC joint was sore, and he wasn’t supposed to lift his left arm higher than his shoulder. But he sure as hell wasn’t an invalid who needed enforced recuperation time. There was some other reason Lieutenant Hal Perkins had insisted that Mac come to this FBI safe house during the Internal Affairs investigation. But why?
Mac had known something was up when the lieutenant had called him into his office and told him to close the door. Hal Perkins hadn’t smiled; he never smiled. His voice sounded like he had a mouthful of rocks. “You’re going on vacation. There’s a place in the mountains where you’re going to spend some time to heal.”
“Not necessary,” Mac had said.
“You’ll like it. The feds arranged it.”
“The feds?” That didn’t make sense. Denver P.D. seldom even talked to the feds, much less cooperated with them. “Why?”
“You don’t need to know.” Perkins sank heavily behind his desk and pulled a stack of papers toward him. “You’ll be contacted and given directions.”
“What if I don’t want to go?”
“Then you can consider this a direct order,” Perkins growled. “Don’t be a jackass, Mac. This is a gift. An all-expenses-paid vacation in the mountains. Accept it, okay?”
“I don’t get it. I shot that undercover agent. There’s no reason for the feds to give me a gift.”
Perkins shrugged. “Maybe they feel bad on account of you got shot at their sting.”
“I thought it was our sting. Vince Elliot was on scene.”
“Don’t start, Mac. Just go to the mountains.” He glared. “And I will need your badge until the I.A. investigation is over.”
Silently, Mac had pried his shield from his wallet and placed it on the lieutenant’s desktop. He’d already turned over his service handgun.
“Okay,” Perkins said. “See you next week.”
As soon as he left Perkins’s office, Mac had gone to vice looking for answers. He’d talked to Vince Elliot. In spite of the fact that Mac had probably saved his life at the warehouse, the vice cop was cold. Vince said that all he wanted was a bust, then he turned and walked away.
Why all the secrecy? Why wouldn’t anybody tell him anything?
“Mac,” the blonde whined. “Aren’t you going to cut the branches for me?”
He clipped two lower branches that he could reach with his right hand.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
He wished he knew the answer to that question.
THREE HOURS LATER, Mac stepped through the door of the Sundown Tavern in Redding. It felt like he’d gone back in time fifteen years. Not much had changed since high school when Mac and his buddies came here to play pool in the back room. The pine paneled walls still held sepia photographs of legendary skiers and other Colorado sports heroes, notably John Elway. The musty smell of old logs and beer was the same. The wood floor still creaked when Mac walked across it. The light was dim except for the neon beer signs over the bar where a couple of old-timers hunched on stools nursing their drinks.
At the end of the bar, Mac spotted his friend, Paul Hemmings. He’d changed. A lot.
No longer the skinny teenager, Paul was six feet, four inches tall and built like a linebacker. For the past seven years, he’d been an Eagle County deputy sheriff. After his divorce, he was raising two little girls on his own; he carried a lot of responsibility on those big shoulders.
He lumbered across the creaky wood floor like a St. Bernard coming to the rescue of a stranded skier. His huge arms enveloped Mac in a hug that caused a poignant ache in his wounded shoulder.
“That’s enough,” Mac said.
Paul backed away quickly. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”
“I’m fine.”
“I can’t believe you got shot in the line of duty. You’re supposed to be the smart one.”
“Not this time.”
After a round of hellos to the other men in the bar who remembered Mac or at least pretended they did, they went into the back room where liquor wasn’t served. There were a handful of teenagers back here, eating burgers and giggling.
Paul rolled a cue ball across the green felt of one of the pool tables. “Do you feel up to a game?”
“Bring it on,” Mac said. “I can still beat you with one hand tied behind my back.”
As Paul racked up the balls, he said, “Tell me about the shooting.”
“We heard the call for an officer in need of assistance. Me and my partner, Sheila—”
“You have a woman partner? How’s that?”
“I like female partners. They’re usually smarter than the men and know the rules. It’s never been a problem.”
Not until Sheila came along. A lot of what happened at the warehouse had been her fault. First, she’d yelled and provoked the bad guys before sufficient backup was in place. Then, she’d gotten herself in the line of fire.
Mac had downplayed her incompetence when he talked to the I.A. investigators; it wasn’t right to rat out your partner. But Sheila had made two dumb moves. That was nearly enough to put her in the same classification as that high-maintenance blonde at the safe house.
The thought of Vanessa brought an unexpected grin. All her prancing and posing made an amusing diversion, especially after she gave up on seducing him and dropped the sex-bomb act. During dinner, she’d rattled on about this and that. At one point, she’d given them a hilarious rendition of her act as a Las Vegas showgirl balancing a wineglass on her cleavage. He had a sense that she was more intelligent than she let on. Street smart, anyway.
Mac picked a cue from the wall rack and tested it. “We’re playing eight ball. I’ll break.”
“Fine with me.” Paul leaned on his cue. “So how’d you get shot?”
“I’m not proud of what happened.” Mac stretched himself across the pool table, testing different positions that wouldn’t strain his left arm and shoulder. He zeroed in on the cue ball and fired. The balls scattered across the table. He sank the seven. “I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“It happens.”
“Tell me about you,” Mac said. “How are the girls?”
“Too smart for their own good. Apparently, at age seven and nine, they know everything. And I’m an idiot.”
“I could have told them that.” Mac sank another ball. “How about sports? Are they skiing?”
“Skating,” Paul muttered. “Figure skating with the fancy outfits and the show tunes.”
Mac bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing at the thought of his big, husky friend shepherding around his two little princesses.
Mac missed his next shot and stepped back from the table in time to see their friend, Jess Isler, stroll through the door. Mac wasn’t the only one who noticed. The teenaged girls in the room stopped talking when Jess appeared.
It had been that way all through high school. Jess was a good-looking man. He was on the ski patrol and lived in nearby Vail.
After enduring another hug, Mac punched Jess on the shoulder. “Are you still dating that movie star?”
“We moved on. It was too much attention. You know, the paparazzi.”
“Oh, yeah.” Mac rolled his eyes. “Those paparazzi can be a real pain.”
Paul stood between them. “It’s been a long time since the three of us got together.”
“It was your mom’s funeral, Mac.” Jess shrugged. “Four years ago.”
“She was a good woman,” Paul said.
Jess nodded.
Mac said nothing. His feelings about his mother were ambivalent. Sure, he had loved her. Kathryn Granger was beautiful and fun, always laughing. But he knew something about Kathryn that nobody else was aware of. She had betrayed the family.
That was one of the reasons he had left town when he graduated high school. It was also one of the reasons he knew never to trust a woman; they would only break your heart.
Speaking of which…he looked up and saw Vanessa strolling toward the pool table. What the hell was she doing here?
“Hi there,” she said in a breathy little voice. “Mac? Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friends?”
“This is a private conversation.”
Undeterred, she moved toward Paul. When she grasped his huge hand, he had no alternative but to shake. “I’m Vanessa,” she said. “And you are?”
“Paul Hemmings.” He gave her a sheepish grin. “How do you know Mac?”
“We’re both staying at the same little resort.”
“I wanted to ask about that place,” Paul said. “Why is it called Last’s Resort?”
“The woman who runs it is Julia Last,” Mac said. Though Paul was his friend and a deputy, he wouldn’t betray the true purpose of the safe house. “Nice place. Real quiet. A friend recommended it to me.”
“You could have stayed with me,” Paul said.
“Or me,” Jess put in.
“Thanks, guys.” Mac knew his lieutenant had arranged his stay at the safe house for a reason. “But I’m supposed to rest and recuperate. I can’t do that with the little girls at your place, Paul. Or with the big girls who are always hanging out with Jess.”
Vanessa had picked up a cue. “Whose shot?”
“Mine.” Mac stared down at the table. Paul’s last shot had left him behind the eight ball. There wasn’t much he could do.
“I’ll play the winner,” Vanessa said.
Though Mac concentrated on their game, he couldn’t help listening as Vanessa chatted with handsome Jess. She was the kind of woman who would always focus on the best-looking man in the room. Or the wealthiest. From the platinum blond curls on her head to the toes of her high-heeled boots, she was a gold digger. It annoyed him that her husky laugh tickled pleasantly at the edge of his senses.
“The Vail ski patrol,” she said admiringly to Jess. “You must know some famous people.”
“Some,” he admitted. “Mostly, my job is a great way to get in a lot of skiing. As a bonus, I get to help people.”
“Like your friend, the deputy.”
“Kind of weird,” Jess said. “The three of us were buds in high school, and we all ended up in some kind of law enforcement jobs.”
“Ski patrol?” Paul scoffed. “Do you catch a lot of bad guys on the slopes?”
“Tell me about Mac,” Vanessa said.
Mac muffed a shot. He didn’t want Jess giving her too much information about him. Until he figured out what Vanessa was up to, he didn’t want to let his guard down.
“Mac’s dad was the sheriff,” Jess said. “A good guy. He moved down to Florida after Mac’s mom died.”
“Does he have other family up here?”
“Aunt Lucille.” Jess chuckled.
“Oh, yeah,” Paul chimed in. “Good old Aunt Lucille. She’s a real character.”
Jess picked up where he left off. “The woman has got to be in her seventies, but she still wears flashy clothes and skis like a demon. She competed in the 1952 Winter Olympics when Stein Eriksen won the giant slalom.”
“My kind of woman.” Vanessa bared her teeth in a grin. “A winner.”
“We’ll see about that,” Paul said. “Looks like you’re playing Mac.”
As she sashayed toward the pool table, her dark eyes held a competitive gleam. Mac decided there was no way he’d let her win this game. Unfortunately, when he broke the balls, nothing went in.
When Vanessa positioned herself across the table, he had a spectacular view of her cleavage. Earlier today, her vamping and prancing was a major turnoff. Now, when she wasn’t trying to be sexy, he was getting turned on.
With a crisp shot, she sank a striped ball and left herself another good lie.
“Nice,” Jess commented.
Gliding around the table, she nudged Mac out of her way. “I don’t like losing.”
She tapped the cue ball. Another ball tipped into the corner pocket. Now she had a problem. The cue ball was trapped behind two others.
Her eyes narrowed as she considered all the angles. When Vanessa banked the cue and sank the four, it was obvious that she knew what she was doing.
“You’re a hustler,” Mac said.
“I learned more in Vegas than just shaking my tail feathers.”
When her ruby lips spread in a smug grin, he had the insane urge to kiss the smile off those lips. He didn’t want to be attracted to this woman. She was a protected witness. For all he knew, she was up to her pretty brown eyes in danger and disaster—criminal activity of the worst kind.
He only had one more chance to sink a ball. He muffed it. Then she cleared the table and sank the eight.
Grudgingly, he offered approval. “Not bad.”
“Beat you.”
She tapped her cue against his chest and looked him straight in the eye. What was going on inside her head? He wanted to find out.
Mac was good in a police interrogation when he had the weight of the law on his side. Subtlety wasn’t his forte, but he was good at spotting a liar. “Buy you a drink?”
“I’ll have a Singapore Sling.”
“The Sundown Tavern doesn’t do cocktails with umbrellas.”
“Then, I’ll have the specialty of the house.”
As he led the way from the back room to the bar, Mac calculated her body weight and probable resistance to intoxication. It shouldn’t take more than three tequila shots to loosen her tongue. Then she’d be ready to tell him anything he wanted to know.
AN HOUR LATER, Abby stared down at the shot glass on the table. It would be her fourth. Though she’d managed to spill more than she drank, she was beginning to feel the effect.
“Drink up,” Mac urged. He was sipping soda, claiming that he couldn’t mix alcohol with his pain medication. “No need to worry. I’m the designated driver.”
She rose to the challenge, lifting her shot glass. “Here’s to the mountains.”
“To the mountains,” echoed Paul and Jess, both of whom were still nursing their first and only glass of beer.
She tossed back the tequila. The fiery liquid burned her tongue, but she held it in her mouth. When she lifted her beer glass to her lips as a chaser, she spit most of the tequila into the glass. Even with all these precautions, she was woozy. Clearly, Mac was trying to get her drunk. But why?
He rested his elbow on the table and gazed curiously into her eyes. “How are you doing, Vanessa?”
“Great,” she said defiantly.
“Feeling a buzz?”
“Nothing I can’t handle.”
Drunk or not, she could nail his hide to the wall. If he was a dirty cop, she was the woman who could prove it. As she stared back at him, she was momentarily distracted by the devilish spark of amusement in his intense blue eyes. Being with his friends had loosened him up, and he almost seemed to be having fun. When the tension in his face relaxed, it was a very interesting face. Good bone structure. Strong features.
Though he wasn’t as gorgeous as Jess and not as likable as Paul, she was intrigued by Mac. He was a man of many secrets. At the same time, he seemed straightforward and solid. Not the kind of guy who broke the rules. Was he dirty?
“You know, Vanessa,” he said softly, “from the first time I saw you, you looked familiar. Have we ever met before?”
“Nope,” she said.
“It seems like you know me.”
At the edge of her alcoholic haze, a warning bell went off. He was very subtly interrogating her, trying to get her to admit to a link between them. He suspected her.
Easily, she slid back into her Vanessa persona. “You and me? Honey, we don’t run in the same circles.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I just am.” Though she didn’t physically move away from him, she tried to create some distance. “And if you’re using this as a pickup line, it’s not very good.”
“I don’t have to pick you up,” he pointed out. “You followed me.”
There was no point in pretending she had come to the Sundown Tavern by coincidence. It had been difficult for Julia to arrange the logistics for this trip while still keeping the other safe house agents in the dark about Abby’s true identity. Though Abby didn’t see the agent who had acted as her chauffeur, she knew he was nearby.
“I didn’t come here because of you,” she said. “I just wanted some fun.”
“But you’re interested in me,” he said.
“What an ego!”
Across the table, Jess and Paul seemed to be observing their interaction with approval.
“When a woman follows a man into town,” Mac said, “there’s usually a reason.”
“What do you know about women?”
She heard snickers from Jess and Paul, but Mac didn’t crack a smile. “I know this,” he said. “Women are good at manipulating. They have these secret agendas. Clever little plans. What’s yours, Vanessa?”
“You know, there’s a word for that attitude. Men who don’t like women. Misogynist.”
“Big word.”
She tossed her platinum curls. “Just because a girl is pretty doesn’t mean she’s dumb.”
“Ouch,” Jess said. “Score another point for Vanessa.”
“Thanks.” When she stood, her knees were a bit rubbery. “I need to visit the little girls’ room.”
She’d made this trip before they’d started drinking, and Abby wished she’d left a trail of bread crumbs to lead her back to the restrooms. The route led past the bar and a small dining area, which was empty, into a hallway. By the time she got to the door marked Gals, she was walking steadily.
But her head was spinning. Mac seemed to suspect her of ulterior motives. Somehow, he’d seen through her cover story. A smart man. And attractive. She was dangerously close to wanting more from him than information.
She had to stop thinking that way. She was a professional and had worked hard to climb through the ranks in the FBI. Mac was her target. There could never be anything between them.
When she placed her hand on the restroom door, she felt someone clutch her shoulder. Acting on instinct, she whirled in her high-heeled boots to break his hold. At the verge of a karate chop, she checked herself. She knew this man. “Leo.”
“I like the hair. You make a sexy blonde.”
When he reached up to touch her curls, she slapped his hand away. Leo Fisher was no longer her fiancé; he had no right to touch her. “I thought you were in the hospital.”
He gestured with a carved ebony cane. “No broken bones. I need some ligament repair on my knee, but it’ll wait.”
“My sympathies,” she said coolly.
His voice lowered. “How long has it been, Abby?”
“Fourth of July. Last year.” The moment when she broke up with him was still vivid in her memory. There was no way she’d ever forgive him. “Tell me why you’re here. And make it fast. I need to get back to the table.”
“I wanted to keep an eye on your boy, Mac Granger. If he’s one of the dirty cops, he might contact the guy I’ve been looking for.”
“This is my assignment.”
“I’ve been working this case for six months, and I’m close to getting enough evidence on the man at the top of the drug distribution chain. He owns a place in Vail. If your friend, Mac, tries to get in touch, let me know.”
“Forget it,” she said.
“Come on. For old times’ sake?”
He was almost pleading, and that worried her more than if he’d come on strong. “Are you supposed to be on this investigation? Does anybody know what you’re doing?”
“I’m undercover. You know how it gets.”
“Yes, I do.” She worried that Leo had come unhinged and was acting on his own as a rogue agent. “I suggest you go back to Denver and get that operation on your knee. Take some time off. Schedule a visit with a counselor.”
He handed her a scrap of paper with a phone number written on it. “Call me on my cell phone if Mac Granger goes to Vail.”
She crumpled the paper and threw it on the hardwood floor. Then, she turned away from him. “Finding your drug lord isn’t my problem.”
Her assignment was Mac.
Chapter Three
In a shabby little diner in Denver, three people hunched around a small circular table. Though it was late and nobody was seated nearby, they spoke in low, secretive tones. The topic of their conversation was Mac Granger.
“If he figures this out, he could screw up everything.”
“Forget about him. He’s stuck in the mountains.”
“My point exactly.” The speaker took a long drag on a Marlboro Light. “He’s close to Vail. If he gets suspicious, he could start making connections.”
Nervous tension wrapped around them like a gloved hand. For the moment, they were safe and warm. At any moment, the hand could open, and they’d be exposed.
“Well, what do you think we should do about Mac? Kill him?” A strangled laugh underlined the absurdity of that idea. “We’re not murderers.”
But the thought had been planted. To kill Mac Granger was the simplest solution. Better him than us.
“I don’t know him,” the smoker said. “You both do. Is he the kind of guy who gives up easily?”
“Never.”
“Then he should be eliminated. I’ll take care of it.”
The other two stared down at their coffee mugs, unwilling to acknowledge the decision, but knowing they had no other choice. Having Mac alive and probably investigating was dangerous.
“Make it look like an accident. I don’t want an investigation.”
“Don’t worry.” The cigarette stubbed out in the ashtray, leaving a wisp of smoke. “I’m a cop. I know better than to leave clues.”
THE NEXT MORNING, Mac stood on the deck behind the safe house finishing his second mug of coffee. A crisp breeze stirred the dry grasses of the valley and quaked in the golden aspen leaves. The clear blue skies offered the fresh promise of a brand-new day. A new start. He should have felt optimistic.
Instead, a series of dark questions played across his mind. Why had he been sent to this safe house to recuperate? Why wouldn’t Vince Elliot, the undercover cop who had been at the warehouse shooting, talk to him? Was Mac under suspicion? Of what?
Last night, he’d called his partner, Sheila, on her cell phone. Though Sheila had all the perceptiveness of a goldfish, she was his partner. She owed him. And she was a good source for gossip. If all her bragging was true, she’d slept with half the Denver P.D. which was probably how she’d gotten promoted to detective so quickly. Without betraying the location of the safe house, Mac had arranged to meet her later today near Redding.
His frustration level rose. He hadn’t done anything wrong. He was a good cop. His actions at the warehouse were unfortunate but appropriate. Why the hell would he come under suspicion?
He looked to the mountains for solace. When he was younger, he had loved this land. He and Paul and Jess had taken a blood oath to always stay together in the Rockies. When they were kids, they’d called themselves the Three Trolls, Keepers of the Treasure, and they had ceremoniously buried a shoebox filled with crystal, pyrite and pine cones.
Paul and Jess had lived up to that boyhood oath. Both of them were still here—flourishing and happy.
But not Mac. His vision of life was different. He preferred the in-your-face threat of city life where the scene was constantly evolving and there was a reassuring undercurrent of static noise. All this fresh mountain air was choking him. Last night in bed, he couldn’t sleep; the mountain silence weighed down on him.
After less than twenty-four hours here, he was itching to get back to Denver, back to work. The only thing keeping him here was his suspicion of Vanessa. As soon as he understood what she was doing, everything else would become clear.
He returned to the kitchen where Julia had finished washing the breakfast dishes. Everyone had eaten, except for Vanessa, who hadn’t yet made her appearance. He stood in the kitchen doorway and glanced past the dining room table toward the staircase. Where was she?
He asked Julia, “How long has Vanessa been at the safe house?”
“Only a few hours longer than you.”
“She’s a handful.”
“So are you,” Julia said with a hint of accusation. “In the future, I’d prefer that you didn’t roll into town and get blitzed. This isn’t a frat house, Mac.”
“I wasn’t drinking.”
“But Vanessa was. I had a full report from Roger Flannery.”
“The young guy?” Mac had met Roger Flannery yesterday. He was so new to his job as an FBI agent that he still had the stink of Quantico about him.
“It was good experience for him to keep surveillance last night,” Julia said. “But I don’t want it to happen again.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
There was a loud groan from the staircase, and Mac turned to see Vanessa lurch onto the bottom stair. Her skintight leather pants creaked as she wobbled across the floor toward the kitchen. Her blond hair was a fluffy contrast to her pained expression. In spite of her heavy makeup, he saw dark circles under her big, brown eyes.
“Hangover?” he asked brightly.
As she tried to focus on him, her left eyelid twitched. “Aspirin,” she rasped.
“I’d have thought a pool hustler like you could hold her—”
“Aspirin,” she interrupted more loudly. “Percoset. Morphine.”
Julia took her firmly by the arm and pulled her toward the kitchen. “Come with me, Vanessa. I have a no-fail remedy for hangovers.”
“Slow down,” Vanessa said. This morning, she seemed incapable of balancing in her high-heeled sandals.
“It’d serve you right to fall flat on your nose,” Julia said. “You ought to know better than to drink tequila.”
Vanessa came to a halt. She kicked off the high heels. Bare-footed, she plodded into the kitchen.
Though she was teetering at the edge of misery, Mac could tell that she was still in control, which seemed to be her most pronounced character trait. Control. Even though she’d gotten pretty well oiled at the Sundown Tavern, she wasn’t drunk enough to give him any useful information.
Mac had investigated on his own. Last night, after talking to Sheila, he’d contacted a cop buddy in L.A. and asked about a state’s witness named Vanessa.
Her full name was Vanessa Lenore Nye. She was a former Vegas showgirl who had lived with the elderly head of the Santoro crime family before turning state’s evidence. Mac’s first impression of her was one hundred percent correct. She was a woman who’d do anything for the right price. Her extravagance was renowned. Reputedly, she owned half a dozen mink coats and over a hundred pairs of shoes. At one time, she’d been in possession of the famed thirty-four carat LeSalle diamond. Anything for the right price.
So why was she interested in him? It was out of character for a gold digger to flirt with a Denver homicide cop who drove a late-model car and didn’t wear a Rolex.
In the kitchen, Julia dumped tomato juice, raw eggs and a nasty-looking green weed into the blender. When she set the dial to puree and turned on the blender, Vanessa winced at the grinding whir.
“Sounds like a 747,” she muttered.
“After this remedy,” Julia said, “you’ll be better in no time.”
“Want coffee,” Vanessa said pathetically.
“Drink this first.” She held out a glass filled to the brim with a putrid green liquid. “Every drop.”
Like a swimmer preparing for the hundred meter breaststroke, Vanessa inhaled and exhaled deeply. She took the glass and chugged until it was empty. “Yech.”
“Go to the dining room,” Julia said. “I’ll bring you coffee and dry toast.”
At the table, Mac held her chair and took his place at the end of the table beside her. Right now, she appeared to be vulnerable; this might be a good time to start with his probing. “You lived in Los Angeles,” he said. “What part of the city?”
“Newport.”
That fit with the information he’d been given. “Right near the ocean. Did you have a private beach?”
She held up her hand. “No more talking.”
“Ever go surfing?”
Slowly, she turned her head and glared with such cold hostility that she might have been measuring him for a coffin. “No. More. Talk.”
He waited until she’d finished her coffee, a glass of water and a piece of toast. Her eyes were more alert.
“Surfing,” she said, “is not my thing. Even in a wetsuit, the water is too cold. I like indoor sports.”
“So, I assume you’re not a skier.”
“Love the ski clothes. There just aren’t enough times when I can wear my minks.”
Julia popped her head around the corner. “Feeling better, Vanessa?”
“A lot better. What did you put in that drink?”
“It’s a secret formula. And it always works,” Julia said. “The next thing you should do is go for a walk outdoors in the fresh air.”
“Good idea,” Mac said. “I’ll come with you.”
THOUGH ABBY would rather have stayed in bed all day, nursing her hangover and cursing the wormy evils of tequila, she didn’t have that luxury. Last night, she had recognized Mac’s restlessness. He didn’t want to be here. And there was no way to force him to stay at the safe house. He had come here at the suggestion of his lieutenant. If he decided to leave, he could do so.
To fulfill her assignment, she needed to convince him to trust her, offer him a bribe and inform her superiors of his response. A hike along a secluded mountain path seemed like a good way to get close to him.
She abandoned her high heels for a pair of bright pink sneakers that matched her low-cut sweater. Together, she and Mac set out on a path that led past the barn toward a sloping hillside. The morning sun beat down with aching clarity. Behind her huge, extra-dark sunglasses, Abby winced. “Is it always so glaring?”
“Take a deep gulp of that fresh air,” he said cheerfully. The man was positively enjoying her misery. What a rat! If she hadn’t been undercover, Abby would have flattened him with a karate kick to the jaw.
He leaned against the corral beside the barn where three horses pranced and flicked their long tails. “Maybe,” he said, “we should go for a ride.”
Bouncing up and down in the saddle with her brain crashing inside her skull? “Forget it.”
“Look around you. Take a minute to appreciate the scenery.”
“If it’s so great, how come you live in the city?”
He shrugged. “I just ended up there.”
She didn’t believe that for one minute. Mac was the kind of man who took action. Things didn’t “just happen” to him. “What made you leave?”
“The usual reasons,” he said cryptically. “How about you? Did you grow up in Los Angeles or move there?”
Abby couldn’t remember if she’d mentioned L.A. last night when she was drinking. After she’d bumped into Leo outside the ladies’ room, things had gotten real blurry. She’d felt like she was in a waking dream, standing outside her body and watching herself as she slurped down tequila and laughed too loud. Only her years of undercover experience had kept her from completely blowing her identity as Vanessa Nye.
Now, she knew, Mac was trying to pierce that cover. He must have gotten some inside information about Vanessa Nye and was testing her. Well, fine! Even with the remnants of a hangover, she could handle this.
“I grew up in a little town in Oregon. I didn’t hate it, but I was bored. So totally bored. Vegas was more to my liking.”
“I like Oregon,” Mac said. “What was the name of the town?”
“Sterling.” She remembered more details from her dossier on Vanessa. “Our high school team was the Sterling Pirates. Our colors were red and gold. I was a cheerleader.”
“And in Las Vegas?”
“Different kind of cheers.” She started walking along the path. Vanessa’s early life wasn’t all that different from her own. Abby had also come from a small town and had been a cheerleader.
“Tell me how you ended up in California.”
Abby lowered her sunglasses and peered over the rim at him. “I’m not in the mood for a cat-and-mouse game, Mac. If there’s something you want to know from me, just ask.”
“You’re Vanessa Nye,” he said.
“Bingo.”
“You lived with the head of the Santoro family.”
“Right again.”
“Why?”
She allowed her sunglasses to fall back onto the bridge of her nose. How would the real Vanessa handle this inquiry? “None of your business.”
Turning away, she tromped along the path beside a narrow creek. The dried grasses at the side of the rippling water crackled as she walked through them. Under her sweater and leather pants, Abby perspired although the temperature was pleasantly cool. She welcomed the cold sweat, evidence that the alcohol was working through her system.
As she followed the creek into the shadow of the trees, she paused. Her goal was to get Mac to trust her, which meant she needed to be more amenable. She forced herself to smile at him. “I don’t want to think about the past, okay? I just want to have fun. Just to, you know, be friends with you.”
“Maybe I want to be more than a friend.”
She hadn’t expected that response. All the indications Mac had given until now were that he didn’t even know she was female. What was he up to? She studied his expression.
Like all good liars, Abby was easily able to recognize deception in others. It seemed to her that Mac was telling the truth about wanting to hook up with her. His teeth bared in a predatory grin. His gaze latched on to her face, and he leaned close. These were all indications of physical attraction.
Surely not. Surely, she was reading the signs wrong. “What are you saying?”
“I like you.”
“Even though you know who I am?” His readiness to get friendly with Vanessa was clearly inappropriate. “But you’re a cop.”
“So what?”
A good cop would have better boundaries. “Don’t you disapprove of my connection with Santoro?”
“That was the past,” he said. “I thought you just wanted to have fun.”
“Well, sure. But—”
“You could have fun with me.” His right arm encircled her waist and he pulled her tight against his hard, lean body. “What do you say, Vanessa?”
Expertly, she slipped away from his one-armed embrace. Too much was happening too fast. Though her brain was still sluggish from the hangover, her instincts warned her about getting close to this man. He was her target.
And she was Vanessa Nye. A gold digger. That would be her excuse to back off. “Well, Mac. If you really know so much about me, you’ll know that I’m very selective. My companionship doesn’t come cheap.”
“You like pretty things,” he said.
“Expensive things.”
“Today is your lucky day,” he said coolly. “I can afford you, Vanessa. I’m rich.”
From bribes? From ill-gotten gains? “No way. Cops don’t make big bucks.”
“Inheritance,” he said. “I received a ton of money when my grandmother sold off family-owned lands where Vail ski resort was developed in the 1960s. The Grangers are very, very wealthy.”
His gaze flicked down and to the left. His right hand touched the side of his nose and rubbed across his lips. Both were obvious signals that Mac was telling a lie. Abby knew it. But Vanessa wouldn’t. Vanessa would take Mac at his word.
“Really?” she asked. “You’re a land baron?”
“A former land baron. That’s right.”
He looked down at his toes and shuffled. Clearly uncomfortable. Mac was the worst liar she had ever encountered. He wouldn’t last a minute in undercover work.
But this lie—no matter how poorly executed—was very clever as a test. If she really was Vanessa Nye, she’d be all over this good-looking cop who was also rich. Vanessa used seduction to get what she wanted. And, for the moment, Abby was Vanessa.
She purred, “I think you’re right, Mac. You and me? We could have some fun together. Later today, you could take me shopping at the boutiques in Vail.”
“I don’t want to wait until later.”
Again, he dragged her into an embrace.
As Vanessa, she wouldn’t resist. Abby set aside her own feelings of distaste and played her undercover role as the sexy vamp. Her lips met his. In the back of her mind, she was detached, repeating a mantra. This is only a job, only a job, only…
His mouth was fierce and demanding. His arms held her in a viselike grip. Her breasts crushed against his chest.
But when he leaned away from her, she saw a look of surprise in his honest blue eyes. He removed her sunglasses, taking down a barrier between them. She liked what she saw. A strong man.
Though the planes of his face had been hardened by experience, she saw empathy in his eyes—the true kindness that came from understanding. A good man.
Dappled sunlight filtered through the overhanging branches of conifers. The whisper of the creek trickled at the edge of her senses. His arms felt warm and sheltering. It felt right to be with him.
When he kissed her again, her body responded to him. Her well-developed defense system came crashing down as she allowed herself to enjoy the breathtaking sensation of their kiss. Her heart fluttered, and a thrill chased through her entire body.
Oh, God, no. This was all wrong! Mac Granger could be a dirty cop, the worst kind of traitor. She couldn’t be attracted to him.
Gasping, she broke away. “That’s enough.”
They stood, staring at each other.
She saw something in him that touched her soul. He’d been hurt, badly hurt. But he was tough; he could take the pain and come back stronger. Without words, she saw all these things.
She wanted to know him better. To hear his truth.
And she wanted to share her feelings with him, to tell him how tired she was of constantly pretending to be someone else. On the tip of her tongue was her name. Abigail Marie Nelson. She longed to tell him. To be completely, utterly honest.
For the first time in her career as an FBI special agent, Abby had completely forgotten her cover story.
Chapter Four
Mac’s plan to unmask the woman who called herself Vanessa Nye went up in smoke when she kissed him back. Until then, he’d been trying to interrogate her, trying to trip her up. When he had demanded a kiss, he figured she’d back off and admit that she was conning him.
He hadn’t expected a lightning bolt.
He needed distance from her. And time to sort out his feelings. He spent the rest of the morning avoiding Vanessa and took off early for the meeting he’d scheduled with his partner.
Mac parked outside the graveyard near Redding. A secluded spot at the end of a graded gravel road, this was the first place that had occurred to him when he arranged this meet with Sheila. Mac wanted privacy, and nobody came here by accident. Not that the old cemetery was ominous. The opposite was true. This gently rising hillside surrounded by Ponderosa and lodgepole pine provided a peaceful resting place. The graves—some of them dating back over a hundred years—were fenced off, but the land wasn’t manicured. Weeds and wild-flowers grew rampant between the simple markers.
As soon as he stepped out of his car, Sheila pulled up beside him in her own vehicle. Good timing. In spite of her many other faults, his partner was punctual.
“Did you take the day off?” he asked as she came toward him.
“That’s right.” As always, she sounded irritated. “Until you get back, I’m stuck with boring desk work, which I totally hate. If I wanted to spend the entire day hanging around the station, I would have become a lawyer.”
He didn’t point out that a law degree was probably far beyond her limited ability to concentrate. “Did you get the information I asked for?”
“This time,” she said, “you really messed up.”
He messed up? He bit down hard to keep from spitting out accusations. The only mistake he’d made at the warehouse shooting was allowing her to get out of the car. “Tell me what you’ve heard.”
“You don’t have any idea how much trouble you’re in.” Her scowl etched deep lines below her thick brown bangs. “How much do you know about that guy you shot and killed?”
Mac had made it his business to find out about the man whose life he had taken. “His name was Dante Williams, and he was twenty-seven years old. High school dropout. Seven arrests, mostly on drug-related charges. One conviction landed him in prison for eight months.”
“A regular poster boy for how to ruin your life.”
“He still didn’t deserve to die.” Though Mac had fired in the line of duty, he would always regret the shooting, and he would visit the grave of Dante Williams to pay his respects. It was a ritual Mac followed with the other victim he’d shot and killed early in his police career.
“Anyway,” Sheila said, “this guy, Dante, was about to give evidence on the number one drug distributor in Colorado. The top man. The honcho. When you killed him, you blew it.”
“Were the feds and Denver vice working together on the sting?”
“Not on purpose,” she said. “They were both following trails that led to the same place.”
“To Dante,” he said.
“It gets worse.” She glanced at her wristwatch—one of her less annoying nervous habits. “Some people think you killed Dante on purpose. To keep him from turning snitch.”
The implication was clear. The FBI and the Denver P.D. suspected that Mac was a dirty cop, that he’d killed Dante Williams on orders from some honcho drug kingpin.
A burst of anger flared behind his eyelids. The shooting at the warehouse had been a grotesque miracle of bad timing, but he shouldn’t be a suspect. His dedication to his work and his years of service ought to count for something. He’d earned medals and citations. He was a good cop.
“Now you know,” Sheila said with a smirk. Her attitude was smug and superior. She almost seemed to be enjoying his fall from grace. “The best thing for you to do is lay low and let the dust settle. Please, Mac. Will you do that?”
“Why do you care?” His relationship with Sheila had never been good. They bickered like an old married couple at the verge of divorce.
“You’re my partner.” Insincerity dripped from her voice. “You’ve got to forget about this. Don’t rock the boat. Don’t start investigating on your own.”
As if he’d take advice from her? If she’d behaved in a competent manner at the warehouse sting, he wouldn’t be in this position. Unfortunately, she was his only source of information since everybody else suspected him. He needed to maintain this contact with Sheila. “Did you get that photograph I asked for?”
“Of course.” She opened her car door and leaned inside to retrieve a manila envelope. “This is a recent photo of the FBI undercover agent you shot. Leo Fisher. He’s out of the hospital.”
Mac pulled the photo out of the envelope and studied it. Leo Fisher was an average-looking guy with dark eyes and a square jaw. His long hair was pulled back in a ponytail. Mac thought he’d spotted Leo Fisher last night at the tavern, but he wasn’t one hundred percent sure.
Once again, he tapped into Sheila’s vast collection of gossip. “What have you heard about Leo Fisher?”
“He’s off the case, but…” Her voice trailed off.
“Come on, Sheila. What have you heard?”
“I heard that Fisher was up here in the mountains. Going to Vail, I think.”
“Why?” he asked. Vanessa had also hinted about a trip to Vail.
“I don’t know. God, Mac. I can’t tell you everything.”
Her tone was as whiny as a teenager. He really disliked this woman. Incompetent. Immature.
“I’m thirsty,” she said. “Come with me to get a latte.”
“Can’t,” Mac said. He didn’t want to spend any more time with her than absolutely necessary.
“Where are you staying up here, anyway?”
“I grew up here. In Redding.” No way would he tell Sheila about the safe house. “I have friends up here.”
“Like that cute guy.” She was suddenly alert. “I remember him. He stopped by the station to visit you a couple of times, right? He’s on the Vail ski patrol. I’d love to see him again.”
“Not today.”
“At least come with me for coffee. I drove all the way up here. What are you doing that’s so important?”
He pushed open the wrought iron gate leading into the cemetery. “Visiting my mother’s grave.”
Not even Sheila could be argue with the finality of that statement. She backed toward her car. “Bye, Mac. I’ll stay in touch.”
“You do that,” he muttered.
The information she’d given him hadn’t been completely unexpected. He’d felt the suspicions. Now, he knew why.
In the cemetery, he picked his way along a hard earth path lined with stones to a section where all the Grangers were buried. His grandparents. His great-uncle. And his mother, Kathryn Granger.
Leaning down, he plucked a few weeds that obscured the pink marble marker inscribed with her name. He read the words: Beloved Wife and Mother.
It was true. He had loved her. His name— MacCloud—had been her maiden name, and she’d done as well as she could raising him.
But he couldn’t respect Kathryn Granger. Not after he saw his mother in the arms of a man who wasn’t his father. She’d had an affair. She’d betrayed him and his father, the sheriff. Even after her death, he found it hard to forgive her lies.
Mac doubted he would ever find a woman he could trust.
LEO FISHER limped along the cracked sidewalk on a dark Denver street, not far from the warehouse where he’d been shot in the leg. This was a cruddy part of town, deserted after dark except for the bums and the rats that scattered in fear at his approach.
Leo was alone. Always alone. But he wasn’t bitter. He had a job to do, an important job. And he was the only one who could do it right. By himself. Alone.
Seeing Abby had been weird. He’d barely thought about her since the night she walked out on him. Maybe he’d been hard on her, but she should have understood that he was still in character, still playing the undercover role. The hell with her! He didn’t want or need a wife and family.
He was the best damned undercover agent in the FBI. The best. And there was no way in hell he’d give up on this operation. Not now when he was so close. Why should he let some snot-nosed vice cop like Vince Elliot step in and grab all the glory? This was Leo’s bust.
He stopped on the corner under a streetlamp and lit up a smoke.
A dark form materialized beside him. A snitch.
“Sorry about Dante,” Leo said.
The snitch made the sign of the cross. “He was a good man.”
“What have you got for me?”
“A name.”
Leo scoffed. “I know the name. Nicholas Dirk.”
He was the head honcho in drug distribution throughout the Rocky Mountain west. A wealthy guy who dabbled in all kinds of crime under the cover of being a land developer. He had houses in Denver and in Vail.
“I got evidence,” the snitch said.
“Give.”
“It’s on a computer. Dirk always takes the laptop computer with him. Download that and you’ve got him.”
Leo wasn’t impressed by this overly obvious information. “Big deal. There’s no way for me to get my hands on that evidence.”
“For the right price, I can tell you the password.”
“Now you’re talking.” Leo tossed down his cigarette and crushed it with the tip of his cane. That password was worth paying for.
ON THE SECOND FLOOR in the safe house were six bedrooms of varying sizes. Abby’s was small and squarish, plain but clean, without a telephone, computer hookup or television. Her bedroom opened into a bathroom that she shared with Mac.
For the past ten minutes, she had been standing with her ear to the bathroom door, listening to the thrum of the shower and debating with herself about opening the door a crack to spy on him.
Obviously, she’d be invading his privacy big-time. But her job as an undercover agent was to get close to him, and he couldn’t ignore her if she walked into the bathroom while he was half-naked. Kind of a risky maneuver. But she had to make him talk to her. She had questions. A lot of questions.
This afternoon, she and Julia had followed him to the cemetery. Abby’s surveillance technique was simple. Earlier today, she’d planted a tracking device in the heel of Mac’s boot. All she’d needed to do was activate the device. Julia drove and, together, they’d used GPS technology to locate the signal.
From a hillside near the graveyard, they’d watched while Mac met with his partner, Sheila Hartman. Though Abby hadn’t been close enough to hear what they were saying, the very fact that he’d arranged a clandestine meet was suspicious. Were they both dirty cops? What kind of plans were they making?
Using binoculars, Abby had seen them exchange a photograph of Leo. Again, suspicious.
Leo had said that he was tracking a drug kingpin who had a home in Vail. Would Mac make contact with this person? Would he demand a payoff for the murder of Dante Williams? Was he on the take?
Abby really hoped not. After that overwhelming kiss this afternoon, she wanted nothing more than to discover that Mac was squeaky clean and above suspicion.
After the noise from his shower ended, she waited a few minutes so he’d have time to put on some clothes. Then she opened the bathroom door a crack and peeked inside.
Her intention was to march right in. Brazen and bold. But the sight of him stopped her.
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Cassie Miles
UNDERCOVER LOVERSDetective Mac Granger was in trouble. The Colorado mountain-man-turned-city-cop had incensed a drug lord, and now someone was setting him up, making his peers doubt his loyalty and forcing him on the run from a mysterious killer. His only hope lay in FBI Special Agent Abby Nelson, the fed assigned to investigate him. Could he trust the woman who'd gone undercover in order to expose him? He couldn't deny his attraction to the beautiful blonde–or the opportunity to pose as her lover in order to fi nd the killer. But he'd be damned if he fell for a woman whose commitment to duty might make her his worst enemy….
“According to this cover story, I’m supposed to be falling in love with you. Right?”
“That’s the story.”
“That might be more believable, if it was more true.” He rose from the bed and took one step to stand in front of her. “Both times when we kissed, it was a lie.”
Her breath caught in her throat. She knew what was coming next.
He took her hands and pulled her to her feet. “Kiss me now, as yourself.”
“That might not be wise.” Even as she spoke, she knew resistance was futile. With every fiber of her being, she wanted to kiss him.
“Kiss me, Abigail Nelson.”
She melted into his arms. When their lips met, it was different than their other kisses. Instead of fierce and demanding, he was oh-so-gentle.
Her arm encircled his torso. Their bodies skimmed against each other. Sensation built gradually, slowly. Oh yes, this kiss was very different.
Undercover Colorado
Cassie Miles
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Linda Hull and Jan Gurney,
the powers that be. And, as always, to Rick.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
For Cassie Miles, the best part about writing a story set in Eagle County near the Vail ski area is the ready-made excuse to head into the mountains for research. Though the winter snows are great for skiing, her favorite season is fall when the aspens turn gold.
The rest of the time, Cassie lives in Denver where she takes urban hikes around Cheesman Park, reads a ton and critiques often. Her current plans include a Vespa and a road trip, despite eye-rolling objections from her adult children.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Mac Granger—The cynical Denver cop, wounded in the line of duty, becomes part of a bigger sting operation.
Abby Nelson—The FBI Special Agent goes undercover as sex bomb Vanessa Nye to entrap a dirty cop.
Sheila Hartman—Mac’s partner is always in the wrong place and the wrong time.
Hal Perkins—Mac’s lieutenant at the Denver PD.
Vince Elliot—The vice cop has been on the trail of a drug lord for months.
Nicholas Dirk—The high-powered mogul in Vail is involved in shady dealings.
Leo Fisher—Abby’s former fiancé, the FBI undercover agent obsesses about his suspects.
Julia Last—FBI Special Agent in charge of safe house operations.
Roger Flannery—The rookie FBI agent always gets the worst assignments.
Paul Hemmings—Eagle County Deputy Sheriff and Mac’s boyhood friend.
Jess Isler—Member of the Vail Ski Patrol and Mac’s buddy.
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter One
The gun weighed heavy in his hand. The last time Detective Mac Granger unholstered his piece was three months ago at the shooting range when he drilled the heart of the paper target nine out of ten shots.
It was a Thursday night in September. Mac and his partner, Detective Sheila Hartman, had been on their way to a homicide investigation in north Denver when a squawk came over the radio in their unmarked car: “Officer in need of assistance.”
Headed north on Park Street, they had just passed the homeless mission with the red neon Jesus Saves sign. They were close to the location given and arrived first on the scene—a dark, deserted city street lined with two-and three-story buildings. The crumbling bricks were stained by years of greasy soot from the nearby railyards.
Three other cars were carelessly parked near a run-down warehouse. The door to the loading dock gaped open. Inside the warehouse, it was pitch-dark.
As Mac emerged from the car, gun in hand, the night breeze whipped around him. A crumpled sheet of newspaper rolled down the street like a tumble-weed. From ten blocks away, he heard a resounding cheer from the baseball fans at Coors Field where the Rockies were playing a night game. Home run.
From inside the warehouse, gunfire exploded. Several shots in rapid succession. A semiautomatic weapon. This sounded like something bigger than he and his partner could handle. “Stay back,” he ordered Sheila. “Other patrol cars will be here in a minute.”
She shot him a glare. Sheila was inexperienced and willful. She could be a real pain in the ass.
“Police,” she yelled. “Throw down your weapons and come out with your hands up.”
“Come and get us,” was the response.
“Us,” Mac said pointedly. “There’s more than one.”
Ignoring him, Sheila yelled again. “You’re surrounded. Give up now.”
He cursed under his breath. If the bad guys came onto the street, they could see at a glance that the only cops on the scene were the two of them. Frankly, he and Sheila weren’t real impressive when it came to firepower.
“Stay here,” he said to her.
“Maybe I could circle around and—”
“Stay.”
The woman was impossible. They wouldn’t even have been in this area if they’d gone directly to their crime scene in north Denver instead of stopping once because Sheila had to pee, then again because she wanted a latte.
Mac ran toward the loading dock and flattened himself against the brick wall. If anybody came out, they’d be caught between him and his partner.
A bulky figure charged through the open maw of the loading dock and leaped down from the ledge. He landed on the pavement only a few yards away from Mac.
“Drop your weapon,” Mac ordered. “Raise your arms.”
Immediately, the man obeyed. Mac grabbed his arm and flung him face-first against the brick wall. It was Vince Elliot, an undercover vice cop.
Vince gave no sign of recognition. Even in the heat of confrontation, he didn’t break cover.
As Mac cuffed him, he whispered, “This is a drug sting gone bad. Be careful. I want to take these guys alive.”
Sheila abandoned her position and came toward them. Dumb move. The worst thing they could do in this situation was to stand together and get mowed down by one blast.
Angrily, Mac motioned for her to go back. He could hear the sirens of approaching patrol cars. Backup was on the way.
Sheila made a confused gesture. Then she stamped her foot and checked her wristwatch as if she were late for a manicure appointment.
Four armed men emerged from the dark warehouse. The one in front aimed directly at Sheila.
Mac had to protect his partner. He fired once, point-blank. The man with the gun went down.
Time froze. Everything went into slow motion. Mac shoved Vince Elliot to the pavement and stepped in front of him. He looked into the faces of the armed men who turned toward him. He saw panic in their eyes. When they returned fire, he imagined the bullets poised in midair. The thunder of gunshots resounded against brick walls.
It occurred to Mac that he might die right here on this cold city street. A fitting place. Though he had been born and raised in the mountains, this was where he belonged.
He got off another shot, aiming low. He didn’t want to kill these guys. Another man fell with a scream.
The others ran toward their car.
“Freeze,” Sheila yelled. “Police. Freeze.”
The two remaining men dropped their weapons as several patrol cars arrived simultaneously. It was over.
Mac felt a sharp pain in his shoulder and looked down. Blood seeped through his tan sports jacket. He’d been hit.
ABBY NELSON leaned her back against the slender white trunk of an aspen tree and looked up through a canopy of sunlit golden leaves. A fresh wind rustled the boughs, and she glimpsed the clear, blue Colorado sky. Fantastic! This was a truly cherry assignment.
Her last undercover job as an FBI special agent had been in an inner city back east where she was supposed to be a pregnant runaway with a drug habit. Needless to say, her companions were the dregs of society—slimeballs, creeps and heinous criminals, many of whom were going to be locked up for a very long time thanks to Abby’s efforts.
But this time? Way better! When she was told that she was going undercover to an FBI safe house in the Colorado Rockies, Abby couldn’t believe her luck. She inhaled the crisp clean air and reveled in the spectacular scenery. This was practically a vacation.
Her undercover identity was Vanessa Nye, a protected witness who was waiting to testify at a high-profile case in Los Angeles involving the Santoro crime family. The real Vanessa was an unabashed gold digger who traded on her outrageous sexuality, and Abby had disguised herself accordingly. She dyed her hair platinum blond, heaped on tons of makeup and slithered into skintight clothes. The worst part of her Vanessa outfit had to be these wretched spike heels that were digging holes in the soil beside the aspen trees. She wasn’t looking forward to the mile-and-a-half hike back to her bedroom at the safe house.
Her solitude was interrupted when a sturdy-looking woman on horseback rode toward her. Julia Last was the special agent in charge of the FBI safe house known as Last’s Resort. She was the only person on site who had been informed that “Vanessa” was a cover for Special Agent Abby Nelson.
Julia gave a friendly wave. “Want a ride?”
“You bet I do.”
Julia stared pointedly at the purple high-heeled shoes. “When you get into an undercover role, you don’t kid around. How do you stand in those things?”
“Not very well,” Abby admitted. “It’s not something they teach at Quantico.”
Julia flicked the reins and directed her dappled gray mare close to a granite ledge. “Climb on the rocks, then throw your leg over the rear behind the saddle.”
Abby moved carefully. Her snug designer slacks were partly spandex, but she didn’t want to take a chance on stretching them out and ruining her look. “If I were the real Vanessa, I’d never do this.”
“If you were the real Vanessa, I wouldn’t have let you wander off by yourself.” As soon as Abby was settled, Julia nudged her horse into a steady, rolling walk. “We take security for our protected witnesses very seriously.”
“Have you had problems?”
“Not from outside,” Julia said. “Our location is remote enough to provide natural protection. As far as anybody knows, this safe house is just another mountain resort. The problems come when witnesses get bored.”
“Cabin fever. They want to take side trips to Vail, right? Or invite a friend to visit.”
“That’s right.” When Julia nodded, her curly brown ponytail bounced. “Sometimes we indulge them with supervised outings.”
“And you’ve only got the other two agents working with you?”
“On a rotating basis. This safe house is considered a prime assignment until they get here and find out that their responsibilities include chopping wood, mucking out the stalls for the horses and making beds.” She tossed a grin over her shoulder. “I take a certain amount of satisfaction seeing these macho agents doing housework.”
“I’ll try not to gloat when I see them with feather dusters. What’s the name of the young one?”
“Roger Flannery. Nice kid.”
Abby tucked a wisp of platinum hair behind her ear. “How many other people are staying here?”
“Two,” Julia said. “We refer to them as guests. Both older guys. They’ve been here for nearly a month.”
“I thought the protected witnesses got shuffled more frequently so nobody can get a bead on their location.”
“I didn’t say they were both witnesses.”
Abby already knew that the safe house was used for more than protected witnesses. Sometimes, the feds held high-level meetings here. Sometimes, this idyllic mountain setting provided a place for rest and recuperation for injured agents and cops. “The guy I’m interested in will show up this afternoon.”
“The homicide detective from Denver.”
Mac Granger was Abby’s assignment. He was a Denver cop who had been wounded in a drug sting and was suspected of being on the take which—in Abby’s opinion—made him the lowest of the low.
According to her information, he’d wounded an undercover FBI agent at the sting—an agent Abby knew very well. Leo Fisher was her former fiancé.
Though their breakup had been exceedingly nasty, she didn’t wish Leo dead. At least, not most of the time. She’d been glad to hear that he was expected to recover from the bullet wound in his leg.
As she rocked on the rump of the horse and watched the landscape unfolding around her, a familiar twinge of regret brushed through her. Too bad things hadn’t worked out with Leo. For a while, she’d thought she loved him.
But she wasn’t sure. Because they were both undercover agents, it was possible they were both playing at being in love—acting the way they thought people in love ought to behave. With all her undercover identities, she sometimes forgot what it meant to be real.
Her thoughts returned to her current assignment. In addition to shooting Leo in the leg, Mac Granger had gunned down and killed a drug dealer who had been watched by the FBI and Denver vice cops for months in an unusual cooperative investigation. Usually, the death of a drug dealer was no cause for mourning, but this particular guy had indicated a willingness to talk about higher-ups in the drug distribution chain and about dirty cops. Now he was dead, thanks to Mac Granger. It made sense that Mac had killed the dealer to keep him from talking.
Because Mac was off duty during the obligatory Internal Affairs investigation into the fatal shooting, his lieutenant had agreed with the FBI plan for Mac to go to the FBI safe house—the location of which was, of course, undisclosed except to Mac who was supposed to relax and take time for his wound to heal.
That was where Abby came in. Her job was to befriend Mac Granger and to ultimately offer him a bribe.
Julia glanced over her shoulder. “Is there anything you can tell me about your assignment?”
“I can guarantee that you’re going to hate the way I’ll be acting around Mac Granger.”
“As Vanessa?”
“The high-powered sex-bomb,” Abby said. “I want to attract his attention.”
“With the way you’re dressed, that shouldn’t be a problem. Roger started drooling the minute you arrived.”
“We won’t tell Roger that I have a third-degree black belt in karate.”
“Lethal,” Julia said. “And I’m glad. If you were the real Vanessa, I’d worry about keeping you in line.”
“It’s all an act,” Abby assured her. Always an act.
At the top of a rise, they looked down at the safe house which was at the end of a graded gravel road. The two-story cedar structure had a large covered porch at the front. On the opposite side was a sundeck that overlooked a barn and two storage sheds.
“I see an unfamiliar car,” Julia said.
“Must be Mac.”
“That’s odd.” There was a hint of irritation in her voice. “We usually don’t allow our guests to have their own transportation.”
Part of the plan was to allow Mac some mobility in the hope that he might implicate himself. “I promise to keep close surveillance on him.”
When they entered the safe house, Abby made an immediate detour to her upstairs bedroom. The first thing she did was kick off the spike heels and flex her aching toes. Why would anyone wear these things on purpose?
In the bathroom, she repaired the dramatic makeup that made her brown eyes look huge and dewy. She applied a fresh coat of fire engine-red lipstick. Putting on all this sleazy glamor wasn’t nearly as difficult as maintaining a believable attitude for a gold-digging bimbo.
Though she had no intention of seducing Mac Granger, she wanted him to notice her. She plumped up her boobs inside her fuzzy pink sweater. With her feet wedged into the high heels again, she sashayed down the staircase toward the kitchen.
From inside the kitchen, she heard Julia giving Mac the rules of the house.
“You’ll need to make your own bed,” Julia said. “And keep your room tidy. We aren’t a maid service, but we do provide three square meals a day. If you have any special dietary requirements, you need to tell me.”
“No problems.” The deep male voice sounded cranky. “What else?”
“No weapons. No visitors. Don’t leave without notifying me or one of the other agents. And, obviously, tell no one that this is a safe house.”
“Fine,” he said. “I’m going into Redding tonight. I grew up here and have a couple of buddies who live nearby. We’re going to meet at the tavern.”
Interesting, Abby thought. From her brief bio of Mac Granger, she knew he was born near here and attended the local high school. But she hadn’t been aware that he still had ties in the area.
She slithered into the kitchen and took her first look at Detective Mac Granger. He stood just over six feet tall and was very nicely put together with a broad chest and narrow hips in button-fly Levi’s. He wore a loose-fitting, fisherman’s knit sweater in the same dark blue as a policeman’s uniform. His sandy blond hair was neatly trimmed and combed straight back from his forehead. Though Mac had grown up in the mountains, his blue eyes showed the world-weary expression of an urban homicide cop who had seen too much. It wasn’t going to be easy to outsmart him.
Julia introduced them, using first names only, and asked, “Vanessa, would you like to help prepare dinner?”
“Cooking?” In her role as the spoiled hussy, Abby gave an appalled gasp. “Oh, honey. I don’t cook.”
“Never?”
“I barely even eat. But I do mix a great martini.” She zeroed in on Mac. “I’m ever so pleased to meet you.”
He turned toward Julia. “I’d be glad to help with dinner.”
Abby scowled. Mac hadn’t shown the least bit of interest, hadn’t even glanced at her cleavage which—thanks to a WonderBra—was as significant as the Grand Canyon.
As Julia set Mac to work, slicing fresh veggies for a tossed salad, Abby sidled up beside him. Rubbing against his arm, she purred, “Let me help you with that.”
“Grab a knife,” he said as he rolled a cucumber across the countertop toward her.
She picked up the cucumber and caressed it—a hopefully unsubtle innuendo. “Tell me about yourself, Mac. Where are you from?”
“Denver.”
“I thought you were from around here.”
He shot a suspicious glance in her direction. “Why would you think that?”
“I heard you talking before I came in.” She fluttered her fake eyelashes. “Is it true? Are you a mountain man?”
“Not anymore. I left Redding when I was eighteen.”
“But I bet you still ski. You look athletic.” She squeezed his bicep. “I bet you’re real good at sports.”
He shrugged off her grasp and concentrated on slicing a tomato. Talk about unresponsive! This disregard had to stop right now. Abby purposely sliced too close to her index finger and nicked it.
“Ow. Ow. Ow,” she wailed. “I cut myself.”
She held up her finger so Mac could see the drop of fresh blood beside her French tip manicure. In a baby voice, she said, “Would you kiss it and make it better?”
He glared. “That’s not going to happen.”
At least, he was looking. Maintaining eye contact with him, she placed her cut finger on her tongue, closed her lips around it and sucked.
His eyebrow lifted. Though he said nothing, his expression showed utter disdain. Calmly, he returned to his chopping.
She pulled her finger out of her mouth with a pop and glanced at Julia who was doing her best not to smirk.
Apparently, the sexy vamp act wasn’t going to work on Mac. So what kind of woman did he like? Somebody cute who made him laugh? A helpless damsel in distress?
Julia asked, “Want a bandage?”
“I guess I’ll be okay.” Abby didn’t bother with a sexy pout. Mac wasn’t looking. “I don’t like this cooking. I want to set the table.”
After Julia showed her the plates and silverware, Abby carried them to the dining room. She turned a task that should have taken a few minutes into a big production, moving a dried flower display from the great room to the center of the long oak table. Maybe Mac liked the “happy homemaker” type.
When he appeared in the kitchen doorway, she fussed. “These flowers aren’t right. You know what would be really beautiful? I saw some golden aspen leaves outside. We should pick some and put them in a vase.”
“Great idea,” Julia called from the kitchen. “While you’re outside, you can bring in a few more logs for the fireplace.”
Abby made one more attempt to get Mac’s attention with her sexy disguise. Since he didn’t seem impressed by her boobs or her fluttering eyelashes, she figured he might be the kind of guy who liked to look at bottoms.
As she shuffled the dinnerware, she purposely dropped a fork to the floor. Turning strategically, she bent down to pick it up, giving Mac a full view of her rear end in her snug purple slacks.
She peeked over her shoulder. He wasn’t paying the least bit of attention. Geez! What did it take to get this guy interested?
Chapter Two
The blonde had “high maintenance” written all over her, and Mac had made the mistake of getting involved with that kind of woman before. Not this time.
Carefully averting his gaze from any of her body parts that jiggled, he followed her outside to the deck behind the safe house. The sun had set, and the afterglow gilded the underbellies of the clouds. A wide valley spread before him. The buffalo grass had faded to dusty brown and the forested hillsides were pocketed with groves of brilliant yellow aspen.
He’d grown up here. This land was his home. And he hated being back. There were too many memories, too many regrets.
“Oh, Mac,” Vanessa called. “I need a big, strong man to help me reach these high branches.”
What she needed was a muzzle and a sheet to drape over that delectable body. He trod heavily down the steps from the deck, and stood beside her.
“Up here,” she said, handing him the snippers Julia had provided. “This is a pretty branch.”
When Mac reached up with his left arm, he experienced a throbbing ache in his shoulder. It was only three days since he’d been shot, and the wound wasn’t close to being healed. The doctors told him he’d been lucky. No bones had been broken, but ligaments and muscles were stressed. The bullet had lodged against his scapula, requiring a surgical incision to remove it. The scar required twenty stitches.
He’d lost some blood and was still weak. His AC joint was sore, and he wasn’t supposed to lift his left arm higher than his shoulder. But he sure as hell wasn’t an invalid who needed enforced recuperation time. There was some other reason Lieutenant Hal Perkins had insisted that Mac come to this FBI safe house during the Internal Affairs investigation. But why?
Mac had known something was up when the lieutenant had called him into his office and told him to close the door. Hal Perkins hadn’t smiled; he never smiled. His voice sounded like he had a mouthful of rocks. “You’re going on vacation. There’s a place in the mountains where you’re going to spend some time to heal.”
“Not necessary,” Mac had said.
“You’ll like it. The feds arranged it.”
“The feds?” That didn’t make sense. Denver P.D. seldom even talked to the feds, much less cooperated with them. “Why?”
“You don’t need to know.” Perkins sank heavily behind his desk and pulled a stack of papers toward him. “You’ll be contacted and given directions.”
“What if I don’t want to go?”
“Then you can consider this a direct order,” Perkins growled. “Don’t be a jackass, Mac. This is a gift. An all-expenses-paid vacation in the mountains. Accept it, okay?”
“I don’t get it. I shot that undercover agent. There’s no reason for the feds to give me a gift.”
Perkins shrugged. “Maybe they feel bad on account of you got shot at their sting.”
“I thought it was our sting. Vince Elliot was on scene.”
“Don’t start, Mac. Just go to the mountains.” He glared. “And I will need your badge until the I.A. investigation is over.”
Silently, Mac had pried his shield from his wallet and placed it on the lieutenant’s desktop. He’d already turned over his service handgun.
“Okay,” Perkins said. “See you next week.”
As soon as he left Perkins’s office, Mac had gone to vice looking for answers. He’d talked to Vince Elliot. In spite of the fact that Mac had probably saved his life at the warehouse, the vice cop was cold. Vince said that all he wanted was a bust, then he turned and walked away.
Why all the secrecy? Why wouldn’t anybody tell him anything?
“Mac,” the blonde whined. “Aren’t you going to cut the branches for me?”
He clipped two lower branches that he could reach with his right hand.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
He wished he knew the answer to that question.
THREE HOURS LATER, Mac stepped through the door of the Sundown Tavern in Redding. It felt like he’d gone back in time fifteen years. Not much had changed since high school when Mac and his buddies came here to play pool in the back room. The pine paneled walls still held sepia photographs of legendary skiers and other Colorado sports heroes, notably John Elway. The musty smell of old logs and beer was the same. The wood floor still creaked when Mac walked across it. The light was dim except for the neon beer signs over the bar where a couple of old-timers hunched on stools nursing their drinks.
At the end of the bar, Mac spotted his friend, Paul Hemmings. He’d changed. A lot.
No longer the skinny teenager, Paul was six feet, four inches tall and built like a linebacker. For the past seven years, he’d been an Eagle County deputy sheriff. After his divorce, he was raising two little girls on his own; he carried a lot of responsibility on those big shoulders.
He lumbered across the creaky wood floor like a St. Bernard coming to the rescue of a stranded skier. His huge arms enveloped Mac in a hug that caused a poignant ache in his wounded shoulder.
“That’s enough,” Mac said.
Paul backed away quickly. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”
“I’m fine.”
“I can’t believe you got shot in the line of duty. You’re supposed to be the smart one.”
“Not this time.”
After a round of hellos to the other men in the bar who remembered Mac or at least pretended they did, they went into the back room where liquor wasn’t served. There were a handful of teenagers back here, eating burgers and giggling.
Paul rolled a cue ball across the green felt of one of the pool tables. “Do you feel up to a game?”
“Bring it on,” Mac said. “I can still beat you with one hand tied behind my back.”
As Paul racked up the balls, he said, “Tell me about the shooting.”
“We heard the call for an officer in need of assistance. Me and my partner, Sheila—”
“You have a woman partner? How’s that?”
“I like female partners. They’re usually smarter than the men and know the rules. It’s never been a problem.”
Not until Sheila came along. A lot of what happened at the warehouse had been her fault. First, she’d yelled and provoked the bad guys before sufficient backup was in place. Then, she’d gotten herself in the line of fire.
Mac had downplayed her incompetence when he talked to the I.A. investigators; it wasn’t right to rat out your partner. But Sheila had made two dumb moves. That was nearly enough to put her in the same classification as that high-maintenance blonde at the safe house.
The thought of Vanessa brought an unexpected grin. All her prancing and posing made an amusing diversion, especially after she gave up on seducing him and dropped the sex-bomb act. During dinner, she’d rattled on about this and that. At one point, she’d given them a hilarious rendition of her act as a Las Vegas showgirl balancing a wineglass on her cleavage. He had a sense that she was more intelligent than she let on. Street smart, anyway.
Mac picked a cue from the wall rack and tested it. “We’re playing eight ball. I’ll break.”
“Fine with me.” Paul leaned on his cue. “So how’d you get shot?”
“I’m not proud of what happened.” Mac stretched himself across the pool table, testing different positions that wouldn’t strain his left arm and shoulder. He zeroed in on the cue ball and fired. The balls scattered across the table. He sank the seven. “I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“It happens.”
“Tell me about you,” Mac said. “How are the girls?”
“Too smart for their own good. Apparently, at age seven and nine, they know everything. And I’m an idiot.”
“I could have told them that.” Mac sank another ball. “How about sports? Are they skiing?”
“Skating,” Paul muttered. “Figure skating with the fancy outfits and the show tunes.”
Mac bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing at the thought of his big, husky friend shepherding around his two little princesses.
Mac missed his next shot and stepped back from the table in time to see their friend, Jess Isler, stroll through the door. Mac wasn’t the only one who noticed. The teenaged girls in the room stopped talking when Jess appeared.
It had been that way all through high school. Jess was a good-looking man. He was on the ski patrol and lived in nearby Vail.
After enduring another hug, Mac punched Jess on the shoulder. “Are you still dating that movie star?”
“We moved on. It was too much attention. You know, the paparazzi.”
“Oh, yeah.” Mac rolled his eyes. “Those paparazzi can be a real pain.”
Paul stood between them. “It’s been a long time since the three of us got together.”
“It was your mom’s funeral, Mac.” Jess shrugged. “Four years ago.”
“She was a good woman,” Paul said.
Jess nodded.
Mac said nothing. His feelings about his mother were ambivalent. Sure, he had loved her. Kathryn Granger was beautiful and fun, always laughing. But he knew something about Kathryn that nobody else was aware of. She had betrayed the family.
That was one of the reasons he had left town when he graduated high school. It was also one of the reasons he knew never to trust a woman; they would only break your heart.
Speaking of which…he looked up and saw Vanessa strolling toward the pool table. What the hell was she doing here?
“Hi there,” she said in a breathy little voice. “Mac? Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friends?”
“This is a private conversation.”
Undeterred, she moved toward Paul. When she grasped his huge hand, he had no alternative but to shake. “I’m Vanessa,” she said. “And you are?”
“Paul Hemmings.” He gave her a sheepish grin. “How do you know Mac?”
“We’re both staying at the same little resort.”
“I wanted to ask about that place,” Paul said. “Why is it called Last’s Resort?”
“The woman who runs it is Julia Last,” Mac said. Though Paul was his friend and a deputy, he wouldn’t betray the true purpose of the safe house. “Nice place. Real quiet. A friend recommended it to me.”
“You could have stayed with me,” Paul said.
“Or me,” Jess put in.
“Thanks, guys.” Mac knew his lieutenant had arranged his stay at the safe house for a reason. “But I’m supposed to rest and recuperate. I can’t do that with the little girls at your place, Paul. Or with the big girls who are always hanging out with Jess.”
Vanessa had picked up a cue. “Whose shot?”
“Mine.” Mac stared down at the table. Paul’s last shot had left him behind the eight ball. There wasn’t much he could do.
“I’ll play the winner,” Vanessa said.
Though Mac concentrated on their game, he couldn’t help listening as Vanessa chatted with handsome Jess. She was the kind of woman who would always focus on the best-looking man in the room. Or the wealthiest. From the platinum blond curls on her head to the toes of her high-heeled boots, she was a gold digger. It annoyed him that her husky laugh tickled pleasantly at the edge of his senses.
“The Vail ski patrol,” she said admiringly to Jess. “You must know some famous people.”
“Some,” he admitted. “Mostly, my job is a great way to get in a lot of skiing. As a bonus, I get to help people.”
“Like your friend, the deputy.”
“Kind of weird,” Jess said. “The three of us were buds in high school, and we all ended up in some kind of law enforcement jobs.”
“Ski patrol?” Paul scoffed. “Do you catch a lot of bad guys on the slopes?”
“Tell me about Mac,” Vanessa said.
Mac muffed a shot. He didn’t want Jess giving her too much information about him. Until he figured out what Vanessa was up to, he didn’t want to let his guard down.
“Mac’s dad was the sheriff,” Jess said. “A good guy. He moved down to Florida after Mac’s mom died.”
“Does he have other family up here?”
“Aunt Lucille.” Jess chuckled.
“Oh, yeah,” Paul chimed in. “Good old Aunt Lucille. She’s a real character.”
Jess picked up where he left off. “The woman has got to be in her seventies, but she still wears flashy clothes and skis like a demon. She competed in the 1952 Winter Olympics when Stein Eriksen won the giant slalom.”
“My kind of woman.” Vanessa bared her teeth in a grin. “A winner.”
“We’ll see about that,” Paul said. “Looks like you’re playing Mac.”
As she sashayed toward the pool table, her dark eyes held a competitive gleam. Mac decided there was no way he’d let her win this game. Unfortunately, when he broke the balls, nothing went in.
When Vanessa positioned herself across the table, he had a spectacular view of her cleavage. Earlier today, her vamping and prancing was a major turnoff. Now, when she wasn’t trying to be sexy, he was getting turned on.
With a crisp shot, she sank a striped ball and left herself another good lie.
“Nice,” Jess commented.
Gliding around the table, she nudged Mac out of her way. “I don’t like losing.”
She tapped the cue ball. Another ball tipped into the corner pocket. Now she had a problem. The cue ball was trapped behind two others.
Her eyes narrowed as she considered all the angles. When Vanessa banked the cue and sank the four, it was obvious that she knew what she was doing.
“You’re a hustler,” Mac said.
“I learned more in Vegas than just shaking my tail feathers.”
When her ruby lips spread in a smug grin, he had the insane urge to kiss the smile off those lips. He didn’t want to be attracted to this woman. She was a protected witness. For all he knew, she was up to her pretty brown eyes in danger and disaster—criminal activity of the worst kind.
He only had one more chance to sink a ball. He muffed it. Then she cleared the table and sank the eight.
Grudgingly, he offered approval. “Not bad.”
“Beat you.”
She tapped her cue against his chest and looked him straight in the eye. What was going on inside her head? He wanted to find out.
Mac was good in a police interrogation when he had the weight of the law on his side. Subtlety wasn’t his forte, but he was good at spotting a liar. “Buy you a drink?”
“I’ll have a Singapore Sling.”
“The Sundown Tavern doesn’t do cocktails with umbrellas.”
“Then, I’ll have the specialty of the house.”
As he led the way from the back room to the bar, Mac calculated her body weight and probable resistance to intoxication. It shouldn’t take more than three tequila shots to loosen her tongue. Then she’d be ready to tell him anything he wanted to know.
AN HOUR LATER, Abby stared down at the shot glass on the table. It would be her fourth. Though she’d managed to spill more than she drank, she was beginning to feel the effect.
“Drink up,” Mac urged. He was sipping soda, claiming that he couldn’t mix alcohol with his pain medication. “No need to worry. I’m the designated driver.”
She rose to the challenge, lifting her shot glass. “Here’s to the mountains.”
“To the mountains,” echoed Paul and Jess, both of whom were still nursing their first and only glass of beer.
She tossed back the tequila. The fiery liquid burned her tongue, but she held it in her mouth. When she lifted her beer glass to her lips as a chaser, she spit most of the tequila into the glass. Even with all these precautions, she was woozy. Clearly, Mac was trying to get her drunk. But why?
He rested his elbow on the table and gazed curiously into her eyes. “How are you doing, Vanessa?”
“Great,” she said defiantly.
“Feeling a buzz?”
“Nothing I can’t handle.”
Drunk or not, she could nail his hide to the wall. If he was a dirty cop, she was the woman who could prove it. As she stared back at him, she was momentarily distracted by the devilish spark of amusement in his intense blue eyes. Being with his friends had loosened him up, and he almost seemed to be having fun. When the tension in his face relaxed, it was a very interesting face. Good bone structure. Strong features.
Though he wasn’t as gorgeous as Jess and not as likable as Paul, she was intrigued by Mac. He was a man of many secrets. At the same time, he seemed straightforward and solid. Not the kind of guy who broke the rules. Was he dirty?
“You know, Vanessa,” he said softly, “from the first time I saw you, you looked familiar. Have we ever met before?”
“Nope,” she said.
“It seems like you know me.”
At the edge of her alcoholic haze, a warning bell went off. He was very subtly interrogating her, trying to get her to admit to a link between them. He suspected her.
Easily, she slid back into her Vanessa persona. “You and me? Honey, we don’t run in the same circles.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I just am.” Though she didn’t physically move away from him, she tried to create some distance. “And if you’re using this as a pickup line, it’s not very good.”
“I don’t have to pick you up,” he pointed out. “You followed me.”
There was no point in pretending she had come to the Sundown Tavern by coincidence. It had been difficult for Julia to arrange the logistics for this trip while still keeping the other safe house agents in the dark about Abby’s true identity. Though Abby didn’t see the agent who had acted as her chauffeur, she knew he was nearby.
“I didn’t come here because of you,” she said. “I just wanted some fun.”
“But you’re interested in me,” he said.
“What an ego!”
Across the table, Jess and Paul seemed to be observing their interaction with approval.
“When a woman follows a man into town,” Mac said, “there’s usually a reason.”
“What do you know about women?”
She heard snickers from Jess and Paul, but Mac didn’t crack a smile. “I know this,” he said. “Women are good at manipulating. They have these secret agendas. Clever little plans. What’s yours, Vanessa?”
“You know, there’s a word for that attitude. Men who don’t like women. Misogynist.”
“Big word.”
She tossed her platinum curls. “Just because a girl is pretty doesn’t mean she’s dumb.”
“Ouch,” Jess said. “Score another point for Vanessa.”
“Thanks.” When she stood, her knees were a bit rubbery. “I need to visit the little girls’ room.”
She’d made this trip before they’d started drinking, and Abby wished she’d left a trail of bread crumbs to lead her back to the restrooms. The route led past the bar and a small dining area, which was empty, into a hallway. By the time she got to the door marked Gals, she was walking steadily.
But her head was spinning. Mac seemed to suspect her of ulterior motives. Somehow, he’d seen through her cover story. A smart man. And attractive. She was dangerously close to wanting more from him than information.
She had to stop thinking that way. She was a professional and had worked hard to climb through the ranks in the FBI. Mac was her target. There could never be anything between them.
When she placed her hand on the restroom door, she felt someone clutch her shoulder. Acting on instinct, she whirled in her high-heeled boots to break his hold. At the verge of a karate chop, she checked herself. She knew this man. “Leo.”
“I like the hair. You make a sexy blonde.”
When he reached up to touch her curls, she slapped his hand away. Leo Fisher was no longer her fiancé; he had no right to touch her. “I thought you were in the hospital.”
He gestured with a carved ebony cane. “No broken bones. I need some ligament repair on my knee, but it’ll wait.”
“My sympathies,” she said coolly.
His voice lowered. “How long has it been, Abby?”
“Fourth of July. Last year.” The moment when she broke up with him was still vivid in her memory. There was no way she’d ever forgive him. “Tell me why you’re here. And make it fast. I need to get back to the table.”
“I wanted to keep an eye on your boy, Mac Granger. If he’s one of the dirty cops, he might contact the guy I’ve been looking for.”
“This is my assignment.”
“I’ve been working this case for six months, and I’m close to getting enough evidence on the man at the top of the drug distribution chain. He owns a place in Vail. If your friend, Mac, tries to get in touch, let me know.”
“Forget it,” she said.
“Come on. For old times’ sake?”
He was almost pleading, and that worried her more than if he’d come on strong. “Are you supposed to be on this investigation? Does anybody know what you’re doing?”
“I’m undercover. You know how it gets.”
“Yes, I do.” She worried that Leo had come unhinged and was acting on his own as a rogue agent. “I suggest you go back to Denver and get that operation on your knee. Take some time off. Schedule a visit with a counselor.”
He handed her a scrap of paper with a phone number written on it. “Call me on my cell phone if Mac Granger goes to Vail.”
She crumpled the paper and threw it on the hardwood floor. Then, she turned away from him. “Finding your drug lord isn’t my problem.”
Her assignment was Mac.
Chapter Three
In a shabby little diner in Denver, three people hunched around a small circular table. Though it was late and nobody was seated nearby, they spoke in low, secretive tones. The topic of their conversation was Mac Granger.
“If he figures this out, he could screw up everything.”
“Forget about him. He’s stuck in the mountains.”
“My point exactly.” The speaker took a long drag on a Marlboro Light. “He’s close to Vail. If he gets suspicious, he could start making connections.”
Nervous tension wrapped around them like a gloved hand. For the moment, they were safe and warm. At any moment, the hand could open, and they’d be exposed.
“Well, what do you think we should do about Mac? Kill him?” A strangled laugh underlined the absurdity of that idea. “We’re not murderers.”
But the thought had been planted. To kill Mac Granger was the simplest solution. Better him than us.
“I don’t know him,” the smoker said. “You both do. Is he the kind of guy who gives up easily?”
“Never.”
“Then he should be eliminated. I’ll take care of it.”
The other two stared down at their coffee mugs, unwilling to acknowledge the decision, but knowing they had no other choice. Having Mac alive and probably investigating was dangerous.
“Make it look like an accident. I don’t want an investigation.”
“Don’t worry.” The cigarette stubbed out in the ashtray, leaving a wisp of smoke. “I’m a cop. I know better than to leave clues.”
THE NEXT MORNING, Mac stood on the deck behind the safe house finishing his second mug of coffee. A crisp breeze stirred the dry grasses of the valley and quaked in the golden aspen leaves. The clear blue skies offered the fresh promise of a brand-new day. A new start. He should have felt optimistic.
Instead, a series of dark questions played across his mind. Why had he been sent to this safe house to recuperate? Why wouldn’t Vince Elliot, the undercover cop who had been at the warehouse shooting, talk to him? Was Mac under suspicion? Of what?
Last night, he’d called his partner, Sheila, on her cell phone. Though Sheila had all the perceptiveness of a goldfish, she was his partner. She owed him. And she was a good source for gossip. If all her bragging was true, she’d slept with half the Denver P.D. which was probably how she’d gotten promoted to detective so quickly. Without betraying the location of the safe house, Mac had arranged to meet her later today near Redding.
His frustration level rose. He hadn’t done anything wrong. He was a good cop. His actions at the warehouse were unfortunate but appropriate. Why the hell would he come under suspicion?
He looked to the mountains for solace. When he was younger, he had loved this land. He and Paul and Jess had taken a blood oath to always stay together in the Rockies. When they were kids, they’d called themselves the Three Trolls, Keepers of the Treasure, and they had ceremoniously buried a shoebox filled with crystal, pyrite and pine cones.
Paul and Jess had lived up to that boyhood oath. Both of them were still here—flourishing and happy.
But not Mac. His vision of life was different. He preferred the in-your-face threat of city life where the scene was constantly evolving and there was a reassuring undercurrent of static noise. All this fresh mountain air was choking him. Last night in bed, he couldn’t sleep; the mountain silence weighed down on him.
After less than twenty-four hours here, he was itching to get back to Denver, back to work. The only thing keeping him here was his suspicion of Vanessa. As soon as he understood what she was doing, everything else would become clear.
He returned to the kitchen where Julia had finished washing the breakfast dishes. Everyone had eaten, except for Vanessa, who hadn’t yet made her appearance. He stood in the kitchen doorway and glanced past the dining room table toward the staircase. Where was she?
He asked Julia, “How long has Vanessa been at the safe house?”
“Only a few hours longer than you.”
“She’s a handful.”
“So are you,” Julia said with a hint of accusation. “In the future, I’d prefer that you didn’t roll into town and get blitzed. This isn’t a frat house, Mac.”
“I wasn’t drinking.”
“But Vanessa was. I had a full report from Roger Flannery.”
“The young guy?” Mac had met Roger Flannery yesterday. He was so new to his job as an FBI agent that he still had the stink of Quantico about him.
“It was good experience for him to keep surveillance last night,” Julia said. “But I don’t want it to happen again.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
There was a loud groan from the staircase, and Mac turned to see Vanessa lurch onto the bottom stair. Her skintight leather pants creaked as she wobbled across the floor toward the kitchen. Her blond hair was a fluffy contrast to her pained expression. In spite of her heavy makeup, he saw dark circles under her big, brown eyes.
“Hangover?” he asked brightly.
As she tried to focus on him, her left eyelid twitched. “Aspirin,” she rasped.
“I’d have thought a pool hustler like you could hold her—”
“Aspirin,” she interrupted more loudly. “Percoset. Morphine.”
Julia took her firmly by the arm and pulled her toward the kitchen. “Come with me, Vanessa. I have a no-fail remedy for hangovers.”
“Slow down,” Vanessa said. This morning, she seemed incapable of balancing in her high-heeled sandals.
“It’d serve you right to fall flat on your nose,” Julia said. “You ought to know better than to drink tequila.”
Vanessa came to a halt. She kicked off the high heels. Bare-footed, she plodded into the kitchen.
Though she was teetering at the edge of misery, Mac could tell that she was still in control, which seemed to be her most pronounced character trait. Control. Even though she’d gotten pretty well oiled at the Sundown Tavern, she wasn’t drunk enough to give him any useful information.
Mac had investigated on his own. Last night, after talking to Sheila, he’d contacted a cop buddy in L.A. and asked about a state’s witness named Vanessa.
Her full name was Vanessa Lenore Nye. She was a former Vegas showgirl who had lived with the elderly head of the Santoro crime family before turning state’s evidence. Mac’s first impression of her was one hundred percent correct. She was a woman who’d do anything for the right price. Her extravagance was renowned. Reputedly, she owned half a dozen mink coats and over a hundred pairs of shoes. At one time, she’d been in possession of the famed thirty-four carat LeSalle diamond. Anything for the right price.
So why was she interested in him? It was out of character for a gold digger to flirt with a Denver homicide cop who drove a late-model car and didn’t wear a Rolex.
In the kitchen, Julia dumped tomato juice, raw eggs and a nasty-looking green weed into the blender. When she set the dial to puree and turned on the blender, Vanessa winced at the grinding whir.
“Sounds like a 747,” she muttered.
“After this remedy,” Julia said, “you’ll be better in no time.”
“Want coffee,” Vanessa said pathetically.
“Drink this first.” She held out a glass filled to the brim with a putrid green liquid. “Every drop.”
Like a swimmer preparing for the hundred meter breaststroke, Vanessa inhaled and exhaled deeply. She took the glass and chugged until it was empty. “Yech.”
“Go to the dining room,” Julia said. “I’ll bring you coffee and dry toast.”
At the table, Mac held her chair and took his place at the end of the table beside her. Right now, she appeared to be vulnerable; this might be a good time to start with his probing. “You lived in Los Angeles,” he said. “What part of the city?”
“Newport.”
That fit with the information he’d been given. “Right near the ocean. Did you have a private beach?”
She held up her hand. “No more talking.”
“Ever go surfing?”
Slowly, she turned her head and glared with such cold hostility that she might have been measuring him for a coffin. “No. More. Talk.”
He waited until she’d finished her coffee, a glass of water and a piece of toast. Her eyes were more alert.
“Surfing,” she said, “is not my thing. Even in a wetsuit, the water is too cold. I like indoor sports.”
“So, I assume you’re not a skier.”
“Love the ski clothes. There just aren’t enough times when I can wear my minks.”
Julia popped her head around the corner. “Feeling better, Vanessa?”
“A lot better. What did you put in that drink?”
“It’s a secret formula. And it always works,” Julia said. “The next thing you should do is go for a walk outdoors in the fresh air.”
“Good idea,” Mac said. “I’ll come with you.”
THOUGH ABBY would rather have stayed in bed all day, nursing her hangover and cursing the wormy evils of tequila, she didn’t have that luxury. Last night, she had recognized Mac’s restlessness. He didn’t want to be here. And there was no way to force him to stay at the safe house. He had come here at the suggestion of his lieutenant. If he decided to leave, he could do so.
To fulfill her assignment, she needed to convince him to trust her, offer him a bribe and inform her superiors of his response. A hike along a secluded mountain path seemed like a good way to get close to him.
She abandoned her high heels for a pair of bright pink sneakers that matched her low-cut sweater. Together, she and Mac set out on a path that led past the barn toward a sloping hillside. The morning sun beat down with aching clarity. Behind her huge, extra-dark sunglasses, Abby winced. “Is it always so glaring?”
“Take a deep gulp of that fresh air,” he said cheerfully. The man was positively enjoying her misery. What a rat! If she hadn’t been undercover, Abby would have flattened him with a karate kick to the jaw.
He leaned against the corral beside the barn where three horses pranced and flicked their long tails. “Maybe,” he said, “we should go for a ride.”
Bouncing up and down in the saddle with her brain crashing inside her skull? “Forget it.”
“Look around you. Take a minute to appreciate the scenery.”
“If it’s so great, how come you live in the city?”
He shrugged. “I just ended up there.”
She didn’t believe that for one minute. Mac was the kind of man who took action. Things didn’t “just happen” to him. “What made you leave?”
“The usual reasons,” he said cryptically. “How about you? Did you grow up in Los Angeles or move there?”
Abby couldn’t remember if she’d mentioned L.A. last night when she was drinking. After she’d bumped into Leo outside the ladies’ room, things had gotten real blurry. She’d felt like she was in a waking dream, standing outside her body and watching herself as she slurped down tequila and laughed too loud. Only her years of undercover experience had kept her from completely blowing her identity as Vanessa Nye.
Now, she knew, Mac was trying to pierce that cover. He must have gotten some inside information about Vanessa Nye and was testing her. Well, fine! Even with the remnants of a hangover, she could handle this.
“I grew up in a little town in Oregon. I didn’t hate it, but I was bored. So totally bored. Vegas was more to my liking.”
“I like Oregon,” Mac said. “What was the name of the town?”
“Sterling.” She remembered more details from her dossier on Vanessa. “Our high school team was the Sterling Pirates. Our colors were red and gold. I was a cheerleader.”
“And in Las Vegas?”
“Different kind of cheers.” She started walking along the path. Vanessa’s early life wasn’t all that different from her own. Abby had also come from a small town and had been a cheerleader.
“Tell me how you ended up in California.”
Abby lowered her sunglasses and peered over the rim at him. “I’m not in the mood for a cat-and-mouse game, Mac. If there’s something you want to know from me, just ask.”
“You’re Vanessa Nye,” he said.
“Bingo.”
“You lived with the head of the Santoro family.”
“Right again.”
“Why?”
She allowed her sunglasses to fall back onto the bridge of her nose. How would the real Vanessa handle this inquiry? “None of your business.”
Turning away, she tromped along the path beside a narrow creek. The dried grasses at the side of the rippling water crackled as she walked through them. Under her sweater and leather pants, Abby perspired although the temperature was pleasantly cool. She welcomed the cold sweat, evidence that the alcohol was working through her system.
As she followed the creek into the shadow of the trees, she paused. Her goal was to get Mac to trust her, which meant she needed to be more amenable. She forced herself to smile at him. “I don’t want to think about the past, okay? I just want to have fun. Just to, you know, be friends with you.”
“Maybe I want to be more than a friend.”
She hadn’t expected that response. All the indications Mac had given until now were that he didn’t even know she was female. What was he up to? She studied his expression.
Like all good liars, Abby was easily able to recognize deception in others. It seemed to her that Mac was telling the truth about wanting to hook up with her. His teeth bared in a predatory grin. His gaze latched on to her face, and he leaned close. These were all indications of physical attraction.
Surely not. Surely, she was reading the signs wrong. “What are you saying?”
“I like you.”
“Even though you know who I am?” His readiness to get friendly with Vanessa was clearly inappropriate. “But you’re a cop.”
“So what?”
A good cop would have better boundaries. “Don’t you disapprove of my connection with Santoro?”
“That was the past,” he said. “I thought you just wanted to have fun.”
“Well, sure. But—”
“You could have fun with me.” His right arm encircled her waist and he pulled her tight against his hard, lean body. “What do you say, Vanessa?”
Expertly, she slipped away from his one-armed embrace. Too much was happening too fast. Though her brain was still sluggish from the hangover, her instincts warned her about getting close to this man. He was her target.
And she was Vanessa Nye. A gold digger. That would be her excuse to back off. “Well, Mac. If you really know so much about me, you’ll know that I’m very selective. My companionship doesn’t come cheap.”
“You like pretty things,” he said.
“Expensive things.”
“Today is your lucky day,” he said coolly. “I can afford you, Vanessa. I’m rich.”
From bribes? From ill-gotten gains? “No way. Cops don’t make big bucks.”
“Inheritance,” he said. “I received a ton of money when my grandmother sold off family-owned lands where Vail ski resort was developed in the 1960s. The Grangers are very, very wealthy.”
His gaze flicked down and to the left. His right hand touched the side of his nose and rubbed across his lips. Both were obvious signals that Mac was telling a lie. Abby knew it. But Vanessa wouldn’t. Vanessa would take Mac at his word.
“Really?” she asked. “You’re a land baron?”
“A former land baron. That’s right.”
He looked down at his toes and shuffled. Clearly uncomfortable. Mac was the worst liar she had ever encountered. He wouldn’t last a minute in undercover work.
But this lie—no matter how poorly executed—was very clever as a test. If she really was Vanessa Nye, she’d be all over this good-looking cop who was also rich. Vanessa used seduction to get what she wanted. And, for the moment, Abby was Vanessa.
She purred, “I think you’re right, Mac. You and me? We could have some fun together. Later today, you could take me shopping at the boutiques in Vail.”
“I don’t want to wait until later.”
Again, he dragged her into an embrace.
As Vanessa, she wouldn’t resist. Abby set aside her own feelings of distaste and played her undercover role as the sexy vamp. Her lips met his. In the back of her mind, she was detached, repeating a mantra. This is only a job, only a job, only…
His mouth was fierce and demanding. His arms held her in a viselike grip. Her breasts crushed against his chest.
But when he leaned away from her, she saw a look of surprise in his honest blue eyes. He removed her sunglasses, taking down a barrier between them. She liked what she saw. A strong man.
Though the planes of his face had been hardened by experience, she saw empathy in his eyes—the true kindness that came from understanding. A good man.
Dappled sunlight filtered through the overhanging branches of conifers. The whisper of the creek trickled at the edge of her senses. His arms felt warm and sheltering. It felt right to be with him.
When he kissed her again, her body responded to him. Her well-developed defense system came crashing down as she allowed herself to enjoy the breathtaking sensation of their kiss. Her heart fluttered, and a thrill chased through her entire body.
Oh, God, no. This was all wrong! Mac Granger could be a dirty cop, the worst kind of traitor. She couldn’t be attracted to him.
Gasping, she broke away. “That’s enough.”
They stood, staring at each other.
She saw something in him that touched her soul. He’d been hurt, badly hurt. But he was tough; he could take the pain and come back stronger. Without words, she saw all these things.
She wanted to know him better. To hear his truth.
And she wanted to share her feelings with him, to tell him how tired she was of constantly pretending to be someone else. On the tip of her tongue was her name. Abigail Marie Nelson. She longed to tell him. To be completely, utterly honest.
For the first time in her career as an FBI special agent, Abby had completely forgotten her cover story.
Chapter Four
Mac’s plan to unmask the woman who called herself Vanessa Nye went up in smoke when she kissed him back. Until then, he’d been trying to interrogate her, trying to trip her up. When he had demanded a kiss, he figured she’d back off and admit that she was conning him.
He hadn’t expected a lightning bolt.
He needed distance from her. And time to sort out his feelings. He spent the rest of the morning avoiding Vanessa and took off early for the meeting he’d scheduled with his partner.
Mac parked outside the graveyard near Redding. A secluded spot at the end of a graded gravel road, this was the first place that had occurred to him when he arranged this meet with Sheila. Mac wanted privacy, and nobody came here by accident. Not that the old cemetery was ominous. The opposite was true. This gently rising hillside surrounded by Ponderosa and lodgepole pine provided a peaceful resting place. The graves—some of them dating back over a hundred years—were fenced off, but the land wasn’t manicured. Weeds and wild-flowers grew rampant between the simple markers.
As soon as he stepped out of his car, Sheila pulled up beside him in her own vehicle. Good timing. In spite of her many other faults, his partner was punctual.
“Did you take the day off?” he asked as she came toward him.
“That’s right.” As always, she sounded irritated. “Until you get back, I’m stuck with boring desk work, which I totally hate. If I wanted to spend the entire day hanging around the station, I would have become a lawyer.”
He didn’t point out that a law degree was probably far beyond her limited ability to concentrate. “Did you get the information I asked for?”
“This time,” she said, “you really messed up.”
He messed up? He bit down hard to keep from spitting out accusations. The only mistake he’d made at the warehouse shooting was allowing her to get out of the car. “Tell me what you’ve heard.”
“You don’t have any idea how much trouble you’re in.” Her scowl etched deep lines below her thick brown bangs. “How much do you know about that guy you shot and killed?”
Mac had made it his business to find out about the man whose life he had taken. “His name was Dante Williams, and he was twenty-seven years old. High school dropout. Seven arrests, mostly on drug-related charges. One conviction landed him in prison for eight months.”
“A regular poster boy for how to ruin your life.”
“He still didn’t deserve to die.” Though Mac had fired in the line of duty, he would always regret the shooting, and he would visit the grave of Dante Williams to pay his respects. It was a ritual Mac followed with the other victim he’d shot and killed early in his police career.
“Anyway,” Sheila said, “this guy, Dante, was about to give evidence on the number one drug distributor in Colorado. The top man. The honcho. When you killed him, you blew it.”
“Were the feds and Denver vice working together on the sting?”
“Not on purpose,” she said. “They were both following trails that led to the same place.”
“To Dante,” he said.
“It gets worse.” She glanced at her wristwatch—one of her less annoying nervous habits. “Some people think you killed Dante on purpose. To keep him from turning snitch.”
The implication was clear. The FBI and the Denver P.D. suspected that Mac was a dirty cop, that he’d killed Dante Williams on orders from some honcho drug kingpin.
A burst of anger flared behind his eyelids. The shooting at the warehouse had been a grotesque miracle of bad timing, but he shouldn’t be a suspect. His dedication to his work and his years of service ought to count for something. He’d earned medals and citations. He was a good cop.
“Now you know,” Sheila said with a smirk. Her attitude was smug and superior. She almost seemed to be enjoying his fall from grace. “The best thing for you to do is lay low and let the dust settle. Please, Mac. Will you do that?”
“Why do you care?” His relationship with Sheila had never been good. They bickered like an old married couple at the verge of divorce.
“You’re my partner.” Insincerity dripped from her voice. “You’ve got to forget about this. Don’t rock the boat. Don’t start investigating on your own.”
As if he’d take advice from her? If she’d behaved in a competent manner at the warehouse sting, he wouldn’t be in this position. Unfortunately, she was his only source of information since everybody else suspected him. He needed to maintain this contact with Sheila. “Did you get that photograph I asked for?”
“Of course.” She opened her car door and leaned inside to retrieve a manila envelope. “This is a recent photo of the FBI undercover agent you shot. Leo Fisher. He’s out of the hospital.”
Mac pulled the photo out of the envelope and studied it. Leo Fisher was an average-looking guy with dark eyes and a square jaw. His long hair was pulled back in a ponytail. Mac thought he’d spotted Leo Fisher last night at the tavern, but he wasn’t one hundred percent sure.
Once again, he tapped into Sheila’s vast collection of gossip. “What have you heard about Leo Fisher?”
“He’s off the case, but…” Her voice trailed off.
“Come on, Sheila. What have you heard?”
“I heard that Fisher was up here in the mountains. Going to Vail, I think.”
“Why?” he asked. Vanessa had also hinted about a trip to Vail.
“I don’t know. God, Mac. I can’t tell you everything.”
Her tone was as whiny as a teenager. He really disliked this woman. Incompetent. Immature.
“I’m thirsty,” she said. “Come with me to get a latte.”
“Can’t,” Mac said. He didn’t want to spend any more time with her than absolutely necessary.
“Where are you staying up here, anyway?”
“I grew up here. In Redding.” No way would he tell Sheila about the safe house. “I have friends up here.”
“Like that cute guy.” She was suddenly alert. “I remember him. He stopped by the station to visit you a couple of times, right? He’s on the Vail ski patrol. I’d love to see him again.”
“Not today.”
“At least come with me for coffee. I drove all the way up here. What are you doing that’s so important?”
He pushed open the wrought iron gate leading into the cemetery. “Visiting my mother’s grave.”
Not even Sheila could be argue with the finality of that statement. She backed toward her car. “Bye, Mac. I’ll stay in touch.”
“You do that,” he muttered.
The information she’d given him hadn’t been completely unexpected. He’d felt the suspicions. Now, he knew why.
In the cemetery, he picked his way along a hard earth path lined with stones to a section where all the Grangers were buried. His grandparents. His great-uncle. And his mother, Kathryn Granger.
Leaning down, he plucked a few weeds that obscured the pink marble marker inscribed with her name. He read the words: Beloved Wife and Mother.
It was true. He had loved her. His name— MacCloud—had been her maiden name, and she’d done as well as she could raising him.
But he couldn’t respect Kathryn Granger. Not after he saw his mother in the arms of a man who wasn’t his father. She’d had an affair. She’d betrayed him and his father, the sheriff. Even after her death, he found it hard to forgive her lies.
Mac doubted he would ever find a woman he could trust.
LEO FISHER limped along the cracked sidewalk on a dark Denver street, not far from the warehouse where he’d been shot in the leg. This was a cruddy part of town, deserted after dark except for the bums and the rats that scattered in fear at his approach.
Leo was alone. Always alone. But he wasn’t bitter. He had a job to do, an important job. And he was the only one who could do it right. By himself. Alone.
Seeing Abby had been weird. He’d barely thought about her since the night she walked out on him. Maybe he’d been hard on her, but she should have understood that he was still in character, still playing the undercover role. The hell with her! He didn’t want or need a wife and family.
He was the best damned undercover agent in the FBI. The best. And there was no way in hell he’d give up on this operation. Not now when he was so close. Why should he let some snot-nosed vice cop like Vince Elliot step in and grab all the glory? This was Leo’s bust.
He stopped on the corner under a streetlamp and lit up a smoke.
A dark form materialized beside him. A snitch.
“Sorry about Dante,” Leo said.
The snitch made the sign of the cross. “He was a good man.”
“What have you got for me?”
“A name.”
Leo scoffed. “I know the name. Nicholas Dirk.”
He was the head honcho in drug distribution throughout the Rocky Mountain west. A wealthy guy who dabbled in all kinds of crime under the cover of being a land developer. He had houses in Denver and in Vail.
“I got evidence,” the snitch said.
“Give.”
“It’s on a computer. Dirk always takes the laptop computer with him. Download that and you’ve got him.”
Leo wasn’t impressed by this overly obvious information. “Big deal. There’s no way for me to get my hands on that evidence.”
“For the right price, I can tell you the password.”
“Now you’re talking.” Leo tossed down his cigarette and crushed it with the tip of his cane. That password was worth paying for.
ON THE SECOND FLOOR in the safe house were six bedrooms of varying sizes. Abby’s was small and squarish, plain but clean, without a telephone, computer hookup or television. Her bedroom opened into a bathroom that she shared with Mac.
For the past ten minutes, she had been standing with her ear to the bathroom door, listening to the thrum of the shower and debating with herself about opening the door a crack to spy on him.
Obviously, she’d be invading his privacy big-time. But her job as an undercover agent was to get close to him, and he couldn’t ignore her if she walked into the bathroom while he was half-naked. Kind of a risky maneuver. But she had to make him talk to her. She had questions. A lot of questions.
This afternoon, she and Julia had followed him to the cemetery. Abby’s surveillance technique was simple. Earlier today, she’d planted a tracking device in the heel of Mac’s boot. All she’d needed to do was activate the device. Julia drove and, together, they’d used GPS technology to locate the signal.
From a hillside near the graveyard, they’d watched while Mac met with his partner, Sheila Hartman. Though Abby hadn’t been close enough to hear what they were saying, the very fact that he’d arranged a clandestine meet was suspicious. Were they both dirty cops? What kind of plans were they making?
Using binoculars, Abby had seen them exchange a photograph of Leo. Again, suspicious.
Leo had said that he was tracking a drug kingpin who had a home in Vail. Would Mac make contact with this person? Would he demand a payoff for the murder of Dante Williams? Was he on the take?
Abby really hoped not. After that overwhelming kiss this afternoon, she wanted nothing more than to discover that Mac was squeaky clean and above suspicion.
After the noise from his shower ended, she waited a few minutes so he’d have time to put on some clothes. Then she opened the bathroom door a crack and peeked inside.
Her intention was to march right in. Brazen and bold. But the sight of him stopped her.
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Cassie Miles
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: UNDERCOVER LOVERSDetective Mac Granger was in trouble. The Colorado mountain-man-turned-city-cop had incensed a drug lord, and now someone was setting him up, making his peers doubt his loyalty and forcing him on the run from a mysterious killer. His only hope lay in FBI Special Agent Abby Nelson, the fed assigned to investigate him. Could he trust the woman who′d gone undercover in order to expose him? He couldn′t deny his attraction to the beautiful blonde–or the opportunity to pose as her lover in order to fi nd the killer. But he′d be damned if he fell for a woman whose commitment to duty might make her his worst enemy….