Cavanaugh Undercover

Brennan nodded. “He has a suite near the top floor.”

“And you?” she asked, not really sure what had prompted her to ask, other than she was attempting to live up to the image of a madam she was creating. “What do you have?”

An elevator car’s door slid soundlessly open in front of them.

Brennan looked at her pointedly as they walked into the empty elevator car. He pressed number 30. “An itch I can’t scratch—yet.”

Was he actually putting her on notice, she wondered, stunned. “Saving yourself for Miss Right?” Tiana deadpanned.

The spontaneous laugh was deep and rich and all-encompassing within the small space. And, if she allowed it, it was also hypnotic in its own compelling way. Tiana did what she could to block the effects. Beyond his being good-looking, she knew nothing about the man. He could be a homicidal maniac for all she knew, even though her gut told her that he most likely wasn’t.

“There’s no such thing as ‘Miss Right,’” Brennan told her.

“How do you know?” she asked, deciding to give him a hard time. “Just because you haven’t encountered her yet doesn’t mean she’s not just around the next corner.” As far as she was concerned, there were a great many “Miss Rights” out there. The main problem was that there were no “Mr. Rights” to receive them.

Numbers flashed by as they passed each floor. Brennan stared at his companion as if she’d lost her mind. “Never met a madam who was into fairy tales. How long did you say you were in this business?”

“It feels like all my life,” she responded, infusing just the right amount of weariness into her voice.

They got out and he led the way down a winding hallway to a recessed door that appeared to be removed from the other rooms. This was clearly a suite among suites. Whoever this man was, Tiana thought, he certainly knew how to enjoy the fruits of his labors.

“Any word of advice?” she heard herself asking the tall man beside her.

She had to be crazy, but there was just the tiniest part of her that trusted this man—which on the face of it was nothing if not a foolhardy move on her part. Other than not really knowing this man from Adam, she realized again that she could very well be allying herself with a stone-cold killer. She had no way of knowing who or what he was. Why she should feel that she could trust him was a concept that was completely beyond her.

Since when had she turned into a trusting soul where men were concerned? a small voice in her head asked. She had no answer.

“Yeah,” Brennan told her after a beat during which time he appeared to be weighing the pros and cons of answering her question at all, much less truthfully. She might, after all, be trying to trap him. For all he knew, she was allied with Roland and had been sent to test him.

Maybe he was crazy, but he decided to take his chances—up to a point.

“Don’t let your guard down around Roland for a second. He’s a narcissist, but he’s the type who wouldn’t think twice about slitting your throat if he thinks you’re lying to him—or if he believes that you went against him.”

“Doesn’t sound like he’s going to be winning any Mister Nice Guy awards anytime soon,” she quipped drolly.

“That’s not his bottom line, no,” Brennan agreed. He knocked on the door and it opened immediately.

A veritable giant of a man was standing in the doorway, blocking any access to the suite. She guessed he had to be about six foot six at the very least and he looked as though he weighed more than the two of them combined—perhaps even with Janie thrown into the mix. The seams on the suit he was wearing appeared to be stretched to the limit.

“Bodyguard?” she asked Brennan.

“More like all-around everything guard,” he answered, never taking his eyes off the man.

The giant with the close-cropped blond hair regarded her through slits where his eyes should have been. The extra fat he was carrying in his face had all but crowded out his eyes, giving him a permanent squint that made the man’s face look more ominous and menacing than it already did.

Recognition was evident in his eyes when he looked at her companion and he allowed the man to pass, but as she began to follow, he placed one hand against her upper torso, holding her back.

“Just him,” he rumbled, his face unsmiling.

Brennan didn’t attempt to remove the bodyguard’s hand because it would be like trying to move a tree trunk. There was no pitting his strength against the giant’s outright.

Instead, he looked at the man authoritatively and said, “She’s with me. It’s okay.”

The bodyguard appeared to roll the matter over in his head; then he dropped his hand and inclined his head, as if to say she was allowed to pass. This time.

Swallowing the heart that had climbed up to her throat, Tiana glared at the bodyguard and told him in a voice filled with barely suppressed fury, “Don’t you ever lay a hand on me again without an invitation.”

Both men looked surprised at the bravado erupting from such a small, compact source. Brennan allowed a smile to slip over his lips.

“Pretty gutsy of you,” he commented as they moved farther into the suite. “You do realize that he could easily have broken you in half like a twig without even half trying.”

“I realize,” she answered, her voice giving away nothing. She was silently relieved that it didn’t crack and give her away.

The suite, she thought as she got a better look at it, was huge. Bigger than some houses. Definitely larger than the house where she and Janie had grown up. Business had to be very good.

The thought made her sick to her stomach. She wished she could take the man out right now, bring down his operation. But arresting Roland wouldn’t get her anywhere. She needed tangible evidence.

“Should I be dropping bread crumbs?” she asked the man in front of her.

They had taken a couple of twists and turns within the suite and she was trying to commit each step to memory, but she really didn’t like leaving anything to chance in case a quick getaway was necessary. The size of the place was overwhelming.

“Don’t worry, I’ll take you back,” Brennan promised in a soothing voice.

She looked at him. He was acting as if they were on some ordinary stroll through the park instead of walking through a very sick bastard’s temporary living accommodations.

“Why should I believe you?” she asked.

That was a simple enough question to answer. “Because you have no choice.”

He was right and she hated him for it. Hated the fact that once again, everything was all on her shoulders and she had no one to look to, no one to trust or share the burden with. Her sister’s life depended on what she did here.

If it’s not already too late, a small, nagging voice whispered in her head. She clenched her hands at her sides as she blocked the voice.

Instead, she made a silent pledge—not her first—to her sister. Hang in there, Janie. No matter what, hang in there. I’ll find you. I swear I’ll find you.

They entered what looked to be a sitting room. It was decorated entirely in stark white, which made the room appear twice as large. The only color in the immediate area was provided by the two men on the opposite sides of the room and the man in the middle who they were obviously paid to protect.

The deeply tanned guards appeared as if they were interchangeable, somewhat smaller versions of the guard at the front door. Both men were wearing dark navy blue suits, white shirts and dark ties. Each had a telltale bulge beneath his jacket, which Tiana assumed was caused by their not-so-concealed weapons.

The suits had to be specially tailored, she guessed, because the twin guards, like the man at the front door, were hulks in their own right.

The man in the center, looking out on the terrace with his back to them, was a great deal smaller heightwise. But he was far more imposing when he turned around to face them. While the guards were a compilation of sheer muscle and brute strength, the thin, dark-haired man had an aura of intelligent evil about him.

His eyes, as they passed over them—or accurately, over her—were flat. They were eyes that might have belonged to a dead man for all the expression that they had in them—except that she was fairly certain this man missed nothing.

Granted she spent most of her time in the lab when she was at work, but she could definitely recognize evil when she saw it. And this was the worst example of evil she had ever seen. It took effort not to shiver in its presence.

“You brought me a gift?” Roland asked Brennan. Approaching Tiana, he circled around her slowly as if she were an inanimate object, like a painting or a vase that had been given to him.

“No, she was in the motel room when I got there. He’s dead, by the way,” Brennan told Roland. “The kid you wanted me to check on. He’s dead.”

“You?” Roland asked, his implication clear.

“No,” Brennan answered, wondering if all this was part of an elaborate game. He was fairly certain that Roland had been the one to have the young man killed. “I didn’t kill him. He was already dead when I got there.”

Roland raised one perfectly sculpted eyebrow. “You?” he asked, turning toward Tiana.

She shook her head, hoping she could keep the charade up long enough to find her sister. “No, I found him that way. Someone got to him before I could.”

“The whore has a mouth on her,” Roland announced with a nod. It was difficult to say whether there was admiration in the man’s voice or if what they were hearing was the calm before a storm.

Not taking any chances, Brennan remained alert. He knew that things could turn on the head of a pin at any moment.

“She also isn’t a whore,” Tiana informed him with a toss of her head that seductively sent her flame red hair over her shoulder.

The appearance of amusement in Roland’s features increased. “Oh, really?”

“Really,” she confirmed in a no-nonsense tone of voice.

“You brought along your girlfriend?” the man questioned, as if he believed the woman’s disclaimer.

“Why don’t you talk to me instead of him?” Tiana proposed, making her voice sound as arrogant as the man she was speaking to. “Especially since he doesn’t speak for me because he doesn’t know me.”

“Is this true?” Roland asked, looking at Brennan. What the man was thinking was impossible to gauge.

Brennan had no choice but to tell the truth without knowing where that might lead. “I just met her in the motel room.”

“All right, who are you?” There was an unspoken threat in the man’s voice that forbade her to say anything but the truth. It went without saying that it would go badly for her if she lied.

She said the lines that she had been practicing ever since she’d asked for a leave of absence. “I go by Aphrodite Starling and I’ve come with a business proposition for you.”

The cold, dead eyes never left her face. “I’m listening.”

“I run an escort service of young ladies, emphasis on the word young,” she began. “Some of my girls have aged out, shall we say? I’m in the market for replacements. I need fresh talent. Word has it that you have fresh talent,” she told him, forcing herself not to look away. If she did, she knew he would take it as some kind of weakness—or worse. She had to win him over and do it fast.

“I might,” he said vaguely, as if they were talking about a tool she wanted to borrow from his garage.

She kept it conversational, as if he was her first stop, but not necessarily her only one.

“I’d be interested in seeing what you have, perhaps taking a few off your hands.” She paused a moment before adding, “I’ll pay you top dollar.”

The man appeared to only be vaguely interested, but she knew that had to be an act. Men like him were only in it for the money and they wanted as much as they could get their hands on as fast as they could get it.

“I’d like to see the color of your money,” he told her.

She had a counterrequest. “I’d like to see the nature of your girls.”

He laughed, shaking his head. “Not so fast. I don’t even know who you are.”

“And you won’t,” she told him matter-of-factly. “I don’t broadcast my organization. Staying under the radar is how I survive. Word of mouth in a very small, elite, tight circle does all the advertising for me that I need. Once I’m confident that you can deliver—and that you’re not just out to steal my money—I’ll give you references and you can have me checked out to your heart’s content.”

“That sounds fair,” he allowed, then added, “But I’ll have to think about it. It doesn’t pay to be trusting. You understand that?”

“Oh, perfectly.” Because I trust you as far as I can throw you, she told the unsavory man silently. Still, what she thought of him didn’t really matter. He had her sister, of that she was fairly certain. That gave him all the cards to hold. She just had her bluff, nothing more.

“I have photographs I can show you,” Roland was telling her. “You can make your choices from them.”

“Photographs can be easily doctored,” she told him with just a hint of contempt in her voice. “When can I see the girls in person so I can make my choices?” she countered.

“My, my, such eagerness,” Roland said with a laugh that had no humor in it whatsoever. “All in due time, my dear, all in due time.”

Okay, if he wanted to play word games, she’d play along. Anything to gain his confidence—as far as it went. “I heard that time was scarce and that you and your ‘people’ would be leaving the country very soon.”

He sneered at her gullibility—or at least that was his inference. “Don’t believe everything you hear.”

“Then you’re not leaving soon?” she asked, watching his eyes for some sort of a sign that would give him away one way or another. When he didn’t answer, she looked to the man who had brought her here for a confirmation or denial.

“Don’t look at him,” Roland warned sharply. “He doesn’t have an answer to that any more than you do. You see, I do believe in equality. You will both be kept in the dark until such time as I feel you need to be enlightened. Not a moment sooner,” he told her.

“All right, then, for the time being, I’ll look at those photographs you have.” The moment the words were out of her mouth, she knew it wasn’t even going to be that easy—seeing a photograph of Janie wouldn’t confirm that she was still alive. But she had to try even though she knew she was playing right into his hands. Maybe she could use that, she told herself. Use that to win the miserable human being over.

It was a long shot, but right now she didn’t have anything else.

“Tomorrow,” he said. “Come back tomorrow and perhaps I’ll let you look at them then.”

She played along and looked confused even though in her heart, she knew that the man was enjoying asserting his power.

“You just offered to show those photographs to me now,” she protested, delivering just a part of the frustration she was beginning to feel building up inside her.

“I changed my mind. Women aren’t the only ones with that prerogative, you know.” The smile on his face indicated just how pleased he was with himself. “Give one of my men a cell number where you can be reached and I’ll call if and when I want to see you again. You can go,” he commanded like the tyrant he aspired to be within this growing organization, dismissing her with a wave of his hand.

Inwardly, Tiana was seething, but she couldn’t afford to indulge herself and show it. Somehow, exercising supreme control, she managed to keep her feelings under wraps.

“Tomorrow, then,” Tiana said to him as civilly as she could.

“Tomorrow,” Roland said with a smirk. “Or the next day.”

She turned on her heel and began to walk away. It was either that or lose all control and strangle the pompous ass.

When Brennan fell into place beside her, she looked at him almost accusingly. “I can find my way out of here without your help.”

“I’m your ride, remember?” he reminded her cheerfully.

Roland, apparently, hadn’t heard him say it. “Where are you going?” he demanded, eying Brennan, as if outraged that he’d leave without being dismissed.

“I’m taking her back to her car,” Brennan answered. “I drove her here, thinking it was better if she didn’t have a way to leave from the hotel unless you wanted her to leave.”

Roland appeared rather impatient for a second, then shrugged.

“Not half-bad thinking. All right, be quick about it—and then come back. I want details from you about that motel room and then I might have another assignment for you. See if you’re worth my time,” he said loftily. “So whatever you’re going to do,” he ordered, and it was clear he wasn’t referring to just a simple drop-off and delivery, “make sure you do it fast.”

“I’ll see what I can do to move things along,” Brennan replied respectfully, playing up to the man because there were a great many lives at stake if he played the game correctly and well.

He was well aware that the woman beside him—who in his opinion remained an enigma—clearly had contempt in her eyes when she looked at him.

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