Shelter in Place (Page 78)

She hung up, toasted herself in the mirror with the scotch she’d developed a taste for.

Seleena raced to change into an on-camera suit. If things went well, she’d have the crazy woman in her studio inside two hours. The biggest exclusive anywhere, and it fell in her lap.

Once she had that in the pipe, she’d call the FBI. First the mother of all exclusives, then she’d rake it in as the intrepid reporter who brought down Patricia Jane Hobart.

She checked the time as she grabbed her laptop—she’d start with digital remote. Nearly midnight. She’d beat that forty minutes if she pushed it.

She packed up her recorder in case Patricia was initially shy, a still camera, her phone, tossed in a makeup bag, checked her Glock with its hot pink frame, and was in her garage in five minutes flat.

Emily Devlon could have warned her about Patricia’s skill with garage doors, but dead women don’t talk.

Seleena slid behind the wheel.

Her eyes widened in the rearview mirror when Patricia sat up in the back seat. Even as she grabbed for her purse and the gun, the syringe jabbed into her neck.

“Night-night,” Patricia said.

When Seleena slumped, Patricia got out, popped the trunk. She hauled Seleena out, fixed plastic restraints on her wrists and ankles, added a gag just in case Seleena came out of the sedative and made a fuss.

With some effort, she dragged her to the trunk, hoisted her up, and rolled her inside. “You just take a nice nap,” Patricia told her. “We’ve got a long drive ahead of us.”

She closed the trunk.

* * *

Simone didn’t tell him; she wasn’t ready. And in any case, the moment didn’t seem right for declarations of love.

She knew he’d keep the dog. If he wasn’t already in love, he was—as she’d been—slipping and sliding in that direction.

Because he’d done a very good deed for the day, she did one of her own and fixed a simple pasta dinner. She didn’t mention she’d learned how to make it from a certain Italian cellist.

As Reed explained how easily the dog spooked around people, and why, Simone strategically ignored him.

Reed fed the dog, who ate as if he’d been starved for weeks. Her heart ached as she wondered if he had.

By the time she had their meal together, the dog had stopped hiding behind Reed and was curled up under the table asleep beside his empty food bowl.

“He needs a name.”

Reed shook his head as they sat down to eat—at a drop-leaf barnwood table he’d bought from a friend of CiCi’s. “If he goes somewhere else, they’ll name him something else, and it’ll just add more confusion. Man, this is great,” he said after a bite of pasta. “You’ve been holding out on me. You can cook?”

She shook her head. “I can make a couple of things well, a few other things reasonably edible. That’s surviving rather than cooking.”

“It’s cooking on my scale. Thanks. How’d things go for you today?”

“They went well, but I realize I need a break from my … mission. A change of pace. I need those sketches of you.”

“How about a loincloth? I could wear a loincloth.”

“Do you have one?”

“No, but maybe I can rig one up. The naked thing…”

“I’ve seen you naked.”

“It’s different seeing me naked and studying me naked, drawing me naked. You’re on the other side of that.”

“I’ve been on both sides.”

“What?” He stopped eating.

“I subsidized my income in New York by modeling.”

“Naked?”

“Figure studies.” Amused, if unsurprised, by his reaction, she stabbed a noodle. “It’s art, Reed, not voyeurism.”

“I can guarantee some of the guys—and probably some of the girls—were voyeuring.”

She laughed. “I got paid either way. So, tonight’s perfect. I brought my sketchbook. You can consider it a trade for the meal—and what I’ll give you after the session.”

“Bribing me with sexual favors? That will … completely work.”

“I thought it might. You haven’t mentioned the FBI paying you a visit today.”

“Grapevine,” he said.

“It drips with juice. Did you not mention it because you thought it would upset me?”

“It didn’t amount to all that much.”

She’d heard differently, but wanted his side of it. “So tell me what it did amount to, and trust me to handle it.”

He picked up the wine she had insisted went better with the pasta than beer. He couldn’t say she was wrong. “It’s not about you handling it. I guess, it was more about bringing work home.”

Arching her brows, she angled to look deliberately down at the dog under the table.

“Okay, you got me there.”

“Proving your work doesn’t come to a hard stop, and neither does mine. So?”

“Special Agent Dickhead didn’t like some LEO with a cushy job in bumfuck stepping on his sensitive toes.”

“He called you a lion?”

“A—oh. No.” On a laugh, Reed ate more pasta. “LEO as in ‘law enforcement officer.’ L-E-O.”

“Oh. And he considers the island bumfuck.”

“It kind of is. I’m fine with serving and protecting our bumfuck. I’m not fine with him coming into my office trying to strong-arm me.” He gave her the gist, shrugged, and added, “So basically I told him to blow me, and he left.”

“Didn’t it matter to him that a woman’s dead?”

“I have to believe it did, and does, which is one of the reasons he decided to take a swipe at me. Swing and a miss. Look, most FBI I’ve crossed paths with are dedicated, want to catch the bad guys, and are willing to cooperate with local LEOs—to integrate them into investigations where it makes sense. This guy? He takes the special in ‘Special Agent’ literally. He just thinks he’s better than cops.”

“I don’t like him.”

“Hey, me, either. He’s a raging dick. That doesn’t mean he’s not good at his job.”

“Then why hasn’t he caught Hobart?”

“She’s slick. Smart, slick, and fucking canny. She’s got skills, focus, and a boatload of money. I wouldn’t punch at Special Agent Dickhead for not taking her down yet.” He jerked a shoulder. “I did it for him being so self-important and territorial that he flips off information and assistance from outside sources—especially, for whatever reason, me.”

“CiCi knows people. I bet she knows people who know the head of the FBI, or people who know people who do.”

“Don’t go there.” He gave her hand an easy pat. “I’ve got this, and if it turns out I don’t?” He polished off his wine. “Then we can revisit the idea of pulling out the awesome power of CiCi.”

He rose to clear the pasta bowls. The dog jumped up immediately, smacking his head on a chair leg in his haste.

“Jeez, chill. I’ve got to give him another pill, do another ear deal. The pill’s easy. They’ve got this little flavored thing you push it into. The ear deal could get ugly.”

“I bet he’s a very good dog.” Simone turned in her chair as the dog followed Reed to the sink. “I bet he’s very brave.”