Cassie Miles - Undercover Colorado

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.”