Private Investigations

He was afraid she’d hung up, then she sighed and mumbled a distracted, “What?”

“Don’t answer the phone again. You, um, never know who might be calling.”

“I thought you said you weren’t married.”

“I didn’t say I was a monk.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Joe disconnected the line, waited a heartbeat, then pressed redial. As expected, Ripley picked up on the first ring.

“I thought I asked you not to pick up the phone.”

“Well, then, quit calling me.”

Joe disconnected again and chuckled as he headed to the conference room, ready to face the suits in there.

RIPLEY REACHED OVER to replace the receiver on the nightstand, then collapsed against the pillows, smiling. And he thought she was weird. What kind of person called to tell her not to answer the phone, then called back and checked to see if she would? She stretched. The kind of guy with a sense of humor, that’s what.

She settled her head more comfortably against the pillows. How long had it been since she’d dated someone with a sense of humor? A while. Maybe never, even. At least not a guy with the same wicked, inventive sense of humor Joe had. Of course, she and Joe weren’t dating. They’d just slept together. In the same hotel room.

She pushed up to her elbows. A hotel room she should be at least thinking about getting out of.

She caught a glimpse of a note next to the phone and reached over to pluck it up.

“Call the police,” was written in large block letters. It was signed, “Joe.”

She put the paper down and glanced at the clock then leaped off the bed. Was it really nine-thirty already? She’d meant to get up early and try to follow the third guy when he left her room. Assuming, of course, that he had left her room.

She crossed to the wall and pressed her ear against it, although common sense told her one person waiting for another to return probably wouldn’t make all that much noise. She sighed then eyed the phone. A person waiting for another probably wouldn’t answer the phone in that room, either.

She placed an order for room service to deliver to her room. As soon as she broke the connection, she rushed into the bathroom for a quick shower, only after toweling off realizing she didn’t have anything to wear. She stood in the doorway to the bedroom and eyed the drawers. Well, she’d already borrowed the guy’s bed. A pair of underwear wouldn’t be completely out of line, would it? She put Joe’s shirt on, fished a pair of those clingy cotton boxers out of the top drawer, then a pair of socks from the next. Not exactly the epitome of fashion, but it would do. Then she hurried to the door to stand watch for room service, wishing she had thought to have something sent to Joe’s room when her stomach growled.

Five minutes later she watched the elevator open and a white uniformed guy roll a cart in the direction of her room. She followed it as far as the peephole would allow, then with the security block securely in place, cracked the door open so she could listen.

A brief, determined knock next door. “Room service.”

Ripley smiled. She couldn’t help thinking that Nelson Polk would be proud of her little ruse. She resisted the urge to open the door the rest of the way and peek her head out, deciding that wouldn’t be very smart. The way her luck was running, the guy would spot her when she was trying to determine if he was still there.

Another knock and a more strident call.

Ripley gave in to temptation and her screaming stomach and opened the door. The room service guy was just beginning to turn away from the door to her room when she waved at him, hurrying down the hall.

“Oh, I’m so sorry! I locked myself out of my room.”

He eyed her skeptically. “Ma’am?”

“I’m Ripley Logan. This is my room.”

He didn’t say anything.

“You don’t believe me. Okay. I’ll tell you exactly what I ordered then.” As she told him, he silently read the order. “Convinced?”

He grimaced while she cautiously eyed the door to her room. Was the guy in there even now, watching her? Attaching a silencer to his gun? She shuddered and stepped a little closer to the wall where she couldn’t be seen from the peephole. She’d seen a movie once where someone was shot through the peephole. Even if the logistics didn’t make much sense, a little caution never hurt anybody.

The delivery guy called to a maid cleaning a room down the hall. Within minutes she was unlocking the door. Ripley hung back, trying to see beyond the small crack.

“Ma’am?” the delivery guy asked.

“What? Oh, of course.”

She swallowed the wad of wool in her throat and tentatively pushed the door open, smiling her nervous thanks to the maid. If the guy was in there, she wanted to be sure she could make a clean run for it. Besides, the room service guy was pretty hefty. He would jump in to protect a damsel in distress, wouldn’t he? She eyed him more closely. More likely he’d be running down the hall right after her.

Nothing in the living area.

Ripley tiptoed into the room, craning her neck to make out the bedroom. Remembering the mirrors, she glanced behind her. From the living room, into the bedroom, into the bathroom, she saw no scary shadows. She stepped into the bedroom and closed the balcony doors. Whew. He was gone.

THE WOMAN was an ego booster.

Joe grinned at the conference room full of sales reps and company bigwigs, confident that after a sluggish start, he’d made a successful comeback and had just given one of his strongest finishes ever. Jackpot. This contract was as good as in the bag.

“Gotta tell you, Joe, you had me worried there for a while,” VP John Gerard said, pumping Joe’s hand after he took down his chart and slid it into its carrying case.

“Don’t tell anyone, but I had myself worried there, too.”

John chuckled and moved away. Joe straightened to shake hands with the remainder of his colleagues, easily moving from speaker to greeter. His secretary, Gloria Malden, once told him she loved to watch him work. That no one could work a room the way he could. It was a good thing Gloria was fifty and a grandmother or else he might have thought she was coming on to him. Instead, he’d taken her words as a rare compliment. Lord knew he’d had so few of them growing up. And while he’d like to think he’d grown beyond the shallow desire for praise, he reasoned that it wasn’t hurting anyone to acknowledge it when the occasional bit did come his way.

“Dinner tonight, right?” Percy said quietly, leaning closer to him in a conspiratorial way.

Percy had been the biggest tipper at the strip joint last night. Joe was surprised he had money left to slip in any more G-strings.

Joe thought of the sexily provocative Ripley Logan and wondered if she was still in his room and whether or not she’d still be requiring his…services when he finished here. He grimaced. Even if she was and did, he had too much riding on this deal to chuck it all in exchange for some amateur sleuthing with someone who was so wet behind the ears she squeaked.

“Mr. Pruitt?”

Joe told Percy they were on, then glanced toward the door through which most of occupants of the room had already exited. His smile froze on his face when he saw the guy he had shared the elevator with that morning, the one who had chased Ripley from her room and into his bed, standing squarely in the doorway. His body—as wide as it was tall—effectively blocked the exit, and two guys with the exact same build and height stood behind him.

Damn.

RIPLEY REACHED across the table and plucked a strawberry from the nearly empty service tray in her room, then turned over the picture she was staring at. Dressed in dark blue jeans and a purple T-shirt, she felt much better now that she had regained possession of her room and there were no armed gunmen hiding in the shadows. Her chewing slowed as she eyed the security lock on her door. Of course, it probably wasn’t a good idea to stick around too long, lest they figure everything out and make a return appearance.

She brushed her fingers on her jeans then turned the photograph right side up again. The black-and-white shot was of a dark-haired woman of about her age who could have been a double for Angelina Jolie, except that her hairstyle was different. But it wasn’t so much the woman in the picture that caused questions. Rather it was the picture itself.

Ripley ran her thumb along the length of the photo. It wasn’t on traditional stock paper. Rather it appeared to have been run off a printer. And the grainy quality and downward angle of the shot made it look like something from one of those low-end security cameras. Which really didn’t make any sense considering she’d gotten the picture from Nicole Bennett’s sister, Clarise.

She glanced over the information again. Nicole Bennett. Twenty-eight years of age. Dark brown hair, gray eyes. No noted employment. She’d been visiting her sister one day when she just up and disappeared with the family silver. The pieces, bearing the recognizable initials ZRD, had popped up at a Memphis pawnshop two days ago.

“She does it all the time,” Clarise Bennett had said in response to Ripley’s questioning stare. “One Christmas she took antique ornaments from the tree.”