My life had been simple a day ago. Work, coffee, rock ‘n’ roll. Now I was being shot at, dragged around by bad guys and propositioned by the love of my life who I had decided I didn’t want anymore.
The simple life seemed far superior to all of that.
“I’m Terry Wilcox,” he went on.
I nodded again. I was beginning to feel enough of myself to be scared, but not enough to be polite.
“You’re India Savage, Lee’s woman.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to say I was not Lee’s anything but these people seemed scared enough of Lee for me to decide that I should keep my mouth shut on that score.
It was then Wilcox really looked at me, from head to toe, and he sat back, getting comfortable, his face changing from depressed to assessing.
“Lee’s always had good taste in women,” he said quietly and something in his eyes made my skin crawl.
Serious euw.
Then he said, “I’m looking for Rosie Coltrane, do you know where he is?”
Great.
Rosie.
The bane of my existence.
I was pissed off enough with Rosie, who had got me into this mess and the one with Lee, to be a little snippy.
“If I knew where he was, why would I be sitting in my car outside his house?”
Something dangerous changed in Wilcox’s eyes and I realized I’d just let my mouth run away with me and that being a little snippy might not go over too well. Like with the guys who shot at me. Evidence was clearly suggesting that bad guys did not like snippy women. I should maybe have been more polite, maybe more meek, then again, I didn’t have a lot of experience with conversing with creepy, scary, bad guys.
“He has something of mine,” Wilcox continued.
“I know.” I felt it safe to admit.
“I was supposed to get it back this morning. Do you know what happened?”
Hmm, I’d never taken the “how much information to divulge during interview with bad guys who kidnap you” course at the local community college. I’d barely squeaked by with computers and business accounting. I was feeling a little bit out of my depth.
“He was staying with Lee but, this morning, me and Lee got kinda… er…” I stopped and searched for a word to describe that morning’s trauma, “busy… and we didn’t notice he took off.”
“Busy.” His eyes dropped to my chest, the Euw Look was still in them. I felt my stomach lurch uncomfortably and tried really hard not to let my lip curl in disgust. “I bet. Do you know where he might be?”
I shook my head. “I wish I knew. He’s my coffee guy. He didn’t come to work, if I lose him, it’ll affect my profit margin.”
“He’s a good coffee guy,” Goon Gary offered, “sheer talent.”
Wilcox was throwing a “shut the fuck up you idiot” look at Gary. Gary’s mouth snapped shut.
Then Wilcox turned back to me.
“Do you know where the diamonds are?”
This I knew, but I shook my head again. I wasn’t going to drag Duke into this mess.
Since I was such an accomplished liar, I think he bought it.
“It’s a million dollars worth of diamonds.”
My mouth dropped open.
Holy crap.
“It is?”
“Yes, and I think you can understand that I want them back.”
I nodded, this time fervently.
If I had a million dollars worth of diamonds, I’d definitely want them back. Rosie must grow seriously primo grass to get paid a million dollars in diamonds for it.
Gary moved slightly, looking out the window, then he murmured, “Nightingale’s here.”
This news sent a surge of hope through me as I immediately decided that, just for the next thirty minutes or so, I wasn’t avoiding Lee.
Wilcox didn’t say anything at first, he just watched me.
“Are you sure you don’t know where Rosie is?”
“San Salvador?” I tried, and I wasn’t joking.
He smiled, he thought I was amusing. It was an oily smile and my skin started crawling again.
Lee walked in. I turned my head to him, the ice still held to my face.
One look and I could understand why these guys were scared of him.
This was a Lee I’d never seen.
He was still wearing his jeans, skintight, navy tee and biker boots and his hands hung loose and casual at his sides. However, the minute he entered, any other presence was forced from the room as his invaded. His eyes were hyper-alert and sharp, he was emanating pure, brutal energy and he was seriously and obviously pissed off.
He stopped and glanced at the ice on my face.
A muscle in his cheek jumped.
Uh-oh.
He cut his eyes to Wilcox.
“I thought we had an understanding,” Lee said.
Wilcox had come to his feet. He put his hands up in a placating gesture.
“Lee, it was a mistake. I just wanted to have a talk with your girl here and things got out of hand.”
“Coxy, things are gettin’ out of hand a lot these days. Who hit her?” Lee’s pissed off glance slid to Goon Gary.
Wilcox looked to Gary and I looked to Gary.
Gary looked a little pale.
“Let me take care of it,” Wilcox said.
“You don’t tell me, I’ll go through every one of your men, that way, I’ll be sure to get the fuck.”
Holy shit.
I nearly wet myself.
The way Lee said that made me shiver and not in the usual way Lee made me shiver.
Wilcox sighed, obviously overwhelmed by the stupidity of his workforce. Clearly, sometimes it’s tough being the leader of the bad guys.
“It was Teddy,” Wilcox answered.
Lee nodded, walked toward me and pulled me off the couch.
“It was nice to meet you,” Wilcox said calmly as Lee escorted me out of the room, his hand curled around my upper arm.
I looked over my shoulder and said (perhaps feeling a bit tougher now that Scary Lee was with me). “The pleasure was all yours.”
I heard him laugh as we left.
Lee did not laugh, Lee ignored the whole exchange.
Lee put me into the passenger seat of his silver Crossfire and got in the driver’s side, started the car and we shot from the curb. Before I could say a word, he grabbed his cell and punched a number.
“Pick up Teddy and take him to the office,” he paused, “Coxy’s boy.”
Then he hit a button and tossed the cell on the console.
Yep, angry.
“Ally...” I started to say.
“She’s fine.”
I took in a breath.
“How did you know where I was?”
“I’ve got a man at Rosie’s. He saw the whole thing.”
Uh, say what?
“Why didn’t he do something?” I asked, somewhat loudly.
“He didn’t know who you were,” Lee paused, “now he knows.”
Yikes.
I decided not to talk loudly anymore.
“You have a man?”
His eyes moved to me, his face was blank, he was still angry. He turned back to the road.
“I have a lot of men.”
“Oh.”
I found that surprising but I decided that maybe it was not the time to give Lee the third degree about his secret life, such as how many men he had and how he knew lowlife kidnapping scum like “Coxy”. I wasn’t even certain I wanted to know about his secret life, in fact, I think I was more certain I didn’t want to know.
Maybe it was the time to begin planning how to avoid Lee again. However, I didn’t know how to accomplish that when I was actually with Lee.
The house I was taken to was in the Denver Country Club area, very ritzy, very wealthy. Lee hit Speer Boulevard and drove faster than was allowed or safe, changing lanes on the three lane road deftly and often. I decided it was probably best not to say anything about this as Lee’s energy wasn’t exactly inviting conversation and definitely not admonishments about driving safety.