The Angel and the Outlaw
Ingrid Weaver
SHE WAS SECONDS AWAY FROM PULLING THE TRIGGER……when the stranger strode out of the storm and witnessed her failure to take out her brother's killer. His eyes, his gaze…everything about him stirred a response in Hayley Tavistock. But he'd interfered in her plan for vengeance. And for that, Cooper Webb had some explaining to do. He was a lone wolf who operated outside the law to see justice done. Now Hayley had stumbled into his mission to right a terrible wrong. The last thing Cooper needed was to join forces with an avenging angel out for the wrong kind of revenge–even if Hayley aroused the right kind of passion in him….
“I hope you’re not going to apologize for that kiss, because I sure as hell won’t.”
Oh, he was dangerous. His voice was soft, as much as a caress as his kiss had been. Sunshine gleamed from his spiky black lashes and warmed the startling blue of his eyes with flecks of gold. Hayley wanted to lean forward and lick the moisture that slicked his lips. “I didn’t plan any of this.”
“Too bad. This was the first good idea you’ve had.”
“I didn’t mean to give you the impression that—”
“That you’re a passionate woman? Or that you wanted to kiss me?”
“Neither.” She struggled to focus her thoughts. “Can we just move on? This isn’t why I came to see you today, Cooper. I thought we already established that.”
“Yeah, I know.” He sighed, rocked back on his heels and rose to his feet. His gaze flicked downward. “But the way you look, you’re making it hard to remember.”
The Angel and the Outlaw
Ingrid Weaver
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To my friend Deb.
Thanks for the ear, the shoulder—
and for just being you.
INGRID WEAVER
admits to being a sucker for old movies and books that can make her cry. “I write because life is an adventure,” Ingrid says. “And the greatest adventure of all is falling in love.” Since the publication of her first book in 1994, she has won the Romance Writers of America RITA
Award for Romantic Suspense, as well as the Romantic Times Career Achievement Award for Series Romantic Suspense. Ingrid lives with her husband and son and an assortment of shamefully spoiled pets in a pocket of country paradise an afternoon’s drive from Toronto. She invites you to visit her Web site at www.ingridweaver.com.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Epilogue
Chapter 1
The woman was lying on her stomach behind the cover of a lilac bush with the butt of a rifle tucked against her shoulder. If it hadn’t been for the rain gleaming from the gun barrel, Cooper wouldn’t have spotted her. He eased back a step, but she gave no sign that she was aware of his presence. The night and the noise of the storm would have masked his approach. On top of that, he could see that she was entirely focused on her target.
Cooper followed her gaze across the garden to the house on the far side of the lawn. It was three stories high, built of brick and covered with ivy. Light spilled from the first-floor windows, making them sparkle festively through the rain. Figures moved inside, well-dressed people with champagne flutes in their hands. Oliver Sproule was having a party. Of course. He would be celebrating his acquittal.
The woman on the ground shifted, sliding her elbows along the mud beneath the shrub so she could press her right eye to the scope that was mounted on top of her weapon. The gun barrel inched toward the thin, silver-haired man who had paused at the French doors that led to the terrace.
Even without the aid of a telescopic sight, Cooper recognized Oliver Sproule. He was smiling as he lifted his glass to a cluster of people, oblivious to the threat that lay in the darkness less than thirty yards away. He’d been released this morning. He must be savoring his freedom.
Cooper knew how that felt. Almost four years had passed since he’d been let out, but he remembered that first, sweet breath of free air. Cooper had partied, too, but it sure hadn’t been in a mansion with fancy people and champagne.
Thunder growled in the distance. A sudden gust of wind sent needles of rain through the garden. A fragrant burst of lilac blossoms, ghostly pale in the dimness, showered the woman’s back.
She didn’t appear to notice. She curled her finger around the trigger. “You murdering bastard,” she said. Her voice had a throaty edge, sounding as raw as the wind. “How dare you smile?”
Cooper assessed the situation while he gauged his distance to the woman. She’d made it past the electric fence and the guards who patrolled the Sproule estate, but he suspected that was due more to luck than to skill. She wasn’t a professional. Pros never got emotional about a hit. And a pro would have been better prepared for the weather. This woman wasn’t wearing any rain gear. Apart from her white sneakers, her clothes were dark enough to blend into the shadows, which was good, but they were soaked through, plastered to her body and would provide no protection from the storm.
The real giveaway was the gun. It had no silencer. As soon as she pulled the trigger, she would reveal her position. And Cooper’s.
The way he saw it, he had two choices. He could jump her and grab the rifle before she took her shot.
Or he could turn around and walk away.
It would be simpler to walk. It sure as hell would make his task easier. She was aiming at Oliver. With that high-powered weapon from this range, even a novice would be deadly. If Cooper let her follow through, he could consider justice done. His debt would be paid. He could forget about this crazy quest Tony had chosen for him and pick up his life where he’d left off.
Sure, why not leave now? Nothing was stopping him from working his way back to his truck and letting this woman finish her business. What happened to her afterward wasn’t his problem. No one would have to know he had been here.
Rain dripped from the rifle, from the woman’s hands and the curve of her cheek. The sound of a sob mingled with the noise of the storm.
A woman armed with a gun was dangerous enough. A crying woman was even worse.
Go, Cooper told himself. Turn around now. Let her do what she wants. You don’t need this complication. You’re not her keeper.
She took her finger from the trigger to wipe the back of her hand over her eyes. A shudder shook her body. Cooper would bet it wasn’t due solely to the weather.
The figure framed in the French doors drained his glass.
The woman fitted her eye back to the scope. It wasn’t easy. She was sobbing continuously now. Her hands were trembling. The gun barrel wavered.
Aw, hell. What if she missed? Cooper pulled his hands from the pockets of his raincoat, preparing to lunge for her.
Before he could move, she dropped the gun on the ground and pushed to her knees. Her shoulders jerked with a sob. She slammed her fists into the mud. “Damn you!” she cried.
A dog barked from somewhere on the far side of the house. It was answered by a second bark from the direction of the front gates. Cooper glanced around. Terrific. Someone must have set loose the Dobermans.
“I’m sorry.” The woman punched the ground again, then sat back on her heels and buried her face in her hands. Her head brushed a branch of the lilac as she rocked back and forth. More blossoms fell on her shoulders and stuck to her wet hair. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”
The barking grew nearer. Cooper strode forward to snatch the rifle. “Yeah. Too bad you didn’t save us both a lot of trouble and figure that out sooner.”
The woman staggered to her feet. She spun to face him.
She was taller than she’d appeared when she’d been lying down. The top of her head was at a level with his nose. Her soaked clothes clung to long legs and a slender body. Her hair hung across her face in limp, muddy strands. In the dim light that shone through the shrubbery from the house, her features were nothing more than blurred suggestions of planes and shadows, impossible to identify.
Yet Cooper already had a good idea of who she had to be. Plenty of people might want to put a bullet into Oliver Sproule, but only one person would want it this badly.
She held up her palms. Her hands were still shaking. Her gaze darted to the gun.
Cooper emptied the bullets from the magazine, worked the bolt to eject the cartridge that was in the chamber and slipped the rounds into his coat pocket. He slung the strap of the rifle over his shoulder and grabbed her wrist. “Come on. We have to get out of here.”
She pulled at his grip. Behind her straggling hair, her eyes were wide, her gaze not completely rational. She shook her head, spattering water droplets and petals.
Through the mud that slicked her arm, Cooper could feel her pulse fluttering against his fingers. Her breath was coming out in shallow puffs. He suspected she was on the verge of breaking down, but there was no time to coax her gently. If he couldn’t bluff her into moving, he’d have to carry her. But that might make her scream and jeopardize them both. “Suit yourself.” He leaned forward, bringing his face to hers. “If you feel like taking your chances with the dogs and Sproule’s guards, go ahead, but I’m not sticking around to watch you bleed.”
A healthy dose of alarm flickered over her face. Whether it was the sound of the barking or his harsh words that finally got through to her didn’t matter. She shivered, glancing past him.
He let go of her wrist and backed toward the place where he’d scaled the fence. “My truck’s over there. I’ll give you three seconds and then I’m gone.”
She wavered for two seconds, then took a halting step toward him. “Am I…” Her teeth chattered. “Am I under arrest?”
If the circumstances had been different, he might have enjoyed the irony of that. Imagine him, Cooper Webb, being mistaken for a cop. “Seeing as how you’re gunning for Oliver Sproule, sweetheart, the cops are the least of your worries.”
Hayley opened her eyes with a start. Had she fallen asleep? It seemed incredible. She hadn’t been able to sleep for days, not since the jury had gone out.
She lifted her head. She was lying on a couch in a room she didn’t recognize. The only illumination came from a gooseneck lamp that sat on an oak desk a few steps away from the couch. On one corner of the desk rested a pair of large cowboy boots, the leather worn to the point of broken-in comfort. Hayley pushed up on one elbow, moving her gaze from the boots to the man who wore them.
He was sitting behind the desk in a green leather chair, his legs stretched out in front of him and crossed at the ankles. His hands cradled a white porcelain mug that he balanced on his flat stomach just above his belt buckle. His chest was broad, straining the fabric of a black T-shirt. Raven-black hair curled past his ears and brushed the sides of his neck. Although the light from the desk lamp left the top half of his face in shadow, Hayley recognized the lines around his mouth and the way his beard stubble darkened the cleft in his chin.
It was the man who had found her at Sproule’s. The one who had appeared like a wraith from the storm, his long dark raincoat whipping against his calves, his shoulders squared against the wind, his features slick with rain and hard as stone. The stranger who had seen her reach the absolute rock-bottom point of her life.
Her pulse gave a painful thump. She remembered now. He’d taken her to a black pickup truck in the shadows outside the fence. She had been shivering so he’d draped his coat over her and turned up the heater. As incredible as it seemed, she must have fallen asleep.
She swung her legs off the couch and sat up. A plaid blanket fell from her shoulders to bunch in her lap. The man must have replaced his coat with this blanket when he’d brought her in from his truck, but she couldn’t remember walking in. He must have carried her.
It was humiliating to know she’d been so out of it that she’d been helpless and at the mercy of a complete stranger. But it was nothing compared to what he had witnessed…
Good God, had she really tried to kill Oliver Sproule?
She dipped her head, peering through her hair at the mud that smeared her fingers. On some level, she knew she should be horrified by what she’d almost done.
On another, more primitive level, she was ashamed that she had failed.
She drew the blanket aside. Her jeans were stiff with mud but almost dry. So was her blouse. She must have been here a while.
The man behind the desk lifted the mug to his mouth and took a leisurely swallow. The name of a heavy metal band, Metallica, was emblazoned in silver lightning bolts on the front of his T-shirt. He tilted his head toward the gray file cabinet behind him. A coffeemaker sat on top of it. “There’s plenty of coffee left if you want some. You look as if you could use it.”
His voice was a quiet rumble. His words were mild, yet they carried the same undertone of steel she’d heard him use the last time he’d spoken.
Hayley brushed at the mud on her legs. She didn’t want to consider how bad she looked.
But she had almost killed a man tonight. What was a bit of mud compared to the horror of that? How much lower could she sink? How much uglier could she be?
She shoved her hair off her face so she could take a more careful survey of her surroundings. There was a window behind the desk but the blind that covered it was shut tight and blocked the view outside. There was a closed door to her left. Was it locked? She wasn’t handcuffed or restrained. Would the man chase her if she made a break for it?
This room appeared to be an office, yet it wasn’t like any she’d seen in the Latchford police station. Wait, she remembered he had said something about cops being the least of her worries. She wasn’t under arrest. “Where…” She cleared her throat.
“Where’s your rifle?” he asked before she could continue. “It’s locked in the storage room along with the bullets.”
“I meant where are we?”
He drained his mug, pulled his feet from the desk and stood. The room suddenly seemed smaller. He was a tall man, his body lean, his movements projecting a careless sexuality. He took a second mug from the top of the filing cabinet and filled it with coffee. “We’re at the Long Shot.”
She knew the place. The Long Shot was a bar at the northern edge of the Latchford, Illinois, city limits. The parking lot was usually packed with pickup trucks or cars such as Mustangs and Camaros with tinted windows and oversized tires. Hayley had driven past it many times but had never been inside before. “You’re not a cop,” she said.
One corner of his mouth twisted upward. “Nope. I’m a bartender, but it’s after hours so all I can offer you is coffee. Wouldn’t want to break any laws.”
“Why did you bring me here?”
“Didn’t want to argue with the Sproule guards or the Dobermans.”
“I guess I should thank you for getting me off the estate.”
“Yeah, you should.”
“Thank you.”
“No problem.” He hooked his chair with one foot, rolled it toward the couch and sat down in front of her. He held out the mug. There was a tattoo of an attacking eagle on his forearm. Its faded blue talons seemed to flex with the shift of his muscles. “You look as if you’re feeling better.”
She braced her hands on her knees and rocked forward. “Yes. I’ll call a cab and—”
“Later. We’re not finished yet.” He caught her fingers in his before she could stand and wrapped them around the heavy porcelain mug. “Before you go, we need to get a few things straight.”
She focused on their joined hands. It was easier than looking at that vicious tattoo or the muscled arm beneath it. “You’re not going to turn me in, are you?”
“That depends.”
His touch was oddly gentle for a man who looked so…hard. She decided not to struggle. Considering his size, it would be pointless. As it turned out, it was unnecessary—the moment she firmed her grip on the mug, he released her hand. “What does it depend on?” she asked.
“On whether you plan to try shooting Oliver Sproule again.”
“I realize how it must have appeared but—”
“Don’t lie to me, Hayley. I was there.”
He was right. There was no point denying the truth. This man had seen her when her soul was naked.
And he’d said her name, she realized. She wasn’t carrying any ID. She hadn’t carried anything but the loaded rifle when she’d walked to the Sproule estate. She hadn’t thought past pulling the trigger. “How do you know who I am?”
“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out who might want to shoot Sproule. Adam Tavistock had a little sister named Hayley. I read in the paper that she made statements all through the trial about how her brother was murdered and Oliver Sproule should burn in hell. That would be you, right?”
There was no point denying this, either. “Yes, that would be me.”
“Better forget the Winchester and stick to talking the man to death.”
She inhaled the aroma from the coffee. It was strong enough to make her eyes water. Or at least, that was one way to excuse the spurt of tears. “Oliver Sproule is a criminal. He’s guilty of murder. He deserves to be punished.”
“He was charged with manslaughter and acquitted.”
“The verdict was wrong. He should have been charged with murder. The whole trial was a farce.”
“What else did you expect? Sproule owns this town. The only reason he got charged with anything in the first place was because your brother was a cop. That couldn’t be covered up, so they went through the motions of a trial.”
Hayley blinked. For months it had been only herself and her father. No one else had supported her. Not the police who had been Adam’s colleagues and his friends, not the D.A., not even the private detective she’d hired. Oliver Sproule, backed by his wealth and his criminal associates, was just too powerful. To hear this stranger express so easily what she’d fought to prove made her throat close with a lump of emotion.
She’d felt alone for so long. Could she have found an ally?
“Hey, steady there.” He took the mug from her hands and set it on the edge of the desk. “You’re not going to start crying again, are you?”
She wiped her eyes with her knuckles. Flakes of dried mud fell to her lap. “It wasn’t an accident.”
“What?”
“Adam’s death. It was a clear night and a well-lit street. Oliver Sproule waited outside that nightclub downtown for Adam to walk to his car and then ran him down in cold blood.”
“Oh, yeah. That’s a given. But if you keep gunning for Sproule, you’re liable to meet an accident of your own.”
Where was her caution? She was alone with a strange man. Shouldn’t she be afraid? Hayley glanced at the door. “Was that supposed to be a threat?”
With a nudge of his heel, the man rolled his chair to the left, placing himself between her and the room’s only exit. She would have to climb over him if she wanted to get out. “Relax, Hayley.” There was a hint of impatience in his voice. “You were passed out for three hours after I put you on that couch. If I’d wanted to hurt you, I would have already done it.”
That was true. He’d had plenty of opportunity to do her harm. For starters, he could have left her in the garden to be mauled by the dogs or caught by the guards. Or he could have taken her to the police. That would have been the ultimate injustice, to be thrown in jail while Oliver Sproule walked free. Instead, he’d brought her out of the rain and covered her with a blanket. He’d let her sleep. For three precious hours. Why?
She returned her gaze to his face. His change of position had put him directly in the cone of light from the lamp on the desk. For the first time she had a clear view of his eyes. They were ice-blue and framed by spiky lashes as black as his hair and the stubble on his chin. His gaze was compelling in the way of something deadly, like the bird of prey that rode his arm.
Awareness tingled down her spine. The way he moved, his voice, his gaze, everything about him was stirring a response in her. Was it recognition? Had she seen eyes like that before? “You know who I am and why I was at the Sproule place,” she said. “But you haven’t said why you were there.”
His gaze didn’t waver. And it gave nothing away. “That’s my business.”
“Do you work for them?”
“If I did, you wouldn’t be sitting here. You would already have had one of those handy accidents like the one that killed your brother.”
His tone was still mild. Hayley realized that he spoke about evil and the threat of death with the same casualness he displayed when he poured coffee. She wondered once more why she wasn’t afraid. “Who are you, anyway?”
“I told you, I’m a bartender.”
She made a sharp gesture. “What’s your name?”
“Cooper Webb.” He continued to watch her. “Mean anything to you?”
Was it a trick of exhaustion, or did that name spark something in her memory, something connected with those startling blue eyes of his? “Should it?”
He lifted one shoulder. He didn’t reply.
“Why did you bring me here, Mr. Webb? You didn’t really answer my question before.”
“Sure I did. I said we have to get some things straight.”
“All right. What?”
“I can’t let you run around Latchford like some avenging angel. Forget Sproule. He’s out of your league. You’ll never get him.”
“I won’t give up. Not about this. I’m going to bring him to justice.”
“How? With a bullet?”
Pride made her want to argue. Shame kept her silent. Lord knew, she’d been raised to tell right from wrong.
“The verdict pushed you to your limit, Hayley, and you snapped. I could see that. But you still couldn’t pull that trigger. You admitted it yourself when you threw down your gun. You don’t have it in you to kill anyone.”
“You don’t know me.”
“Maybe not, but I do know the kind of people who would pull that trigger, and you’re not one of them. You won’t get justice by getting yourself killed.”
“While I appreciate your concern and the way you rescued me earlier, I won’t—”
“My concern? Rescue?” His mouth quirked in another one of his half smiles. “You’ve got the wrong idea. I’m no do-gooder. I only made sure you got out of there in one piece because I didn’t want you screwing up my plans.”
“What plans?”
His smile faded. “Here’s the deal. I’m going to keep your gun, but I won’t turn you in to the cops or to Sproule as long as you give me your word you’ll stay away from him. Let it go. Will you agree to that?”
Hayley hesitated. It would be easy to lie. How would he know?
He regarded her carefully. “You should never play poker, Hayley, because what you’re thinking is all over your face. If you lie, I would find out. Trust me, I’m not someone you want to cross.”
There was definitely a threat in his words that time. She lifted her chin. “Fine. I won’t lie. You’re right. I can’t kill Oliver. I realize that now. So I can promise I won’t try to shoot him again.”
“Okay.”
“But I can’t promise I’ll keep away.”
“Hayley—”
“One way or another, I’m going to find enough evidence to reopen the case. I’ll do whatever it takes to see him in prison for my brother’s murder.”
“Then back off and let me do the job.”
“What?”
“I intend to bring Oliver Sproule to justice myself.”
It took a moment for what he said to sink in. When it did, she surged forward and clasped his leg. She’d been right. She had found an ally. Maybe that’s why she didn’t fear him, and why she found him so…compelling. “Why didn’t you tell me that in the first place? We can work together.”
His thigh muscles bunched beneath his jeans. He looked at where she touched him. “No.”
“Why not? I have my brother’s notebook. His last entry showed he was meeting someone at the nightclub who never showed up. Sproule killed him because he was getting too close. The D.A. said I didn’t have enough to prove anything in court but if you and I team up we could find more—”
“No.”
“Mr. Webb, please.” Her grip on his leg tightened. “We both want the same thing.”
“Sweetheart, you have no idea what I want.” He stood, breaking her hold. He shoved his chair backward. “This isn’t some personal vendetta for me. I’m going to see that Sproule ends up behind bars because I have no choice.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t need to. All you need to do is keep out of my way.”
She got to her feet too quickly. She staggered and grabbed his arm. “We can help each other. I don’t have much money left, but I’ll give you what I can.”
“I don’t want your money.”
She gave his arm a shake. “Adam was my only brother. Seeing his killer punished is all that my father lives for. I can’t quit now. I’ll do anything.”
“Careful what you promise, Hayley.”
“Mr. Webb, please.” She moved her grip to his shoulders, lifting herself on her toes so she could look into his face. “We’re on the same side.”
He regarded her in silence for a minute. A muscle in his cheek twitched as he brought his hand to her hair. He rubbed one mud-encrusted lock between his thumb and fingers until it softened. When he finally spoke, his voice had gentled. “We’re not on the same side, Hayley. We could never be.”
“Why not?”
He brushed her hair behind her ear, then grasped her wrists and pulled her hands from his shoulders. “If it was up to me, I’d let Oliver party on and enjoy his champagne.”
“But he murdered my brother.”
“Yeah.” Cooper let go of her and stepped back. “And your brother was the son of a bitch who put me in prison.”
Chapter 2
Hayley flattened her palms against the tiles, dipped her head and let the spray from the shower sluice down the back of her neck. She didn’t know how long she’d been in here. The water was already turning cool. But she was far from feeling clean.
There was a film of grit on the bottom of the tub. Puffs of dirty lather speckled with some kind of flower petals swirled around her ankles. The shampoo bottle she’d emptied bobbed against the drain. It was running slow again. She hoped it wouldn’t back up. She wasn’t any good at fixing things like that and she couldn’t afford to call in a plumber. She shouldn’t have used up all the shampoo, either. The brand she preferred didn’t go on sale very often, but it was the only kind that didn’t leave her hair too brittle to comb.
Oh, God. She dropped her forehead against her arm, feeling an irrational urge to laugh. She was worrying about a clogged drain and the price of shampoo. Well, it was easier than thinking about how she had gotten dirty.
The storm, the mud, the gun…. It all seemed like a bad dream now, as if it had happened to someone else.
She hadn’t held a firearm for years, hadn’t wanted to go near one, but the moment she’d felt the weight of her father’s old Winchester settle into her palms, the lessons had all come back to her.
Keep your eye on your target. Breathe slow and easy. Concentrate and squeeze.
She had never liked hunting. She hadn’t gone since she was thirteen and had thrown up at the sight of her father bringing down a six-point buck. Her squeamishness had disappointed him. Everything about her had been a disappointment to him from the minute she’d been born. It was a mercy neither Adam nor their father had been at Sproule’s to witness her failure…
Oh, God. What was she thinking? Her brother was dead. The stroke her father had suffered at the news of Adam’s death was killing him one day at a time. That’s why they hadn’t been there. That’s why she had.
But even if she had succeeded, if she had pulled the trigger, she would have failed. Her father would have been devastated if she had sunk to the very level of the murderer she wanted to punish. Both he and Adam had devoted their lives to upholding the law. There was no excuse for what she had attempted. She had been crazy to pick up the gun in the first place.
She twisted the knobs to shut off the water, rattled the shower curtain aside and stepped out of the tub. The storm of the night before was over. A bright-pink dawn was breaking beyond the bathroom window. She wove her way through the piles of laundry that littered the floor, chose a towel that didn’t look too bad and began to blot herself dry.
She wasn’t crazy.
It was the world that was insane.
Like their father, Adam Tavistock had been a decorated police officer. He’d been almost twelve years older than Hayley and a larger-than-life hero whom she’d worshipped. Throughout his career he’d epitomized courage, honesty and dedication to his duty. He’d always been the apple of Dad’s eye, a chip off the old block.
But the very system Adam had sworn to uphold had turned a blind eye to justice and let his murderer go free. Oliver Sproule, with his network of theft, fraud and illegal gambling, had a stranglehold on Latchford. His wealth kept him above the law. Everyone knew it. No one wanted to admit it.
Except one man.
Cooper Webb. She understood why she hadn’t recognized him immediately. They had never actually been introduced. Fifteen years ago, he’d been a senior at Latchford High when she had been in her freshman year. Yet it hadn’t been only the age difference that had separated them. Cooper had been in with the tough crowd, the boys who hung around under the bleachers and shared cigarettes while they bragged about their cars and their girls. Like many of his friends, he had dropped out before he could graduate. She hadn’t seen him since.
If Hayley’s mother had been alive then, she probably would have warned her about boys like Cooper. Boys with ice-blue eyes and coal-black hair and that rebel glint in their smiles.
Except for his eyes, Cooper had changed. His smile had distilled to a sardonic twist of his lips. His features had been honed to uncompromising maleness. He no longer had the naughty charm of a teenage bad boy; he had the allure of a dangerous man.
Allure? That was too tame a word. His long, hard body, the lines beside his mouth and the cleft in his chin, the unruly black hair that curled at the nape of his neck, even that awful tattoo…the whole package practically oozed testosterone.
Hayley had been at rock bottom last night, yet she hadn’t been so far gone that she’d been oblivious to his appeal. It had been a normal physical reaction. No female, no matter how stressed out, could have failed to notice Cooper Webb.
But his physical appearance alone wasn’t what had made such an impact on her. It was the contradictions in his manner that had struck her the most. He had looked hard, yet his touch had been tender; he’d spoken bluntly yet his actions had been tinged with…chivalry.
She shook her head. He was an ex-con who was a bartender at a place she had never worked up the nerve to enter. Who knew what else he did to earn his income? Although her gut feeling told her he wasn’t as bad as he seemed, she had to be realistic. There was a possibility he might still be involved in crime to some extent.
A knight in shining armor he wasn’t. More like a lone wolf in a Metallica T-shirt.
And she wasn’t exactly fair-damsel material.
Hayley wiped the fog from the mirror over the sink with her forearm and stared at her reflection. The mud was gone, but she was still a mess. Not sleeping or eating regularly tended to do that. Over the past seven months she had thrown all her energy into proving Oliver guilty and praying her father lived long enough to see it. Her life had become a blur of vigils at the courthouse and visits to the nursing home. It was no mystery why the verdict had made her go off the deep end.
Cooper had seemed to understand. He hadn’t condemned her. He had regarded her attempt on Oliver’s life as an inconvenience rather than a sin.
She didn’t know how she felt about that. Sure, it was nice not to be judged—Lord knew, she’d been judged all her life and found wanting—but what kind of person could be so casual about something so wrong?
Then again, what did she know about ex-cons? Even less than she knew about the boys who hung around under the bleachers and smoked.
It had still been dark when Cooper had brought her home. The two-story Victorian where she had grown up was at the opposite end of town from his bar, on a street of large houses canopied by hundred-year-old maple trees. It was a safe, well-established neighborhood, yet Cooper had waited at the curb until she’d retrieved her spare key from the planter on the veranda and unlocked the front door. Even after she’d closed it behind her, she had heard the sound of his pickup idling in front of the house. It wasn’t until she had turned on the foyer light that she’d heard him drive away.
Considering the tense way their conversation had ended, she had planned to call a taxi, but he’d driven her home anyway. It was the same kind of concern he’d shown earlier, only he had denied it was concern.
He’d called her brother a son of a bitch and yet he claimed he wanted to bring Adam’s murderer to justice.
Why?
She tossed aside the towel, picked up a comb and started on her hair.
He’d said he had no choice. It didn’t make sense. He’d implied he was being forced to take her side even as he’d insisted that could never happen. He’d told her to back off and trust him to get Oliver.
She had been too shaken to argue last night. He must have taken her silence for agreement.
She was going to have to set the record straight.
“Sorry, ma’am. We don’t open until noon. It’s only eleven.”
“Yes, I know. I’m looking for someone. He said he works here.”
At the sound of the woman’s voice, Cooper snapped up his head to look across the room. Through the forest of upended chair legs he saw Pete Wyzowski, the Long Shot’s manager/bouncer, standing at the front entrance. Whoever he was talking to was hidden behind his bulk and the half-open door. He had one foot wedged firmly behind it. Since the door was constructed of oak planks over steel and Pete had a build like a bulldozer, no one smaller than a line-backer could hope to force their way inside.
“Come back in an hour,” Pete said.
“Please, it’s extremely important. He’s a bartender here.”
“A bartender?”
“His name is Cooper Webb.”
Pete placed one hand on the door frame to bar the narrow gap he’d allowed and twisted to look at Cooper. “A bartender?” he repeated. He lifted his eyebrows.
Cooper tossed his pen on the stack of credit-card receipts he’d been going through and pinched the bridge of his nose. He had hoped to have this paperwork done an hour ago. He hated paperwork. He stunk at math. If his schedule hadn’t been so tight, he might have welcomed the interruption.
“If he isn’t here yet, just tell me when you expect him.”
Pete returned his attention to the woman outside. “That’s hard to say, ma’am. Cooper’s got a killer commute.”
“Then I’ll wait.”
“Let me give him your phone number and—”
“It’s all right, Pete,” Cooper said. He might as well get this over with, he thought, as he moved from behind the bar. “I’ll take it from here.”
Pete stayed where he was until Cooper reached him. “Sure, boss.” He let go of the door and gave Cooper a friendly punch in the arm. “But if you don’t want her phone number, give it to me.”
Cooper had seen the punch coming so he managed not to get knocked sideways. He waited until Pete moved off to begin righting the chairs and setting them on the floor before he looked outside.
He had an instant of confusion. He’d been expecting Hayley to return since he’d driven her home. He’d been certain he’d recognized her voice—Hayley Tavistock had a throaty way of talking that any man would remember—but the woman who stood in front of him didn’t look anything like the one he’d left six hours ago.
She was still as blond as she’d been in high school. With all the mud, he hadn’t been able to tell before. Rich curls like the kind he’d expect to see on pictures of angels framed her face and tumbled over her shoulders. She was wearing a tailored jacket the color of cream. The matching skirt ended well above her knees, treating him to a good view of her long legs. She looked classy and sexy at the same time.
“Hello, Mr. Webb.” She shifted the purse she carried to her left hand and extended her right. “If you’re not too busy, I’d like to speak with you for a few minutes.”
He glanced at her hand. The mud was gone from that, too. Her skin was pale, her nails clean and buffed to a shine. He remembered how good it had felt when she’d gripped his leg. He wondered how much better it would have felt without the barrier of denim. He enclosed her hand in his.
As soon as he touched her, his confusion dissolved. She might have cleaned up, but she hadn’t been able to scrub away the tremor in her fingers.
He moved his gaze to her face. Back in high school she’d been cheerleader-cute. Not his type, yet he couldn’t deny he’d noticed. Problem was, she’d been an underage girl from a family of cops so he’d steered clear. Now she was all woman. She had the kind of bone-deep beauty that even mud and matted hair hadn’t disguised. Her lips were full and shaped in a feminine bow. Her eyes were hazel and tipped up at the corners, as if she should be on the verge of a smile.
She didn’t appear to be a woman who had smiled much lately. The hollows in her cheeks weren’t from a trick of makeup. And no amount of makeup could hide the weariness that pinched the edges of her lips or the despair that shadowed her gaze.
Cooper studied her more closely. Her skirt was too loose on her. He realized she didn’t quite fill out the jacket, either. Along with the hollows in her cheeks it all pointed to a recent weight loss. He felt a sudden rush of sympathy. And he had a crazy urge to yank her closer and do what he hadn’t done last night. He wanted to kiss her until her lips lost their tension and her eyes filled with desire instead of despair.
And he had an even crazier urge to wrap her in a blanket again and carry her someplace safe.
He dropped her hand and hung on to the door. Since when was he anyone’s protector? She might stir his hormones, but she was an inconvenience, a distraction he couldn’t afford. “There’s not much point talking, Hayley. I already said everything I wanted to say.”
“All I ask is that you hear me out.”
“I’m busy.”
“Tending bar?”
“Not right now. We’re closed.”
“That man called you boss.”
“Yes, he did.”
“Are you?”
“Yeah. I own this place. I also work the bar. Is that what you wanted to talk about?”
She shook her head. Her hair rippled in the sunshine. “Why are you going after Oliver Sproule?”
“What difference does it make as long as I get him?”
That made her pause. She pulled her lower lip between her teeth.
Damn, he still wanted to kiss her. He swung the door open and motioned her inside. “You might as well come in before you draw a crowd.”
Was it his imagination, or did she hesitate a beat before she lifted her chin and stepped over the threshold? “Thank you, Mr. Webb.”
“Call me Cooper.” He closed the door and shot the bolt. “I’m expecting a delivery in ten minutes so that’s all the time I can give you.”
She acknowledged his words with a smile that was too stiff to call real.
There was a clatter of chairs as Pete continued to clear off the tables. Cooper stepped aside and gestured Hayley toward the door at the other end of the room. “We’ll talk in my office.”
She remained silent as they walked past the bar, her gaze darting everywhere. He had taken her out the rear door when they had left here earlier this morning, so she hadn’t seen anything except his office and the back hallway. Cooper looked around, trying to see the place as she would.
Four years ago the building had housed a custom welding shop that had been going out of business. Cooper had liked the location on the outskirts of town since there were few neighbors to complain about noise or traffic. The large, two-story main room had suited him, too. He’d kept the renovations simple, laying down a hardwood floor and installing a rectangular oak bar as an island in the center. He’d also lengthened the existing windows that had been set high under the eaves so he had a view of his surroundings.
Enlarging the windows hadn’t been all that practical, since the bar’s busiest hours were after dark, but Cooper liked to see outside. It was one of the legacies of the time he’d spent inside.
Each year he’d poured any profit he’d made into added improvements. Now he had pool tables, a big-screen TV and a top-of-the-line sound system. On Pete’s suggestion, last winter he’d added a raised stage in the corner beside the front door where local talent had the chance to show what they could do. He liked being able to give them a break.
Cooper was proud of what he’d done with the Long Shot. It wasn’t fancy, but it was solid and getting more popular every year. Best of all, it was his.
For now, anyway.
Hayley had asked him why he was going after Oliver Sproule. She was walking through the answer.
Damn Tony and his bargain. It had been four years since he’d made it. It had gone on so long, Cooper had begun to hope that Tony was going to let it slide, but he should have known better. Tony Monaco wasn’t the kind of man who forgave anything, especially a debt.
“This is very nice,” Hayley said. “It’s much bigger than it looks from the outside. I like all the wood.”
Her compliment sounded sincere. He tried to keep it in perspective. She wanted something from him, he reminded himself, so she’d say whatever she thought was necessary. “I guess you haven’t been here before,” he said.
“No. I’ve been living in Chicago for the past ten years. I only moved back to Latchford last fall. Since then I’ve been too busy to…socialize.”
He pushed open the door that led to the back hall, then stepped to one side so she could go ahead of him. Last fall? Right. That’s when her brother had been killed and her father had had his stroke.
But it was more than grief that had kept her out of the Long Shot. Hayley Tavistock didn’t strike him as the kind of woman who would normally come to a place like this anyway. She was probably too much of the good girl to let loose and enjoy herself.
She brushed close enough for him to catch her scent. There was soap and shampoo, but there was still a trace of earthiness. Maybe he was wrong about her not letting loose. Just because she was a Tavistock and dressed with class didn’t mean there wasn’t passion beneath the surface. He’d already seen some of it.
They reached his office in silence. Hayley stopped in front of his desk and looked out the window. The shade was up, so she had a good view of the orchard on the far side of the parking lot. The trees had come into bloom the week before. The blossoms were pretty well finished now. Last night’s rain had knocked down of most of them but there were a few still stubbornly clinging to the boughs.
Again, Cooper caught himself wondering what she thought. Before Sproule had set up business here, much of Latchford’s economy had depended on the surrounding farms. Only a few pockets were left, like this overgrown apple orchard. Although this window also overlooked the loading ramp at the back of the building, a practical feature which allowed Cooper to keep track of delivery trucks when they arrived, the trees were the main reason he’d chosen this room for his office.
The bargain he’d made with Tony was what allowed him to have this. It could also make him lose it all.
He closed the door behind him more forcefully than he’d intended.
Hayley gave a nervous start and turned to face him.
He felt like a jerk for making her jump. “I’m sorry about your troubles, Hayley,” he said.
“Everyone’s sorry. No one except you wants to do anything about it.”
He wanted to pull her into his arms. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans instead. “That’s right,” he said. “I mean to do something about it. I plan to see that Oliver pays for his crime. If you want that to happen, the best thing you could do is keep out of it. You shouldn’t have come here.”
She chewed her lip again, as if restraining herself from asking the same question as before. “While I do appreciate your help last night, I’m afraid you might have gotten the wrong impression about me.”
“Oh, yeah? What part?”
“I’m not always that…” She paused, as if searching for the right word.
“Passionate?” he supplied.
“Irrational.” She straightened the cuffs of her jacket. “As you mentioned, I was pushed to my limit. I snapped. I wasn’t myself.”
“Sure, you were. No one can fake feelings that strong.”
“Yes, well, I feel much better now.”
“Did you sleep?”
“Excuse me?”
“After I took you home. How much sleep did you get?”
She brushed at a wrinkle in her skirt. “That really isn’t relevant.”
She was right; he wasn’t her keeper. But that didn’t stop him from wanting to kiss the weariness from her expression. He locked his elbows to keep his hands in his pockets.
“I came here to assure you that you don’t need to fear I would hinder your plans if we worked together,” she said.
“Soap and clothes won’t change who a person is, Hayley.”
“That’s my point. You got the wrong impression.”
“Not about one thing. There’s no mistaking the fact that you’re a Tavistock,” he said bluntly.
Color flared in her cheeks. “I won’t apologize for my brother. He was a dedicated policeman.”
“Right. I know. Just like your father. You come from a long line of cops.”
“What does my father have to do with this? Adam’s the one you’re holding a grudge against.”
“I was locked in a cage for three years of my life and your brother was the one who put me there. Saying I hold a grudge doesn’t cover it.”
“What were you arrested for?”
“Hijacking a truckload of computer chips.”
She studied him for a moment. “Were you innocent?”
He kept his gaze steady on hers. She would probably feel more comfortable if he lied, but he wouldn’t deny what he used to do any more than she would apologize for her brother. They both were what they were, and there was no changing that. “I was guilty as sin, Hayley.”
“Then how can you resent Adam? He was only doing his job.”
“Yeah, I know. But do you have much luck telling yourself how you should feel?”
Her gaze wavered. The color in her cheeks deepened. “No, but sometimes to get what we want, we have to put our feelings aside. That’s why we should work together, no matter how much you dislike me because of my brother.”
“Dislike you?” He moved to where she stood, unable to restrain himself from touching her any longer. He pulled his hands from his pockets and tipped up her chin with his index finger. “Where did you get that idea?”
“You said you don’t want to work together.”
“I don’t. That doesn’t mean I’m blind.” He stroked his thumb along the edge of her jaw. This was another one of those times he didn’t have much luck telling himself how to feel. Sure, she was a distraction he couldn’t afford, but his body wasn’t listening. “You’re an attractive woman, Hayley. I could see that even when you were wearing half of Sproule’s garden.”
She didn’t pull away from his caress. He’d expected her to. Then again, she did want something from him. She might think accepting his touch was as necessary as making a compliment about his bar.
He fingered a curl that rested against her neck. The way it sprang back against his hand made him smile. Her hair was soft but stubborn, sort of like her. “You cleaned up real good, too.”
Beneath the classy jacket her breasts rose as she inhaled unsteadily. The pulse beneath her ear beat hard against his fingertips.
She wasn’t much good at hiding her feelings, Cooper decided. He could see her awareness, just as he could see her distress over it. She didn’t want to be attracted to him any more than he wanted to be attracted to her. He should let this go, but some demon inside him wanted to push. Last night she’d said she’d do anything, hadn’t she? He leaned closer. “How about it, Hayley?”
Her lips parted. “What?”
“Aren’t you curious? I know I am.” He traced his fingertip down her throat to the V of her jacket neckline and tapped her breastbone. “What other passions do you keep inside here?”
Her gaze sparked with an unmistakable response. It was anger. She pushed his hand aside and stepped back. She didn’t get far. She was stopped when the back of her legs hit the edge of his desk. “Don’t think you’re going to scare me off with some fake come-on, Cooper. That’s just too obvious and it won’t get rid of me.”
He exhaled hard. Would he scare her off if he told her there had been nothing fake about his interest?
“Could we get back to business, please?”
He raked his hand through his hair, then rubbed the back of his neck. “We don’t have business together. Even if I wanted a partner, it wouldn’t be you.”
“What Adam did to you is history. Surely you can put your grudge aside and—”
“Hey, Coop!” It was Pete’s voice, coming from the hallway outside the office. The door rattled with a hard knock. “You better get out here.”
Cooper hadn’t heard him approach. That jarred him. Even through a closed door, Pete’s tread was always heavy enough to hear. Cooper must have been too focused on Hayley to notice. He stepped away from her and opened the door. “What’s going on?”
Pete looked worried. “Sorry to interrupt, boss, but your two o’clock appointment got here early.”
“My appointment? What the…” It took him a second to change gears. “Aw, hell. Where is he?”
“Still in his car out front. He sent four of his men to check the place out first.”
Cooper turned to look at Hayley. “Where did you park?”
She looked at him blankly. “I don’t understand. Why—”
“Just answer the question. Where’s your car?”
“I don’t have one. It was repossessed last month. I took a taxi here.”
He flicked his gaze to the window behind Hayley. He could see a man in sunglasses and a dark suit walking across the parking lot toward the loading ramp. Cooper hadn’t noticed him before, either. “It’s too late to get you out the back way,” he said. “They’ll see you.”
She twisted her head to follow his gaze. “Who? What are you talking about?”
He snatched her purse from the desk and shoved it into her hands, then grabbed her arm and tugged her toward the door. “Come with me. You’ll have to wait upstairs until they leave.”
Her heels slid across the floor. She hooked her purse strap over her shoulder and caught the door frame with her free hand before he could pull her through. “No. We’re not finished. I’m not going anywhere.”
He moved his grip to her upper arms and brought his face to hers. “Hayley, this isn’t the time to argue. You can’t be seen here.”
“Why not?”
“Because everyone in Latchford knows how you feel about Oliver Sproule.”
“Well, yes, but—”
“That’s why we can’t work together. It’s why you have to get out of sight now. If Oliver suspects that we teamed up, I don’t have a hope in hell of getting close to him.”
She shook her head. “You’re not making sense.”
He glanced past her to the window and muttered a curse. The man by the loading ramp had taken a gun from beneath his suit coat.
“Boss,” Pete warned. “He’s carrying.”
“Yeah, I saw it,” Cooper said. There was no time left for finesse. He pulled Hayley’s hand from the door frame, leaned down to wrap his arms around her thighs and tossed her over his shoulder. “Pete, call Ken. Tell him the game’s on.”
“Sure thing, Coop,” he said, digging his cell phone out of his pants pocket.
Hayley thumped her fist into Cooper’s back. “Put me down! What are you doing?”
“Saving your pretty little butt. Again.” He clamped his hand over her bottom to hold her steady, then jogged down the hallway to the door that was set halfway between his office and the barroom.
Pete called after him, “What do you want me to do after I phone Ken, Coop?”
“Give me five minutes to get Hayley out of sight,” he replied, raising his voice over her continued protests. “Then unlock the back door and bring Sproule to my office.”
Chapter 3
“Sproule?” Hayley braced her palm against Cooper’s back to lift her head. Her heart was pounding, her palms wet. Had she heard him right? “Oliver’s here?” she asked.
“Yeah.”
She clenched her jaw, fighting a wave of light-headedness as Cooper opened a door and made a sudden turn to his right. By the time she got it under control he was halfway up a staircase. The lighting was dim. Combined with the jostling from Cooper’s pace, it was disorienting.
Hayley stopped struggling and anchored her fingers in his shirt. She didn’t want to send them both tumbling down the stairs. “Why is he here?”
“Because I invited him.”
“Why?”
“I don’t have enough breath to explain and carry you at the same time.”
Hayley knew that wasn’t true. He was taking the stairs two at a time and wasn’t even breathing hard. She could feel the strength in his hands and in the corded muscles along his arms and shoulders. “Put me down,” she said. “I want answers.”
He didn’t comply until they reached the landing at the top of the stairs. He bent his knees and let her slide off his shoulder until her feet touched the floor.
There was a varnished wood door in front of them that looked identical to the one at the front of the building. A lock with a numbered keypad was set into the wood below the knob. Hayley had barely registered these facts when Cooper punched a combination into the lock and swung the door open. He grabbed her hand and pulled her inside with him.
After the dim staircase, the brightness of the room they entered made her squint. The place was big, appearing to stretch away from her the entire width of the building. She glimpsed a large unmade bed on a low platform in the far corner, some overstuffed couches and a leather recliner in the center of the room and the gleam of stainless-steel kitchen appliances set into a U-shaped counter to her right. Dominating everything was a long wall with three multi-paned warehouse-style windows that overlooked the same overgrown orchard she had seen from Cooper’s office.
But she had no chance to take in more detail. Cooper grasped her cheeks and turned her face to his. “Hayley, you have to stay here,” he said. “Keep away from the windows. Don’t open the door to anyone except me.”
Out of principle she didn’t like taking orders any more than she allowed anyone to manhandle her, but she could see the anxiety on Cooper’s face was genuine. “What’s going on?”
“I didn’t want you involved in this. I warned you that you’re out of your league. You should have stayed away.”
“Cooper—”
“I’ll explain later.” He dropped his hands and returned to the door. “I’ve got to go.”
She ran after him. “Cooper, wait!”
He paused in the doorway, his body hard with tension. He looked at her over his shoulder. “I can’t, Hayley. It’s already been set into motion.”
“But what are you doing?”
“Applying for a job.”
“With Oliver? I thought you wanted to see him punished.”
Cooper’s gaze was like ice as it bored into hers. “I’m an ex-thief with a criminal record and a public grudge against the man Oliver murdered. Those credentials will get me places that you and the law could never go.”
She stopped before she reached him. She tried to think, but it was hard. Too much was happening too fast. “I still don’t understand.”
“You’re a bright woman, Hayley.” He turned away. “I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”
Oliver Sproule sat completely still, his hands folded neatly on his crossed legs. Two of his men stood behind him, their bulk a marked contrast to Oliver’s greyhound-slender frame. Against the dark backdrop of their suits, his hair shone like platinum.
He hadn’t moved since he’d taken the chair Cooper had offered. Not one fidget of his manicured fingers, not one rustle of his silk suit, not even a scuff of his hand-stitched shoes. He was as composed as a corpse.
Cooper didn’t like it. He’d never met anyone who was so difficult to read.
Yet by his very composure, Oliver revealed something basic about his character. He was a control freak. That’s why he’d shown up three hours early. It was also why he’d elected to have their meeting in the barroom at a table of his choice rather than in Cooper’s office.
The fact that he’d chosen to meet in Cooper’s territory instead of his own had provided yet another opportunity for one-upmanship. A second car had arrived while Cooper had been busy with Hayley. In addition to the two goons at the back of Oliver’s chair, there were several more at each exit and another four in the parking lot. Oliver’s men outnumbered Cooper’s by more than four to one. He’d essentially turned Cooper’s turf into his own.
Cooper couldn’t let him see how much that part of it bothered him. The Long Shot was his.
“While I’m flattered that you would like to do business with me, Mr. Webb,” Oliver said, “I’m curious to know why.”
Cooper hooked his thumbs in his belt loops and leaned back in his chair, endeavoring to keep his body language casual. “Money. Why else?”
Oliver arched one platinum eyebrow. “Indeed.”
“I figure you could be interested in some extra cash flow now that you fixed your legal problems.”
One corner of Oliver’s upper lip lifted in a barely suppressed sneer. The first chink he’d allowed. “Go on.”
“Congratulations, by the way,” Cooper said. “Nice piece of work on that verdict.”
“I fully support the justice system in this great country of ours.”
“Yeah, I bet. I would have popped Tavistock myself if I’d had the chance.”
“It was an unfortunate accident.”
“Sure. Whatever. The thing is, I’ve been wanting to get some action going but I need a way to move the merchandise. My former associate who used to handle that for me is doing twenty to life.”
“I don’t run a van line, Mr. Webb.”
“I thought you would know the trucks are my specialty, Ollie.”
The nickname brought on an eyelid twitch. Oliver regained control and regarded him stonily.
Cooper decided it was time to get to the point. “Okay, here’s the deal. Say I bring you some TVs. You find a buyer, you take ten percent of the proceeds.”
“Sixty.”
“Twenty, and you provide storage until the merchandise can be moved.”
Oliver snapped his fingers. The men behind him stepped forward and drew back his chair as he stood. “Forty percent and secure space in my warehouse where you can unload.”
Cooper got to his feet. “You’ve got a deal.”
“Agreed.”
Cooper nodded and held out his hand. “Great. I’ll be in touch.”
Oliver slid his palm against Cooper’s and gave him a token squeeze. He moved toward the exit, his bodyguards falling into step behind him.
Cooper waited until he saw the cars pull out of the parking lot, then carefully wiped his right hand on his pants. The groundwork had been laid. He’d established an angle that would get him into the organization, just as he’d planned.
That didn’t stop him from feeling dirty.
It had been seven years since his last job. Four years since he’d made his promise to Tony. He’d become accustomed to feeling…clean.
Soap and clothes won’t change who a person is.
That’s what he’d told Hayley. Had she realized he hadn’t only been talking about her?
He helped Pete finish the preparations for the day, then left him to manage the bar while he headed upstairs. There was no sound coming from the other side when he reached the door to the loft. He didn’t think Hayley could have gotten out—he’d instructed Pete to keep an eye on the staircase during the meeting with Oliver to make sure she remained out of sight. But Cooper had made no attempt to mask the noise of his boots on the steps. He’d expected her to meet him with more questions and demands.
As soon as he unlocked the door, the reason for her silence became obvious. She had fallen asleep in his chair.
Cooper eased the door closed behind him and set the lock, then crossed the floor to Hayley. For a minute he indulged himself and simply looked at her. She had discarded her shoes and was curled on her side like a kitten, her bare feet drawn up on the seat and her cheek pillowed on the chair arm. Her hair hung over the side in a tangle of curls. In the daylight that poured through the windows, the hollows in her cheeks and the lines of strain around her eyes were more obvious than ever.
Was the woman trying to self-destruct? Didn’t she realize she had to start taking better care of herself? When was the last time she’d had anything to eat or had a full night’s sleep? This was probably the only rest she’d gotten since she’d slept on his office couch.
She looked so defenseless, it was hard to believe that she had taken on Oliver Sproule alone. Saying she was out of her league was an understatement. Yet even though her presence was turning into a complication he didn’t need, Cooper couldn’t help feeling a twinge of admiration for her. She had guts, he’d give her that. Despite his attempts to get rid of her, she didn’t scare off easy.
On the other hand, he hadn’t tried all that hard yet, had he? He had to stop thinking with his libido.
He knelt at the side of the chair and picked up a lock of her hair, letting the curls twine through his fingers. His gaze moved to her mouth. Her lips were parted and completely relaxed. It would be a shame to wake her up. If he had the time, he’d let her sleep her fill the way he had before, but they had to straighten this out. For her own safety, he had to convince her to back off.
Besides, he had too much riding on this to allow anyone, including her, to get in his way. “Hayley?”
A frown line appeared between her eyebrows. She sighed, moistened her lips and snuggled her cheek against the chair arm.
Cooper released her hair and leaned closer. “Hayley, wake up.”
Her lashes fluttered. Her lips moved into the ghost of a smile. “Cooper?”
“Yeah.”
He never saw it coming. Later, he would wonder how different things might have turned out if he had. As it was, any good intentions that might have lurked somewhere inside him were swept away when her hand stole around the back of his neck and she tugged his head to hers.
The kiss she gave him was sweet and sleepy. It was the kiss of a woman who wasn’t completely conscious, who didn’t know what she was doing. It didn’t mean a thing. She was probably dreaming, reacting instinctively, reaching for comfort the same way she would reach for a blanket.
Cooper didn’t give a damn. He tilted his head and gave her a kiss that brought her completely awake.
As soon as she felt Cooper’s tongue slide over her lips, Hayley realized it wasn’t a dream. No dream could be this vivid.
Cooper kissed the same way he moved, with a careless sexuality, as warm as the sunlight that poured through the wall of windows beside her, as supple as the leather of the chair that cradled her, as bold as the hair that curled around her fingers where she held the back of his neck.
Yet beneath the sexuality there was tenderness. She could feel it in the way he coaxed her response instead of demanding it. He tilted his head, testing angles until his lips fit perfectly over hers. The pressure was gentle, a sweet exploration, giving more than he took. This wasn’t the brusque-mannered bar owner who had carried her out of his office, this was the protector who had rescued her from the Sproule estate and had seen her safely home.
And for a crazy instant Hayley wanted to pretend she was still asleep. It was so tempting. It would give her an excuse to let the pleasure last a few moments longer.
But this was a man her brother had put in prison. How could she be kissing him? She knew what she wanted from him, and her own needs weren’t high on the list. She let go of his neck, pulled back and opened her eyes.
He was kneeling on the floor, one hand braced on the chair arm, the other on the seat beside her ankles. The sleeves of his chambray shirt were rolled above his elbows. His forearms—and the eagle—flexed. “If I’d realized you woke up like that,” he murmured, “I never would have let you sleep last night.”
Oh, he was dangerous. His voice was soft, as much a caress as his kiss had been. Sunshine gleamed from his spiky black lashes and warmed the startling blue of his eyes with flecks of gold. She wanted to lean forward and lick the moisture that slicked his lips.
What was the matter with her? How could she let him affect her like this? Even worse, how could she have relaxed her guard enough to fall asleep again? Maybe she really was going crazy. She pushed herself upright. “I can’t believe I dozed off.”
“I can. I saw you were still strung out when you got here.”
“But I didn’t intend…” She cleared her throat, uncertain what to say. I didn’t intend to dream about you. Or to enjoy the reality more than the dream.
He stroked his thumb along her foot to her calf. “I hope you’re not going to apologize about that kiss, Hayley, because I sure as hell won’t.”
That was exactly what she should do, but she wasn’t certain where to start. “I didn’t plan any of this.”
“Too bad. This was the first good idea you’ve had.”
“I didn’t mean to give you the impression that—”
“That you’re a passionate woman? Or that you wanted to kiss me?”
“Neither.” She pressed further back in the chair. The recliner was large so she was able to draw away from Cooper’s touch. Yet she still felt the imprint of his thumb on her leg. And his tongue in her mouth. She struggled to focus her thoughts. “Can we just move on? This isn’t why I came to see you today, Cooper. I thought we already established that.”
“Yeah, I know.” He sighed, rocked back on his heels and rose to his feet. His gaze flicked downward. His cheek twitched. “But the way you look, you’re making it hard to remember.”
She glanced at her lap. Like most of her wardrobe, her skirt was too loose on her—she hadn’t realized it had ridden up almost to her hips. She hurriedly tugged it into place over her thighs. “I’m here because of my brother. I want to talk about Oliver Sproule.”
“There’s nothing more to talk about, Hayley. You need to back off. Leave Sproule to me.”
She thought about the last thing Cooper had said before he’d gone downstairs. He’d claimed he wanted a job with Oliver.
He’d also claimed he wanted Oliver brought to justice.
It hadn’t been that difficult to connect the dots. The hard part was concentrating on them when he was still close enough for her to catch his scent. His aftershave was spicy, his soap smelled of pine, and his mouth had tasted warm and sexy and pure male—
Focus, she reminded herself. “You’re planning to gather evidence against Oliver from the inside, aren’t you?”
“I see you figured it out.”
“Some of it. If you’re going to pretend to work with Oliver, I can understand why you wouldn’t want to be seen with me.”
“There won’t be any pretense about it, Hayley.” He backed up a few steps, then walked to the window in the center of the wall. He angled himself to the side of the window frame and scanned the area below. “I’ll be right in the middle of the Sproule organization.”
“That’s going to be dangerous.”
“Bingo. That’s why you have to keep out of it.”
She looked around for her shoes, slipped them on and followed him. Mindful of his earlier warning about keeping away from the windows, she was careful to stay behind him so she wouldn’t be visible from outside. She shifted her gaze to his back. Sunlight filtered through his shirt, silhouetting his broad shoulders and long, lean torso.
She did her best to ignore the view. “Why are you taking this risk in the first place?” she asked. “You’re not working with any law-enforcement agency, are you?”
He snorted. “Nope. I trust them about as much as I trust Oliver.”
“And you made it clear you don’t have any affection for Adam, so you’re not doing this for his sake.”
“No, I’m doing this for me.”
“Why?”
“What difference does it make?”
He’d asked that before. She’d thought about her answer while he’d been gone. “Unless I get an answer I’m satisfied with,” she said, “I have no reason to believe that you’ll do as you say.”
He fisted his hand on the window frame. His rolled-up sleeve tightened across his biceps. “We don’t have time to go around with this again. We’ve got to get you out of here before Oliver decides to send some of his guys back to keep an eye on me. He doesn’t trust me yet, either.”
“Then you’d better answer my question, because I’m not leaving until you do.”
Swearing under his breath, he grasped the cord that hung beside the window and gave it a sharp tug. A Venetian blind clattered downward over the glass, the slats diffusing the sunshine. He moved to the other two windows and did the same, then leaned one shoulder against the frame of the center window. Shifting his weight to one foot, he propped the toe of his other boot against the floor. He studied her for a minute, as if deciding how much to reveal. “Ever hear of a man named Tony Monaco?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“His family used to run an organization that would make Oliver and his friends look like Boy Scouts.”
An organization, she thought, as in organized crime. And worse than Oliver? She swallowed. “Used to run?”
“Tony got out of the business ten years ago, but he’s still not a man you would want to mess with.” He paused. “To cut to the chase, Tony financed the Long Shot. Unless I bring Oliver Sproule to justice, he’s going to call in the loan and I’ll lose my bar.”
“I don’t see the connection. Did Oliver do something to this Tony Monaco? Is that why Tony wants you to go after him?”
“That’s beside the point. You said you were interested in my reasons, not Tony’s.”
“It sounds like a strange way to repay a loan.”
“Tony isn’t a banker. If he was, he wouldn’t have given me any money in the first place. Ex-cons aren’t real high on a banker’s preferred-client list.”
She couldn’t disagree. Anyone with a criminal background would be considered a bad credit risk. As unfair as it might be, there would be few, well, conventional financing options open to someone like Cooper. “It seems as if your business is doing well. Every time I’ve gone by, the parking lot is crowded.”
“It didn’t happen overnight. Tony gave me the loan when I got out of prison. I’ve spent every day of the four years since then building the Long Shot into what it is now. Going straight has been damn hard work.”
“Going straight?”
“Surprised, sweetheart?”
She realized she was. Not by his claim that he’d gone straight—although she was glad to hear him say it, all along her instincts had told her he wasn’t as bad as he seemed, despite his gruff manner. What surprised her was the flicker of hurt in his gaze at her thoughtless response.
But what did he expect? He’d been throwing his criminal past in her face since they had met, as if he were trying to shock her, as if he wanted her to assume the worst about him.
Then again, she had already decided he was full of contradictions. Like his primitively sexy yet ultra-sensitive kiss…
She jerked her thoughts back on track. “I’m sorry, Cooper. I didn’t mean to offend you. It’s admirable that you, uh…”
“Don’t get carried away. I’m not due for a halo anytime soon. Keeping my nose clean was one of the conditions of Tony’s loan.”
There had to be more to the story, she decided. From the sound of this, Tony was a former mob boss. Why would he care whether or not Cooper went straight…unless he didn’t want Cooper’s activities to compromise his investment. Yes, that was probably it.
But as Cooper had already said, she should be concentrating on his reasons, not Tony’s. “Regardless of why, you should be proud of what you’ve accomplished.”
He lifted his shoulders in a stiff shrug. “The funny thing about earning something honestly is you don’t want to lose it. The Long Shot is mine. I plan to do whatever it takes to keep it.”
“Including putting your life at risk to infiltrate the Sproule organization?”
“Whatever it takes,” he repeated. “Like I said, Tony Monaco isn’t a man you would want to mess with. I owe him. I intend to pay him back.” He pushed away from the window and folded his arms over his chest. “Satisfied now?”
“What?”
“I’ve answered your question. You know why I’m going after Oliver. Anything else you have to say, you can say it in the truck.” He nodded toward the door. “Let’s go.”
She had never met anyone as single-minded as Cooper. This man would be a formidable enemy. She had to convince him that he wasn’t hers. She crossed her arms, mirroring his posture, and stayed where she was. “You haven’t told me anything to change my mind. It still makes sense to team up.”
“Hayley, haven’t you listened to anything I’ve said?”
“No one has to know, Cooper. Now that you’ve explained why we can’t be seen together, we’ll both be careful not to let that happen. But that’s no reason why we can’t help each other.”
“How?”
“The evidence I told you about yesterday, the information in Adam’s notebook, is only part of what I have. I’ve been gathering material on Oliver and his business since last October. I’ll share it with you. It would give you an advantage before you go into the Sproule organization if you have a framework of knowledge to start from.”
His expression sharpened, his gaze suddenly alert.
Something clicked in Hayley’s mind. “That’s why you were at the Sproule estate last night.”
“What was?”
“You were planning on getting into the house to do some investigating of your own while everyone was distracted with Oliver’s party.”
He hesitated a beat. “Could be.”
“Of course! If you had been there to apply for a job, you wouldn’t have hidden your truck or climbed the fence, you would have used the front gate. You wouldn’t have worried about being caught there.”
“All right. So what?”
“Then that’s even more reason to take advantage of the help I’m offering. Your plans were interrupted because of me, so it’s only fair to let me make it up to you.”
He regarded her in silence for a while. He still wasn’t agreeing, but at least he wasn’t moving toward the door.
“Think about it, Cooper. You said you can go where I can’t. Well, that works both ways. I have connections, too. I can use them to check out whatever lead you discover.”
“If you mean your connections with the Latchford police,” he said, “then forget it. Oliver has to have people on the inside there.”
It pained her to admit it, but she was beginning to suspect that much herself. Her father had become so agitated at the idea the one time she’d mentioned it to him that she hadn’t brought it up again, yet she had to be realistic. Whatever the reason, the police hadn’t helped her so far. They would be even less likely to help her now that the trial was over.
She shook her head. “No, I meant the connections I have in the financial world. I worked as a forensic accountant in Chicago so I have a lot of experience following money trails. I can follow Oliver’s.”
“What good would that do?”
“We could get solid evidence of Oliver’s motive to kill Adam, which would prove my brother’s death wasn’t an accident. We might even be able to prove Oliver bribed his way to an acquittal.”
He raked his fingers through his hair. “This is sounding complicated.”
“It doesn’t have to be. Would Tony object if you worked with a partner?” she asked.
“Tony Monaco’s never been real particular about methods. He’s more interested in results.”
“Then there isn’t any good reason why we shouldn’t team up. You did say you would do whatever it takes to keep your bar.”
He turned back to the window and lifted a blind slat to look outside. “Yeah, I did say that.”
“Why can’t that include working with a Tavistock?”
He shook his head, muttering something under his breath.
“Well?”
The silence lasted longer this time. Finally, he left the window and strode directly to where she stood. He took her by the shoulders. “If I agree to this, you’ll keep your distance from Sproule, right?”
Her heart began to pound. She wanted to think it was from what he was saying, but she knew it was more from his touch. “I’ll stay away as long as you don’t shut me out of what you’re doing.”
“Hayley—”
“I mean it, Cooper. Don’t shut me out. I want you to keep me up to date on your progress.”
He moved his palms along her shoulders to her neck. “I’ll do more than that. Once I bring you in with me, you’ll be all the way in.”
“That’s how I want it.”
“Don’t be so fast to agree, Hayley, seeing as how you cleaned up so good and all.” He touched his fingertip to the pulse at the base of her throat. “The kind of dirt you’ll be getting into now won’t be so easy to wash off.”
Chapter 4
Cooper heard the distinctive rumble of the split carburetor well before he saw the bike’s headlight sweep past the chain-link fence to the broken gate. Nathan Beliveau was right on time, which wasn’t surprising, considering his business—he was the president of the largest courier company in the midwest. He would know about keeping schedules. But his choice of transportation was…unexpected. Cooper leaned back against the front fender of his truck and waited as the Harley Davidson coasted down the ramp into the abandoned gravel pit and slowed to a stop beside him.
The echoes of the bike’s engine faded gradually, replaced by the ticking of cooling metal. A cloud of dust tainted with exhaust floated through the headlight briefly before the beam was extinguished. The meeting place they’d agreed on was five miles out of Latchford and half a mile from the highway. The floodlight that had been mounted near the entrance when the pit had been in operation was long gone, but it was a clear night and the moon was almost full, so there was enough light to see what he needed to.
The man astride the motorcycle stretched his long legs on either side to balance the machine but made no move to get off. He could probably afford to travel by chauffeured limo, but he appeared completely at ease on the powerful bike. “You’re Webb?” he asked.
“Yeah.” Cooper made no attempt to hide his scrutiny—it would be expected. “Nice hog, Beliveau.”
“She’s a beauty, all right.” He slipped off his helmet and rested it on the gas tank in front of him. “It sure beats riding a desk.”
Cooper shifted his scrutiny from the bike to the man on it. Moonlight gleamed from his straight black hair and the sharp ridges of his cheekbones, revealing the stamp of native heritage. He would probably look just as comfortable riding bareback on an Appaloosa.
Wind rustled through the weeds that ringed the pit, muffling the distant whine of tires on the highway. Nathan lifted his face, as if testing the breeze. “Tony said you wanted televisions.”
“Know of any?”
“How about a trailer load of sixty-two-inch plasma screens?”
Cooper whistled. “That’ll do.”
“They’re at an electronics manufacturing company in Hammond where they’re scheduled for an overnight shipment to Kansas City. The pickup’s slated for ten-thirty tomorrow night. That means you should be out of there by ten.”
“Sounds good.”
“Can you handle a big rig?”
“No problem. Have you got one with a sleeper compartment?”
“There’s one at the Chicago terminal. I’ll arrange to have it parked in a rest area off the Interstate. You’ll have until seven in the morning before I’ll have to report it missing.”
Cooper calculated the time it would take him to get the truck to Hammond, do the pickup and drive back to Latchford. It would be cutting things close, especially since he would be taking detours onto secondary routes to get around the weigh stations. “I’ll have it back by then.”
“Try to keep the damage to the rig to a minimum. My insurance rates are already killing me.”
“Except for the wires, it won’t have a scratch.”
Nathan turned his head toward Cooper. His eyes were too deep-set for the moonlight to touch, making his expression inscrutable. “You better be as good as Tony said you were. I heard it’s been a few years since you did a job like this.”
“Some things you don’t forget.”
Nathan studied him. “That’s right. Some things you don’t forget.”
Cooper couldn’t help being curious about Nathan’s connection to Tony, but he knew better than to ask. The fact that he was here said enough. Nathan was indebted to Tony Monaco, just like Cooper, just like all the members of the Payback network.
And he was probably as eager as Cooper was to settle his debt and get on with his life.
Leather creaked as Nathan slipped his hand inside his riding jacket. He withdrew a folded sheet of paper and held it out to Cooper. “Here are the rest of the details about the load. It should be all the information you’ll need.”
“Thanks.” Cooper pushed away from the fender of the truck, took the paper and shoved it into the pocket of his jeans. “If there’s anything I can do for you, let me know.”
“Count on it.”
“About those TVs…”
“What about them?”
“Who’s covering the loss?”
“Nobody. The guy who runs the electronics company in Hammond owes Tony a favor.” Nathan switched on the ignition, gripped the throttle and kicked the bike back to life. “I heard he decided not to pay it back.”
One hour later, concealed by the overhanging boughs of the maple at the back of the Tavistock yard, Cooper grasped two of the wrought-iron arrowheads that ran across the top of the fence and vaulted to the other side. He paused to look around, but there was little chance of his arrival being witnessed—the houses on this side of the street backed onto a park, which was not only picturesque, it could prove to be a useful setup. Hayley had probably cut through the park when she had carried the rifle to the Sproule estate.
He turned his attention to the house. When he’d brought Hayley home last week, he’d noticed that the front of the house had a big veranda decorated with gingerbread trim. There was no porch in the back, nothing to use to climb to the second story, and the rear door was solid wood with a deadbolt. But the ground-floor windows were the sliding-sash kind and had conveniently wide ledges.
No dog. No alarm. A yard with overgrown trees that blocked the view of the next-door neighbors. For a family of cops, they should have paid more attention to making their house secure. Cooper used the gas meter that stuck out from the wall for a foothold and hoisted himself onto the nearest window ledge. He scowled as he let himself in. He’d have to tell Hayley to get better locks.
Right. Otherwise, someone like him might get inside.
He waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, then scanned the room he had entered. A long oval table sat in the center, surrounded by chairs with curving wooden backs. Teardrop prisms of a large chandelier glinted above the table and the flat glass front of a china cabinet gleamed next to the wall on his left. It looked like more than a cop, even a police commissioner, could have afforded, but Cooper had heard that Hayley’s mother had come from money.
The archway across from him led to a center hall. It was dark, but a sliver of light showed beneath a door to his right. Keeping his weight on the balls of his feet to minimize the noise of his footsteps on the hardwood floor, he moved to the door and eased it open.
The room was lined with bookshelves. The light came from a green-shaded banker’s lamp that rested on the top of an old fashioned roll-top desk. Hayley was sitting on a swivel chair in front of it, the kind with oak slats in the back and casters on the feet. She had her back to him, her fingers clicking at the keyboard of the laptop computer in the center of the desk. She lifted her hand to rub her eyes, then reached for a water glass that sat on a stack of file folders beside her elbow and downed the contents in one gulp.
Cooper’s scowl deepened as he studied her. It was two in the morning, but she didn’t look as if she had been to bed. She was dressed in jeans and an oversize gray sweatshirt, her hair tied haphazardly at the nape of her neck with a scarf. Her feet were bare, her toes curled against the chair casters. She looked lonely, vulnerable and too damn approachable.
So far, she had kept her word—in the four days since he’d agreed to her deal, she hadn’t gone near Oliver. Instead, she had spent most of her time at the nursing home with her father. Cooper had been pleased that she’d been smart enough to stay away from the Long Shot, yet it was as if she had been there anyway. Echoes of her presence lingered. He kept picturing her on the couch in his office, or curled into the chair in his loft.
He kept remembering the taste of her mouth.
But he was here because she could be useful to him, that’s all. She had been right—she had connections and skills that he didn’t. They could help each other. He couldn’t afford to let it get more complicated than that. She had been intruding into his thoughts too much as it was.
She wasn’t his type, no matter how alluring she looked right now. One glance at the kind of place she lived in told him that. So did the room she was sitting in. Scattered among the books on those bookshelves there were framed photographs of men in uniform. Police uniforms. What looked like certificates hung on the wall behind the desk. Those were probably two generations worth of official commendations. He moved his gaze along the frames.
Which one of them was the commendation Adam had received when he’d arrested Cooper?
He gave the door a push to swing it the rest of the way open and stepped over the threshold. “Hello, Hayley.”
She reacted instantly, her head snapping up. She spun the chair to face him. “Cooper! How did—”
Her words cut off at the sound of a crash as the empty glass that had been beside her elbow shattered against the floor.
“Aw, hell,” Cooper muttered, striding across the room.
Hayley shoved herself out of the chair. It rolled sideways and thudded into the front of the desk.
“Stay where you are!” he ordered.
She glanced around quickly, her eyes wide. “What? Is something wrong?”
“Don’t move or you’ll cut your feet.” He went past her and took the top file folder from the stack on the desk, then squatted down and used its edge to sweep the shards of glass into a pile.
She pressed her hand to her chest and drew in a shaky breath. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I have boots, you don’t.”
“You shouldn’t have startled me.”
“Couldn’t be helped.” He checked the floor for the glint of stray pieces. When he was satisfied it was clear, he scooped the remnants of the glass onto the folder, then straightened up and looked around. There was a small wicker basket half filled with crumpled paper beside the desk. He dumped the glass into it. “I wanted to make sure you were alone.”
“Of course, I’m alone. It’s the middle of the night.”
He slapped the folder on his leg. The loose neckline of her sweatshirt had slid down when she’d jumped out of her chair, baring her shoulder. There was no sign of a bra strap. Cooper tried hard to keep his gaze on her face. “For a woman who kisses like you do, that’s not something I’d take for granted.”
Color seeped into her cheeks. She grabbed the back of her chair. He wasn’t sure whether it was for balance, or to have something on hand to shove between them. “You could have called first.”
“Yeah, but then I wouldn’t get to see that pulse in your neck. I like seeing you excited.”
Êîíåö îçíàêîìèòåëüíîãî ôðàãìåíòà.
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