Armed With Steele (12 page)

An argument erupted somewhere down the hall, and stretched my overtaxed nerves to within an inch of their breaking point.

“I won’t do it! You can’t make me!” a woman cried out, followed by the sound of breaking glass and the clang of a metal tray hitting the floor.

“You have to do your rehab if you want to gain your strength back,” said a man, his voice strained as if he were struggling to keep a good grip on his patient.

“I don’t want to gain my strength back, I just want to get the
hell out of here
!”

More items hit the floor and I jumped in my seat. My eyes flashed to the door, where I half expected to see the unruly patient burst in at any moment. I relaxed when the sound of reinforcements met my ears.

Once I felt confident that the situation had been handled, I looked from the door to Grace. Poor, defenseless Grace. And then to the newspaper, shaking like a leaf in my hands. The way to get Nate off my back, and to ease my guilty mind, was staring back at me: an administrative assistant position under the Vice President of marketing at Maxwell Office Solutions.

* * * *

I made my way through Java Joe’s coffee shop and stopped before a familiar table in the far back corner. A table that was plenty big for one, cozy for two. It was the table I’d found my first semester of college, and had claimed for my own until a certain pretty strawberry blonde came along and swiped it from me. Beat me to that table every day for a full week. I sat across the room and glared at the stranger that entire time, pissed that she would steal my favorite homework spot.

Then one day she’d looked up, smiled, and motioned for me to join her. I’d grudgingly accepted—a good thing, too. If I hadn’t, I never would have met my best friend. Or had the chance to become her roommate, and escape from my domineering mother a few years early.

Now I was getting ready to stick my neck out for Grace. It only felt right to have this talk with Nate at JJ’s. Here, where it all began.

“Somebody had a rough night last night.”

Apparently my hefty coat of foundation hadn’t completely hidden the bags under my eyes. Nate, on the other hand, looked dapper as ever. He was in full uniform, pressed to perfection, sunglasses tucked neatly into his left breast pocket, and coffee mug in hand. His deep blue eyes looked different today, though. Wary, perhaps.

I threw the newspaper down on the table. “Alright, you got my attention.”

Nate set down his mug. “Took long enough.”

I glared at him for a moment, then sat down in the seat across from him. “I still think you’re crazy.”

Nate’s eyes locked with mine. He stared at me. Through me. Read between the lines. “So is that a yes?”

“As much as I’d like to tell you where to stick your plan, I can’t. I…can’t live like this, knowing I could be doing something and I’m not.”

“Welcome to my world,” he mumbled in a voice so low I wasn’t sure if he meant for me to hear it or not. He took a drink of coffee, then set the mug down, and extended his hand out across the table. “Glad you changed your mind.”

“There is one condition, though.”

His hand lowered to the table. “Which is?”

“Tell me why you are so hung up on this case.”

“I already told you.” He looked down and wrapped his hands carefully back around the coffee mug. “We can’t have—”

“Look, if you can’t be honest with me up front, there’s no way in hell I’m putting my life in your hands.”

His narrowed eyes found mine. After another moment, he looked away and cursed under his breath. “Somehow I knew you’d bring this back up.”

I leaned back in my seat and crossed my arms. “Well?”

Nate glanced around the shop. I didn’t bother—knew from experience that no one could hear us back here. Grace and I had freely gossiped in this corner for years. Still did, when we made a rare visit to our old stomping grounds.

His blue eyes flashed back to mine then, a fury burning just beneath the surface. “Maybe you’re not the only one with a vested interest in getting this person off the streets.”

“Keep talking.”

He turned his eyes back to the java before him. “I have a…relative…who works at Maxwell. Been there for years. They’re widowed, actually. And it was the murder of their spouse that convinced me to pick the career I did.”

A wave of guilt washed over me. Never in a million years would I have guessed that was his reason for staying involved. I’d pushed him for an answer, and had unintentionally dug into his soft underbelly. An intimate part of him I had no business asking him to share.

“Nate, I’m sorry. I didn’t kn—.”

“You asked for an honest answer, so I gave it to you.” He shrugged, tried to play it down. “It was a long time ago. But they’ve got two kids, Jessica. I can’t ask my cousin for help on this. And I’m not going to sit back and do nothing, either. Especially now that I know a homicidal maniac might be working along side them.”

How could I possibly say no to his proposal, knowing how much we both stood to lose? It was my turn to curse under my breath. I rose from the chair and slid my sunglasses back into place. “Then it looks like we have some work to do.”

Chapter 9

The doorbell rang just after four o’clock that afternoon. I steeled my resolve as I walked to answer it. Vowed to get this stupid plan of his moving forward, so we could get in, get out, and get both Grace and my lives back to normal.

I opened the door and found Nate on the front porch, eyes bright with an angelic smile on his face. He’d changed into street clothes: dark, well-worn jeans, a blue plaid flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up just enough to expose those muscular forearms of his again, and a bright white t-shirt underneath.

As I stood there thinking the man would probably look good in just about anything, the four-legged object sitting next to him caught my attention. It, and the slobber dangling lazily from its mouth.

“Um, hi. Whattcha got there?”

He cast a confused look down at the squatty, rotund bulldog, then back up at me. “Wow, Jessica. I’m beginning to seriously doubt the quality of public education around here.”

My eyes narrowed. “I know
what
it is. Why is it
here
?”

Nate threw me one of his most charming smiles as he lowered the black canvas bag he’d been shouldering to the ground. “This,” he said, and crouched down to rub under the pooch’s right ear, “is Brutus. My guard dog.”

I ducked a little and scanned the street behind him. “Why? Do you think you’re being followed?”

“Oh, heck no,” he said, standing back up. “I didn’t bring him along for me.”

“Then wha—?”

“Don’t worry, I’ll explain everything in due time. May we come in?”

I looked back down at Brutus, whose tongue had lolled out to retrieve the nearly-escaped strand of slobber and then disappeared again behind his protruding lower lip. “Sure,” I said, stepping aside. “Great. Come on in.”

“Not an animal lover?” he said with a smirk.

“I don’t
not
like them.” It wasn’t a lie. Truth was, I hadn’t always had the best of luck with animals. All the fish and small, furry critters I’d kept as a kid had usually died fairly quickly. Gave me one heck of complex.

Nate walked into the living room, his four-legged companion tromping along beside him. The beast kept his nose to the ground, taking in all the scents trapped in the fibers of our well-worn carpet. And leaving a slimy trail in his wake.

“Never knew I was until Brutus came along. A friend of mine got him a couple years ago, but found out a few days later he was allergic to dogs. I offered to watch Brutus while my buddy tried to find him a home.” Nate took his usual seat on the couch. Dog plopped his butt onto the ground next to Nate’s feet, nose still having a heyday with the carpet. “But after a few days, I got attached. Now he’s my buddy. Sharp as a whip, doesn’t shed too much. And the best part is, he’s low maintenance.”

I took a seat on the chair across from them and eyed the dog. Nothing about that animal said
sharp
to me, but I wasn’t about to argue—in fact, I’d promised myself that was one thing I would try
not
to do this visit. If Nate’s insane plan was ever going to get off the ground, I needed to keep my temper in check. “Uh-huh. So where’d you come up with his name?”

“It’s my favorite college team’s mascot.”

Brutus
? That ruled out the local favorites. I tried to remember the names of the rest of the Big Ten’s mascots. “So…you’re from Ohio, then?”

“My parents were. It’s hard to
buck
tradition,” he added with a wink.

“Yeah. Funny.” I didn’t know what else to say, since I really didn’t follow sports much.

“So.” He leaned forward and rubbed his hands together. “You ready to dive into the world of undercover work?”

Brutus looked up at the sound, realized there was no treat coming forthwith, and slumped back down onto the floor. Our nice, previously
clean
floor. I cleared my throat and tried my best to ignore Nate’s four-legged shadow—he’d be gone soon enough.

“I don’t have much of a choice, do I? I mean, it’s either do this, or sit and wait for Grace to wake up and tell me herself. By then she’ll have been framed and be out of a job. Besides, how can I know she’ll be safe unless we figure out who did this to her and stop them from doing it again? Or to someone else?”

Nate nodded in agreement, his jaw set. “Exactly.”

“But I’d feel a whole lot better if you’d explain to me how this is going to work.”

Nate unclipped Brutus’s leash and set it aside to reach for his backpack. “I had a feeling you’d ask.”

I held my breath, waiting for the dog to jump up and go tearing off through the house. My luck, he’d come running back into the living room carrying some embarrassing article of clothing he’d snagged from my laundry hamper—another purple panty incident all over again.

But my worries were wasted. Brutus stretched out onto his side and settled in for a nap.
Guard dog, my ass.

“I brought a few things with me that I think’ll work best for us.” Nate retrieved a few small boxes from his bag and set them on the coffee table between us. “See, when I’m not working for the Fort Wayne PD, I’m at the spy gear shop I own with my friend, Charlie. He’s a former detective, specialized in undercover surveillance.”

“Wow, your own shop? That’s pretty cool. Did you guys work together at the police department?”

“Yeah. Charlie was there when I first started. Took me under his wing when I tried my hand at detective work. He taught me everything I know about working undercover. After a while, we both started to see a gap in the market—personalized security systems and tools for homes and small businesses. So we decided, what the hell? Let’s set up a shop.”

Protector and entrepreneur both? Not too shabby. “And how’s that been working out for you?”

Nate shrugged. “At first, most of our sales came by word of mouth. But when those early customers discovered how much we had to offer, our referral business began to multiply. And when business really started to boom, Charlie left the force to run it full time.” Pride shone in his eyes.

“So, why Charlie and not you?”

“Charlie’s a better bean counter than I am. Plus, he was always butting heads with his superiors. Charlie tells it like he sees it. It was probably best for everyone that he left to run the shop.”

I could relate with Charlie—working from home meant no head-butting with your superiors.

“Alright, enough about all that.” He withdrew a slender, silver chain adorned with a half moon-shaped pendant from the fist box and dangled it before me. “So, any guess as to what this is?”

“A necklace?”

“To the unsuspecting eye, yes. But it’s also a tracking device. With my laptop,” he said, and retrieved that from inside his bag as well, “I can trace where the person wearing this is, where they’ve been, and how fast they’re moving, all within an accuracy of about three feet.”

“Sweet!” I scooted to the edge of my chair and leaned in for a better look. “Man, too bad they don’t make dog collars like that. People would never lose their dogs!”

Nate chuckled. “Oh, they do. Where do you think this idea came from?”