Hostile Makeover (3 page)

Lacey never really felt small until she was wrapped in Vic’s arms and looking up at him. She was five-foot-five in her stocking feet, next to his muscular six feet. She pulled away and tossed him the towel.

“A call would have been nice.”

“And ruin the surprise? I just wanted to make sure you hadn’t gotten into any more trouble since last week.”

“What kind of trouble could I possibly get into?”

He cocked an eye at her. “I’m sure I’ll find out. Did you know the front door of your building is wide open?”

“Broken. Just try getting something fixed around here.”

They had just come to the decision to revive their long-frustrated romance and try to take it to another level. But Vic’s business was getting in the way. There always seemed to be something pulling them apart. And he was unhappy about her recent accidental involvement in crime solving. “Leave it to the professionals,” was Vic’s rule.

He had recently returned from Steamboat Springs, Colorado, where he sold his home to his ex-wife, who was now divorced again—and available. At the thought of Montana McCandless Donovan Schmidt, Lacey could feel her upper lip curl. Vic had made it back from Colorado just in time for Gloria Adams’s long-delayed funeral the previous weekend, a funeral that Lacey had sworn would be a new beginning. And Vic Donovan was a big part of Lacey’s new personal love-life makeover plan.

After years as a small-town cop and finally chief of police, Vic was now working for his dad, who had retired from the Pentagon to set up one of the most well-connected security firms in the Washington area. Vic was involved in running a big project that made huge demands on his time and pulled him away at odd hours. Worse, he said he couldn’t discuss it. Lacey assumed it was contract work for the Department of Homeland Security, but she couldn’t drag a word out of him. She made a mental note to revise her interrogation methods. They had been doing way too much talking anyway.

“Before I make a fool of myself, Lacey, I want to get one thing straight. About Jeffrey Bentley Holmes. Is he going to get in our way?”

“We were just friends.” She didn’t know what to think about Jeffrey. “And it’s rather awkward after the rather untidy exposé I wrote about his family.” She winced at the memory.

“You have to factor those things into the risk assessment when you date a reporter.”

“Oh, really.” She raised an eyebrow at him. “What have you factored into your risk assessment?”

“That the benefits outweigh the risks. I think.”

“Very funny.”

“About Holmes . . .”

Lacey had received a letter the other day from Jeffrey Bentley Holmes, nephew of the famous designer Hugh Bentley, following her latest story on the Gloria Adams murder. He said it was painful for the family dirty laundry to be aired in public, but it had been done before and no doubt would be again, and he held no grudges. She wasn’t sure whether she believed him.

Mother is hospitalized under psychiatric care for the foreseeable future,
Jeffrey wrote.
Uncle Hugh has decided it would be better that I distance myself from the Bentley name, Cousin Aaron no longer talks to me, Aunt Marilyn refuses to speak my name. Only the lawyers are speaking to other lawyers, and there has been talk of my disinheritance. So, as you see, things are looking up. My retreat here at the monastery has offered a most needed respite, but I soon will have to decide what to do next.
Lacey hadn’t written back yet. She didn’t know what to say.

Vic waited for her answer.

“Darling, there is nothing between me and Jeffrey.”

“I saw you kiss him.”

“He kissed me. There is a difference, and besides, you hadn’t called or written for months while you were out of pocket in Steamboat. What’s a girl to do?”

“I’m not a letter writer,” he protested. “And we’re talking about
now
. Next time I’ll be sure to use the Pony Express.” She raised her eyebrow again. “And e-mail. I’ll e-mail. But Lacey . . .” His green eyes were warm as he reached and pulled her into a kiss so deep that she forgot what she was doing. “Don’t go around kissing anyone but me, okay?”

“Okay.”
Who else would I want to kiss?

A tremendous bolt of lightning flashed outside. Vic moved swiftly through the living room. He opened the French doors to the covered balcony to take advantage of the stunning view of the sheets of rain and the sky still bright with beating thunderbolts, their clean white strikes arcing into the river. He stepped outside. “Some storm, huh?”

“I ordered it special for you.” She stood at the open door.

Vic took hold of her hand and pulled her next to him, holding her close while she shivered. “I’ve been thinking, Lacey. We should really get away for a while.”

Her heart jumped. “You want to get away?
You
and
me?
Are you talking about you and me—
together?
”

“I think it’s time, don’t you?” He tilted her face up and met her eyes. “I want us together pretty badly, and I get a feeling you do too.” There was no denying that she wanted to be with Vic, but she had never heard him say it so plainly before. “We’ve waited long enough.” He leaned in and kissed her forehead, then her cheek and her neck, raising her temperature and sending chills through her at the same time. “And if we don’t do it soon, I’ll be up to my ears in this new contract. And then we’ll both, you know—explode. It’ll be messy.”

“Well . . .” She hesitated. It was complicated. Although he had flirted with her mercilessly the entire two years she worked in Sagebrush, Colorado, they had never dated there. Back then he was the chief of police, and she was the cops reporter on the tiny daily newspaper: a slight conflict of interest. There had been enormous sexual tension between them, but Vic was in the middle of a divorce from the infamous Montana—and Lacey refused to consider him while he was married. “Straitlaced,” he had called it; “high standards,” she had replied.

“I’ve waited for you for six years, Lacey.”

“Technically, I’m not so sure you’ve been waiting, Vic Donovan,” she countered. “And I certainly haven’t been exactly—”

“Now you shut up.” He kissed her again.

Catching her breath, she said, “Okay. What exactly did you have in mind?”

“Something romantic, preferably somewhere you can’t run away from me.”

“Me? Run away?” Of course, she had run away once from a man—not Vic—who asked her to marry him, and they were probably still talking about it back in Sagebrush.

“You’ll like it.” He grinned at her and his hands moved up the small of her back. “We’ll go away for the weekend. Before Halloween.” She opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her off. “I know a place. I’ll take care of everything. You think you can stay out of trouble until then?” He kissed her neck.

“What do you mean, trouble?”

“Oh, you know, dead bodies, crazed killers, running with scissors, that sort of thing.”

“Those were just freak occurrences. Besides, it’s going to be a very simple week. I only have to interview one diva supermodel introducing her new line of clothing, which I very much doubt she had anything to do with. A major snoozefest. How dangerous can it be?” Then she thought of something else, and a look must have crossed her face.

“What? What is it?”

“Well, it’s only a rumor, but this supermodel, Amanda Manville, has kind of a reputation.”

“As what?” He was wearing his cop face. He looked suspicious.

Lacey didn’t want to say,
Amanda Manville has a reputation as a killer.
It might set him off. She cleared her throat. “Nothing. I’m sure it’s nothing.”

“Lacey, I’m waiting,” Vic said, his green eyes locked on hers. She could see how suspects would spill their guts to him.

“There’s a rumor, and it’s never been confirmed, probably because it’s not true, right? It’s totally a supermarket-tabloid story, and there never has been a body or charges or indictments or anything, but Amanda Manville is supposed to have, um . . . killed, um . . . an old boyfriend.”

“You’re making this up,” he said, doubt still wavering behind his eyes. “You’re yanking my chain.”

“Your chain should be so lucky, big fella. And I try not to make up what I report. I work for
The Eye Street Observer,
after all. Not
The New York Times
. But I thought you would like to know about Ms. Manville. As I said, it’s only a rumor. Completely unfounded, I’m sure.”
I hope. I’ll call Miguel in New York tomorrow. He’ll know.

“Are you sure, Lacey?” He stroked her cheek with his fingers. She marveled at how such large hands could be so gentle. “Because I really want to see you in one incredibly sexy piece by the end of the week.”

“Incredibly sexy?” He kissed her so hard her toes curled. “Silly boy, what could possibly happen?”
Indeed, how many murders could possibly happen in one lifetime that I could possibly get involved with? I figure I’m done.
He kissed her again.
Incredibly sexy, huh?

Vic laughed. “What could happen? With you on the story? Oh, darlin’, don’t get me started.” He gave Lacey another kiss and then zipped up his jacket. “I have to go.”

“Go? You can’t go now!”

“It’s tearing me up, honey, but there’s this last-minute job I have to take over, a big surveillance for Dad.”

“But you just got here. Come on, you’re exhausted. You need to rest. Lie down. Prolonged bed rest is what Dr. Smithsonian orders.”

“Smile and think of me, Doc. And be careful.” He turned and kissed her again before walking out the door. She admired his well-muscled flanks as he sauntered down the hall. He turned and saluted her, flashing a devastating smile before stepping onto the elevator. “I’ll be thinking of you.”

Isn’t that just like a man? Gets you all hot and bothered and then waltzes right out the door.

Chapter 3

“How do you do it, Smithsonian? The attack of the killer doughnut sign, and there you are, right alongside the staff trouble magnet!”

Douglas MacArthur Jones’s deep voice greeted her. Lacey’s boss, “Mac” to everyone who knew him, held up the front page of
The Eye Street Observer,
featuring a photo of the famous HOT DOUGHNUTS NOW sign, angled upside down, looking like a piece of modern sculpture rising out of Harlan Wiedemeyer’s vanquished Volvo. Wiedemeyer was standing next to it, holding several boxes of Krispy Kreme delicacies and wearing a silly grin on his face.

“Great photo, Mac. So I’m not the staff trouble magnet anymore? Wiedemeyer stole my title?”

“You’re trouble, all right. But compared to Wiedemeyer, you’re small potatoes.” Mac was wearing a blue ink stain below the pocket of his peach-colored short-sleeved dress shirt, where a pen had exploded. The purple madras-plaid tie didn’t quite go with the shirt or the ink stain, and his pants were an inexplicable bright blue, as though they’d been cut from a beach umbrella. Though he was in the presence of the newspaper’s resident fashion expert, or what passed for one in Washington, she knew he wouldn’t appreciate her advice. Mac, who was editor of
The Eye
, merely shook his head and handed over the newspaper. He always reminded Lacey of a black G. Gordon Liddy, similar in mustache and eyebrows and polished dome, but the polar opposite in politics.

“It was Harlan’s car, not mine. He gets all the glory. This time.” Lacey headed to her desk while Mac followed.

“Too bad you weren’t in the photo. We could start a collection. The Smithsonian portfolio.”

“Sure. All I need is another ridiculously silly photo of me in the paper.”

“You got fans. I’m not so sure about Wiedemeyer. Not even all those ‘poor bastards’ he keeps talking about. Of course, most of them are dead. But you, Lacey—you take a good picture.”

Lacey was still smarting from her last picture. Taken by her hairstylist, Stella, of all people, it had appeared on the front page of her paper the previous month. She was caught wearing a great designer dress and brandishing an antique Victorian sword cane, technically known, she’d been told, as a “flick stick,” while fending off an enraged killer at a prestigious fashion gala.
I looked like a maniac. Great dress, though.

“That Stella could have a new career,” Mac goaded.

“It was sheer luck,” Lacey said. Stella was still glorying in her moment of fame.

“She has a talent for being in the right place at the right time.”

“What about me?”

“You somehow always manage to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Unfortunately, that seemed true enough. The photo was a sensation on DeadFed dot com, the local all-conspiracy-theories-all-the-time Web site that had a host of crazed devotees, including her best friend, Brooke Barton. The photo had even reached Colorado and elicited an urgent long-distance phone call of concern from her mother. Lacey tried never to upset her mother, who inevitably offered a little unasked-for advice.
Unasked-for, uncalled-for, and unending.

“Too bad, circulation went up with that one,” Mac said. “Speaking of which, that photo for the head of your column—”

“We weren’t speaking about it, Mac. It’s an unspeakable idea.” Lacey settled down at her desk and turned on her computer, all the better to ignore her e-mail.

“We need to speak about it.” Mac made himself comfortable perched on the edge of her desk. “
The Eye
is getting a makeover, in case you hadn’t heard. A whole new look. New layout. New graphic design, new features, new columns, new beats. Our consultants tell me all columns are to feature a photo of the writer at the head. Next to your byline.”

“That’s not new, Mac! It is so 1950s, and I hate the Fifties, the era of female bondage. And a reporter’s copy ought to stand on its own two feet, not on who has the cutest little yearbook photo next to their name. Besides, it’ll make us look like a bunch of boring talking heads, like one of those yammering news-talk shows this town is infamous for.”