Intimate Caresses (The Love and Danger Series) (13 page)

Gathering the papers, she carried them into the kitchen were Brock was busy writing something down.  As soon as he saw her face, he knew something was up.  “Hey, let me call you back.  I think Nina might have something.”

Nina spread the printed e-mail messages out on the kitchen table and picked up her pen.  “This is some sort of code, although I don’t know what it represents.  It looks fairly simple but here,” she pointed to words.  “Each word is either four or five letters long.”  She sifted through several more messages.  “Here, look at all of these.  It seems as if they discuss business, he gives her instructions or she informs him of whatever is happening on the various projects, but then they revert to the coded part of their communication.”  She pointed out several of the words. “And here,” she said as she shifted the papers, “is where they started this crazy talk.”  She tapped the pen against her chin.  “I don’t see this in any of the messages that they send to other people, so I think it’s just a private game they were playing.”

“But what does it mean?”

She shrugged. “I have no idea.  It could be they were counting something, or a phone number…”

“Of fours or fives?” he asked, not believing it.  “No.  It’s something…” he looked at the words.  “
They’re directions,” he said in almost a mumble, still not sure if he was right.  “Come on,” he said and moved back to his computer.  He pulled up a map of the city.  “If each four letter word means to turn left,” he said and followed the route, “and each five letter word is to turn right.”  Again, he pointed through the arrows but then threw his hands up in the air. “Okay, that was wrong.” 

Nina bit her lip, shaking her head. “No, I think you’re onto something.” 

She was about to pull up a chair, but he shifted so that she was sitting on his lap instead.  She perched on the edge, unaware of Brock looking at her long back and dropping down to her bottom as she contemplated the words.  “See anything interesting?” he asked, shifting her so that he had a better view of her lacy bra.

She tapped her pen against the words. “Here,” she said and scribbled something out.  “Start from my office building,” she pointed to the computer monitor where the map was still up.  “Then go,” she counted the words, “Five blocks and turn right.”  She waited for him to do that.  “Then six blocks, turn left.”  They went through the rest of the sentence and, sure enough, they ended up at a hotel on the outskirts of town.  “These last few sentences on each message were directions to their
rendezvous points.”  They went through several more e-mail messages, all of them ending up at some cheap hotel on the outskirts of the city. 

She leaned back, feeling a marvelous sense of success, only to realize that Brock was looking at her and not
the computer screen.  “What are you staring at?” she asked suspiciously. 

Brock chuckled.  “I was considering our next
rendezvous.”

She turned around, throwing her arms around his neck and smiled down at him.  “You were being a man, weren’t you?”

“Always,” he told her and pulled her closer, his hand resting on her bottom.  “And I enjoy being a man.  Especially around you.”

Nina laughed and kissed him.  “What’s next on the investigation?” she asked
, eager to figure out the next puzzle.

Brock blinked and pulled back abruptly.  “I guess I’d better tell Colt about this.  Fill him on what you’ve figured out.”

Nina started to stand up from his lap, about to give him privacy but he pulled her right back down.  “Stay here.  You deserve most of the credit,” he said and pressed two buttons on his desk phone.

“
Whatcha got?” Colt answered, his deep voice sounding grumbly through the phone lines.

Brock explained what Nina had figured out, smiling when Colt came back with, “I’ll be dammed.” 

“We’ve gone through seven of the messages, all of them end up at a hotel.  There are five more that didn’t work the trend.”

“Try starting from either her apartment or his house,” Colt suggested.

Brock nodded and worked through one of those that didn’t work as an office starting point and sure enough, it worked.  “You’re right.  I’ll run through the rest and note the various hotels.”

“We can then take their pictures to the hotel offices to see if they recognize either of them.”

“Monday?” Brock pointed out.

“Yep.
  See you Monday.”

Brock pressed the button on the
phone which disconnected them from Colt.  Looking down at her, he slid his hand along her yoga covered thigh.  “What do you want to do for the rest of the weekend?” he asked, his tone not leaving any doubt as to what he wanted to do.

“The whole weekend?” she asked, stunned and surprised.   But her arms were already moving to wrap around his neck. 

“I guess it’s already Sunday so most of the weekend is gone.  But there’s the rest of today.  What might be on your lovely brain to do today?” he asked, bending down to nibble on her neck.  “After all, you’re going to have to eat.  You didn’t eat enough at breakfast to keep a bird alive.”

She laughed, more at the way his lips and teeth were nibbling at her ear than his words, but they were funny too.  “I’m not a two hundred pound giant like some people in this room.  I don’t need to eat like one.”

He growled and lifted her into his arms, carrying her back to his bedroom.  “I need to make sure you’re hungry enough at lunch time.”  He stopped in the hallway and looked down at her laughing eyes.  “On second thought, maybe this not-eating enough stuff is a good thing.”

He continued down the hallway. 

“Oh?  Why is that?” she asked a moment before he tossed her into the center of his bed, then followed her down, his hands already smoothing her clothes off of her slender legs.

“Maybe if I get you too weak from hunger, you’ll be too weak to tell me no when I ask you to marry me again.”

She laughed and tried to wiggle away, obviously not trying too hard.  “You think that’s going to work?”

He chuckled and bit
the hem of her shirt and lifted it higher since his hands were holding her pinned to the bed.  “Oh, I have many ways to try and lower your resistance,” he explained a moment before he started nibbling on her stomach and hip bone.

Nina laughed, feeling elated and astonished.  She’d never laughed in bed before.  It had al
ways been a serious, get-in and get-out type of activity.  She hadn’t minded the rush, preferring it with her ex.  He’d been a poor lover compared to Brock but now she was discovering so much about her sexuality, all thanks to this amazing, enormous man who was shockingly creative!

Colt rolled his eyes as he watched Brock walk into the conference room.  “Good grief.  Wipe that smile off of your face.  You look ridiculous.”

Brock took the stress ball that was always lying about somewhere and threw it at Colt, but he wasn’t really into the effort so the missile barely reached his victim.  “Can I help it if I spent a great weekend with a beautiful woman?”

Colt snorted and tossed the envelope that contained the pictures of the various suspects in the murder investigation.  “Are you ready to drag our way through the hotel slums of Chicago?” he asked with resignation. 

Brock slipped out all of the pictures,
his stomach tightening when he thought of how the victim had treated all of the women in his life, including Nina.  He wanted to find the murderer, but he was having a hard time feeling sorry for the dead guy. 

“Let’s roll,” he said.

For the next four hours, Colt and Brock drove from one sleazy hotel to the next.  At most of the hotels, the person at the reception desk recognized the victim.  After that, it was just a matter of which woman he was with.  Shockingly, sometimes it was even the wife who showed up with her husband.  Brock assumed it was just their way of adding a bit of spice to the marriage. 

“Unfortuna
tely, this morning’s adventures only tell us is that the victim was an ass who slept around with his wife, his nanny and his administrative assistant.  It still doesn’t get us any closer to finding out who killed him.”

Brock knew that and sighed with exasperation.  “I know.  I was hoping someone would give us a juicy bit of gossip that would point us in one direction or another.  Right now, we just have an adulterer who died.”

“Exactly,” Colt said and leaned his head back against the headrest.  “What about if we expand our investigation?  We’re pretty sure that the wife was either the shooter or the poisoner.  But we don’t have probable cause to search her house for either the gun or the poison.”

“Because her medical records show that she hasn’t ever been prescribed that medication.
  Nor has anyone in her family.”

Colt nodded,
thinking about the issue.  Then something occurred to him and a smile slowly formed on his handsome features. “That was only for his immediate family.”

Brock and Colt
were on the same path.  Their eyes connected as their thoughts merged on the same possibility.  “The wife has a brother,” Brock offered, leaning forward as the pieces of the puzzle started to fall into place.  “Did you do a background check on him?” he asked.

Colt was grinning now. 
“Nope.  But I’d bet lunch today that he has a prescription for allergy medicine.”

Brock chuckled.  “I don’t think I’m going to take that bet,” he said. 

Colt started the engine on his SUV and backed out of the parking space, heading right back to the police station.  Both of them were heads down for the rest of the afternoon, connecting the dots, putting the information up on the white board that would help them visualize their investigation to date. 

“Bingo!” Brock said when the report came back on
the wife’s brother.  “He’s been on allergy medicine, the same formula that was found in the victim’s body, for the past seven years.”

Colt shook his head, wondering why people didn’t think the police could find these things out.  “So the wife is looking good for the attempted murder.  We still need to make sure the assistant didn’t also have access to that drug as well.  And both women had access to a
thirty-eight pistol.”

“So did the nanny, actually.”

Colt grimaced with that announcement.  “You’re right.”  He sighed and braced his hands on his desk.  “Where do you want to go from here?”

Brock thought about picking up Nina and spending the rest of the night in her bed, in her arms.  “Let’s check on the known relatives of the assistant,” he replied, resigned to a late night.  If it meant getting this case solved faster, he was all for it.  “If she doesn’t have any connection to the murder, I still think we should search her place for the murder weapon.”

“But on what grounds?”

Brock shrugged his shoulders.  “Because I think she’s guilty.”

Colt laughed.  “Agreed, but guilty of stupidity for fooling around with her boss?  Or guilty of murdering her boss?”

“There’s always the lipstick,” Brock pointed out.

That startled Colt.  “You’re right.  The two different shades of lipstick.”

“One was the nanny’s.  We’re pretty sure about that.”

“And the wife has access to the weapon, plus the drug used to try and poison the victim.”

“And motive
if she knew her husband was cheating on her.  We can’t forget motive.”

Colt nodded his head.  “We just need to get in and search the assistant’s apartment at the same time
we search the wife’s house.”

“She’s probably gotten rid of the weapon.”

Colt shrugged.  “It wouldn’t be the first time a criminal was stupid enough to keep the murder weapon.”

Brock laughed.  “Okay.  Good point.  Maybe she hid it somewhere in that apartment.”

“If that’s the case,” Colt cringed, “we’ll never find it.”

By eight o’clock, Brock was ready to call it quits.  “Okay, I’m done,” he said, rubbing his eyes that were sore from squinting at data on his laptop.  “I’m going to find my woman and try and figure out why she won’t marry me.”

Colt was getting up at that point but he almost tripped over his chair when he heard his partner’s words.  “Did you just say married?” he demanded.

Sam and Hannah were walking into the conference room but Hannah squealed and threw her arms around Brock.  “That’s so exciting! 
When are you going to propose?”

Walker was leaning against the wall by that point as well, glaring at Brock.  “What the hell are you thinking?” he demanded. 

Hannah released Brock and both Sam and Colt turned to face the angry man.  “It’s okay,” Sam said, slapping their friend on the shoulder.  “Nina’s a good woman.”

Hannah looked at Walker, worried and anxious.  “
Of course she is a good person!  Brock wouldn’t fall in love with a bad woman.”  She turned to smile up at the man in question.  “When are you going to propose?”  She turned to Walker.  “If there’s ever a woman that one of you guys fall for that isn’t a good person, I promise I won’t like her as well, okay?”

Walker
’s eyes smiled down at the adorable, bubbly brunette.  “Deal,” he replied and chucked her under the chin softly.  “Glad you’re watching out for us, little lady.”

Hannah rolled her eyes.  “I’m not so little.  You all are just irritatingly big,” she said and came to stand next to Sam.  “Okay, so I’m dragging this big guy out of here.  Brock is off to
be with his woman.  What are your plans?” she asked Colt and Walker.

Colt looked at Walker. “Let’s go get a beer,” he said.

The two men hurried out, not wanting to be around the happy half of their group.  At least not tonight. 

Brock drove over to Nina’s house.  She
wasn’t answering her phone, but he suspected that was only because she was wrapped up in whatever she was doing on all of that computer equipment in her family room.  He wanted to ask her what she was doing, but every time he thought about it, she distracted him somehow. 

Not a bad thing, he thought.  He hoped she would distract him again tonight.  “I’m on my way over, Nina.  I’ll bring dinner because I’m guessing you had a yogurt for dinner or something equally non-dinner-like and only ate half of it.”  He thought about her eating habits and knew he wanted to fatten her up just a bit.  Not that she was too skinny.  He just was worried
about her health.  She really didn’t eat enough.  There was no way she was getting enough nutrients on the tiny nibbles she normally ate.  “I’ll be there in a half hour.  Call me if I’m too late and you’re already in bed.”

Precisely a half hour later, he was skipping up the stairs to
her apartment with a bag filled with sandwiches from a great little bistro he’d been wanting to try.  Knocking on her door, she answered almost immediately. 

Nina didn’t realize how adorable she looked.  She was distracted, trying to finish up this one small part of her project before Brock arrived.  But she hadn’t finished it and she just had….

With a sigh, she poked her pen into the messy bun on top of her head.  “Hi there,” she said shyly as she opened the door wider so he could enter her apartment.

“Good evening, beautiful,” Brock replied, stepping through the door and pulling her into his arms.  She resisted only slightly this time before her arms were wrapped around his neck and her body melted against his.  A good start to the night, he thought. 

Lifting his head, he looked down into her soft eyes.  “I think we should get married,” he said, closing the door with his foot so he didn’t have to pull away from her.

Nina laughed and pulled out of his arms.  “I’m not that weak yet.”

Brock sighed.  She thought he was joking?  Not at all!

“Why not this time?” he asked and handed her a sub sandwich, tossing her uneaten cup of yogurt into the trash.  She’d obviously been working since she’d arrived home.  She was still in her work clothes, only slipping off her sexy heels and pulling her hair up off of her neck. 

“Same reason,” she said and opened the bottle of lemonade he handed to her. 

“Not a good enough reason.”  He wandered over to the computer screen, wanting to see what had captured her attention so thoroughly.  “What is this?” he asked.

Nina quickly pressed the button that would start the screen saver, hiding her work.  She didn’t think Brock was someone who understood computer code, but he was pretty smart and could figure things out.  “Just a project I’m working on,” she replied.  “It’s too messy in here. Why don’t we go somewhere else?” she suggested.  She took a bite of her sandwich and took several steps away, pulling the pen out of her hair that had twisted her hair off of her neck. 

When she realized he wasn’t following her, she pulled the other three pens out of her hair, letting it tumbled down her back.  “Coming big boy?” she asked, enticing him in the only way she knew how.

Brock forgot about his sandwich, no longer hungry for food.  Nina was like a siren, luring him in to crash on the rocks.  And he was loving every moment of it.

Nina squealed in delight when he lifted her into his arms and carried
her the rest of the way to her bedroom.  She held her sandwich and her lemonade in her hands, protecting them.  “Aren’t you going to let me eat?” she asked, laughing.

“Oh no!” he growled.  “You don’t get to tempt me like that and then deny the prize.”  He took her sandwich and set it beside the bed.  With swift hands, he had both of them naked and breathing hard.  “Damn woman!” he said through gritted teeth, trying to control the passion she elicited within him.  “You drive me crazy!”

Nina tried to tell him that she felt the same way, but his hands and mouth were everywhere.  She could barely breathe much less talk.  So she let her body tell him what she needed.  And Brock was fabulously good at reading body language!