Buch lesen: «Under The Covers»

1

EXHAUSTED, Detective Blake Hammond dropped into the worn leather chair, leaned back and propped his polished brown loafers on the edge of the gray metal desk. He glanced at the clock hanging on the far wall and managed a tired grin, anxious to wrap up the long unproductive night of surveillance. In less than twelve hours he’d be on a 747 to the Hawaiian Islands. The most strenuous item on his agenda consisted of downing a variety of fruity rum drinks, while appreciating the view of sunbathing beauties intent on deepening their tans under the warm tropical sunshine.

Life was good, and bound to be an improvement over the last month, which had been filled with long hours that hadn’t garnered a solid arrest. For the past two weeks, he’d been convinced the lead from a snitch was a dead end. A series of robberies in Los Angeles’s high-rent district had the lieutenant demanding a bust, but so far, Blake and his new partner, Lucas Stone, had turned up nothing. The robberies were clean, no forced entry and not a single print or scrap of evidence left by the perps.

“You don’t have to gloat, Hammond.” Luke tossed a thin file near Blake’s feet. “It’s depressing to the rest of us grunts left behind to deal with the criminal element.”

“I’ve earned the right to gloat,” Blake said with a chuckle, swinging his feet to the floor. “I haven’t had a vacation in over three years. For the next fourteen days the only surveillance I’m planning has to do with curvy, suntanned, string-bikini-clad bodies glistening with coconut-scented oil.”

Luke dropped into the chair behind the desk adjacent to Blake’s. “Great,” he grumbled, reaching for the phone after shoving a lock of sandy-brown hair off his forehead. “I’m stuck partnering that blowhard bore, Pearson, while you’re scoping beach-bound Bettys. There’s just something unfair about that.”

“You know what they say about life being fair,” Blake said without an ounce of remorse, glancing up as Lieutenant Forbes came out of his office.

“Hammond. A minute,” Forbes barked. His salt-and-pepper eyebrows were pulled into a heavy frown Blake was certain didn’t bode well.

Blake shot a look in his partner’s direction. Luke shrugged and punched numbers into the telephone keypad.

“Close the door,” Forbes ordered when Blake walked into the lieutenant’s office. He perched on the edge of his desk while Blake propped his backside on the arm of the leather sofa that sat against the far wall.

“I’m canceling your vacation.”

Blake came off the sofa. “No. You’re not.” Let Forbes write him up for insubordination. He needed a vacation before he made a serious, and costly, mistake. The previous week he’d gotten a little too rough with a suspect. He didn’t want to think about what could’ve happened if Luke hadn’t pulled him off the creep. Blake had been appalled by his own behavior. His usual calm and patience had slipped out of frustration, telling him loud and clear he was overdue for some much needed R and R, something he planned to rectify in the next twelve hours.

A tired cop made mistakes. An overworked cop was dangerous.

A frustrated cop was deadly.

“I haven’t had time off in three years,” Blake said, frowning. He stuffed his hands in the front pockets of his pressed khaki trousers and gave Forbes a hard look. “I’m tired, Lieutenant. I need a break.”

Forbes crossed his arms over his barrel chest. “I know you need a vacation, Hammond. I wouldn’t do this to you, but I don’t have a choice. I need someone to go undercover with DEA.”

“DEA? Oh, come on, Lieutenant. I’m not in the mood to be hassled by some government agent over petty jurisdictional issues. Give it to Stone. I’m tired.”

“Stone’s too involved in the uptown robbery. I need someone familiar to stay on that case. You’re the only one free for the next couple of weeks.”

“A couple of weeks somewhere warm and tropical, not holed up with an uptight, arrogant DEA agent.”

“It’ll be light duty.”

Blake gave a harsh laugh. “Light duty? With the DEA involved? Yeah, and the CIA’s adopted a kinder, gentler method of interrogation, too. Tell me another fairy tale, Lieutenant.”

“I’m still your superior officer, Hammond,” Forbes said in that cold-as-steel voice he’d perfected as a beat cop back in the glory days of the LAPD. “This is a special situation and you’re needed.”

Blake took a deep breath and attempted to summon his trademark calm and cool demeanor. He felt as if he was fighting a losing battle as the thought of handing in his shield played on the fringes of his mind. Just the fact that he even considered walking out was solid proof he needed to get away for a while. Good cops didn’t make mistakes, or take their frustrations out on suspects. The role of good cop was as natural as breathing to him.

Lately he’d forgotten how to breathe.

“Is that an order, Lieutenant?” he asked, his voice filled with a composure that felt far too foreign to be realistic.

Forbes returned Blake’s hard stare with one of his own. “Yeah, Hammond. It’s an order.”

Irritation climbed up Blake’s spine and settled in his neck. He let out a long breath and rubbed at the tension. “Fine,” he said after another deep breath that did little to ease his frustration. “My airline ticket’s nonrefundable. I want to be reimbursed.” If the department was going to screw him out of a vacation, then they could damn well pay for the privilege, he thought irritably.

Forbes nodded sharply. “I’ll see what I can do about it. This is coming from the brass upstairs, so it shouldn’t be a problem. As soon as you’ve wrapped this assignment up, you can take off.”

With nothing else to say, Blake dropped onto the edge of the sofa. He didn’t like it, and the churning in his gut confirmed his suspicions. He despised being backed into a corner, but an order was an order which left him with no other option than to comply. “What am I getting into?”

Forbes circled the desk, opened a file and stood with his hands braced on the large desk. “This isn’t just an L.A. problem,” he said looking at Blake. “The word on the street is a new designer drug is hitting the West Coast. There are already reports that it’s starting to show up in the Midwest and, we can assume, moving farther east.”

“Colombians?” Blake asked. He was familiar with drug trafficking, as were all the detectives in Vice. Busting the bad guys, the small-timers and even the movers and shakers in the underworld was part of his everyday life. The only reason he and Luke had been stuck on the uptown robbery detail was that their snitch had refused to provide information to anyone other than Luke.

“Not this time,” Forbes answered, shifting his attention to the open file. “According to Ronnie Carmichael, the agent you’ll be working with, this new brand of synthetic coke is being smuggled into the States through Avalon.”

Blake leaned forward, braced his elbows on his legs, and clasped his hands between his knees. “Catalina Island?” Interesting, he thought. Southern California’s island retreat was more of a place for lovers and honeymooners than drug traffickers. “How are they getting it out?”

A knock at the door had Forbes moving around his desk. “DEA suspects it’s being brought out by chopper or run out of Avalon Harbor on the launches,” he said, reaching the door and resting his hand on the knob. “There are about twenty or more runs back and forth between Avalon and Long Beach Harbor per day.”

“Which provides plenty of opportunity for movement,” Blake surmised.

“Considering the Coast Guard has never paid a whole lot of attention to the water taxis, you’re right.”

“That could explain how the stuff’s getting out of Avalon.”

“That’s what you’re going to find out,” Forbes said as he opened the door. “And stop.”

Standing in the threshold was a woman. Not just any woman, but a breathtakingly beautiful one. Blake gazed into eyes a startling shade of brilliant turquoise and felt his heart slam into his ribs.

“I apologize for being late,” she said quickly.

She shifted her attention to Forbes, and away from that instant spark of awareness Blake would bet his badge she’d felt, too. Not only did she have the softest, sweetest voice he’d ever heard with just a trace of a Southern accent he found sexy as sin, but the slight smile canting her lips caused an adorable dimple to wink at him. “Your L.A. interchange was a little more than I expected.”

Forbes commanded her attention and ushered her into the room while Blake took advantage of her movements, allowing his gaze to travel the length of her. He had no idea who she was, but she had the kind of legs that made a man sit up and take notice, slender and shapely, like the rest of her. When it came to the appreciation of women, Blake considered himself an expert. And in his expert opinion, the curvaceous brunette was a vast improvement over the last department secretary. If this was the type of support staff personnel was placing in the detectives’ bureau, he might just stop complaining about having to ride a desk for hours at a time to deal with the endless stream of paperwork.

Her sensible, low-heeled pumps clicked sharply on the linoleum as she crossed the small office space to the pair of mismatched chairs opposite Forbes’s desk. Always the gentleman, Blake stood, hoping to gain an introduction to the petite dream come true.

A straight peach skirt reached just above her shapely knees and a soft, floral-print blouse brought out the intriguing color of her eyes. He usually liked his women tall, but he’d make an exception for the looker with a thick file tucked under her arm.

She glanced over her shoulder at him, and Blake flashed her his most winning smile. Delicately arched eyebrows rose briefly, and those turquoise eyes looked him up and down without showing the slightest hint of interest, curious or otherwise, before turning her attention back to the lieutenant.

Just as well, Blake thought, even if he didn’t buy her disinterest for a nanosecond. She more than piqued his interest, but she was off-limits since the department had a strict fraternization policy that applied to all law enforcement and support staff personnel.

“Blake,” Forbes said, drawing his attention from her lethal legs. “This is Special Agent Veronica Carmichael, from the Drug Enforcement Agency. Ronnie will be your partner for the next couple of weeks.”

Blake looked from the slight grin tugging his superior’s lips to the lust-inspiring brunette and back again. Ronny was Ronnie?

“This is a practical joke, right?” he asked desperately.

No way was all that honey and sweetness an uptight, arrogant DEA agent. The few times he’d crossed paths with Drug Enforcement agents, they were hard-drinking, rough-talking, take-no-prisoners brick walls of solid muscle with a penchant for risking their thick, beefy necks. She didn’t look as if she could withstand a brisk Santa Ana wind, let alone wrestle a whacked-out dust dealer to the ground.

“I assure you, Detective,” she said, a flash of determination lining her delicate Southern accent. “I’m no joke.”

“You’re going to be my partner?” he asked carefully.

“I hope you don’t have a problem taking orders from a woman,” she said, a saccharine smile curving her lips.

“Taking orders?” he asked incredulously. “There must be a page missing from my script. Would you mind starting from the top?”

She turned to face him fully, settling her gaze on him with a level stare. “Make no mistake, Detective. This is strictly a DEA operation. We’re calling the shots. As my superiors have explained to your Lieutenant, the LAPD is being brought into this investigation merely to appease the local jurisdictional issues. Your presence is merely a token offering of cooperation.”

“Now wait a minute, Agent Carmichael,” Blake started irritably. Maybe if he wasn’t close to burnout, he wouldn’t have taken offense to her tone and haughty attitude. But he was tired, cranky and his fourteen glorious days in Hawaii had been preempted so he could baby-sit the DEA.

He took a step toward her. She didn’t so much as widen her gaze in alarm. “I’m nobody’s token anything,” he said, reluctantly admiring her attempt to establish territorial boundaries early in the game. “You’re in my sandbox now, honey. That means we play by my rules.”

“The name is Special Agent Carmichael. You may call me Veronica, but I prefer Ronnie,” she said, slipping a length of bobbed, sable hair behind her ear to reveal a pair of small gold, heart-shaped earrings. “In the future, I suggest you select one as a form of address as opposed to honey, sweetheart, doll or babe. If remembering my name is too difficult for you, then might I suggest you simply refer to me as Special Agent in Charge. It’d be a shame to have your sterling record besmirched with a sexual harassment complaint.”

Blake glared at the sexy half-pint agent and counted to ten. Then kept going until he hit thirty-five. He’d never been prone to losing his temper. His skill for sweet-talking the toughest suspects into giving him the goods was legendary in the department. He’d always had a way with women, and the fact that the Southern belle in a badge seemed immune to his equally legendary charm, chafed. Nothing would have given him more satisfaction than to tell the department brass what they could do with their half-baked ideas about partnering him with an arrogant little DEA agent with more sass than smarts. The only thing that kept him from following through was the she-put-you-in-your-place smirk on Forbes’s face. That and, despite being in need of a long vacation, he loved his job.

“I was just starting to fill Blake in on the case,” Forbes said, motioning to the chairs in front of his desk.

Blake waited for Ronnie to sit before taking the remaining chair for himself. She gave him a bland look, then sat primly on the edge of the cracked vinyl. She placed the file beside her then smoothed her delicate, manicured hands over her skirt. Then, crossing her feet at the ankles and tucking them to the side in a perfect display of ladylike, finishing-school training, she turned that interesting gaze his way.

“Our preliminary investigation has revealed the primary activity to be in one of the island’s most exclusive resorts,” she said, folding her hands demurely in her lap. “For the past six weeks, we’ve had two agents in place working as employees of the resort.”

Blake propped his foot over his knee and leaned back into the chair, still bristling over her haughty I’m-in-charge speech. “Why the need for another agent?” he asked. Avalon wasn’t a large island, and in his experience with the DEA, they liked to do things their way, and without the assistance of other law enforcement agencies.

The phone on Forbes’s desk rang and he picked it up, waving at them to continue.

“We know where the drugs are being manufactured and suspect the resort as a means of transportation,” Ronnie said quietly, reaching for the folder. She pulled out a half-dozen glossy black-and-white photos and handed them to him. “We don’t know who is involved. Unfortunately, our agents’ positions in housekeeping and the resort bar haven’t allowed them to develop any concrete evidence.”

“And that’s where I come in,” Blake finished, examining the photographs. He didn’t recognize any of the suspects’ names or faces, but that didn’t mean they didn’t have records, something he planned to look into as soon as this meeting was called to an end. “I assume we’ll be going in to obtain that evidence,” he said, handing her the photographs.

Her smile was brief, causing that adorable dimple to wink at him again. “Exactly. Agents Anderson and McCall are working full shifts as employees so their time has been limited. Unfortunately, this particular resort plays to high-profile types and, as I mentioned, is very exclusive. They operate under a strict policy that doesn’t allow employees to frequent the resort during non-work hours. Because of that, Anderson’s and McCall’s activities have been severely disabled.”

“What makes you think we’ll have any better luck?” he asked her.

Forbes hung up the phone and smiled pleasantly at Ronnie. “If you’ll excuse me, Special Agent Carmichael, I have a meeting upstairs to attend.”

Blake frowned. None of the detectives in his squad would ever call the lieutenant a touchy-feely kind of guy, and the kind, grandfatherly smile he cast in the pint-sized agent’s direction struck Blake as almost comical. “Feel free to use my office for as long you like.”

Ronnie slipped the photographs back into the file and flashed Forbes a charming grin. “Thank you, Lieutenant.”

After crossing the room and opening the door, Forbes turned his attention to Blake. “Be prepared to depart for the island tomorrow morning,” he said, using that commanding “I’m the boss” voice Blake was used to hearing. “Carmichael will fill you in on the rest.”

The door closed and they were alone. Ronnie cleared her throat, making Blake wonder if she was more nervous than she appeared. Not that her demeanor would so much as hint at anything but ladylike calm, he thought. A more erotic image tripped through his mind, one that would have Ronnie Carmichael’s cultured Southern charm slipping…right into his arms.

“The agency needs someone inside and allowed free rein of the island,” she said, dragging his thoughts out of the bedroom and back to their conversation. “Our primary objective is to determine how the drugs are being moved through the island, as well as ascertain the key players.”

“I understand DEA wanting to avoid jurisdiction problems, but you’ve already got two agents on-site hampered by resort policy. What makes you think we’ll have any more luck?”

She lowered her gaze, her dark sable lashes sweeping downward. “Because we’ll be going in undercover,” she said, without looking at him. “Only not as employees.”

The knot of tension returned and tightened, and he rubbed the back of his neck to help ease it. “But why me?” he asked, his voice filled with caution.

She smoothed her skirt again. “Your lieutenant explained you were the only officer he could spare…that fit the profile.”

Blake frowned again. That twisting in his gut made a return visit, too, causing a riot among his insides. “Profile?” he asked, slowly lowering his hand. “What profile?”

Ronnie sighed and looked at him, her turquoise gaze intense. “I’ve read your file, Detective. Your experience in this area is well documented, and while there were other detectives with more experience, you are available and you fit the profile.”

His frown deepened. “What profile?” he demanded a second time.

“You’re thirty-one, right?”

“So? What does age have to do with an interdepartmental investigation?”

She tilted her head to the side, and regarded him skeptically. “Your lieutenant didn’t tell you, did he?”

The churning increased, igniting a ball of fire in his gut that had him reaching into his pocket for the roll of Tums he’d starting carrying two weeks ago. “Tell me what?”

She pulled in a deep breath and let it out slow. “Detective, the resort under surveillance is Seaport Manor.”

He shrugged and reached into his pocket. The name meant nothing to him.

She caught her bottom lip between her teeth. Her hesitation had his suspicion mounting. “Seaport Manor is a honeymoon retreat.”

His hand slipped over the roll of antacids. “I’m still not following you,” he said, refusing to jump to the wrong conclusion.

“We’re going undercover, Detective. Tomorrow morning we board the Island Express, a water taxi which will take us to the quaint island resort and deliver us directly to the private dock of Seaport Manor, where we have two weeks to gather as much evidence as possible. We are registered under the name St. Claire, one of Savannah, Georgia’s oldest and most prominent families.”

His hand tightened over the roll of Tums. “We are registered?”

“That’s right, Detective,” she said with a brisk nod. “Blake and Veronica St. Claire will be spending the next two weeks at Seaport Manor as newlyweds.” She flashed him a saucy grin, and a victorious light brightened her turquoise eyes. “Welcome to Operation Honeymoon. Babe.”