Savannah giggled. “Yeah, I had heard something like that…”
And as she took her husband deep into her body once more, she sent up her continued chant, maybe this time.
Savannah was in the kitchen fixing them something to eat before they both passed out from hunger and sexual fatigue when the phone rang.
“I got it,” Blake yelled out from the bedroom where he hadn’t moved from since they woke up.
Several moments later she could hear him coming up behind her chuckling and saying, “yes, ma’am.” He handed her the phone. “Mom.” He turned and sauntered back to the bedroom.
“Hey, Mom.” She tucked the phone between her ear and shoulder and continued to fix the western omelet.
“Hey, sweetie, can you talk?”
Savannah took a quick glance over her shoulder. “Yep. What’s up?”
“You tell me,” her mother said in a conspiratorial whisper.
Savannah lowered her voice. “I didn’t get a chance to look at it yet.”
“What? Savannah,” she said in that tone she used with her as a little girl. “This is important. You wouldn’t have been chosen if they didn’t completely believe in you.”
“Mother, I know. It’s just that…well, I’ve been a little tied up.”
Her mother said, “Chile, you’re going to kill that man one of these days.”
Savannah bit back a laugh. It never ceased to amaze her how out there and open her mother was about sex. “We are trying to have a baby, so I never want to miss out on an opportunity.”
She turned off the flame beneath the frying pan and placed the omelet onto a platter. Savory steam wafted up to her nose.
“I told you before, stop trying and it will happen.”
Savannah sighed. “Yeah, that’s what Blake keeps saying.”
“And he’s right. Relax, sweetheart. I know you and Blake will make beautiful babies together when the time is right. In the meantime, I suggest you take a look at your assignment. I want you to do well on this. People are depending on you.”
Savannah swallowed hard. “I’ll take care of it. Promise.”
“Good, and if you need me for anything, let me know.”
“I will.”
“Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
Slowly Savannah hung up the phone then took the platter and put it on the kitchen table. A part of her desperately wanted to read what was inside that envelope and another part of her dreaded it. But if she only had three weeks to pull off whatever it was that needed to be done, she couldn’t ignore the contents for long.
Chapter 6
“I’ m just going to relax and watch the game,” Blake said, assuming his Sunday-afternoon position on the couch.
What else is new, Savannah’s arched brow queried. She walked by and handed him the remote. It was a ritual she’d grown used to since the beginning of their marriage. Blake was willing to give all of his time and energy to her Monday through Saturday, but Sunday was sports day come hell or high water.
“Can I get you anything?” she asked.
“No, I’m good.” He’d already spread out his goodies for the afternoon—chips, pretzels and an ice bucket with beer—and was surfing through the stations. The blare of a baseball game filled the room.
Savannah leaned down and kissed his forehead then headed off to the bedroom. She closed the door behind her. Going to her dresser, she opened the bottom drawer and pulled out the envelope that was tucked beneath her lingerie.
Taking it to the bed, she felt her heart pound with trepidation. She used a nail file to slit open the top then pulled out the stapled pages. It had the TLC logo blazoned across the top. She knew she only had a short period of time to digest all of the information that was contained in the hermetically sealed envelope before the letters on the pages began to dissolve.
She read quickly, absorbing the information the way she did legal briefs, cataloging everything that was important and discarding the rest.
The more she read, the more disturbed she became. What she’d feared was no longer a bad feeling. It was a full-blown reality. The knot that had settled in her stomach since she’d gotten her assignment from Jean now threatened to loop around her lungs and cut off her air.
Her assignment was to infiltrate Montgomery headquarters on East 72nd Street, secure the original accounting documents and the legal papers that negotiated the land-acquisition deal for the development in downtown Brooklyn—the project that her husband was working on. It was believed that not only was The Montgomery Enterprises involved in illegal land deals and coercion, but several members of the City Council and the architect and developer, i.e. Blake Fields, PPC. She was to secure the necessary documents, any video tapes or audio conversations that would lead to indictments of all the parties involved—or irrefutable information to exclude them.
Her stomach roiled. Bile rose to the back of her throat and sat there burning. She stared at the pages as the words began to cloud over. She wiped the tears from her eyes as she watched the words slowly become ghostlike on the page until they were totally gone. The only thing remaining was the TLC logo.
The sudden ringing of the phone snapped through her, jerking her out of the place to which she’d descended. Dully she turned toward the intruding instrument and picked it up. She cleared her throat and sniffed hard.
“Hello…”
“Damn, girl, it’s nearly one in the afternoon, you still sleep?”
Savannah laughed. Danielle Holloway was one of her two best friends, notorious for her early morning wake-up calls. One o’clock was definitely late for Dani. “What’s up? And no, I’m not still asleep. Are you ill? It’s after ten.” She stole a glance at the now lily white pages.
“Very funny. I figured I’d give you a play since it was Sunday and all. Got any plans for today?”
“Not really. You know today is Blake’s sports day, so I’m pretty much off of his radar until bedtime.”
“I just got off the phone with Mia, we were thinking about going down to the South Street Seaport. They’re having a jazz concert on one of the boats.”
Maybe getting out of the house for the day and spending it with her girls was just the thing she needed to clear her head for a few hours.
“Sounds like a plan. What time?”
“You know me, I’ve been ready for hours.” She chuckled. “Mia was finishing getting dressed and I’m going to pick her up. Then we can swing by and get you.”
“I should be ready in about a half hour. That good?”
“We’ll be there. Casual dress. I have on jeans and flip flops.”
Yeah, Savannah knew what Dani meant by jeans and flip flops. Like Claudia, everything on Dani’s body was high-end designer. As a fashion photographer for several leading women’s magazines, Dani stayed on the cutting edge of style. “Right up my alley. See you guys in a few.”
Savannah hung up, feeling momentarily better. She got off the bed and went to her closet to find something equally casual to wear.
Blake barely turned his eyes in her direction when she emerged from the bedroom in concert with the ringing