Now, doing her…that she could definitely see. He’d slipped into her fantasies as easy as a night swim in August. What about making them real? She tugged on her locket, sliding it back and forth on its chain, pondering the idea.
Ask him out. You want him. He wants you. Simple.
Mona claimed Samantha used Bedroom Eyes as an excuse to back-burner her love life. Mona thought she was chicken.
Brrock, brrock.
So prove her wrong. This is the man. This is the place.
Still watching her, Rick braced a hip on the counter. When it shifted under him, he turned to jiggle it. “I could fix this. Someone could get hurt.” He winked. Hire me. You know you want to.
“I can’t offer you the job, Rick,” she breathed, “but how about dinner?”
“Dinner?”
“Or maybe just dessert.” She’d blurted the words before she’d absorbed the utter surprise on his face. He evidently hadn’t been flirting so much. Oh, God. She’d gotten so caught up in her imagination, she’d assumed they were doing that sexy subtext repartee she loved in the movies…and her fantasies.
“Just kidding. Heh-heh.” She laughed a fake laugh, madly grinding her locket along its chain, embarrassed as hell.
“Uh, that sounds…tempting….” He nodded a little, awkward, opened and closed his mouth, as if not sure what to say next.
The door buzzed and they both turned to watch Bianca Sylvestri rush in, her timing either perfect or rotten, Samantha wasn’t quite sure which.
Bianca, a chubby dynamo, wore a knitted dress of multicolored nubby yarn with a matching pillbox hat. Her own creation, no doubt, since her ankle boots were trimmed in the same wool. Bianca loved to knit and was about to open her own yarn shop.
“You have to help me, Sammi,” she said with breathy drama. “My niece Angela and her new husband Joey are desperate for a photo.”
“I’ve got a client right now, Bianca. Misty’s here.” And I just asked a man out for dessert. Dessert, can you believe that?
Even mortified to her roots, Samantha wasn’t done fantasizing about Rick. Even now she could picture drizzling chocolate over his naked chest and flat belly, could see him licking her own swells and dips absolutely squeaky clean.
“Misty? Bless her heart, she does need you. But Joey’s going to Chicago for three whole months and Angela needs a picture to keep her warm while he’s gone. They’ll be here in a blip. Joey doesn’t know and we can’t give him a nanosecond to think. Strip-sit-click, you know, before he starts whining.”
“I’d love to help, Bianca, but Misty’s waiting for me.”
“Is she in the fairy-tale room?”
Samantha nodded.
“Great, because we need the exotic studio. You just go on and finish up with Misty.” Bianca waved her away with diamond-heavy fingers. “I know exactly what we want and I’ll set up for you.” Bianca had helped with several friends’ shoots, so this wasn’t unusual behavior.
“I don’t know…” Samantha said.
“I can help her.” Rick said. “So you can finish.”
“I can’t ask you to do that, Rick.”
“Sure you can,” he said, low and steady, coaxing her.
“Perfect!” Bianca sang out. “Rick, is it? You’re a lifesaver.”
“Anything I can do,” Rick said, keeping his eyes on Samantha, still angling for the job.
He could save her time. Plus, moving props on Bianca’s command would undoubtedly prove to him he didn’t want the job.
Now dessert…that might still be on the table. She’d have to wait and see.
2
MAYBE JUST DESSERT? Damn. Rick followed the hot photographer deeper into her studio, figuring his next move. He’d meant to be friendly and helpful—a Boy Scout, not a horn dog—but his attraction to her obviously showed.
Now the woman didn’t want to hire him; she wanted to screw his brains out. He’d been close to saying, How about dinner and dessert? As if he regularly traded sex for a W-4.
He was rusty at this.
Granted, the old Rick would have been happy to share dinner, dessert, a midnight snack and breakfast in bed with a woman like her. Not the new Rick and certainly not the Rick who was on duty.
He hated undercover work, despite the prestige. He hated wearing a different persona, keeping his lies in order, cozying up to suspects and scumbags. He liked things clean and straight and honest and simple. But his photography background made him ideal for the assignment, so here he was.
And he’d struck gold already, whether or not Sawyer hired him. He was about to question the wife of the mobster they were after. Darien Sylvestri owned this building and had set up Sawyer and her friends in business.
Exactly what kind of business the organized-crime task force hadn’t yet pinned down. Money laundering, stolen goods or bookmaking, if Sylvestri stuck to his Chicago specialties. Pornography? Possible, considering Darien’s in-town associates and all the strippers and hookers prancing through the Mirror, Mirror Beauty Center, the complex that housed the studio, salon, lingerie shop and massage place.
Something was definitely happening in Bedroom Eyes, they knew. Just before Sawyer had opened shop, the task force had triangulated a juicy call between Sylvestri and an associate. The photo studio’s prime, he’d said. We’re all set with the tenant…. God bless Bianca. The caller had said something garbled about a shop and some deliveries, then they’d lapsed into small talk. That was enough to move on the building.
Whatever was going on, Rick’s job was to expose it from the inside as an employee. Which meant he had to get the damn job. Say whatever he had to say to get Sawyer to hire him.
He’d have to work the attraction angle. Just enough to get the connection going. Keep a tight rein on his reactions, of course. Go by the book, but he could be friendly, couldn’t he?
She’d caught him off guard with that offer. Very direct. She almost seemed to have surprised herself.
She was hotter close up than she’d seemed from the surveillance. Smarter, too. And more intense.
Interesting.
He followed her down the hall, scanning every detail of the place in case this was his only chance to check it out.
Sawyer stuck her head into the first room. “Go ahead and pick out a CD to play, Misty, and I’ll be right back.”
Misty Simone, Rick knew. He and his partner Mark had watched her enter the studio earlier. Her husband Tony was small potatoes compared to Sylvestri. So was Joey Balistero, Sylvestri’s son-in-law, whose shoot Rick was about to help with, but the more they knew about everyone who frequented the center, the tighter the case would be.
He wondered how deep in Sawyer was with Sylvestri, who’d relocated from Chicago a year ago, supposedly to retire, making a few quiet property purchases—a big house in Paradise Valley, a small commercial lot in Scottsdale, some horse acres outside Cave Creek and this two-story office building in a faded Phoenix strip mall.
Sawyer’s help-wanted sign had been the first solid way onto the scene. Infiltrating the cleaning crew had failed—Sylvestri’s people handled that—and trying for a lease or posing as shop customers was too short-term. Once he got hired, he could freely search the building, get to know the players, locate the action.
In a few minutes, he was about to see Balistero stripped to Skivvies. Not a pleasant prospect, but if it helped with the case, he’d hold the guy’s, uh, belt for him.
Glancing