Dirty Little Lies (16 page)

“You could work for yourself,” he said.

The idea appealed to her on many levels, but Marisela had to admit the truth. “I’m not ready and you know it.”

He arched a brow. “Where’s all your
machísma
,
vidita
? The gringos already breaking you down?”

She narrowed her gaze. “My
machísma
is fine, okay? But I’m not stupid no more, Frankie. I know when I still have shit to learn and Brynn,
gringa
or no, wants to teach me. I can’t walk away from this just because you and the boss can’t go five seconds without having some sort of pissing match.”

“My dick is longer. I’d win,” he said cockily.

“And you measured him, when?”

That shut Frankie up. They rode the rest of the way in silence, chatting only to review their plan. With the help of the agent assigned to tail Manning, they were going to locate the reporter, swipe his cell phone, and use it to call his sister while Titan’s experts triangulated a location for Tracy. They might not get her position right on the money, but they’d be a damned sight closer than they were now.

Once they were in Jamaica Plain, Marisela called in to the agent tailing Parker Manning. She repeated his location to Frankie, who consulted the GPS module on the truck.

Parking half a block from where Manning was sitting at a bar, Frankie turned off the engine. Marisela stepped out of the truck, instantly reconnecting with the sights and sounds all around her. This morning, they’d been in too much of a rush to look around, but now, even in the dark, Jamaica Plain rocked with a rhythm that lured her. One of the largest neighborhoods in the city of Boston, JP was as diverse as it was large. Murals starring citizens from every ethnic background imaginable graced the walk of hair salons, restaurants, and a bakery. Motorcycles were parked outside taverns while women with baby strollers maneuvered on the sidewalks. The music was loud, the talk was louder. And to Marisela, the vibe was pure heaven.

Finding Parker Manning would be a snap. But Yizenia?

“Needle in a haystack,” Marisela said, looking around.

Frankie slammed his door shut and clicked on the security system. “Gotta start somewhere.”

The Titan agent who’d been tailing Parker Manning caught up with them almost immediately. He directed them to a tavern a few doors down from where they’d parked.

“He went in about half an hour ago,” he reported. “Once you spot him, I’m out of here, right?”

Marisela smirked at the blond-haired, blue-eyed agent in his slick polo shirt and khaki pants. “Got a hot date or are you just afraid someone will jump you and steal your iPod?”

With a sneer, he crossed his arms tight over his chest. “I have better things to do with my time than keep tabs on your suspects.”

Frankie stepped forward, and though her ex didn’t quite reach six feet, he managed to make the taller, although skinnier guy take a shaky step back. “We’ve got it from here. Why don’t you blow?”

With a quick glance at Marisela, who mockingly blew him a kiss, the agent left.

Marisela turned to Frankie. “Let’s go.”

Through the tinted window crowded with beer signs and painted advertisements for twenty-five-cent wings, Marisela and Frankie spotted Parker Manning sitting at the bar, surrounded mostly by men glued to the television sets mounted from the ceiling. Parker’s gaze, however, hardly strayed from the door for more than a minute. Frankie had a hell of a time entering through the front door without Manning noticing, but Marisela figured he had a better chance than she did to blend in. She circled around to the back door, waited for a guy in a white apron to exit with the trash for the Dumpster, then slipped inside.

The place was hazy with smoke from the barbecue in the kitchen. The crowd stood three deep at the bar, where the main libation seemed to be beer on tap, though the mirrored cabinets glittered with half-empty bottles of cheap rum, scotch, whiskey, and bourbon. Two televisions in each corner blared with high-stakes soccer action, the players blurring by in bright greens, blues, and reds. After a goal, the commentary in, if Marisela wasn’t mistaken, Portuguese, stirred the sports fans to near hysteria, giving her a chance to slither through the throng until she was directly behind Parker Manning, whose eyes kept darting toward the door.

Who was he waiting for? Or who was he afraid would find him?

All around him, faces with complexions that ranged from light caramel to deepest ebony ensured that Parker Manning stood out like a beacon with his graying brown hair and ruddy skin. Marisela couldn’t see Frankie, but she knew he was close by. Funny how she could sense that. When they were in sync, they were a pair to be reckoned with. Tonight’s job was a relatively simple one, but she couldn’t discount the comfort of working with someone she could rely on.

She sidled up to Parker Manning and in a quick move she’d perfected at age fourteen, checked his jacket pockets for his phone.

Nothing.

Plan B.

She took a deep, fortifying breath, leaned forward and blew in his ear.

Manning spun around. “What the—?”

The phone was on his belt.

“Hey, there,” she purred, pretending that her once-over of his body was sexual and not professional. “Did you come here looking for me or is this just my lucky night?”

Whatever leftover curses were lingering on his tongue dissolved in a puddle of drool.

“What a weird coincidence,” he said, his frown deep.

“Maybe its just destiny.”

God, she couldn’t believe she’d just said that. Out loud.

“What? You live around here?” he asked, not so subtly scraping his gaze down her body, lingering on her breasts long enough to make her stomach turn.

“Nah, I’m new to town,” she said. “But Jamaica Plain is my speed. What’s a
gringo
like you doing around here, anyway?”

Manning smirked. “I like the beer and
pasteles fritos
.”

His New England accent chopped the words up until they were nearly unrecognizable, but she took the opening anyway.

“Then we have something in common.”

He eyed her skeptically. “Is this a setup? ‘Cause I told you everything you need to know earlier. I’m not telling you one damned thing about my sister.”

Marisela smiled softly and shook her head. “Just like a man to have a one-track mind. I’m off the clock.” She leaned across him, snagged his beer and took a sip. “Everyone has to wind down, right?”

The man wasn’t a fool. Though he grinned at her sensual move, his shoulders remained tight and he’d kicked the bar stool slightly behind him so he could bolt if the situation warranted. She had to move fast. Pulling the sexy, hot-for-you act would only get her so far.

The crowd seemed to swell as the players on the television went in for another forward rush. Marisela felt someone press against her, but before she react, she heard Frankie whisper, “When they score.”

All the eyes in the place were drawn to the televisions, including Manning’s. The minute the forward in the green striped shirt kicked the ball into the net, the crowd erupted. Frankie pushed back, propelling Marisela into Manning. She stole his phone, slipped it behind her back, where Frankie retrieved it and tunneled through the cheering crowd until he was gone.

Marisela spun to follow, but Parker Manning stopped her, his hand tight around her upper arm. “Where do you think you’re going, sweetheart?”

Ten

MANNING’S GRIP WAS
tight, painful. She figured their run-in earlier would have taught him about pissing her off, but she decided to put her disgust aside and concentrate on the case. She had what she wanted and he didn’t have a fucking clue. And nauseating as the prospect was, she might need him again. So she wouldn’t kick his ass. Yet.

“Little
chicas’
room,” she replied sweetly, her eyes darting to the back where she assumed the bathrooms were. With her prettiest pout, she leaned forward until his breath, a putrid combination of nicotine and beer, assailed her nostrils. “Will you miss me?”

His expression was uncertain, but with a nod, he let her go. Smart man.

She rendezvoused with Frankie in the alley.

“Got it?” she asked anxiously, wiping at the spot where Manning had grabbed her.

Frankie frowned. “Yes, and no.”

“What do you mean, no? That was some of my best work. He didn’t even know I’d touched him,” she insisted, shaking her hand as if it were saturated with stinky-man smell.

Frankie nodded in the other direction, so they took off before Manning discovered he’d had his phone lifted and came after them. If they had any luck at all, he’d think he lost it in the crowd. Once they had what they wanted, they’d break into his car and shove it between the seats so he’d never be the wiser.

Once they were at the end of the street, Frankie stopped. He held up the phone, an older-model flip phone with no special features—no camera, no video, and apparently…

“No signal?” she asked, unable to read the LCD in the relative darkness.

“Worse. No power.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me! He didn’t charge his phone? What an asshole.”

Frankie shook his head, unruffled. “Max’s team is tracking down a universal charger. Said to check back with him in an hour. Apparently, Manning’s phone is a dinosaur.”

“So what do we do until then?”

The number of people walking down and around Centre Street had swelled as the night wore on. Even if she could muster up the enthusiasm to search for Yizenia, she didn’t have the energy.

Frankie pocketed the phone, then surveyed the street around them, inhaling deeply. Marisela couldn’t help but do the same. The minute the savory scents hit her, her stomach growled. She hadn’t eaten all day.

“Hungry?” he asked.

“Who wouldn’t be in this neighborhood?”

He smiled. “
Bien
. It’s been too long since we’ve had a taste of home.”

They grazed their way down Centre Street, chowing down on fish tacos at a local
taquería
, checking out the
pastelitos de carne
at a bustling Salvadoran cafeteria, and then trying, for the first time, Guatemalan
rellenitos
for dessert from a glorious-smelling stand set up on a corner where Centre Street ran into Ballard. Marisela was so enthralled by the sweet fried
platanos
filled with savory refried black beans, dusted with sugar and dipped in sour cream that she nearly forgot why she was in Jamaica Plain in the first place.

They managed to avoid seeing Parker Manning again, and when they checked, his car was no longer in its parking space.

“He’s gone,” Marisela grumbled. “Now how will we get the phone back?”

Frankie shrugged. “We’ll slide by his apartment later.”

Seemed easy enough, though she couldn’t remember ever breaking into a car to return something. “Okay, then, I’m full. Let’s get the hell out of here,” Marisela said.

Frankie whipped an old, grainy photograph out of his jacket. “It’s early. Let’s see if anyone’s seen our favorite assassin.”

No one they spoke with had seen or heard of anyone fitting Yizenia’s sketchy description. After a while, Marisela got tired of asking and decided to simply enjoy the sights and sounds. Hearing Spanish spoken all around her, from the shopkeepers to the children to the DJs spinning tunes at the club they strolled by, filled her with a warm comfort that made her, for a minute, long for home.

Unfortunately, Frankie wasn’t so quick to give up the search.

“You see this woman around here?” Frankie asked a guy selling tickets for the upcoming Festival after he made change for a twenty. Frankie gestured for the man to keep half the money, then whipped out the fuzzy picture of Yizenia, the only one the research team could dig up.

The man looked at him as if he’d sprouted a second head.

Marisela dazzled the man with her best smile. “She’s
mi hermana
,” she lied, watching her charm and cleavage do the work as the man looked again at the picture with much more serious consideration.

“We were supposed to meet her here,” Frankie added.

The man shook his head. It wasn’t a very good shot—and didn’t much look like the kind of family photograph you’d shove in a wallet. More like the result of computerized enhancement from a shot taken by a long-distance security camera.

“That was helpful,” Marisela quipped once they’d walked out of earshot.

“Never hurts to try,” Frankie replied, popping the last of his
rellenitos
into his mouth and sucking the remnants of sugar and sour cream off his fingertips.

Marisela forced her eyes forward as they walked back toward their truck. They’d wasted enough time here. Tomorrow’s objective was to find Tracy Manning and they couldn’t do that until they deciphered her location, which meant getting back to Max and charging the damned phone.

“Well, other than finally pushing me over the edge into a size ten,” she said, tugging at her waistband, “tonight was a big fat waste of time.”

“We’ve got the phone. Once we find Tracy Manning, we’ll know if she hired Yizenia Santiago. Seems so
loca
.”

“What?”

“A chick hiring a cold-blooded killer for something that happened so long ago.”

“What’s crazy? That she’s a chick or that she hired a killer?”

“All of it,” Frankie said.

“Doesn’t seem crazy to me at all,” Marisela decided. “If those rich boys did that girl, then they deserve to die.”

Frankie eyed her skeptically. “
Mierda
, Marisela. You’re not going to freak out again and screw the client, are you, just because you don’t think he deserves to live?”

She stopped dead. In all the time that had passed since their last mission together in Puerto Rico, she and Frankie hadn’t really discussed how the case had ended. He’d been too busy fighting for his life and recovering from his wounds.

When she’d first learned that Frankie had opted to stay with Titan after she’d gone off with Brynn to Mexico, she’d been shocked as hell. Frankie had hated Ian before their boss had nearly sacrificed Frankie’s life for a client. At least when he’d been with the
Toros
, his boys cared if he died—at least, they would have to the point of avenging his murder. Ian Blake, on the other hand, had used Frankie’s injury as a bargaining chip—a way to keep Marisela in line.