Midnight Action (5 page)

“Why are you still here?”

Morgan tensed at the sound of Noelle’s voice, but didn’t glance up from his laptop screen. Her question didn’t surprise him—it was one he’d asked himself countless times today, while he’d been holed up in the living room of Noelle’s elegant town house. There was nothing stopping him from checking into a hotel, yet instead of doing that, he’d parked his ass on her white leather couch and had been digging up intel on Gilles Girard ever since they’d arrived in Paris.

Slowly, he lifted his head, but no words left his mouth when he laid eyes on her.

She was dressed for seduction.

From head to fuckin’ toe.

A skimpy red dress clung to her curvy body, hugging her full, braless breasts and barely covering her firm thighs. Silver stilettos added four inches to her petite frame, and her blond hair was artfully twisted atop her head, pulled back to emphasize her high cheekbones and timeless features. She rarely wore her hair up, and it annoyed him to realize that he preferred it down.

Goddamn it. He shouldn’t have a fucking preference.

Swallowing his irritation, he pasted on an indifferent look. “Aw, baby, is that all for me?”

“Absolutely not,” she said cheerfully.

“Hot date?”

She ignored him. “I want you out of my house. Your gear is already in the car, and my driver will drop you off at a hotel on our way.”

“On your way where?”

Again he didn’t get a response, just the sharp clap of her hands. “Get off your ass. I’ve got somewhere to be.”

Smirking, Morgan leaned back against the couch cushions and got comfortable.

“I mean it, Jim. It’s time for you to go.”

When he still didn’t budge, she reached for the hem of her dress and slid it up a few inches.

His mouth went arid when a lacy black garter was revealed. But it was no ordinary garter—this one was custom-made to secure a silver derringer to her thigh.

“Please don’t make me use this,” she said coolly. “My decorator insisted on an all-white color scheme in this room, and poor Miles will have a bitch of a time scrubbing your blood off the carpet.”

He supposed he could’ve argued some more, but truth was, he was feeling stir-crazy from being cooped up indoors all day. He had no intention of going to a hotel, though. Nah. A night on the town might do him some good.

With a shrug, he leaned forward and shoved his laptop in its case. “You win. Let’s go.”

When he reached the doorway, Noelle spoke through gritted teeth. “Your laptop.”

He glanced at the black case on the glass coffee table, then hid a grin and went over to retrieve it. Fine. Looked like the computer would join his gear in the car. But it was damn well coming back here, just like he was.

As he followed Noelle down the wide corridor, he had to wonder why he was so determined to stick close to her, when normally he couldn’t get away from her fast enough.

Then again, normally he wasn’t the target of a faceless enemy who wanted him dead.

He might not trust Noelle, but he couldn’t deny that she was a good ally to have in hairy situations. Besides, until her story checked out and he received confirmation that Girard had actually hired her to eliminate him, he wasn’t letting the woman out of his sight.

The town house boasted its own elevator, which they rode down to the spacious garage in the basement. When they stepped onto the concrete floor, Morgan couldn’t help but admire the collection of vehicles Noelle kept stashed there. A sleek silver Ferrari, a cherry red Lamborghini, a yellow Ducati motorcycle whose model hadn’t even hit the market yet. The woman had expensive taste in cars; that much was obvious. But she ignored all of them and headed for the black Lincoln Town Car parked in front of the automatic steel door.

Noelle’s driver, a bulky man with a shaved head, instantly hopped out of the sedan to open the back door for his mistress.

Morgan had noticed that every member of Noelle’s staff just happened to be a handsome male. Her driver, her flight staff, her housekeeper. But since one of her favorite pastimes was toying with men, it didn’t surprise him that she surrounded herself with an army of them.

They settled in the back of the Lincoln on opposite ends of the leather seat. As the car engine hummed to life, the partition between them and the front seat rolled down.

“Which hotel should I take him to?” the driver asked in a disinterested voice.

Morgan spoke up before Noelle could. “No need for a hotel. I’ll be staying here with your employer. Just take us to—” He glanced at Noelle. “Where are we going again?”

Her lips went so tight they nearly disappeared off her pretty face. But just as he expected, she didn’t challenge him. Noelle would never allow herself to appear undermined in front of her staff.

“The Nuit Rouge, Frédéric. Thank you.” Then she pressed a button on the door and the partition swooped right back up.

“What the fuck kind of game are you playing?” she demanded.

“No game. I just think your house is super-duper cozy and I sure don’t want to leave it,” he replied with saccharine sarcasm. “Got a problem with that?”

She glowered at him. “Yes.”

“Tough cookies. Because I’m not going anywhere.”

Her hand played with the bottom of her dress again, as if she were contemplating pulling out her pistol and using it on him, but after a beat, she laid her hand flat on her thigh and turned to him with a thoughtful expression.

“If you want my help, just ask for it.”

He arched a brow. “Who says that’s what I want?”

“Why else are you forcing yourself into my life?”

“Maybe I just like spending time with you.”

A genuine laugh popped out of her mouth. “Bullshit. You hate being around me as much as I hate being around you.”

His lips twitched. “You’re right. That was a load of bull.”

“So then man up and ask me to help you find the person who hired me.”

“Are you offering?”

“Nope. But I might consider it.”

Son of a bitch. Nothing was ever easy with this woman.

Morgan spoke through clenched teeth. “Will you help me track him down?”

“I’ll think about it.” She shrugged. “Maybe if you ask me nicely next time and say please.”

Whatever. That was good enough for now. At the moment, he was more interested to know why she’d gotten dolled up and was apparently hitting a club.

“So why are we going to the Nuit Rouge? You tracking a target?”

“Just feel like dancing.”

He narrowed his eyes. “That’s it? You just want to go dancing?”

“I happen to enjoy it. I do have interests outside of killing scumbags, you know.”

A thread of discomfort coiled around his throat. She
did
like to dance—he remembered that now. All those little details about her were stored in a deep abyss in his brain, banished from thought and locked down tight, but they’d started floating to the surface ever since Noelle and her operatives had gotten entangled with his team.

He wondered if she still liked watching old black-and-white movies late at night. Or if she still liked her steaks rare. If she still added a shit ton of salt to everything she ate. Did she still go for a run every time it rained?

He could never ask her, of course. Noelle would take any interest on his part as a sign of weakness. And it would be.

Christ, it’d be so much easier if he didn’t have those memories. That way he could just hate her, destroy her, end her life without ever having known the taste of her lips, or the way she felt naked and writhing beneath him.

They didn’t speak for the rest of the car ride, and when the Lincoln came to a stop twenty minutes later, Noelle was out of the car in the blink of an eye. He suspected she was trying to ditch him, but Morgan was a trained soldier, which meant he was capable of moving just as fast. He stayed on her six as she brazenly bypassed the mile-long line of hopeful clubgoers, and marched right up to the red steel door.

A monstrous bouncer with a deep scowl manned the entrance, but his meaty hand immediately unclipped the velvet rope at Noelle’s approach.

“Est-il avec vous?”
the bouncer barked.

She glanced over her shoulder, her expression flickering with aggravation when she realized Morgan was directly behind her.

“Oui,”
she said tersely, then strode through the door.

Morgan followed her into the club and let his eyes adjust to the sudden darkness. A heavy bass line pounded in the shadowy corridor, and the intermittent flash of strobe lights illuminated the path to the main floor. This time, Noelle did manage to lose him—before he could even blink, she darted toward the red-and-white-checkered floor and was swallowed up by the crowd of dancers.

Ah well. He knew he’d spot her again sooner or later. In that boner-inducing dress of hers, she’d be hard to miss.

Morgan drifted over to the bar spanning one black-painted wall. He ordered a beer, then turned to face the dance floor, his gaze seeking out his prey.

And there she was. Dancing, just like she’d claimed she came here to do. Her curvy hips undulated as she moved to the music, slender arms raised, firm ass rolling sensually. The techno beat blasting out of the speakers made it impossible to hear anything but the relentless drum and bass and the shrill synthesizers. It wasn’t Morgan’s kind of music—he preferred classic rock or easy blues, not this headache-inducing bullshit.

Noelle didn’t seem to mind it. She stayed on the floor while he leaned against the counter and sipped his beer. And he wasn’t the only one watching her. Every male gaze seemed to be glued to the beautiful blonde. She drew men to her like a flame luring a moth. A hot flame of seduction, igniting every libido in the club.

But she didn’t accept any offers to dance; she simply turned from the flock of men who approached her, spinning around and flitting away each time a new bachelor joined the fold.

Morgan kept watching as one song ended and another began. She was up to something. He could feel it in his bones.

Sure enough, the suspicion was confirmed a minute later, when a tall, muscular man stepped onto the floor and moved with purpose toward Noelle.

The newcomer came up behind her—and she let him. She ground her ass against the man’s groin, allowing his hands to slide down her body and grip her hips.

Morgan’s nostrils flared with derision as he studied Noelle’s dance partner. Dude looked like a total creep with his slicked-back hair, sharp features, and lips that were far too pouty to belong on a man’s face. His getup consisted of tight leather pants and a black wifebeater, and only added to the slimebag vibe he was broadcasting.

What was the damn woman up to?

It pissed him off that he couldn’t figure it out. He usually had no trouble getting inside Noelle’s head and intuiting her next move, but tonight he was drawing a blank.

“Danse?”

The shrill female voice had him jerking his head to the side. He glanced at the dark-haired woman who’d sidled up to him, then gave a brisk shake of the head.

As the brunette slunk off in disappointment, he refocused his attention on the dance floor, but Noelle and her slimebag were gone.

Shit.

Where the hell were they?

His shoulders went rigid as he scanned the crowded club. He didn’t spot them in the throng of dancers. Didn’t see them near the DJ platform. They weren’t in the bar area, and they wouldn’t have been able to head out the door without crossing his line of sight, which left only one option—the shadowy corridor leading to the restrooms.

Setting his jaw, Morgan left his beer on the counter and marched toward the rear of the club. He dodged a group of inebriated young men, waved off several offers to dance from eager women. When he finally ducked into the back hallway, he discovered two long lines leading into each of the restrooms, but no sign of Noelle and the creep.

He assessed the narrow space, catching sight of the closed door with a succinct French sign:
SUPPLIES—KEEP OUT
.

His right hand tingled with the urge to reach for the Sig tucked into his waistband, but he kept his arms at his sides as he approached the closet. A test of the handle revealed the door was unlocked. Hmmm. Noelle had gotten sloppy.

Or not
, he discovered a moment later, after he’d opened the door a crack and noted that the padlock on the interior handle was broken.

He quietly slid into a room that was bathed in darkness and much larger than he’d anticipated. As his eyes adjusted, he could see rows and rows of metal racks that took up the space, shelves lined with cleaning supplies, bags of cocktail napkins, and random storage items.

The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end when he heard a low male groan. Followed by a female purr of pleasure that hardened his veins to ice.

For fuck’s sake, was she screwing the loser in a goddamn supply closet?

A rustling noise broke the silence, the unmistakable sound of a zipper dragging down, and then a metal clatter and a soft giggle, as if someone—a curvy female body, perhaps—had been backed into a rack by an overeager lover.

Morgan’s jaw was so tense his teeth started to hurt. He took a step forward, then stopped, forcing his scuffed-up boots to remain planted in place. Fuck it. If Noelle wanted to get drilled by a creep who didn’t know how to use hair gel in moderation, then fine. It was none of his damn business.

He had just taken two steps back to the door when the horrified male expletive echoed in the darkness.

This time he didn’t hesitate—he drew his weapon and crept down one of the aisles, just as a loud thump reached his ears. When he turned the corner and reached his targets, the sight he encountered made him gape.

“You really don’t know how to mind your own business, do you?” Noelle said in a dry voice.

Morgan stared at the dead body lying on the cement floor, then focused on the woman kneeling beside it. Without waiting for a response, Noelle stuck her hand in the stiff’s front pocket and pulled out a ziplocked plastic Baggie full of white powder.

“Hold on to this for me? I didn’t bring a purse and this needs to look like a robbery.”