Naked Sushi (7 page)

“Pepper is that good, Jordan. Let me prove it to you.”

“No can do. You compromised yourself by fucking her. You’re off the case.” She leaned over him so he could get an eyeful of her full breasts, her nipples pointing through her tight sweater. Her way of keeping her power secure in her empire. “Agent Barker will take over.”

He cocked a brow. “I’ve never seen you this jealous before, Jordan.”

“I’ve never seen you take such an interest in a material witness before.” She crossed her arms over her chest in a show of authority. “The higher-ups are on my ass to wrap up this case before someone blows the whistle and the media get wind of it. I’ve got a team sitting on Briggs day and night. He’s bound to slip up.”

His cell chimed—a text. His Japanese contact. Briggs wanted to take a meeting. That gave him an idea.

“What if I promise you I can get a taped confession from Briggs that will stand up in court?” Steve said. “Will you put me back on the case?”

Jordan smirked. “Does it involve you getting into that girl’s pants?”

Steve grinned and then stuck his middle finger through the hole of a crispy, glazed, sugary, doughy delight. “Care for another doughnut?”

* * *

“You want me to do
what?
” I asked, adrenaline racing through me like popcorn popping outta control. I turned down a rainbow-painted path and headed toward Bongo’s Pizza Playland
.

“Wear a wire,” Steve said, not missing a beat. “It’s the only way we can nail Briggs.” He was hot on my tail. I wasn’t a happy camper. I hadn’t heard from him since our
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
rendezvous, complete with the rescue of the cat, like in the film.

And now this?

“You’ve got to be crazy.” I didn’t care how good-looking Special Agent Steve Raines was. I was
not
going to jeopardize what little future I had left by letting the FBI hot-wire my bod so they could listen to everything I said. What if I said something stupid? Like how I hacked into the company computer?

Or, worse yet, admitted I’d gone all Bruce Lee and zonked a federal agent? I’d be sent to a planet far, far away faster than you could send R2-D2 to a recycling bin. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a job interview and I’m late.”

I rushed through the bright red double doors into the pizza parlor and put on my best cheesy-clown smile. I prayed Steve wouldn’t follow me. Why bother? He knew my routine. He’d had a tail on my ass all week. I wasn’t so dumb that I didn’t notice a guy with tattoos following me. Guys with tattoos
never
followed me.

So I wasn’t surprised when Steve showed up with his scary request. It wasn’t enough the FBI had seen me half-naked and put me through an interrogation like I’d tried to get past airport security with a double latte. Now he wanted me to play Mata Hari. I
knew
what happened to her, and it wasn’t pretty.

“Hi, I’m Pepper O’Malley,” I choked out, handing the balding manager my résumé. He smelled like garlic and had pepperoni stuck in his teeth. I held my breath. “I’m here for the ball-pit job.”

“You got any experience?” he asked, and then sneezed on my resume.

“Yeah, sure,” I said, unnerved. “I play with balls all the time.”

He snickered. Too late I realized what I’d said. Then he explained to me that all I had to do was keep the kids’ ball pond filled with red, blue, yellow and green hollow plastic balls. Hey, a job is a job. And you get free pizza, a programmer’s main food staple. So what if being trapped with a bunch of screaming kids in a padded cage wasn’t my dream job? A girl had to eat.

The manager stuffed my résumé into his jeans waistband and then looked me up and down while he picked his teeth. With a penknife. “Do you have good people skills, Pepper?” His eyes lingered on my breasts.

“I love kids,” I blurted out.

“She hates kids,” said a deep male voice behind me. It made my nipples hard.

Steve.

He didn’t stop there.

“She eats them for breakfast.”

“Who’s your boyfriend?” The pizza parlor manager wanted to know, staring at Steve like he wanted to put him through a sausage grinder.

“He’s
not
my boyfriend,” I said, my spirits sinking.

“I’m her pimp,” Steve said, and then he grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the pizza parlor. Holding me by the elbow, he steered me toward his unmarked car parked in an alley. Nobody around. Perfect for a kidnapping.

“Why did you do that?” I asked, jumping into the passenger seat rather than make a scene. I didn’t want to go downtown to the federal building a second time. “I answered a hundred online ads, and this was the only job that would talk to me.”

“Cool it, Pepper, I’ve got a better offer for you.”

“Since when did wearing a wire for the FBI pay the big bucks?”

“You’re going to be a companion girl,” he said, checking his messages on his cell.

“A
what?
”

“Your job is to entertain Japanese businessmen.”

My eyes bugged out. “I’m
not
taking off my clothes again.”

“You don’t have to. You’ll wear a recording device here.” He slipped his hand under my baby tee and cupped my breast. Okay, so he had my attention. Next, he flicked his finger under my bra strap.

Oh, that wasn’t fair. He knew I was dying for him to pinch my nipple.

“What if he gives me a bear hug and finds the wire stuck to my tits with duct tape?” I asked, trying my best not to get turned-on. I didn’t want to go down that road only to be disappointed again. I liked Steve too much to play games.

“It’s not like the old days, Pepper, when you had to wear a clunky, battery-operated recorder. Everything’s digital. The recorder is implanted in a jeweled pin.” He smiled that devil grin of his. “No one is going give you a New Jersey pat-down but me.”

He leaned over and ran his hands expertly up and down my rib cage, then between my thighs, taking time to dig his finger into my crotch. He rubbed his thumb into the tight denim cutting into me.

Pushing, probing, stroking, delicious sensations filled me up. I squirmed. So much for me not getting turned-on. It was pure hell for me not to unzip my jeans and slide them down my thighs so he could finger me.

I decided to play along. Let him try to convince me.

What did I have to lose?’

I had no intention of wearing a wire.

“How do you know Mr. Briggs will be at this fancy party?” I leaned in and ran my finger along the sexy stubble on his chin. I loved the way he touched me, made me feel good.

But I wanted more.

I didn’t want to press my luck, but I couldn’t help wishing he’d kiss me.

“He’s eager to meet my Asian contacts,” Steve said, grabbing my fingers and entwining them with his. It was a romantic gesture and one that made my bachelorette meter soar even if he
was
trying to con me. “There will be several pretty models at the hotel. All you have to do is follow the script I give you. There will be a surveillance team in place. We’ll move in quietly and take Briggs into custody after we get what we want.”

I pulled away. I wanted to see my ex-boss pay for what he did to me, but those old feelings of doubt lingered in my mind. Like smelly gym socks left in your tote bag. You didn’t want to open it.

“I can’t do it.”

“Pepper—”

“Mr. Briggs may be a crook, but you’re asking
me
to be a snitch.”

“You want to be a spy, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Then be one.”

He had a point. For years, I’d watched every cop and spy show on TV. Learning the lingo, imitating their moves when they kicked down doors, practicing my two-handed gun pose.

Still—

“What if I screw up?” I had to ask.

“You won’t, Pepper. I’d stake my badge on it.”

“You would?” I asked, disbelieving.

“I would.”

He tilted my head back and claimed my mouth with the most intoxicating pair of lips a girl ever knew. Burning with need, melting into me, pressing harder when I reached around his neck and held him tight. I parted my lips and he entwined his tongue with mine, leaving me breathless.

If this was a bribe, bring it on.

I pressed my breasts against his muscular chest and moaned so loud I shocked myself. “Don’t stop, Steve, please don’t stop.”

He gave it to me hot and long, sweetening the moment with trails of kisses up and down my neck and then sticking his tongue into my cleavage. Tickling me, unhooking my bra. He circled my breasts, but he didn’t play with my nipples.

What the—

“Suck on my nipples,
please
,” I said, jiggling my breasts like a wound-up Kewpie doll.

“No.”

“You know you want to,” I teased, biting down on my lower lip. Was that
me
talking?

“Not until you promise to help me take down a corporate thief. A man who is a liar and a cheat.”

“Steve, I—I—”

“You can do it, Pepper.” He cupped my breasts and squeezed them.

Oh, the frustration. Whoever thought he’d resort to such torture?

Jesus, I thought I was going to die.

I begged him to bite my nipples. Twist them. Wet them with his tongue. Blow on them. Do
something
.

No
, he said. Not until I promised to do what he asked.

I writhed about in the bucket seat of his old Buick, the split leather cracking under my butt. I was in an emotional pickle. I wanted to be a spy and when the opportunity was handed to me on a silver platter, I froze. I knew this was my defining moment. No more daydreaming about being a spy girl.

Do it or forget it.

That meant I had to let go, get over my fears, and if it took wild, passionate sex to put me over the top, then so be it. I couldn’t stand the burning in my belly another minute.

I gave in.

“Okay, Steve, I’ll
wear
the damn wire.”

He grinned wide. “I thought you’d see things my way.”

“Do I have a choice?” I asked, panting hard.

“No, but I do.” He bit my nipple hard, then the other, and I fell headfirst into exquisite pleasure.

Chapter Six

“Jeez, Mr. Briggs,” I muttered in a flat voice, “what a surprise seeing you here.”

“
No
,
no
,
no
, Pepper,” Cindy said, exhaling with a loud
whoosh
. “You’re too stiff. Try it again.”

I pulled in my gut and clenched my pubes. “
Jeez
, Mr. Briggs—”

“You sound like a robocall,” Cindy said, exasperated. “Now say it with feeling. Give it
oomph
.” She cleared her throat. “Jeez, Mr. Briggs, what a big surprise seeing little ol’ you here.” She batted her Dolly Partons.

Her lashes, not her boobs.

“I’m not trying to seduce him, Cindy. I’m trying to get a confession.”

“Whatever. You have to be
in the moment
. Think of something way more important than Mr. Briggs.”

“Like Steve’s dick?” I teased.

She sighed. “You’ll never be an actress, Pepper, if you don’t give it your all.”

“I’m a tech-head, not a drama queen.”

She shot me a dirty look and fluffed her hair at the same time. That was a joke between us ever since high school when she was cast as the Good Witch of the North in a spoof of
Wicked
and I worked the special effects “wizard” board.

“So? Didn’t I let you sprinkle techie dust on me so I could learn how to use that image-fixing software you bought?” she reminded me.

“Yeah,” I said. It was a matter of survival. Cindy was determined to zap her freckles from her headshot.

“Then
you
can learn how to pronounce your vowels and how to breathe properly.”

“I don’t
want
to breathe, I want to die.” I tossed down the script Steve had given me and sank into the big easy chair in her parents’ living room. She couldn’t afford her own apartment. Acting wasn’t exactly a high-paying job, though she was determined to convince me otherwise.

She tried the I-did-it-and-so-can-you approach
.

“You know that hair show I did?” she said, bubbling over like fizzing soda pop.

“Did they cast you or your dark roots?”

Cindy ignored my sarcasm as she always did. She was my best friend. She put up with me.

“I’ve been dying to tell you, Pepper. A TV producer saw me and wants to cast me in his new reality show about four single girls who can’t live without their phones.”

“What’s it called?” I asked with a smirk. “
Confessions of a Cell-Phone Princess?
”

She rolled her eyes. “All I have to do is live in a store window with three other girls with no communication to the outside world except our smartphones. The girl who gets the most votes from the viewers wins fifty thousand dollars.” She sighed. “Just think, Pepper, I could move out on my own.”

With that Barbie collection?

She’d never find a one-bedroom apartment that big.

“What about your intimate moments?” I asked.

“I don’t know all the details,” she admitted, furrowing her pencil-thin brows.

“Like bathroom breaks and lonely nights with your vibrator.” I wasn’t surprised at Cindy’s news since recent stats suggested more people in the world had a cell phone than a bathroom.

“Oh, I never thought about that.” She perked up. “Well, anyway, I’m sure they’ll work the kinks out. What’s more important now is getting you your job back.”

“I wouldn’t do this if Steve hadn’t kissed me.”

“He’s that good?”

“Better,” I said, my whole bod humming, the memory of his kiss and the promise that went with it stirring my desires. I rubbed my thighs together and moaned.

“
That’s it
,
Pepper!
” she said, her lips parting in a big O. She was so excited she jumped up and clapped her hands together. “You’re
in the moment.
Now, try it again....”

And so it went for hours with Cindy directing me like we were doing a
Star Wars
sequel and I was Princess Leia. Too bad I didn’t have her lightsaber. All I had was a measly recorder between me and exile to a doomed planet for fired programmers. God help me.

Finally, we had it down to where she thought I just might pull it off.

I thought about how what had started out as a job fixer-upper had turned into something far different. Because of Steve. This sexy FBI agent had flipped my world into a new orbit. Melted my resistance. Forced me to face my fears. No matter what happened, there was no turning back.

I jumped when the holy grail of polyphonic rings ripped through the air and my cell phone lit up with a now familiar caller ID.

Steve.

“The eagle...that is, the walrus,” he said, referring to my oft-used description of my ex-boss, “has landed.”

I gulped.

Lights. Camera. Action.

This was it.

The big takedown.

Oh, my God, I just wet my pants.

* * *

My assignment: Get Mr. Briggs to hire me back. Not as a programmer, but as a courier. Board a private jet. Deliver documents to his contacts in Asia. Then return with cash or drugs hidden in my—

No, I couldn’t even think it. It was too gross.

Hopefully, I’d never get that far. Once he made me the offer, I was off the hook. That is, wire.

I blinked through my star-crossed, false eyelashes and checked out the private lounge in the hotel filled with happy partygoers. Japanese and American businessmen drinking expensive whiskey and gulping down cubes of Kobe beef and truffles. Pretty young models wearing thigh-high, slinky dresses and spike heels. Their long earrings dangled over their bare shoulders when they laughed, provocative and jazzy.

Was I the only one not having a good time?

I glanced briefly into a dark corner and spied a couple making out on the couch. Two men drinking and laughing pointed to them. One of them must have told a dirty joke. I moved on before they zeroed in on me. I had never felt so vulnerable. My skin prickled like I was a chicken with its feathers plucked. Yet I knew Steve and his team were here somewhere.

Watching me.

“Do you copy, Pepper?” I heard him say in my earpiece. The microbud was the latest in surveillance technology, giving me the freedom to move about and receive information.

“I’m here, Steve,” I whispered, grabbing a martini off a tray. My third. I scanned a trio of businessmen watching a pretty girl balance a champagne glass on her forehead while they trickled the bubbly down her cleavage. “But Mr. Briggs isn’t.”

“Keep looking. You’ll find him. And when you do,
be sexy
. Make him forget you were ever a programmer.”

Easier said than done.

I was afraid to jiggle my boobs. Steve had fastened a faux diamond pin with the tiny digital recorder onto my low-cut dress. What if it came loose?

At least I could see where I was going. The Bureau had staked me with soft contacts for the job, or so Steve said. I was sure the money came out of his own pocket. I considered it a personal loan, and I intended to pay him back as soon as I found work.

I sipped my martini. Sea salt and orange mixed on my tongue as I peeked over the rim of my glass. I shook, not stirred, my courage. Revved it up all the way. Swaying my hips so the sparkly pin caught the light. Swinging my silver-sequined purse with the long chain over my shoulder. I had this fantasy I
was
a spy. Especially in this setup. An intimate lounge with cut crystal and glass, blue velvet couches and purple walls that reminded me of a scene in a Bond flick.

The villain’s lair.

How juicy.

I scoped out the men drinking at the long mahogany bar.

There he was. I saw Mr. Briggs raising his glass in a toast with an Asian businessman, his other hand grabbing the man’s business card. Perfect timing. I knew his game: Get a foot in the Japanese video game market and he was set.

Not tonight, Mr. Briggs.

My job was to convince him that he “owed” me a job, and I would blow the whistle on him if he didn’t hire me.

Remembering what Cindy said about being in the moment, I thought about sex as I sashayed over to my ex-boss.

Steve’s big dick. And his hands all over me.

No wonder I had a big smile on my face when I came up behind him. “Jeez, Mr. Briggs,” I said, tapping him on the shoulder, “what a surprise seeing you here.”

Flustered, he spit out his drink and then turned to see me grinning at him. “You show up in the strangest places, Miss O’Malley.”

“I’m a whiz kid, remember?” I said, leaning in closer. “Your calendar is an open book to me.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said. “Leave me alone.”

“Not until you give me a job.”

“I just hired a new programmer to take your place.”

“That’s
not
the job I want.” I cozied up to him, licking my lips. The Asian businessman next to him smiled, bowed and left. “You could send me to Japan to work on your
other
business.”

Mr. Briggs wiped his sweaty brow with his cocktail napkin. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I think you do.” I sipped my martini, flirting with him and batting my thick eyelashes like a pop music queen. “All that lovely, dirty money flowing into your hands, and all you have to do is wash it clean.”

“Are you trying to blackmail me, Miss O’Malley?”

“All I want is what you owe me, Mr. Briggs. Back salary and my key to the exec girls’ washroom.”

That last part was off script, but I couldn’t help it.

“What?” he asked, not getting it.

I took a deep breath and got back into character fast. “I hear there’s
beaucoup
bucks in moving overseas money through phony shell companies—”

An irritated female voice butted in. “Excuse me, honey, but Mr. Briggs isn’t interested in balling you, so lay off.”

Holy shit. It was Ms. Sims looking glam, if you could make a witch glam. Her perfume reeked, as usual. Where did she get that stuff? It smelled like hair dye.

“Did you fly in on your broomstick?” I asked, feeling smug.

It took her a moment to recognize me.

“Pepper O’Malley,” she screeched, “what the hell are you doing here?”

“Mr. Briggs and I are discussing business,” I said, standing up to her. “Now if you’ll excuse us.”

“I’m calling security.”

“Don’t be so hasty, Genevieve,” Mr. Briggs said, nervous.

Genevieve?

“Miss O’Malley is going to be our new business associate.”

Did you get that, Steve?

“Make him offer you a job outright,” I heard in my earpiece.

Damn, this wasn’t going according to plan. I needed more courage. I downed the martini in one gulp.

“Mr. Briggs wants me to be a courier for the company,” I said in a clear voice.

He acknowledged what I said with a brief nod and a weak grin.

“Make him
say
he wants you to move money for him, Pepper,” Steve whispered in my ear. “We need his voice on the tape.”

“You want me to be your new courier to Japan and pick up phony documents
and
cash. Right, Mr. Briggs?” I said, the vodka cruising to my brain in a slow, easy fashion. I will not get dizzy. “Who would ever suspect me? I’m perfect for the job. After all, I wrote the damn video game program.”

I burped. Loud.

Mr. Briggs didn’t notice. He was too busy freaking out, praying no one had heard me. I don’t know where my sassiness came from. Either Cindy was a damned good acting teacher or three martinis was a damned good incentive.

“She’s
crazy
, Seymour,” Ms. Sims said, pulling on his arm. “Don’t agree to anything.”

“Are you going to let
her
run
your
business, Mr. Briggs?” I said, not letting up. I was enjoying this. Big-time.

“No,” he began, “but Ms. Sims is in charge of the overseas accounts.”

I was sweating pink. Hot and heavy. I still didn’t have his confession.

I made one more try.

“I
need
this job, Mr. Briggs. Say you’ll hire me to move cash for you,
please!
” I begged him. Jeez, that was dumb. Overkill. I broke the spy rules. I couldn’t help it. My pulse kicked up its heels higher than I wanted to go. My desperation showed.

Something popped in Ms. Sims’s brain.

She looked me up and down. I swear she was onto me and knew the fake diamond pin stuck in my cleavage was a recorder. “Something smells fishy here, Seymour. Who let her in here?”

“
Who cares?
” he said, going postal. “I’m hiring her to be a courier for us. If I don’t, she’ll go to the feds and tell them everything she found on your computer. The phony companies, the overseas dirty money,
everything.
”

“Keep your mouth
shut!
” Ms. Sims swiveled her head from left to right. She gasped loudly when she saw Steve and two men in plainclothes closing in on her. “
You fool!
You damned fool
. Look what you’ve done.”

She pushed me hard, knocking the glass out of my hand, then bolted. She left poor Mr. Briggs wiping his forehead and demanding he be allowed to talk to his lawyer. I ignored him. Steve could take care of him. Ms. Sims was right. Something
did
smell. Her exotic dill weed perfume lingered in the air.

I jammed after her.

This was one takedown I was going to enjoy.

* * *

Ms. Sims had the advantage. No one knew why she was running. She could be headed to the bathroom to toss up the fried squid kebabs. Or reapply her demon-red lipstick. She also hadn’t downed three dirty martinis
and
she was used to maneuvering the corporate world in sky-high heels. I wasn’t. That didn’t stop me. I sprinted through the devil’s lair like a regular speed freak, my arms flailing about like I was a roller derby queen.

Nothing
could stop me.

Until—

A trio of businessmen blocked my way. They were trying to look up a model’s skirt when she bent over to pick up her earring.

“
Excuse me
,
excuse me
,” I busted out, knocking off a Japanese businessman’s glasses when I zinged past him. Then I slammed into a waiter carrying a tray of empty plastic champagne flutes. Down we went like dominos. I heard the loud
crunch
of plastic under my butt as I landed.