True Shot (16 page)

“I don’t know her.”

“What you do know, you don’t like.”

“I sense that she and Charlie don’t have the best relationship. I suppose I feel protective.”

“What about Alex? Does she get along with our mother?”

Mac thought about that for a moment. “I really don’t know. Charlie never mentioned any issues between Alex and their mother.”

“’So you’re . . . close to Charlie.”

The way she said it, and the dawning understanding on her face, had him setting down his fork and scrambling to explain. “Whoa, wait. Don’t go there. It’s not like that.”

“Yes, it is. I can tell by the way you say her name.”

“Like hell you can tell.”

“Your lips quirk. And your eyes . . . darken. Are you in love with her?”

“No.”

She didn’t respond. She just watched him, head slightly cocked.

“No,” he said more firmly. Then, as she continued to pierce him with an I’m-taking-apart-your-soul-and-looking-inside stare, he sighed and pushed away his plate. “Yeah, fine. I was. But it was a year ago, and I’m over it. Besides, she’s got the man of her dreams now, so even if I did have a thing for her, it’s a moot point.”

“Why do you feel so guilty about it? I’d understand regret or disappointment or even anger. But why guilt?”

A cold shaft of alarm caught him off guard. “What are you doing? Reading my mind? Because that’s really uncool.”

Her eyebrows arched in surprise. “No, of course not. I can’t—”

“You’re a psychic spy. Of course you can.”

“I’m not that kind of psychic. I can sense your emotions. And I can read your face, your expressions.”

“You’re a human lie detector.”

“I’m a trained government spy.”

They both sat back when Roz approached with the coffeepot to top off Mac’s cup. “You folks about ready for dessert? We’ve got some delicious pecan pie, and the banana pudding’s to die—” Noticing Sam’s nearly untouched food, she cast a worried glance at Mac. “Might should I bring her a salad after all?”

“No,” Sam said, and used both hands to pick up the huge sandwich. “I just haven’t had a chance to dig in yet because we’ve been talking.” She flashed an all-teeth smile and obediently took a large bite of burger.

Mac watched as she chewed, swallowed and went in for another big bite. Maybe it was weird, but the flexing of her jaw muscles, the way her throat worked as she swallowed, were just about the sexiest things he’d ever seen.

“It’s really good,” Sam told the waitress, her mouth adorably full.

Also sexy, Mac thought.

“All righty then.” Roz threw a little wave over her shoulder as she walked away. “You folks enjoy.”

Mac couldn’t stop himself from grinning. “Oh, she’s going to remember you, whether you want her to or not.”

She ignored his amusement and continued to eat.

He decided that even if she consumed only half the cheeseburger, he’d consider that a major win. Already, color was returning to her pale cheeks. He had to work to suppress a satisfied smile when she adjusted the straw in the chocolate shake then sucked her cheeks hollow getting her first taste of the thick ice cream. Jesus, was he horny or what? Because
that
was
definitely
the sexiest thing he’d ever seen.

To get a grip, he spent some quality time stirring his fork through his bowl of mac and cheese. What the hell was wrong with him? Yeah, okay, he was tired. Tired and whipped and freaked out. And of course the spy was distracting. How could she not be? She wasn’t like anyone he’d ever met, let alone any
woman
he’d ever met. In fact, he couldn’t remember a time when he’d ever wondered idly how a particular woman would look in black leather. He imagined hip-hugging leather pants and a laced-up bustier that pushed the goods together and up, just waiting for a—

The thought stalled when he realized Sam had stopped eating, her attention riveted on the TV in the corner.

Mac twisted in the booth to take a look. The reality show had ended, yielding to an eleven o’clock newscast. At the moment, a publicity shot of a silver-haired, craggy-faced man with bushy eyebrows flashed on the screen.

“Who is that?” Sam asked.

Mac faced her. She’d abandoned her burger and shake, and he weighed the idea of trading information for every extra bite she took. He decided against it when her gaze, cold and intense, met his. Earlier, he’d considered her every gesture sexy as hell. This look, however, was just plain lethal.

“That’s Arthur Baldwin,” he said. “Ponzi scheme extraordinaire. Why?”

“I know him.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

I
really think this is a bad idea,” Mac said as he followed Sam back to the stolen Camry. The woman could book when focused on a mission. “We don’t know how you know him. What if he’s got Flinn Ford on speed dial?”

“This man can tell me more about who I am. He can help.”

“You don’t know that. I mean, this guy isn’t your stereotypical Southern gentleman. He’s kind of a rat bastard, if you ask me.”

She paused in the process of opening the passenger-side door. “Why?” she asked over the top of the car. “What do you know about him?”

“While he was governor of South Carolina, he engineered a pyramid scheme that cost thousands of people their life savings. It blew up on him when the stock market tanked. He pinned the collapsed scam on his two sons, who were partners in his investment firm and supposedly running it while he was in office. They’re sitting in prison now while he’s drinking pina coladas on Kiawah Island.” He paused. “Does any of this sound familiar?”

She shook her head without speaking, then opened the car door and got in. Mac did the same but didn’t put the key in the ignition right away.

“I think we should continue on to Lake Avalon,” he said.

“Isn’t Kiawah Island near Charleston? How far is that?”

“A couple of hours, but—”

“Then we should check it out. I need more answers, Mac. Just knowing I’m an empathic spy for the FBI isn’t enough.”

His brain stalled. She’d called him “Mac.” She hadn’t called him by name since he’d met her. He wasn’t sure why that seemed significant, but it did.

“What?” she asked, impatience lacing the word.

He blinked, realizing he’d stared for too long. “I guess I’m just thinking that chasing after this guy seems a bit impulsive. I mean, if you want information about who you are, we should go to the source. Someone several levels above Flinn Ford at the FBI, for instance.”

“That’d be an excellent plan if my instincts weren’t telling me not to trust anyone at the FBI or any other feds. I need to gather as much information as I can before I approach any type of law enforcement. Which means I need answers from people who know me—and possibly know Flinn. Arthur Baldwin knows me. I’m sure of it. At the very least, maybe he can tell me something that gives me a direction. Right now, I’m just a fish flopping around on the bank with no idea how to get back into the water.”

Unconvinced, Mac jammed the key into the ignition, but instead of twisting it to start the car, he sat back. “Your sisters know you, too,” he said quietly. “Maybe you should focus on figuring out more about who you are from them.”

When she didn’t respond, he added, “If this Arthur Baldwin guy is the kind of people you hang out with in your spy life, then maybe . . .” He trailed off with a shrug, reluctant to be too blunt.

“Maybe what?”

“Maybe you’re better off not knowing the gritty details about who you are.”

 

Sam turned her head to look out the windshield, the muscles in her jaw clenched against the unwanted surge of panic at Mac’s words. Suddenly, she
didn’t
want to know more about who she was. She had a feeling she wouldn’t like it, judging by the personality of the man pursuing them. What if she were just as calculated and—

“Look,” Mac said, cutting into the thought. “I didn’t say that to hurt you.”

She glanced at him, careful to keep her expression neutral, determined to not let him see that his words
had
hurt her. What he thought of her didn’t matter, she reminded herself. Surviving mattered. Somehow, she knew that that’s all that ever mattered. “You didn’t hurt me. You can’t if you don’t know me, right? We aren’t friends.”

He winced as though she’d struck a nerve. “I don’t know about that. I mean, we did just share some French fries and onion rings.”

Leave it to this man to boil the meaning of friendship down to the absolute minimum. “Is that all it takes in your world to be friends?”

“I shot that huge Italian guy to keep him from hurting you. That counts for something, doesn’t it?”

She actually wished she could buy into his perception. A friend in such a hostile world would be nice. Leaning her head back, she sighed. “Maybe.”

God, she was tired. And while she’d enjoyed the few bites of cheeseburger she’d managed, the food now sat in her stomach with the weight of a bowling ball.

As Mac steered the car onto the road beside the diner, Sam checked the name of the highway and direction: 301, east. Good. That was toward Charleston.

“Why don’t you try to get some more sleep?” Mac said. “You’re still exhausted.”

He reached over and patted the back of her hand. She didn’t hear what he said next, because the interior of the car shifted away.

“What about getting a job at the
Inquirer
instead of that tiny little weekly?”

I sit next to her, exhausted by the past year. Mom’s car wreck was horrible enough. And Dad’s dive to the bottom of a liquor bottle still pisses me off to no end. Fucking . . .
weak
. . . coward. They both left me in charge of getting a teenage girl through adolescence when I can barely summon the give-a-shit to get out of bed in the morning.

But she’s gearing up to relent, and relief tugs at the corners of my mouth. The smile wants to turn bitter. I’m supposed to be on the investigative-reporting staff at
The New York Times
by now. Guess that’s off the table.

“Sam? Sam!”

She blinked open her eyes to Mac’s frantic expression, confused by the damp, cold breeze on her face. It took her a long moment to realize he wasn’t in the driver’s seat anymore, that the car was parked haphazardly on the side of the two-lane highway. He’d gotten out of the car and opened her door so he could lean in to try to rouse her. Her cheeks vibrated with the vague impressions of his insistent taps.

“You with me?” he asked, peering into her eyes, his gaze dark but intense under the Toyota’s dome light.

Nodding, she pressed back against the passenger seat to put distance between them. His body gave off heat like a furnace, but instead of wanting to shrink away from it, she yearned to get as close to him as she could. Instinct, or something—self-preservation? —kept her back.

“You okay?” He shifted back to a squatting position outside her door.