Anything For You

175 Pages·2011·0.61 MB·English

by  Monroe Jill

TALL, DARK AND FILTHY RICH
Jill Monroe
TORONTO • NEW YORK • LONDON
AMSTERDAM • PARIS • SYDNEY • HAMBURG
STOCKHOLM • ATHENS • TOKYO • MILAN • MADRID
PRAGUE • WARSAW • BUDAPEST • AUCKLAND
Thanks to my husband and family.
I love you and treasure your support.
Special thanks to Gena Showalter—a great dancer
who’s taught me all her best moves. Please note
what DOES happen to those who steal garden
gnomes.
Thanks also to Sheila Fields, Donnell Epperson
and Betty Sanders, who always make me laugh
and are always there for me. And to
Kassia Krozser, whose name is always
on my dedication page.
To my friends Jennifer and Karen, who’ve put up
with a lot during this book. Thanks. I promise to
return to all sweetness and light shortly.
I also want to thank the other authors from the
Million Dollar Secrets books and Kathryn Lye.
It was great fun working with all of you.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
1
“EVER THINK MAYBE YOU’RE in the wrong line of work?” Dana, the reporter
from the Atlanta Daily News, asked in a bored tone as she flipped a Skittle into
her mouth.
“No. Why?” Jessica Huell shrugged. So much for the great article the
reporter planned to write about Atlanta’s Most Interesting Professionals. Clearly,
Jessie’s execution of her current job was proving to be a dud, and she’d really
hoped the exposure from the proffered feature in the newspaper would swing a
little more business her way.
Movement caught her eye. “Wait, get down,” Jessie said, as she pushed
Dana’s head below the dashboard.
Both women scrunched low, toward the floorboard of Jessie’s car, which
was littered with sacks of fast food they’d eaten earlier that night.
Jessie listened. They’d cracked the windows for a little air and to hear the
night sounds more easily. At two in the morning, this residential street in Atlanta
was quiet. She easily heard the clap of high-heeled shoes on the sidewalk. The
opening and closing of a car door. The turning of an engine.
After counting to ten, Jessie poked her head up over the steering wheel. The
blue car. Bingo. She watched as it drove down the street, then turned left. She
counted another ten seconds and then slowly took the same path.
Dana sat up in her seat and rubbed the muscles of her neck. “This wrecks
that ‘female private investigators are cool’ thing I was going for.”
Good. Jessie curled her fingers around the steering wheel in satisfaction.
Being an investigator could be dangerous and exciting, but when people were
drawn to the job for those qualities, that’s when folks started getting hurt. Her
job entailed hard work, long nights and little sleep. With “boring” thrown in to
smooth out the rough edges. A whole lot of boring.
smooth out the rough edges. A whole lot of boring.
“Whew, I’m glad that’s over,” Dana said as she rummaged in her purse for
something, obviously ready for her one night of undercover to be over. “I don’t
know how much longer I could stand being in this car.”
“Well, we still have a ways to go.”
The reporter stopped applying her lip gloss. “Why? You already have the
picture of him with the woman.”
Jessie dropped back farther from the car she was trailing. Even in a big city
like Atlanta, a car closely following another would be suspicious after 2:00 a.m.
“A picture tells only part of the story. We don’t know who the woman is. What
her relationship is to Mr. Roberts.”
Dana scoffed. “She hugged him, then stayed in his home for over three
hours. I don’t think she was the maid. Not with those shoes.”
Those were some pretty sexy stilettos. Not that Jessie was much of a shoe
person. Not much call for high-heeled sling-backs in her line of work, in spite of
the Hollywood image.
Smiling, she kept an eye on the sedan several car lengths ahead. They were
back on side streets, where only an occasional streetlight or neon sign broke the
darkness. They’d be hitting a residential neighborhood soon. She gave a silent
plea that the car would lead her to a house with an address rather than to an
apartment complex. Those were the worst. A lot of effort wasted on a dead end.
Yes! The owner of the nonmaid shoes was pulling into a paved driveway.
Jessie held back, waiting for the woman to enter her home before driving past.
Then she slowly moved forward, looking as casual as she could. Just an
insomniatic neighbor out for a drive. Or maybe a desperate mother hoping to get
her baby to sleep. Whatever. Blending in. Appearing like someone who
belonged there. That was her strength; she’d never been one to stand out. She
hated flash, and unlike the reporter beside her, Jessie had never applied lip gloss
in a moving vehicle. She wouldn’t even know how to take care of a highlight.
With a subtle glance at the number on the front of the house, Jessie was on
her way.
“That was a little more fun. It was the closest we’ve come to getting caught,”
Dana said, her voice slightly breathless.
“We weren’t anywhere near getting caught,” Jessie told her dryly. She was
all for exaggeration, but not if it made her come across as less than professional.
“No need to get irritated. I just meant it was the first bit of excitement we’ve
had since blondie showed up in the first place. When I still thought this night
would be interesting,” Dana said with a wink. “What now?”
Dare she tell her? Jessie wondered. Dana was a reporter, after all. The
woman dealt with facts. Hopefully.
Actually, Jessie herself should be delving only in facts. Conjecture shouldn’t
be part of her professional world. But in the lonely hours after midnight, The
Speculation Game was often the only thing that kept her awake. And interested.
Maybe Dana was right; maybe she needed a different line of work.
Okay, she was losing it. She loved her job. Giving another woman the truth
—that the man she was about to marry was a loser—was always good. Or even
better, that the man she was about to commit a lifetime to, or at least the next
several years to would be “on the level” with her. If only someone had been
around to wake up Jessie before her own loser fiancé proved what a louse he
was.
She glanced at her companion, whose laptop illuminated the front seat of the
car. No, she probably shouldn’t tell Dana that on a stakeout she often dabbled in
assumptions and bizarre guesses. But then, at nearly three in the morning,
common sense was asleep.
“Right about now I start thinking about where she’s going.”
“What do you mean? We just saw her go into her house.” Dana stated, not
bothering to look up from her typing.
“No, I mean, what does she plan to do with that stolen microchip he passed
along to her?”
Dana stopped typing and gave Jessie an assessing look. “Stolen…I thought
he was just some guy who doesn’t spend his Thursday nights with his
girlfriend.”
girlfriend.”
Jessie put on her best mock-serious expression. “Oh, no. He may come
across as a mild-mannered accountant who worked overtime during tax season
to buy an engagement ring, but in reality he’s escaped from a faraway land. The
secret agents from his country have found him.”
“The country of Fabricatia, perhaps?” Dana asked, her body language
suggesting for the first time this evening that The Speculation Game was
something she could get into.
“Exactly. And now he’s being stalked by that woman, but determined to
keep his secrets safe.”
“I knew there was something suspicious about those pointy-toed sling-backs.
Those were total spy shoes. He slipped her a fake chip, I know it.”
“But how long can he hold out?”
Dana laughed. “So, do you make up stories like this all evening?”
“Beats the reality of the job.”
“No question about that. I was really hoping some irate couple caught in a
clandestine tryst might come after you with a gun. Would have made this story a
lot more interesting.”
“Sorry I couldn’t accommodate.”
“That was before I knew you. Now I don’t want you to get shot at. You can
stay with your boring job,” Dana said with a smile.
Jessie pulled her car into the parking lot of an all-night diner. “Then you’re
going to love this next part. You’re about to witness the glamorous excitement of
plugging this address into the database. Hopefully we’ll make a quick hit.”
“Ugh. Where’s the excitement in that?”
“Did I mention the waffles?”