Serving Up Trouble

Chapter 3

Angie got up at the crack of dawn, as always. She drove to work, as always. She figured she’d enter the café fifteen minutes before her shift, then help Elisa prepare for the break fast shift. As always.

But nothing was as always at all, because with one twist of fate-and a very sharp knife-she could have died, and unexpectedly she was still dealing with the horror of that.

And then there was Detective Sam O’Brien. He’d both saved her life and changed it forever, because she’d taken a look into those deep, fathomless, brooding eyes and had seen her future. It sounded silly now, in the sharp, glaring light of a new day, and at the memory of how he’d treated her in his office, she blushed. If that was her future, feeling like a ball of unimportant fluff, she didn’t want it, thank you very much. Been there, bought the T-shirt.

Yes, he’d been sweet and kind during her bank ordeal, and yes, darn it, maybe as a result she’d looked at him with stars in her eyes, but now those stars were so long gone.

She was better off by herself.

But she was going to find his suspect. Oh yes, that would be satisfying, if nothing else, just to prove she wasn’t the kind of person who made these things up to get attention.

She didn’t need attention, not from him. What she needed was to stick to her guns and live her life. She liked the feeling that coursed through her at that thought. This new-lease-on-life-thing felt good. Empowering.

Yeah. And next time she got held up, she wouldn’t need a hero, she’d save herself.

As if her karma was in perfect sync, on the walk to work she caught a glimpse of a man striding away from her, down the alley between the café and the used book store.

She knew that short, dark crew cut. She knew those tennis shoes, that compact, muscle-bound body, as she’d seen him several times now, either loitering in front of the book store where she spent far too many hours and too much of her tips, or as he was now, walking down the alley.

He was also the man she’d seen in the picture on Sam’s desk.

He was Sam’s suspect, and visions of proving him wrong and her right danced in her head. So did visions of getting herself killed, but she was too fond of her new life at the moment to let that happen.

Besides, contrary to popular belief by one stubborn detective, she had a brain. She knew better than to try to stop a wanted man by herself.

To prove it, she fumbled in her purse for the cell phone she’d won just last month in a mailer sweepstakes. At the time she’d thought she’d much rather have won a year’s supply of groceries, but right now she was grateful for the phone.

And the fact that for once her battery was fully charged.

Dialing 911, heart pounding, Angie flattened herself against the wall of the building, holding her breath when the man paused and glanced over his shoulder.

From nearly fifty feet, their gazes met and locked.

“Emergency dispatch,” came a female voice in her ear.

“I need to talk to Sam O’Brien,” Angie whispered, swallowing hard as fear turned her stomach to mush. “He’s a detective with-”

“Ma’am, you need to dial him direct-this is not an answering service.”

“It’s an emergency.” This whole calling-a-cop thing looked so much easier on television. “I have one of his suspects in sight right this very minute, and I think he’d want to know.”

“Where are you and what’s your name?”

Sam’s suspect stared at her for exactly two more seconds before vanishing around a corner.

Angie grated her teeth and gave the dispatcher the information, knowing it would be too late. “Tell Sam to hurry, and that if he needs me I’ll be working in the café.” Frustrated, she stood there staring down the alley, wishing she was a police officer so she could go find the guy herself.

The war between doing just that and staying put wasn’t a hard one to fight. She knew better. And anyway, despite feeling strong and sure, she didn’t have quite enough nerve.

But she’d give anything to be a big, tough, armed cop at this moment. With one last sigh, she entered the café.

“About time,” her boss groused as she came into the kitchen.

Angie hung up her sweater, pulled a hair band out of her pocket and tied up her hair. “Good morning to you, too. And I’m not late. I’m early.”

“Hmph.” Josephine looked at her and let out a huff. “It should be illegal to look as good as you do wearing that ugly uniform and your hair all piled on top of your head like that.” She continued slicing cantaloupe as she sighed, and on her two-hundred-plus-pound frame, the sound was substantial. “Why aren’t you in bed after your ordeal?”

“My ordeal was two days ago. Besides, I’d be bored to tears in bed.”

“Not if you put a man in there first.”

“Yeah, well…” Angie reached for her apron. A man in her bed had never brought her anything but a vague sense that she was missing some thing. “You should know, there might be some excitement here in a few minutes.”

“Excitement?”

The heavy knock at the back door caused Angie to jump. Casually as she could, she opened the door and faced one glowering Sam O’Brien.

He was imposing, intense, and very unsmiling.

“You got my message,” she said, amazed and trying not to gape at the oddly thrilling sight of his big, tough body standing there. “I didn’t think the dispatcher would tell you. She thought I was a prank call.”

“Was it?”

“Was it what?”

“A prank call,” he said slowly, through his teeth, towering over her.

“Of course not.” She had to remind herself that just because he was breath taking didn’t mean he couldn’t be a complete jerk. Although that seemed a bit unfair, because she could remember quite vividly how gently and warmly he’d held her, talking her through the after math of the holdup.

Where had that man gone?

“Did you look down the alley?” she asked.

“Yes. And in the still-closed book store. And in all the neighboring alleys. There’s no one out there, Angie. No one.”

“He was.”

He closed his eyes and shoved a hand through his hair. Then he leveled her with a look that made her want to cringe. It was that look, the one that said she didn’t know what she was talking about, and if she did, it probably wasn’t important anyway.

She was very tired of that look, of feeling invisible. It came from being average, she thought, annoyed with herself. All her life she’d been so average most people had never even noticed her.

And she’d allowed it.

That would have to change, too. Maybe she’d go blond. No, that would only multiply the ditzy image. Redhead? Hmm, some thing to think about. “I saw him,” she repeated, raising her chin, refusing to let him make her feel stupid again. “And if you lost him, it’s your own fault. You need to respond faster.”

“I got here in less than five minutes from your original call,” he pointed out, still through his teeth, his huge body practically quivering with temper.

What was it about her that brought out the worst in people? Another thing she intended to change. Thinking only to soothe, she reached out and put her hand on his arm.

The considerable amount of muscles beneath his skin jerked, but he con trolled himself with nothing more than pure will power.

She under stood the effort, if not the reasoning. She too felt an almost physical jolt. Unnerved, she dropped her hand.

He stared at her for a long moment before pulling a business card from his pocket. “Take this. It’s got my office and cell numbers on it. Call me direct next time.”

The air whooshed out of her lungs. “You believe me?”

He put his sun glasses on. “I don’t know.”

“You believe me.” She grinned, ridiculously relieved, even when his frown returned.

“But if you’re in danger, call 911. Got that?”

“Yes. So which number should I call next time I see him?”

Sam looked pained. “You won’t.”

“I think I will.”

“Angie-”

“I’m not making this up, Sam. He’s out there. I’ll see him again.”

“No one else has.”

“Because no one else is out there at this time of morning. I think he’s an early bird.”

He sighed again, as if she was making his life a living hell on purpose. “You realize this guy is considered dangerous, right? Don’t-”

“Don’t do anything stupid?” She tried not to care that he thought she would. “I won’t.”

“If you think you see him again-”

“Not think. Know.”

“If you think you see him again,” he repeated firmly, “stay safe. Stay far away. Really far away. Then call me.”

“Call you.”

“Yeah. Me.” He didn’t look thrilled. “But if you’re in any sort of danger at all, I mean it, Angie, if he so much as blinks at you, call 911. Immediately.”

“Like I did this time.”

His eyes narrowed. “Are you telling me he saw you?”

“And listened to me call for help.”

He swore, winced, then again shoved his fingers through his hair. “Terrific. Look-” His radio crackled, and someone called to him, requesting him as backup. “Damn. We’ll finish this later.”

She wondered if that was a threat or a promise, and decided by the look on his face it was a chore. “No need. I’ll contact you when I see him again.”

When the door had shut behind him, Angie turned to see Josephine brimming with curiosity.

“Was that your cop?”

“Not my cop. The cop.”

“Uh-huh.” Josephine looked bowled over. “He was…wow.”

“Oh, close your mouth, you’re going to catch flies.”

“I guess we’re not going to talk about how wow he was.”

“Did I mention I registered for college?”

“Nice subject change.”

“Yep.”

Josephine put her hands on her ample hips. “Honey, listen. I don’t mean to interfere-”

“Yes, you do.”

“Hush. I’m talking, and what I’m talking about is you getting over what’s-his-name and finding another man. Like Mr. Wow Cop for example.”

“I’m over what’s-his-name.” Definitely over Tony. So over Tony-ex-fiancé, ex-friend, ex-everything. Maybe still recovering, still getting her balance, but not mourning.

Life was too darn short.

“Lordie, that man was hot.” Josephine fanned herself. “And I bet he wouldn’t let you out of bed so early.”

Angie laughed, but a small part of her tingled at the thought of finding a man who wouldn’t let her out of bed because he couldn’t stand to be without her.

She hadn’t a clue what that would be like.

“Angie, honey, you know I love you.”

Angie smiled. “Does this mean I’m getting a raise?”

“Uh…no. But I worry. You shouldn’t be here today just because I don’t have anyone to cover the shift. You should take some time off.”

“I’m fine.”

“Fine is good, and good is crap. But never mind that now. The point is you deserve more.”

“Like I said, I’m going to college. Oh, and I bought myself a book just the other day.”

“A romance?”

“Well, no.”

Josephine snorted in disgust.

“But it was good,” Angie insisted. “And I’ve got lots of changes in the works. Big ones.”

“Really? You’re going to read a romance?”

“Much bigger.”

“Uh-huh. How about we just pretend to see that suspect so your cop will come back. Just once, pretty please?”

Luke stood in an interrogation room in front of their witness, Lou, who was seated in a chair.

Sam stood behind him.

Lou fidgeted nervously. He had a stack of petty crimes against him, all of which Sam could make go away.

For an exchange, that is. A good one. Such as one damn lead on their case.

Luke slowly paced the room. “So.” He stopped in front of Lou and smiled, his eyes warm and encouraging. “You have an uncle who has a neighbor, who has a girl friend, who’s friends with the guy who offered you a new identity for three hundred. Right?”

“Yeah.” Lou licked his lips, warming up to Luke. “That’s all. I didn’t ask for it or nothing, you know? They just thought…” He bit his fingernail.

“That you’d like to skip out on your crimes.” This from Sam, whose voice was hard as steel. He stayed behind Lou, wishing he could wring his scrawny, stupid little neck. “No. No,” Lou said, forced to twist around in his chair to eyeball Sam, who did not smile warmly and encouragingly. “I don’t need a new identity.” Sweat broke out on his brow. “I’m innocent. Totally innocent.”

“Yeah. As a shark.”

“Now, Sam.” Luke shot him a “be patient” look. “Let’s give Lou a break.”

They were playing good-cop bad-cop. Not a stretch for Sam to be the tough one. “I’ll give him a break when he gives me one. I want the-”

“The bigger fish?” Lou broke in hope fully.

“That’s right,” Luke soothed. “The bigger fish. The other guys. You can help us, Lou. It’d be good for you to help us.”

“You want to take down the entire identity-theft ring.”

“With your help,” Luke said.

Lou started to sweat more. “But I told you already, man. I know nothing. Nothing at all.”

“You know enough, I think,” Luke said pleasantly.

“No, Luke, maybe Lou here is right.” Sam came around front and stared at Lou coldly. “Maybe he can’t help us. Never you mind, Lou. We’ll just take you down the hall, book you, and-”

“What?” Lou cried, shrinking back, shoving his hands into his pockets as if to avoid the cuffs. “But you just said you don’t care what I’ve done.”

“Not if you help us.” Luke smiled again. Sweet as an innocent babe. “Why don’t you help us, Lou?”

“Don’t bother, he doesn’t want to.” Sam pulled out a pair of hand cuffs, yelled for a guard and walked toward Lou.

“Okay, okay!” Lou shot them a shaky smile as sweat poured down his face. “Sheesh. Maybe I can get you…some thing.”

“Now you’re talking,” Luke said very kindly. “Keep going.”

“Uh…”

Sam held up the cuffs and raised an eyebrow. Waiting.

Lou sighed. “Okay, listen. The kid making the new IDs…he’s some computer whiz kid at P.C.C.”

“If he’s a whiz kid, why is he going to Pasadena City College instead of a four-year school?” Luke asked.

“No money.”

Sam thought about this then shook his head. “Don’t buy it. This guy, if he’s the right one, is making a fortune off this gig. Two hundred thousand last month alone.”

“He’s not the boss, he’s just a paid joker.”

“Who is the boss?”

“Don’t know.”

“Give us a name,” Luke coaxed. “That’ll be a good start.”

“John.”

Sam rolled his eyes. “That’s convenient. How about a last name, ace?”

“That’s all I know,” Lou insisted. “That’s all I know.”

When they were back in Sam’s office, Luke looked at Sam very seriously. “I’ve got to ask.”

“Okay,” Sam said, expecting a question on the case.

“Get any more flowers today, lover boy?”

Luke was grinning at him, the bastard. “You know I didn’t.”

“Then you didn’t play your cards right.”

“Luke?”

“Yeah?”

“Shut up.”

Luke merely laughed. “You’re still in the papers this morning, did you see that? Such a hero, our Sam. Can I have your au to graph?”

Each of them had been through some pretty rough times, and each of them had come through with different attitudes. Luke tended to put his emotions out there, despite his tough ness.

Sam did not.

Sam didn’t like to acknowledge his emotions in any way, shape or form. They had disappointed and hurt him once too often.

Anyway, for all those reasons, or maybe none of them, Luke’s dark eyes rarely did that sparkle dance thing as they were doing now, no matter how amused he might be.

Nice as that was to see, Sam didn’t care for it being at his own expense, even if he was aware Luke was just trying to get a rise out of him.

If only Luke knew, just thinking about Angie got a rise out of him. “Can we talk the case, do you think, or do you want to joke around all day?”

“Sorry.”

“You don’t look sorry. You look disgustingly…I don’t know. Happy.”

Luke lifted a shoulder. “Maybe I got lucky last night.”

“With Sara?”

“Maybe.”

“About time. You’ve been dating her a month.”

“Some things are worth waiting for.”

Sam eye balled the known womanizer Luke Sorrintino. “That sounds serious.”

Luke shrugged again and turned away.

“Oh, now that we’re talking about you, we’re done?”

“That’s right. Besides, our little problem awaits us- Well, hello.” Luke smiled broadly at someone in the doorway, and even before Sam glanced over and saw his partner’s flirtatious expression, he knew.

Angie.

She stood there with her sweet face smiling right at him, in her second hand glasses that emphasized her huge eyes and a floral, gauzy dress covered in sunflowers that made him wish he had a pair of sun glasses just to look at her.

“You look tense again,” she said to Sam. “Am I interrupting?”

Yes.

“Of course not,” Luke said before Sam could speak. “We were just questioning a witness. I was the good cop. Sam here…” They both turned to stare at him.

“I bet he makes a scary bad cop,” Angie said with a secret little smile.

As if she knew him.

Well, if she did, and she could read his mind right now, she’d know this terrible urge he had to go to her, touch her. She’d probably run screaming from the room.

“You catch far more flies with honey instead of vinegar,” she said, wrinkling her nose delicately as she looked around his office with a sort of morbid curiosity.

“A mess, isn’t it?” Luke tsked, and Sam glared at him.

“I suggested opening the shades and fumigating,” Angie said. “But he wasn’t interested.”

“No, he’s very tense, our Sam.”

Oh, very funny.

“At the very least, he should try aromatherapy,” Angie said told Luke.

“I agree. I mean, just look at him.” Now Luke sidled over toward Angie, so that both of them were looking back at him; his partner with laughter in his eyes, and Angie, with…uh-oh. An un mistakable spurt of…some thing, all right. Some thing that made his insides do a juvenile sort of quiver. Damn it, he thought he’d taken care of that the last time they’d stood in this office together.

No attraction between them. Not now, not ever.

He faced them both. “I don’t need sunshine, fumigating or aromatherapy, thank you.” He took Luke’s arm, showed him the door and closed it behind him.

“Before you say a word,” Angie said. “I just wanted to say, I didn’t come here to discuss the horrid color of your walls or the way you keep your office.”

“But you had to mention it.”

“Well, yes. Since I was here.” She smiled, a totally disarming smile. “That was just a bonus suggestion, you understand, and I’ll try to restrain myself in the future. I’m not here to make a pest of myself.”

Oddly enough, she wasn’t. Because somehow, simply by standing there, his day seemed…brighter.

Not good. “I’m pretty busy.”

Her smile dimmed slightly, and he wondered what exactly it was about her that made him such a jerk. “I wanted to see that picture again,” she said.

“Picture?” All he could think of was the photo of them in the paper, when she’d been snuggled against his chest, when he’d been staring down into her face-

“The suspect drawing.”

“Oh.” Idiot. “It’s here…some where.” He went to his desk and started rifling, nearly growling when she came close and leaned over his desk, too, her sweet-smelling hair brushing his arm.

“Sorry,” she said, tossing it over her shoulder. “I tend to get in people’s spaces. I know you don’t like to be touched.”

Oh, he liked to be touched. Sexually, that is. Which, unfortunately, was suddenly all he could think about at the moment. “Here.” He found the picture before he made a fool of himself and pulled it from the disaster masquerading as his desk. “What did you need it for?”

“I just wanted to add…” She took the paper, set it on the desk, reached for a pencil and-

“Hey, that’s-”

“Yes,” she breathed, straightening, holding up the sheet to inspect her handiwork. “That’s it. Now it’s perfect.”

Sam grabbed the composite drawing and stared at it. She’d added a little goatee.

“Some thing about the rendering has been bothering me.” She peeked over his shoulder, which she had to stand on tiptoe to do. He could imagine her a little closer, just enough that her breasts would press into his back and-

“I couldn’t place it right away,” she said softly, clearly having no idea his thoughts had taken him to the gutter. “Not until I saw him again.”

Sam stepped clear and faced her, not allowing himself to look anywhere but into her dark eyes. “You…saw him again?”

“Not since I called you, no. I’ll let you know if anything else comes to me. Well, I know you’re too busy to stand around talking, so…”

Sam stared at her, but all he saw was her pretty little behind as it sashayed toward his door. “Where are you going?”

“To work,” she said. “I skipped the bank this morning. Still don’t feel comfortable going inside. I’m finally replacing my lost ATM card.”

She made his head spin. “Angie-”

But she was gone.

Two days later, Sam and Luke were still checking on every “John” registered at P.C.C. when Sam’s cell phone rang.

“Sorry to bother you,” Angie said in his ear. “But Mr. Suspect just walked down the alley between the café and the book store. And you know, I keep for get ting to ask you. What’s his name? What’s he wanted for?”

“We don’t know his name and he’s part of an identity-theft ring-wait.” He shook his head to clear the strange pleasure that had come over him at hearing her musical voice. No matter how much he ignored her, she’d been in the back of his mind. Hell, okay, the front of his mind. “You saw him?”

“That’s why I’m calling, Sam.”

Lord, she was going to give him gray hair before he hit thirty-five. “Angie.”

“Yes?”

“Stay right where you are.” He pulled a U-turn to head back across town. “Don’t even think about going after him yourself.”

She didn’t say anything, and a bad, bad feeling overcame the good one he’d had at the sound of her. “I mean it, Angie. If you-”

“I hear you perfectly well, Sam,” she said in a rather subdued voice. “And believe it or not, I even understand the English language, so there’s no need to repeat yourself. I won’t go after him myself, that would be stupid.”

When the dial tone sounded in his ear, he swore and tossed the phone aside.

“Angie?” Luke asked.

“Yeah.”

“Trouble?”

“Yeah.” Sam sped them toward the café and tried not to panic over all the possible scenarios Angie was creating at that very moment. “Big trouble.”

“Isn’t that just like a woman.”