More Than a Mission (8 page)

Aidan smiled suggestively. “Unless I can entertain the lady the way I did last night. If I can…” He pointed to Lucia. “There's a special fiberoptic camera I've been working on. I think you can use it to help pick the locks on the safe and locker since we haven't been able to track down a master key due to their age.”

“Not without backup,” Walker advised. “I'll be back by ten this morning so that you can prep, Lucia. We'll play it by ear after that.”

“Sounds like a plan,” she confirmed.

With a nod, Aidan grabbed his jacket and walked out the door. He had a little over an hour left before Elizabeth expected him for work and a lot to do.

He was optimistic, however, that the information from her friends might help seal the deal on Elizabeth being the Sparrow. It might also help him drive away his attraction to the enigmatic woman he'd come to know in the past few days.

N
othing could have prepared him for what was going on in Samantha's shop. A multitude of women, some of them familiar from last night at the WAC, jockeyed for position around the merchandise, cramming every inch of the store looking for bargains. The young fashion designer was apparently running an immense clearance sale.

Samantha and one of her associates were very busy behind the counter, ringing up and packaging purchases. Clearly the likelihood of talking with Samantha was nil, and when one particularly aggressive woman shoved past him with a shoulder an NHL hockey player would envy, he decided to turn his attention to the other young woman he had met last night.

Kate's shop, which was just a block away from Samantha's, was very much like the woman he had met at the WAC. Quiet. Subdued. Elegant. Everything in her shop sat neatly in order on the shelves and display tables scattered throughout the intimate store.

He browsed around the store while Kate helped a customer. There were an assortment of lotions, salts, perfumes and soaps. Aidan paused at one table and eased the stopper off a bottle. A heavy and rather cloying floral fragrance immediately filled the air before he could replace the top. He wrinkled his nose and quickly put the bottle down.

Moving to the next table, he took note of the assorted flowers being used in the preparations. Plumeria. Peony. Lavender. Lily of the Valley. No foxglove.

He wondered who prepared the floral essences for Kate or whether she did them herself. If it was the latter, it occurred to him that maybe she had been an unwitting accomplice to the Sparrow's kills. Maybe Elizabeth had asked her friend for something of a medicinal nature.

Or maybe Kate had managed to pull off a grand charade, he thought, as he examined her while she worked behind the counter. She was gift wrapping the customer's purchase. Her hands were nimble as she worked. Quick and sure with the scissors, he noted.

Kate was about the right height, although not slim. Definitely more voluptuous and of a slightly larger, but arguably medium build. Her hair leaned toward black more than brown, but of course, a woman's hair color could easily be changed.

As Kate finished and walked over, he gave her his best smile, but like Elizabeth, the lady seemed unaffected.

“You don't strike me as the gardenia type,” Kate said and motioned to the bottle he held.

He shot the label a quick glance. “I was looking for something for Elizabeth. Do you know what she might like?”

Kate narrowed her eyes and took a long moment to scrutinize him. “Lizzy Bee doesn't strike me as your type, Aidan.”

“Lizzy Bee?” he repeated and recollected her friends calling her by that nickname last night. “Cute,” he added.

Kate adopted what some might consider a wary stance, arms across her midsection, head cocked to one side. “What do you want from Lizzy?”

Smiling, he put down the bottle of gardenia oil and moved to another table, Kate trailing behind him. “How about this? Do you think Lizzy Bee would like this?” he asked as he picked up another bottle.

Kate gently removed the fragrance from his hands and put it back in place. “Only her friends call her Lizzy Bee.”

He wasn't winning any points by being nice, so maybe some shock factor would help this conversation move along in a more helpful direction. “Well, I'd definitely say that what happened last night could be called friendly.”

She surprised him then by getting right in his face, her early wariness brewing into anger. As she poked a finger in his chest, he took a moment to examine her roots—all the same color as the rest of her black hair. Either recently colored or her natural shade.

Kate jabbed him once with her finger as she said, “Look, Mr. Travellin' Man. Lizzy has had enough grief in her life. She doesn't need the likes of you causing any more. Get it?”

Recalling the information in the file about her parents and hoping to elicit further explanation from the now prickly Kate, he urged, “What about Lizzy's family?”

Kate's look turned even harder and her poke this time actually registered on his pain meter. “You'll probably hear it anyway if you linger—Lizzy's mom and dad were killed a long time ago. Best you don't bring that up around her.”

“I'm sorry to hear that. Accident?” he asked, his tone conciliatory and finally, a break appeared in Kate's armor.

“Murdered,” she replied in soft tones and a telltale sheen erupted in her eyes.

With a slight incline of his head both in recognition of her statement and in deference to the deaths, he said, “I hope they got the bastard who did it.”

“Unfortunately not, although if there is such a thing as karma, the prince got what he deserved.” She spun away from him, heading back to the counter.

Aidan grabbed a bottle from a table along the way as he followed her. Once she was there, he placed the bottle on the glass top of the counter holding an antique brass cash register. “Care to explain?”

Kate considered him carefully, as if deciding whether or not his interest was sincere. Apparently he passed muster, because she sighed and picked up the bottle, toying with it nervously as she explained herself. “Rumor had it that Lizzy's parents were accidentally delivered a load of fish stuffed with drugs. Whoever was bringing in the load must have found out and gone to retrieve the drugs.”

“And Lizzy's parents were in the way?”

“Or maybe they had already found the hidden drugs and needed to be eliminated. Who knows? A suit from some ministry decided to use his pull to quash the investigation.”

“Because the prince was involved in the murders?” Aidan pressed, needing to know because on some level, it justified to him what the Sparrow had done to the prince.

Kate shrugged. “Probably not directly. He was too young. But rumor has it he was a party animal. People like him are as responsible as the dealers who killed Lizzy's parents.”

She finally looked down at the bottle in her hands. “Lizzy doesn't wear any perfume. You're better off buying her something she'll use.”

She took the bottle with her as she walked away from the counter, placed the oil back on the shelf, paused by another table to pick up a small round jar and returned to where he stood. “Here. This is her favorite hand lotion. Slight hint of plumeria. Her hands get chapped.”

That she used something on her hands was good, he thought. It might have left a residue on something at the prince's retreat that would help connect Lizzy—the Sparrow he forced himself to remember—to the murder.

“Thanks. Could you gift wrap it, please?” He dug into his jeans pocket for cash. While he was counting out the money for the lotion, he asked, “So who helps you create the formulas for everything?”

Kate punched up the sale on the antique register. With a loud clang and kachunk, the drawer opened and she finally responded to his question. “Most of them I do myself. Every now and then I ask Lizzy. She's a whiz with plants.”

 

Elizabeth had been prepared to keep her cool around him, wanting to create some distance after what had happened on Friday night. Despite her desire to do so, she found herself surprisingly annoyed when it was Aidan who kept his distance.

He had shown up for work the next day, surprising her. She had been prepared for him to run.

He'd been courteous and respectful. No subtle mentions of Friday night's make-out session. No hint that it had left any kind of impression on him or even that he was inclined for a repeat performance.

Color her annoyed. Saturday and Sunday night had come and gone without any kind of move on his part and as for her—she'd be damned if she'd throw herself at him. Lord knew he'd probably had his share of women doing that, what with those blond good looks and that amazing body. Not to mention that whole swagger thing.

Elizabeth paused in the midst of her workout on the boxing bag as she considered that she was just losing focus about Aidan Rawlings.

A light sweat covered her body from her workout. She grabbed hold of the bag, which was rocking a bit from her last blow, and steadied it, considering as she did so that she'd done just fine in her life without a man. She definitely didn't need one to mess up her life right now.

Punch, punch. Jab followed by a drop kick.

The bag swung away again from the force of the blow and she timed its return arc, swung out with a roundhouse kick, imagining as she did so that it was Aidan's head.

From behind her came the sound of someone approaching. In her peripheral vision, a man's arm came into sight, reaching for her.

She grabbed the arm, high up close to the elbow, and with a shift of her hip, sent him flying over her shoulder and onto the mat face down. Once he was there, she twisted the arm she still held and placed her knee smack in the center of his back, pinning him forcefully to the mat.

Aidan, she thought from the familiar sight of his shoulders and that shaggy mane of sun-bleached hair. She was tempted to release him, but there was a bit of anger there, so she maintained her hold and warned, “Don't sneak up on me.”

He turned his face to the side, the only movement he was capable of without dislocating a key body part. “Good mornin', love. I thought I'd drop by and see if you wanted to have breakfast. I guess not.”

She released her hold a little. A mistake she quickly realized as he reversed their positions and nailed her to the ground. He had her wrists pinned to the mat in a tight grip. She was breathing a little roughly from her workout, and the motion seemed to drag his attention to her breasts.

Typical man, she thought as he loosened his hold much as she had earlier, giving her enough slack to roll and assume the upper position with Aidan now trapped below her. “We're closed Mondays. I wasn't expecting anyone.”

He flexed his hips beneath her, right where she was busy straddling him in a very intimate position, she suddenly realized. “And a very good morning it is. Now,” he teased.

“You're no gentleman,” she said, freed him and rose, grabbing a towel from inside an open locker.

He was reaching out for her again, but she batted his arm away, disliking his assumption that one kiss gave him the right to touch. “Don't,” she warned.

“Like to play rough?” he questioned playfully and as if to test how far he could push, extended his hand toward her once more.

As she had done before, she batted it away, but he teasingly repeated the gesture. Tossing down the towel with which she had been drying off, she once again flung away his arm and took a step toward him. “Mister, if you want to learn about rough, I'm game.”

“Oooh. Big tough chef—”

He didn't get a chance to finish the statement as she dropped and swept his legs out from under him. He went down onto the mat in an ignominious sprawl.

He leaned up on his elbows and grinned at her. Damn him, she thought, but stayed out of his reach since she suspected he would be more than capable of taking her down. “Pretty nice moves. Where did you learn them?”

He was just full of questions, it seemed. Kate had told her that he had been by her shop on Saturday, prying into her private life. She wasn't about to satisfy his curiosity. She didn't trust him enough yet to tell him anything. “Let's just say a girl needs to know how to defend herself.”

A moment of hesitation played across his face, which afterward, grew serious. “On account of what happened to your parents?”

She knew Kate had spilled the beans about her family history. Despite that, she had not been prepared for him to raise the subject. There wasn't anything really personal going on between them. Yet, the daring little voice in her head tacked on.

Walking back to the locker, she picked up the towel from the floor and began collecting her things, intent on going ahead with her normal Monday routine.

Out of the corner of her eye, she watched as Aidan stood and dusted himself off. He took a step toward her, then seemed to reconsider the wisdom of that. Grasping his hands in front of him tightly, he said, “Could we start over?”

Juggling her bag and towel in her hand, she half turned and said, “Meaning?”

“Good morning, Elizabeth. Would you care to have breakfast?” he asked in that husky bedroom voice of his.

She picked up her chin a defiant notch, determined not to let his charm affect her. “Sorry, but breakfast was two hours ago.”

He glanced at his watch and with a carefree tone said, “How about lunch then?”

Determined, she would give him that. Smiling, she replied, “That's not for another three hours. Maybe four since I had a nice big breakfast.”

In response, his stomach growled. He rubbed his hand over his midsection to silence it. “So what do you plan to do in the meantime? It is your day off after all.”

“There's never a day off,” she replied and walked to the stairs.

Aidan was immediately there, following her. Was it her imagination that he shot an inquisitive look at the safe and lockers? she wondered, but then realized that his gaze was securely fixed to her Lycra-clad backside.