Doggone Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Chapter Thirty-five

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-one

  Chapter Forty-two

  Chapter Forty-three

  Chapter Forty-four

  Chapter Forty-five

  Chapter Forty-six

  Chapter Forty-seven

  Chapter Forty-eight

  Chapter Forty-nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-one

  Chapter Fifty-two

  Teaser chapter

  About the Author

  Charming . . . complex, and multilayered, and filled with fully developed characters.’’ —The Best Reviews

  With Catlike Tread

  Connor checked the street. I turned my head to do the same. No movement, no lights, no curious neighbors with sawed-off shotguns. Nothing. I turned back to him. He was fluid, graceful. Review the scene. Move with purpose. Repeat. Building to abandoned car. Car to light post. Light post to doorway. Doorway to body.

  Oh, my God. Body. I hadn’t seen him before. A T-shirt, baggy blue jeans, and battered tennis shoes. Untied laces. Pool of red seeping along the concrete. Connor knelt and reached for the man’s wrist. He didn’t react.

  ‘‘Connor?’’ I called to him.

  He stepped into the street, staying low as he returned. When he was within reach, I lunged, wrapping my arms around him and holding on as tightly as I could.

  ‘‘Are we waiting for the police?’’ I asked. He pushed his sunglasses to the top of his head and I could see his eyes. Grass green. No sign of stress. Or fear, or panic. His calm slid into me like honey. . . .

  Also by Gabriella Herkert

  Catnapped

  OBSIDIAN

  Published by New American Library, a division of

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  First published by Obsidian, an imprint of New American Library,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  First Printing, August 2008

  Copyright © Gabriella Herkert, 2008

  All rights reserved

  OBSIDIAN and logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

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  http://us.penguingroup.com

  For Great-grandma with the mashed-potato hair, who dreamed big and told great stories;

  For Grandpa Baumann with his Pillsbury Doughboy laugh;

  For Ed, Joe, Sherry, Florine, Marschel, Greg, Debra, John, Teresa, and Spurr—artists all;

  And for Ker and Koko—it’s okay you’re remedial;

  With special thanks to Kristen and her team—you make me better than I am.

  Chapter One

  FORTY-SEVEN MINUTES TO NAKED.

  I looked at the text message again. I’d never been the sort to turn my cell phone on the second an airplane landed, but then again, my messages were getting better. At least my propositions weren’t coming from strangers anymore. I caught my seatmate glancing at my screen. She was a grandmother in a housedress who’d spent the journey from Seattle showing me pictures of gap-toothed adolescents and waxing rhapsodic over their amazing achievements.

  ‘‘Porn,’’ said Grandma, sighing. ‘‘I miss it.’’

  I tried to cover my choke with a cough and reached for my carry-on.

  WHERE? I typed, lining up in the airplane aisle behind the harried parents of screaming twin toddlers.

  ANYWHERE.

  I shook my head and tapped, WHERE R U?

  SECURITY.

  SAFE SEX?

  FLIRT!

  U STARTED.

  I shuffled off the airplane and into the terminal. The airport was bright, the tinted windows blocking the brutal glare of the San Diego sun. I walked beside the moving sidewalk, too impatient to stand and wait to be transported. I saw Connor through the Plexiglas at security, the sun streaming behind him, giving him a sort of halo effect. I might not know him well, quickie wedding and all, but I suspected my husband’s angelic glow was a lie. As if to prove me right, he looked up from his cell phone to watch a twentysomething hottie in a tight, short dress walk by him. I snapped my phone closed and moved past the checkpoint.

  ‘‘I can come back if you’re having a guy moment,’’ I drawled.

  Man, he looked good. Really good. Michelangelo’s David with clothes and a navy haircut. I tried to smooth my hair. No man should look
that good when static electricity was turning me into a jeans-wearing Medusa. He grinned. Amused. Fine. I’d just be cool. Oh, what the heck. Amused could be done naked.

  Connor pushed a loose curl behind my ear, then kissed the skin beneath my lobe and whispered, ‘‘Forty-three. ’’ He grabbed my hand and steamrolled toward baggage claim.

  ‘‘I’m sorry, Commander, but this trip is official business, and the law firm of Abercroft, Hamilton, and Sterns does not finance booty calls. It’s against our expense policy.’’

  He leaned closer. ‘‘Forty-two.’’

  ‘‘That’s it?’’ I asked, half running to keep up. ‘‘I don’t see you for three weeks, fly for hours behind hyperactive five-year-olds, and all I get is a peck? I must look really bad.’’

  He stopped. Turned. Let his eyes wander from the top of my head to my toes, then back up, stopping at his favorite parts.

  ‘‘Or not,’’ I said weakly, covering my cheek with my hand.

  ‘‘Not.’’ He started pulling me again, but I balked under the baggage claim sign.

  ‘‘Um, Connor?’’

  ‘‘Yeah?’’

  ‘‘I didn’t actually check any luggage.’’ I half turned, showing the carry-on bag I had draped over one shoulder.

  ‘‘That’s it?’’

  ‘‘Yep.‘‘>

  ‘‘One overnight bag for a week?’’

  ‘‘Well, um, yeah.’’ I shrugged.

  ‘‘You are the weirdest woman. But I like that. One suitcase. Forty.’’ He took my bag and herded me out the door into the bright sunshine.

  ‘‘Because I can fit my jammies in one suitcase?’’

  ‘‘You’re not going to need pajamas.’’

  An older woman in a gray suit looked over her shoulder at us, silver eyebrows raised. What was this, Shock a Senior Day?

  He stopped next to a convertible. Black. I couldn’t help smiling. Honestly, sometimes the guy thought he was James Bond. The convertible was at short-term parking, which was half the distance and twice the price. Money well spent. He tossed my case into the car before backing me up against the hot metal and really kissing me hello. I wrapped my arms around his neck and kissed him back. Connor could kiss.

  ‘‘Get a room,’’ an old guy muttered as he climbed into a Buick in the next slot.

  ‘‘Great idea,’’ Connor whispered, reaching behind me to open the door.

  ‘‘You are a bad influence.’’ I slid into the passenger seat, fanning my face with one hand. ‘‘But we have a great car.’’

  ‘‘We?’’ he asked, getting behind the wheel and reaching across me. I felt the tingle slide all the way down my spine. I swatted at his hand, but he just opened the glove compartment and took out the parking ticket, holding it up for me to see with his most innocent expression. An angel he was not.

  ‘‘We. California is a community-property state. I never thought I’d own even half a BMW.’’ I looked over at him. ‘‘Impressive as it is, if you stole this car I never saw you before.’’

  The engine roared to life and Connor drove toward the exit. He moved his hand to my thigh, and I could feel his heat through the denim. I gave him my best what-are-you-up-to look, like I didn’t know, but he didn’t move his hand. This flirting thing was fun.

  ‘‘What’s the new case about?’’ he yelled over the rush of sound. Once the car was in fifth gear on the freeway, he returned his hand to my thigh, migrating just a little north.

  ‘‘Fraud. One of those identity-theft things,’’ I yelled, stroking the back of his hand. ‘‘Except that my thief is bolder than most.’’

  ‘‘Bolder?’’ He slid his fingers up two inches of denim.

  I pushed him to the relative sanity of my knee. Crashing wouldn’t be good here. ‘‘Yeah, bolder. My guy isn’t just in it for the money. He wants the fame, the attention, the invites to the swankiest parties in town.’’

  ‘‘I’d pretend to be somebody else to get out of one of those things.’’

  ‘‘I bet you look great in a tux. Very man-about-town.’’

  ‘‘I’d look like a waiter.’’

  ‘‘Well, a waiter in a nice restaurant, anyway.’’ I laughed.

  Weren’t we the normal married couple? Recently married, with the flirting and sexual tension, but normal. From the outside, anyway. So what that we got married after knowing each other less than a week? So what that ‘‘knowing each other’’ was mostly biblical even then? Or that the same could be said of the fifteen or so days we’d spent together in the six months since we’d been married? We didn’t fight about money or sex, but that was probably a good deviation from the norm. We did fight about my job as an investigator for a law firm, but mostly because I’d nearly gotten myself killed on a missing-pet case. What were the chances that would happen again? I rubbed my wedding ring with my thumb. I even had the outward trappings of a run-of-the-mill wife. Normal.

  Except that half the time it felt like I was pretending to be married and Connor was just a figment of my imagination. A very good, very vibrant imagination, but make-believe nevertheless. If this were my version of normal, there would be a lot more panic: hyperventilation and hand-wringing followed by drunken excuses and annulment. What the heck? If I was going to hallucinate a hot husband, a hot car, and the promise of hot sex, I might as well enjoy it.

  ‘‘Or you could wear your uniform,’’ I suggested. ‘‘Sort of a blond Tom Cruise. Now, he’s cute.’’

  He squeezed my leg and I squirmed with a laugh. Now he knew I was ticklish. Another late-to-the-party discovery.

  ‘‘He’s short. Besides, you wouldn’t throw me over for a midget actor in an ice-cream suit, would you?’’

  ‘‘I would if he’d give me a deal on chocolate- chocolate chip. Men are great, but they’re not dessert.’’

  He lifted my hand and kissed my fingers, then my palm. ‘‘Depends.’’

  I curled my fingers over the spot. ‘‘Watch the road.’’

  ‘‘Yes, ma’am.’’

  ‘‘So, anyway . . . my identity thief gave this interview to some right-wing radio guy all about how he had amnesia for years and wandered around homeless. Then, one day, he just woke up and remembered who he was.’’

  ‘‘Rich and famous. That’s handy,’’ he said, pulling onto the San Diego Coronado Bridge. I grabbed at his arm, craning for a better look at the view.

  ‘‘Amazing.’’ I leaned back in my seat. ‘‘What? Oh, yeah. He remembered he was rich. Not so famous, though. My guy, the real guy, he’s practically a hermit. Makes Howard Hughes look like a party animal, which is why John Doe—that’s what I call my mystery man— why John needed to do interviews. He wanted to raise his profile. Become Time’s Man of the Year.’’ Since profile raising does not come free, a line of credit was established.

  ‘‘Gutsy,’’ he said.

  ‘‘Maybe, but definitely not genius material. Still, he did me a solid. The bank that let John withdraw upon demand hired us. A potential fraud with an important customer’s money freaked them out enough to send me down here on their dime. They preapproved a week, although that might have more to do with me not having to stay in a hotel. I have to work, of course, but I figure with you working during the day it’ll be fine. I might not be able to keep it to the nine-to-five, but we’ll have some time together.’’

  ‘‘We could afford you coming down from Seattle whenever you want, Sara.’’

  ‘‘This is better. Besides, I don’t have much vacation time saved up. Prestigious law firms do not allow their serfs out of work often. It gives them ideas.’’

  Connor touched my cheek. ‘‘I’ve got some ideas myself about that.’’

  We were pulling onto Orange Drive, heading toward the Hotel Del Coronado. I wanted to go see the old hotel, maybe check out the ghost stories. I looked at Connor. Maybe we’d do that later. It was weird. I never thought of myself as half of a couple before. Planning little adventures for the two of us. It was amazing how quickly I was adj
usting to this new two-person configuration. Connor pulled in front of a high-rise, parking in a red zone. Apparently he was also seeing some advantages in the relationship. I smirked.

  ‘‘Welcome home, Mrs. McNamara,’’ he said.

  I giggled. He yanked my suitcase off the backseat and sprinted around the car. We laughed and chased into the building, stopping for a mind-blowing kiss just inside the door. Seven floors in the sluggish elevator and he had my shirt mostly unbuttoned, sending tingles down my back. Ten floors and we could have been arrested.

  His condo was at the end of the hall. We kissed and touched, and he fumbled with his keys. I leaned back against the door, pulling him closer into me as the door opened behind me. I grabbed for him to keep from falling backward.

  ‘‘You must be Sara.’’

  Connor pushed me behind him with enough force to have me stumbling, grabbing for my open shirt. I struggled with the buttons, peering around his shoulder to gape at the intruder.

  ‘‘Either that or you got some ’splainin’ to do, Lucy,’’ the man—boy, really—in front of Connor drawled.

  A younger, darker version of Connor waggled his eyebrows at me. I stood horrified as the Norman Rockwell portrait of mother, father, brother, and sister stood framed in the open doorway, all assessing me and my state of undress. Oh, my God. Their resemblance was unmistakable. They had to be his family.

  ‘‘You ever think of calling first?’’ Connor asked harshly, sexual frustration evident in his voice.

  Great. Terrific. Now, not only was I seducing their firstborn in a public hallway, he was openly resenting his own family. Family. As in stuck-for-life relationships. I’d barely considered meeting his family. If I had, I wouldn’t in my wildest, darkest dreams have imagined this nightmare.

  ‘‘I couldn’t stop her,’’ Connor’s father offered. ‘‘You know how your mother is when she gets an idea in her head.’’ He shrugged, turning up his hands and not seeming even a little embarrassed. ‘‘Ryan, Siobhan, come into the living room. You, too, Liss. Let’s let them have a minute.’’

  His mother looked like a Madonna, all serene and unnerving. His sister seemed to share my mortification. Ryan gave me a leering wink before he turned away.