Big Jack

She traded in the day’s separates-she was going to remember that one-for a T-shirt and jeans. She thought about going barefoot, but there was that cop-in-the-house factor, and bare feet always made her feel partially naked.

She went for te

Since she felt nearly human again, she stopped by the computer lab on her way to her office.

Roarke and Feeney were ma

She must be seriously tired.

There were screens up with data zipping across them too quickly for her eye to read. The men tossed comments or questions at each other in the geek language she’d never been able to decipher.

“You guys got anything for me in regular English?”

They both looked over their shoulders in her direction, and she was struck how two men who couldn’t have been more different in appearance could have identical looks in their eyes.

A kind of nerdy distraction.

“Making some headway.” Feeney reached into the bag of sugared nuts on his work counter. “Going back a ways.”

“You look… fresh, Lieutenant,” Roarke commented.

“I didn’t a few minutes ago. Grabbed a shower.” She moved into the room as she studied the screens. “What’s ru

Roarke’s smile spread slowly. “If we tried to explain, your eyes would glaze over. This one here might be a little more straightforward.” He gestured her closer so she could see the split screen working with a photo of Judith Crew on one side and a blur of images ru

“Trying for a face match?”

“We dug up her driver’s license from before the divorce,” Feeney explained. “Got another run going over there from the license she used when the insurance guy located her. Different name, and she’d changed her hair, lost weight. Computer’s kicking out possible matches. We’re moving from those dates forward.”

“Then we’re using a morph program on yet another unit,” Roarke continued. “Searching for a match on what the computer thinks she looks like now.”

“The civilian thinks if the image was close, we’d have matched by now.”

“I do, yes.”

Feeney shrugged, nibbled nuts. “Lot of people in the world. Lots of women in that age group. And she could be living off-planet.”

“She could be dead,” Eve added. “Or she could have evaded standard IDing. She could be, shit, living in a grass shack on some uncharted island, weaving mats.”

“Or had facial restructuring.”

“Kids today.” Feeney blew out an aggrieved breath. “No faith.”

“What about the son?”

“Working a morph on that, too. We’ve hit some possibles. Doing a secondary on them. And our boy here’s looking for the money.”

Eve looked away from the screens. The rapid movements were bringing back the headache. “What money?”

“She sold the house in Ohio,” Roarke reminded her. “It takes a bit of time for the settlement, the payoff. The bank or the realtor would have had to send the check to her, or make an e-transfer per instructions. In the name she was using at the time, unless she authorized it to be paid to another party.”

“You can find out stuff like that? From that long ago?”

“If you’re persistent. She was a careful woman. She authorized the settlement check to be transferred electronically to her lawyer, at that time, then sent to another law firm in Tucson.”

“Tucson?”

“Arizona, darling.”

“I know where Tucson is.” More or less. “How do you know this?”

“I have my ways.”

She narrowed her eyes when Feeney looked up at the ceiling. “You lied, you bribed and you broke any number of privacy laws.”

“And this is the thanks I get. She was in Tucson, from what I can find, less than a month in early 2004. Long enough to pick up the check, deposit it in a local bank. My educated guess would be, she used that point and those funds to change identities once again, then moved to another location.”

“We’re narrowing it down. Once the matches are complete, we’ll take a hard look at the hits.” Feeney rubbed his temple. “I need a break.”

“Why don’t you go down, have a swim, a beer?” Roarke suggested. “We’ll see what we’ve got in another half hour.”

“That’s a plan I can get behind. You got anything for us, kid?”

Nobody but Feeney ever called her “kid.” “I’ll bring you up to date after you take a thirty,” Eve told him. “I need to set a few things up in my office.”

“Meet you there then.”

“I could use a beer myself,” Eve commented when Feeney walked out.

“A break seems to be in order.” Roarke ran a finger down the back of her hand, then tugged it closer to nibble.

She knew that move.

“Don’t even start sniffing at me.”

“Too late. What is this scent? All over your skin?”

“I don’t know.” Warily, she lifted her shoulder, sniffed at it herself. Smelled like soap to her. “Whatever was in the shower.” She gave her hand a little yank, but made the mistake of glancing around in case Feeney was still nearby. The instant of distraction gave him the opening to hook a foot around hers, tip her off balance and into his lap.

“Jesus, cut it out!” Her voice was a fierce and frantic whisper. On the mortification scale, getting caught snuggled in Roarke’s lap hit the top three, even above getting caught napping or barefoot by another cop. “I’m on the clock. Feeney’s right here.”

“I don’t see Feeney.” He was already nuzzling his way along her neck toward her ear. “And as an expert consultant, civilian, I’m entitled to a recreational break. I’ve decided I prefer adult activity to adult beverage.”

Little demons of lust began to dance along her skin. “You can’t even think I’m going to mess around with you in the computer lab. Feeney could come back in here.”

“Adds to the excitement. Yes, yes.” He chuckled as he nipped at a spot-his personal favorite-just under her jaw. “Sick and perverted. And though I’d wager Feeney suspects we have occasional sex, we’ll take our recreational break elsewhere.”

“I’ve got work to do, Roarke, and… Hey! Hands!”

“Why, yes, those are indeed my hands.” Laughing now, he cupped them under her and levered out of the chair. “I want my thirty,” he said, and carted her toward the elevator.

“The way you’re going, you’ll be done in five.”

“Bet.”

She struggled against a laugh of her own and put up a token struggle by clamping a hand on the opening of the elevator. “I can’t just go off and get naked with Feeney in the house. It’s too weird. And if he comes back and-”

“You know, I suspect Feeney gets naked with Mrs. Feeney, and this is probably how they had their little Feeneys.”

“Oh my God!” Her hand trembled, went limp, and her face paled considerably. “That’s just despicable, the dirtiest of dirty fighting to shove that one into my head.”

Because he wanted to keep her unbalanced, he reached behind her and keyed in the bedroom rather than using audio command. “Whatever works. Now you’re too weak to hold me off.”

“Don’t count on it.”

“Do you remember the first time we made love?” He touched his lips to hers as he said it, changing tactics with a gentle brush.

“I have a vague recollection.”

“We rode up in the elevator like this and couldn’t keep our hands off each other, couldn’t get to each other quick enough. I was mad for you. I wanted you more than I wanted to keep breathing. I still do.” He deepened the kiss as the elevator doors opened. “It’s never going to change.”

“I don’t want it to change.” She combed her fingers through his hair, shoving the band away so all that thick, soft black slid through her fingers. “You’re so damn good at this.” She pressed her lips to his throat. “But not quite good enough to have me doing this with the door open. Feeney could, you know, wander in. I can’t focus.”