eyes narrowed. “It doesn’t matter what you’ve got in your billfold. You can’t afford me,” she told him confidently.
He knew this was all about how successful he was at role-playing and posing. He needed to keep his mind on the game. That was what the chief was counting on, and he didn’t want to disappoint the man the first time out.
All that taken into consideration, he admitted to himself that the woman in front of him made him itch. Itch a lot.
In a place he couldn’t afford to scratch.
It was way too risky to do anything but banter with this low-key madam.
“You’re piquing my interest,” he finally told her.
“Well, you’re boring mine.”
“Sorry to hear that,” he acknowledged. “I’ll try harder next time.”
“What makes you think there’s going to be a next time?” she asked, sneering.
“Oh, lady, there’s going to be a next time,” he promised her. One way or another, he added silently, intrigued despite the situation. “Count on it.”
Tiana narrowed her eyes. “You’re part of the organization?”
He smiled, enjoying this game, even if the circumstances didn’t quite call for it. Keeping her in suspense. “I might be.”
“You either are or you’re not,” she said impatiently, her nerves just about at the end of their frayed life expectancy.
“What’s it worth to you if I am?” he asked her, his eyes drifting over the length of her again.
She pushed ahead. “I’ll pay top dollar for every girl I take off your hands—but they have to be in prime condition. No bruises, no scars, no signs of abuse. And teeth,” she added. “They have to have teeth,” she underscored. Tiana was doing her best to describe Janie the way she looked the last time she’d seen her. Hopefully, nothing of consequence had changed.
“Picky,” he said.
“Thorough,” she countered.
“That, too,” he agreed. “Also very cool.”
Her suspicions were immediately raised. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t think I know many women—or many men for that matter—who could remain so calm around a recently murdered victim.” He was studying her. “But you act as if this is an everyday occurrence in your world.”
Tiana supposed that she did come off somewhat insensitive—not that she cared what this man ultimately thought of her unless it helped her find Janie—but she was far more concerned about the living. About her sister and other girls who undoubtedly had been stolen from their homes, from their parents who had to be as worried sick about them as she was about Janie.
As for her disregard of the lifeless body on the bed, well, to her way of thinking, Wayne had just gotten what he had coming to him. He’d stolen her sister, quite possibly stolen Janie’s innocence, as well, and maybe even more than that. She had absolutely no tears to shed for the likes of someone like Wayne.
“I’m not interested in the dead,” she told the tall stranger with the intense eyes. “My only interest is in the living. Now, can you help me or at least give me the name of someone who can? Because if you can’t, then get the hell out of my way.”
“All business, huh?”
She had the feeling he was baiting her, seeing how she reacted in a given situation. Why, she didn’t know. Maybe it was some sort of a test. All she knew was that she wanted to wipe that smirk off his face. Badly.
“I left my warm, fuzzy center in my other outfit,” she told him coldly.
“The one with the whip?” he asked with a straight face. Only his eyes showed any trace of humor.
“You’ve seen it,” she deadpanned.
“Only in my dreams—” He hesitated for a moment. “So, what do I call you, anyway?”
If he was asking that, then maybe she’d passed whatever stupid test he was giving her. She never hesitated. “Aphrodite.”
“The goddess of love,” he acknowledged.
“You know your Greek mythology.” She hadn’t expected any of the people on the lower rungs of this organization to be educated. Maybe this man wasn’t low man on the totem pole. Maybe he went up higher than that.
“I know a lot of things,” he replied.
“Such as where the merchandise is being kept?” she asked, trying to sound vaguely bored as well as impatient. She fervently hoped her pounding heart wasn’t going to give her away.
“Such as that, yes,” Brennan said. Truth be told, he had just managed to breach the outer ring of the organization in this past week. He’d come to the traffickers, thanks to an informant who had since disappeared, only a few days ago, posing as a wealthy representative of a club that catered to depraved men who craved being serviced by females who were definitely below the legal voting age.
Because nothing was accepted at face value, his background—the background that had been created for him by Brenda Cavanaugh, the chief of Ds’ daughter-in-law who ran the tech support division—was being checked out by unknown people even as he stood here, talking to this madam-in-search-of-an-extended-stable. He only hoped that Brenda was as good as everyone said she was. His life could very well depend on it.
“Then take me there,” she challenged, moving in close to him.
“Whoa, hold your horses, honey,” he warned. “Nobody sets foot in ‘the candy store’ without being checked out first.”
“Like him?” she asked contemptuously, nodding her head at the dead college senior on the bed.
“I think it’s pretty clear that he didn’t make the grade,” Brennan told her matter-of-factly.
“Was that why he was eliminated?” she asked, wondering why Wayne had been killed now rather than later. Knowing might help her find Janie. Every piece of information might very well be crucial—or not. It was like trying to navigate a moving van in a dense fog. She had no idea if she was going in the right direction, or completely off the road. She couldn’t remember a time when she had been more frustrated.
“Part of the reason,” Brennan allowed vaguely.
“Hold it,” Tiana ordered as something dawned on her.
“If you knew he was already dead, why did you accuse me of killing him?” she demanded.
For a second he seemed flustered before quickly gaining his composure. “Simple,” he said after a beat. “I wanted to see how fast you thought on your feet.”
Incensed, because for a moment he’d had her thinking she was going to have to kill him in order to survive, Tiana gave in to her temper. She swung and made contact with his
