“No need to be soul-baring.” Derek reached for the bowl and picked up the soup and sniffed. Potato. He took a bite. “Just explain to me what’s going on.”
“Okay, here’s the deal.” Reese leaned against his desk, ripping open a pack of crackers. “I lied to my boss, told him I had the flu. I sent in the wedding story so it could go in the Wednesday social section. And I stayed because I need to write this story, and I want to be here when it breaks.” Her words were laced with stubborn determination. “I need you to talk to me, tell me when you think it’s possible you can get an arrest.”
Derek glanced around, fighting the urge to clap his hand over her mouth. “Shh. We’re in the middle of the office, Reese. Jesus.”
“What? Are we being recorded or something?” Reese snorted, but damn if she didn’t look a little excited by the prospect. She dumped her crumbled crackers in her soup and looked around his cubicle, like she expected to see microphones jutting out from the file cabinet.
“Listen.” Derek set his soup back down on the desk, his appetite gone. “Why don’t we make plans for tonight? We’ll talk all you want, somewhere where there aren’t half a dozen agents milling around all the time. Okay?”
Reese flipped her spoon over and licked it clean, slowly. “Can we do…other things, too?”
Given that gleam in her eye, he knew exactly what other things she was talking about. Making a mental note to stop at the drugstore for those long overdue condoms, Derek nodded. “Whatever you want.”
“Mmm. Carte blanche. I like it.” She tapped the clean plastic spoon on her bottom lip. “I guess we should meet at my hotel again, then. How about seven?”
“Fine.” That gave him half a day to pretend he was actually getting some work done.
She smiled. “Great. Now eat your soup like a good little boy and maybe I’ll let you have some dessert.”
THIRTY
Reese contemplated openingthe door for Knight naked, but then nixed the idea. She really did need to get him talking about Delco and how far along the case was. The whole naked thing would probably distract him.
Her other clothing options weren’t all that palatable. She had her suit, which she’d taken off the minute she’d gotten back to her room after lunch. She and business wear didn’t get along.
There was her cocktail dress from the wedding. But how stupid would that look sitting around in her hotel room?
Very stupid, she decided.
There was a pair of pajama pants she had packed for downtimes, along with a white tank top to wear with it. They weren’t flannel and three sizes too big like she’d told Knight the first night she’d met him, but they were loose fitting gray cotton. Not at all sexy, but comfortable. And if she wore the tank with no bra, that should counter the sex-less effect of the shapeless bottoms.
Pulling the pants on, she rolled her eyes, singing along with the music of a car commercial playing on the TV. Knight was making her go to a lot of work. Maybe sex wasn’t worth all this effort. Then she remembered Knight’s tongue pushing inside herwhile she closed her mouth over him, and her body twitched in response.
Oh, yeah, sex with Knight would be worth a little clothing crisis.
The knock came as she was pulling on the tank top. “Coming!”
She ran to the door and promised herself she would not leap into his arms, under any circumstances. Business first, then pleasure. Though he looked very delicious, all folded arms, and well-worn jeans, he appeared to have the same idea.
Without even a greeting, he strolled into the room and said, “Okay, lay your cards on the table, Reese. What the hell do you want from me with the Delco case?”
She matched his brisk tone. “I want to know how close you are to an arrest.”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“Don’t give me specifics. Just give me vague. Tell me what’s going on in hypotheticals.” Why was he making this so hard?
He didn’t say anything for a minute. Then he sighed. “Here’s the thing. To make an arrest in a price-fixing case you need to have irrefutable proof, usually a recording or documents, of executives from the companies involved actually agreeing on a fixed price and on production volumes from each company.” He stopped in front of the bed and yanked his black fleece sweatshirt off over his head.
Trying to ignore the muscles and the gun in its holster, Reese said, “And you don’t have an agreement yet?”
“I can’t answer that.”
“I’ll take that as a yes. So what’s the problem? You get your witness to record their meetings. How hard could that be?”
“You have no idea of the legalities involved. We can only record if a consenting person is present, and our guy can’t be at all the meetings. And he’s nervous, so we haven’t approachedhim about being wired yet.” Knight ran his fingers through his hair. “Look, get your story ready based on what you’ve read in the files. Go back to New York. When things break, I’ll call you. That’s all I can promise. I can’t tell you anything about the investigation right now.”
“Can you tell me who the cooperating witness is?”