“She’s hangin’ in there,” Duke mumbled, answering my unspoken question.
“Indy, are you gonna try my coffee, or what?” Tex called.
I disengaged from Lee and walked on shaky legs to the counter. I took the cup from Tex and before I even took a drink, I stopped and lifted my eyes to look at the big, crazy man.
I could smell it, and it smelled good.
I tasted it.
Divine.
“Tex,” I whispered, “this is the nectar of the gods.”
“I told you anyone could make coffee,” Tex replied.
“You want a job?” I asked him.
Tex stared. “You shittin’ me?”
“Nope.”
“What about the cats?”
“Sometimes they need to play and sometimes they need to sleep. They can sleep while you’re making coffee.”
Chapter Seventeen
Bitch Triple Threat
We left Tex to fill out employment forms and Lee drove into LoDo, turning into underground parking. There was a bank of spots with signs that said, “Nightingale Investigations” and Lee reversed the Crossfire into one. Most of them were empty, one held a soft-top Jeep, another the Mercedes Lee was driving when Tex and I did our breaking and entering, another held a red Miata and one held a black Ducati Monster Testastretta next to a silver Harley Dyna Low Rider.
I’d seen Lee on the Ducati and it was sweet. I kinda hoped the Harley was his as well.
I couldn’t concentrate on happy thoughts of maybe getting a ride on the Ducati, or the Harley, because I was too excited about the fact that I was about to visit Lee’s LoDo offices.
We got off the elevator on the second floor and I saw a door with a small brass plaque that had Lee’s company name on it. Lee opened the door for me and I walked in.
It was decorated in “Man” with wood-paneled walls, a hulking reception desk, leather couches, thick carpet and dark wood, heavily framed cowboy prints on the walls with a bronze statue of a bucking bronco on a column in the corner.
The final touch was a glamorous blonde woman who looked like a super model sitting behind the reception desk.
She glanced up and the moment her eyes caught sight of Lee, they went from enquiring to inviting.
“Hey Lee,” she said, or more like breathed in a “happy birthday, Mr. President” way.
“Dawn. This is Indy,” Lee said but Dawn was already looking at me and sizing me up.
She was wearing designer clothing, she had a fresh French manicure and her yearly budget for hair highlights probably was more than my new furniture. She looked ready to step on a private jet, I looked ready to go to Six Flags Elitch Gardens.
She knew this, I knew this and when her eyes flickered to Lee I also knew Dawn wasn’t working here because it was an exciting career opportunity.
I smiled sweetly and lied, “Dawn, nice to meet you.”
She smiled sweetly back and it was fake, fake, fake.
“Indy,” she greeted and her eyes turned again to Lee. “Luke’s out of critical, I thought you’d want to know. I’ve e-mailed your phone messages through, two are priority but you’re expecting them and there’s a new high bond skip that needs your attention. The file’s on your desk.”
Lee nodded and propelled me with a hand at my back toward a hallway.
“Can you get Indy outfitted with a belt, stun gun, taser and spray?”
Yikes. What did I need all that for?
I decided not to ask.
“Sure thing,” Dawn answered, clearly ever-helpful.
We walked down the hall and into Lee’s office, which was more of the same but with a bigger desk. I was shocked when I entered, it was obsessively neat and tidy. A sleek coffee mug sat on a leather coaster on the desk, the mug shiny clean. A laptop also was on the desk, closed and positioned perfectly at an angle to the side. Fancy leather and wood desk accessories adorned the top as well, but they were empty except for a pencil holder filled with perfectly pointed pencils and one folder sitting in the in tray.
“This is scary, you’re a neat freak,” I said.
Lee walked behind the desk, opened the laptop and hit a button. “Dawn keeps it like this.”
That was not surprising.
“I bet she does.”
Lee’s eyes came to mine. “I’m not exactly in the business that allows me to keep open files on my desk.”
Hmm.
Locking away confidential files is one thing. Keeping your boss’s designer coffee mug shiny clean is another. I gave myself one guess as to who bought Lee that mug and that guess was Dawn. I wondered if it was a thanks-for-the-great-sex gift or a wish-we-were-having-great-sex gift.
I didn’t answer Lee. I made a show of studying the cowboy print on the wall and decided not to tell him that it was likely that Dawn would clean his Crossfire with her toothbrush if he asked.
Knowing Lee, he probably already knew.
“She’s dating a Bronco linebacker,” Lee told me, as ever, in my brain.