HER BODYGUARD Page 22

  His brows shot upward. "Lili, I don't think—"

  "Don't answer. I shouldn't have asked." She took a quick breath. "It's just that she looks like the type of woman who'd be good at tying men into knots."

  "You don't know anything about Monica, or my relationship with her."

  "You must've been very close once, for her to risk her career for you."

  "I helped her out, and she feels she owes me a favor." He hesitated, then said, "Her younger brother was messed up and I helped him get his head straight. Monica's big on family, and she was grateful that I helped him before he ended up dead or in jail."

  Intrigued, she asked, "What did you do? To help the brother, I mean."

  Matt's gaze went flat. "I talked to him."

  "Must've been some talk."

  "It worked, that's all I cared about. I need to take a shower."

  He looked at her, obviously waiting for her to move. When she didn't, he frowned and said, "What?"

  "Who are you?" she blurted.

  Surprise flashed across his face, then a sudden wariness, even though he smiled. "Lili—"

  "No. I'm serious. Who the hell are you?"

  His smile faded, and he held out his hand. "Matt Hawkins. Pleased to meet you." When she didn't smile as he'd likely hoped, he dropped his hand, narrowed his eyes, and said softly, "I figure the part of me still inside you doesn't need an introduction."

  She refused to rise to the bait. "Stop evading my questions, Matt. I want to know how you can hold back on me like this, after what we just shared. And I'm sitting here thinking that I know nothing about you, not really."

  "You don't need my life history. This isn't going to last," he said, his tone cool. "You know it, I know it, and I don't see any reason to make it harder to say good-bye than we need to."

  "You really believe that?" she asked, her gaze searching his.

  He didn't respond.

  After a moment she said, "You know, I don't feel as if I have a gaping hole in my life, and that all I'm missing is a man to fill it. I have friends and family, a job I love, and a life that's pretty good. I'm not looking to fall in love, and even if I were, I'm not entirely sure I want to fall in love with you. God, you can be such a pain in the ass!"

  She finally stood and buttoned her shirt. Slowly, not taking his gaze from hers, he hiked his pants up and stood as well.

  "Do you think you might be falling in love with me?" she asked bluntly.

  To his credit, he didn't look away from her. "You're not … I've never known a woman like you. You're beautiful and sexy, you have a great laugh, all this energy … I like being with you. I like you. But when this is over, you'll still be Lili Kavanaugh, designer, and I'll still be Matt Hawkins, bodyguard. And you hate my job. Remember?"

  "So get a different job."

  "I can't."

  She stared at him, disturbed and angered by his stubbornness. "Of course you can. There's nothing you can't do if you set your mind to it, Matt. I believe in you. Why can't you believe in yourself?"

  When he said nothing, Lili gave a loud, gusty sigh. "Never mind. You're right; none of this matters. I'm going to take a shower, too. Are you coming with me?"

  He shifted, turning away so she couldn't see his face. "In a minute. You go on."

  Sixteen

  "What have you got for me?" Matt stood at a pay phone outside the small grocery store in the resort town of Eagle River, trying to block out the noisy street traffic as he listened for Monica's answer.

  "A warning," she said, her tone grim. "I've heard the brass is issuing a bulletin to all surrounding states to bring you in for questioning. They want you back in Chicago."

  "To arrest me?"

  "Not exactly, more of a clarifying sort of discussion. There's this issue that you've taken a woman and disappeared with her. She may have gone voluntarily, but only you, me, and Lili know that."

  "Shit," Matt said in disgust. He didn't need another complication, not now. His gaze strayed to Lili, sitting in the front seat of the car and reading Vogue.

  He had his hands full with unexpected complications.

  "You better lay low, and stay out of sight of the local law enforcement."

  "Will do. What else have you got?"

  "A lot, actually. I had Ward copying old files for me off duty, and I went to the library to see what I could find. Care to tell me where you are?"

  "Why do you need to know?"

  "So I can get everything to you. Most of it's background and history, which doesn't seem all that important, but then I don't know what you're looking for. I figured it'd be easier to give it to you than try and summarize it on the phone."

  "You're being straight with me?"

  Silence. "There comes a time when you have to trust somebody, Matt."

  True, and it wasn't that he didn't trust her – but Monica had always been a cop first, a lover and friend second.

  "Who'd be willing to make a long drive up here?" he asked. "I can arrange a meeting away from where Lili and I are staying. That way, if somebody asks, you can say you don't know where I am and it'll be the truth."

  "I've got a backlog of vacation time to use. I can get Mom to watch the boys, and drive up myself."

  "I don't want you any more involved than you have to be."

  "And I'd prefer involving as few people as possible in this mess. I can do it. Just tell me where."

  Good point, one he couldn't argue against. "All right. We can meet tomorrow at three, at the gas station in Antigo that's right off the Highway 64 exit."

  "Will do."

  A patrol car turned the corner, and Matt casually shifted away from the street, looking down.

  "I've found something else," Monica said. "I don't know if it means much, but I got one of those feelings."

  And Monica's "one of those feelings" almost always translated into something good. "What is it?"

  "Do you know who Anthony Graziano is?"

  Matt frowned, thinking. "He's that crime boss everybody calls Crazy Tony, right? Involved in some big scandal a few years back, when he got off from racketeering and extortion charges because of an entrapment issue?"

  "That's the scumbag."

  "What does he have to do with Joey Mancuso?"

  "His old man headed the Mancuso hit. Lou Graziano was one of Mike Riley's shooters."

  Matt stared ahead, watching cars and trucks go past – and keeping an eye on Lili, still absorbed with her magazine. "Huh," he said.

  "Lou Graziano botched the job, since he failed to return the money, and Riley flew into a rage about it. He had Graziano killed a couple weeks later."

  "This could be something," Matt said. "What about Graziano's family? Wife, sons, friends? Somebody else who could be involved?"

  "I'll check into it further, but it doesn't look promising. Tony's on his third trophy wife, he has three grown daughters, and a bunch of grandkids. None of his immediate family are involved in the business as far as we know, though he has a couple of distant cousins with questionable job histories. Tony was seven when his father died, and his mother, who was an alcoholic, committed suicide two years later. He found her in her bedroom with half her head blown off."

  "That could explain why he's called Crazy Tony." Matt shifted the phone to his other ear. "He must be what … in his seventies?"

  "And still going strong. Tony's a vicious old bastard … and the beauty of the mob life is that there's no retirement. You tend to business until the day they put you in the ground." She paused. "I know it's not much to work with, but it's all I have right now."

  "It's enough, thanks."

  "There's one more thing before you hang up." He heard her sigh over the line. "If you get into trouble, or even suspect trouble, notify the local police."

  "You just told me to stay clear of them."

  "If the kind of trouble you're hiding from comes looking for you and finds you, you're better off in jail. And I really don't want you shooting anybody. There's a lot less trouble and
paperwork when cops shoot the bad guys, okay?"

  "Sure."

  Another sigh. "At least promise you'll call me. I can talk to somebody in the area, try to explain, one cop to another."

  He couldn't promise her anything, and didn't answer. After a moment, she said, "You can come back, you know. Let the police here take care of it."

  "No can do, Monica."

  "Well, I had to ask. Matt, I understand why you don't trust the cops, but we can keep her safe. Probably safer than if she's with you, if you're doing what I think you are. I'm not going to keep arguing about it, but I'm trusting you to do the right thing. Don't let me down this time."

  "I am doing the right thing. I'm protecting my client."

  "No matter what," Monica said, her voice weary.

  "No matter what," Matt agreed, and then changed the subject before the conversation degenerated into an all-too-familiar argument. "How are Dal and Manny doing?"

  "I wish I could give you some good news on Dal, but he's the same. Still hanging on, though. He's a fighter. Manny's out of surgery and doing good. He was asking after you. I told him you were okay. He also went to see Dal, and I think it shook him up pretty bad."

  "When you see Manny again, tell him to hang in there. And ask him to tell Jodie I'm … sorry."

  Sorry didn't sound like much, but he had nothing else to offer beyond the certainty that if the chance presented itself, he'd take down the bastards who'd shot Dal and Manny.

  Not something he could tell a cop.

  "I'll do that," Monica said. "I have to go. I got an autopsy I have to be at in an hour, and court later this afternoon. I'll see you tomorrow at three. Don't be late."

  After hanging up, Matt walked slowly back to the car. Lili had put aside her magazine, her gaze searching his face, trying to figure out if the call had meant good news or bad. She was still a little angry with him, probably; she'd been cool to him in the car.

  It was hard to keep his concentration on their danger when she was mad at him – and the reason for it.

  Lili wasn't anything like his past lovers; she'd give all of herself, hold nothing back. The problem was, she'd expect the same in return. She needed it. Hell, she deserved it, but he wasn't sure he could ever trust anybody that much – or love a woman so freely.

  There's nothing you can't do if you put your mind to it.

  Her words had stunned him. After she'd stalked off to the bathroom, he'd stayed in the kitchen, trying not to read too much into her words – and remembering.

  As a kid, he'd wanted someone to believe in him. He'd needed it then, whenever he'd looked in a mirror, full of shame for the nobody that had stared back, the boy with the angry eyes and ragged clothes. But he wasn't that kid anymore, and he thought he'd grown beyond that need.

  Maybe not.

  "Well?" she asked, as he opened the car door and got in, avoiding her gaze. "Did Monica have any information?"

  "Not much, which I'd expected, considering it's been nearly seventy years." He cranked the ignition, and the engine roared to life. "Monica's agreed to drop off the information she's copied. We'll meet her down in Antigo."

  "Why don't you just corner Willis Conroy and ask him about the shoes? Wouldn't that be easier, not to mention quicker?"

  "Because I don't trust him," he said, putting the car in gear and beginning the short drive back to the resort. "Maybe it doesn't mean anything that Conroy's at the resort during the off-season, but every time I see him, he's watching the news. I find it hard to believe he doesn't know about the attack on you, or who wants the shoes. He's old, but who's to say he wouldn't be willing to strike a deal and take a cut if he turns in anybody who comes asking him about Mancuso?"

  "Are you serious?" she asked, her voice uneasy.

  "Don't forget what he was, Lili."

  "It's like a game of chess, what you do."

  Matt glanced at her solemn face as he braked at an intersection. "You could look at it that way. It's all about anticipating every possible contingency, and planning for it."

  He paused, his jaw tightening at the memory of Manny's blood, dark against the sidewalk. "But sometimes things go wrong, no matter what."

  She sighed. "So what's your plan?"

  "I'm going to watch Conroy, try to get a read on him, get him to talk."

  "He seems harmless enough."

  Matt didn't look away from the long, empty stretch of country road. "Trust nobody, Lili."

  "What would you do, if you weren't a bodyguard?" she asked abruptly. "Do you ever wonder what it would be like, never having to play mental chess twenty-four hours a day, day after day? Not distrusting every living soul you encounter?"

  "Lili, I don't want to get into this again."

  She didn't speak for the rest of the drive. The thick, heavy silence of her anger hung over him, and he realized how bone-deep weary he was. What he wouldn't give right now to lie down on a bed and sink into a bottomless, black, and dreamless sleep. Even for just an hour.

  When Matt turned onto the road that led to the resort, he finally looked at Lili. She met his gaze and held it – and he saw that concern had replaced her anger.

  "I won't change my job," he said wearily. "I make decent money, and I'm good at it."

  "There's a difference between being good at a job and liking it."

  "Right now you should be glad I'm good, considering I'm the one keeping your pretty ass out of trouble," he said, putting the car in park. He swung open the car door. "Let's get the groceries inside and then we're going for a boat ride."

  Lili got out of the car and frowned at him across the sun-faded brown roof. "Boat ride?"

  "We're newlyweds here to do some fishing and hiking, remember? So we better make good on it. Besides, I need to talk to you about what Monica told me, and out on the water, there's no ears."

  She stared at him for a moment longer, then shook her head, and walked into the cabin without him.

  *

  Lili stood on the creaking pier, waiting while Matt untied a rowboat from a sun-bleached wooden post. He'd declined any of the resort's motor boats, telling the owners he and Lili wanted to go for a romantic rowboat ride.

  They'd smiled, and bought the lie hook, line, and sinker.

  "Careful," he said, and held out his hand to help her in. "It's not too steady."

  Once she was settled on the wooden bench seat, Matt climbed in, rocking the boat enough that she grabbed on to the sides. He sat behind her, took both oars, and pushed the boat away from the pier. With amazingly little effort, he rowed out across the wind-rippled waters of Little Moccasin Lake, and past the small island in its middle, covered by scrub brush and scattered trees.

  Turning, Lili watched him row. He'd pushed up the sleeves of his T-shirt and rolled up the sleeves of the flannel shirt, and she admired the flexing muscles of his forearms. "You said you have a sailboat."

  He nodded. "I keep it at a marina. Sailing is my way of getting away from it all. It's as close to solitude as you can get in Chicago."

  Lili smiled, picturing him alone on his boat, shirtless, the breeze ruffling his hair, looking as relaxed and easy as he had last night in her arms.

  From her seat at the bow, she surveyed their surroundings. Little Moccasin Lake was part of a wider chain of lakes. The whole area was dotted with small, shallow glacial lakes nestled along the fringes of Nicolet National Forest, and looked almost untouched. She took in a deep breath, smelling pine and lake water, and somewhere in the distance, heard the eerie call of a loon.

  "It's beautiful here," she said, breathing in deeply of the cool, fresh air.

  "I like being close to the water," Matt said, with another long, slow pull of the oars. "Someday, I'm going to own a house on the ocean."

  She held back her surprise at his unexpected confidence. Maybe he was trying, in his own cautious way, to open up to her. So many shades to this man, and she had so little time to discover them.

  "If you want a house on the ocean, then I'm sure it'll hap
pen." Lili eased back to get more comfortable and enjoy the ride. It wasn't every day, after all, that she was ferried about by a gorgeous, sexy man. "You strike me as the type that gets whatever you want."

  "I do, huh?"

  "Most definitely." She gave a long, low sigh of contentment. "I like this. It's romantic."

  He was smiling, and she was glad to see that his earlier tension had faded.

  "So what's this secret stuff you wanted to talk to me about?"

  Matt checked out the few other boaters sharing the lake. There was a group of four fishing boats in the distance, and a couple in a canoe gliding along the far shore.

  After pulling the oars into the boat, he sat back. "Monica thinks she's found a connection. It may be nothing, but she's checking into it further."

  "Does it have to do with the shoes?"

  "No." He tipped his head toward the sun, eyes briefly closing. "The guy in charge of the Mancuso hit was named Lou Graziano. Monica said Graziano's boss had him killed shortly afterward because Graziano blew the job by not bringing back the stolen money."

  Lili frowned; the name Graziano didn't ring any bells. "So what's the connection?"

  "A Chicago crime boss named Anthony Graziano."

  Lili leaned toward him, her attention sharpening. "A son?"

  Matt nodded. "He was a kid when Riley whacked his old man, but it makes sense, having somebody like Graziano behind the attacks on you. It feels right, and Graziano would have the resources. What I still don't know is why."

  "Would Graziano's son know about Willis Conroy?"

  "Mancuso, Conroy, and Lou Graziano all had connections to Mike Riley, and when Conroy turned on Mancuso, it was Graziano who went to take care of the problem. I'm certain the two know of each other. I'd even be willing to bet Tony Graziano has talked to Conroy about the bag, but Conroy doesn't know where it is. He only knows that the shoes have something to do with it."

  "That doesn't make sense." Lili scooted closer, frowning at a sudden thought. "Willis and Joey had already split up. There's no way Willis could've known Joey would hide the bag, much less that he'd use Rose's shoes in some way."