Investigating the Hottie (5 page)

“Worse. We don’t know enough yet to be certain it’s him. We know something is planned for the Symposium. The thief has offered the formula up for sale. He erred in mentioning the date and something about a professional conference. That’s how we knew to come here.”

She laughed. “Dr. Ivan’s pretty bad at sneaking around. He’s known for being a tightwad, but he just spent his retirement money on a house in France. And he’s been telling everyone he’s sick, but he hasn’t been to the doctor in four years.”  

Her jovial mood evaporated, and she shivered. “The trouble is, I don’t just have to watch him. You get to buddy up with that junior hottie, I have to actually come on to this specimen of grossness.”

“Is grossness a word?” He certainly fit the bill.

“It is now.” She glanced at the TV and frowned. “We’re trying to spook him a little. So, I’m working with him on coordinating the Symposium, and I am,” she winced, “inexplicably attracted to him.”

I examined my aunt, and then the loser on the screen. “No way is he going to believe that.”

“Well, that’s kinda the point. We figured he probably has poor social functioning based on his history. So a pretty woman is going to make him uncomfortable. A pretty woman coming on to him should scare the bejesus out of him.”

I tried to focus on Christie. I didn’t want to ruin my appetite. “I thought Mom made that word up.”

“Bejesus?” She waved dismissively. “No, it’s been around. It’s one of my personal favorites.” She hit a button to clear the screen.

“So you’re hitting on him?” Unfortunately, his face remained etched in my brain, scabby hairline and all.

“Yep.” She nodded. “Asking him to lunch, flirting with him while we work, hitting on him at his favorite bar.”

Now I was following. “Where Nic works?”

“Exactly. He spends his evening there, so Nic covers that, while I cover his days.”

“How long have you been doing this?” I asked.

“Three weeks now. We haven’t made much progress but we expect Dr. Ivan to crack soon. If we knew the hacker’s identity, we’d have an easier time.”

“It’s not Will is it?” He was the only hacker I knew.

“No,” she assured me. “We stumbled onto Will while searching for a suspect. But Will’s style is different. It’s not him.”

“So who invented the truth serum?”

“We did,” she admitted.

“GASI?” Man, they had a lot going on.

“No, the government.”

“Our government? How’d it get stolen?”

“Well, it was too powerful to make because of the risk of it falling in the wrong hands. So they canceled the project. But, somehow an old computer still had the file, and it got networked by accident, and
voila
, stolen formula.” She seemed resigned to it. 

“Aren’t there already truth serums?”

“Not like this one, Amanda. This one is bad news.”

“What happens if they sell it?”

“It would probably mean a lot of agents would die. The serum is too strong to resist. And it works quickly. By the time you realize you’ve been dosed with it, complacency has set in, and you can’t fight it.”

“So you actually have to talk to that guy all day.” I motioned to the blank screen.

She closed her eyes. “I have to touch him too.”

“Ooh.” I didn’t know it was that kind of agency.

“Yep. Brush my arm against his. Touch his hand. Find excuses to linger.” She shook her head quickly as if to wipe a picture from an Etch A Sketch.

“Barf.”

“It’s pretty awful.” She grinned. “But, it’s funny to watch him. It really freaks him out. He turns kind of purple and looks around to see if anyone notices. I like to call the investigation, ‘Flirting with the Mangy Rat.’”

“I guess that sums it up pretty well.” I thought for a minute. “Then, mine should be ‘Investigating the Hottie.’”

She reached out to squeeze my shoulder. “Perfect.”

“I’ll bet you wish we could trade.”

“Oh, yeah. But your suspect isn’t eighteen yet, and this chemist guy has a history suspicious for violent behavior.”

“So Will isn’t capable of violence?” Thank goodness.

“Oh, no,” she responded matter-of-factly. “He probably is. He just hasn’t shown it yet.”

“Great.”

Christie switched back to Will’s images and paged down. There were dozens of shots of his butt. I didn’t even remember looking there.

Christie sighed. “You are so lucky he brushes his teeth.”

“Eewww.”

“Yeah, tell me about it.”

Christie dropped me at the field at seven, and the game was in full swing. There were a couple of guys who obviously didn’t speak much English, but everyone was able to communicate well enough for soccer.

I didn’t see any other girls out there, and the guys were older than I was used to. But I had my shinguards and cleats on, and I was practically itching to play. So I walked up and asked one of the goalies if I could play.

“Sure,” he said, looking me over. I was glad Christie rubbed some dirt on my shoes so they didn’t look shiny and new. “You can be on our team. What do you play?”

“Defense.”

“Okay.” He yelled to his team. “She’s gonna play defense.”

A couple of guys looked at me funny, but by now, I just wanted to play. I ran over to right fullback. The ball had been in action the whole time, and I got to knock it up to my forward pretty quickly.

Some of these guys could really dribble, but one of them got cocky, and I stole the ball from him. I could feel the disbelief.

“Good job, girl,” one of my teammates said.

“Thanks, boy,” I said under my breath.

The next time, the guy dribbled up the other side. Ha! Now, this was fun. He’d decided I wasn’t the weakest link on my team after all.

At the other end of the field, I saw a new arrival tying his cleats. He was counting the players on each side to see which team to join. He waved to a couple of the guys. Obviously a regular. Then he moved closer and turned around and I realized it was Will.

I should have known Christie would have an ulterior motive.

He jumped into the mix as a forward for the other team.

At least he’s on the other side of the field, so I don’t have to guard him
. But, some of the guys started talking and next thing I knew, he switched to my side. 

Crap
. 

The ball came our way, and I ran for it. Will did, too. But despite the fact that he was hot, and despite the fact that I was supposed to make friends with him, I just ignored all that and went for the ball. We ended up tripping each other, and tumbling in a heap on the ground.

“Sorry,” I said automatically. It wasn’t the first time  gone a little too far for the sake of the game.

He said “sorry” at almost the same time.

I threw in the ball.

“I didn’t expect to see you here.”

He talked to me but kept an eye on the ball. My team was about to score at the other end of the field.

“I needed a soccer fix.”

He laughed, so I guessed he didn’t think I was a stalker. Plus, I had gotten here first. “I know what you mean.”

He smiled at me, and I smiled at him. Then, the ball headed our way and we took off.  

After an hour or so, one of the really good players, I guess he was in charge, called the game. A second later, the lights switched off. I guess the university was only willing to pay for lights for so long.

I looked around for Christie and saw her car in the parking lot. I was sweaty and gross, and it felt really great. I love soccer.

“See you tomorrow, Amanda.”

Oh my God! I turned around and tried to be cool. “Yeah. See you then, Will.”

Then, I crunched through the leaves to Christie’s car and tried not to scream. Because I was so crushing on this guy.

Chapter Four

On Tuesday, I woke up to menstrual cramps from hell. I groaned and snuggled deeper into the covers but the searing pains continued, and I resigned myself to getting up before the situation got messy. Plus, I really had to pee. I opened my eyes to the deep purple comforter and pillow instead of my Caribbean print bedding. It took me a moment to recognize my surroundings. Aunt Christie’s spy villa. Right.

I really hated mornings. Almost as much as I hated pain.

I crawled out of bed, dragged myself over to the desk, and groggily rummaged in my purse for my Advil. Never leave home without it. I popped three in my mouth, the only dose that would work for me, and washed it down with the flat, syrupy remains of a can of Diet Coke. I winced. Warm soft drinks suck.

Confident that the pains would stop in thirty minutes or less, I started the search for tampons. None in my purse or my bag or my backpack. I had nothing. I’d like to say that this didn’t happen to me often, but the truth was that every single freakin’ month, my period snuck up on me.

Crap.

Maybe Christie had some. I headed to the bathroom for damage control.

At home, I could rummage through the cabinets while sitting on the toilet. I liked to consider it multi-tasking rather than awkward and a little gross. Christie’s bathroom was way too big. I’d love to have the Jacuzzi tub but the toilet was too far from the sink and counter.

I relieved my bladder, feeling pretty lucky that my favorite pair of periwinkle panties weren’t ruined. Personally, I think periods prove that God is a man. Or a masochistic woman.

Then I stood and waddled over to the bathroom counter with my panties around my knees. Unfortunately, I could see my ridiculous image in the large vanity mirrors and the mirror on the back of the door. I tried the medicine cabinet first. Christie had cleared the left side for my toothpaste and stuff, so I tried the right side. Score! Alone on a shelf below the mouthwash and moisturizer, sat a box of tampons. Super. Just what I needed for my heavy periods. I reached out to pick up the unopened box. It didn’t budge.

I gave it a tug, and the box flipped down to reveal a flashing red light as the screech of an alarm pierced the air.

No, I’m not kidding.

I let go of the stubborn tampon box and covered my ears. What the—

My heart pounded.

“Amanda,” Christie yelled, banging on the bathroom door. “Are you okay?”

“No!” I turned to the door and got the full view of myself in my gown with my panties around my ankles. If the apartment had been on fire, I’d never have made it out. But somehow, I had this gut feeling that the tampon box had caused the whole thing.

“It’s okay,” Christie called through the door.

“No, it is so not okay!” I struggled to pull up my panties. Unfortunately, this effort left my ears undefended and the noise hurt.

“Put the gun down, Nic.” I heard her yell. “It’s okay. I forgot to tell Amanda about the panic button in the bathroom.”

Gun! Nic! Here I am half-dressed and he practically came busting in here
. I yanked my undies the rest of the way up. 

The alarm stopped, and Christie came back to the door. “He’s gone.”

“You rigged the tampon box with an alarm?” I shouted as I opened the door.

Christie was fully dressed and wore a gun strapped to her side. She grimaced. “I’m so sorry. I’m usually the only one here, and I needed something to disguise the panic button in the bathroom.” She shook her head. “I am so sorry.”

“Yeah, you said that already.” She ran federal investigations and worked undercover but couldn’t tell me what I needed to know to avoid a heart attack at fifteen.

“So now you and Nic and half the government know that I’m on my period?” My life was over.

She laughed. “No. Just me. Nic didn’t know I used a tampon box, and I canceled the alarm so the agency won’t even think twice about it.”

And I thought having a guy ring up my tampons at the grocery was torture.

I started to shut the door albeit pretty much in her face, but hey, I figured I was entitled.

“The real tampons are under the sink,” Christie said. In a pleading tone, she added, “I’ll let you have first pick of the muffins for breakfast.”

“Thanks,” I said, pulling the door closed. My heart rate slowed a little, and I could breathe better. I opened the cabinet under the sink and found the value-sized box of tampons. The same box Mom always buys.

Another cramp hit me, and my ears were still ringing. The day was not starting well.

I could hardly keep my eyes open in American Government. Christie and Nic had kept me up late doing training programs on the computer and brushing up on my self-defense skills. Just in case. After the soccer scrimmage, it’d all nearly killed me. Then, the booby-trapped tampon experience had pretty much sucked up any energy I had left.

I was almost too tired to care what Will thought of me. Except that I wasn’t. I still totally cared what he thought of me. Of course I couldn’t see him without turning around in my seat because he was sitting in the back of the class again.

“Miss Peterson.”

Oh, crap! I wasn’t listening. I sat up straight and tried to look alert. “Yes?” The blackboard didn’t hold any clues.

Mr. Moyers narrowed his brow. “I was asking you for an example of checks and balances.”

Luckily, I knew this one. “Right. Ummm. The President’s veto power?”

His face relaxed and he seemed to be satisfied. “Good. Try to pay attention, will you?”

“Sorry.”

“We have a test on this on Thursday folks. Amanda, I’ll give you the weekend. You can take it on Monday.”

Thank goodness I wouldn’t need to ask this guy for a college recommendation. I managed to concentrate for a few more minutes, but it was pretty hopeless. I was exhausted.

In Algebra, Will sat next to me. “Tired from last night?”

I ignored the fact that it sounded like a sleazy line from a bad movie. “No. Not from soccer. I stayed up late with my aunt.” I tried to look at him when I talked, but making eye contact with him this morning seemed dangerous. He already knew me better than any guy ever had.

He cocked his head. “Are you going to be living with her?”

I really didn’t want to lie to him. Besides, I was a terrible liar, unless it was for a really good reason. “I’m staying with her for a while. I’m not really sure how long yet.”