Fast Women Read online

  Nell straightened. “How did you know?”

  “Lucky guess. When did they tell you?”

  “Wednesday,” Nell said.

  Gabe nodded. “Which would explain going upstairs with the guy on the decoy and sleeping with Riley and smashing your ex’s office. I’m not sure how you ended up with the dog and Lynnie—”

  “People kept doing lousy things and getting away with it,” Nell said. “I was mad.”

  “You can’t do that anymore,” Gabe said.

  “I know,” Nell said.

  “As part of this firm, your actions reflect on all of us.”

  “I’m part of the firm?”

  “That depends.”

  He looked into her eyes, and she gazed back, trying to look steady and trustworthy. I want to be part of this, she thought. Let me in.

  “I have an assignment for you,” Gabe said. “You are hardworking and efficient and smart as hell, and I don’t want to fire you. But you have to promise to keep your mouth shut and not avenge any wrongs you see. Can you do that?”

  Nell nodded.

  “This particular assignment is about someone you know,” Gabe said, “which is why you can help.”

  “Will I have to betray anybody?” Nell said. “Because I won’t.”

  Gabe shrugged and picked up another fry. “Depends on what you mean by ‘betray.’ I want the answers to some questions. I don’t think the person you’ll be asking is guilty.”

  Nell swallowed. “I can promise not to say anything to anybody about anything you tell me. I can’t promise anything else until you tell me what this is about.”

  “Fair enough,” Gabe said. “Somebody is blackmailing people at O&D. Trevor Ogilvie, Jack Dysart, and Budge Jenkins.”

  “Oh.” Nell felt relieved. She didn’t care what happened to any of them. She picked up another french fry. “You think it’s Lynnie?”

  “It’s a guess.”

  “What is she accusing them of?”

  “Budge of embezzling.”

  Nell laughed out loud. “Budge? She doesn’t know him at all.”

  “Really?” Gabe said. “What would you accuse him of? If you wanted to scare him?”

  Nell leaned back and looked at the ceiling as she thought. Nothing bothered Budge, except … “Something that would take Margie from him,” she said. “He worships the carpet she walks on, has for years.”

  “What would do that?”

  “If he broke a piece of her Franciscan Desert Rose earthenware,” Nell said, only half joking. “Margie is pretty easygoing. She put up with Stewart for fifteen years, and I’d have killed him on the honeymoon.”

  “Stewart,” Gabe said.

  “Stewart Dysart,” Nell said. “Jack and Tim’s brother. Jack’s the oldest and the big success, and Tim’s the baby and the sweet one everybody loves, and Stewart would have been just pathetic in the middle except he was so obnoxious about everything.”

  He frowned at her. “Why does his name sound familiar? Did they divorce?”

  “No. He went south with almost a million of O&D assets seven years ago.”

  “Got it,” Gabe said, nodding. “O&D hushed it up. Why didn’t she divorce him?”

  “If she gets divorced,” Nell said, “she’ll end up marrying Budge, and she doesn’t want to marry Budge.”

  Gabe looked at her in disbelief. “She can’t say no?”

  “No,” Nell said. “Margie cannot say no. But she can say, ‘Not yet, I’m married,’ so she’s covered. What did the blackmailer accuse Jack of?”

  “Adultery. Trevor, too.”

  “I don’t think so,” Nell said. “Jack’s bananas about Suze. Almost to the point of pathology. And Margie’s dad cheated once before, but it was over twenty years ago, so I don’t think that counts. Besides, that ended so badly, so much scandal when her mother killed herself, that I don’t think he’d take the chance again.”

  Gabe nodded. “I need you to ask Margie some questions about her mother.”

  “Oh.” Nell’s good humor faded. “No.”

  “Somebody has to ask her,” Gabe said, looking the way he had the first day she’d met him, dark and hard. “You don’t want it to be me.”

  “Don’t threaten me,” Nell said. “And don’t threaten her. I don’t even know what this is about, and you want me to go asking horrible questions.”

  “I told you what it’s about,” Gabe said with exaggerated patience. “Blackmail.”

  “What does Margie’s mother who died over twenty years ago have to do with Margie’s dad being blackmailed now?”

  “You’ll just have to trust me on that.”

  “No, I won’t,” Nell said. “Look, if I have to promise to question Margie or you’ll fire me, I’m fired.”

  Gabe sighed and stood up. “Come on. It’s time to get back to work.”

  Nell stood, too, and looked down to take one last fry for the road.

  There weren’t any. She’d eaten a huge salad and two orders of fries.

  “You ready?” Gabe said.

  “Am I fired?”

  “No,” Gabe said.

  “I’m ready,” Nell said.

  Chapter Eight

  “Still employed?” Riley said to Nell when they got back to the office.

  “Of course,” Nell said. “How’s SugarPie?”

  At the sound of her name, the dog crept out of Riley’s office, quivering and limping, a cashmere-clad basket case.

  “What did you do to her?” Nell said, appalled.

  “Absolutely nothing,” Riley said. “I left her to go check on Lynnie, and when I got back, she was doing this. I ignored her and she snapped out of it. She does it for the effect.”

  “She does not. She’s been abused.” Nell crouched down to gather SugarPie into her arms, but she moaned and rolled over on the Oriental, her stubby little legs pointing off to one side, looking pathetic in their white cuffs. “SugarPie? What’s wrong?”

  “If this dog was human, she’d be leaping in front of buses, claiming whiplash.” Riley looked down at her. “I won’t play the sap for you, sweetheart. But the redhead will. Work it for all the dog biscuits you can get.”

  “That’s not—”

  “Give her a dog biscuit,” Riley said.

  “Biscuit?” Nell said to the dog, and SugarPie rolled her head to look at her pitifully. Nell reached up to the desk and got a biscuit. “Here, baby. It’s okay.”

  SugarPie looked at her for a long dramatic moment. Then she took the biscuit carefully in her mouth, looked yearningly up at Nell one last time, and rolled over and devoured it with savage relish.

  “You stole an unabused dog,” Gabe said.

  “He called her a little bitch,” Nell said from the floor, indignant.

  “Well, technically, she is,” Riley said.

  “And she looked awful.” Nell looked down at SugarPie, now licking the rug to get the last of the biscuit crumbs. “She was traumatized.”

  SugarPie looked up at all of them, dropped her head between her shoulders, and moaned.

  “Now what?” Gabe said, and she fluttered her eyelashes at him, quivering at his feet.

  “Marlene Dietrich used to do that eyelash thing in the movies, right before she took a guy for everything he had,” Riley said. “All this dog needs is a garter belt and a top hat.”

  “You’ve been had, kid,” Gabe said to Nell. “It’s an occupational hazard around here. Take the dog back.” He looked down at SugarPie and added, “Preferably in the dead of night.”

  “That would be a good idea,” Riley said. “Except she shaved it, dyed it black, and dressed it in Ralph Lauren. Its own mother wouldn’t recognize it now.”

  “You shaved it?” Gabe sighed. “Don’t tell me why. Just get it out of here.”

  “Before I forget,” Riley said to Nell, “Suze Campbell called. I told her the dog was fine.” He looked down at SugarPie. “I lied, of course.”

  “Suze who?” Nell said, surprised.

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