stands with his patented, “Oh wow, did we hook up last night? I totally blacked out.”
Which made him an ass back then, but he certainly wasn’t alone in the crime of faking a blackout.
Amnesia, however, was slightly more complicated to pull off than a blackout. Greg telling Elaine he didn’t see any physical signs that Eliza was lying might intrigue her. That he was going to ask her to take on the case as a personal favor would seal the deal.
The people who worked for the Tyler Group were an eclectic bunch. Together they had lots of talent in lots of different areas. But they all had one thing in common. At some point in each of their lives they had fallen on hard times and Ben, the leader of their group, had been there to pick them up. It created a bond among them. They all knew where they had been and how hard they had worked to crawl back up from the bottom.
Greg hit his contact list again and found Elaine’s name. After a few rings her voicemail came on. After the beep he gave a brief synopsis of the situation and asked about her schedule for tomorrow. He finished with a request to call him back as soon as possible, but given that it was Sunday night he wouldn’t blame her if he didn’t hear from her until morning.
The ACPD was going to have to wait then. Eliza wasn’t going anywhere without Elaine by her side.
Chuck wasn’t going to be pleased about it, either. Elaine might possibly be the one woman on the planet Chuck didn’t have on his list to seduce. At least not anymore.
A couple of months ago Greg had consulted on a case for Elaine. She’d come by to review notes with him and Chuck had made some feeble attempts at hitting on her, until she put him firmly in his place. Greg remembered being amused by their interaction. Then something happened. Chuck did the completely unpredictable thing and started treating her as a person he wanted to get to know, not someone he wanted to have sex with and forget about.
Greg knew that Chuck didn’t believe he could wow a woman physically, but he did believe he could wow women with his mental prowess. The come-ons, the one-liners, were designed to showcase his cleverness.
With Elaine he’d been different though. With Elaine he’d been...himself. Greg thought they made a good match.
Then one night, Chuck came back to their place drunk. Greg knew he’d planned to meet Elaine that night but when he asked about her, Chuck had nearly bitten his head off. He’d been mad at the world and had refused to talk about it. Since then, Chuck and Elaine had been at each other’s throats.
Greg had tried to find out later what happened, as Elaine was someone who Greg needed to work with occasionally. But for someone who typically held nothing back, Chuck was surprisingly closemouthed about whatever had gone down between them.
He would have to get over it. Elaine was the best and Greg needed her.
He walked out of his bedroom to find Chuck and Eliza—no, Jane. He needed to think of her as Jane, at least for tonight. The two of them were washing dishes at the sink. Jane washing, Chuck drying. Jane laughing, Chuck flirting.
A piece of aluminum foil had been placed on top of Greg’s plate to keep it warm. Since he doubted Chuck even knew they had aluminum foil in the pantry, Greg knew who had put it there.
“Hey, sorry about that. Another contract I’m working on.”
Jane turned around and smiled. Her long hair, now dry, shifted along her shoulders when she moved. It was pretty the way it did that. “I hope it’s okay that we went ahead and ate without you. Chuck didn’t want to wait and I didn’t want him to eat alone. I can sit with you, though, if you’d like. Chuck says there’s ice cream.”
“There will be ice cream,” Chuck corrected her. “I’m going to run out and get some.”
“You’re going out to get ice cream? It’s after eight on a Sunday. Really?”
Chuck shrugged, evading Greg’s eyes. “What? I’ll find someplace open. A man needs ice cream every once in a while. You said you liked chocolate, right?”
“I think so,” Jane answered. “It sort of hit me that chocolate ice cream would be amazing. But you should get whatever you want.”
“No, no. Chocolate is my favorite, too.”
“What a coincidence,” Greg drawled.
Chuck didn’t bother to respond and darted out of the apartment like he was on a mission for the government. Greg sat down to finish his dinner, peeling back the foil and watching as the steam rose up into his face. It was a nice thing to do, keep his dinner warm. Something a mobster’s mistress would have done? Did mobsters have nice mistresses?
“I hope Chuck isn’t pestering you. He’s really fairly harmless.”
“I like him,” she said, sitting at the table, her hands wrapped around a damp dishcloth. “He’s so...open. Out there. You know what I mean.”
Out there was a pretty good way to describe him.
“I don’t think I’m like that.”
Greg pinned her with his gaze. “You remember something?”
“No. It’s just, when Chuck was talking and making all these silly memory jokes, I had a sense that I wished I could be more like him. More open with people. Which made me think I’m not.”
Her expression grew serious as she turned her thoughts inward. She looked exactly like a woman trying hard to recall something. As if she could squint out the memory through her eyeballs.
“Then you got a craving for chocolate ice cream,” he said trying to distract her.
“I did.” She smiled. “It sounded like a good idea.”
“I’m sure it will be. No doubt Chuck will scour the land to find you the finest chocolate ice cream there is. Besides being out there, he’s also been known to go over the top.”
She smiled again and it did funny things to him. Made him feel guilty for lying to her. Which was ridiculous.
“You’ll take me to the doctor’s tomorrow, then?”
“I will.” Maybe. If there was time, after Chuck took her to Atlantic City. If she wasn’t in jail by then.
“I’m really hoping I’ll go to sleep tonight and tomorrow I’ll wake up and this will all be over. Like it will all come back to me in the night.”
“It might.”
He could see that she hoped he was right and another dagger shot to his heart. She seemed so damn sincere. Clear pale blue eyes on pale skin with pale hair. She could have been a damned fairy princess.
Instead she was D’Amato’s piece.
“Look, you’re probably exhausted.”
“I am. But Chuck went to get the ice cream....”
“My understanding is that it comes frozen and will last until tomorrow. Listen, why don’t you take my bedroom. I changed the sheets while you were in the shower. If you’re right and all you need is a good night’s sleep, you won’t get that on the couch. Too soft.”
“Oh, I couldn’t take your bed. The couch is fine.”
“No, this way is better. It will be quieter, too. You really need to rest.”
She looked at him, assessing him as she had at the hospital earlier that day. He could actually see her coming to a conclusion.
“Your friend was right. Your woman friend. You’re a good person, Greg.” She put her hand on his forearm and squeezed for a second. Then she got up and made her way back to his bedroom, softly closing the door behind her.
“No, Eliza,” he said quietly to an empty room. “I’m not.”
CHAPTER FOUR
“WAKE