Dealing with Annie Read online

  Danger comes to Cooper’s Corner…

  Annie Hughes had become the Martha Stewart of cosmetics. But when DEA agent Ethan McCall warned Annie that her company was the target of sabotage—and that she was in danger—she wouldn’t listen. Then Annie disappeared. And only Ethan could rescue her.

  Originally published in 2003.

  Dealing with Annie

  Jill Shalvis

  CONTENTS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  CHAPTER ONE

  THERE’D BEEN BETTER TIMES in Ian McCall’s life, far better. In a matter of just two short, little weeks he’d taken a bullet in the thigh, had been given a desk job to compensate for his newfound lack in ability to be the best DEA agent in New York City, and had been dumped in front of everyone by Lila at happy hour in McIver’s pub.

  Didn’t get worse than that.

  Oh, wait, it did. The leader of the vigilante gang he’d been chasing all year, the one who kept shooting drug dealers dead before Ian could get them into jail, had gotten away. That really got him. A bullet in the leg, a desk job, a public dumping, plus he’d failed to catch the perp.

  Not good. Making things worse, when his commander had shown up at the hospital, Ian had told him to stuff the desk job. He wanted back out on the field despite the fact he couldn’t yet pull his pants up without wanting to bawl.

  In return, Commander Richards—Dickhead to all who worked beneath him—had stood by Ian’s hospital bed the day after the shooting, looking fit and pissed, and had given Ian a six-week leave. Mandatory.

  Yep, Ian had definitely seen better times.

  Now, two weeks later and fresh out of the hospital, he sat in his brother’s truck, driving from New York City to Thomas’s farm in Cooper’s Corner, Massachusetts. He had nowhere else to be, no one else to be with and nothing to do except brood for a month until February 1, which he would have been happy doing.

  Except Thomas had come and gotten him, refusing—as he had his entire career of being Ian’s big brother—to take no for an answer.

  This bugged the hell out of Ian, who was still in work mode regardless of the hole in his leg. In his life, things fit into two compartments—bad guys and good guys, and never the two shall meet.

  And yet here he was, his head still in his last case, immersed in vigilantes and shootings and investigations, while being tended to by his brother, who didn’t know a perp from the mailman.

  “Cooper’s Corner is great, you’ll see,” Thomas said in his usual way of telling Ian what to do and think.

  “It’s the country.” Ian said country like the bad word it was. “It’s winter. It’s the country in winter.”

  “Shut up. You don’t know how good it’ll be. The air is fresh, for one thing.”

  Ian liked the air in New York. Stuffy, stinky and used.

  Thomas downshifted to get around a truck filled with hay. “I can hear you thinking from here.”

  “I’m not.”

  “You’re thinking you’re looking out at the boondocks.”

  Yep.

  “You’ll enjoy the quiet.”

  Nope. Ian stared at the wide-open rolling hills dotted with early January snow, the complete lack of skyscrapers and congested traffic, and swallowed his sigh. He wasn’t fond of quiet any more than he was of fresh air.

  They’d grown up in the Big Apple, he and Thomas and their parents, both of whom had been teachers before they’d retired to another universe entirely…Las Vegas, of all places.

  But their growing-up years had been quite happily spent in Manhattan—playing in alleyways, concrete parks and stairways, finding trouble as often as possible, and loving every minute of it.

  There’d been a freedom to being a kid in such a place that Ian had never forgotten. He’d played cops and robbers all day long, until he’d honed the ability to sniff out anyone from anywhere. So it surprised exactly no one when, as an adult, he’d stayed in his favorite city in the world, ferreting out real bad guys for a living.

  And not just any bad guys, but highly coveted, highly dangerous bad guys who pretty much kept him on an adrenaline rush 24/7, ensuring his life remained on a constant fast-paced roller coaster.

  But he’d been shoved off that roller coaster now, hadn’t he. For at least another month. An eternity, in his book. All thanks to one little bullet he hadn’t managed to dodge and his own inability to force his body to heal any faster. Somehow that felt like a betrayal in itself.

  “I’ve been trying to get you out here forever.” Thomas’s smile was grim. “It only took a bullet to do it. Damn, Ian…” He glanced over at Ian’s cane lying between them and grimaced, his eyes anguished. “You got lucky, huh?”

  Ian rubbed his still-aching leg. A few inches up and to the right, and he’d have been singing soprano the rest of his life. Hell, yeah, he’d gotten lucky. He stared out at the alien landscape of white, white and more white—not a single bus, traffic light or Chinese takeout in sight.

  “Two years,” Thomas repeated softly, then glanced over again. “I quit the landscape architecture business to come here two years ago. We never used to go two days without seeing each other.”

  “You never used to live out in the middle of nowhere, U.S.A., either. You live on a farm, Thomas. Growing…what the hell do you grow, anyway?”

  “Lots of stuff.” He smiled proudly. “Who’da thought, huh?”

  “Well, you always did like to pick worms up off the sidewalk after a rain.” Ian shuddered. “You’d carry those slimy suckers a mile if you had to, just to find them dirt.”

  “I have a lot of dirt now.”

  “Great. That’s terrific.”

  Thomas let out a low laugh. “I know you think this is stupid, me dragging you out here, but you’ll slow down for once. You’ll smell the roses, meet people other than your usual fast babes who want only a quickie—”

  “Hey, there’s nothing wrong with fast babes or quickies.”

  “Maybe you’ll even live without being on the edge for a while, without a gun—”

  “I brought my gun.”

  Thomas sighed. “Of course you did. And a knife, I presume.”

  “Two.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Do you really want to know?”

  “No.” The truck hit a pothole, which threw Ian against the door. When he came in contact with the steel, white-hot pain exploded from his thigh all the way up through his torso to his head. “Jesus,” he gasped, clutching his leg, grinding his jaw, watching stars dance in front of his wavering vision. “Slow down!”

  “Sorry.” Thomas eased on the brake as they rode down the gravel road that surely led to hell. “That’s a new pothole.”

  Where Ian came from, there weren’t gravel roads. There were speeding taxis with drivers who pretended not to speak English. And there were people, everywhere. Noise. Pollution. Crime.

  God, he missed it already.

  “You okay?” Thomas threw him a quick glance, laced with sympathy and worry. “I’ve never seen you so pale—Well, unless you count your twenty-first birthday. Remember? I took you clubbing, and you drank so much you—”

  “I’m
fine.” But he held his leg and took a careful deep breath. Thank God they were back on a paved road again—less chance of potholes. “Just tell me we’re almost there.”

  “Yeah. You’re really going to love it.”

  “Great.” An entire month filled with…farm stuff. He’d say shoot him now, but someone already had.

  They passed a hanging sign that read Cooper’s Corner. What came into view next was just what he’d expected. Small town. Mom and pop. Something a woman would call “quaint.” They drove through the main drag, which was called—whoa, big surprise—Main Street.

  He saw a single gas station, a post office, a firehouse, a place called Tubb’s Café and a schoolhouse. Then more wide-open space. “That’s it?” he asked, craning his neck to look back. “Not even a bar in sight?”

  “There’s Tubb’s.”

  “Tell me they have an alcohol license.”

  “Wine and beer. And on Friday nights they push back the tables and play music for dancing.”

  Woo-hoo, party town.

  They turned on Church Street, then on Oak Road. After a few miles, they turned left onto a long drive-way. At the end of it was a sprawling ranch house, a barn and…a potbellied pig in the middle of the driveway, staring at them with an extremely territorial look in its eyes.

  “Here it is.” With a smile, Thomas shut off the engine and turned to his brother. “Home sweet home. The outside still needs lots of work, I’ve been concentrating on the inside as I get the time and extra money.” His smile turned into a laugh at the look on Ian’s face. “This might actually be fun, you know.”

  “Yeah.” Ian looked over the large house Thomas had been renovating with his own hands. It was blue with gray trim that probably was supposed to be white but needed painting. The windows had plant boxes, a few of which were crooked. There was a large porch that seemed a little rickety, but overlooked miles and miles of surrounding hills dotted with snow, under which he imagined were crops.

  Or something. “Thomas…”

  His brother sighed. “I suppose it’s too much to give it a try before you decide you hate it.”

  Now Ian sighed.

  “Look, I know you think you don’t belong here. You’ve got to hurry back to work and find more trouble. Save the world—”

  “Shut up.”

  “I’m not making fun of you, you moron. You’re a hero to a lot of people, you’ve put more bad guys out of commission than I can even imagine, but Ian, even the good guys need a rest once in a while.”

  Ian let out a long, ragged breath and admitted what was bugging the hell out of him. “The last one got away.”

  “And that’s really eating at you.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, you can catch him when you’re better. Come on.” Thomas opened his truck door and cold air blasted in, sank into Ian’s bones.

  He got out, with the assistance of a lot of teeth grinding and the cane he hated with every ounce of his being. He took one step toward the house before the pig dipped down his snout and let out an ominous sound that might have been…a growl? Did pigs even do that? “You are kidding me,” he said.

  The pig made the noise again.

  Definitely sounded like a growl. He lifted his cane. “I’ve taken down a lot worse than you, you little…whatever the hell you are, so bring it on.”

  “Whoa.” Thomas stepped between the pig and Ian. Squatting, he scratched between the pig’s ears, and if there was such a thing as a purring pig, this one was it.

  Ian stared first at the animal, whose eyes had half closed in ecstasy, then at his brother. “You’ve lost your mind.”

  “Ian, meet Augustine.”

  Ian shoved his sunglasses on top of his head and looked the thing over. It was short, fat, dark brown and hairy. Its big snout quivered madly with every breath. “Seriously, that’s the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen.”

  Thomas covered the pig’s ears and shot Ian a look. “Shh!”

  “Are you telling me this isn’t tonight’s special, it’s a…pet?”

  “A true member of the family,” Thomas said, and rose to his full height, smiling at his brother’s shock. “See? What’d I tell you? It’s fun already. Let’s get inside and find something warm to drink. Might even try something different for a change, and relax.”

  Ian never took his eyes off the pig. “Is Tonight’s Special coming with us?”

  “Augustine.”

  “Thomas, you’re scaring me.”

  “Come on.” Fondly, Thomas took him in a headlock before letting him go and leading the way inside.

  Inside was more wide-open space. High ceilings. Big, comfortable, lived-in furniture. Magazines, books and clutter everywhere. It felt just like… Thomas.

  And despite himself and the hell his life had become, Ian had to admit it felt good to be surrounded by the comfort of his brother.

  The gigantic living room was the center of the house, with a large stone hearth, scarred hardwood floors and wood-paneled walls between wide windows that looked out to the barn and those gently rolling hills.

  The kitchen was huge, too, with a pile of dishes in the sink that made Ian smile. “Not much has changed.”

  Thomas shrugged. “I wait until the cupboard is empty before I wash anything, but if you have a thing about it, dish soap is beneath the sink.”

  “Why don’t you hire a cleaning service?”

  Thomas laughed. “Did you see the town? The closest service is probably back in New York.”

  New York. Just the sound of it made him yearn.

  There were five bedrooms upstairs. The guest room Thomas gave Ian had a bed, a dresser, a throw rug on the bare floor and an attached bathroom. Out the window was a view of—big surprise—wide-open space filled with rolling hills and naked trees.

  “Haven’t had anyone in here since Mom and Dad visited last fall.” Thomas watched Ian limp to the window and frowned. “Maybe I should put you on the couch downstairs to avoid the stairs. It folds out—”

  Ian watched a huge hawk soar over the landscape, and wished for that same freedom. “I’ll be fine.”

  “Ian—”

  “Leave it,” he said, then added a word he didn’t often find a use for. “Please?”

  Thomas studied him for a long moment, and Ian knew what he’d see. Exhaustion. Maybe a little sadness. Fear. God, he hated being vulnerable like that, hated it with everything he was. But at least it was Thomas, the one person he could be vulnerable with if he had to be.

  “You want to learn to ride a horse?” Thomas asked, clearly trying to change the subject, trying to lift his mood.

  “Hell, no.”

  “We could stay up late over a good poker game.”

  “Yeah, maybe.”

  Thomas sighed. “Will you at least promise to try to relax and just be for once?”

  “If you’d ever stop yakking.”

  Thomas grinned and lifted his hands in surrender as he moved to the door. “Letting you be, then, starting now. Come down for dinner, ’kay?”

  Ian took one more glance out the window, looking jealously for the hawk and its freedom, but this time he saw a deer. The thing lifted his head and seemed to stare right at him.

  “Ian.”

  “Yeah.” Jeez, there was a lot of land, too damn much. “I’ll be there.”

  And then he was alone, finally, for the first time since he’d been shot, since he’d woken up to doctors hovering over him, then nurses, then his co-workers, then Thomas.

  Blessedly alone.

  As he had at least a thousand times since, he thought about the shooting itself. He didn’t have to close his eyes to see it all again—the dark, dingy warehouse, the smell of the fear of the men hiding in it, the taste of that fear when the bullets had been flying and he knew it was all going to go bad, very bad.

  Thomas had been right about one thing, though, he’d gotten lucky, and he knew it. He still had his life, and after some serious kissing up to Commander Richards, his job as
well.

  But what had happened had been about far more than just a bullet in his thigh. It was the failure.

  He hated failure.

  Only two weeks ago he’d been happily chasing down that damn group of vigilantes. Nothing burned his butt more than some wannabe cops carrying out justice for the glory of it all and putting innocent people’s lives at risk in the process. The head of the group, Tony Picatta, was known to be extremely elusive and hermitlike. Oddly enough, he used to be a police informant, but he’d always come in different disguises, never allowing his real face to be seen, interested only in seeing justice served in his strange way. It made it difficult to catch him now as no one knew what he looked like for certain. Especially since, three years ago, Tony had gone underground, heading this vigilante group. No one had seen him since, at least no one from the DEA.

  But Tony’s underground minions weren’t as careful, or as faithful…some of those guys were all too happy to let a few details spill, especially when Ian dangled prior records or warrants in their faces. That had been the DEA’s only way of knowing anything—how close they were, or what Tony was planning next.

  Ian and his partner of three years, Steve Daniels, had nearly caught him several times. So close…

  And Ian knew damn well he hadn’t been the only one who’d been shot that night. He’d gotten off a few rounds before he’d been hit, had in fact heard the telltale yelp of pain, just before he’d taken his own bullet and everything had gone to hell in a handbasket.

  Humiliating, to be taken down like some rookie. He still didn’t understand all of what had happened, but he would. Oh yeah, he would.

  His leg was killing him from the two-and-a-half-hour drive, but he didn’t want to give in and take his meds, not yet. They made him tired and he was damn sick of being tired.

  So he went downstairs. Since he didn’t see his brother, he limped outside. Man, the sky was huge out here. Huge, and so stark blue it almost hurt to look at it.

  The lack of the honking, yelling, swearing and general all-round chaos that was New York was going to take some getting used to. Even straining his ears, the most he could catch was a bird singing. He took the porch steps. Ah, now he heard his own uneven breathing, and the sound of a horse off in the distance.