Crooked Read Online Free Page A

Making love to her under the mosquito netting. Her olive skin. Nicholas stealing a boat, then going AWOL: Averting Women, Obsession, and Love. It was only years later when he was already back in the States that he ran into her doing insurance investigation work, too. Only she worked with Trident Mutual, and had since moved up in the ranks.
    “Nicholas, that card you keep playing is from the bottom of the deck.” She flipped over a joker and tossed it at him. He caught it. “I’ve paid you back tenfold on that debt just by setting you up with your first reputable job in New York, though why I even did that after the way you bailed on me…”
    Had they been in love? Nicholas didn’t think so, but knew by her bitterness that she—at the very least—felt he’d stolen her heart. Yet at the same time he imagined she still admired his cool intensity and brash confidence. Not that she’d ever admit as much. Between them in a professional capacity it was all about brinkmanship filling the gap where friendship and feeling might have been.
    “Bottom line, Nicholas? I can’t trust you, and can’t afford to associate with you. You have a shady reputation.”
    “Is my shady reputation really that expensive, considering I get results?” Nicholas waved the joker in the air.
    “In terms of my credibility, yes. Your fiascoes make me and Trident Mutual look bad.” She shot him an icy grin and sipped her seltzer like it was vodka.
    “Have you forgotten the eighty thou I saved you guys? All the big ones I brought in for you? Are we forgetting?” He tossed the card onto the table like he was angry. He wasn’t. “That was just last year about this time too.”
    “Oh yeah, the Louis XVI ‘Liberace’ Commode,” Nicasia said flatly, slapping out cards in a game of solitaire. “Except the damages to the aircraft far exceeded the recovery cost.”
    “The pilot panicked.” Nicholas produced wire-rimmed glasses from an inside pocket. Clear glass lenses. A tool: he just used them to look either innocent or authoritative.
    “Nicholas, the pilot
panicked
when you knocked him cold with your sap while he was in the act of barreling the plane down the runway. I’m sorry, I should say
off the runway and into the bay
.”
    “We didn’t go into the bay. Just along the pier a bit.”
    “The tail ended up in Jamaica Bay.” She slapped down a card and glared at him. “They couldn’t use a crane from shore to lift it out, so they had to bring in a very expensive barge. We’ve been tangled in litigation with the Port Authority and Avionic Leasing ever since.”
    “The commode was undamaged. And have you forgotten Barney? I hooked you up with Barney, didn’t I? He made you look terrific at Trident.”
    Nicholas reflected on what a gold mine Barney Swires had turned out to be. Another in a long line of thieves that Nicholas had exposed. What had begun as simple investigative work had turned into a job as middleman, brokering the return of stolen art. The insurance companies didn’t make back any money sending people to prison. Paying the burglar was a lot cheaper than paying lawyers. And of course, Nicholas got his vig as “broker.” But Barney was not your garden-variety burglar. Nicholas liked his unrepentant nature, so he’d set him up working for Trident as a consultant on how to thwart burglars. But he’d had no idea Barney and Nicasia would hit it off romantically. He was tickled pink they had. Could wedding bells be far off? One more thing Nicasia owed him.
    Nicasia flushed as her hands steadily laid out the cards like they were somebody else’s. And yet her chin trembled almost imperceptibly.
    “Nicasia?”
    He considered the ruddy veil to her face. Eyes wet and fixed on the cards. Jaw flexing.
    “Nicasia?” He took off his glasses and sat across from her. “Is Barney OK?”
    “They say he’s dead.”
    “Dead? Who said he’s dead?”
    “Newcastle.”
    “Newcastle Warranty?” Everybody in the business knew