Intimate Knowledge. Julie Miller

a large envelope from the entertainment console and plunked it down on the table. “This was delivered earlier this morning.”

      She recognized the courier’s logo, and the return address of Commander Carmody’s office. So she hadn’t been the first to awaken him. “What is it?” she asked.

      “What the hell are you thinking, going after this guy? He’s a freak.”

      Grace reached for her glasses in an unconscious habit. But her nervous fingers brushed against an unadorned cheek. “Excuse me?”

      “Harris Mitchell.” He thumbed through the dossier on Mitchell’s background. Pages and pages of allegations. Eye-witness testimony that had been tossed out of court because the eye witnesses kept disappearing or recanting their stories. It had taken her weeks to pull all that information together. He’d read through it in a single morning?

      She dropped her attaché into a chair and stood straight, defending her hard work. “If you’ve read his file, then you can see why he has to be stopped. He runs a multimillion-dollar money-laundering business. He’s strengthening the positions of several different mob factions and bypassing the entire Internal Revenue system. You understand why we have to do this, don’t you?”

      “Understand?” He jabbed the stack of papers, then he pointed that same finger at her. “Look, Gracie, I thought we were playing a game here. Teaching you a few tricks so you could go after a standard-issue hoodlum. But Mitchell’s serious business.”

      “I know that. Don’t call me Gracie—”

      “The man’s nickname is Mr. Clean. And it’s not because he showers twice a day. His loose ends wind up in the city dump, which is where you’ll be if he even suspects you’re an undercover agent. And I haven’t even started on all the kinky stuff in his file.”

      Grace planted her hands on her hips and swelled with indignant fury. She wasn’t an idiot. She had no delusions about Harris Mitchell being an easy case. “So he’s a dangerous man. The FBI doesn’t put pool hustlers on their Most Wanted list. I’ll be careful.”

      “You’ll be dead. You’re a rookie. A walking disaster waiting to happen. This guy is slick and smart and expecting trouble. Carmody must be out of his mind to send you after him.”

      “Disaster?” Defensive anger swelled inside her, pushing its way past the self-doubts, past the need to prove herself to a world that refused to take her seriously. “I earned this assignment. I came up with the plan. It’s my computer program that’s going to find his second set of books and flush out all his contacts. It’s my strategy. I’ve done my homework.”

      “On paper.” He plowed his fingers through his short-cropped hair and paced the kitchen, shaking his head as if the idea of her succeeding was incomprehensible. “Sure, your numbers look good. You can download his files and corrupt his system so all his little minions come out of the woodwork to find him. Well guess what, sweetheart? He doesn’t want that to happen.” He stopped abruptly and faced off over the table, leaning toward her in a way that made her curl her toes inside her pumps to keep from retreating.

      “If he finds out you’re a Fed, you’re dead.”

      Grace resisted the self-preserving need to look away from the accusatory gleam in those piercing silver eyes. “Then it’s up to you to make sure I don’t screw up.”

      “You’re not going.”

      “I’m not Roy Silverton. And sticking me behind a desk won’t bring him back.”

      Logan froze as if she had slapped him. His cheeks flushed with color. It was a cruel reminder, she knew, but she had enough obstacles of her own to overcome without having to compete with the memory of a dead man.

      She gentled her voice to reason with Logan. “It didn’t matter that Roy was on his first field assignment. You couldn’t have foreseen what was waiting for him on that dock. I’m sorry. But a seasoned agent would have been slain, too.”

      “And that’s supposed to reassure me?” Logan stood straight and tall again, dismissing her argument. And her compassion. “I’ll take this up with Carmody. If anyone’s going after Mitchell, it’s going to be me.”

      Logan strode from the kitchen. He pulled on his leather jacket, expecting her to obey his pronouncement like a good little girl.

      Grace did one better. She grabbed her bag and circled the room, blocking his path before he reached the door. The man couldn’t argue with cold, hard logic.

      “Afraid you can’t do that, Agent Pierce. You lack the necessary credentials for the job.”

      “Credentials? Like what?”

      She looked down at her chest, which he had studied so thoroughly only minutes ago, then back up at him. “Forty, twenty-eight, thirty-eight.”

      “Take your forty, twenty-eight, thirty-eight and get in the damn car.”

      NOT FOR THE FIRST TIME in his life, Logan wished he’d spent more time practicing his diplomacy skills. Sam Carmody held up his hand like some magic talisman and demanded the room be still. Then he lined himself up at a forty-five-degree angle to his putter and knocked the tiny golf ball across the plush carpet into a green mechanical cup.

      Logan bit down on his protest, grinding his teeth on the silence until his jaw ached. A red light blinked on the cup, signaling victory. When the ball spit back out, Logan was released from the spell.