For the First Time. Stephanie Doyle

tips were tricky. Sometimes they panned out. Sometimes they didn’t. Mark always preferred identifying the source of an anonymous tip as a way of evaluating the reliability of the information. But he hadn’t been able to locate the person who had sent him the copy of the coroner’s report along with the plainly typed note that simply read, She didn’t do it.

      It had been enough to pique his interest. Especially when he read the report and the police file. Suicide had been a stretch, he thought. When people chose to kill themselves they wanted it done immediately.

      This girl had been dying for months.

      “That doesn’t matter now—the case is closed. So, I should tell you I’m looking for someone with several years’ experience.” It was a prelude, he thought. A way to cushion the blow he was preparing to deliver.

      “I’ve been working in the field independently for four years, and apprenticed with another investigator two years before that while earning my master’s in criminology.”

      He sighed. He should have figured she would be the type to put up a fight. Couldn’t she pick up on all the subtle no signs he was throwing out? It wasn’t that she wasn’t qualified—of course she was qualified or she wouldn’t have gotten as far as this interview.

      The problem was her. There was something about her that made him want to squirm in his chair. It was completely irrational. He had no idea why he felt this way. But he was a man who relied on his gut. His gut said no. His gut said she was trouble.

      Mark really hoped that gut feeling wasn’t based on the fact that when he looked her in the eyes, he had a suspicion she was smarter than he was. Because that would probably make him an ass.

      “I’m targeting a certain type of clientele.” Hell, that made him sound like a snob. Now he was a snob and an ass.

      “I imagine paying ones.”

      There was no point in prolonging the inevitable. He’d made his decision almost instantly. The moment he’d shaken her hand and it fit so securely in his. A knee-jerk reaction that told him to run.

      “I’m sorry, Ms. Hatcher, but I’m not sure you’re the right fit.”

      He watched her shoulders slump. Only for a second, though, then she straightened. “Can I ask why? You have my résumé. You know I’m more than capable.”

      It was a ridiculously impressive résumé. A bachelor’s in psychology from New York University, and that master’s of criminology from Columbia—graduated top of her class in both. She’d worked for a medium-size private investigator firm for the six years since. She was changing jobs only because the firm’s owner had decided to retire and she wasn’t happy with the new ownership. Her former boss, Tom Reid, happened to know Ben Tyler—Mark’s former boss and adversary from their days in the CIA together.

      That Tom knew Ben wasn’t a surprise. It seemed everybody, at some point in their life, knew Ben Tyler, who headed up the Tyler Group—a small troubleshooting firm located in Philadelphia. Ben employed a few detectives so Reid had forwarded him Josephine’s résumé. Ben—recognizing that he had deprived Mark of his assistant, Anna, by knocking her up and marrying her—had sent Josephine’s résumé to Mark instead.

      On paper, she was exactly what he was looking for. He’d already found someone to replace Anna’s duties from an administrative aspect, but his business was gaining a solid reputation and with that came more cases. Trying to make his schedule work with his daughter’s was becoming a challenge. Adding a trained, licensed investigator—one recommended by someone Ben trusted—was like a godsend.

      But she wasn’t going to fit. Her eyes were too blue. A deep color that made him think they could see through anything—probably a great quality in an investigator but not such a great quality in a colleague.

      “Can I ask you a question?” It was probably unfair to drag out the interview, especially since he’d decided not to hire her. He was curious and wanted to confirm his suspicions that she was, in fact, trouble.

      “I think that’s what I’m here for.” She half smiled and again fiddled with the cloth around her neck.

      “You’ve got a really impressive résumé. Did you ever consider applying for the FBI?”

      “Not really my thing.”

      “What about your local police force?”

      “Also not my thing.”

      Right. Trouble. Just like he suspected.

      “Yet according to your list of special skills, you’ve spent months at several law enforcement training camps specializing in firearms and hand-to-hand combat. I guess I’m curious why you wanted to train like an agent, but didn’t want to be an agent.”

      He watched her crack her neck as she seemed to search for an answer that was accurate, honest and didn’t cost her the job—even though it was already too late.

      Almost too late.

      “While law enforcement—either as a police officer or a federal agent—is an honorable career path for many, I was concerned that the confines of the hierarchal structure would be too limiting. Especially for someone in the minority sex.”

      She didn’t like authority or sexist pigs.

      The sexist pigs he could get behind because she was right. While many of the government investigative agencies from the FBI to NCIS were opening their doors to more women, it was still a man’s world.

      But it was the authority part of her explanation he had a problem with. Since, if he employed her, he would be the authority she had a problem with.

      “Can I see the tattoo?” That was for his curiosity again.

      “Excuse me?”

      “The tattoo. Can I see it?”

      She smirked. “I have a few. In some rather interesting places so you’ll have to be more specific.”

      “Specifically...the one on your neck.”

      She lifted her eyes to the ceiling, a move that reminded him vividly of his teenage daughter, then she pulled down the collar.

      Black ink barbed wire. With spikes. Covering both the right and left sides of her neck. Not completely circling her skin the wires trailed off as they neared her larynx. Still, a signal to the world to back off.

      “Yes, I can see where you might struggle within a—how did you phrase it?—a hierarchal structure.”

      “I’m a good investigator. No, check that. I’m a great investigator. I prefer to work on my own, but I never fail to get results. I don’t see why a tattoo should be a problem in getting a job.”

      “Except that you know it is or you wouldn’t have covered it up with the turtleneck.”

      “Some people are more conservative than others.”

      As a rule, Mark was not. In fact, a couple of months ago he wouldn’t have given a rat’s ass about a tattoo. But that was before the mother of his estranged daughter died in a car accident. Before he left the CIA to return to the States. Before he started the process of building a relationship with said estranged daughter...

      And failed at it miserably.

      Now he was trying to do everything right. He wanted the right type of company. The right type of people around his daughter. The right everything.

      Nose-stud, barbed-wire-tattoo chick was not it.

      He glanced at her résumé again. She’d included a list of high-profile cases she’d worked on. Some very high-profile cases. What had she said? She was a great investigator. That was probably true, damn it.

      “Why the move to Philadelphia?”

      “To get away from New York.” She quickly added, “Not that there was anything bad there. Tom’s brother Tim is assuming the