Romano and Albright 01 - Catch Me If You Can (MM) Read Online Free PDF Page A

closet, as well as the lady’s powder room, hoping to find his jeans—or at the very least, his underwear. Nada. I went downstairs and poked around, and finding nothing, I grabbed a tablecloth from the kitchen and headed back. Shep sat on the toilet lid with his head in his hands. His knees were pressed together, and a paper towel covered his privates. His new haircut was still unreasonably attractive.
    “Ce?”
    “Here. It’s all I can find.” I draped him in sixty inches of hemmed muslin. “Is there someone you can call to bring you some pants and…shoes?”
    “I don’t know. My agent maybe, but no one can know I’m here.” He lifted his chin. His eyes were round, his version of imploring. I looked away. He was an actor and I’d seen this particular show before. My gaze fell on the watch he’d placed on the sink. Shep used his everyman voice, pleading with me. “I’m telling you. No one can know I’m here. I signed a huge contract and…I can’t have any bad press or…any scandal.”
    “Mm-hm. Scandal? What do you mean?” That watch was familiar. “Is this yours?” I scooped it up. It was broken, obviously. The band was stiff with tiny pubic hairs…no…they were strands of dried glue.
    “What? No. I don’t know where that thing came from.”
    “Did you screw someone here in my place of work? Boy or girl?”
    Silence.
    “Or both?”
    “I don’t think so. I’m still…you know…I’m not doing that.”
    “Doing what? Boys? Girls?”
    He cringed. “I’m seeing women.” He lied to me with ease. I knew better. Also Poppy had told me otherwise. “Was there a chick here with nipple rings?” His expression turned hopeful. As if last night he’d become the straight man he pretended to be. He was an idiot. “I swear, I don’t remember. I think I was with…a guy. Tall, no shirt? He had on a bow tie? What were you wearing?”
    I gave him a frosty stare. “It wasn’t me. You’ve just described every waiter here last night. And most of the guests. And Jean. You can’t miss those things. What color hair?”
    “She… He…” Shep looked pained, “…had…I don’t know. It’s all sort of fuzzy.”
    I clenched my teeth. “The hair or the memory? You know, Sheppard , for someone who needs to be ‘careful’ …” I made exaggerated quotation marks with my fingers, “…you’re missing the mark. There were photographers everywhere.”
    He buried his head in his hands. “I don’t know what happened. I was celebrating. It’s a fuck of a lot of money when a pilot gets picked up. Things got out of hand.”
    “Yes. Your being here at all is testament enough. And this conversation isn’t getting you any clothing.” I dialed Poppy. “Does Poppy have a key to your place?” Her phone rang and went straight to voice mail. “Call me right now,” I barked into the phone.
    “Yeah. But I don’t want to deal with her.”
    I couldn’t believe him. “That’s too bad. You need to get dressed.”
    “We could call Estelle—my agent.”
    “Fine.” I handed over my phone and left him tying a makeshift toga around his shoulder, his big feet naked on the cold tile. I could step around the corner to Urban Outfitters and buy some clearance jeans, but, goddamn him, I wasn’t going to help. I had work to do. “There’s mouthwash under the sink.”
    In principle, that was helping me, not Shep, because his breath could strip the varnish from the floor.
    I went to the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. As I swung back out the door, coffee burbling behind me, I realized where I’d seen that watch.
    Justin Timberlake.
    The featured piece from the collection—the one that graced the cover of the catalogue my Uncle Vito had printed for me at cost—was no longer perched on its display stand. How could I have missed that?
    “ Sheppard. ”
    I stood for a moment, scowling at the empty space above the pedestal, and then I bustled down the hall, breathing heavily. I searched every square foot of the