Smoke and Mirrors Read Online Free PDF Page B

notion before it seduced his imagination any further. A woman of sunshine and mystery had no place in his thoughts. A woman like her clouded a man's judgment, made him forget lessons he'd learned the hard way.
    A woman like her was a dangerous distraction he could neither afford nor risk. He had only to resist.
    Piece of cake.

----
    Chapter 3
    « ^ »
    Y ou can't always get what you want.
    Mansfield 's prediction stayed with Cass. The words crawled into bed with her, tossed and turned with her, stood under the shower spray with her. They now accompanied her down one of the long corridors of the Stirling Manor. All those dour-looking ancestors tracked her every step, but she refused to acknowledge them. Too much anticipation hummed through her.
    Mansfield was wrong. She would get what she wanted. Him. Behind bars.
    As she passed, a door opened. That was the only warning she got. Before she could glance back, arms closed around her waist and dragged her into a dark room. Adrenaline spurted. Her heart rate surged. The cop in her took over, and a quick maneuver had her breaking free and spinning toward her captor.
    Mansfield had a lot of nerve—
    Gray laughed. "Easy there, partner."
    She froze midattack. "You fool! Are you out of your mind?"
    The man known to the hotel staff as John Dickens, but whom Cass knew as Detective Mitch Grayson, closed the door behind him and leaned against it. "Expecting someone else, dear heart?"
    "You mean someone other than the big bad wolf?"
    "Sorry to disappoint you."
    She narrowed her eyes, refusing to label the quick drain of adrenaline as disappointment. Of course Mansfield wouldn't make a move on her like this, right out in the open. Cat and mouse was more his style. Truth or dare.
    He'd made that abundantly clear last night.
    "Sorry to surprise you like that," Gray said, "but we need to talk, and I didn't want an audience."
    Her nerves still jangled, but she squelched them. "What's up?"
    "He's been spotted."
    She almost rolled her eyes. "Of course he's been spotted, big guy, he's been back several days now."
    "Not Mansfield —Vilas."
    That grabbed her attention and snapped her to alertness faster than the three mugs of black coffee she'd already guzzled.
    "Santiago Vilas," she said, recalling the photo of the Latin man shaking hands with Mansfield . "Well, well, well. So he surfaces again. Will miracles never cease?"
    "Some coincidence, huh?"
    Like hell. The man had vanished when Mansfield did, and now he'd surfaced concurrently, as well. Another domino. "What's the lowdown?"
    "Last night. Navy Pier.
Seven o'clock
."
    "Practically broad daylight," she mused. " Mansfield with him?"
    "He was alone when he was spotted, then he gave us the slip."
    Cass let out a jagged breath. "Damn."
    Gray swiped off his gold-tassled hat and crossed to her. He was all cop now, despite the benign image of his bellman uniform. "Can you account for Mansfield 's whereabouts last night?"
    I want to hear you say my name—my first name. But after that, there'd been nothing. "AWOL, I'm afraid."
    Gray shoved a hand through his dark hair and began to pace the length of the elegant room. Behind him the antique cherry poster bed sat unmade, the damask sheets tangled, waiting for housekeeping to come and put everything to right.
    "There's no such thing as a coincidence," Gray growled.
    "No there's not." A lesson she'd learned the hard way, one snowy Christmas Eve. "But there's usually an explanation."
    "You know something I don't? You holding out on me, Cammy?"
    She smiled at the nickname, let it soothe her edgy nerves. Cammy. Short for chameleon. A reminder of all the aliases tucked away in her repertoire, that she could be anyone, anything.
    "Meet me at the front desk in five." She turned to leave, then pivoted back toward him. And grinned. "Put your hat back on—boss's orders."
    His frustrated growl followed her as she closed the door. Seeing her ruggedly handsome partner in his staid bellhop uniform never failed to