A Beautiful Heist by Kim Foster Read Free Book Online Page A

unpleasant to spend time with,” he said. His mind flashed to a memory of sitting with Cat at a sunny sidewalk café. He was smiling, watching her pour endless packets of sugar into her cappuccino. Then the image changed and they were curled on a sofa watching a movie in his fire-warmed living room. He rubbed her feet while she cradled a giant bowl of butter-fragrant popcorn.
    Wesley cracked his knuckles, frowning at Jack. And then a look of understanding dawned. “Oh, that’s right.” He smiled. “You were dating a crook. According to rumor anyway. Cat Montgomery?”
    Jack’s head snapped up before he could curb his reflex.
    “Yep, that’s the one,” Wesley said with a self-satisfied smile. “And—yeah, I remember now—you’re the one who let her off the hook in that Camelot job.” Wesley’s smile spread to a full, toothy grin. He let out a short bark of laughter. “The girl sure knew what she was doing, sleeping with you.”
    Jack lunged across the coffee table, grabbed Wesley’s throat and pushed him back into the leather armchair. Wesley’s eyes popped.
    “It wasn’t like that,” Jack said in a dangerously low voice. “And if I ever hear you saying anything like that again—”
    “Okay, okay!” Wesley choked “Just a joke, dude.”
    Jack forced himself to release Wesley. A few moments of silence passed. Jack looked away, frowning fiercely, willing himself to let it go. The nerve that Wesley had touched throbbed like a toothache.
    The guy was wrong—completely wrong about Cat, about their relationship. But why did Jack care anyway? It was over. It didn’t matter anymore. Being with Cat had been a mistake. A huge mistake. But it was all in the past now.
    After everything that happened with Cat, Jack had applied for a department transfer out of property crimes. He just couldn’t stand the conflict of interest, even though the only person who knew was him. He now worked in the Counterintelligence Task Force, Seattle division.
    Being the low guy on the totem pole in that department, Jack was mostly shuffling paper around a desk these days. His supervisor was a hard-ass, and wasn’t letting him out in the field until he’d paid his dues. Which, when Jack thought about it, was probably going to work in his favor now. He could do what was essentially an office job with the FBI during the day, and work with Cole’s crew at night.
    Wesley was rubbing his throat and straightening his jacket. Jack shook it off. He looked directly at the other man. “All right,” Jack said. “Unless I’m mistaken, we’ve got work to do. What’s our next move?”
    Wesley stopped rubbing his throat and smiled. “Glad you asked.” He reached into a drawer and handed Jack a thick, engraved invitation, embossed with a small Venetian mask.
    Jack read it and looked up. “What’s this? A masquerade ball? What’s this got to do with anything?”
    “You’ll see.”
    Jack stared back down at the invitation and rubbed the heavy card stock with his thumb. So it began. Question was, would he be able to live with himself, when it was all over?

Chapter 4
    I unpacked a bagful of pencils, charcoal, and erasers, and looked furtively around. I arranged my instruments on an easel in an art studio that was ablaze with the last rays of evening sun and wondered what I was going to do with it all. The studio smelled of chalk dust and oil paint and herbal tea.
    If Templeton knew I was here he’d kill me. A pang of guilt and anxiety centered between my shoulder blades. He could never find out I came here.
    I couldn’t leave it alone, though. It hadn’t taken me long to ferret out some personal information about the new FBI agent. And what I’d learned about Nicole Johnson was that she attended a figure drawing class every Thursday evening. I had attempted to go through proper channels with this information—called the right department at AB&T and everything—but they said they didn’t have the manpower to deal with it right