Ice Cold by Cherry Adair Read Free Book Online Page A

to prove it.
    “Mag ich mit Ihnen sitzen?” a light, sultry voice asked.
    Rafe let his gaze travel up a pair of long, silky, pale legs, past a short floral skirt, skimmed the young woman’s rather flat chest, and rose to meet heavily made-up, inquiring brown eyes. Probably a student. She was cute but very young. Barely eighteen. Her short, choppy, dark brown hair spiked on her poppy red painted cheeks. Bright purple lipstick accentuated lime-green braces, and an enormous, garishly patterned fabric bag slung over one shoulder.
    Even if he’d been tempted, which Rafael wasn’t–he didn’t rob cradles. He smiled and shot a quick glance behind her. “Sorry, schatz, ” he murmured. “My girlfriend will be back any minute.”
    With a coy bat of her fake lashes, the girl slid into Winston’s seat, resting her folded arms on the table. The lurid tattoo on her forearm showed she had a fondness for bats. “Then I will only sit for a few seconds, ja ?”
    Rafe grinned at the kid’s cojones. “You don’t know my girlfriend. Do you go to school here, at the college?”
    She pouted. “Don’t you want my name and comm number before we make small talk?”
    He glanced toward the bathroom sign, feeling slightly uncomfortable. What on earth was taking Winston so damned long? Maybe if he took the girl’s number she’d leave. “Sure.”
    She leaned over her arms and said in a stage whisper, “Is this what you do when you’re out with a ‘girlfriend’?” Her heavy German accent was gone, and the hard, cold tones of Honey Winston sounded incongruous coming from the perky young student’s glossy purple lips. “Pick up girls young enough to be your daughter?”
    Rafe’s mind caught up… “Holy shit !”

FIVE
     T  he things our personnel dossiers leave out. I had no idea you had a thing for bats, Winston.”
    Navarro took up far too much damned space in the rear of the cab, his booted foot propped on his knee, an arm slung across the back of the vinyl seat. His height, his bulky coat, and his odd need to chat furthered her irritation.
    He’d wanted to take the Company car offered to them. She’d given him the percentage of time they’d waste driving around, plus the cost, plus finding parking wherever they went. He’d held up his hands, and said, “ Fine . Find us a damned cab.”
    She did.
    Honey looked out her window. An elderly woman, net bag of groceries in one gloved hand, dragging a shrieking child by the other, hurried along the sidewalk to the bus stop as the snow fell. Honey calculated the gap. Unless the bus driver slowed down, the grandmother and the screaming kid were destined to wait a while in the cold. Granny was pretty spry; she might make it.
    “My alter ego, Gretchen Malik, likes bats,” she told Navarro. As Granny reached her goal with seconds to spare. Good for you, lady. Well done. People should be rewarded for trying. For working hard. For living a good life. They rarely were but it was a worthy goal.
    “She also likes heavy metal and Thomas Burleigh, who has a thing for old cars.” Honey didn’t look at Navarro, instead watching the towheaded child scamper into a seat and peer down at her from the bus, his face twisted into howls of rage. She resisted the urge to return the gesture. She wasn’t any better with small humans than with the adult size. The cab kept pace with the bus, and she changed her depth perception as the kid, red-faced and crying pressed his face to the glass.
    She needed a few minutes to figure out exactly what happened back at the café minutes after Navarro had walked in. She’d been minding her own business, following the bank numbers, when a message popped up on the screen.
    Dear God. A text from Catherine Seymour!
    Her friend and mentor, Catherine Seymour, code name Savage, was in prison for treason. Honey had done a double take when the message had come through. Thank God, she’d been able to school her expression so Navarro hadn’t noticed anything