No One Lives Twice (A Lexi Carmichael Mystery) by Julie Moffett Read Free Book Online Page A

screeched. “That’s blackmail.”
    “Take it or leave it,” he said calmly.
    I fumed for a moment while he leaned back on the couch and crossed his arms against his chest. “Well?” he asked.
    I was desperate. “I thought you were going out with Carla Romanov.”
    He lifted his hands. “I haven’t seen Carla for a couple of weeks. It didn’t work out. We didn’t have much in common.”
    “And we do?”
    He leaned forward. “Look, I’ll be straight with you. I’m hungry for female companionship. It’s hard for me to get a date. I know it’s hard for you, too, so think of it as me doing you a favor. Don’t take it personally.”
    In some perverse way he was right, but on the other hand, he had insulted me. It didn’t really matter which because I needed his help, so I was stuck.
    “All right, dinner and one dance. No disco stuff.”
    “At least four dances, whatever music I want, and a minimum of one slow one.”
    “Two dances and one of them can be slow,” I countered. “The music is up to you. That’s my final offer.”
    “Deal,” he said and then carefully copied the phrase down. “I’ll stop by your cubicle tomorrow with the exact translation of the company name.”
    I thought for a moment, making an executive decision. “Actually, I’m not going to be in tomorrow. I’ve got a…ah, doctor’s appointment. Can I call you instead?”
    He narrowed his eyes. “I guess.”
    “Thanks. And, Paul, one more thing. Can I get you to give me a lift somewhere?”
    “A lift? Right now? What’s wrong with your car?”
    “It’s on the blink,” I lied.
    “The Miata?”
    “The one and only.”
    “How did you get here?”
    I pointed to my feet. “It’s only a few miles and a good cardiovascular workout.”
    He looked at me as if I were crazy. Maybe I was. “Jesus, Lexi, why didn’t you call me? It’s the middle of the night. I could have come and got you. There could be all kinds of unsavory characters out and about at this time of the night.”
    Yeah, if he only knew. “I didn’t want to trouble you too much,” I said. “But, how about that ride now?”
    He sighed. He seemed to do that a lot with me. “All right. Let me put some clothes on.”
    He disappeared back into the bedroom and returned wearing a pair of faded jeans, a white T-shirt and sandals. A set of car keys was in his hand. I gathered the papers and my bag. He locked up and we walked out to the parking lot. He had a nice car, a black BMW that he’d somehow managed to keep in the divorce settlement. I rode in it on our one and only date. It happened to be the most exciting thing about him.
    Paul opened the door for me like a gentleman, which I liked, and I settled back against the soft leather cushions. He got in and started the car.
    “If it’s not too much trouble, could you take me to Guilford Street instead of my place?” I asked.
    He looked at me for a long time and then turned off the engine. “Guilford Street? At this time of the night?”
    “I’ve got to see some friends,” I said.
    “At one in the morning?”
    “They’re expecting me,” I lied.
    He raised an eyebrow at that. “They?”
    “The Zimmerman twins,” I explained. “I’ve got a computer problem.”
    Everyone at the NSA knew the Zimmerman twins. They were extremely odd people, identical twins marching to the beat of a completely different drummer. They were also incredible math and physics geniuses and had been the stars of the InfoSec department until they were lured away by a huge computer security firm in Baltimore for boatloads of money. Although they could have afforded a mansion the size of New Jersey, they still lived in the dinky town of Jessup in the same two-story house off Guilford that they had purchased a few years earlier when working for the NSA.
    I had bonded with the twins at first because I was the one person they knew who could whip them both at Quake. We also liked hanging out together, eating greasy pizza with anchovies,