Thigh High by Christina Dodd Read Free Book Online Page B

interview all the tellers who were robbed.”
    â€œThis morning?”
    â€œOf course.”
    â€œI’ll need to schedule them.”
    â€œPick some place neutral. Deaux, if you like it.” He shut the drawer and faced her. “Then I need to talk to the policeman in charge of the investigation.”
    â€œThat would be Chief Cutter.”
    â€œYou know him.”
    â€œHe’s an old friend of the family.”
    He nodded as if that confirmed some perception he held of her. “I was told you knew everyone in New Orleans.”
    She was tense again. “Who told you that?”
    â€œIs it true?”
    â€œYes, but…” But it was almost spooky how well he knew her, as if he’d been studying her from afar.
    â€œThen I chose my associate wisely.”
    Associate. She was flattered. Yet she wanted to question him further, to find out who’d talked to him about her. But he’d already proved he wouldn’t answer her queries if he didn’t wish to. She supposed that was the investigator part of his job; he had to protect his sources.
    But what sources would talk so freely about her?
    â€œSo wherever we go, you’ll do the talking?” he asked.
    â€œI will.” When he looked at her as he did now, as if he knew what color panties she was wearing, the hair rose on the back of her head. She stood, a quick, uncomfortable leap to her feet. “I’ll make the calls right now.”
    â€œDo it here.”
    No wonder he needed someone to help him out. He was the oddest, most abrupt man she’d ever met. Furthermore, although he worked while she made the calls, unloading his briefcase, loading DVDs into the new changer that had been placed there for his convenience, she was quite sure he was eavesdropping. Why, she didn’t know. Calling the banks and sweet-talking the managers into releasing their employees for an hour was not that interesting. Nor were her calls to the tellers who had gone on to other jobs. When she put down the phone, she felt on edge. “We’re set. Do we need to tell anybody we’re leaving?”
    â€œNo.”
    She waited, but apparently Jeremiah Mac saw no reason to explain himself—to her or to anyone.
    Well, all right.
    â€œI’ll get my purse, Mr. Mac.”
    â€œCall me Jeremiah.”
    â€œAll right, Jeremiah.” Stephabeast would hate that Nessa called him by his first name. She would hate that Nessa could leave during bank hours. She would hate that Nessa no longer reported to her—and she wouldn’t say a word. Mr. MacNaught himself had demanded Nessa’s cooperation.
    Nessa found herself liking this assignment.
    She got her purse out of her desk—the desk she’d said farewell to this morning, the one that sported an invisible and apparently unbreakable ball and chain—and with a cheerful wave at the tellers, walked across the lobby and out of the bank, Jeremiah Mac on her heels.
    The heat and humidity had intensified. The street was getting busy. In the distance Nessa could hear the roar of the endless party on Bourbon Street. “Let’s go to the corner. We can catch a cab there.”
    Jeremiah walked a few steps away, then stopped to look back at the bank. “It looks like a house.”
    â€œYou would be right, sir.” Nessa listened in amusement as her Southern accent strengthened in response to the plain, flat notes of Jeremiah’s Yankee voice. “This branch of Premier Central has a history. It was originally built before the War between the States by the prosperous Steve Williams family. The Williamses, being a New Orleans family of proper sentiment, backed the Confederacy, and by the time the war ended, their fortune had vanished.”
    â€œIt pays to back the winning side,” Jeremiah said without inflection.
    â€œSo it does, although some would say honor and integrity are more important than winning.”
    â€œThe some who say