First Star I See Tonight

17

The drinks in the sports bar were cheap, the tourists few, and the locals uninterested in a woman sitting in the corner staring blindly at a televised soccer game being played somewhere in the world. It was two in the morning. A few men had approached her, but Piper had turned such blank eyes on them that they’d quickly left her alone.

She was lower than low, and now she was doing what all messed-up detectives did when they were lost. She was getting drunk.

She should never have taken his ring. She wouldn’t have if she’d been smart enough to come up with another plan. But she hadn’t been smart enough-not as smart as he’d been. Some detective she was turning out to be. And now here she sat, drowning her ineptitude in liquor.

She polished off her third drink. Ordered a fourth. She was swilling old-fashioneds, but with no cherry, no orange, straight bourbon whiskey, extra hard on the bitters.

Duke Dove would never have done anything so half-brained. But then, Duke had been a pro, while she was still an amateur.

Her fresh drink arrived. She thought she might be getting double vision, but she sipped it anyway. The ice cubes clinked against the side of her glass as the chair next to her squeaked on the wooden floor. She didn’t look up. “Get lost.”

A familiar hand-a familiar, ringless hand-plunked a bottle of Sam Adams on the table. Another mistake on her part-asking the hotel doorman for directions to the nearest cheap bar. She’d never thought Coop would follow her.

She stared up at the soccer game. “I’m not a team player,” she finally said, her speech only slightly slurred.

“I’ve noticed.” The words crackled with hostility.

Her fresh glass sported a waxy lipstick imprint that hadn’t come from her. She took a sip from the other side. “I don’ know how to be.”

“You against the world, right?”

“Tha’s the way it’s always been.” She stuck her index finger in her drink and shifted around the ice cubes. “Today I hit the downside.”

“Way down.”

“I’m not looking for a pass, if tha’s what you’re thinking. I did something stupid because I din’t have a better idea. I’ll figure out how to pay you back.”

He scraped his thumbnail down the middle of the beer label, ripping it in two. “Like you said. Not a team player.”

She couldn’t take it any longer, and she began to stand so she could escape to the ladies’ room. When she wobbled, he caught her arm and steered her back into her chair.

“Do not be nice to me,” she said fiercely. “I screwed up, and I know it.”

“Yeah, you did.” His jaw set in that way he had when he was furious. “Here’s the most challenging part of being a leader. Understanding you may not always know what’s best for the team.”

“Right now, all I know is I have a client-or I used to have one-who’s being threatened, and I don’ have any idea who’s behind it.”

That wasn’t a great way to try to salvage her job-a job she didn’t deserve to hold on to-and he didn’t reassure her. Instead, he pushed back his chair. “You’re going back to the hotel.”

He had to get rid of her. Coop knew exactly how it felt to call an audible and have it backfire, but Pipe had thrown out the whole damned playbook, and that meant she was out.

The wheels of the 747 hit the tarmac at O’Hare, but she slept through it. She was impulsive, but she wasn’t stupid, and she had to know what was coming-had to know he couldn’t keep her around. He had no room for a blue-eyed badass who went off half-cocked doing whatever she damn well pleased.

Yet, despite the fact that he couldn’t trust her judgment, he also trusted her more than anyone he’d ever known. No person he’d ever worked with had cared more about his welfare. Sure, his teammates and coaches had cared, but they’d had ulterior motives. Piper, on the other hand, would protect him in her own screwball way even if he weren’t paying her a dime. Because that’s the way she was made. Loyal to the end. And that’s what this was. The end.

The plane pulled up to the gate, and she began to stir. Being her lover made this more complicated than it should be. He’d known the affair was a mistake, but he’d gone ahead and done it anyway. Now he had to break it off and fire her.

He’d made tough calls before, but none as tough as this.

WHAT’S BUGGING COOPER GRAHAM?

Cockroaches! Thousands of them are swarming the former Stars quarterback’s hot new nightspot, Spiral. “They’re everywhere,” an associate who asked to remain anonymous says. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

The club is closed while exterminators try to eradicate the vermin, but whether the party crowd will return is the big question. Maybe Spiral should be renamed Death Spiral?

The news was all over the Internet. Piper sat at her office desk and buried her still-throbbing head in her hands. She only vaguely remembered collapsing on the hotel room couch last night, but she definitely remembered the strain between them at the airport. They’d barely spoken.

She wished he’d fired her on the plane so they could get it over with, but he hadn’t. Since they’d been lovers, he’d do it more carefully. He’d probably tell her she could keep the apartment for a while. He’d almost surely offer her a generous severance. The thought of his magnanimity made her want to choke.

She smacked herself in the cheek-a really bad idea, considering her jackhammer of a hangover. Until he fired her, she had a job, and she’d keep doing it right to the bitter end. She owed him that much and more.

The online smears, a mugging, a tire slashing, and a drone. It didn’t jibe. And who’d called INS-or was that even relevant? As for the cockroaches… Tony had told Spiral’s employees the club had to be closed for repairs to the cooling system, so the leak about the infestation hadn’t come from the staff. Coop had moved Karah and Jada to a hotel while the fumigation was going on. They knew the truth, but they also knew to keep it to themselves. Someone from the exterminating company could easily have blabbed, but Piper found it more likely that the same person who’d dumped the bugs had made sure the word got out.

She’d hit a dead end, and she had no idea where to go next, other than to make certain the club had a better video security system. She called Tony to talk about it. If it had been last week, she’d have talked to Coop directly, but it wasn’t last week.

The rest of Saturday and Sunday passed without word from Coop. She couldn’t go back to her apartment until the fumigation was done, so she slept on her office couch, not just because she didn’t want to impose on Jen or Amber, but also because she was too depressed to be around people.

The flyers she’d distributed netted a Monday-morning phone call from a suspicious wife, and by the next day, Piper had the unpleasant task of confirming the woman’s suspicions. Duke had been right. Once a wife got around to hiring a detective, she pretty much already knew the truth.

Helping others was supposed to be at least a partial cure for depression, so she tried to come up with someone she could help whose initials weren’t C.G. She thought of Jen’s problems with Dumb Ass and poked around the darker corners of the Internet for a few hours but didn’t come up with anything interesting.

Wednesday arrived, and the owner of an air duct cleaning service called. He’d heard Piper was good at handling rat-ass employees who claimed to have been hurt on the job but were goddam liars. The guy sounded like a jerk, but Piper drove to Rogers Park to meet him anyway. On the way back, Tony called to tell her the club was reopening that night, and he needed her back on duty.

“Did you check with Coop about that?” she asked.

“About what?”

“About me coming back.”

“Why wouldn’t you come back?”

“Never mind. I’ll talk to him.”

She ran Coop to ground in his office at Spiral that evening. She hadn’t seen the point in changing into her nighttime work clothes, and she was still wearing jeans along with a bulky gunmetal-gray sweater that was the closest thing she had to armor.

He was sitting at the desk with his ankles propped on top and idly tossing a softball back and forth. All the lights were off except the desk lamp, which cast the side of his face in shadow. He looked up as she came in, then returned his attention to the softball.

She gathered her courage. “Stop being such a chickenshit and get it over with. You know you have to fire me, and I’d appreciate it if you’d do it now so I can stop thinking about it.”

He pitched the ball from his right hand to his left.

She curled her fingers around the cuffs of her sweater. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but I’d like to keep the apartment a little longer. I promise, you’ll never see me.”

He tossed the ball back.

“I’ll give my files to whoever you hire to take my place,” she said. “And you’d better hire someone, Coop, because this isn’t over.” She’d stay on the case even after he fired her. She owed him answers. And a Super Bowl ring…

He dropped his feet to the floor, but whatever he was about to say was lost as Jada burst into the office, her Nerf gun nowhere in sight. “Mom was in an accident!” she cried. “She’s in the hospital!”

Coop shot up from his desk. “Where is she? What happened?”

“I don’t know.” Jada began to sob. “A nurse called me from the emergency room. What if she dies?”

Coop grabbed his jacket. “Let’s go.”

They had to take her Sonata because Coop had lent out his Audi for the evening. To Karah.

They found her hooked up to an IV and a monitor. Her curly dark hair spilled out in a lopsided corona around the gauze bandage wrapping her head, and more bandaging protected her left wrist and arm. Two police officers stood at the side of her bed.

Jada ran to her mother. Karah winced as she drew her daughter to her breast. “It’s okay, baby. It’s okay.” Over the top of Jada’s head, Karah saw Coop, and her face collapsed. “I wrecked your car, Coop. After everything you’ve done for me.”

“Don’t worry about the car,” Coop said. “As long as you’re okay.”

Karah slipped her hand into Jada’s hair. “I should never have taken it. I thought I was being so careful.”

“Cars can be replaced,” Coop said. “You can’t.”

The officers were doing their best to keep their professional cool with Cooper Graham in the room. The taller of the two turned to him. “She said you gave her permission to take your car?”

Coop nodded. “Hers wouldn’t start, and I was going to be at my club all night, so I didn’t need it.”

“My professor invited some of us to her house up in Wadsworth,” Karah said, “and I really wanted to go. If only I’d stayed home.” She gazed at Coop again. “I’m sorry.”

“No more apologies. This is why I have insurance.”

“Tell us again what you remember,” the second officer said.

“The road was dark, and there wasn’t much traffic.” Karah looked over at Coop. “I wasn’t speeding. I swear.”

“I’ve seen you drive,” Coop said with a forced smile. “I believe you.”

“I saw headlights behind me, but I didn’t pay much attention. It happened so fast. The headlights came closer, and I slowed down so the driver could pass. He pulled out, and- He must have turned off his lights because everything went dark. His car swerved and hit the side of the Audi. Hit hard. I… I lost control. I skidded and hit something. What did I hit?”

“A utility pole,” the taller cop said.

Karah’s hand went to her cheek. “Whoever hit me didn’t even stop to see if I was okay.”

Piper and Coop exchanged glances, then Piper moved closer to the bed. “You said ‘he.’ Did you get a look at the driver?”

“No. I don’t know for sure it was a man. That’s a country road, and there aren’t any streetlights. It was too dark to see anything.”

Piper glanced over at Coop, who threw her a keep-your-mouth shut glare in return. The police needed to know about the attacks on him, but she was smarter now than she’d been a few days ago, and she’d talk to him first.

The police continued to question Karah, but other than a vague sense that the car was large-maybe even a truck-she didn’t know more.

She wouldn’t be released from the hospital until the next day, and Piper told her she’d sleep at their place tonight to be with Jada.

Coop had to get back to the club for the reopening, and Piper followed him out into the hallway. The ding of call buttons and beep of monitors, the smell of antiseptic and sickness brought back those awful weeks before Duke had died.

“I want you on the floor tomorrow night,” he said.

She shook off the memories. “I… still have a job?”

“You’re the only female bouncer I have,” he said grimly.

That wasn’t what she was asking, and he knew it. She dodged a food cart. “I’m taking your advice about being a team player,” she said more firmly.

He headed toward the elevator bank. “Glad to hear it.”

“I’m giving you a chance to tell me why I shouldn’t talk to the police about the attacks on you before I go ahead and do it.”

He jammed his finger at the elevator button. “That sounds more like an ultimatum than being a team player.”

“Baby steps.”

A long exhale. “I’ve had enough bad publicity with the bug infestation. I don’t want this splashed all over the papers, too.”

“I understand. But the Audi has tinted windows. The road was dark. We both know what happened tonight was intended for you.”

His jaw set. “I should have anticipated something like this. Instead, I lent her my car. If I’d thought for a minute…” The elevator doors opened. “Leave the police out of this. That’s an order.”

The doors slid shut between them.

Piper got Jada off to school the next morning, then called Eric. He still hadn’t caught on to the fact that she wasn’t interested in dating him, and he agreed to take her to the lot where the Audi had been towed. As she photographed the streaks of black paint the mystery vehicle had left behind, she knew that Karah’s accident was all that had kept Coop from firing her. As it was, she didn’t know whether he only intended her to work as a bouncer. Not that it made any difference. Nothing could make her give up now.

Eric propped his elbow on the Audi’s undamaged roof, the morning sun glinting off the lenses of his aviators. “There’s this new Italian place I like on Clark. How about it?”

He was a nice guy, and she needed to be honest. “I can’t date you, Eric.”

“Whoa…”

“I’m an idiot, okay? Instead of being attracted to a solid, gorgeous guy like you, I got myself involved with a-a-” A solid, gorgeous guy like Cooper Graham… “… with someone else. It’s over, but I need some space. As I said, I’m an idiot.”

He squinted against the morning sun. “Cooper Graham. I knew it.”

She swallowed. “Do you seriously think he’d be interested in me?”

“Why not?”

This didn’t seem the time to talk about men being attracted to her merely because she was one of the guys. “I’ll fix you up with someone.”

That was one too many blows to his ego. “I don’t need anybody fixing me up.”

“Not even with Jennifer MacLeish? Chicago’s favorite meteorologist?”

“You know her?”

“Yep.” She’d have to persuade Jen, but they just might hit it off. “We can still help each other out now and then, though. Don’t you agree?”

“How do you mean?”

She hoped she’d read his ambitious nature correctly. “I’m an ordinary citizen. I can legally go places a police officer can’t, and that might be useful to you someday.”

He was listening. “Maybe.”

“And I’d like to be able to call on you occasionally. This accident, for example… I’m concerned about Coop.”

Eric wasn’t all good looks. He also had a brain. “You think whoever did this was after Coop?”

“I’m keeping an open mind.” Not so very open.

“Intriguing.” He stuck his thumb in his belt. “About this date with Jennifer MacLeish…”

The former air duct cleaning employee she was supposed to be investigating lived with his girlfriend and baby in her parents’ home. Piper followed the family to Brown’s Chicken, but as they went inside, she started worrying about Coop. He should be at the gym now, right on schedule. A schedule anyone with half a brain could figure out. Her anxiety got the best of her, and she hurried back to her car.

His Tesla was in the gym lot. She took a broken-down baby stroller somebody had put out at the curb from her trunk and pushed it, wobbly wheel and all, across the street. When Coop finally came out, she watched his reflection in a music store window. The stroller had done the trick, and he didn’t spare her a look.

She trailed him to Heath’s house, not caring if he spotted her. Once he was safely inside, she returned to her South Side stakeout and found the family in a hardscrabble neighborhood park.

She settled on a bench and watched them. Only the mother picked up their toddler, but that might only prove Piper’s target was a tuned-out father. Still, her gut told her the guy’s injury was real, and sure enough, when the toddler took a tumble, he swooped up the baby, then clutched his back.

The owner of the air duct cleaning company was as much of a jerk as she’d originally suspected, and he wasn’t happy with either her report or the single photo she’d managed to take. She could easily have stretched out the job by playing on his suspicions, but instead, like the great businesswoman she wasn’t, she convinced him he’d be wasting his money.

A few hours later, she picked up Karah from the hospital and drove her home where she fixed them all dinner. A couple of Band-Aids had replaced the bandage around her head, and her arm was sprained, but not broken. She could have been hurt so much worse.

As they ate, Jada talked about a report she was doing on child sex trafficking. Karah wasn’t happy to learn that the curriculum at her daughter’s parochial school included the seamiest side of street life, but Jada kept going. “Do you know there are, like, girls younger than me right here in the United States that are-”

Karah reached out to brush a lock of hair from Jada’s cheek. “Let’s talk about this when we’re not eating dinner.”

“But, Mom…” Jada’s amber eyes flashed with outrage. “Some of these girls are, like, being raped a bunch of times every day by these old guys, but when the police show up, they arrest the girls for prostitution. Girls my age!”

Piper had done some reading about child sex trafficking and found the subject so disturbing that she’d pushed it into her mental back closet. But witnessing a fifteen-year-old’s outrage made her ashamed of her apathy.

Jada stopped eating. “They’re victims of this horrible sex abuse, and it’s so not right for them to get arrested. We’re going to write letters to Congress.”

“Good for you,” Piper said.

Karah squeezed her daughter’s hand. “I’ll write a letter, too.”

After dinner, Piper changed for work. She dreaded going back to Spiral, dreaded anything that would put her near Coop and closer to getting permanently fired. As she deserved…

The house was packed. Coop and Tony had pulled out all the stops to overcome the bad publicity from the cockroach invasion-specials on top-shelf drinks and lots of celebrities scheduled to show up all week: football players, actors, and a beautiful country singer.

Jonah greeted Piper with a grunt and a rough slap on the back, his simian version of an olive branch. She gave him an elbow to the gut but was glad she didn’t put any force behind it because at least one of the bouncers stayed close to Coop all evening, something Coop didn’t look pleased about.

Deidre Joss showed up again, this time alone. She and Coop disappeared. When half an hour passed and he hadn’t returned, Piper started to worry.

She checked the alley first. New security cameras had been installed as she’d recommended, and Coop’s Tesla sat there unharmed. He must be in his office. But what if Deidre were still with him? Piper couldn’t imagine anything worse than walking in on the two of them doing whatever they might be doing, and she knocked loudly on the door. When it swung open, Coop looked irritated. “You need something?”

“Security check. I wanted to make sure no one was in here who shouldn’t be.”

“Is that Piper?” Deidre said from inside the room.

Coop opened the door wider. Behind him, Piper could see Deidre standing near the couch, her hair a perfect waterfall, her dancer’s carriage upright, her stilettos arranged in third position. She even wore a softly draped ballerina-pink dress.

Deidre was exactly the kind of high-achieving woman Coop was most attracted to, and it wasn’t hard to imagine the two of them married. In between board meetings, Deidre would bear him three beautiful children, and on weekends, she’d prepare gourmet meals. Piper wondered if Coop would someday look back on his fling with her and wonder how he could have been so crazy.

“I’ve been looking for a chance to talk to you,” Deidre said. “Come in.”

Piper reluctantly did as she was told.

“According to Noah, I owe you an apology,” Deidre said. “He told me in no uncertain terms that I made life difficult for you by not letting you tell Cooper I was the one who’d hired you.”

His name is Coop, Piper thought, even as she plastered on a smile. “No harm done.”

“Other than my threatening to sue her,” Coop said.

“Oh, no! You didn’t.” Deidre looked horrified. “I am sorry, Piper. I didn’t know that.”

She was so damned nice. And smart. And successful.

Piper hated her.

Deidre directed her attention back to Coop. “I have to be up early, so I need to get home. Good talk.” She extended her arm to shake his hand, when what she really wanted to do was give him a long, deep good-bye kiss. Or maybe Piper was projecting. One thing she did know: Coop genuinely liked Deidre. And why wouldn’t he?

“See that Deidre gets to her car safely, will you, Piper?” He squeezed Deidre’s hand. “Apologies, Deidre, but I have to get back on the floor.”

Deidre smiled. “One of the things I most admire about you.”

Along with his abs, his smile, that incredible mouth… Which I’ve sampled, and you haven’t.

Piper’s self-disgust hit a new high… or low, depending on how she looked at it.

She escorted Deidre from the club to the lot across the street where she’d left her BMW. “You really didn’t need to walk me to my car,” Deidre said.

“It’s nice to get some fresh air.”

“Did you know that Noah’s become a big fan of yours?”

“Really?”

Deidre stopped and smiled. “You’re the first woman he’s shown any interest in since his divorce.”

Piper made a noncommittal murmur.

“Girlfriend to girlfriend… He’s solid. Ambitious. I don’t know what I’d have done without him after Sam’s death. He can be a little intense, I’ll give you that, but maybe you should let him take you out to dinner and you can see if you hit it off.”

“I don’t really have any time to date now.”

She tilted her head. “Because of Cooper? I heard a rumor that the two of you have more than a professional relationship.”

Piper hadn’t seen this coming. “Fascinating what people will say.”

“Is it true?”

“You don’t believe in subtlety, do you?”

“Not since I lost my husband. Hell of a way to learn how short life can be.” She shifted her clutch to her other hand and waited, regarding Piper in an open, patient manner. “Well?”

Piper began walking toward the BMW. “I think you probably know by now that I never comment on my clients.”

“I respect that.” The locks on her car clicked. She opened the driver’s door, then turned back to Piper. “But if it is true… I like him a lot, and I’m going to give you a run for your money.” She didn’t say it in a bitchy way, more as a straight-up point of information. “And if it’s not true, tell him I’m low maintenance and fabulous.”

Piper laughed. Whether from surprise or amusement, she didn’t know. What she did know was that Deidre Joss was a force of nature.

Deidre pulled out of the parking lot. Piper crossed the street back to the club, barely avoiding a Lexus whose driver thought he owned the right-of-way. It felt good to have a target for her frustration, and she flipped him the bird.

The next night was a Friday, and the club was even busier. She helped Ernie toss out some men who were making themselves obnoxious, ordered the servers to cut off a couple of overzealous dancers, and broke up a fight heading for the alley. She was proving to be an excellent bouncer. If only she were as good an investigator.

By the time she entered her apartment, she was dead on her feet. She peeled off her dress, tugged on her Bears T-shirt, and brushed her teeth. As she came out of the bathroom, she heard her door open. She peeked into the living room.

Coop had makeup smears on his sweater sleeve and lipstick on the side of his neck. He looked tired, disheveled, and irritable. “I’m too tired to drive home.”

He’d been everywhere tonight, and she knew how tired he was, but she hardened her heart. “You can’t stay here.”

“Sure I can. It’s my apartment.”

He began emptying his pockets on the counter between the kitchen and living room, and she was temporarily distracted by what emerged: his cell, key fob, and a tampon wrapper with something written on it, probably a phone number.

Somebody had spilled a drink on him, and he smelled like liquor. “Coop, I’m serious. We’re… over.” She faltered on the word, but it had to be said. Their relationship was a train wreck. “Lovers need to be on equal footing, and we’re not.”

He took in her sleepwear. “Do you ever wash that T-shirt?”

“Frequently. I have more than one.”

“Of course you do.” He jerked his sweater over his head, filling the room with the scent of a dozen different perfumes. She spotted another lipstick mark on the opposite side of his neck. It was hard being Cooper Graham.

He would have already fired her if Karah hadn’t been run off the road. He probably still would. “Did you hear me?”

“I’m taking a shower, then I’m going to bed.” He headed for the bathroom. “Try your best not to jump me.”