me put it another way. Turn over the name, and I’ll hire you myself.”
She gaped at him. “For what?”
“For your suspicious nature. I’m a fast learner. It’s obvious I need another set of eyes in the club. Just for a couple of weeks. Someone who can see what I’ve been missing. Security to check on my security, if you will.”
This was her dream job. Exactly what she needed right now—a client with deep pockets offering work that would be both interesting and challenging. Her head spun. There was only one catch. A big one. “And all I have to do is . . .”
“Turn over the name of your client.”
At that moment, Piper hated Deidre Joss. Deidre’s stubborn insistence on anonymity was going to ruin Piper. She should just tell him the truth.
But she couldn’t. She stalked across the carpet to the door, fighting the ache in her chest. “Nice talking with you, Mr. Graham. Too bad you have to leave.”
“You’re not going to do it?”
The urge to give him the name he wanted was so strong she had to clench her teeth. “I don’t have your money, or your power, or your fame, but I’ve got ethics.” Ethics. She’d never hated a word more.
“Once you step over the line, you can never step back. Remember that.”
Duke had probably been talking about sex, but the fact was, if she gave in on this, she’d be giving away her self-respect, and she wouldn’t do that for anything or anyone.
Graham came closer, dangling the golden carrot. “Think of all the money you could make on this job . . .”
“Believe me, I am!” She flung open the door. “I did you a favor. Now do me a favor and get out of here so I can finish packing and move into my cousin’s shitty basement and come up with another way to stay in business without selling my soul.”
The sadistic bastard grinned. A big grin that took over his rugged face. “You’re hired.”
“Are you deaf? I told you! I’m not selling out my client.”
“That’s why you’re hired. Meet me at my condo tomorrow morning at ten. I believe you know where it is.”
And that was that.
***
Piper awoke at dawn the next morning, her mind still reeling from what had happened. After downing two cups of black coffee, she settled on wearing her khaki skirt, a short-sleeved army-green T-shirt printed with a red scorpion, and her scuffed brown ankle-high booties. Semiprofessional without looking as if she was trying to impress him.
She was ready too early, so she killed time by detouring to Lincoln Square and stopping in at the few places that were open. Not surprisingly, nobody recognized the photo of Howard that Berni had given her. Because he was dead.
As Jen had forecast, it was unseasonably warm for late September, and Piper kept the windows down on her way to Lakeview. At exactly two minutes before ten, she parked in one of the three allotted visitor spaces in the alley behind his residence.
Once part of a Catholic seminary, the brick building had sat empty for years before it was converted into three luxury condos. Graham owned the two-story penthouse, while a local real estate titan and a Hollywood actor with Chicago roots owned the other two units.
She walked along a fern-bordered brick pathway to the front entrance and into a small lobby with a high-tech video security system she’d like to know more about. A computer-generated voice directed her to a private elevator that rose automatically to the penthouse. The door opened, and she stepped out into an expansive living space with brick walls and big industrial windows. The two-story-high ceiling had exposed ductwork painted a flat charcoal. The bamboo floors lay in an oversize chevron pattern, giving the space a sleek edge, and the long bookshelves on one wall held a collection of books she’d bet anything he’d never opened.
Two men with their backs to her sat on a curved oyster-colored couch the size of three normal couches. One of the men—the one she’d come to see—wore a white terry cloth bathrobe, the other, a blue dress shirt and dark pants. He was the man who rose and walked around the end of the couch to shake her hand. “Heath Champion,” he said.
Heath Champion, aka “the Python,” was a Chicago legend and one of the most powerful sports agents in the country. He represented two of the Stars’ great former quarterbacks, Kevin Tucker and Dean Robillard, as well as her own