LITMIR.BIZ

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give you a call if I turn up anything.”

      “Thanks, Ross.”

      “Don’t be such a stranger, Grif.”

      As he hung up and walked to the window, Griffin wondered if he would ever be anything but a stranger. He had chosen his course, and he had no one to blame but himself.

      With a snap of his wrist, Griffin closed the drapes and let the darkness enfold him.

       Chapter Three

      LULU’S WAS JUMPING tonight, and the hottest table in the joint belonged to Allie Chase.

      She relaxed in her chair, an unlit cigarette dangling from her lips, and watched Pepper Adair dance the Charleston on the tabletop, red hair bouncing to the jazz band’s hectic rhythm. Bruce and Nathan were clapping in time, shouting encouragement as the tempo increased, while Nikolai stared into his drink with a feigned air of gloom and pretended he wasn’t having a good time. Sibella scribbled furiously in her sketchbook, deftly working to capture Jimmy McCrae in action as he balanced an empty glass on his nose.

      “It is all so meaningless,” Nikolai said in his heavy Russian accent. “Must we always fiddle while Rome burns?”

      Allie laughed. “Is there a fire somewhere I haven’t heard about, Kolya?”

      He gazed at her from dark, soulful eyes. “There is the one in my heart, which only you can extinguish.”

      “Oh, knock off the mushy talk, comrade,” Jimmy said, tossing his glass from hand to hand. “You know Allie ain’t interested.”

      Allie smiled sweetly. “What would I do if I didn’t have you to tell me all about myself, Jimmy?”

      “Good question.” He grinned and loosened his collar. “What I don’t get is why you haven’t fallen for me.”

      “Because she has better taste than that,” Bruce said. “Such good taste, in fact, that I doubt any guy will meet with her approval in the foreseeable future.”

      “Don’t listen to him, Allie,” Nathan said, his gentle face achingly sincere. “Sometimes he just likes to hear the sound of his own voice.”

      Bruce snorted. “Allie would be the first to agree with me.”

      The music had stopped. Pepper jumped down from the table and plopped into a chair, her face flushed and her eyes bright. “What are y’all talkin’ about?” she demanded. “Come on, tell!”

      Allie signaled to the waiter to bring another round of drinks. “It’s nothing very interesting, really,” she said lightly. “Just a discussion of my love life.”

      Pepper leaned forward, the neckline of her frock falling open to reveal a sliver of her fashionably flat bust line. “How excitin’! Who is he, darlin’?”

      “Nobody, Pep,” Jimmy said. “Just the usual string of one-night stands.”

      “That’s right,” Allie said. “I believe in keeping things uncomplicated.” She accepted a whiskey from the waiter and took a long drink. “I’m not the kind to settle down like Bruce and Nathan.”

      “Who says I’ve settled down?” Bruce said.

      “Don’t you be mean to Nathan, darlin’, or you’ll regret it. Won’t he, Allie?”

      Allie gave Bruce a long look, and he acquired a sudden interest in his drink. Kolya heaved a great sigh. Sibella chewed on her pencil, oblivious. The jazz band struck up another number.

      Pepper seized Jimmy’s hand and hauled him onto the dance floor. After a moment, Bruce and Nathan wandered off together, while Kolya began to feel the effects of his drinking and sprawled across the table. Allie smiled fondly and ruffled his dark hair.

      “Look after him for me, Sibella,” she said. “I’ve got some business to attend to.”

      Sibella mumbled agreement, and Allie strolled away from the table. She felt the eyes on her…covetous eyes, hungry eyes, eyes that saw a length of leg in a rolled silk stocking, the sway of hips beneath a low-waisted black satin dress, and thought nothing of the woman to whom they belonged.

      That suited her just fine. The men who watched her, who assumed she was a hot little number who would jump into bed with the first big six to pass her a line…they were her rightful prey. The boldest fish were the easiest of all to hook.

      She allowed her gaze to wander from table to table, seeking the most likely mark. A young man in Oxford bags, his face as yet fresh and unblemished by years of dissipation, tried to catch her eye. She ignored him and passed on, pretending boredom as she examined the darkest tables in the back of the room. An otherwise appealing mobster grinned in her direction, but when he lit his cigarette she crossed him from her list.

      At last she found the perfect donor: a good-looking man in his early thirties, his cynical expression hinting at experience, his body firm and fit. She sauntered toward him, dipping her finger in his gin and slowly licking it clean.

      “Buy me a drink?” she asked, sliding into a chair beside him.

      He looked her up and down. “What’ll you have, baby?”

      She picked up his half-empty glass, drained it and gave him a heavy-lidded stare. “Whiskey and soda,” she drawled. “And make it fast.”

      He ran his fingertip from her bare shoulder to her wrist. “Why’re you in such a hurry?”

      “I don’t believe in wasting time when I find what I want.”

      “I can see that.”

      “Then let’s have that drink.”

      He signaled to a waiter, his attention focused on Allie. When the waiter failed to appear at the table, he glanced reluctantly toward the bar.

      “Promise me you won’t go anywhere, baby,” he said, an edge to his voice.

      She stretched luxuriantly, letting him glimpse several inches of bare thigh. “Now, why would I do that?” she purred.

      He wrapped his fingers behind her neck, pulled her against him and kissed her, hard. She gave him exactly what he wanted, melting into him with a little gasp of admiration.

      “There’s more where that came from,” he said, rising from his chair. “You stay right where you are.”

      He strutted off like a peacock, all broad shoulders and jutting chin. He thought he’d won the prize with his natural charm and good looks. Men like him always assumed that any girl, even the most sophisticated flapper, would fall for them if they so much as crooked their fingers.

      Let him keep his illusions. He would awaken from their encounter believing he’d had the best sex of his life, which meant that she could come back for more and he would be happy to oblige.

      Allie rolled her toes inside her pumps and let her thoughts wander to yesterday’s fruitless search. She and Lou had practically turned the apartment upside down looking for the papers Elisha—and obviously someone else, as well—believed Cato might have given her. They hadn’t found anything but dust and a pair of earrings Allie had thought she’d lost last winter.

      In a way, their failure had relieved Allie. She hadn’t solved the mystery of why those notes were so valuable, but at least she could honestly say she didn’t know where they were if someone questioned her again. And that might buy her time to keep looking into the circumstances of Cato’s death.

      The watch on Allie’s wrist ticked out the minutes, and lover boy still hadn’t returned. She glanced toward the table where she’d left Kolya and Sibella. Kolya had fallen asleep over his vodka; Sibella was still sketching the various speakeasy patrons, her tongue between her teeth. Beyond them, at the entrance to the club, the doorman had just admitted a single girl in a cheap, overlarge yellow dress and a long string of very expensive-looking pearls.

      Allie

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