Page 26 of Blind Luck

It’s too early for this.Erin appeared to be part lunatic and part genius, either a winning combination or a nightmarish one. Only time would tell which.

“Back to the beard,” Erin continued as the coffee machine hissed. “What are your thoughts?”

“I like the beard.”

She gave him a pitying glance. “Weak chin?”

“No.”

“It doesn’t matter if you do.”

“I donothave a weak chin.”

Erin just looked in his direction, her lips scrunched to one side, and even though his chin status shouldn’t matter one bit, he found that it did. Erin was the human equivalent of grit in his shoe, but somehow, her opinion mattered.

“Fine, I’ll shave the fucking beard. Happy?”

“I’m delirious. That’s a new word I learned, and it means?—”

“I know what it means.”

“Okay, Mr. I-Went-to-College. If you need scissors, they’re in the drawer to the left of the stove.”

In the bathroom, Rusty hacked away at his beard, cursing under his breath. His chin wasnotweak. It was a perfectly fine chin. He just spent a lot of time on the ice, that was all, plus he came from Minnesnowta, and the beard kept his face warm. Granted, the cold was less of a problem in California, and he rarely went home in the winter now, but he’d had the beard since he was in high school, and he’d almost forgotten what the bottom half of his face looked like. But he grudgingly admitted that Erin was right. Nobody would recognise him without the beard, and they’d recognise him even less if he wore the spectacles she held out to him as he was about to exit the house.

“Put these on,” she instructed. “The lenses are plain glass.”

“Do you want me to chop off a leg too? I bet nobody would recognise me with crutches.”

She tapped her watch. “Just drive. We don’t want to miss Kelsey, and I’m hungry.”

Erin had shown up for surveillance duty in tight blue jeans and a hot-pink tank top. Subtle, it wasn’t. But as Cole looked around the dining room in the Neptune, he realised half the women in there were wearing bright colours and jeans. Erin would have stood out more if she’d worn black. Kelsey was already there when they arrived, checking her phone while she picked at a bowl of fruit, and Erin chose a table several rows away, then waved Rusty into a seat with his back to their quarry. Erin sat facing her, and boy, could that woman put away food. She couldn’t have been more than five feet three with the build of a long-distance runner, but she chowed down on two eggs, bacon, toast, and hash browns, then finished with a glass of orange juice. Rusty had teammates who ate less than Erin did.

She’d even brought a guidebook with her, and while she shovelled food into her mouth, she flipped through the pages, chatting about attractions they’d never visit. At one point, she even leaned over to ask the woman at the table next to them what her favourite show on the Strip was.

When Kelsey got up to leave, she didn’t give them so much as a cursory glance. Erin quickly wrapped a spare croissant in a napkin and shoved it into her giant purse, then she rose as well.

“In case I need a snack,” she explained, grinning as she hefted the purse onto her shoulder. “We’re just two tourists doing the tourist thing. Act natural.”

Act natural? How could he do that when Erin was the first woman he’d spent time with since Florence kicked him to the kerb?The sooner this is over, the sooner I can go home.But wherewashome now? Savigny didn’t hold the same appeal that it once had, and he’d always viewed his rental in Fresno as temporary.

Erin snapped her fingers in his face. “Don’t your feet work?”

Rusty forced a smile of his own and followed her out of the dining room.

CHAPTER 8

ERIN

He’s not a weirdo, he’s not a weirdo, he’s not a weirdo.I repeated the mantra to myself as I led Rusty out of the Neptune’s dining room. Despite answering the door minus his shirt, he hadn’t done anything super creepy, so I was choosing to trust the results of Alexa’s background check, which had pinged into my inbox moments before I left the Galaxy with Ari this morning.

Rusty Bolt had grown up in the town of Savigny, Minnesota, population nine hundred and seventy-two at the date of the last census. He’d attended the local high school and been voted homecoming king, and maybe he’d been dating the homecoming queen because they sure looked cosy in the photo Alexa had dug up. Even in high school, he’d been a hockey star, so it had been no surprise to the local community when he was drafted by the California Commanders before his junior year of college. The fear of injury was always at the back of his mind, so he’d opted to finish his studies—he’d majored in business and finance with a minor in geology—before he signed his entry-level contract. Three years later, the Commandersoffered him a new contract with a mind-blowing salary, and he stayed in Fresno.

In truth, Rusty seemed a little boring. He played hockey, and in the offseason, he disappeared, presumably back to Minnesota because his name occasionally popped up in the local newspaper when he guest-coached junior hockey classes or opened the town’s summer fair. As well as his seven-million-dollar salary, he had sponsorship deals with a drink manufacturer, various sporting goods companies, and a fashion label that specialised in jeans. That last deal was probably something to do with his ass. I didn’t go out of my way to look at men’s asses, but I could recognise a good one when I stumbled across it.

Anyhow, Rusty Bolt was a country boy who’d hit the big time playing hockey.

And now he was my partner in surveillance.

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