Page 38 of Kissing Danger

I huffed again and pouted. The spoiled brat act wasn’t usually my thing, but it distracted me from the worry eating at my heart.

Nathan had a plan.

Trust him.

That mantra repeated itself over and over in my head as I watched Agent Belden handcuff him and lead him out of the hotel room.

Unfortunately, I was not left alone. Several officers stayed behind. I soon found myself moved from the bedroom to a table in the hotel room’s small kitchen, thankfully dressed. Across the table sat the same officer who had uncuffed me from the bed. She seemed to be the highest rank of all the remaining officers. Her name was Officer Quinn, and she looked at me with uncomfortably sad eyes.

“It’s okay,” she said as she placed a hand over mine. “He’s gone now.”

Scowling at her, I pulled my hand out of her grip. “I’m sorry. Are you under the impression that I’m here against my will? I know the handcuffs were a bit misleading but trust me...” I leaned closer and let my smile turn just a bit lecherous. “I was a very eager participant.”

The officer cleared her throat and shifted in her seat, clearly uncomfortable.

“Be that as I may, I still have a few questions for you.”

Technically, since they hadn’t arrested me, I didn’t have to answer their questions. But I also knew that reminding them of this would only make me look suspicious.

Lounging back in my chair and crossing one leg over the other, I tossed a careless hand in the air. “Fine. Whatever. Ask away. I’ve got nothing to hide.”

Too much?

Maybe. I’d never been interrogated before. Even when Agent Belden came to my old studio, it had been more of a threat than an interrogation.

Officer Quinn pulled out an old-fashioned notebook and pen. “You just arrived in the city today. What time was that?”

My heart thudded in my ears. This is where I could mess everything up. They’d separated Nathan and I to check if our stories lined up. If not, then it would basically be an admission of guilt. Unfortunately, I didn’t know what Nathan planned to tell them. I was certain he had a plan, but there hadn’t been timeto “get our stories straight”. If I said the wrong thing, I could accidentally end up incriminating him.

A tactic that Kiki had once taught me came to mind. The dumb blonde act had gotten her out of many tickets in the past.

I was neither blond nor female, and this was much worse than a parking ticket, but hopefully, the principle would work the same.

Resting my chin on my hand, I pretended to think for a minute. “I don’t know the exact time. Nathan handled the tickets and I never looked at the clock. The sun was still up when the plane landed, though.”

Not surprisingly, Officer Quinn didn’t bother to write my answer down.

“I see. And what are you doing in New York? You live in Las Vegas, correct? That’s a long way to fly. I’m sure you didn’t come all this way just to rent a hotel room.”

This one was easy. I didn’t even need to feign excitement when I answered her. “We’re starting a new fashion line. Well, it’s not really new. It already existed, but Nathan bought the company and hired me as the lead designer to reinvent the brand’s look.”

I started telling her all about my design plans, and the new ideas I was eager to try. It wasn’t even an act. I could go on all day about color pallets and stitching patterns if she let me. Most of the time I was holding my obsession back, so all I had to do was release the dam on my words and I wasted a significant amount of the Officer’s time.

It reached the point where I was critiquing the construction of the Officer’s uniform—those clothes really didn’t fit her figure, and the fabric was cheap—when she finally cut me off.

“Yes, that’s all very good,” she said, obviously trying to hide her annoyance. “But what, specifically, are you doing here in New York? Your studio is in Las Vegas, so you must be here for some specific reason.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said, waving away her question as if it were unimportant.

“You... don’t know?” she repeated my answer slowly, probably wondering if she really had just heard those words.

“Yeah. Some business stuff with the company. I didn’t ask. I’m a designer, not a business major. I don’t bother sticking my nose in things I don’t understand. Nathan just asked me to come along, so I came.”

“Right.” Officer Quinn’s words were growing more clipped by the minute. “Why don’t you walk me through what you’ve done today. Your plane landed. What did you do after that?”

I thought for a moment, considering many different ideas.

How did Nathan want me to reply?

---