Page 13 of Off the Grid
A timerdinged.
They both jolted.
McKenzie spun and reached for an oven while Leo finished the pastry in his hand, topping it with another spoonful of butterscotch. By the time she turned around with a baking dish in each hand, she was the machine again—hard eyes and lips pursed in concentration. He could practically see the calculations in her gaze.
Leo turned to the waitress still waiting by the door, taking an educated guess on her name. “Sarah?”
She turned to him with brows raised in question.
Leo pulled the edges of his lips into a wide smile, sinking back into the role he knew how to play—kind, flirtatious stranger. “Could you please point me in the direction of a phone?”
“Sure.” She smiled back. “There’s an office through this door, down the hallway, and on your left. If you can’t find it, there’s almost always someone floating around who’ll be able to help.”
“Thank you.”
“And can I just add,” she whispered as he pushed open the door, “my boyfriend has a snoring condition, and those little nose-strips did wonders with him. You should give it a try.”
“What?” Leo froze, letting the door smack him in the ass as he met her encouraging stare.
She lifted her fingers to her face, gesturing to the arch of her nose. “Those little strips. You wear them at night. I don’t really know how they work, but after a few nights, they shut my boyfriend right up.”
Leo didn’t miss the under-the-breath snicker coming from McKenzie’s side of the kitchen, but he pointedly kept his gaze from swerving in that direction. “It can’t be that bad.”
Sarah winced and dropped her hand as her eyes went wide. “Of course it isn’t.”
“It can’t be.”
She nodded and pulled her lips into her mouth, biting them shut.
Leo frowned. “Can it?”
Her eyes narrowed in apology.
Leo stepped into the hallway, letting the door close as his life flashed before his eyes. That girlfriend in college who broke up with him after the first time she spent the night in his dorm. The guys giving him the nickname Buzz at training because they said he sounded like a buzz saw when he slept. His brother sleeping on the living room couch because he didn’t want to share a room. He knew he snored…but that bad? Really?
Leo walked down the hallway, keeping an eye out for an office on the left. A waiter approached from the other end, eying him strangely.
“Can I help you?” he asked, but the way the words rolled slowly out made the question sound more like,Who the hell are you?Was suspicion the go-to emotion in this city?
Leo sighed. “Hi, I’m Agent Alvarez—”
The waiter’s eyes popped wide with understanding. “Oh, the narcoleptic Fed from the kitchen. What’s up?”
Leo growled under his breath. “I need a phone.”
“The office phone is back here.”
The waiter reached back and pushed open a door. Leo marched through it, located the phone, and dialed. His partner picked up on the second ring.
“Parker, do I snore?”
“Does a bear shit in the woods?”
“No, I’m serious,” Leo said, gripping the phone tight as he leaned against the edge of the desk, turning his back to the door. “My snoring, on a scale of one to ten, how bad is it?”
“Leo, what does this have to do with anything? Did you find McKenzie? Are you in New York?”
“Yes and yes. Just humor me.”
