Page 53 of A Very Un-Shakespeare Romance
“If he does that, he can’t give us any info,” Lily pointed out, tossing the dress aside onto a spare corner chair.
“Fine.” Sheila walked over to her large closet filled with her limited selection of eight summer dresses, all of which had been under ten dollars at the local discount store. “This one. He’ll be hot for you, but it’ll also show off your sweet, nurturing side.”
She’d liked the celery-green shimmery dress the moment she’d spotted it on the end-of-summer sale rack. It hugged her average bodice with its scoop neckline before flaring out flirtingly and stopping just above her knees. Likely no one had gone for it because it wasn’t exactly a casualhang on the beachdress. The dress was a mix of cotton, spandex, and something else that made it a dress-up or dress-down kind of outfit, depending on the right shoes, hair, and makeup.
“We’re walking on the beach, so I’ll have to carry the sandals I was thinking of,” she commented, crossing to her bathroom to change into it.
“You’re wearing those fuck-me pumps, right?” Sheila asked, following her.
Lily slanted her a look. “Hey, I’m changing in here.”
“Call me a voyeur.” She laughed, fluffing her already blown-out sexy wavy beach hair. “Plus, I have the same parts. Nothing to see here. I’m just glad we don’t have to figure out how to carry a gun in these dresses. I don’t think Thunderwear would get the job done.”
Lily snorted as she pulled on her dress. “I was glad Buck didn’t ask me directly if I’d packed mine. On the last undercover op, he told me to keep it in the car since it’s not exactly something you can buy at the local clothing store.”
“It reminds me of Mormon underwear,” Sheila commented. “Don’t ask.”
Shoulders shaking from silent laughter, Lily pulled a few locks of hair off her face and secured them with a tiny clip. “Good?”
Sheila studied her like she was crashing for a final exam at Quantico. “Yeah. He’ll want your hair blowing in the ocean breeze. You aren’t going to want it getting stuck in your lip gloss. Because it is so acome hither, big boylipstick kind of night.”
“Oh, Sheila, where do you come up with things like that?” she asked, reaching for her mascara.
“Rap mostly. It’s the most honest assessment of the male mind in my opinion. The entire lexicon is like the FBI manual set to music. But really, it doesn’t matter if the guy is from the hood or waltzing down Wall Street in a twenty-thousand-dollar suit.”
This she had to hear. “How so?” she asked as she curled the brown-coated wand over her lashes.
“One, a man gets money however he can. Two, he’ll shoot something if it comes at him or have someone else do it. We’re talking murder one and two. Three, if he can fuck it, he will. Every single time. Sometimes he pays. Prostitution, anyone? And don’t get me started on the whole, if he can smoke it part…”
Lily clapped. “You should give a special training.”
“I’ll email a proposal to Buck.” Sheila stuck her face next to Lily’s in the mirror and smoothed the smudge of mascara in her right corner. “Did I mention it used to drive my mother nuts when I listened to rap? She’d stop in my doorway and say, ‘I put men like that in prison every day, Sheila Rae, and they aren’t good role models for you to be listening to.’”
“To which you’d reply?” Lily asked, applying her favorite raspberry lip gloss, trying not to think about Robbie kissing it off later. Her nerves were already jumping.
“‘Yes, Mother.’ I had no voice back then.”
Since that was hard to imagine, she patted her partner on the back. “I’ve met your mother, so I get it. She’s formidable.”
“Wouldn’t be a federal judge if she wasn’t.” Sheila winked at herself in the mirror. “I sometimes wonder how she would feel if she saw me like this, dolled up like a hottie on an undercover assignment.”
They both regarded themselves in the mirror. Looking at them tonight, no one would think they were FBI agents. They both looked their scripted part: two best friends getting ready to go on dates with men they’d met on a beach vacation. “I’d bet she would know it was necessary.”
Sheila rubbed the corners of her eyes. “She gets my case files from someone in DC. That I know. And she tells me every Christmas how proud she is of me and all the bad guys I’ve put away, the justice I’ve dispensed. But I think she’d lose her shit if she knew about this underbelly of justice. Then again, this is the woman whose sole maternal advice was: if you take theFout of life in every situation, you’ll remember there’s always a lie. Justice balances the lies.”
Justice?
“Is that what tonight is about?” Lily asked, turning from the vulnerability in her eyes reflected back at her in the mirror.
Sheila lightly grabbed her shoulders. “Yes! The same way it is when we’re sitting in the car for hours surveilling someone, or when I have to give a lap dance to someone on a yacht or at a strip club. The O’Connor boys are good men, but they have information on the likely whereabouts of a very important person of interest. The one who landed in your lap, Sunshine, when your CI told you about the Kellys laundering money through Tara’s nail salons.”
She nodded. “Thanks for the reminder. I needed it. Sheila, I hate to ask this…”
Her partner rested her hip against the sink. “You wonder if I’ve ever enjoyed kissing someone undercover when it couldn’t be avoided.”
“Yes,” she said quietly, hoping her blush covered up the sudden heat crawling on her cheeks. “I’ve evaded it so far.”
“Tangled limbs did the job, huh?” Sheila got a rare soft motherly look on her face. “Sure, I have. There was one guy we’d turned as a witness who was going back into a major drug operation with me so we could take down his boss. He was the kind of ripped, charming bad boy I’ve always found attractive. He wasn’t a killer, so he had that going for him.”
