“Hold up. You had someone at the office watching out for her?”Jesus. Why the hell would he risk bringing another person into this without checking with Leonard first?
“Yeah, I can’t be in the office all the damn time. Anyway, I had her go into my office there and grab a tracking device from my desk. She planted it in her bag like a pro.” He sounded proud. “And don’t worry, she won’t tell anyone.”
“She?”
“Like I said, you don’t need to worry about her. She’s solid, and I trust her completely.” Vinny’s voice had a defensive edge to it.
“Who is she, Vin?” The last thing they needed was some dumb broad giving them up at the first sign of trouble.
“Her name’s Helene. She’s …” His long hesitation was concerning.
“She’s what?” His frustration with his friend began to build. “Spit it out!”
“She’s Pennington’s personal assistant.” The words came out so quickly, Leonard thought he must’ve surely misheard him.
“Wait a fuckin’ minute. Did you just say she’s Pennington’s assistant?”
“Yeah, but—”
“You have got to be fucking kidding me.” Leonard pounded his first on the counter, and pain shot up his arm. “Of all people, why would you trust a woman who is stupid enough to work for that arrogant prick?” He shook out his hand, opened and closed his fist.
“She’s not stupid, Leonard.”Vinny had never used that kind of forceful tone with him before. “And like I said, I trust her.”
“Are you bangin’ this chick, Vinny?” It was obvious he had the hots for her.
“Don’t talk about Helene that way!” Yeah, they were either already doing the horizontal cha-cha or he was hoping to. “I care about her, and she cares about me, too.”
He highly doubted it, but now that Vinny’s dick had begun to do all of the thinking for him, things had just become more complicated.
Leonard did not do complicated.
“Relax, Vin.” He sighed. “What makes you think we can trust her?”
“Because she doesn’t like Charlotte Cavanaugh and wants her gone.” He quickly added, “Not gone in the waywewant her gone, but she wants her fired.”
“Why does she hate her so much?” Chicks held grudges against people for the slightest things. “Was she wearing the shoes she wanted or something?”
“I don’t know why she hates her. Hell, I didn’t even know she did until this afternoon. She called me complaining that Charlotte showed up late, and when she finally got there, she had her boyfriend with her.”
“Why the fuck does she care about any of that?” Leonard asked.
“I guess it’s against some company rule or something to bring someone in the building without a visitor’s badge.” If Vinny were a legitimate director of security, he would know if that was true or not. “I didn’t tell Helene anything about … you know, what we’ve been doing with the buses and shit. And I definitely didn’t tell her I’m planning to kill Charlotte. She just doesn’t want her coming back to the office anymore.”
“All right, fine, whatever.” He did not need to be dealing with this petty, female bullshit right now. “You said she put the tracker in Cavanaugh’s bag? How did she manage that?”
“I didn’t ask,” he said. “She just called me to let me know it was done and that she and the boyfriend had left.”
“This boyfriend, why haven’t you mentioned him before?” Depending on who he was, a boyfriend could be a serious complication. Case in point, Leonard’s secretary’s detective boyfriend.
“Never knew she had one.” What the fuckdidVinny know? “But Helene said he was tall, good-looking, and very intense. But I’m not worried—my guys can take care of him.”
“Let’s hope you’re right.” Sounded like the bug up Helene’s ass had more to do with Charlotte having a hot boyfriend than the fact she broke some stupid office rule. “What’s your next step?”
“If the tracker is working correctly, the signal is coming from a place about two hours northwest of here.” Theifwas a bit disconcerting.
“You don’t know if it’s working correctly?” Maybe Leonard would’ve been better off taking the risk and finding someone who had an actual clue about these things.
“No, I mean, yeah, it’s workingnow. The thing is kinda cheap, and it took a couple hours before I could get it to start working. But once I did, the signal was really clear.”
