Dangerous Tease (The Layton Family 3)

She flayed him with a dirty look.

Cy took a step back. “I'd tell you if I could, but I can't. All you need to know is that I'm with the good guys and that you need to get the hell out of Vegas.”

“What do I do about Snips?”

“Don't worry about him. I'll take care of it.”

“I'm supposed to go to Nebraska and stay at the Rose O'Neill Dry Creek Artist Colony for six months, but how do I do that if you're in trouble?”

“What's wrong, pussycat, you think I can't take care of little ol' me?” He flexed his pecs and winked. “Get your ass to Dry Creek and lay low. I wouldn't put it past Snips to try to use you as bait again if he finds you. I'll check in on you, but Nebraska is one of the last places anyone would ever look. Hell, I don't think most people could find it on a map.”

She rolled her eyes. “Cy, is all of this really necessary? It's Snips. He's a wannabe.”

“He's a scumbag with major ambition to be somebody. How soon can you get to Nebraska?”

“I'll leave after I get off work.”

“Do it. Don't call Mom or Dad after you leave. I have someone watching the 'rents, but I wouldn't put it past that little prick to find a way to tap into their phones. Here, take this.” He handed her a cheap cellphone. “It's a pay-as-you-go phone. Untraceable. Leave your cell in Vegas so they can't track the GPS chip and take this one with you to Nebraska. I have the number already. Don't give it to anyone else.”

Josie rubbed her arms, which prickled with goose bumps. “Fuck. Now you're starting to scare me.”

“Good.” Cy's eyes, the same shade of gray as hers, went dark. “You should be scared.”

They hugged, his sinewy arms squeezing the air out of her lungs. Damn, he hadn't done that since before he’d left for overseas.

“Be safe, little bro.”

He grinned down at her. “If you haven't noticed, I'm not that little. Talk to you soon.” With that, he strutted out the back door.

Cy had saved her back in L.A., bought her first canvas after that debacle and urged her to paint again. He knew, had always known, how important painting was to her sanity. They'd always had each other's backs before, so there was no reason to think this time would be any different.

Josie stepped back out among the diner's tables. Other waitresses buzzed around, dropping off food and pouring coffee. Customer chatter filled the room as if everything in the world was normal, as if she hadn't just discovered her brother was some sort of covert operative working for God knows who and a loan shark with delusions of grandeur was trying to use her as bait.

Desperate to stay busy, she snagged a stack of napkins along with the bucket of loose silverware and headed toward a table to roll the cheap forks, spoons and knives inside the paper napkins. The mindless work would help bring her heart rate back to normal.

“You better have my money.”

A squeak escaped and she spun around.

Snips lounged at the table closest to the employee-only door, usually reserved for busboys scarfing down roast beef sandwiches during break. He wore a gray track suit, a black newsboy cap pulled low over his forehead and sunglasses, presumably to hide evidence of what had to be a gnarly bruise. The whole ensemble made him look like a cheap imitation of the type of people Vegas had in surplus.

Seeing him pissed her off. The little fuck had stirred up all this trouble. It took everything she had not to punch him in the face, but what he lacked in style he made up for with a short-fuse temper and deadly aim.

He smirked at her. “Cy is still avoiding my calls. I can't have that. My rep demands fast action.”

Willing herself not to smack him over the head again with any of the tools of her trade, she took a deep breath and counted to ten. She couldn't let on that she knew the debt was a ruse. Cy needed time to put some distance between him and this power-hungry little shit.

“Look, Snips —”

“Nobody calls me that anymore. It's Jimmy now.” His cheeks flushed.

People had called him Snips since freshman year when he showed up for yearbook picture day with a completely jacked-up home haircut. Even back then he'd been a shithead, but he hadn’t had the paid muscle to back up his flapping gums.

Not so today. Linc, the giant sitting across from him, cracked his scraped knuckles.

Josie had to play it just right. Until she skipped town, he had to believe she was getting him the money.

“Fine. Jimmy, let's do this logically. Cy owes you forty grand. I have ten I can have to you as soon as the bank opens tomorrow. I'll have the rest for you in a month.”