Cutting Loose Read online

  “Deal with me?” Sawyer replied. “Why, I don’t have the slightest idea what you mean. I’ve never done anything wrong.”

  “Is that the line you’re feeding to her?” Eastman stuck his thumb towards me, and I felt once again offended by how he passed over acknowledging me directly. “You’re a con man, and we both know it.”

  Sawyer turned to me, rolled his eyes exaggeratedly. “See what I have to deal with? No respect from the law. It’s very frustrating; I’m thinking of suing for discrimination.”

  “Probably a good idea to record it all,” I piped up. I still hadn’t the foggiest idea what was going on, but I’d learned from my own family how to piss off cops and investigators that came sniffing around. If we weren’t paying them, we didn’t want them poking their noses into our business - and turning a lens on them was as good as roach repellant.

  “A wonderful idea.” Sawyer whipped out his phone, and true to form, Eastman started backing away. He looked a combination of annoyed, dejected, and cynically amused by the response he’d elicited.

  “Just keep your nose out of trouble, Sawyer,” he said as he turned to leave the restaurant. “For once in your life.”

  Sawyer laughed at his back. “You could always write me a parking ticket on the way out, Eastman!”

  Eastman’s shoulders tightened a little, but he held in any reply. The bell jangled once again above the door as the lawman left.

  Sawyer laughed in apparently honest delight, threw back the last of his scotch. “Well, that was quite the spot of fun!”

  I turned to him, stuck out a finger at him. “Okay, you. What the hell is going on? What are you talking about, assistant? Who is that? Who are you?”

  “Whoa, easy there!” Sawyer put his glass back on the bar. “No need to bite my head off!”

  “Explain!”

  He sighed. “Are you hungry, at least?”

  I shook my head as my stomach loudly gurgled at the mention of food.

  “Right,” he said. “Barkeep, a couple menus!” He held up a hand to ward off my next comment. “And then I’ll explain. Relax, Lone Ranger.”

  I knew that if I responded to that retort, I’d just be rising to his bait. I knew it, and it still took every ounce of my self-control to keep my mouth shut.

  Chapter Four

  * * *

  Twenty minutes later, I finished off the second half of my cheeseburger and glared at Sawyer. “None of this makes sense,” I complained. “You haven’t answered any of my questions?”

  “Then why have I been talking for the last twenty minutes?”

  “Because my mouth has been full of food, and I couldn’t interrupt you to ask anything!”

  He grinned, held up a finger. “Ah! So your statement is false – I have answered every one of the questions that you haven’t been able to ask!”

  “What? I – urgh!” I threw a French fry at him, ignoring his hiss as it bounced off his fancy shirt. “Answer them now, then!”

  He scooped another fry from my plate, popped it in his mouth. He hadn’t ordered anything, and mostly just watched as I’d hungrily devoured a plate of a cheeseburger and fries. So what if it wasn’t healthy – I didn’t know when I’d get my next meal. “Very well. Ask away.”

  “I…” I wasn’t really ready to ask anything specific, so I just sort of let it all out in a single burst. “What the hell?”

  “About what?”

  I gestured rather wildly towards the door of the restaurant. “Who was that guy??”

  “Who, Agent Eastman?”

  “No, the six-foot-tall blue bunny that came in after him, carrying the giant carrot. Yes, that guy!”

  “You know, nothing ruins the allure of a pretty girl faster than sarcasm,” Sawyer sighed, and I readied another French fry in throwing position. “That was Agent Jackson Eastman of the Federal Bureau of Investigations.”

  I goggled at him. With a sigh, Sawyer reached out, picked up another fry, and slid it into my open mouth. I gurgled, chewed, swallowed, and managed to get ahold of my senses. “Why in the world is an FBI agent chasing you? Oh god, did you do something so illegal that the FBI is after you?” I felt my breath start coming faster in my chest. “Oh my god, am I an accomplice to your crime now? Am I going to go to jail?”

  “Probably,” Sawyer said, looking supremely unconcerned. “If you’re good, you’ll get off with no more than five to ten years in Federal pen.”

  I started to freak out worse, but this time I saw the glint in his eye. “You’re lying to me!”

  “It’s what I do for a living,” he shrugged.

  “Oh. Oh wow. You’re a con man?”

  “No!” he exclaimed, looking genuinely hurt by this accusation. “I’m a consultant! Much more professional title, still end up mostly convincing people that it’s okay for them to be wrong. Or, sometimes, I smile and nod as they get themselves into even deeper trouble, knowing that they paid me up front.”

  “But why is the FBI after a consultant?”

  “Because,” he huffed, “they seem to have the mistaken idea that I’ve done a bit more than consult. Namely, they’re convinced that I’m guilty of a long list of crimes, everything from forgery to fakery to burglary to impersonation.”

  “Impersonation is a crime?” I asked, imagining Sawyer wearing a long, fake white beard, reminiscent of a mall Santa. I couldn’t see him bouncing a small child on his lap; he’d probably be more interested in the child’s attractive, curvy mother.

  “It is if you do it in a bank vault,” he said, shrugging.

  “Did you do it?”

  He winked and tapped his nose. “Allegedly. But I wasn’t joking about needing an assistant, and it’s all completely above the law.”

  I already had my mouth open to turn him down. In just a half hour of conversation, this man had managed to grab every single red flag I could imagine and was gaily waving them around, as if pleased by his complete collection. Despite his half-hearted denials and vague assurances, I was very convinced that he was guilty, that he’d done every single one of those crimes he’d named. Why else would the FBI be investigating him, to the point of challenging him in public? And besides that, I’d seen him commit theft with my own eyes!

  But…

  But I only had between ten and sixty dollars to my name, depending on whether Sawyer paid for my cheeseburger. But I didn’t know where I’d be sleeping tonight. But I only had a broken-down car and a single suitcase of clothes between me and owning absolutely nothing. But if I passed on Sawyer’s offer, I’d have to go crawling back to my family with my head hung in shame. And I knew that, if they found out about this stunt, they’d never let me get away again. I’d spend the rest of my life trapped under my mother’s thumb, like one of those butterflies impaled on a pin in some collector’s box.

  So I decided right then and there, with my mouth full of fries and my stomach full of cheeseburger and wine. If I was going to make a run for it, I might have to end up striking a deal with the devil.

  “What sort of job?” I asked.

  For a moment, Sawyer just smiled. It was a victorious smile, one that told me that he knew exactly what sort of thoughts had just passed through my head. He’d anticipated them all, had seen that I’d end up exactly at this conclusion.

  That look on his face made me hate him a little bit, but I’d be damned if it didn’t also come with a blooming of newfound respect for him as well. Whatever else I might say about his lack of moral character, Sawyer certainly wasn’t stupid. That was an improvement of most of the men who’d previously been a part of my life.

  “You,” Sawyer said, tapping his chin, “seem like the kind of girl who won’t find herself totally overwhelmed and star-struck when confronted by a few members of high society.”

  He’d guessed correctly. When I had been little more than a fixture on my mother’s arm to show off and parade around, I’d come to know many of the hoi polloi, many of the “beautiful people.” I’d learned very quickly that, despi
te their status and wealth, most of them ended up being just as small-minded and petty as the workers that they derided as their inferiors.

  “I can keep my head,” I said, cautiously agreeing with him. “What do I have to do for this job?”

  “I’m afraid that I can’t share many of the details until you’ve accepted,” Sawyer countered, the gleam in his eyes making it clear that he immensely enjoyed this back-and-forth. “But I can tell you that this job comes with a salary and lodgings.”

  “What kind of salary?”

  “A small one.”

  “What kind of lodgings, then?”

  “Cramped and uncomfortable.” Oh yes, he was enjoying this immensely.

  “Anything else you want to demand from me?” I burst out, overcome by irritation. “Maybe you want the promise that I’ll give you my first-born? Do you want me to put my virginity up as a bonus for hiring me?”

  His grin grew wider. “If I was just after that, honey, I wouldn’t need to offer you a job.”

  “Pig.” I ate another fry, thought about it. Getting this job would solve two of my problems in a single stroke – that of income, and that of lodgings. It could at least give me a buffer until I figured out what I was going to do with the rest of my newly freed up life.

  On the other hand, it also came with Sawyer, but I was pretty sure that I’d be able to handle him once I got myself re-oriented, once I wasn’t wasting so much brainpower worrying about where I’d sleep tonight or what I’d eat tomorrow.

  “You’re not going to tell me anything else about this job until I accept, are you?” I finally asked.

  He tapped his chin in thought. He had a good, strong chin, although his face was a little narrow, I thought to myself. He was very good-looking, even if he was a little too aware of this fact himself. That could be dangerous if I let my guard down. That joke about my virginity probably wasn’t the smartest move to make, if it put the wrong thoughts into his head.

  “The job is fairly short-term, likely no more than a month or three,” he said at length. “You’ll be helping me on a consulting job where I could use a bit more expertise, the kind of expertise that I’m fairly confident that you’ll be able to provide. You’ll be paid weekly, with a bonus at the end if we have a successful completion of all of our objectives. I can draw up a contract for you, if you want it.”

  That was fairly vague, although I did like the sound of contracts. I knew better than to trust them fully – after all, my father had swindled many the merchant out of their money and funneled their assets into our own already-swollen accounts despite the existence of a supposedly “ironclad contract” – but it was better than nothing at all. I figured that I at least could try and look for some of the more obvious loopholes.

  I looked up at Sawyer. The man had affected nonchalance, but I could tell that he was watching me carefully, a chess master waiting for his opponent to fall into his trap. “You know what I’m going to say already,” I sighed.

  He shrugged. “You still have to say it, though. That’s the fun part.”

  “The fun part?”

  “Sometimes, you put together the perfect plan, and you feel a bit of satisfaction and pride in having created something so perfect and beautiful. But that’s like admiring a beautiful woman from afar. Yes, it’s pleasant, but it pales beside the true experience of putting that plan in motion and watching it all come perfectly to fruition. That moment of completion, when you kiss the beautiful woman, when the plan executes perfectly, is the best reward.”

  “Keep it together,” I said, annoyed at how he seemed to be gaining such pleasure from my plight.

  “Then say it.”

  “Fine. I’ll take your stupid job. Are you happy?”

  “So happy, I’ll give you a signing bonus.”

  That made me perk up a little. “Oh? How much?”

  Sawyer glanced down at the nearly empty plate, my wine glass. “About the price of three glasses of wine and one cheeseburger and fries.”

  Figures. “Throw in that double chocolate brownie that they’ve got on the dessert menu and the rest of the bottle of the wine, and I’m your girl,” I said.

  “Seems like a fair deal to me.”

  I immediately flagged down a waiter to get that order in before he decided to torment me further by rescinding the offer. A little part of me felt very ashamed that I could be bought so easily, but it was being overruled by my stomach, which had managed to find new, additional space for that brownie. Ooh, did it come with ice cream?

  “And what about this lodging, then?” I asked as the waiter refilled my wine glass. I tapped him on the arm. “You can just leave the bottle here.”

  His smile widened. “There’s an empty bedroom in my apartment.”

  Oh no. “You’re kidding me.”

  “I told you that it would be cramped and uncomfortable. It’s the smallest bedroom.”

  “That’s not what upsets me about it!”

  He put on an expression of fake affront. “You think that I’d do something malicious to you? That I need to resort to physical violence or intimidation to get whatever intimacy I might be after?”

  “Are you after… that?” I asked, trying to figure out whether I had enough pride to reject him if he demanded some sort of sexual pleasure. I was fairly confident that I could turn down such an offer – at worst, I could sleep in my car. I’d read articles online about people doing that very thing, and they survived, didn’t they? Living in vans to save on rent?

  Sawyer groaned. He placed both hands flat on the table, leaned forward slightly so he could stare directly into my eyes.

  “This is an offer of lodging only,” he said flatly. “Reliant upon your continued employment, and nothing else. You will be paid and you will have a bedroom. You will receive these benefits as long as you do your job. Nothing else.” His stern expression cracked slightly. “Honor among thieves, and all that.”

  I believed him. God help me, I believed him, even though… “I’m not a thief,” I pointed out.

  “You’re getting a steal of a deal, here, because I’m a big softie.”

  I laughed despite myself at that. “Okay, okay. Deal!”

  As if the waiter had been waiting for me to agree, the double chocolate brownie dessert arrived in front of me, accompanied by a scoop of vanilla ice cream and chocolate drizzle on top.

  It tasted delicious – even if Sawyer kept on smirking at me, the most annoying man I’d ever met, while I ate the whole thing.

  Chapter Five

  * * *

  We dealt with the next issue when we finally left the restaurant (my life savings: still sixty-eight dollars, as Sawyer paid for the meal): transportation.

  “Do you want to follow my car?” Sawyer asked, a key fob seeming to appear in his hand as if by magic. “I’m sure we can find a parking space for you.” He eyed my car with mild distaste. “Preferably somewhere far back, so that no one else sees it.”

  “That’s going to be a problem,” I hedged.

  “How’s that?”

  “It doesn’t run.”

  He looked at me blankly. “It got you here, didn’t it?”

  I winced. “It died on the way into the parking lot. A guy had to help me push it into this spot.”

  Sawyer audibly groaned, throwing his head back as if this was God’s personal smiting upon him. “Get the suitcase out,” he finally said. “We’ll just both take my car.”

  “What about mine?”

  “I’ll call someone and have him pick it up.”

  “Who?”

  He waved a hand, as if it wasn’t a big deal. “I know a guy.”

  “Let me guess,” I called to him as I opened my trunk and wrenched my big, heavy suitcase out. “A car thief?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.” Sawyer stood back and watched me wrestle with the heavy luggage, making no move to help me. “He owns a chop shop. A very successful one.”

  I spun around and stabbed a finger out towards him. “Don’t
sell my car for parts!”

  “Relax. Your car is…” he wiggled his fingers, as if searching for the right words. “Not the same caliber of vehicle as what he usually handles.”

  I knew that Sawyer was calling my car cheap. I’d heard my mother use almost those exact same words when she saw what I’d picked. “Why not a nice Mercedes, or at least a Lexus?” she had asked me. I’d struggled to explain to her that I didn’t want to flaunt our family’s wealth, that it didn’t truly belong to me. Even the money to buy this cheaper car came with strings attached. Strings that I’d only now managed to sever through escape.

  I dragged my suitcase to his car, which was suitably expensive. My mother would have been impressed. I recognized the BMW logo on the trunk and hood but didn’t know enough about cars to guess how many horses were under the carriage or how many turbos or nitros or whatever it had. But I had an eye for expensive things, and I knew at a glance that Sawyer’s car easily cost more than a hundred thousand dollars. Probably coming closer to two hundred thousand, once I added in the all-leather interior and the size of the touchscreen mounted on the dashboard.

  With my suitcase finally stowed, I climbed into the passenger seat, and Sawyer drove us smoothly to our destination. His apartment. My new home, at least for the short term.

  It was, of course, luxurious, quietly understated elegance, and ridiculously expensive.

  Just how fancy was Sawyer’s apartment?

  Ignore that it’s the penthouse of a high-rise apartment building. Ignore that it had floor-to-ceiling glass windows that made me feel strangely exposed, even though the people were little more than ants crawling on the street far below. Ignore the hardwood floors, the monochromatic color scheme, the massive marble countertops in the kitchen and bathrooms and the actual, fully working fireplace hulking in the living room. I knew we were talking about a fancy apartment from the moment that Sawyer guided me out of the car where he parked it in an underground garage. He walked me straight into an elevator – which opened directly into his apartment.