Hooked Read online

  So what should she do? Lie and say she didn’t know Cooper, or tell the truth? “I’ve heard of him,” she said. Not a lie. She had heard of him. Now what?

  “In what context?” the cop asked.

  “He married a working girl. News gets around.”

  “You know her? Eileen Cooper?”

  Tawny swallowed hard. She knew Eileen Cooper. While their paths hadn’t exactly crossed, they’d connected indirectly. “Um, no, but I know of her. Girls in the trade pass along those feel-good stories. You know, hooker marries rich hedge fund manager who takes her off the streets. Kind of like in the movies.”

  “Is that what didn’t happen to you?”

  Tawny got off the bed, brushing against Walsh as she did. “Absolutely,” she said calmly, though this guy was getting under her skin. He was trying to goad her, and she couldn’t let him.

  “Number one, I never worked the streets. Never. And neither did Eileen Cooper. You should know there’s a caste system of women offering various services. We’re not all on the streets. I used the term metaphorically. And two, in case you think I was waiting for some guy to propose so he could get it for free, marriage was never in my game plan.”

  “What was?” he asked. “Hoarding all your money and living happily ever after? Alone?”

  Now she was getting pissed. “Exactly, Detective Walsh. I’ve seen enough of happily married men. They marry the girl next door, have kids, and then one day feel trapped and wonder what they missed. Doesn’t matter whether these upstanding citizens are rich or poor, whether they pay or get a freebie. They want a fantasy fuck. Even a politician with a record of breaking up prostitution rings falls victim. Can you beat that?”

  Walsh didn’t answer.

  “These guys all walk around with condoms in their wallets,” Tawny continued, “primed to jump the bones of the first woman who tempts him with a little pussy.” She crouched in front of his chair. “Tell me, Mister NYPD Detective, have you got a condom in your wallet? Bet you have.”

  His face flushed. Aha! The first sign of discomfort. Oh, yeah. He had one. She’d put money on it.

  He kept his outward cool. “I’m not married. And I’ve never had to pay for a woman.”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “No.”

  Disappointed, she got up, walked around, making sure the light coming through the balcony doors silhouetted her body through her lightweight dress, leaving nothing to the imagination.

  “I keep them in the car.”

  She turned around to see a playful smirk. “I knew it. You’re all alike. Cops, businessmen, crooks. Even professors. Very cerebral, those profs. Never without a Trojan.”

  “You ought to know. You bankrolled your PhD screwing half the faculty at Columbia.”

  Angry heat came off her neck and worked its way down her back. She rarely lost her temper. Couldn’t remember the last time. And she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of losing it now. “Don’t forget my undergrad at Brown. You know all about me.” But not everything. “Yes, I paid for my college education turning tricks. Sorry, I didn’t have a hundred thou back then. Everyone got what they wanted. I had no loans to pay back, and half the faculty, as you wrongly think, fulfilled their fantasies. I was good at what I did. No one ever complained of being ripped off.”

  He tsked and sputtered, his cool dissipating, apparently frustrated at being bested. Good. She was getting his goat too. “Now, are you going to tell me what you want? What about Cooper?”

  “You got anything to drink in that cabinet?”

  “I don’t know. I wasn’t thirsty so I didn’t check.”

  He opened the mini bar and took out a small bottle of vodka, uncapped it, and drank half of it straight. “Want one?”

  “I don’t drink, but you can get me a Coke from the mini fridge.” He glared at her. “You asked.”

  He pulled one out. “I thought high-priced hookers drank nothing but champagne.”

  “And I thought cops weren’t supposed to drink on duty.”

  “I’m on break.”

  She didn’t say anything else. Let him stew. He wasn’t the first man she’d driven to drink. Men who thought that paying for one evening meant they owned her. Well, they didn’t. Go ahead, Mister Detective, drink away. The longer you do, the more time I have before facing whatever it is you want me to do.

  The room closed in on her. She slid open the glass door to the balcony and stepped outside. Leaning against the rail, she sipped her drink. The breeze had picked up, swirling her hair around her head, plastering her dress to her body. A thunderhead gaining momentum had driven everyone off the beach. White crests danced on the surface of the water as far as the eye could see; waves crashed onto the shore, spewing frothy sprays into the air. It was as if Lincoln Walsh had brought the dark clouds and ruined her sunny day. Now she sensed he was about to ruin her life. Movement in her peripheral vision announced his presence, his body sheltering her from the south wind’s blustery onslaught.

  “Sorry. I had no right to throw all that in your face. It’s what you do…did,” he corrected. “Your past life is none of my business.”

  “You’re right, it isn’t. But I have a feeling you’re going to ask me to do it again, aren’t you? And I have four-hundred-thousand reasons why I can’t refuse.” She faced him. “Right?”

  He shifted his focus from the horizon to the beach to the vee of pelicans gliding by overhead. Everywhere but on her. “Right.”

  She wondered if she could tempt him into forgetting about her. Cop or not, she could think of worse punishment. Now he was looking down the beach to the fishing pier, his jaw set tight. It wouldn’t work. Not with this guy. He’d probably haul her in and add bribing a cop to the charges.

  She’d been so careful, so private. All those years, she never spoke out of school either to or about her clients or to the few friends she’d made. How the hell did he find out? “I’d like to know how you found out about the money.”

  * * * * *

  The woman was too damn smart for her own good. She knew Cooper, and she didn’t lie about it. When Linc first got this assignment, he couldn’t believe her profile. Tawny Dell earned a doctorate in art history. She could fucking teach at Columbia. Instead, she was a high-dollar call girl. He didn’t understand it. She had everything going for her. College tuition aside, there were only two reasons a woman did that. She liked the money and liked screwing men to get it. His first glimpse of her photograph almost knocked him over. She’d been careful, but all it took to take her down was one friend who ratted her out. With friends like that…

  “Sheri Markham,” he said.

  Tawny didn’t say anything for a while. “I tried to help her, you know, but she couldn’t kick it.” She gazed at Linc. “I hope you got her into a drug program for the information.”

  He nodded.

  “She didn’t know anything for sure. Just giving it her best shot. It figures. She needed a bargaining chip, and I was it. I might have done the same thing.”

  Somehow he doubted that. “What were you planning to do?”

  She shrugged. “Oooh, I don’t know. Go to some Mediterranean island, Sardinia or Crete. Open a gallery. Something like that.”

  “Why didn’t you?”

  Piercing him with those turquoise eyes, she said, “Hadn’t gotten around to it.”

  She brushed a disobedient strand of hair off her face, but a gust of wind recaptured it and set it free. A light mist turned into a drizzle, then a pelting downpour. She didn’t move. Neither did he. Within a minute, both were soaked. Her thin dress clung to her like Saran Wrap and was about as transparent. Dark circles appeared around nipples that poked stubbornly through the thin fabric. She stood there.

  Jesus, she was beautiful. He never understood paying for sex. He could always get a woman if that’s all he wanted. Good thing he didn’t have that kind of money, because he sure might be tempted to pay for Tawny Dell. There’s a first time for everything. Even
breaking every rule in the book. “Better come inside.”

  “You go. I like the rain.” She turned to him. “Don’t worry, I won’t jump.”

  “I wasn’t worried.”

  Inside, he found a towel in the bathroom and rubbed it through his hair. He’d taken off his suit jacket and shoulder holster—put the gun in his pocket—but his shirt and pants were sopping. He glanced outside. The wind twisted her hair into a tornado of long honey-colored strands. The dress glowed white against the dark cloud-covered background and billowed around her contours. She might as well have been naked.

  When she cupped his nuts on the beach, she knew he was hard. Any man would have to be anesthetized not to have a serious hard-on around her. He was hard again. Christ.

  He seriously thought of asking out of the assignment. Would his boss buy a conflict of interest defense? Sorry, Captain, but every time I feast my eyes on this woman I want to fuck her. He doubted that would fly. Besides, his friend and mentor, FBI Special Agent Harry Winokaur, a man to whom he owed his life, would no doubt express disapproval, and Linc never wanted to disappoint Harry. Forget your dick, Linc, and concentrate on the dirty, stinking job before you.

  Michael Corleone’s line from The Godfather stuck in his mind. “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.” He almost felt sorry for her.

  Then he wondered how much Tawny really knew about Benny Cooper’s operation. Whatever it was, she was on the fast track to learn more.

  Chapter Three

  Benny’s Perks

  Benny Cooper’s chauffeur-driven Bentley pulled up to the building’s front entrance. Benny enjoyed owning a Bentley. Almost like the car company christened the luxury automobile after him. Didn’t matter that Bentleys had been around longer than the fifty years since Benny’s mother named him. He got out and scaled the five steps to the nondescript door of a four-story brownstone, punched a code on the touchpad, and slipped a key into the door lock. Charles, the doorman, allowed entry to only those with a reservation and password. He waited to greet Benny like a loyal servant.

  “Afternoon, Mr. Cooper.”

  “Afternoon, Charles. Anyone here yet?”

  “Colin, as usual, sir, and a couple of the ladies arrived early for appointments.”

  Benny checked his Rolex, then studied the sign-in sheet. “Hmm, Melody’s free for a while. Ask her to come to the apartment in half an hour, will you please?”

  “Certainly, sir.”

  The unobtrusive façade of the building, nicknamed Upper Eighties, belied the luxury inside. The small, posh lobby boasted marble floors, potted palms, and eighteenth-century erotic prints in gilt frames. Unlike other lobbies, no cameras filmed entries or exits, though they were secretly positioned elsewhere throughout the establishment.

  Ever since Benny read in The Times that police had identified the body found floating in the harbor as Sarah Marshall, a prostitute, he’d suffered a combination of acid reflux and cardiac arrhythmia. Benny’s condition degenerated when he read the reports that police had ruled the death a homicide. Then he received a phone call on the island from an NYPD detective by the name of Walsh, who specialized in sex crime investigations. The Marshall woman had called Walsh a week before and mentioned Benny’s name. The detective knew Benny’s wife, Eileen, had been in the life, so it was pointless to deny knowing the dead woman, admitting only that he had known Sarah Marshall as Serena, and neither he nor his wife had seen her in years. Puzzled, Benny claimed he couldn’t imagine why Serena alluded to him. End of story.

  He hoped.

  Benny gratefully accepted his gift to banish unpleasant thoughts as just another perk in his blessed life. This time, however, he needed a little help to put Walsh and Serena out of his mind. In an hour, he’d be a new man. Tension gone, blood pressure back to normal, and no lingering melancholy about poor Serena. In a brief and rare moment of self-reflection, he acknowledged his absolute shallowness. But if that tacit admission conjured any guilt, it passed with a sigh.

  He passed a few closed doors on the way down the long hall to the back of the building. No doorknob or handle marred the polished finish of what appeared to be solid wood paneling, but when Benny slipped a key card into an inconspicuous slot, the panel sprang open. He entered the apartment that occupied the back third of the first floor. Decorated in nineteenth-century bordello, the small suite of rooms immediately put him in the right mood.

  He needed to have another key card made. What if he had a heart attack or choked on a piece of the exceptional Kobe beef he imported from Japan. No one ever bothered him while inside his apartment, fearful they’d catch him naked, except for garter belt and hose, in the middle of a bondage routine with his favorite dominatrix. Why, it might be days before they found him. The depressing thought gave him the creeps. The idea of bondage in a garter belt gave him an erection.

  Benny shed his jacket in the apartment and walked halfway down the hall to an elegantly appointed office where Colin Harwood, webmaster extraordinaire, computer guru, and all-round right-hand man controlled the operation.

  “Got a few reservations tonight,” Colin said in his distinctive Cockney accent. He was strictly business, with no interest in the women he bartered. No interest in women, period. At least Benny didn’t have to worry about employee competition.

  “Angie’s hostess this evening,” Colin said. “Also, I have two girls booked for the holidays. One with that Italian racecar driver from Milan, the other with Sergei Rogoff’s son. She’s his twenty-first birthday present.”

  “Nice daddy. He can afford it.” Benny craned to peek over Colin’s shoulder at the schedule on the computer monitor. “Fat man tonight, I see.”

  “Yeah, Martell wants a twosome. Melody’s his regular, but I called Cindi to pair with her. The guy’s a city block. I feel sorry for both of them.”

  “Cindi should get double the money for him,” Benny said. “It’s not every day you get to bag a four-hundred-fifty pounder.”

  “She’s not moose hunting, Benny. You don’t bag someone like Rick Martell. You feed him a quadruple cheeseburger, a supersize order of fries, and a chocolate shake. Besides, Melody’s not complaining about the pay. Most women don’t make that in a month.”

  “Try three.” Benny patted his tech’s shoulder. “Have you checked to make sure the bar on four is stocked for Friday’s get together?”

  Benny did everything right at Upper Eighties. He supplied the alcohol because he didn’t want the scrutiny attached to a liquor license. All his ladies were over twenty-one—he insisted—and except for one time, so were his patrons. The exception came with an enormous fee to break the cherry of the son of an old friend, head honcho at a major financial institution. The boy was a child of fifteen the day he met Lily, a man of sixteen the day after. Benny heard the kid’s skin cleared up within a week. Daddy became a regular.

  “Took care of that after last week’s party,” Colin said. “Wanted to make sure I ordered only what we needed.”

  “I like doing business with you, Colin. All you care about is money. Making it and saving it.”

  “Is there anything else?”

  Benny smiled. “Of course. We both have our needs, don’t we?”

  “Different though they are.”

  Years back, Benny wanted to see what it was like to make it with a guy. His one and only, an eager-beaver Wall Streeter angling to move up, thought blowing Benny was his ticket. But peering down at a thinning comb-over and hairy shoulders while being inadequately deep-throated caused instant dick deflation. Pffft! Just like that. He gave himself credit for being adventurous, but experimentation from that point on consisted of women in all their naked, ebullient glory. And he had the money and venue to make that happen.

  Benny caught Colin’s wink as he left the office. The little man was a genius, even if his sexual persuasion was the flipside of his own. Still, Benny never judged. Like his dear, newly-departed mother used to say: ‘To each his own, said the man as he kissed the cow.
’ Different strokes for different folks. Whatever floats your boat. Yada, yada. Role-playing, bondage, multiple partners, gay, or straight. Everything was on the table as long as it suited both partners or all parties, depending.

  Those kinky thoughts made him think of Eileen. Why, if he had steak at home did he seek chicken and pork elsewhere as part of a regular diet? No matter how much he pondered the question, he never came up with an answer that made sense. He savored steak—rich, earthy, and full-bodied—but he liked the different flavors of chicken, pork, fish, and all the other delicacies that tempted his insatiable palate for variety. His wife met all his requirements, triple Ds included. Even his mother had liked her. Okay, so she wasn’t Jewish. But she had a college education and a princess complex. Close enough. Of course Mom didn’t know she was a whore, but no woman is perfect.

  He pulled out his cell, dialed, and waited for the message machine to kick in. “Hi, darling. Won’t be home tonight. I have business in town. Don’t worry. Kiss the kids for me.” He smooched into the receiver and sang, “Love you.”

  Eileen knew his business. How could she not? Upper Eighties was her brilliant idea. She took the ingénues under her wing, taught them the social graces and tricks that turned one-night-stands into repeat customers, knowing full well the young ladies would practice everything she taught them on Benny. How else could he match his girls with suitable clients?

  Eileen’s wise acceptance—no, compliance—afforded her two beautiful homes, a Lexus SUV to haul the children, a legitimate lifestyle, and most importantly, Benny. You could take the girl out of the business, but you couldn’t take the business out of the girl. Not entirely. A wicked smile curled his lips.

  Back in his apartment, Benny deposited his cell phone and wallet on the hand-carved table beside his bed. Lifting one of the silver-framed photographs of his children, he pressed his lips to the glass. “My darling babies,” he said, placing it back on the table with the others, turning them all to face the wall. “Now don’t watch.”