Krystal's Bodyguard

  Table of Contents

  Cover Page

  Excerpt

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Books by Molly Rice

  Title Page

  Dedication

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Preview

  Copyright

  His face was shadowed by a large Stetson…

  And Dana’s daughter, Krystal, was right beside him. A mix of feelings flooded through her, and she grabbed Krystal, pulled her into the safety of her arms. Words and sounds, all meaningless, burbled from her throat as she clutched the child against her.

  Krystal cried out in protest. “Mommy, you’re squishing me.”

  Dana loosened her hold and pushed Krystal behind her, thinking only to keep the child from returning to the man’s clutches. “What are you doing with my child?” she demanded, now for the first time getting a look at his face. His handsome face.

  Nico stored at the woman before him. He could see how close to hysterical she was, how concerned she was for her child. Surely she needed him. And he was grateful…for Dana Harper looked like every man’s fantasy….

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  For Molly Rice there was never any doubt that she’d become a writer. At the age of four she began a lifelong obsession with notebooks and pencils, which only recently transformed itself into an obsession with computers. Somewhere in between, she discovered the excitement of the public library, and the rest, as they say, is history. Molly has set this book in her home state of Minnesota, where she lives, in St. Paul, with her husband.

  Books by Molly Rice

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  Krystal’s Bodyguard

  Molly Rice

  This book is dedicated to “my boys” from the Jesuit Novitiate of St. Paul: Gerard Engen, SJ; Jeffrey Essmann, SJ; Daniel Hendrickson, SJ; Mark Kramer, SJ; Patrick Medinger, SJ; Erik Oland, SJ; Michael Rosinski, SJ; Mark Ryan, SJ.

  The 2nd-year novices: Darcy Blahut, Deron Lawrence, Rob Button, Ian Gibbons, Christopher Collins and John Sullivan. The 1st years: Steven Rodenborn, Stephen Winters, Phillip Cooke, Timothy Manah and Michael Swan.

  To the staff who have helped me all along the way: Fr. Pat McCorkell, Fr. Mike Harter, Fr. Jean Paul, Br. John Masterson and Kathryn Anderson.

  And especially to Margaret Rawlings, the best friend and partner I’ve ever worked with—someone who knows how to feed the spirit as well as the body and who has always been there for me.

  And finally to Michael McManus, still one of “my boys,” and always in my heart.

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  Dana Harper—She refused help from the only man who could protect her.

  Nico Scalia—He’d be Dana’s shadow…without her knowing.

  Krystal Harper—She was a little girl wise beyond her years.

  Mrs. Johnson—Kindly housekeeper who’d protect Krystal with her life.

  John Yearling—Why did Dana’s boss want her to fade into the background?

  Joe Lake—He was a cop and a good friend in love with Dana.

  Stella Martinson—Nico’s boss worried that he was too emotionally involved with Dana.

  Marcus Caprezio—With Dana out of the way, this crime boss would be free from prosecution.

  The Carter Brothers—Accused of murder, these boys had no use for Dana Harper.

  Charlie Donegan—This white-collar criminal wasn’t happy with Dana on his back.

  Chapter One

  Nico Scalia took the stairs two at a time, anxious to clear up the paperwork on his last case, ready to be free for his next assignment.

  The reception area was like a hospital ward with its circle of glass-walled offices surrounding it. Mindy Jacobson, the receptionist/secretary, sat in the middle, monitoring the needs of the staff as well as the flow of clients.

  Nico waved at Mindy as he moved around the circle toward his own little cubicle.

  “Nico, hey, wait, there’s someone here to see you.”

  “Not now, Min, I’m pumped, gotta get those reports done while the mood is on me.” He kept going.

  The phone rang before his Stetson hit the hat rack and his bottom the seat of his swivel chair.

  “Nico, she’s been waiting an hour to see you, says she wants to hire you, won’t tell me what it’s about and Stell’s not in.”

  She? A woman?

  He hadn’t noticed anyone sitting in the guest chairs in the reception area. He peered through the glass. His gaze traveled over three empty chairs and then widened at the fourth. It was a woman all right. Or would be in about ten more years. The kid’s feet didn’t even touch the floor.

  “Yeah, right. Very funny, Min,” he said into the phone, “tell Stell I said, ‘good one.’”

  He hung up and withdrew the file from his right-hand lower drawer. As he lifted his head his eyes met the piercing blue gaze of the kid. She didn’t seem to be moving. So the joke wasn’t over yet. Okay, he could play it out along with the best of them. He punched Intercom. “No calls, Nurse,” he cracked, “I’m incommunicado for the next hour.”

  “What about the kid, Nico?” Min whined.

  “She’ll have to wait,” Nico said, refusing to be drawn into the practical joke.

  He swiveled around and hit the Enter key on his computer. The screen lit up with page one of the file on his last case. He prepared to enter the notes from his file folder, his focus totally directed at the work in front of him.

  Ten minutes passed, then fifteen. He slumped back in his chair in disgust. He couldn’t pull it together. At the rate he was going, the report would be thirty pages long and such a mishmash that even he wouldn’t recognize the case he’d completed. Either that or it would be so brief he’d leave out half the vital details. He searched his desk drawer for the pack of cigarettes he knew he’d shoved in there. His hand met cellophane and closed around an empty pack. Damn. When had he smoked the last one? Probably the last time he’d tried to write one of these reports.

  It was great when he got teamed with someone on a case so he could con the partner—or partners—into filing the report. Or at least do a share of it.

  He tapped a pencil against his cheek and without being too obvious about it, scanned the reception area. The kid was still there. Someone was taking the prank to the limit.

  He returned his attention to his work. Ten minutes later he gave up.

  He picked up the phone, set it down, glanced down at the papers in front of him, adjusted his seat in the swivel chair, picked up the phone again and fought for control over his nerves. Though he had avoided contact with the blue eyes staring at him through the glass wall of his office, he had not been able to avoid their impact as they followed his every move.

  He punched Intercom and then Mute.

>   “All right, Mindy,” he said when the secretary picked up, “joke’s over. Give the kid the dollar you promised her and let’s get back to work.”

  “I swear, Nico, she’s the real article. Been here all afternoon, won’t see anyone but you. Honest.”

  He blew out a sigh of exasperation and darted a quick glance at the kid. What was she, about seven? Eight, tops. He had nieces that age. What the hell was a little girl doing here all alone without a parent? It dawned on him then.

  “Okay, Min, so your baby-sitter didn’t show up and you had to bring the kid to work with you. We understand. Now do you mind if I get some work done here?”

  The phone rang the minute he set it down. “No calls, Mindy,” he said sternly.

  “That is not my Tiffany, Nico,” Mindy said, sounding almost as exasperated as he. “Says her name is Krystal Harper and says she isn’t leaving until she has her appointment with you.”

  “Appointment?” He took a breath, lowered his voice. “You made an appointment with a kid for me?” Two agents passed his office and glanced from the little girl to Nico, their expressions curious. They didn’t have the look. If they were in on it, they should have the look. They didn’t, and he knew from poker games with them that neither one could pull it off straight-faced.

  He looked at the kid again and back at his computer. The cursor hadn’t moved two inches down in almost an hour. It blinked maddeningly, taunting his frustration.

  He slumped back in his chair, letting out a sigh of submission. “Send her in, Mindy, but I’m warning you, if you ever pull something like this again, you’re fired.”

  “You can’t fire me, Nico, you didn’t hire me,” Mindy said calmly, getting the last word as always.

  Krystal Harper walked sedately into Nico Scalia’s office.

  She used the armrests on the chair to boost herself up and back, her pink-sneakered feet barely clearing the edge of the seat.

  Nico cleared his throat and sat back, propping one leg on the edge of his own chair’s armrest. He steepled his fingers and gave the little girl a forbidding look.

  “This is a business, kid,” he said, “and I’m a busy man. What’s on your mind?”

  “I saw you on TV,” the child said. Her smile revealed a gap where two teeth were missing, which explained the slight sibilance in her speech. “They said you cracked a case the police couldn’t solve.”

  Nico nodded, not bothering to hide behind false modesty with a child. In his best Humphrey Bogart imitation he twisted his mouth and said, “So? You got a murder you want solved? Somebody killed your dolly?”

  The kid giggled. The sound loosened something in his chest. Why play high-and-mighty with a little girl? She was a kid; he knew about kids, liked them a lot in normal circumstances.

  He lowered his leg and leaned forward, his elbows on the desk. “Why would a little kid like you need a private investigator?” he asked, gentling his voice.

  Krystal sobered. “I need you to be a bodyguard for my mother.”

  “Your mother? Why do you think your mother needs a bodyguard?” He was intrigued despite himself. He had a lot of nieces and nephews and couldn’t visualize any of them coming up with this kind of agenda.

  The little girl’s eyes widened earnestly. Nico thought he’d never seen quite that shade of blue eyes before.

  Krystal scooted forward on the chair and placed her arms on the edge of Nico’s desk. “My mom is getting scary letters and phone calls and even though she works with the police a lot, she doesn’t tell them about it and she acts nervous and scared all the time.”

  “Your mom’s a cop?”

  Krystal shook her head. “My mom is a prosecuting attorney in the adult criminal division of the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office.” She said it with wellrehearsed ease, her face and voice glowing with pride.

  Nico thought about her mother. Lady lawyer. Not Nico’s favorite kind of animal. Most of them were barracudas. Seemed like almost the minute they passed the bar they crossed some invisible line and became as masculine as it was possible to become without a sex change. And the ones from County were the worst.

  “So, listen, Kiddo,” he said, “if what you say is true, why doesn’t your mom get help from the cops—why come to me? I don’t come cheap and your ma can get all the help she wants for free.”

  Krystal shook her head again and a look of impatience twisted her mouth, squinted her eyes.

  “She doesn’t admit she’s getting threatened, and she would never tell the people she works with, anyway.”

  “Why not?”

  “There are only two other women besides my mom in her division.”

  Nico was surprised. The Hennepin County Attorney’s office was huge and in this day and age he’d expect the ratio of genders to be narrower than that. Still, he didn’t see what that had to do with anything. He said so.

  Krystal was completely off the chair now, leaning on the desk, one finger toying with the variety of pens and pencils in the leather cup, her head cocked to the side. She straightened and glared at Nico for his ignorance.

  “They said on the news that you were really smart,” she said with a sigh. Nico had the impression she was disappointed in him. He felt the way he did when, as a kid, he’d let his mother down.

  Mustering bravado, he shrugged and gave her his helpless look. He knew he was prolonging the interview but if even half of what the kid was telling him was true, he was intrigued. Thursday, he had no date tonight, he could stay late to finish his report.

  “Women in the workplace have to work harder, show more grit, go the extra mile, keep their emotions under wraps. It’s a man’s world out there and women have to make themselves fit in.”

  Nico felt his jaw slacken and then quickly snapped it shut as he headed off an urge to laugh. The kid sounded like she was making a speech at a professional women’s group and he realized she was probably parroting her mother’s gospel, verbatim.

  He envisioned the mother as one of those man bashers, a libber who wore flannel suits with ties, sensible shoes, and had a haircut that would have passed muster in a Marine boot camp.

  He looked at the feminine little girl before him and mentally shook his head. A shame. This pretty little thing would probably grow up emulating her mother and trade in that soft lovely promise for the butch exterior she believed would move her ahead in the world. Exactly why he avoided most career women.

  “Listen, Ms…. Harper is it?”

  Krystal nodded. “Krystal Harper. My mom’s name is Dana Harper.”

  Of course, he should have made the connection; Harper’s name had been popping up in the news a lot lately, meaning she was on her way up, maybe being groomed for the top job if John Yearling had his eye on a senatorship.

  It didn’t change anything though, this was not the kind of work he preferred and this interview had no validity since the prospective client was a minor.

  “Ah-ha, Krystal.” He wanted to let her down lightly.

  “Well, the fact is, Krystal, we don’t really do much bodyguard work in this agency except on a limited basis. We’re mostly investigative and I couldn’t investigate…” He stopped, a new thought popping up. “Say, how do you know your mom’s getting threatening letters and calls, did she tell you?”

  The little girl’s cheeks flushed. “I…I saw one of the letters myself. And you can tell when she gets a bad phone call ‘cause she looks real scared for a minute and then when she sees me watching, she straightens her face and pretends nothing’s wrong.” Krystal nodded. “But I know.”

  “Yeah,” he said softly, “I see. But like I said, I can’t really help you. For one thing, it’s against the law for me to work for you because you have to be twenty-one to hire a private investigator.”

  He didn’t know if twenty-one was the actual age. It ought to be, but the fact was he had no idea at what age a person reached majority. Maybe it was eighteen. In any case, he was just scrabbling around for a way to let her down easy.

&nbs
p; What he didn’t expect was tears.

  Her eyes pooled up with them, making the blue color even shinier, dampening and darkening the lashes. And then a single tear escaped and he followed its course down her pink cheek with awe. It was the biggest tear he’d ever seen and the sight of if twisted his gut and choked off his breathing.

  “Aw, kid…Krystal…please, don’t, hey, come on, no, don’t…” He gasped and shook his head as more tears slid from her lowered lids.

  Alarmed, Nico got up, went around the desk and patted the girl’s shoulder. “Okay!” he growled. “Listen, stop crying and I’ll make you a deal.”

  She lifted her eyes to his and swiped at her cheeks with her one free hand. When she sniffed he pushed a box of tissues toward her.

  “You…you’ll h-help me?” she hiccuped.

  “What I’ll do is, I’ll take you home and I’ll talk to your mom. It’s up to her if she wants to hire me,” he said, strengthening his voice with a warning note.

  Krystal nodded. “Okay,” she said, wadding the tissue against her eyes. “If you talk to her I’m sure she’ll be glad to have someone like you to protect her.”

  Nico shook his head. He wasn’t so sure. Krystal’s mother didn’t sound like the kind of woman who’d ever admit needing a man. He wasn’t looking forward to the confrontation. The trouble was, he also couldn’t deal with the little girl’s tears. He took her hand resolutely and leaned forward to grab her backpack. “C’mon, let’s go get this over with.”

  “GONE? What do you mean, she’s gone? Gone where?”

  Dana Harper grasped the edge of the counter with the first dizzying flash of fear.

  “Mrs. Johnson, please. Where did she go?”

  The older woman slumped down on a kitchen chair and shook her head, her gray eyes dulled by distress. “She said she was going down the street to the Halyards’s house to play with Kim. She said she’d be home before you. When I saw it was after five, I called over to the Halyards’s to remind Krystal that you’d be home any minute and that dinner would be ready at six on the dot because I have bridge club tonight, you remember, and…”