Great Exploitations (Crisis in Cali) Read Online Free

lifting her drink and waving at the bartender.
    As a general policy, I didn’t drink with Clients, but with the way this Meet was going, a drink couldn’t have been the worst idea. “Sure. What are you having?”
    Once the bartender had acknowledged her with a nod, Mrs. Wallace took another sip. “The same thing you are.”
    I raised a brow and bit my tongue. I respected a strong, opinionated woman—there were far too many spineless, eager-to-please ones who gave the rest of us a bad name—but respecting the type and having to deal with one as a Client were two different things. “You’ve got the file, I assume?” I eyed the oversized canvas bag hanging over the back of her chair.
    Mrs. Wallace patted it. “I’ve got it. All of the detailed, juicy notes that will help you nail the dirtbag.”
    “Mr. Wallace,” I said with a nod. I’d heard plenty of names describing one’s cheating spouse, but dirtbag was a first . . . and the least severe.
    “The dirtbag.” Mrs. Wallace’s lips pursed as her eyes narrowed ever so slightly. Not in anger, but in . . . focus maybe? Concentration?
    This was, by far, the oddest Meet I’d ever attended, and Meets are the very definition of odd.
    “G went over the role of the Contact and you’ve got one lined up?” I thanked the bartender with a smile when she set a drink in front of me. Every aspect of an Errand was important, but given that I was dealing with a pro athlete, having the Contact in place as soon as possible was a priority.
    “That’s the person who takes the pictures, right?”
    Her answer was so flippant I was tempted to get up and leave. “That’s correct. The person who takes the pictures that make a world of difference in divorce court.” My reply was the opposite of flippant.
    “Then yeah, I’ve got the Contact all ready to roll. You let me know the time and place, and we’ll be ready.” She pulled the file from her bag and dropped it in front of me.
    I took a sip of my drink, stalling. It tasted like a screwdriver, but it had been a while since I’d had one of those. Typically I didn’t like to challenge my Clients, but there was nothing typical about this Client. “Is your Contact male or female?” I kept my voice level and my expression unaffected so it would seem that I was asking a simple question.
    Mrs. Wallace had had no problem looking me in the eye so far, but as she prepared to give me her answer, her eyes elevated to the ceiling for the briefest moment. “A female,” she answered in what I guessed was the smallest voice she possessed.
    She was lying. She didn’t have a Contact set up, or if she did, she hadn’t been the one to find it. I realized delicacy was important when asking a Client if she was being honest with me. I knew diplomacy was critical to not pissing off a Client when asking if she was lying to me.
    Dropping my hands into my lap and putting on a small smile, I worked up my reply. “What are you lying to me about, Mrs. Wallace?”
    So much for delicacy and diplomacy.
    Her eyebrows pulled together for a second before her expression ironed out. Leaning forward, her eyes locked onto mine. “What are you lying to yourself about?”

 
     
    THE MEET HAD been the strangest one I’d ever encountered by a long shot, and I was hoping the rest of the Errand wouldn’t follow in the same vein. After tipping back another sip of my screwdriver, I’d told Mrs. Wallace that this whole thing was about her, so we should keep the focus on her and her husband, not me.
    The rest of the Meet had gone fairly according to plan, but I had to admit her question was one I continued to repeat to myself long after I’d left that spa. What was I lying to myself about? My instinctual answer was everything , but that was far too sobering to accept, so I distracted myself by dissecting that all-encompassing answer. Was I lying to myself about who I was and who I wanted to become? Possibly. Was I lying to myself that the ends justified the