Sleepless in Las Vegas

This investigation is getting very personal

P.I.-in-training Valerie LeRoy is dying to get into the field. So when a client asks her to spy on someone, the thrill of her own case is too tempting to refuse. Instead of a cheating fiancée, however, Val’s actually checking out P.I. Drake Morgan! Worse, she ends up working with the guy.

Their differing opinions on techniques—and the instant attraction—make the sparks fly. It’s almost impossible to focus on their arson investigation. As the hunt for the truth intensifies and their passion rivals the triple-digit temperature, she and Drake learn why Las Vegas is the city that never sleeps.…

The scrape of bar-stool legs against the floor interrupted Drake’s thoughts

In the mirror behind the bar, he observed a young woman sitting next to him. Even in this dim lighting, her hair gleamed like metal. Dye job or a wig. She wore so much eye makeup he couldn’t tell the color of her eyes.

His gaze dropped to her top—what little there was of it. A flicker of heat leaped in his chest as he caught the outline of her breasts straining the red, white and blue material.

She looked like a Fourth of July celebration about to pop.

“Like my top?” she asked in a Southern drawl.

He picked up her signals more clearly than if she’d banged a gong in his ear. Just because he picked them up didn’t mean he had to respond. Nope. He’d mind his own business and ignore her.

“It goes with my skirt,” she continued as though it were a two-way conversation.

He knew better than to look, but it was like telling Bambi to stay out of the forest. The skirt was thigh high and red. Below it, shapely legs in fishnet stockings ended in a pair of black stiletto heels with some kind of symbol on the side.

“It’s a fleur de lis,” she explained, pointing at her shoe with a frosty-pink fingernail, “for my boys, the Saints.” She grinned so wide, he saw she had a slightly crooked front tooth, which almost gave her a sweet, naive quality.

Clunk.

He looked stupidly at his phone lying on the floor and wondered when he’d let go.

Dear Reader,

I had so much fun writing Sleepless in Las Vegas, which follows up on the story of Val LeRoy, the best friend of Cammie Copello, the heroine in The Next Right Thing (Mills & Boon Superromance, March 2013).

I relate to Val, who has her heart set on being a private investigator. Nearly ten years ago, I had that same goal, and like Val, I had only a general idea what P.I.’s did when I started my internship. It’s one thing to watch Jessica Fletcher, the female sleuth in the old TV series Murder, She Wrote, or Nora Charles, the other half of the Nick and Nora private-eye team in The Thin Man film series. But it’s a whole other reality when you’re working a case undercover, trying to blend into your surroundings, hoping you don’t blow it! An experience Val and I share, by the way.

One reason I so enjoy writing for the Harlequin Superromance line is that the stories, like life, thrive on romance, family and love. The hero in this story, Las Vegas private investigator Drake Morgan, has given up on finding love, but Val hasn’t…for the most part, anyway. Although they share a passion for their profession, they seem to have nothing in common in their personal worlds. Their story is about two very different people, a case of opposites attracting, who struggle with giving and receiving, contentment and heartbreak. What they gradually learn is their hearts have more in common than they realize.

I love to hear from readers, so I invite you to drop by my website, colleencollinsbooks.com, and let me know how you liked Val and Drake’s story!

Happy reading,

Colleen Collins

Sleepless in Las Vegas

Colleen Collins

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Colleen Collins has written several dozen novels and two nonfiction books. She has also written articles for various writing organizations, including the Private Eye Writers of America and Romance Writers of America, and for periodicals such as USA TODAY and PI Magazine. Similar to the P.I.-intern Val LeRoy in Sleepless in Las Vegas, Colleen began her P.I. career being mentored by a man who drove her crazy at times—and vice versa—but they’re still together over a decade later.

To Elle Kaufman, with love

Contents

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

Epilogue

Excerpt

CHAPTER ONE

THE PHONE RANG, giving Val LeRoy a start. If it rang more than once or twice a day at Diamond Investigations, maybe she’d get used to its high-pitched jangle.

She swallowed the last bite of her lunchtime tuna-with-chutney sandwich while checking the caller ID. No name, but a 219 area code. She had been trying to memorize different area codes—after all, a phone was a private investigator’s most powerful tool. She wasn’t a P.I. yet, but when the day came, she wanted to be a knowledge bank in stilettos.

This incoming call was from...Michigan? No, Indiana. As she reached for the receiver, she noticed a glob of papaya chutney on her fingers.

Another jangling ring.

She didn’t want to sticky up the phone with her gooey fingers, but Jayne Diamond, her boss, insisted Val always answer using the handset, never putting the phone on speaker, to maintain the confidentiality of conversations. Rules, rules, rules. That woman had more than a reform school. Val had to remind herself constantly that being mentored by one of the best investigators in Las Vegas was worth all the restrictions.

Keeping in mind the confidentiality of the call, she glanced through the picture window next to the agency’s front door, which offered a view of their business parking lot and the sidewalk beyond. Their office was a renovated corner bungalow on a street with other similar bungalows. Not a high-traffic area. Although they sometimes had walk-ins, nobody was headed toward the agency on foot, and the only car in the lot was Jayne’s shiny Mazda Miata.

She glanced at Jayne’s office door. Closed.

Val rapped the speaker button with her knuckle.

“Diamond Investigations,” she answered softly, plucking a tissue from the box on her desk.

“Uh, are you a private investigator?” The man’s voice was low, hesitant.

“Yes.” Technically an apprentice, but Jayne didn’t want her saying that to potential clients. So Val could answer yes to such a question, but the truth was she’d done little else other than screen calls these first few months of her internship.

“I...think my wife’s...having an affair.”

Have mercy, a brokenhearted tale was on its way. She wiped her fingers with the tissue. “I’m sorry to hear that. What’s your name, sir?”

“George. My wife’s name is...Sandy.” He cleared his throat. “She started acting different about four months ago...in April, around our anniversary...doing things like walking into the other room to answer her cell, losing weight, buying new clothes. I suppose I coulda justified some of that, but when she started working later and later...”

Val watched a bright orange angelfish dart around rocks in the aquarium against the far wall, guessing what was coming next—Sandy was traveling to Las Vegas for A, a business trip; B, to visit family; C, to see old friends....

“Anyhoo...” He blew out a puff of breath. “Sandy is flying to Las Vegas later next week—on Friday, August sixteen—for a reunion...some kind of hookup with her cheerleader buddies from high school...”

Or another kind of hookup.

“And...” His voice grew thin. “I was wondering if...”

A P.I. could follow Sandy while she’s in Sin City.

“You could follow her?”

“We offer such services,” she affirmed. Val couldn’t wait for the day when she could just say yes and take on a case. But for now, she only passed on callers’ information to Jayne, who would make the final decision.

“I know the hotel my wife will be at...she mentioned renting a Dodge Charger...”

Ever since meeting her best pal, Cammie, a real-life P.I., a year ago, and hearing her stories about sitting on stakeouts, digging through trash to find evidence, interviewing witnesses to crimes, Val wanted nothing more than to be a private eye, too. But first, she needed to earn a Nevada license, which required logging ten thousand hours of investigative experience. After that, the plan had been for Val to become a student Watson to Cammie’s Sherlock in their own kick-ass, all-girl Las Vegas agency.

Val had to make adjustments to the plan when Cammie found true love and moved to Denver, but she hadn’t given up.

Jayne’s door creaked open, followed by the tap-tap of her sensible heels across the hardwood floor.

Which stopped abruptly at Val’s desk.

“...I could describe what clothes she’ll be bringing, jewelry, too, although...” George sniffed loudly. “I guess she might not be wearing her wedding ring...”

Val looked up at her boss, a trim sixtysomething with cut-glass cheekbones and gray-blue eyes that always seemed to carry within them a withering understanding of the human condition.

Jayne shot one of those withering looks at the phone, back to Val.

Who shrugged apologetically. She could almost hear another “you can’t always do things your way” lecture.

“I had that ring made special for her...” George stifled a sob.

Jayne mouthed a silent “no” while plucking a ballpoint pen from the breast pocket of her linen blazer, the same bloodless color as her short, bobbed hair. The blazer used to fit her better before she started losing weight recently.

Jayne jotted something on a notepad on the desk and held it up for Val to read: no infidelity cases.

Val nodded, waiting for George to calm down.

“Unfortunately,” she said gently, “we’re currently not accepting infidelity cases.”

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, during which the hum of the aquarium pump filled the room, Val added, “Let me give you the number of another P.I. who might be able to help you.”

After looking up the information on her computer, she gave him the number and ended the call.

Then she rolled her gaze up to Jayne’s.

“You cannot always do things your way,” the older woman began, arching a pale eyebrow. “Although I admire your strength of will and creativity—” she glanced at Val’s purple-streaked black hair, which today she’d knotted into a loose chignon “—you have a habit of forgetting that investigations are not always about autonomy. Often you must work closely with people. Even if you disagree with them or believe you have a more advantageous idea, it would behoove you to treat others’ suggestions with respect.”

Sometimes she wondered why Jayne always made it sound as though Val were interacting unbehoovingly with some nameless third party and not Jayne herself. But then, her boss had a way of distancing herself, as though she was always observing the world rather than living in it.

“Yes, indeed,” Val agreed, “I knew better than to put that call on speaker. Although, if you don’t mind my adding a side note, nobody was in the room with me, so it wasn’t like I was broadcasting the poor man’s broken heart to strangers.”

A look that might pass for amusement flittered across the older woman’s face. “Sometimes I wonder if we should post my rules alongside your side notes.”

The older woman reminded Val of the English actress Helen Mirren—formidable, sophisticated, articulate. But whereas the actress had played her share of industrial-strength women in the movies, Jayne was the real deal. In a Las Vegas Sun interview three months ago, a reporter had referred to her as “one of the best sleuths in Sin City,” and that “a new P.I. earning Jayne’s Diamond Grade designation is like a restaurant earning a Michelin star rating.”

After reading that Sun article, there was only one P.I. Val wanted to be her mentor—Jayne Diamond.

Who now stood in front of her, lips pursed in thought. “What else is on your mind?”

“Well, these landline phones are—” older than dirt “—quite antiquated. Plus, cradling a jumbo-size receiver under my chin while taking notes, looking up information on the computer and talking is like juggling pancakes—hard to keep a grip on everything. It would make so much more sense if we used cell phones.”

“Cell phones have speakers, too. The point is not landline versus mobile, it is about confidentiality.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Jayne.”

“Yes, Jayne.”

“Also...” She smiled, but it looked more like a grimace. “I’ve reached the conclusion that Diamond Investigations needs to reduce the number of cases it accepts. Starting today, we no longer accept infidelity cases, except if they are part of an investigation that we are already conducting for a law firm.”

“But...I thought infidelity investigations were steady business for a P.I. agency. Although, of course, we don’t accept honey traps.”

When she realized she wanted to be a private eye, Val started religiously watching the reality TV show Honey Catchers to learn about the business. It featured hot-looking private eyes, male and female, whom people hired to set “honey traps” to test their lovers’ fidelity. The P.I., dressed in some sexy outfit rigged with a covert camera, would “accidentally” run into the lover, usually at a bar, and strike up a conversation. Eventually, the P.I. asked for a phone number, a date or even got a little frisky on the spot.

Afterward, the P.I. would show the video to the client. Honey Catchers never showed lovers turning down phone numbers or sexual advances. Which made for a lot of high drama at the end of the shows as the cheated upon confronted the cheater.

“Infidelity investigations can be lucrative, certainly, but we have never conducted honey traps.”

“I know...it’s just that I don’t see the harm in accepting those cases as long as we keep them legal...” Something in Jayne’s face—exhaustion? Distress?—gave Val pause. “We don’t need to do a mentoring session right now if you’re tired.”

Jayne eased into one of the high-back wooden guest chairs that faced Val’s desk. Through the window blinds, hazy sunlight striped the side of her face, highlighting fine lines around her mouth and eyes. “These moments always count, dear.”

She couldn’t think of a single time that Jayne had uttered an endearment, for Val or anyone else.

“Legal,” Jayne repeated. She reflected on that for a moment. “Some agencies seem to believe that inducing the behavior a P.I. should be attempting to objectively document is acceptable. It is not. If a law enforcement officer behaved in such a manner, it would be called entrapment.”

“On some reality cop shows, I’ve seen female cops dress like hookers and lure men, who are then arrested for soliciting prostitution.”

“But those men, when they withdraw their billfolds to pay, exhibit prior predispositions. Honey traps are not telling of the subject’s predisposition. A lawyer could easily attack such frivolous evidence in court.”

As Jayne pushed a wisp of hair off her forehead, Val noticed her hand shook slightly. But she knew not to ask questions because Jayne didn’t like to talk about herself.

Val had learned that well in June, the first time she walked into Diamond Investigations. She had barely shut the door before Jayne made it clear that Val had already broken a rule—clearly stated on the agency website—that people seeking internships were to mail their résumés, not show up in person. Besides, she had curtly added, she was on her way out.

When she swung her purse over her shoulder, the bag knocked a figurine off a side table. Val dived, catching it before it smashed into pieces on the floor.

As she’d stared at the miniature crystal figure—two birds perched side by side on a watering bowl—she swore she felt something faint, like a light passing through her. Although maybe what she experienced had more to do with the tender, yet sad, look on her future boss’s face. For a moment, she and Jayne had shared concern and relief that the crystal birds hadn’t hit the floor and shattered.

After Jayne gently placed the figurine on the top shelf of the bookcase—where it remained to this day—she asked Val why she wanted to be a private investigator. She had answered that she worked well alone, liked solving puzzles and wanted to help people.

Jayne had actually laughed. “If you can accept that this business is often driven by greed, revenge and self-preservation,” she said, “you will be better off. Shall we start your internship next Monday?”

And here they were, two months later, having yet another of their question-and-answer sessions.

Jayne stood, picked up her purse. “I will be gone the remainder of the afternoon.” After a moment of deliberation, she added, “I have changed my mind. For the time being, we are not accepting any new cases until I finalize some...cases I’m working on. Are you still commuting by bus?”

“Yes.” Ever since the brakes and fuel pump went south on Val’s fifteen-year-old Toyota, she had been relying on mass transit. “Mornings are okay, but after five those buses are slower than a bread wagon with biscuit wheels.”

Jayne blinked. “I have never heard that expression.”

“Means they’re slow.”

That pained smile again. “Feel free to close at four. See you tomorrow.”

She watched the older woman leave, not believing that line about finalizing other cases. When Val first started here, the agency carried ten to twelve cases, easy. Currently there were three open cases, two of which were on hold while lawyers decided whether to go to trial. The third involved pulling court records, which took an hour or two. If anything, the agency needed more cases.

No, Jayne was hiding something. From the recent tiredness in her face and the weight loss, Val wondered what her boss was going through. A death in the family? A financial setback?

She glanced at the crystal figurine. This small object had always seemed too fragile in an office furnished with a heavy wooden desk, bookcases, a grandfather clock and scuffed hardwood floors. The birds obviously held deep meaning. Shame Jayne didn’t take it home with her, both for its safekeeping and her own comfort.

Val looked at the picture of her nanny on the corner of the desk. Her grandmother—smiling, her white hair freshly curled, wearing her favorite blue dress—stood in front of her tiny antiques shop, Back in Time Antiques, on Chartres Street in the French Quarter. When Val was growing up, she had commuted with Nanny to the shop from their house in the Ninth Ward, the only home Val had ever known before Katrina.

She had brought the photo to work maybe for the same reason Jayne kept the figurine here. Some objects carried too many memories to keep at home, where your mind could easily wander to the past, to what was lost and never found again.

* * *

THE GRANDFATHER CLOCK chimed four o’clock. As the last metallic note faded, the front door opened and a woman walked in, her perfume smelling faintly like strawberries.

She wore a red halter dress, cut too low, and matching lipstick. Her chestnut hair hung sleek with straight-cut bangs that hovered over almond-shaped eyes. Most walk-ins looked embarrassed, nervous or dubious, but this woman looked determined or surprised, which could just be the unfavorable effect of those overarched Cruella eyebrows.

Without a word, she sat in one of the guest chairs and crossed her slim legs. Val took note of strappy Badgley Mischka sandals, which she guessed were the real deal based on the monster-size bling on the woman’s ring finger.

“My name Marta,” she said, rolling the r in her name. “My fiancé, I think he cheats. I want you to find out.”

Val tried to place the thick accent. Romanian? “I’m sorry,” she said, “but we’re currently not accepting any new cases.”

Under a veil of thick black lashes, a pair of hazel eyes coolly assessed Val. After a beat, she reached into her purse and extracted a wad of bills bound with a rubber band.

“I pay thousand dollars.” Which sounded like I pay zouzand dolarz. She set it on the edge of the desk.

“I’m sorry, but—”

“Tonight,” Marta interrupted, “I know where he goes. I give address, you see if he cheats.”

This woman did not want to take no for an answer.

Val recalled the name of the P.I. she’d looked up earlier. “Bert Warner, just a few blocks away, handles infidelity cases. I can get you his number—”

“No man investigator. Want you to dress up, see if he flirts with you.”

“Sorry, that’s a honey trap, and we never do those.” She was being good reciting the party line, but dang, this kind of work could be profitable.

“Honey trap,” Marta repeated slowly, then smiled, as though liking how the word tasted. She pulled out another wad of bills and set it on the desk. “Two thousand.”

This is how it would be someday when Val ran her own agency. A client would walk in, discuss their problem and Val could say yes, I’ll take your case. And she’d do one helluva good job, too.

She stared at the two grand, cash.

What was so wrong with honey traps anyway? Jayne talked about lawyers attacking the evidence, but wasn’t that what lawyers did in courtrooms for any type of case? Didn’t mean honey trapping was illegal. Cops did it, other P.I.s did it.

Jayne was also an older woman. Obviously she couldn’t conduct a honey trap herself. But Val was young, could pull it off. She had learned a lot watching all those hours of Honey Catchers.

No. She had to stop thinking this way. She had to abide by agency policy. Rules were rules. Even if she disagreed with some of them.

She stared at the wads of bills. Two grand, cash.

Enough to cover a new fuel pump, brakes, with plenty left over to toss into the kitty for the day when she moved out of her cousin’s place into her own.

Marta leaned forward, emotion shining in her eyes. “I come to United States from Russia. I clean houses, make better my English. Now I work in dress store, want to have own business someday. Did not want to fall in love, but...” She shrugged. “He ask me to marry. I say yes, then I hear about other women...” Her chin trembled.

Val nudged the tissue box toward her. “Maybe,” she said gently, “you should talk to him. Tell him what others have told you.”

Marta took a tissue, dabbed the corner of her eye. “Da. Yes. I do. He say no, people lie.” A tear spilled down her cheek. “I must know. Please. Help me.”

Boy, oh, boy, could Val relate to starting over. After Katrina, starting over became the story of her life. After a short stay in the Superdome, Val had relocated to Houston, where FEMA paid her rent for a studio apartment while she looked for work. Maybe if she had felt connected to the city, or at least known somebody, it might have worked out. But there were days she hadn’t even been able to get out of bed, much less tackle job hunting. When she moved to Las Vegas, at least she had family, but it was still tough learning her way around a new city, finding a job, making friends.

If she had also been forced to learn a new culture and language, she would have lost her marbles.