Ignore. Ignore.

“Had to,” Bartoli said. “Before we asked you to come on board, we needed to know as much about you as possible. I wouldn’t have been doing my job otherwise.” He gave her an apologetic grimace. “If it makes you feel any better, if you’ve got any deep, dark secrets, the Bureau didn’t find them.”

“Speaking from personal experience, the Bureau couldn’t find its ass with both hands,” Garland said.

“I don’t.” Charlie kept her eyes glued to Bartoli’s face. “Have any deep, dark secrets.”

“You have me,” Garland pointed out. She still couldn’t see him, which was driving her insane. “Don’t tell lies to the po-po, Doc. Don’t you know you can go to jail for that?”

Go away. Charlie wanted to shriek it, but managed to smile at Bartoli instead.

“I was pretty sure of that even before the background check,” Bartoli said. “In this business we get good at reading faces, and what yours says about you is that you have character and intelligence and honesty. I saw that as soon as I met you.”

“This guy sucks,” Garland said. “He should be telling you what a hot little body you have.”

Charlie shot a lightning glance in the direction of the voice—she didn’t mean to; it just happened—but since she couldn’t actually see Garland, she couldn’t be sure he got the whole shut up or die import of it.

“I appreciate that. Thank you,” she told Bartoli. Okay, she did sound kind of stiff and pedantic, but she was having trouble working out how to have a real conversation with him while a demon listened in and jeered in her ear.

“I have to admit, you were a surprise,” Bartoli said. “After going over your credentials, I was expecting somebody more … imposing.”

“What he means is, he thought you were going to be butt-ugly,” Garland said. “That was what I thought, when I found out the psychiatrist they were taking me to see was a woman. I mean, who sticks a babe in a men’s prison?”

Concentrating on Bartoli while tuning out Garland was challenge enough without having the fact that Garland had called her a babe break loose and start worming its way into her mind, which is what, Charlie was horrified to realize, it was doing.

“You were a surprise to me, too. I mean, having the FBI show up at the prison was a surprise to me,” she said, rattled. Her dilemma was maddening: if she encouraged Bartoli to go where she thought this conversation might be heading—i.e., somewhere more personal—Garland would hear everything, yet if she tried to keep Bartoli from going there, he might take it as her subtly warning him off, which was the last thing she wanted to do.

“Not a bad one, I hope.” Bartoli’s smile was personal. Her pulse would have quickened except, oh, wait, it was already racing from stress.

“Other than the whole Boardwalk Killer thing, no,” Charlie replied, and smiled, too. “I wouldn’t characterize it as bad.”

“I wouldn’t characterize it as bad,” Garland mocked. “Jesus Christ, Doc, he ought to have his tongue down your throat by now. Dancing like this, you ought to be wanting him so bad you’re getting wet in your panties. Instead, there’s six inches of space between you and he’s smiling at you like you’re a fricking nun. I can tell you right now, you ain’t gonna have no fun in that bed.”

“Is anything wrong?” Bartoli frowned down at her. Charlie realized that her face must have frozen—or something—as she’d listened to Garland. Actually, no telling what her face had done. If the way she felt was any indication, it might have gone homicidal.

Damn it—him, Garland—to hell.

“No,” she said hastily. Then she amended her reply to, “Well, nothing much. It’s just … my stomach’s acting up again.”

She hoped the explanation was enough to cover any weird behavior he might have noticed while she was trying not to react to Garland.

“You’ve been pretty much under the weather since we met, haven’t you?” The sympathy in Bartoli’s voice made Charlie want to howl. Why, just when she had met this absolutely great guy, did she have to be afflicted with the worst ghost in the history of her own particular universe?

“Seems like it, doesn’t it?” She summoned a pseudo-rueful smile. Her entire body was tense as she realized she had lost track of Garland. Was he still close by, or had he, by some miracle, gone? My luck isn’t that good. “I think maybe I have a touch of the flu.”

“I’m sorry we’re—” Bartoli broke off. Charlie followed his gaze, to spot Kaminsky waving them in. He looked back down at Charlie. “Looks like we’ve done our time.” They stopped dancing, and he took her arm. “Come on, back to the salt mines.”

“That was fun,” Charlie said brightly as they made their way through the dancers toward where Kaminsky waited on the sidelines. A glance around told her that Crane was working his way toward the same spot. The same glance revealed no trace of Garland.

“It was,” Bartoli agreed. “We ought to do it again sometime—when I’m not on duty and we’re not on camera.”

Charlie glanced up at him, suddenly feeling warm all over. He was interested. The sense that something could be beginning here hadn’t been all on her side.

“I’d like that,” she agreed. She and Bartoli had rejoined the crowd on the sidelines, but hadn’t quite reached Kaminsky when it happened.

A derisive snort in her ear located Garland for her. She’d known he was still there.

“Just to give you a heads-up, Doc, he’s the type that asks permission. Is that what you want? May I put my hand on your titty, Dr. Stone?” Garland’s mocking falsetto made Charlie clench her teeth. “Is it okay if I put my dick in your—”

Jerking her arm from Bartoli’s hold, Charlie stopped dead. Then, as Bartoli looked down at her in surprise and Charlie remembered that she was the only one who had any idea that a devil was tormenting her, she grabbed hold of her composure with both hands and held on tight.

While winging this heartfelt admonition toward Garland: No more.

“Um, you know, if you’ll excuse me, I really need a bathroom break,” she said.

Without waiting for Bartoli’s reply, she turned on her heel and headed toward the ladies’ room, the sign for which she could see outside a one-story, whitewashed brick outbuilding on the far side of the gazebo.

“You. Come with me,” she ordered out of the side of her mouth, as certain as it was possible to be without actually seeing Garland that the rat bastard was close enough to hear her perfectly well. It was all she could do not to stalk through the crowd, but with careful self-control she managed it. Reaching the ladies’ room moments later, she pushed through the swinging door, where she was greeted by a delicate floral scent and a wall of blessedly cool air-conditioning. At a glance she took in the posh lounge with its aqua leather couch and chairs and a small corridor leading into the sinks and stalls beyond, and ascertained that the restroom appeared to be empty. Marching into the center of the lounge area, she whipped around to snarl at what looked like empty space, “This. Has. Got. To. Stop.”

“You sound like you’re pissed at me, Doc.” Just as Charlie had expected, Garland materialized right in front of her, all six-foot-three hunky golden inches of him. “Now, that’s what you call a real co-inky-dink. ’Cause, see, I’m pissed at you, too.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

“Is that right?” Charlie’s eyes flashed fire. Standing scarcely more than arm’s length away, Garland looked as big and bad and muscular and intimidating as ever. At that moment Charlie was just so furious she didn’t care. Taking a step forward, she thrust a pugnacious finger at his chest. “Listen, you jackass: any more dirty talk in my ear, and what I do next will make that whole incense-and-candle thing look like a party game.”

Garland’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “You threatening me, Doc?”