“Sometimes I listen to classical music while doing it.” He smirked.
“That’s very Hollywood of you.”
“Makes it feel less horrific.”
We sat in silence for a few more minutes, both sipping our drinks, refusing to make eye contact.
Finally, when I couldn’t take it anymore, I asked the question I’d been dreading all night. “Why are you really here? Clearly, her father isn’t aware you’re helping us — and I saw you talking to Phoenix earlier.”
“I wasn’t trying to hide the fact that I need a favor.”
“We’ve already done enough for you,” I spat.
“No.” He shrugged. “This is more… personal.”
My eyes narrowed. “How so?”
“Andi’s safe.” He frowned. “At least as safe as she’s going to be with the likes of you. But others in her family? They’re still in danger. I just need the right kind of information in order to save them.”
“And when you say them?”
“I mean her.”
“Her is who?”
“I keep my secrets well.” He grinned. “Do I have your word?”
“You haven’t told me anything.”
“About Andi,” he said slower this time, methodical, as if I was a slow learner.
Then again the booze was starting to do the trick. Already my hands felt heavy, my eyes burned with the need to close off the world and succumb to the darkness of sleep.
“I’ll protect her.”
“Good.” Nicolai let out a breath. “Because her father won’t be happy she’s disappeared. She’s no longer useful to him now that Director Smith is dead, now that her brother is dead. She’s….” He sighed.
“A very loose end,” I finished.
“She’s as good as dead if she gets into the wrong hands.”
I fought the urge to bang my head against the granite. “She’s already dying.”
“A fact you keep reminding her of.” He tilted his head. “I wonder why?”
“Because.” That was all I had. Because. Weeks ago, I could have talked the guy under the table and convinced him he was an escaped ostrich from the zoo. Now? All I had was because. Damn, I was broken.
Nicolai stood, a smile forming across his lips. “You’re not trying to convince her.” He tilted his head. “You’re trying to convince you.”
“What?” I snapped.
“Keep saying it, then maybe one day you’ll believe it enough to keep your distance, to keep your hands off of her. But my guess?” He chuckled darkly. “You’ve already followed the rabbit. Careful when you jump. There won’t be anyone there but Andi to break your fall, and something tells me that’s exactly what you don’t want.”
“Go to hell.” My voice was hoarse, unsteady, basically telling him exactly what he claimed he already knew.
She could be a potential weakness for me.
And I hated weakness.
I hated it in others, but I especially hated it in myself.
“Good talk.” Nicolai stood and pulled out a business card. “If you ever find yourself in Seattle, or if you need good surgeon.”
I glanced at the white card with the red embossed letters.
“JR? What’s that stand for?”
He shrugged. “Family crest.” Without another word, his light footsteps echoed across the floor. He made it to the hall then turned, his expression one of pity. “You know… when this is all over… I can make you forget it even happened.”
My eyes narrowed as dread trickled down my spine. “You’ll have to be more straight-up with me. I don’t speak doctor.”
“When she dies…” He said it softly. “…which she will… have no doubt about it… call me if you… find that that stony heart of yours actually cares about that girl upstairs. The least I can do is help you forget the pain, help you forget everything.”
My hand trembled against the glass. “Is that what you really do? Brainwash people? Break them? Make them forget?”
He inclined his dark head. “Have a good night, Sergio. And remember my promise. Sometimes pain, especially that of a broken heart, is best forgotten.”
“Thanks, but my heart’s just fine.”
His eyes said he knew otherwise.
My damn erratic heartbeat concurred.
I wanted to smash my hand into his face.
Instead, I saluted him with my middle finger and ripped his card in half.
With one last dark chuckle, he moved down the hall. Finally, the sound of the front door clicking shut gave way to absolute, blissful silence.
The exhaustion that had earlier been creeping in was gone. And in its place, extreme paranoia that Nicolai saw me better than I saw me — that he knew my secrets, he knew my fears, and in the end, he knew I’d come calling. Because the very last thing I wanted…
Was to break.
I’d already lost so much.
It seemed unfair that she’d be the final catalyst of my downfall.
Rubbing my eyes with the backs of my hands, I moved away from the bar and padded down to my office.
I clicked on the lamp at my desk and went to work.
I’d just married someone who I needed to make disappear. With a sigh, I cracked my neck and placed my hands on the keyboard.
Passport first.
License second.
Marriage license third.
And I went to town. This, I could lose myself in. Numbers, I could do. Hacking was something I could probably do with my eyes closed.
I fixed, and I fixed, and I fixed.
When I was finished, I should have felt better. Instead, I felt worse, because the whole time I’d been creating a new identity for her, I’d felt, somewhere in the back of my exhausted brain, that I was simultaneously losing my own.
Who was I anymore?
What was my purpose outside of paying back my family for all my secrets? My lies?
I glanced down at the black folder Phoenix had placed on my desk a few days ago…
”Read it,” he ordered slamming it onto my desk.
”I’ll pass.” I pushed it away with one of my pens, and for a brief minute contemplated throwing it into the fire. “There’s nothing in there I don’t already know about myself.”
”Ha!” Phoenix chuckled “You have no freaking clue, Sergio. No clue.”
”Maybe I like it that way.” The black folder seemed to elevate toward me, tempting me, taunting me. “Being in the dark.”
”Trust me, you won’t. You don’t.” He nodded toward the folder. “Everyone has secrets… how do you know this isn’t so much about yours… but someone else’s entirely?”
That piqued my interest. “I thought it was my folder? The one that Luca kept on me in order to keep my balls within his grasp.”
”I didn’t say it wasn’t.”
”Phoenix.” I said his name like a curse. “How about you just tell me what’s in it so I don’t have to read.”
”It’s better it come from him.”
”He’s dead!” I yelled.
Phoenix hung his head. “I’m well aware that Luca, one of the greatest men I’ve ever known, is no longer breathing, but that doesn’t mean he still can’t reach his creepy ass hand out of the grave and give us a bit of a… surprise.”
”I freaking hate surprises,” I muttered.
Phoenix laughed. “Well put your party hat on, my friend, because it’s about to get real.”
”And it’s been what?” I leaned back in my chair. “A cakewalk all up until now? Do you even realize how many times we’ve almost gone to war with other families in the past two years? How many lives have been lost? How many lies I’ve told?” My voice was getting louder and louder. I couldn’t help myself, I was pissed. It wasn’t Phoenix’s fault. Hell, the guy had more of a reason to be pissed than I did, and there he was, passing out top-secret folders and smiling.
Jackass.
His wife probably had something to do with it; well that, and they had a baby
on the way. Lucky bastard.
”Read the folder,” he said again, then tapped his knuckles against my desk. “And try to get some sleep. You look like hell.”
”You do realize I used to say the same thing to you not so long ago.”
”Karma’s a bitch.” His snarky reply as he slammed the door to my office, leaving me alone with the folder.
I reached for it, but something stopped me, something that felt a hell of a lot like fear.
Fear that Luca had known things that I’d done — things I still hadn’t ‘fessed up about.
The bodies I’d hidden for the FBI. The ones I’d hidden from them.
The people I’d killed, all because it had been my damn job.
And the families I’d destroyed all in order to save my own ass.
I knew I was a selfish bastard; I just didn’t want others to know how deep that selfishness went.
Deciding against it, I pushed away from my desk and got out of my office before I did something stupid.
Taking the stairs two at a time, I hurried into my room then froze. Shit. Andi was sleeping in my bed.
I had at least twenty-two other rooms I could sleep in — I lived in a mansion, for shit’s sake.
But my bed.
She was in my bed.
FML. Seriously.
I had two choices. I could get my head out of my ass and walk backward, slowly out of the room, and crash somewhere else.
Or I could watch her sleep like the creepy son of a bitch I was… no way I would actually be able to succumb to sleep if I was next to her.
She was too…
Everything.
The decision was made when she made a little moan, not one out of pleasure, but something that sounded fearful, like she was afraid of the dark and needed a teddy bear.
Shit, had I really just thought teddy bear?
And unfortunately my body reacted — responded, one foot after another — and suddenly I was pulling my shirt off and lying down on the soft mattress.
Like a pubescent high-schooler, I stayed on my side of the bed, careful not to touch any area she’d been on.
It worked for about ten minutes.
And then an arm plopped onto my chest, followed by a leg covering my leg, and then, I was getting used as a giant ass pillow.
My teeth clenched. My body tightened with awareness, and just when I was getting ready to get the hell out of there, she whispered.
“Safe.”
I was anything but safe. But, in that moment, I vowed never to let her feel fear again, even if it meant I had to kill every son of a bitch in my way.
Safe I could do.
Safe I could promise.
CHAPTER TEN
Andi
I KNEW BEFORE I EVEN OPENED my eyes that I had molested poor Sergio in his sleep.
I only felt sorry for him because I knew my sleeping habits. I wasn’t one of those girls who slept quietly with their arms folded across their chests, their hair softly lying across the pillow, lips glossy, makeup still on.
Um, no. Sleep for me was a full contact sport — one I embarked on with my mattress nightly.
It wasn’t rare to find me on my ass on the floor, because somehow during the night I’d decided that my sheets were trying to strangle me alive, and in order to protect myself, I’d had to pull them from my bed and create a makeshift fort on the floor.
My favorite position usually consisted of my feet being where my head should be and my head nearly teetering off the bed, hands hanging in front of me, just ready for someone to pull me the rest of the way off and onto the floor.
Needless to say, I was a bit cautious when I opened my eyes.
First off, I’d feel horrible if I’d accidentally punched him in the eye or something. Heck, I wouldn’t put it past me to knee him in the balls a few times just because I wasn’t used to men sleeping with me.
They were never welcome.
The few times I’d had one-night stands, it had been to gain intel for dear old Dad. Love had had nothing to do with it.
Survival — did.
Sergio’s chest rose and fell with a slow rhythm. He was still sleeping, or I assumed as much, so I stared like a raging lunatic.
I took inventory of his abs, noting that they were, in fact, as cut as I suspected; my fingers itched to trace the hard edges, and when my eyes drifted lower, I fought this insane temptation to see if the rest of him was that impressive.
Unfortunately, he’d kept his pants on from the night before; meaning, if I wanted to explore, I’d need to actually unbutton said pants, and that set me up for risk of exposure.
Ha! Exposure.
I held in a giggle at my own joke.
He let out a little moan and shifted closer to me.
And like a complete idiot — I let him. Because he was warm, and sexy, and had I mentioned sexy?
At least with his mouth closed, I could finally see what all the fuss was about. It was hard to look past his cruel nature when he was constantly speaking or, you know, breathing.
His chiseled jaw was clenched tight. His eyebrows furrowed a bit as if he was concentrating extremely hard on whatever type of dreams invaded that head of his. I imagined he probably dreamt of death.
Lots and lots of death.
I reached out and briefly touched his silky dark hair. It should be a sin to have such soft hair and be a man.
He already had long enough eyelashes to make me green with envy.
I sighed and tucked a strand behind his hear. My hand hovered near his temple.
Holy crap.
He had a scar.
I kind of wanted to throw a party. The man wasn’t perfect. Thank God. I needed to see a flaw because things were looking pretty uneven at that point. He didn’t snore, he smelt like heaven, and even his eyebrows had a perfect arch.
But that scar? Yeah, I could work with that.
It was small, barely noticeable. A pinkish white line trailed from his right ear down the back of his neck, his hair covering it perfectly. Hmm, I fought the urge to trace it with my finger.
Or my tongue.
But that was inappropriate, almost as inappropriate as raping him with my eyes, but hey, I at least deserved some eye candy after the way he’d treated me in the field.
It was a sort of payback.
My eyes receive a treat after my ears receive a scolding. Plus, he really wasn’t in any position to get mad at me.
He let out another moan then turned toward me. Uh-oh. I tried to slide away, but his left arm snaked out and pulled me close while his right hand found.
My breast.
I ignored my hormones, or at least tried to, and shifted away. Then the man squeezed.
I closed my eyes and muttered a curse.
He started massaging.
Okay, so maybe he wasn’t dreaming about death.
I knew the minute he woke up…
Because his hand froze.
I wasn’t sure if I should pretend to be sleeping, yell at him, or simply stare.
I chose the latter.
Hoping my expression wasn’t one of lust but of mild curiosity, as in why the heck did you grab my boob? and not will you please touch the other one too?
“Shhi-i-it.” He drew out the word, his eyes focusing on the hand currently holding my boob captive. “I umm…”
“Why don’t you have morning breath?” I asked, truly curious as to why he didn’t smell. It would have been a mercy had he been remotely human. But no, apparently he was some sort of Sicilian god.
“Huh?” He shook his head, his long eyelashes fluttering against his cheeks. “How am I even supposed to answer that?”
“Well…” I licked my lips. “…you could start by taking your hand off my boob.”
He looked down again.
“Or you could keep it there if that’s how you start all your mornings, but then it begs the question… do you grab your own, or do you simply imagine someone else’s?”
He jerked
his hand away. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to…” He sighed. “Just, sorry.”
“It’s okay. I liked it.” I winked.
Did he just growl?
“So, morning breath…” I pushed up onto my elbows. “…not something you’re plagued with, huh?”
“Too early,” he grumbled, reaching for his cell.
“Warts?”
“What?” He dropped the phone and turned his hazy gaze to me. “You have warts?”
“No.” I made a face. “Do you?”
“No.” Again with his slow one word answers.
“Zits? Tell me you had zits when you were a teen, and your parents tried everything, and nobody would be your friend, so you made up an invisible friend and named him, then had to see a shrink for three years because you were thought to be mentally unstable.”
Sergio stared at me for a few minutes then asked. “Are you always this weird in the mornings?”
I threw my hands into the air. “Flaws, Sergio, I’m trying to find flaws.” I shrugged. “You know, other than the fact that you tend to be a giant ass-hat most the time.”
“That’s a flaw.”
“An epic flaw. Poor me.” I smiled. “I’m stuck with your ass-iness.”
“Not a word.”
“Is now.”
“Can we at least have coffee before you continue assaulting my ears with your voice?”
I rose from the bed. “Fine, fine. You win.”
Sergio’s mouth dropped open, his eyes flashing with something I couldn’t really decipher.
“What?” I put my hands on my hips — and panicked. I was in my wedding lingerie. A cute white corset that had gone perfect with my wedding dress and white lacy boy shorts.
He opened his mouth then closed it. But didn’t look away. No, that wasn’t Sergio’s style; he didn’t do embarrassed or guilty. He wasn’t that guy, the good guy that even turned around when you dressed.
He stared.
And I liked it.
Because it made me feel wanted — desirable, so I did what any sane woman would do when she had a hot man who just so happened to be her husband in her bed.
I took off my bra. “You said my words assaulted you. I figured I’d attack your eyes too.”
He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing slowly down before he spoke. “You should probably put clothes on.”