by Ophelia Bell
“Callie, talk to me,” he says, carefully scooting closer. He reaches out and takes my hand. “What are you worried about? Is it the DEA thing?”
I wince. “Kind of. But it isn’t what you think, exactly.” Heaving a sigh, I set down my mug and turn to face him. “I had a brother. Chris . . .”
I trail off, suddenly finding it difficult to get the words out. Evidently it isn’t just Nina who I need to be worried about, but me too. Mason’s eyebrows dip, the more serious expression adding a hint of danger to his already devastating good looks. He seems to grasp what I’m trying to say, but only nods and squeezes my hand as he waits for me to continue.
Taking a shaky breath, I say, “Chris was six years older, so as girls do, Nina and I both idolized him. She had a crush on him for years. Probably her whole life.”
“Booth reminds you of him somehow?” he asks.
“Not just looks, Mason. Chris was a DEA agent. He was killed on assignment.”
Mason blinks rapidly and leans back a little, mouth opening, then closing without saying anything. He takes a breath through his nose and looks down at his mug with a slow nod. “So you think she’s latching onto Booth because he reminds her of your brother, Chris . . . Was his last name Nicolo like you? Maybe Booth knows the story.”
I huff a laugh. “No, we didn’t use our full last names once we started our careers. Mom and Dad kept their last names when they got married, but Chris and I were hyphenated. He kept Mom’s name for professional reasons, I kept Dad’s. My full name is Callista Angelica Longo-Nicolo. Since Chris went into the intelligence sector where Mom rules, he chose to use her last name. And since I followed in Dad’s footsteps and became a doctor, I kept his.”
I shrug as if it’s that simple, even though it’s far from it. Mom has never quite forgiven me for dropping “Longo” from my name, and I’d wager that doing it may have driven a deeper wedge between her and Dad than I intended.
Mason is quiet for several seconds, just looking at me as if he’s seeing me for the first time. It’s a little disconcerting, and I wonder if I’ve made a mistake. Has he figured out that my Mom’s a senator? Not everyone is in tune with politics the way my family is. He may not even know a Senator Katherine Longo exists.
Finally he shakes his head and sighs. “I’m sorry about your brother. I can ask Booth if he knows anything about what happened, if you want.”
“No. If they’ve got something good going on, I think she’ll bring it up to him on her own. I just hope she doesn’t see him as a substitute, you know? She was as devastated as I was when Chris died. I think it’s part of the reason she’s so hard on men.”
He leans over and sets his mug on the coffee table, leaning back with a groan and a nod. “I don’t know what I’d do if any of my brothers died. But I guess they all know exactly how it feels to lose one.” He pulls the blanket tighter around him and sighs, letting his head fall back atop the couch cushions so he’s staring at the ceiling.
“Is there more to the story than you told me last night?” I ask, though I’m a little distracted by the bare expanse of his throat, the light dusting of stubble just beneath his chin giving way to smooth, tan skin. The ink doesn’t start until just beneath his collarbone, but from there down, he’s covered. Tracing my gaze across one stretch of ink, I see another scar that I’m positive was one of the wounds I actually stitched for him that day three years ago.
“Not much,” he says. He lifts his head and looks at me, and I tear my gaze away from the top of his chest, flushing at the smirk that greets me.
Flustered, I stand and grab my empty mug, holding it up. “Want more?”
“Sure, but make sure the next one bites. I’m still thawing out.” He picks up his mug and holds it out to me. I reach for it. “And one more thing . . .”
As I grab his mug, he snags me by the wrist and pulls me down. With a quick tilt of his head he plants his lips against mine. The warm, soft contact and sweet, chocolatey flavor of his tongue infuses my entire body with heat.
I nearly lose my balance when he releases me, and if any part of me had still been cold, it’s gone molten now.
“Um. Wow.”
His blanket falls off his shoulders and splays open all the way to his navel, displaying even more ink. I didn’t have enough time to explore in between rounds of sex last night, and it’s all I can do not to abandon the offer of hot drinks and work on warming him up myself.
But we’re talking. And it’s getting deep, which is such a new experience for me, I don’t want it to end just yet.
Drunk with the heady flavor of his kiss, I totter off to the kitchen. Before I even register what I’m doing, there are two fresh, steaming mugs of cocoa on the counter. He said he wanted bite . . .
I stick my head back into the pantry and snag a dusty bottle of whiskey. Uncorking it, I take a sniff, then toss a healthy dollop into each mug.
I’ll give him bite.
I smile, my mind going to a special place. A place where my teeth sink softly into that succulent piece of tattooed muscle right over his hip before I lick my way in and find a tastier morsel to feast on. I can already taste him, and my mouth waters. One thing I suppose I can thank Barnaby for is his incessant need for being on the receiving end of oral sex, so I’ve gotten pretty damn good at it over the years, if I do say so myself. And after Mason’s performance last night, he deserves it.
“With bite,” I say, handing him the mug before sitting down next to him. I shift slightly to face him, leaning sideways on the back of the sofa and watching while he takes a sip of the whiskey-infused cocoa. His eyebrows draw together and his nostrils flare.
“Goddamn, this is good.”
The name tattooed on his forearm stares at me as he drinks, and my stomach churns. The whiskey in my cocoa is slow to numb the curiosity and conflict warring inside me. I desperately want to trust him, but that tattoo is making it difficult.
“Who is she?” I blurt, hating how pitiful and pleading my voice sounds.
Mason shifts his mug to his other hand and stares down at the trio of letters emblazoned on his arm. Then he looks at me, lips pressed in a thin line. “To explain her, I think I need to start at the beginning. Are you okay with a long-ass story? It isn’t a pretty one, but I think it’ll help you understand.”
I merely nod, though inside I’m rejoicing that he’s going to open up.
He starts to speak, then laughs and says, “I almost forgot. You met my dad, didn’t you?”
“Um, yeah. He’s a piece of work.”
Shaking his head, he says, “Then this story just got a lot shorter. Julian Santos has always been a mean, brutal bastard. I don’t need to explain that to you—you saw it yourself. There’s no doubt in my mind he’s the reason Mom had a stroke. Maybe he didn’t beat her last week, but he’s been hitting her for years, and that shit adds up. She always ran interference for me and my brothers, but we got our share of the man’s fists when she wasn’t there to stop him.”
I’m not sure what to say, so I just murmur, “I’m sorry.”
He shakes his head. “It’s not your fault. But sharing a name with that bastard got to me, you know?”
Realization dawns. “He’s the reason you changed your name, isn’t he?”
“Partly. The undercover gig gave me a plausible excuse to make it permanent. I’d been using Mason Black for a few years already, so it was like slipping into a familiar pair of shoes that always fit better than the ones I’d been wearing all my life. My hatred of that asshole knows no bounds.”
“Understandable,” I agree, though I’m not sure what this has to do with a girl. Then he continues, and the pieces begin to fall into place.
“But the name is just on the outside. I can’t shed the blood tie to the bastard. The fucking devious bent, the thirst for violence. I’m not proud of it, but that’s part of who I am. Traits that no doubt came from him. He was our goddamn father. And he beat his own kids. He beat his wife bad enough she’s in a coma.
I couldn’t know if that was yet another monster living inside me, waiting to wake up. So I decided it was for the best if I never had kids of my own, because there’s no fucking way I’d risk turning into him and hurting them.”
His jaw clenches hard and his knuckles are white where he grips his mug, lifting it to take a long swallow. I quietly rise and pad to the kitchen to retrieve the whiskey. When I return, he holds his mug out and I pour a healthy amount into it.
“I was all about getting the job done in Mexico. Ingratiating myself to my superiors. Getting into the inner circle. I’m good at it, so it was easy. But also not. I’m not a heartless bastard.” He spears me with a pained look as if he’s begging me to believe him. “Not all of them are mindless criminals, either. They’re real people who have lives, families. They started to mean something to me too, and every single lie I told the ones I cared about took a chunk out of me.
“But I had to do it. It was my job. And when I saw the perfect chance to get all the way in, I took it.” He goes silent, staring into his mug, his face a mask of pain as his throat works, trying to get the next words out.
My heart wrenches. I can’t take seeing him so overwrought. I want the irreverent, randy Mason back, but I’m overwhelmed by the level of truth he’s sharing. I want this every bit as much as I crave his touch, though I have no idea what I did to earn the raw honesty. Does the depth of connection I feel to him really run both ways?
I shift closer and grip his hand. “You don’t have to tell me everything right now. I heard enough last night to get that it can’t have been easy.”
His gaze is earnest and intent when he looks at me, squeezing my hand. “Callie, believe me, I want to tell you. Seeing you again brought back that day we met. I never forgot you, but deep down I believed we’d never have worked back then. I wasn’t the man I needed to be to deserve you. I don’t know if I am now, but I will never be if I don’t say this.”
“Why is it so difficult?” I whisper.
“Because two people died because of me. Two people I cared about. The fucker we’re after, Amador, attacked on Christmas day, trying to get to me. I’m the reason they died. Rafael and Emilia . . .” He closes his eyes and takes a deep, shuddering breath. “They were supposed to be her parents. I could only stomach fathering her because I knew I wouldn’t be the one raising her.” He opens his eyes and stares down at his forearm, flexing his hand into a fist tight enough to make veins and tendons bulge slightly beneath his skin.
The reality of his confession hits me in a cold rush. What he’d said last night about having rock star sperm . . . He’d, what? Donated to his friends? And the result had been . . .
My breath departs in a rush and chills wash over me. “Oh my god. Zoe is your daughter.” But then a darker feeling sinks in and I grit my teeth. “Mason, if your friends died, where is she?”
21
Mason
Getting the words out is hard, but easier than I thought it’d be. Part of me is resistant to burdening Callie with it at all, since we’ve barely begun getting to know each other, and it’s a lot to lay on someone even if they’re a close friend. But I’m tired of secrets, and despite my excuse that she’s a distraction, a way to kill time, I want more. I want to leave the door open to something deeper if I ever manage to free myself from being hunted, if I ever make it back to LA and my old life.
But her question jabs a knife into my gut and twists. It’s irrational, because I have no control over the situation, yet I hate the perception that I’m doing nothing.
“Zavala has her,” I manage to grate out, the words leaving my throat raw. “César Zavala has Zoe.”
Her incredulous look deepens my shame and I pull the blanket up a little, then bury my nose in the mug, taking a deep swallow to cut the jagged edge off this feeling.
“Before you ask, yes, I’m doing something about it—the only fucking thing I can do. He’s using her as leverage to get me to be his fucking errand boy. To bring this deal he wants to the Feds. But what he’s asking for isn’t easy. Shit like that doesn’t happen overnight, so I have to bide my time and wait. Believe me, if there was more I could do, I would.”
She seems to settle a bit, then sighs. “I believe you. I take it that’s why you wanted to spend the weekend with me—to try to forget. Sorry I made you dredge it up.”
“Don’t be, sweetness. I needed to get it out. Just like that bullet that was in my spine. It was paralyzing me to hold onto it. I got this tattoo the other day because it was the only way I could purge the guilt at the time. Guilt over not being able to say the word.”
“What word is that?” she asks, her expression so gentle, so open, I want to lean in and kiss her. But starting down that road under the circumstances doesn’t make sense. The moment will come soon enough, especially with the looks she keeps casting at my body when she thinks I’m not paying attention.
I take a deep breath, bracing myself, but for the first time ready.
“Daughter,” I finally say, pausing to absorb the experience of simply referring to her that way for the first time. It’s terrifying, but at the same time liberating. I exhale and smile a little, then look Callie in the eyes and say it again. “Zoe is my daughter. I’m her father. And I will do every fucking thing in my goddamn power to get her back, to make sure she’s safe. If this contact doesn’t come through for me, then I’ll just have to go kill Zavala myself.”
I mentally chastise myself for the small omission of exactly who that contact is. I put together Callie’s link to the senator the second she shared her full name. I don’t want her to think I asked to spend time with her because of her mother’s involvement in this whole deal. More than that, I don’t want to give her a reason to run, even though it’d probably be better for her if she did.
But the two of us have an undeniable connection, and there’s no way in hell I’m giving up on this chance to explore it. I’ve never been with a woman before who fit me so fucking perfectly.
She winces and shakes her head, then sighs. “God, why do the best men in my life all have to have such a goddamn hero complex? Nina was right.” She gives me a wistful smile, but I like the undercurrent of admiration I see.
“What was Nina right about?”
“That I have a thing for heroes with a penchant for taking risks to save lives. And that was why my ex and I would have never worked out anyway.”
I note the way she carefully avoids saying his name, but I’m curious about the rest. “Who else have you had a thing for, if not him?”
“Not a thing, exactly. It was just an observation she made about how close I always was to Dad and Chris. How she expected me to follow in Dad’s footsteps. He runs a medical NGO that provides trauma care to citizens of developing countries. I think he’s somewhere in East Africa right now, saving lives. He and Mom have been divorced since shortly after Chris . . .” She trails off with a wince. That says a lot, both about her and the senator.
“Is it a dealbreaker?” I ask with a tilt of one eyebrow.
“What? Oh god, no. Seriously. Nina does know me well. If anything, I’d want to go with you to Mexico to help get your daughter from Zavala, but I really hope the killing part isn’t necessary.”
“Trust me, I hope it isn’t, either.”
She pours us both refills, then faces me, bending her legs and propping her feet against my thigh. “So, I hope that clears the air on all the secrets we both have. Any more deep, dark confessions? Do all your tattoos have a story like that one?”
“Probably,” I drawl, then tilt the mug to my lips, watching her over the rim. The warmth has finally permeated to my center and parts of me have begun to wake up to her proximity. “But where would be the fun in telling you all of them at once? You know the big ones now. I’d like to know if there’s a story to your lonely little piece of ink beyond the obvious.”
“Lonely? How do you know it’s the only one?”
“I have seen you naked. Every motherfucking beautiful inch of you, as
a matter of fact. And I enjoyed all of it. But I know for a fact there were no other tattoos. Just a pretty beauty mark or two. I especially like the one you have right underneath your left ass cheek. It’s kind of heart-shaped, if you look at it from a certain angle.”
Her hand reflexively drifts down to the back of her thigh, as if she doesn’t quite believe she has a mark there. I, on the other hand, was up close and personal with that part of her anatomy last night and enjoyed every second of it.
But I don’t stop there. “And you’ve got one on your left hipbone, mirroring your tattoo. Just a freckle, really, but it’s cute as hell.”
I reach out and tease my fingertips up the side of her neck. She braces herself, realizing exactly where I’m headed next. I pause, lightly caressing the skin behind her left ear. Her breathing quickens, and my blood heats in response.
My voice is gruff when I say, “And this one. A birthmark, I think. It’s shaped like a rosebud.”
Evidently it’s a little too much for her. She grips my hand, pulling it away from her neck, and holds it tightly, shaking her head. “How the hell do you remember all that? It’s a little creepy.”
“I have a good memory for details. It’s one of the things that makes me good at my job. All the Santos kids have it, to some degree.”
“Really? If that’s so, I guess you know the name of my downstairs neighbor.”
“Hoffman. There was no first name listed on the buzzer, though.”
“What about my upstairs neighbor?”
“Van-something. It was a complicated Indian name. I don’t know how to pronounce it. I could spell it for you, though.”
Callie laughs. “No, don’t. It’s a tricky one, Vankayalapati,” she says, carefully enunciating until it’s clear and I repeat it back.