by Denise Wells
Once she’d made her second kill, I started backtracking who she was taking out based on addresses and working from there. It didn’t take me long to realize they were all straight-up shit for humans. The world a better place without them. I let four, that I knew of, go by before I said anything. And even then, I didn’t want to.
I took her out to a nice dinner, all romantic and shit with the dim lights and piano music, private little booth in the back. We had a bet that I couldn’t get her off with my fingers between the salad and the main course. She lost. So, while she was still all loose, pliant, and orgasm-drunk, I leaned in and whispered in her ear, “How long have you been assassinating low-life criminals, beautiful?”
A myriad of emotions had played across her face. Outrage, denial, anger, acceptance. Then she surprised us both by telling me the whole story, after which I told her mine. Then she said we couldn’t see each other any longer. I argued that I’d thought about marrying her. Looking back, maybe it would have been better if I’d straight up proposed, but I didn’t. I just said I’d thought about it.
She left me at the restaurant that night and has refused to be with me since. At first, I thought it was retaliation over me catching her in the act. But damn if some of her points about me being a Fed weren’t solid as hell. If she’s ever caught by the authorities, I’ll be in deep shit, regardless.
So, I make it my priority to always make sure that doesn’t happen. And not just for me, but also because I can’t imagine only seeing her dressed in an orange jumpsuit from here on out while she’s cuffed to a cold metal table during prison visiting hours.
And, it doesn’t stop me from feeding her information on creeps we know are guilty but can’t get enough evidence on to prosecute. Sure as shit, those guys drop off our radar after a short amount of time. I don’t ask questions and she doesn’t offer any answers. It works well. ‘Course, it could work way fucking better if she were in my bed every night.
One thing’s for sure, neither of us will see other people. For me, there’s not another woman out there who would measure up. I’ve been with enough to know. And I have a feeling she feels the same way about other men.
Add to that, I come around the bar to see her as often as I can, like a fucking sap, and you have our current predicament. One of these days maybe I’ll come up with the right words to convince us both that I’m capable of deciding about my career, and any impact her actions may have on it.
Until then, I eat a lot of burgers and make sure my partner stays in the dark about the whole thing.
6
Daria
“It looks good on you,” I tell Quinn about the Dirty Dar’s tank top she just changed into. “I wish I had your boobs.”
“Oh no,” she says, holding up her index finger and wagging it back and forth as if to scold me. “I only get to have great boobs because I have to be short and curvy. You are already tall and modelesque. If you had great boobs too, it would be even more grossly unfair. In fact, I wouldn’t be able to be your friend. I’d have to find other friends who are less attractive than me. The only reason I can tolerate being your friend is because you have no boobs.”
“I have boobs.” I grab at the two small lumps protruding from my chest.
“Little baby boobs,” she teases.
“Don’t you have a bathroom to clean?”
She skips off toward the back, leaving me alone behind the bar. Lunch times are always slow, even though we open at eleven-thirty and serve lunch seven days a week. I’ve thought about changing the hours to open at three or four in the afternoon, and just have burgers for happy hour and after. But then my employees would lose hours and I don’t want that for them.
Not everyone that works for me is also an assassin. Four out of my ten employees do the dirty work with me, the other six just work at the bar. And I work hard to keep the two businesses separate. The building has a room upstairs with a private entrance behind a moveable bookcase in my office. Very cloak and dagger type stuff.
We use the room to store weaponry and for when we meet and strategize. Otherwise, it’s completely off limits and no one else knows that it’s there. I pay my girls very well, but they all have a personal reason for being involved. It took us a while to find one another, and even longer to train to the point we are at now.
It’s difficult, what we do. You can’t really have a relationship, unless you want to be lying to your partner all the time. Or you trust them enough to let them in. But, after Mack found out, we agreed that no one outside the group knows unless we all vote on it and it’s unanimous. So far, the only people who know outside the five of us are Quinn and Mack.
And both are my fault.
Speak of the devil.
The jingle bells I hung over the front door sound off as it opens and in saunters Mack and his FBI partner Reed. I say saunter, but with Mack it’s really more of a swagger. Like he rolls his hips and shoulders when he walks. It’s sexy as fuck. I raise my chin at them in greeting.
Mack winks in return. “Hey beautiful,” he says as he pulls out a bar stool and situates his big delicious body on top of it. My panties flood and my heart aches. That’s all it takes with him: one little wink and the sound of his voice and I’m ready to launch myself over the bar into his arms and never leave. He’s dangerous and potent. But he’s a Fed and I’m an assassin. You do the math.
Regardless, he’s the love of my life. And we can never be together.
I clear my throat and send a soft smile Mack’s way. “What can I get you two?”
“I need a beer, Daria,” Reed says. Which surprises me. He’s not one to drink on the job, even if it is just a beer.
“Make it two,” Mack adds. Now Mack, he’s another story. He does what he wants when he wants, and it doesn’t matter what time of day it is. But that’s also the difference between someone who worked toward and applied to the Academy, like Reed. And someone recruited out of the military like Mack.
I’ve never been to the FBI Branch here, but I’m willing to bet Mack is the only one not in a suit and tie each day. I look at him now, dressed in jeans and snug black T-shirt that shows off his chest and arms. His hair a tad too long in the front, and the scruff on his face definitely not regulation. He gets away with it because he’s really fucking good at what he does. It’s how he caught me. And also how he makes sure no one else does.
I pull two draft beers from the tap and set them in front of the guys. “Burgers?”
Both nod as they drink their beer. I leave them to go to the kitchen to put in their order. Reed is here enough I know how he likes his burger. And Mack would eat anything I put in front of him. But I still make sure it’s exactly the way he likes it.
I don’t have to go to the kitchen to put their order in, the point of sale system sends a ticket back there already. But something told me they needed a minute to themselves. Something's going on, and I need not be around to hear it. This way I can warn Quinn that Reed is here. She’s had a mad crush on the guy for as long as I can remember and if I let her walk out there after cleaning the restroom, without touching up her makeup or something, she’ll kill me.
I pass along the order to the afternoon cook, then slip inside the men’s restroom just as Quinn is finishing up. “Reed’s here.”
“Did you just say Reed is here?”
I nod.
Her mouth drops open. “Reed Reed? My Reed? Reed Roberts?”
“The one and only.”
“Ohmigod, how do I look? Is my hair okay? Ugh, I’m all sweaty from cleaning. I can’t believe you made me clean the bathroom. Do I smell like toilet bowl cleaner?” She pivots to look at herself in the mirror. “Oh, I look good in this tank top.” She turns back and forth, studying her reflection, smoothing the bottom of the tank down over her hips. Then fluffs her hair and smiles before turning back to me. “Okay, I’m going to go out there and pretend like I don’t know he’s here. Then I’m going to act surprised. Then, I’ll ignore him. Got it?”
“Got it.”
We both leave the restroom, but I let her head out to the bar before me. I shut my eyes and lean against the wall, banging the back of my head against it a couple times. It’s frustrating when Mack comes in. But if he didn’t come in, I’d never see him. And if I never saw him, I would miss him even more. Still, I don’t know which is worse.
When I do see him, he runs so hot and cold with me. Based on how he greeted me it seems like today will be nice. We will act civil toward one another, maybe even complimentary, with a little flirting, and I’ll escape from the encounter only slightly scathed.
The days where it’s clear he hates the very sight of me are the hardest. When his gaze is cold, his mannerisms are detached, and every word out of his mouth is for the sole purpose of causing me pain. Those are the days I must physically stop myself from running back to him and begging for forgiveness. I see the pain on his face, and I want to make it go away. Slay all the demons inside him and erase every speck of betrayal in his eyes. Instead, I shut down, turning off every single emotion inside me until he leaves. Only then do I allow myself to disappear into my office, lock the door, and cry until I have nothing left.
I hit my head against the wall one last time to knock some sense into myself before I go back out there to face Mack again.
“Careful with the goods, don’t break that beautiful head.”
I swear the tips of my smile and the strings to my heart are directly tied to the sound of his voice. Both start to move as soon as he speaks. I wait until his heavy steps have stopped in front of me before I open my eyes. Mack’s soulful brown ones are shining back at me.
“How are you doing?” he asks softly, running the back of his hand along my cheekbone.
I lean into his touch but force myself to put my hands in my back pockets to avoid touching him back.
“Good. You?”
“Miss you.” His voice is low and gruff. He moves to place his hands on the wall above my head and leans in, his forehead close to touching mine. Our lips mere inches apart.
“Don’t tell me that,” I whisper.
“Can’t help it. You’ve got my soul, babe.”
His eyes lock onto mine, and I can’t look away. Just once I’d like to live in a world where criminals and law enforcement can co-exist. I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. One of us has to be the strong one, I just wish it didn’t have to be me. I wait until I can’t take it any longer before looking away. The urge to kiss him is too overwhelming.
I was wrong before, the good days where he loves me, they are just as bad.
“Your burgers should be up soon,” I tell him trying to duck under his tree-trunk sized arm to get around him.
“Hang on a sec.” He grabs my upper arm to stop me, pulling me back into place against the wall. “I didn’t just come back here to remind myself of what I can’t have.” He looks at me pointedly. “I also need a favor.”
I nod. “Anything, you know that.”
Mack lowers his voice even further and pushes his nose into my hair, his lips grazing my ear. “Not anything, obviously. If it were anything, we’d be in your office with you bent over your desk and my cock buried deep inside you.” His breath tickles my neck and goosebumps decorate my arms. I shiver at the thought of being with him again.
He bites at my lobe before pulling his head away slowly, capturing me in his hard gaze. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, babe.”
I nod again, hating my acquiescence, yet not doing a thing to change it.
“Now, let’s try this again. I need a favor.”
“I’ll try to help if I can,” I say, my voice shaky. It drives me nuts that he has this effect on me. He’s the only man ever to penetrate the ice-cold exterior I try so hard to keep around me.
“Can you use some of your sketchy connections and get me whatever you can on David Tremblay?”
I look up at him, in surprise. “David Tremblay? As in Quinn’s ex? Reed’s friend? That David Tremblay?”
“That’s the one,” he says grimly.
“Sure, but why?”
“Main suspect in a sex trafficking case we’re looking into.”
“Oh!” That piques my interest even more. The scum involved in human trafficking are my favorite scum to eradicate.
“Yeah, oh,” he repeats. “But for Reed’s sake I want to make sure he’s guilty before . . .” He nods at me.
Mack has a general apathy for the lines between right and wrong. For him, they are gray and malleable. It’s what allows him to accept what me and my Dirty Darlings do, even though it goes against everything the FBI works toward.
Thanks to otherwise confidential information that Mack has passed along, a number of really despicable people disappear before trial, or after being released because there isn’t enough to get them to trial. My girls and I can take all the credit for that.
In the same vein, much needed—not necessarily legally acquired—evidence has mysteriously appeared in Mack’s mailbox a few times. Courtesy of an unidentified source, which helps him put away the not-quite-so-despicable guys who need not be wiped off the face of the earth completely, just locked away for a while. My girls and I can take all the credit for that too. Because I won’t kill, or have my girls kill, just anyone. It takes a particular breed of contemptible human lowlife for me to do that.
I have a code of conduct that I follow for choosing targets. I got the idea from a TV show about a serial killer who only killed serial killers and thought it was brilliant. Do I consider myself to be a serial killer? No. My girls? Absolutely not. I think of us more as vigilantes. Contract killers for good, not evil. Even if I am the one contracting all the kills.
“I’ll find out whatever I can today. I’ll call one of the girls in to help,” I tell Mack. “What are you going to do if he’s guilty?”
“I’m not worried about what I’ll do. I’m more worried about what Reed will do. You’ll have a race on your hands to see who can take him out first.”
I want to laugh at that, but the look on Mack’s face is serious. So, instead I nod. “I’ll text as soon as I have anything.”
Mack and I do still communicate. Mostly about ongoing cases. But when it can’t be in person, we use burner phones, which we replace every week. I want nothing on either of our persons with traceable information that law enforcement could ever use against us. Something that I’m far more paranoid about than Mack is. We mostly use them to text and sometimes call. I keep a stockpile of them upstairs for the girls and me anyway, so it’s easy.
Because as much as I hate to admit it, I need to know I can contact Mack and that he’ll be safe if I do so. And not even that I need to know if I can contact him. I have to be able to contact him. To hear his voice when I need it, send him a message when I’m thinking it, keep a lifeline between us open. Since we can’t be together, it’s all I have left of him.
He leans in and kisses me on the cheek. “Thank you.
“Of course.”
He heads into the restroom and I make my way back to the bar, still feeling the kiss long after.
7
Reed
I had to have Jenny from research and records repeat what she’d said twice when she called to tell me the sketch had been matched to David Tremblay. She would have called to tell me anyway, since Mack and I are on the case, but since David also came up as a known acquaintance of mine, she was trying to keep the information on the down low for me until I figured out what to do. David and I have been friends since we were kids. So, I won’t rush out and bring him in for questioning unless I’ve got evidence that is solid as fuck, along with equally airtight backup evidence.
I know that facial recognition identification from a sketch isn’t always one hundred percent correct. That said, there’s a big part of me that thinks Paula Nelson must be incorrect with her recollection of what her abductor looks like and what she passed along to the sketch artist. But, according the Jenny, the sketch matched David’s face with most of the s
ixty-eight facial markers used in the identification process.
Meaning my best friend is trafficking humans in an illegal sex trade and hiding it from me. Which I’d like to believe is unlikely. Or he’s got a doppelgänger here in the city that’s out doing nefarious deeds. Which is possible. Or the FBI facial recognition software is faulty. Which is highly improbable. Leaving the more likely scenario being that Paula’s recollection of what this guy looks like is faulty.
I bow my head and send a silent prayer to the powers-that-be to make it that last option.
“Well, hey Reed, I didn’t know you were here!”
I look up and see Quinn Foster coming toward me behind the bar.
“Hey Quinn, how’s it going?”
Instead of answering, she looks at my beer and says, “Drinking on a workday? Naughty boy. Do I need to punish you?”
I laugh. My dick jumps a bit at her calling me a naughty boy and asking if she needs to punish me. Especially when she’s leaning over the bar in that tank top—her breasts all pushed up and begging for attention. I like Quinn. It’s obvious she likes me. But she dated David a while back.
I don’t know for certain that it would upset him or that he’d even care. If I remember correctly, they only dated for a few months. He brought her to a BBQ I was at and she and I hit it off. It wasn’t until later that I realized she was his date and I backed way the fuck off. I know that was one of their first dates. I just don’t remember how long they’d been seeing each other, or how much longer after that they continued to see one another.
All of which makes it too complicated for me to date Quinn. I need things in my life to be orderly and that situation is anything but. Plus, she’s loud, while I’m quiet. And she’s a lot to handle, for lack of a better descriptor. I would bore her in a matter of weeks. Maybe even days.