by A. J. Lape
Dylan inhaled even deeper and kissed me on top of my head. “Not physically, but mentally I will be with you every step of the way.”
As if the powers of darkness longed to twist the screw, Dylan’s phone rang. Fishing it out of his pocket, he glanced at the number and sent it to VM with a frown. I knew who it was—an agent, and her name was Jackson Callahan. Dylan could speak to agents, which he didn’t relish doing, because just the suspicion of an indiscretion could cause problems. Technically, he couldn’t sign with an agency or even have an oral agreement until the last game of his college career. Jackson Callahan, however, wanted Dylan more than she wanted her next breath and regularly pushed the boundaries to make it known. I’d seen them together, and if she could slide a ring on his twenty-year-old finger…she would.
“Darc?” he murmured. His fingers ghosted oh so lightly across my skin.
“Yeah, kimosabi?” I mumbled.
“To prove my point, you’re also worried about agents calling me.”
With Dylan I’d always been one hundred percent walls down, but regarding Jackson…I couldn’t. So I left my reply open-ended. “There are days the changes in our lives bother me.”
“It shouldn’t. It’s merely a part of the process, and if you feel left out, I’m feeling the same thing. You’ve trained so hard. I long to experience firsthand the good days, the bad days, the days where you need someone to rub your feet, but I have to leave all that to my grandparents. But here’s what I know for certain…your mind is like a steel trap, and you have an unbelievable and unmatched work ethic. You’re not only going to succeed. You’ll be at the top of your class. Opportunities come to those who are prepared.”
Dylan’s voice was thick and deep…and full of conviction.
The longer I’d lived on this Earth, the more I realized things didn’t always work out the way you’d hoped. Me and that sh*t-happens quadrant unfortunately were intimately familiar.
Dylan and I had breakfast with Lincoln and Raymond. Both wanted a blow-by-blow account of last night’s events with Lincoln saying he would phone Battle to get the details surrounding the John Doe we discovered. After we’d eaten, Lincoln and Raymond quote-unquote went for a drive. I’d found through the years that “going for a drive” was code in the family for dispensing private gossip or enduring a butt chewing. Regarding Lincoln and Raymond, God only knew where the conversation was headed, but there was a pretty good chance it included Domino and Boozy…with Lincoln brokering some peacekeeping before civil war erupted. While the rest of the family caught some morning sunshine outdoors, Domino and Remy emerged from the hallway and sauntered toward the kitchen table, wearing sweats and T-shirts…together. As in together-together.
Holding hands.
Hushed voices.
With an afterglow bright enough to heal the blind.
Dylan shot to a stand, thinking both had gotten a little too cozy for two people who’d just met. “What the hell, Domino?” he spat.
Domino dropped Remy’s hand. “Nothing happened. I swear it,” he vowed.
Dylan’s scowl deepened. “Awfully chummy for two people who’ve barely known one another twelve hours.”
Remy thread her fingers inside Domino’s, covering them protectively with her other hand. “Dylan’s a little territorial, Nicholas. It’s sort of his thing, but since you’re being all nosy, Dylan, we talked until three a.m. I’m not sure who nodded off first. Nicholas or me.”
She’d first-named him. They’d sailed right past his street name to this-is-who-I-really-am territory. Huh. This should be interesting.
Domino’s eyes drifted to his feet, then shyly slid his gaze to Remy’s. “It was you,” he told her, “but you were holding my hand, and I didn’t want to wake you. Or hurt your feelings. We just…you were so nice,” he blurted. “I’m sorry if staying was the wrong call.”
Domino’s face was usually unreadable—only blatantly hostile when called for—but he and I had been in enough dogfights for me to recognize what a lack of words or facial expressions meant. His eyes were soft when they fell on Remy, and whatever had been spoken between them had ignited a part of him he might not have known existed. We’d never talked about his mother or where she was, but Domino was soft and cuddly when a girl needed him to be.
When Dylan clocked on Domino’s sincerity, the third-degree treatment softened. Dylan seated himself at a nearby chair and grabbed a sneaker underneath the table, untying the strings. “Okay, man. I can see you’re totally hypnotized by the little Brazilian bombshell. I get it, but Remy’s not the type of girl to just take a guy into her bed, yeah? There’s a tender heart underneath that the guys and I have looked out for. She’s put up with our outbursts and hung with us for the last couple of years, dating no one. She even stays with Willow here during the summer. Again…dating no one,” he emphasized.
Heck, he might’ve growled.
“She told me,” Domino said, “and I’d never disrespect Remy. Raymond and Lincoln were with us for most of the night. We ordered Chinese.”
That I believed without verification. Lincoln loved Chinese takeout. “Domino said he didn’t do anything, D. Give him a break,” I said softly.
Dylan’s jaw clenched and released. He shoved his foot in one tennis shoe, laced it up, and pulled on the other. He’d changed into shorts earlier because we were going for a run. For no good reason other than I was hyper and needed to get rid of some excess energy. “Darcy seems to have explicit faith in you, Domino. The moment that changes?” he said. “Just know the little scuffle I had last night with York was only the opening act.”
Remy scoffed, but there was some humor in her eyes. “Don’t be so judgy, Dylan,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “It wasn’t like you didn’t have an early morning visit with Darcy.”
My self-control was in production. Dylan wasn’t much better.
Dylan frowned. “What are you talking about?” he asked, tying the last string.
“Us. On the floor,” I said. “You got pretty loud. And chatty. Scripting where you wanted things to go.”
He snorted. “I did not.”
“Did too,” I mumbled. And it included some major man-to-man coverage.
Dylan threw his head back, giggling in a loud burst and shrugging it off. Mercy, the guy was never embarrassed. “Well, every ragged breath and sound was merely an extension of my gratitude, sweetheart.”
“Yeah, we heard,” Remy explained, giggling in a throaty laugh. “I switched on my television, so no one would hear you…you know, not doing anything.”
My face burned with mortification. “Mother Mary,” Dylan prayed. “We didn’t do anything bad, okay?” he said, pushing himself to a stand. “And don’t change the subject, Remy.”
“It’s okay,” Domino said. “Message received. And I respect it.”
Dylan might like to protect the women in his life, but I wanted to protect Domino. If I had to come down on a side, it would be his instead of Remy’s. By the scrutinizing gaze of Dylan, my actions startled him. I gave Domino a big hug, and by the bleary look in his eyes, I knew he probably hadn’t slept a wink, wondering if someone would walk in and bust things up—thinking the worst of him. “Domino would never hurt anyone,” I said. “Ever,” and I slid my eyes to Remy, telling her she’d better not work her model-face and body mojo on him and break his heart. One glance at Remy’s face, though, and she stared at Domino as though he were her new North Star.
Ah, love. It’s great until someone or something screws it up.
“Secret’s safe here, man,” Dylan told him, “but you’d better hope Colton doesn’t find—”
“Colton doesn’t find what?” Dylan’s father said when he entered the room with Pixie and his lookalike sister, Willow. Despite the muscle and one-hundred-pound difference, Colton and Willow could be twins, especially since Willow wore her hair in a sophisticated boy-cut.
Domino’s eyes bugged out of his head when they entered the kitchen. Remy, however, was smoother than silk. �
��Good morning, Colton,” she said, slinking forward and hugging him.
Dylan’s father was an imposing man, thick-muscled and six foot three. A former police officer—who occasionally ran vice stings—he left the profession before he’d truly gotten started when his partner shot him in the back. The sordid details of why he’d truly walked away from the badge only became open knowledge in the last few years—for fear Lincoln’s grandchildren would worry too much about him. I wasn’t exactly quite sure why that had been such a secret. Lincoln had new scars all the time from well-documented and sometimes publicized shootings. Whether that had been right or wrong, Colton landed on his feet, scoring Willow her first modeling contract with Go Glam!. Since his negotiation skills had been top-notch, the organization then offered him a job where he became the youngest vice president of sales in the history of the company. He’d recently transferred from that post and headed up their division on fraud containment and global relations.
Chasing thieves. Back to carrying a gun. Some never truly walked away from it.
I understood the pull.
Colton wrapped his bulky arms around Remy, kissing her on the forehead. “Why don’t you boys ever greet me like this? Only the girls are sweet. You boys just take, take, take…and then mouth off and get in fights in bars.” He gave Dylan a teasing side-eye, accompanied with a snort. We’d told him the story, and not surprisingly, he was pleased Dylan had the last word. Dylan had more than the last word though—he endured one heckuva butt-reaming from Matt Mcguire, his defensive coordinator, while we drove back to Orlando. It had been so chockful of profanity, threats, and interspersed prayers I wasn’t positive if God was in the delivery or if it had been straight from the Devil. There had been no 411 on how the scheduled meeting with York and the coaches had gone. I found that sign enough York was in massively hot water since Dylan had not been ordered to attend. It also suggested York could have had some other complaints leveled against him we weren’t privy to.
“Are you girls all right?” Colton said, glancing to me. “Even Will and Pix needed some extra love this morning.”
I eyeballed Pixie who was as devious and happy as ever, bouncing up on the balls of her bare feet. By the panicked look on Willow’s face, though, I knew she had some secrets. Normally, I’d pull her aside and grill her until she broke, but my cell phone dinged with a text. While everyone rallied with talks of travel plans for the day, I snagged my iPhone from the table and focused on the number that had prank-dialed me the day before. My lungs tightened in my chest when my brain caught up with the words.
Maybe we should talk, it said. Murder is such a subjective thing.
Chapter 9
BEING THAT DETAILED HAD PLACED A BULL’S EYE ON MY CHEST.
By the time I made it back to the West Coast late Sunday evening, whoever-the-psycho-was had lit up my phone four more times. Four times I answered, and four times I scored the same mute treatment.
Stupid Sargent, I thought. I hadn’t spoken about murder with anyone else. Whenever my life went sideways, there was one man who righted my trajectory—Kellan Sutherland, better known by the moniker of Jaws to the Cincinnati underbelly of crime lords.
Jaws and I had struck up an unlikely alliance during my high school years. He helped me uncover and disband a gang at Valley High, and when I tracked an identity thief later that year, he sent a man in a yellow Dodge Charger to play Batman when the thugs tried to off me at work. Turned out that man was his brother, and his brother even helped rescue me when I’d been kidnapped. To compound the weird, Jaws and his brother both had relationships with my aunt and deceased mother. Relationships that were still as murky as the Ohio River during flood season. What I’d found with Jaws, though, was that I oftentimes was on a need-to-know basis. Not surprising, since his brother worked for some top-secret government agency…while Jaws fell more along the lines of the anti-hero.
All I knew was you didn’t mess with Kellan Sutherland.
He remembered things that hadn’t even happened yet.
While I scrubbed my teeth, I texted him, providing an abbreviated version of the prank phone calls and screenshots of the text message. When he didn’t answer, I grew impatient and FaceTimed, not caring it was well past midnight in Cincinnati, Ohio. “Did you get my text?” I asked, spitting froth into the sink.
“I’m in the middle of something,” he murmured in a deep bass voice. With hypnotic whiskey-colored eyes and thick brown hair, Jaws was shirtless—his massive, dark-skinned muscles on display. My heart jumped in my chest. He might be mob, but he was gorgeous mob. And slightly less criminal-y when half naked.
He paused our video session, presumably to scroll through my request.
Sticking my head under the faucet for a quick drink, I snatched the towel from the vanity and wiped my mouth. “See what I need?” I said when his face materialized again. “If it’s who I think it is, the guy’s a real weirdo. Smells like cancer sticks and sexual frustration. He’s called me—"
“No need to narrate, Jester,” he said, calling me by my nickname. “I have eyes. So you just need a name?”
“…Baby? Did you hear me?” I heard in the background.
Jeez, another new voice. Jaws had an assembly line of women who regularly revolved in and out of his life. This woman’s voice was seductive and as smooth as silk. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard his partners use the B-word either. Was the term a personal request or a woman’s go-to phrase for her sexy-time partner?
My hopes of discovery unfortunately died on that bearskin rug in O-Town.
“Hey, I can see you’re busy,” I said quickly. Feeling the wall and furniture with one hand, I slowly advanced to the bedroom since I’d already removed my contacts. Finding half a Hershey’s bar on my nightstand, I shoved a bite in my mouth, chewed, and swallowed.
“You just brushed your teeth,” he murmured.
“Sometimes I mess up the sequence of things,” I said as an explanation. Jaws raised a brow, an undercurrent of the way I lived my life swirling between us. “Just get me the name of who owns that number, please? Tomorrow’s my day-one of the rest of my life, and I’m exhausted just thinking about it.”
“Babe, again,” he emphasized, “for the millionth time, please, please move back home and work for me.”
I wasn’t sure how Jaws managed to look sexy and villainous at the same time…but he did. Ignoring the job offer as I routinely did, I gave him a pinky wave, slid under the covers, and powered down.
I remembered the first day of kindergarten vividly. My mother made pancakes. Far from a Cooking Channel masterpiece, she’d somehow burned the edges while the middle was raw, gooey dough. After I’d choked them down, we loaded into the car, and I talked nonstop—how I would meet great friends, be the class president if they had one, and would cure the common cold given the right teacher and patient to experiment on.
It was Monday morning—my first official day at the academy—and the last thing on my mind was being the class standout. Right then, I simply wanted to blend in. I checked my appearance in the mirror in the bathroom, wearing a navy suit and pants with a long-sleeved white shirt buttoned to the top. My hair was pulled back into a tight bun, lying at my nape. I looked like a seriously uptight—and slightly deranged—tax attorney. After I stooped down and gave my boxer, Lucky, a big hug and kiss, I made my way outside and thought about Clyde Sargent. The man had somehow gotten my digits and dropped a bombshell semi-confession that the so-called hunting accident we’d spoken of might not have been such an accident. With him not willing to do anything but taunt me, I was left with no other recourse than to wait for verification from Jaws and get on with the day. But if Sargent was innocent of wrongdoing and contacting me had merely been a weak attempt at forming a relationship—or worse yet, an eventual social media booty call—he needed to work on his technique.
Speaking with him—beyond the normal niceties—had swung the bell curve of wisdom way toward the stupid range. Unfortunately, life had a tende
ncy of pushing me toward trouble even when I tried to avoid it.
Sliding into the seat of my pearl-white Toyota 4Runner, I reached over my shoulder and clicked my seatbelt while Lincoln strode toward my open door, telling me he would text later to see how things were going. A striking man in a red power tie, he stood four inches or so taller than me with graying temples on mahogany-brown hair. My boyfriend resembled his grandfather. On days like today, that was a tough pill to swallow.
“You’re going to be brilliant, dear,” he said, giving me a cup of coffee he’d poured in my bogus YETI. “The first day…it’s going to be hard, yeah? There’s going to be some weeding out right away. There’s going to be a lot of yelling. Things that would make you punch someone in any other setting. Get into formation quickly…left foot first when you march. Don’t lock your knees. Don’t look around. Once you make it inside the classroom, be prepared for a lot of paperwork and introductions. When I say it’s going to come at you fast, prepare yourself to not look frazzled. Try to size up the crowd, yeah? You know I believe the LAPD is the best there is or I wouldn’t be here, but I still want you to case the room—particularly the recruits. See who they are. How they think. What they do. Who can be a confidante…and conversely, who might not be as serious as you are.”
“Like anything,” Alexandra added, “there are always some assholes.”
Isn’t there always? I thought.
“Lord,” Lincoln prayed, throwing his arm around her petite shoulders. Dressed in dark jeans and the white chef shirt she wore daily to her family bakery, Alexandra Taylor had the type of face to launch a thousand ships. With black hair and even blacker eyes, she smoldered like a siren. She and Lincoln were relationship goals. They’d been married forty-plus years and still acted like newlyweds.
“It’s true, Linc,” she said, gazing up into his eyes, “and you know it. You’re being too diplomatic, and diplomacy is overrated.”