Jade (The Kings of Guardian Book 9)

by Kris Michaels

  "Nope." Her mom popped the 'p' in the word. She'd always done it when she was making a point. Hell, every woman in the family did that when they were making a point.

  Jade blew on the hot liquid in her cup and tried to resist the pull to ask her mom what she meant. She made it a full thirty seconds before she caved. "Fine. Go ahead, tell me."

  "You don't want to know what I think." Her mom smiled and drew her finger around the rim of her cup. "But I'll tell you a secret. Over forty years ago, your dad held me, and he told me that I would always have a safe place in his arms. I believed him, and I will never regret the time that I spent feeling safe, protected, cherished… loved."

  But he died. He wasn't there to take care of you or us. We weren't safe or protected. Of course, Jade didn't say any of that. She wouldn't do that to her mom. She couldn't tell her mother that as a young child she felt angry and abandoned. Her dad had died. He wasn't supposed to leave her. How could she feel safe? Even now, when she thought about losing him, the immense void left after her dad's death threatened to swallow her up. She wished she could remember the good times, but the fact was she was still mad at her father. She'd loved him desperately growing up. He was her idol, her hero, and she did everything to make him proud of her. Everything. Every night when he tucked her in, he promised he'd protect her and take care of her, forever. And then he was murdered by a waste of sperm who didn't deserve to live. She'd believed her daddy. She'd never doubted that he would be there forever… until he wasn't.

  Loving people made you vulnerable to unimaginable pain, and as she watched them lower her dad's casket into the ground, she swore she would never depend on anyone else to make her feel safe. She would never trust in promises that couldn't be kept. The world knew an irreverent, impulsive Jade, a woman in search of a good time, and that was the image the world would continue to see. Her "acting out" had those closest to her wondering which screw was loose, but her uncensored behavior kept those who sought to be close to her at arm's length. He wasn't there to take care of you or us. We weren't safe or protected. No, she couldn't speak those words and admit the pain she held inside her. Instead, she took a moment to swallow the bitter feelings and a sip of cocoa.

  Finally, she managed a shrug. "Yeah, and that was after you dated all through high school. It was after you graduated he asked you to marry him, right?" Jade couldn't find a parallel between her mom and dad's long, loving relationship and a single night of great sex with Nic. Hell, it wasn't even an entire night, it was two hours in the sack. Tops.

  "True, but the idea is the same. We all need a safe place, a place where we can be vulnerable." Her mom lifted her eyes and cocked her head giving Jade an assessing look. "When was the last time you let yourself be vulnerable with a man?"

  Jade snorted. Yeah, about an hour ago. She'd let her guard down and fucked it all up by letting the man she was with see it. "I don't know." It was a bald-faced lie, but she was damn good at telling people what they wanted to hear.

  "Maybe you should try it sometime? I promise it won't hurt near as bad as you're imagining." Her mom stood and took her cup over to the sink pouring the majority of the beverage out. She turned around and stopped to kiss the top of Jade's head. "You'd be surprised what a difference letting someone in your life will make. Stop pushing so hard, sweetheart. You may push away the one who could make you happy."

  Jade leaned back in her chair and listened to her mom go back to the guest room. Oh, it would hurt. Of that, she had no doubt. Letting people see you vulnerable was nothing but an invitation for the assholes in the world to kick you in the teeth. No, there was no way she'd ever let anyone get that close. Especially not when there were so many men willing to keep it casual. When it came to relationships, Jade was all about casual, and fun, and absolutely no commitments. Life was one huge smorgasbord of delectable men, and Jade wanted to sample each offering.

  She sighed at the unwanted feelings of discord Nic DeMarco had stirred. All she'd wanted tonight was a little fun and an orgasm. She had the orgasm. Jade smiled despite herself. She had two stupendously satisfying orgasms. Hell, she could validate the reputation Nic had earned. Punch his ticket girls; the man had sexual skills. He was remarkably talented in bed, and his body was a fucking playground that consisted of hard muscles, strong arms, and a sex-fueled libido that very few of her previous partners had ever surpassed.

  Pushing those thoughts from her head, Jade moved her attention from her cocoa cup to her phone. There was only one thing to do. She picked up her phone and tapped out texts to her friends in Manhattan, and one to her brother, Justin. She needed a place to crash in the city. Justin had a sick apartment overlooking Central Park. Maybe she'd even luck out, and he'd be in town. She hadn't seen him in… hell, well it was too fucking long if she needed to think about it. Tomorrow night was girl's night out and then Monday she'd hop up to NYC and blow off some steam. Who the fuck needed Nicolas DeMarco? Not. Her.

  She jumped when her phone suddenly vibrated. It was almost two in the morning. She hadn't really expected an answer from anyone. She picked it up and smiled. It was a text from Justin.

  Justin:> I'll be in town, guest room is yours.

  > :>) B there Monday. YU awake?

  Justin:> 6 a.m. in London.

  > YRU in London?

  Justin:> New restaurant.

  > No shit? How many now? 12?

  Justin:> Something like that. CU Monday.

  > Can't wait.

  Jade grabbed the phone and stood up. What she needed right now was a shower and some sleep. She took a deep breath, rolled her shoulders, and made a resolute decision. Life was way too much fun to let the careless words of one man disrupt her Zen.

  The phone skittering across his nightstand pulled him from a dead sleep. Nic slapped at the offending object and pulled it toward him. He swiped the face without looking at who was calling.

  "What?" He croaked the demand not giving a shit who was calling. It had taken far too long to fall asleep after Jade left. He was tired. Capital T and it was Saturday for fuck's sake. Unless the cases they'd been working on were falling apart, nobody should be calling, especially at the fucking ass crack of dawn.

  "Nicolas Giovanni Constantino DeMarco is that anyway to answer a phone? I think I taught you better manners." His mother's voice lanced through his hostile attitude.

  "Ma, it's early. Zombies are probably still patrolling the streets." Nic rolled onto his back and inhaled a soft whiff of Jade's perfume that lingered on the sheets. He groaned, not wanting to rehash the evening's events again. He'd spent more than enough time last night wondering about the fallout.

  "No, all the undead have retreated for the day. It's almost ten in the morning. Why haven't you been taking my calls? It isn't like I call just to bother you."

  "Ha! Yes, yes, you do, Ma." Nic belted out the comment and chuckled at his mom's laughter.

  "Well, maybe I do, but it's only because I don't get to see you enough. Mario and Carmine are going to be available next week. Take a couple days off and come up here. I want to have dinner with my sons and my docket after next week is insane."

  "Yeah? You telling me the criminals in your district aren't behaving?" Nic sat up in bed, threw two pillows against the headboard, leaned back, and got comfortable. His mom could talk the bark off trees, and it was Saturday, so he wasn't going to get her off the phone with an excuse about work.

  The evil laugh she gave him put a smile on his face. The Honorable Bettina Giada Isadora DeMarco, Federal Judge of the Southern District of New York, wasn't someone you wanted to face in a courtroom if you were a criminal or a defense attorney that didn't know what the fuck you were doing. The woman's mind was sharper than a rapier. She didn't put up with any bullshit in her courtroom. She earned her reputation as a judge you shouldn't fuck with.

  "It wouldn't be so bad if it was just m
y case load, but Judge Salisbury recused himself from a case the Appellate Court remanded back to District, and now I'm stuck with it. Silas and I had to juggle all my other cases so I could hear a case that has already been tried, all because Salisbury won't be able to hear the case."

  "What is it about?"

  "Oh you know, the usual: greed, crime, corruption, murder, and something else, but I can't remember what." That answer waved a red flag under his nose so hard he sat up in bed.

  "Hold on a second. There has never been a case in which you couldn't recall the particulars. What's the case, Ma?" Nic got that hot pinched feeling in his gut, the one that told him shit wasn't adding up.

  "Well, you've heard about the RICO case involving the Triad that happened about four months ago?"

  "Yeah, it involved the Shāshǒu de Yīnyǐng Clan right?" Hell, Nic followed the case because Guardian had been involved with another branch of the Triad in California, but they weren't able to pull a RICO on the members, and most of them walked. RICO cases, or Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organization cases, allowed the federal government to prosecute the leader of the organization for crimes he ordered but did not personally commit. From what he recalled, the leader of the Shāshǒu de Yīnyǐng didn't have a chance in hell because the FBI had done one hell of a job. He heard about it from Cole Davis, Guardian's pseudo-liaison to the FBI. He was actually one hell of a decent guy and on a trajectory to make it to the top of that agency.

  "Yep. Well, that's mine now."

  Nic winced at his mom's words. Making key people, like judges, disappear was a hallmark identifier of the Triad.

  "Has it been announced yet?" Nic threw the sheets off and strode naked through his bedroom into his office. Flipping the light switch, he padded to the computer. He turned it on and started the log on process to the Guardian Server.

  "Not officially. But the clerks know, and you know how juicy stuff like this spreads."

  "Like wildfire." Nic knew it only too well. He and his brothers had lived his mother's career with her. All three of her sons had gone to law school. Carmine and Mario were in practice together in Manhattan. Their firm was immensely successful. Nic had taken an alternate route after he passed the New York Bar. He took a job on the Washington D.C. police force. He wanted to see the criminal world from the bottom up. At the time, he wanted to be a criminal defense attorney, and he wanted to know the process better than any other lawyer did. He needed to understand how and why the cops bent the rules and regulations to suit themselves. Boy did he get his pious, preconceived notions-along with his ass-handed to him on a silver platter. Over and over and over again. His Ivy League education had fed him a crock of shit, and he'd believed it until he'd seen the war going on between the criminals and law enforcement. Moreover, it was a war. Classifying it as anything less was a gross misperception.

  "Yeah, so I'm sure the people who are listening to the gossip know. But that case doesn't come home to roost for another week, so in the meantime, I want to get my sons together and go to dinner."

  Nic watched the screen of his computer as it went through its log on process. "What? You're not going to make me my favorite manicotti?" Nic laid that unapologetic whine out there, as he always did.

  "Of course I will, but one night you and your brothers will take me out to a nice place. I want atmosphere and someone else doing the cooking and dishes."

  "Ma, you just want to grill us on our love lives," Nic chided her. If she had them at a restaurant, they couldn't get up from the table and leave. Well, they could, but Bettina DeMarco didn't raise stupid boys.

  "And what's wrong with that, Nico?"

  He smiled at his mom's use of his nickname. His father had named him after his childhood friend, so he was Nicolas instead of Nico, but his family had always called him Nico.

  "Ma, I'm forty. I think you'd know by now I'm a confirmed bachelor." He typed in his password and pulled up his schedule for the next week. God, it was a fucking zoo.

  "You are only as old as you feel, Nico, and you still have time to get married and give me a grandbaby or twenty."

  "Twenty, Ma? Not asking much, are you?"

  "Nah, knowing what I know about you and your brothers, you enjoy the practicing part of making a baby all too well. Now you need to get busy with the actual baby production."

  "Jesus, Ma." Nic felt his face flush with heat. She didn't pull any punches.

  "Do not take the Lord's name in vain, Nico. It wasn't like you boys were inventive when you hid your condoms or dirty books."

  "Ma, seriously, you need to change the subject!" Nic closed his eyes and groaned the words. How did she always make him feel like he was thirteen-year-old?

  "Point in fact, I wasn't the one who brought the subject up; it was you. Not my fault I followed the trail of evidence." The mirth in her voice was the only thing that stopped him from ramming a pen through his eye. Sometimes talking to his mother was an act of insanity. He loved her to death, but she was a force of nature when she latched onto a subject.

  "Why don't you date that nice girl I talked to yesterday? She sounded pretty, and she had a sense of humor. None of your other assistants sounded like they had a brain in their head."

  "What are you talking about, Ma? How can anyone sound pretty?" His gut pinched again. Until this second, he'd forgotten his mom had talked to Jade yesterday.

  "She was like a breath of fresh air. Nico, that woman laughed, I mean actually laughed, not the pretend tittering of all your other temps. When is your regular assistant coming back to work? She's very nice, too."

  "And very married. She's on maternity leave, Ma. I don't know when she'll be back. I assume she'll show up when she's ready. What days are Carmine and Mario free?" He needed to divert her attention and quick.

  "Carmine is back in town on Tuesday so any day after that. Does this mean you're going to try to come up?" The hopeful sound of his mom's voice made him feel like shit for not going home more often, but life has a way of making best intentions look like bullshit excuses.

  "Yeah, I need to call my partner, and his secretary will need to take a look at both of our schedules, but I'll be home this coming week. I'll even make the reservations for Friday night. I know a guy." He hit his contact list on the screen in front of him and scrolled down to Justin King's personal cell phone number. One of the perks of knowing the King family was having access to the friends and family seating at Justin's Michelin three star restaurants.

  "As long as it isn't owned by organized crime, I'm game." His mom's reply should have been funny, but there were at least twenty restaurants that she couldn't go to due to known or suspected ties to organized crime."

  "Guaranteed no affiliation, and I know the owner." Nic typed out a text to Jason and hit send.

  "Thanks, and Nico?"

  "Yeah?"

  "I don't mean to be a nag. I love you. I want to see you happy, to have what your dad and I had." Her soft voice echoed with loneliness. She'd dated occasionally but never found anyone after his dad had passed. She'd told him once she'd lost half her soul when his dad died. He couldn't imagine loving a person that much, but it was obvious that his mom and dad had been each other's world.

  "I know, Ma. I know." Nic cleared his throat and his gaze bounced around the room as if the act would clear the emotion that dangled between them. He didn't do emotion well, which is why the angsty bullshit from last night had driven him insane until the early hours of the morning. "I'll see you soon, yeah?"

  "Good. Love you, Nico."

  "Love you too, Ma." He ended the call and glanced at his schedule again. Fuck, it wasn't going to be easy to extract himself with all the cases that had dropped out of the sky and stacked like pancakes on top of their normal workload, but he needed to make it work. Hell, he hadn't requested a vacation day in years. Maybe it was about time.

  Chapter Nine

 
Jade stood outside on Justin's balcony. The summer heat had dipped because of a massive thunderstorm earlier in the evening. The noise and bustle of New York faded beneath her. The apartment she remembered had doubled in size. Her brother had bought the unit next to his and knocked down walls. The interior was a marvel of masculine design-dark woods, leather, chrome and smoked glass. Things that shouldn't go together seemed to merge seamlessly. The paintings on the walls were obviously originals, but Jade had no idea who painted the canvases, and if Jason had told her the names, she still wouldn't have a clue if she should be impressed or not. The art was nice to look at, and they made the apartment feel like a home. She took a drink of the very old scotch that she'd found sitting on one of the shelves of his grandiose bar. The subtle lighting on the marble and ornately carved wood held more bottles than most downtown bars. She slid open a pair of beautiful double doors and marveled at the wine collection. A glass face to the chamber hidden behind the doors was something she wouldn't touch because, although she didn't know much about wine, she did know these bottles were priceless. Her brother Justin was pure class, through and through. Of course, that meant their personalities were polar opposites, and maybe that was why they got along so well. Justin had always been a loner, quiet and studious. He observed more than participated. His interests lay in things she couldn't or didn't want to understand-things like ballet, opera, art, and of course, food. He could talk for hours about priceless sculptures, the exhibits at the Louvre, or the latest scandal in the highest social circles. He'd obtained the rank of Master Sommelier, a three year endeavor she'd never dream of trying to achieve. Justin could tell you where wine was grown by tasting it. He was never wrong, and her family had tried countless times to stump him. She never imagined him as a millionaire executive while they were growing up, but he wore the mantle the same way he wore his bespoke suits. Perfectly.