Without any further hesitation, she left the bedroom.
***
The fire was dying out.
Although the living room was adopting a cool chill, he still made no moves to start another. Lost, deep in thought, he stood before the fireplace and watched the dying embers. Like them, wasn’t time and opportunity flickering out?
“How did I lose control of the situation? Things weren’t supposed to turn out like this. And why now?” he whispered in a low breath, shutting his eyes. But, still, he couldn’t block out his troubles. “…especially now…now when I have a chance to win her back…”
But, in light of things, how could he contemplate engaging in a deep relationship with her? Without a doubt, all the danger signs pointed directly at him, foretelling that he breathed nothing but dark trouble.
“Everything’s all fucked up.” The resurging bitterness stirred within him. “Why would I expect anything else? This is the way things are and always will be.”
At once, soft footsteps resounded.
Startled, he glanced towards the stairs.
As he turned and faced her fully, his heart leapt in his chest.
To no surprise, as always, she literally took his breath away.
She’d paused midway the stairwell.
Their eyes locked on instant cue.
Slowly, she made her descent.
With her every step, his breath lessened at the sight.
Damn, he swore under his breath.
As always, she was mega-fine…
She’d just showered.
The lasting mist from the water curled the hair about her head.
Her brown features were bare and flawless.
And the rest?
He swallowed an appreciative growl.
What could he say except that she was glorious?
From head to toe, she was all revealing.
The flimsy sheer white robe swathed her voluptuous shape, perfectly outlining every delicious curve. Beneath it, she wore nothing, he realized, resisting the urge to grab his crotch. Through the fabric, her budded nipples were perfectly imprinted, and her full breasts were akin to plump globes.
And down low, sweet goodness, he breathed inwardly with a sharp intake of breath. The fine hairs dusted her triangular mound and pricked against the sheerness.
Against his will, his eyes locked there.
How many times how he loved her there, right there in that sweet spot?
His eyes shot back to hers.
A steely determination burned in her brown eyes.
Fuck, get a grip, he warned himself and stiffened.
She wasn’t here for no love play, but war instead.
Geared for another heated verbal sparring match…
Well, he didn’t have time for that shit…
He tightened his jaw. “Bella, it’s late---”
“We need to talk.” Halting on the bottom stair, she eyed him silently for a moment. Then, straightening her shoulders, she marched on towards him. Once reaching him, she stopped, and a fierce look captured her already stormy features. Then, scowling, she glanced around the room quickly. “Where’s your shadow?”
“You mean Cassius?” he asked with a short laugh. “He left about a half hour ago.” He slid a quick glance over her. “Why?”
“Why? I’ll tell you why.” Tilting her chin, she crossed both arms along her chest again. “Because I don’t want any interruptions from him or anyone else…” She locked her jaw tighter and focused on him hard. “You and me, we’re going to talk.”
“So, talk.” Shrugging, he edged in the direction of the wet bar. But, she stayed him with a firm hand. His eyes dropped down to the hand on his elbow, and then back to hers. As they did, he was completely shaken by the fierceness inside of hers. A frustrated sigh left him along with a barely restrained curse. “Damn it, Bella. Can’t we just call a truce and not argue----”
“Why didn’t you tell me that Bingsby Smokes was dead?” she asked point blank. “Better yet, why don’t you tell me why you were involved with him to begin with?”
He barely spoke past the numbing shock. “How do you know about Smokes?”
“Is that really important?” she questioned with a scowl. “Or is it important that you’ve felt the need to shut me out completely on this topic?” Releasing him, she took a step back and surveyed him with a lost look. “I’m trying to understand you, Braden. But, you’re making things so hard and difficult---”
“Again, how did you find out about Smokes?” he demanded forcefully and stiffened. “Tell me now.”
“Since you’re so insufferably stubborn and secretive, I learned about him the hard way. There was a segment on the late news, and I saw him.” Her teary eyes clung to his. “Why didn’t you tell me that he was dead?”
Her direct words punched him the gut.
The guilt plagued him.
Even if he wanted, he couldn’t break their visual contact.
Don’t ask him why, but he just knew…
Everything, every fucking thing….hung on this taut moment…
“Why don’t you say what you really want to say?” he replied in a deadened tone, and fought to close off all feelings and emotions. Wasn’t that the instinctive way to survive? “Don’t hold back. Just say it out loud, Bella.”
This time, she hesitated.
Was it because she feared his answer, he mulled, heart dropping.
Did she really believe that he was that monstrous?
If she did, what right did he have to be angered?
Either way, he had to know.
Her solid basic belief system about him…
Her thoughts of who he was to the core…
What she believed about him or of him, he reasoned with a sinking heart.
In the end, through hell and high water, that’s what mattered…
“If I ask you, will you tell me the truth?” she whispered quietly, eyes glistening bright with fresh tears. Though, she bit her trembling lips, she couldn’t halt a sudden breathless sob. “Or will you try to evade the issue?”
“You can’t say it, can you?” Suddenly, his own eyes were misty and bright; and for some reason or another, he had no shame for the immediate sign of weakness. Before him, she was a watery blur, and suddenly, his stupid heart threatened to shatter into a million pieces. “Damn it, Bella---”
Her distraught whisper was low. “Please tell me the truth.”
“You think that I killed Bingsby Smokes---”
“Earlier, you were talking about someone suffering indirect consequences because of your actions…” Her tortured gaze kept his captured. “You were talking about him, weren’t you?”
His gaze didn’t waver. “Yes.”
“Please…tell me what happened…I need to know,” she whispered quietly, and a single tear fell before cascading along her silken cheek. “I need to know that everything that I feel in my heart and soul about you is true.” She grasped the front of the thin robe with a trembling hand. “My heart and soul….” Pausing on a tearful breath, she went on. “…they’re telling me that you’re not responsible for his death. Please tell me that I’m not wrong.”
Within the silence, he found composure.
He nearly dropped o the floor.
The steady and unwavering look in her eyes said everything.
She truly and really did believe in his innocence.
That was enough to free his caged soul.
“I didn’t kill him,” he confessed quietly. “I swear on my life that I didn’t.”
“I know you didn’t.” Shaking all over, she stepped closer and grabbed his hands. At her touch, an irrepressible tremor racked through them both at the contact. “If you’d just let me help you with this---”
“How can you help me, Bella?” he asked, exasperated, and once more, it felt like the walls were closing in. “Don’t you get it? I’m not the boy next door. I’m not the kind of man to take home to a family dinner. There’s nothing upstanding or disting
uished about me inwardly.” He stepped dangerously closer. “I’m a thug in a three-piece suit---”
“No, no, no, you’re not,” she shook her head adamantly. “I know what and who you are. You’re a kind, decent, and honorable man---”
“If that’s the case, why is there a dead man about to be six feet under, huh? Why isn’t Bingsby Smokes alive?” he demanded, growing angered, and dropped her hand quick. Frustrated, he took several steps back. “Why didn’t I make sure that all the loop holes were tied?”
“What loopholes?” Desperate herself, she edged closer. “Tell me what you’re talking about.”
“Enough---you can’t fix this!” Clenching both hands at his side, he forced himself to calm. The tension played in the self-grip, but his next words were carefully controlled and forthright. “This shit that I have going, it’s bigger than you. It’ll crush you alive, and you’d be sickened by the truth of it.”
“Then, tell me the truths so that I can understand it!” she argued, raking a hand through her mussed mane. Taking a sharp breath, she grasped her head for a fast moment and then released it. Her pointed stare became even that more determined and focused. “I keep asking for it, but you keep shutting me out.”
“I’m trying to protect you---”
“Stop protecting me! Alright!” Chest heaving, she dared him to look away. “I’m not some wilting wallflower that can’t take the truth. Have you forgotten how I’ve lived and walked the nightlife? I know what it’s like at Sinful Shades. I know the horrible things that happen there. Better yet, I live with a man whom you claim is a monster. That I do know.” She inhaled a wobbly breath. “So, please drop this idea that I can’t handle things.”
“No.” He shook his head fast. “You’re not getting involved---”
“Too late---I already am involved,” she interrupted quickly. “First of all, we spend a tremendous amount of time together, day in and day out. We work side by side…hell, we’re practically living together.”
“A temporary arrangement, right?” His eyes chilled. “I’m sure that you’ll bolt the minute Vitali returns.”
“That’s not the point, and you know it! Like always, you’re finding ways to evade the real issue, and I’m not going to let you do it any longer.” Slowly, she came up on him again, bringing them into closer proximity than was necessary. “Now, here’s the thing. Either you’re going to tell me what you had going with this Bingsby Smokes, or I’ll do some snooping and find out myself.” Her brown eyes issued a challenge. “Don’t underestimate me. Like you, I have channels, and you’d be surprised by the connections that I have. So, why not just save me all the trouble and tell me what’s going on?”
***
A long pause of silence came.
She held a pent-up breath.
Would he take the bait?
When he nipped it, she nearly wept with relief.
“Vitali’s been running a side operation,” he relayed quietly, turning away from her. Now, disgust played in his tone. “It’s an operation that’s deplorable, sick, and unforgivable. He’s been trafficking under-aged girls and college-aged women…”
The light bulb glowed in her head.
What, she mulled, mentally shell-shocked.
Braden was their elusive vigilante?
“……I’ll skip the sordid details because they’re too sickening to mention.” He turned and faced her, eyeing her with a renewed level of reservation. “Long story short, I thwarted his efforts and set things in motion. As of now, his operation has been shut down. Since then, things have happened---”
“What kinds of things---good or bad?” she asked with a bated breath.
“I’d say a good thing. No, let me change that. It was a helluva good thing. Good lives were spared, and the girls were saved. With all hope, they’ll have a happy ending,” he muttered with hopefulness, one that cooled immediately. “While that’s so, something drastic happened as well.”
“How did you manage it? I mean…” she mumbled, still partially shocked. “…how did you find out the location and everything?”
“I’m in charge of a multi-billion corporation for a reason.” His expression was serious and terse. “Over the years, I’ve made connections. Some of those connections are legitimate while others,” he paused thoughtfully, eyeing her close. “…are not so much.”
She gulped hard. “Of course, I understand that.”
“Anyway,” he sighed heavily. “A team was sent in. They did the job right, freed the girls…” He shrugged. “…the rest is history as they say.”
“I’m taking it that Bingsby headed this covert operation, then?”
“Yes, he did,” he nodded slowly. “Now, he’s dead as a result.”
“Guess the question is---who murdered him?” she frowned in careful thought. Gulping hard, she looked at him. “You have any idea on who it could possibly be?”
“I have some suspicions,” he alluded. “But, I can’t stake my life on it.”
And exactly who was the other player, she thought falling silent.
Without a doubt, it was someone close, someone already heavily involved.
“On the news, they mentioned that witnesses saw a large man,” she continued with a puzzled look. “That night when you left---is that where you went?”
“Yes, I went to Central. When I got there, Smokes was already dead. As soon as I alerted the authorities, I split.” Again, the open guilt played on his features. “Seeing as who I am---I knew that I’d be the first one that they’d suspect.”
“Exactly---with you being Vitali’s son, they’d condemned you at once.”
She blinked three times past her troubling thoughts.
Hadn’t she and the feds done the same?
Wasn’t that why she’d been initially tapped to seduce him and gain information? Instead, however, she’d fallen prey to her own trap.
“So, now what?” His gray eyes held apprehension. “Are you going to turn me? Are you going to call the cops?”
“No, I’m not. What reason would I have to? You didn’t kill Smokes. The circumstances between the two of you were less than ideal at the time of his murder. It’s a case of being caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.” She passed him a confused look. “But, again, why were you out there?”
“Smokes and I were making an exchange.” He bit back a curse. “But, someone intervened and stopped us before we could.”
“Namely, the person who murdered him.”
“You’re on point again.”
“Though some might find it unethical, you did the right thing by leaving. From my standpoint, it’s wrong for anyone to ever argue against self-preservation. Truth is, if you’d stayed and waited on the cops, they would have pinned it on you.” She firmed her lips in a thin line. “You were brokering a deal with Smokes. Their argument would have been that you double-crossed him, kept both the money and the evidence.” She released a pent-up sigh. “It’d pretty much been an open-shut case. They’d thrown the book away at you without a second thought.”
Giving a fast nod, he acknowledged her statement. “You said it first.”
“As for the exchange, what did Smokes have?”
“A flash drive containing information---information that’d end Vitali’s reign of terror for good…” He blew a frustrated breath. “And I know that’s something that you don’t want to hear.”
“So, you are out to destroy your father,” she murmured with pure amazement, and it seemed apparent joy, too. Quickly, she attempted to stifle the latter emotion. For if he witnessed it, wouldn’t he realize the truth? “That’s it, isn’t it?”
***
Frowning, he hesitated for a second.
Then, he held back a look of stunned surprise.
Why wasn’t she angry or upset with him?
Hadn’t he just delivered the confession of a lifetime---a confession that’d rip her so-called lover away from her forever? Yet, for a brief second, he’d glimpsed pure joy and relief
on her face.
But, why?
That was the million dollar question of the hour.
“It’s no secret that there’s no love lost between me and my old man. I’ve always made my abhorrence and distaste for him known,” he replied stiffly. “So, hopefully, you’re not surprised or stunned by this chain of events.” Stepping forward, he grasped her upper arms gently. “And I know that I’ve said it a thousand times, but you deserve better than him. Little by little, I’m going to prove that.”
“Can we not talk about my relationship with him, right now?” With reluctance, she pulled free of his hold. Then, as she combed a hand through her disheveled tresses, her distressed look met his. “Please.”
“Bella, we have to talk about this. If we don’t---”
“Please, no more.” Her look was pleading. “I don’t want to fight about him.”
“Okay,” he conceded with a curt nod. “We won’t talk about Vitali.”
As she grew further teary-eyed, he felt like a complete heel.
“Hey, why the tears?” he asked with sudden concern. “Talk to me.”
“I’m afraid for you.” She hastily brushed a tear from her cheek. “Afraid of what’ll happen when the feds find out.” A desperate look covered her features. “Why can’t they see the man that I see? Damn it, Braden, we have to fix this.”
“Hey, come here,” he soothed, hugging her close, and her body trembled uncontrollably against his. The instinctive reaction only made him hold her tighter. “Nothing is going to happen to me, alright? Vitali and the feds…they don’t know what I’m onto.” Pulling back, he grasped her face between his hands. “And I promise you, I’m going to stay one step ahead of them---all the way.” He hugged her close again, and his words were muffled against her head. “Just trust that.”
Her body went rigid against his. “Are there anymore secrets?”
He stiffened. “Why are you asking?”
“The night that I left…” Her words were muffled against his chest. “…I heard you and Cassius talking.”
“What?” he asked and pulled back. “You heard us?”
“Cassius said something that troubled me,” she confessed, and her brown eyes roamed over his face. “He was talking about burying a dead body---”
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