Before I hear whatever bullshit reply she has, I grab my guitar and start for the stage. By the end of the night, I’ll find a way to make her lower her guard enough to let me all the way in.
* * *
All night long, an unusually hollow look haunted Taya’s face as she played. By the time we’ve packed up for the night, I’m burning to get to the bottom of whatever truth she’s hiding. She’s handing the last of the drums to Vaughn out back when I slip in behind her with the stealth I learned training with the SEALs. I grab onto her hips, pressing my lips to her ear. Her breaths turn fast and tight. The combined odor of our sweat and her lingering vanilla perfume makes for an intoxicating blend that gets my dick painfully hard.
“You and me are gonna have words,” I hiss. “We can do it here or, we can go somewhere private. Either way, it’s happening.”
I’m surprised as shit when she relaxes against my hold, practically sliding down to the ground. I move a hand around to her flat belly to hold her up, lightly brushing my fingertips over the ring in her bellybutton. Whatever’s going on, she’s desperate for comfort.
With a slow, steadying breath, she slips a quivering hand over mine. “It has to be somewhere…discreet.”
Twisting my fingers around hers, I pull her away, lifting my chin in Vaughn’s direction. Eyes stone-hard and locked with mine, he replies with a terse nod. He knows I won’t give in until things with Taya are right again.
She’s quiet as I lead her across the street to my Harley. First time I took her for a ride, I didn’t bother telling her what to do. Girls as hard as her have seen and done it all. Once again, she climbs onto the seat behind me, settling in with her hands tucked between her bare thighs like she’s done it a hundred times.
“Hold the fuck on,” I snarl over my shoulder. Kills me enough the way it is that she’s half naked and not wearing protective gear.
As soon as she’s curled around me, hands resting beneath my pecs, I peel out into the street. I’m calmed by her tempting curves pressing into my back as cool air blasts my face. Maybe we still stand a chance. At least she didn’t run.
A few miles later, I take one of her slender hands in mine and bring it to my lips. Haven’t felt this protective about a woman since Cali died. I’d walk through fire to keep Taya safe. Whatever the cost, I sense she’s worth it.
I drive past the South Side limits until we’re in a smaller, middle-class suburb. I’ve driven past the rundown motel on the far side of the little town enough times to know it’ll offer the kind of seclusion Taya requested. Before I’ve extended the kickstand and parked the bike, Taya’s off and headed toward the office. I shuffle in after her in time to see the smirking perv behind the desk handing her an old-school key, slimy tongue wagging across his teeth. Before I can throw punches, Taya takes my hand and drags me out.
We don’t say a word as she unlocks the door on the far end of the L-shaped building. The room’s dark, musty, and painfully outdated, but relatively neat and clean. Taya locks the door behind us, peering out behind the lone curtain before spinning around to face me, hand on one hip.
“What’s your involvement with Jonathan Bentley?”
What the actual fuck?
I drop down on the bed, parting my lips to spew a response, but whatever answers I could form stick to my throat. Of all the ways this conversation could’ve started, I wasn’t even remotely prepared for it to be about that prick.
How much does she know, and why’s she asking?
“Trent, I need to know.”
Looking up at her, everything comes to a different light. Her impatient tone. Her demanding expression. The way she waits with an authoritative stance.
This isn’t the Taya I know.
Every talk we’ve had, every sexual encounter flickers through my mind.
She was on me like glue from the very start.
I didn’t bat an eye, didn’t question it.
I’ve been duped by a hot piece of ass.
“Who the fuck are you?” I snarl, bracing my fists against my sides, waiting for the ball to drop.
Standing unnaturally still, her gaze holds mine as the truth spews from her savory lips. “I’m…a detective…for the South Side PD—at least I was until this moment. Blowing my cover will probably cost me my career.”
My lungs pinch painfully hard.
She’s a fucking cop?
No idea what my intentions are when I shoot to my feet. All I know is the room’s too small for the both of us, and my heart’s been ripped from my damn chest.
The woman I thought I’d do anything for has been lying to me since the moment we first met.
Taya—or whatever the fresh fuck her name is—cowers beneath me, endlessly dark eyes emitting raw fear. “Do your best,” she prods, tipping her head back to make herself more defenseless. “I deserve it for betraying you.”
Can’t say which stings more: the fact that she deceived me, or the fact that she thinks I’d brutally injure her in this lifetime. Sure, it takes every molecule in my body not to wrap my hand around her creamy white throat and squeeze, but I’d never dream of ending her life. Traitor or not, I’d still choose my own death over doing her any irrevocable harm.
“What do you assholes think you have on me?” I sneer, rubbing at my searing scar.
Her delicate throat bobs with a hard swallow. She’s never looked as appealing as she does in this very second—afraid and helpless. Makes it harder to keep my hands to myself. “My boss thinks you’re responsible for the murder of Dean Matthews.”
“Sounds like your boss is on Bentley’s payroll. They already hauled us in for questioning, but they couldn’t make anything stick. They don’t have any evidence because we didn’t fucking do it.” Snorting, I turn away from her to pace the small room while kneading the white-hot tension from my neck. “We’ve been taking scum dealers like him off the streets, just not in a lethal way. We’ve never taken things that far.”
She lets out a cold, humorless laugh. “You have to admit, calling yourselves ‘Blood Hands’ and ‘taking them off the streets’ make it all sound a little suspicious. If it wasn’t you, then who killed Matthews?”
On the verge of losing control, I spin back around to face her. “Maybe you should ask your boss. Everyone in this piece of shit neighborhood is corrupt as hell. An innocent girl died weeks ago, and no one is doing a goddamned thing about it!”
“You think Bentley’s responsible?” Her brows shoot up. “What's in those trucks of his you followed to St. Paul?”
She’s been tailing us? What else does she know? What else has she seen?
With a handful of strides I’m towering over her once again, shaking with rage. “My baby sister died from the same synthetic drug as that girl. Heard her talking to a friend about meetin’ with Bentley, but she denied it when I asked. She mentioned him again in her diary…said a handsome older man by the name of ‘Jonathan’ had pulled her aside at the mall, told her she should be modeling…gave her ‘vitamins’ to help her hair grow faster and make her skin glow. She was naive and trusting, just like that high schooler.
“After she OD’d, I found a little bottle in her things with ‘V-RON Industries’ stamped underneath a bogus label. Couldn’t be any more obvious that Bentley was supplying her with drugs. I showed the bottle and diary to the cops…they took ‘em, said they’d investigate. Went down to the station every day for a month before they threatened to place me somewhere I wouldn’t be able to ‘disturb the peace’. Your people know damn well Bentley was behind it.” My nostrils jump as I bring my face level with hers. “I’m out for that asshole’s blood. Not a damn thing can stop me from getting it. Not even you.”
I flinch when she touches my jaw, expression lit with empathy. “What’re you planning to do to him, Trent?” she whispers, searching my angry glare. “Are you willing to spend the rest of your life in prison for premeditated murder? Do you really think that’s what Cali would’ve wanted?”
Bile rises in m
y gut. I never told her Cali’s name. It’s another reminder that she’s lied to me from the start. In a flash, my hand closes around her windpipe, fingers digging into her subtle flesh.
“Is that why you’re here?” I challenge, spittle flying everywhere. I shove her up against the wall, wondering how far I can go without losing control. “Hoping to catch me in the act so you can put another arrest under your belt, Detective?”
Her hands wrap over my hand, not doing anything to loosen my grip. Instead her touch is soft…comforting. “I took this assignment as a favor to a friend. I was told you may be involved in Matthews’ murder, but it sounded like bullshit to me from the beginning. I believe they’re trying to bring you guys down as part of a coverup over something bigger. Once I got to know the guys—you, something profound clicked into place. Whenever you look at me, it’s like I’ve found the one person I didn’t know I was looking for. I wasn’t expecting to fall—”
“Don’t you fucking say it!” I roar, squeezing a little harder. In a sort of out-of-body-experience, I consider silencing her from spewing any more lies.
Then I envision her lifeless body slumped on the floor.
Crippling regret blasts through me.
Could never do that to her, even if she tried killing me first. “Everything I’ve said to you was based on a fucking lie! I don’t even know your goddamned name!”
“It’s Sasha…” she wheezes, tears all at once brewing. Head shaking back and forth, she spreads a hand over my chest, laying claim to my heart. “Sasha Green. Trask Green was my brother.”
Though whispered, her brother’s name echoes through my head over and over with the force of a gong. Cali’s Trask?
“Bullshit.” I release her, springing back. “You’re lying.”
For a moment she only hacks on the air returning to her lungs. In that same moment, I nearly break and fall to my knees, begging for her forgiveness. The back and forth of wanting someone who essentially stabbed me in the back makes it hard to think straight. Hard to even my pulse.
Hand covering her neck, she eventually meets my scowl, cheeks wet. “Everything I told you about losing my brother was true. I wasn’t lying when I said I knew how it felt to want justice for your sister. More than anyone, I know how the need to avenge a sibling’s death can turn you inside-out.”
Unable to process everything, I drop to the mattress and study her determined expression. It was a lifetime ago I met Trask at that party—shortly before rumors spread that he’d been arrested for murder. He was a lanky redhead, and overall a goofy-looking fuck. Nice enough guy, but I never would’ve imagined he had a smoking-hot sister. There aren’t a lot of visible similarities between the siblings—if anything, I’d say the curve of their mouths could be close.
“We had different fathers,” she explains with a barley-there smirk. She tugs on the edge of her bra, motioning to the tattoo Vaughn gave her. “I got this in his memory. Trask taught me how to play.”
Staring at the drumsticks arranged in her brother’s initial, I blurt, “Trask and Cali had a thing. They first hooked up before she turned sixteen. Once I heard she was sleeping with one of the South Town Players, I was ready to kick his ass. Then she arranged for us to meet at a house party, and he was such a charming prick that I couldn’t help but like him. Him and his buddy. Only met them the one time, but I knew all about your brother through Cali. She eventually admitted to me that they were in love. Then a week or so later, they broke up. She wouldn’t say why, but she was ticked at him over something. When he died…I was scared as hell I was gonna lose her too. It fucked her in the head something awful.”
Arms wrapped around herself, Taya—Sasha—slowly lowers down at my side. “I’m the only one who knew he had a girlfriend,” she begins in a quiet, unsteady voice. Her eyes fix on the door like she expects someone to barge in. “He thought his friends would pick on her…do their best to cheapen what they had. So Trask kept her a secret. I didn’t know anything about her—not even her name. But I could tell she made my brother happy, and that’s all that mattered. Shortly before he was arrested, I heard them arguing outside our house. It was dark, so I wasn’t able to see her face.” She stops, pulling in a sharp breath. “If I had known it was Cali, I never would’ve agreed to go undercover to bring her brother down. You have to believe me.”
My fingers twitch on the bed between us. Though it’s hard to look her in the eye without seeing her lies, the overwhelming need to comfort her charges through my veins. “What were they arguing about?”
“Our Mom had gone missing, and Human Services was onto our situation. Someone stopped by earlier that day to visit with her. Trask told them she was at work. Once Cali found out, she tried to convince him to run away with me before they found out about our mom, and divided us. But he wouldn’t leave…not without her.” Her shoulders shake with a short, choppy breath. She stops to wipe at her face, effectively removing the dark smudges left behind by her makeup. “I can’t believe they were in love with each other, and now they’re both gone.”
A blade slices through my gut with the sight of her falling apart. I snatch her wrist, ready to shake her for keeping so many secrets. “Where’d you go today? Why’d you almost skip out on us?”
She turns to me, wet eyes now hard. “I went to see Liam Rooker—the buddy Trask brought to that party the night you met him. This morning I saw the picture in your room of you three and Cali together. I wanted him to tell me the connection.”
I grind my teeth together. She’s suggesting I’m the one who can’t be trusted after admitting she dug through my shit? “So did my story jive with his?”
“He didn’t know the part about Cali and Trask dating, but when I showed him the picture, he remembered Trask had a thing for her and was worried about her ‘scary mofo of a brother’ getting in their way. Liam said they hung with her brother that night, and he ended up being cool.” Shoulders dropping, visibly letting off tension, she wipes at her eyes again. “If I had asked you first, I’d be blowing my cover. There wouldn’t be any turning back. I needed time to work through everything…decide if my ending my career was worth it. I needed to come to terms with reality.”
Squinting, I draw in a short breath. “And?”
“You still have to ask after everything I just told you?” Frowning, she pulls her wrist free and stands. “You don’t get it, do you?”
Knowing she’s getting ready to leave, I snarl and drop my head into my hands. Maybe it's the only way it can go down. How could we ever move on from this fucked-up situation?
But when I picture it ending between us, never having claim to her again, my chest constricts with a dark, hallow irritation.
With the sound of the door’s chain sliding into place, I look up. Sasha saunters back toward me, releasing the leather bra with a slip of her fingers before stepping out of the matching shorts. Her expression doesn’t give anything away as she sinks into my lap, gloriously naked, and wraps her arms around my neck.
“You’ve done a real number on me, Risotto. You better have meant it when you said I’m yours, because I’m throwing everything away to be with you.”
10
Sasha
Trent wears his expression on his sleeve throughout my entire confession—looking both enraged and confused—until I strip down and settle in his lap. The flat, emotionless look that takes over his broad features doesn’t match the raging erection in his jeans, and it certainly doesn’t do anything to relieve the wild tingling sensation spreading through my core. I’m ready to concede to doing whatever will earn his forgiveness, and would rather continue the debate using our bodies.
The fact that he doesn’t smile or have anything to say in response to my declaration makes me uneasy. If I’ve blown my cover only to be rejected, I don’t know where to go from here. Maybe I read him all wrong. Maybe I’m nothing more to him than a fun lay.
His jaw flexes with intensity as he thinks it over. Right when I’ve convinced myself he’s done, his lip
s part. “What’re you gonna tell your boss?” he asks in a dark, dangerous tone.
“I haven’t thought that far ahead,” I admit, shifting to move my hands beneath his shirt. His ripped abdomen hardens beneath the gentle caress of my fingers. Like my touch is no longer welcome. Determined to see this through, I don’t relent. “Once she learns I’ve blown my cover, I doubt there’ll be much of a conversation beyond her demanding my badge.”
The crease between his eyes deepens. “What if she doesn’t find out? What if we go on pretending this conversation never happened?”
I brace myself against him. “Is this your way of rejecting me?”
“Fuck no.” His hands cup the globes of my ass in a way that’s more reassuring than sexual. Either way, I’ll take it. “I’m asking if you think we can pull a fast one on your boss. Might help to use her as an unwilling resource in bringing Bentley down. You’ll have a heads up next time they try to pin something on the band.”
“Sergeant Kendall may be a major pain in my ass, but she’s not dirty. We could tell her everything you know—”
“And then what?” he snaps. “You think she’d let you keep your job?”
“Most likely not, but—”
“It’s better if we keep her out of the loop. Even if she’s not dirty, she likely answers to someone else who is.” The way he studies me for a minute, I’m not convinced he trusts me despite what he’s said. “Vaughn heard those trucks of Bentley’s pass through every three weeks—meaning they’ll be out again in a couple of days. Plan to break into them this time…bet your beautiful ass they’re moving V.”
I stop with my bottom lip held between my teeth as I ponder his idea. He’s actually onto something. While Ryker has known and trusted Sgt. Kendall since she started working on the South Side, it doesn’t necessarily mean her superiors are good guys. And stopping those trucks might be our only chance to prove Bentley’s guilt.
Undercover Rockstar: A Bad Girls novel Page 9