by Emma Slate
“Please tell me you finally put in a new jukebox,” I teased. I could picture Paddy on the other end of the phone. Irish through and through. Burly with an easy smile and ruddy face.
“Is this who I think it is?” Paddy demanded, fond affection in his voice.
“Who do you think it is?”
“I’ll be damned,” he muttered. “Miss you, girl. When are you coming home for a visit?”
“Sooner than you think. Hey, by any chance, have you seen my brother around?”
“Yeah, actually, I have.”
“Thought so. Anyway, Paddy, do me a favor. If you see Andrew, don’t tell him I asked. I want to surprise him when I come for a visit.”
“You got it. Listen, I gotta get back to these clowns. They’re drinking me out of house and whiskey. See you soon, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
I hung up with Paddy and grinned at Flynn.
“What’s that look for?” Flynn wondered.
“Paddy can’t keep his mouth shut.”
“But you told him not to say anything if he saw Andrew.” Understanding dawned. “You want Andrew to know you’re coming.”
“I want the bastard to know I’m coming. And I want him to underestimate me, which he will. That’s always been his weakness.”
Chapter 49
I sat in the large tub, the water almost too hot for my skin. I made it hotter, wanting it to burn me. Flynn had given me a moment to myself, but he was back now, sitting quietly in the steamy bathroom.
“I’m worried about you,” Flynn said quietly. “This thing with your brother… if he did kill Lila… you can’t go charging in there.”
“Why not?”
“Aside from the fact that Andrew is probably unhinged—”
“Not probably,” I interjected. “Definitely. Definitely unhinged. Only an insane person would take years of animosity and turn it into a revenge project.”
“I can’t let you—”
“Careful,” I mock warned, but Flynn didn’t smile.
“I’m serious. Things have a way of getting out of control and I don’t want—I just—”
“Yeah, I know.” I shook my head in wry amusement. “I haven’t thought about Andrew in years.”
“Really? Not even a passing thought?”
I shrugged. “Not really.” It was the truth. When Andrew had lost three hundred thousand dollars in Flynn’s New York casino and all but bartered me in lieu of his debt, I’d realized that Andrew didn’t—couldn’t—love me the way a brother was supposed to. So, I’d severed ties and never looked back.
There was no mourning our lack of relationship because there was nothing to mourn. I had Jack, Ash’s brother. He was more than enough brother for me.
If Andrew was responsible for killing his pregnant girlfriend, then that was an entirely different brand of evil. It took a cold bastard to do something that terrible.
I stood up, water sluicing down my body. Flynn’s intense eyes followed the curves of my body, resting on my flat belly. Well, flat-ish, belly. I’d had three children. Nothing ever went back to the way it was.
He grabbed a towel and stood. After putting it around me, he pulled me against him. He was shirtless, wearing nothing but his boxers. I breathed in the scent of his skin and closed my eyes. I wanted his strength; I wanted his acceptance when I told him what I’d done.
When Flynn made a move to step away, I held on, forcing him to keep holding me. His hand wrapped around the back of my neck. He gave it a gentle squeeze, and I looked up at him.
“Whatever you’ve done, whatever is weighing on you, just tell me,” he said quietly.
He lifted me into his arms and carried me to the bedroom. He placed me in the middle of the bed and then crawled up next to me, propping his head on his bended arm.
I looked at the wall when I finally had the courage to tell Flynn what I’d done. I waited for the onslaught, the anger, the horror. But it never came.
“Look at me,” came Flynn’s low voice.
I did as commanded. Aching compassion was written all over his face. Suddenly, I was in his arms and I was crying for the loss of a dear friend.
“You’re the bravest person I know,” Flynn whispered, kissing away the tears on my face. I snuggled into his embrace and closed my eyes.
“Sleep, love, it will be better in the morning.”
It wasn’t better in the morning. It was worse. My actions from the night before came rushing back at me, leveling me emotionally. I was open, raw, unable to think clearly—even after a cup of coffee.
Flynn was already gone from the suite and I hated that we never seemed to wake up with one another. We were always busy, running from one crisis to the next. Even when we were with the boys, we never just spent a Saturday, hanging out in our pajamas, watching cartoons and eating Cap’n Crunch. Maybe that would’ve been my life if I’d married someone else, had kids with someone else.
But I didn’t have a normal life. I could never hope for average. Maybe it was stupid to yearn for it. But average people didn’t have mob bosses as their best friends or a crazy brother hell-bent on revenge.
My cell phone rang. I couldn’t see who was calling, but I answered it anyway. “Hello?”
“Barrett,” Mateo Sanchez greeted, his tongue rolling around the r’s in my name.
“Mateo.”
“Did you get my flowers?”
I looked at the orchids on the coffee table. “Yes, they’re lovely. I meant to call and thank you but things have been… hectic… since I’ve been back.”
“Not a problem,” he said smoothly. “I was calling to discuss the progress of the distillery.”
Ramsey had left London and gone home to Dornoch. He was currently throwing himself into the construction of the distillery. Anything to take his mind off of Jane. As far as I knew, their relationship was over. I still hadn’t spoken to either of them about it.
“Things are coming along,” I said, getting back to the matter at hand.
“Is your husband still reluctant to be in business with me?”
I laughed. “Reluctant? No. Upset that another man is sending me flowers? Yes.”
Mateo chuckled.
“You did it on purpose,” I accused, ensuring that my voice was nothing but teasing.
“Maybe.”
“I threw them away.”
“No, you didn’t,” he said. “Because they don’t mean anything to you. They’re just flowers to you.”
“You speak with such confidence that you know me,” I quipped.
“I do know you. You’re a woman who would do anything for her husband and her family. That kind of loyalty… it’s unusual.”
“Why did you really call, Mateo?” I asked. Tired. Not in the mood for more games or subterfuge.
He paused for a moment and then, “Good bye, Barrett.”
Depression sank into my bones. Everything looked gray, felt gray, tasted gray. I didn’t even have the energy to cry, so I sat on the couch, staring at the TV that wasn’t on.
The elevator doors opened, but I didn’t bother to turn my head to see who it was.
“You fucking bitch.”
I flinched like I’d been punched. My head whipped to the woman looming tall, angry, a force to be reckoned with. What I imagined I used to look like before all this became too much.
“Quinn, I…”
What was I supposed to say? That I was sorry? That I hurt, too?
“Sasha is writhing around in pain, no thanks to you,” she seethed.
I blinked. “He’s what?”
“In pain. Because of you.”
“But I—he’s supposed to be…” I couldn’t say it, hope flaring in my heart.
“Dead?” she snapped. “Because he made a choice and didn’t involve me? Instead, he involved you.”
“Would you have done it?” I asked, finally shaking off some of the apathy. “If he’d told you what he wanted, would you have helped him?”
She fell silen
t, but her green eyes continued to spark with anger.
I lowered my voice. “He didn’t want that on you, Quinn. He didn’t want you to carry around that burden forever.”
“But he had no problem asking you to do that?” she asked in disgust. And something else. Hurt. She was hurt.
“Is it because he asked me and not you or because I’m another woman?”
“You’re not another woman. You’re the other woman. And I think—I think you’ll always be the other woman.”
“He wanted to protect you.”
“I don’t need protection. I’m not a child.”
I looked at her for a long moment and then nodded. “You’re right. So, you want to know what your father’s really doing in New York?”
Chapter 50
I stalked down the white hallway of the hospital, anger making my steps fast and had me balling my fists at my sides. I arrived outside of Sasha’s hospital room, guarded by Big Russian and Bigger Russian.
When I went to open the door to Sasha’s private room, they blocked my entrance. I tilted my head back and glared at them.
“Move.”
“He does not want visitors,” Big Russian said with a clipped accent.
“Get out of my way,” I snapped. “Or I’ll have your balls.”
Bigger Russian spoke in Russian and the only word I recognized was Dolinsky. Big Russian sighed with a look at me, but he moved out of the way.
I entered the room, shut the door, and glared at the occupant in the bed.
“Don’t look at me that way,” Sasha said, his voice tight with pain. “This is your fault.”
“My fault? How do you figure that?”
“You really need me to spell it out for you? Whatever you gave me last night didn’t kill me, it only made me sick to my stomach and then I crapped my pants.”
“I had assurances—”
“Well, they were bullshit assurances!” Sasha yelled with surprising energy.
I suddenly started to giggle. Giggles turned to guffaws and guffaws turned to boisterous laughter. I held my sides; they ached from the strain. I looked at Sasha who was watching me with knowing blue eyes.
“I’m so glad you’re not dead,” I blurted out, emotion gurgling up inside me.
“Should’ve just asked you to put a bullet in my skull,” he remarked gloomily. “At least then I’d know it would’ve worked.”
“You weren’t always this dark, you know.”
“Sorry. I’ll try to be a ‘a glass is half full’ kind of guy. Forget the fact that I look like a horror movie extra—I’m not vain—the pain, Barrett. The months and months of recovery.”
“Doesn’t make you a coward,” I said softly, taking a seat by his bed but not touching him. Though I was in scrubs, I didn’t want to risk giving him an infection.
“Feels that way,” he admitted. “I guess there’s one good thing about all this.”
“What?”
His ice blue eyes went cold. “I no longer have the cigarette burns courtesy of my bastard father.”
My stomach lurched. “Sasha—”
“No. I won’t talk about it.”
“Okay.” I sighed. That piece of Sasha’s history would eat away at me. “Quinn’s pissed at you.”
“Yeah.”
“You have to stop sheltering her.”
“She doesn’t deserve this.”
“She’s a grown up. Let her make her own choices.”
“I don’t want to talk about Quinn.”
“Fine,” I said. “You want me to tell you a joke? A burned guy walks into a bar…”
He smiled, but it looked like a grimace of pain. “So why didn’t I die?” he asked. “I’m being serious, here.”
“I don’t know,” I replied honestly.
“Did you tell Flynn our plan?”
“No. Why?”
“Because your husband always seems to be one step ahead of you.”
“You think Flynn knew I was planning to—and that he somehow, what? Tampered with the drug I was given?”
“You have any better theories?”
“No. I don’t.”
He closed his eyes.
“Should I go?”
“Not yet,” he said, eyes still closed. “Talk to me about something else.”
“You’ve heard of Mateo Sanchez, right? The guy sent me flowers.”
I left the hospital an hour later, lighter but pensive. Sasha had a good mind—he saw pieces to the puzzle when I’d missed them. I didn’t doubt for a second that Flynn had gotten involved. It explained his reaction when I told him what I’d done (or thought I’d done) for Sasha. And it explained why he’d been waiting for me outside the hospital.
I was in no great hurry to confront him about it; there was no anger on my end. I should’ve been mad, but I wasn’t. Sasha was alive. In pain and in great need, but alive, and I wouldn’t be sad about him still being here. With me. Whatever he needed, I’d give to him. The next many months, maybe even a year, were going to be difficult for him. But I’d make him laugh and I wouldn’t coddle him.
He had Quinn for that. Unless he broke up her with her, pushed her away because he thought that was best for her. I hoped Quinn stuck to her guns and proved to him she wanted to be with him. But that was between them.
I walked into the lobby of The Rex and immediately went to the elevators. I wasn’t going to the penthouse—frankly, I was sick of being cooped up in there, waiting for Andrew to make his next move, waiting for some other bomb to detonate. Instead, I went to the glass lounge on the roof. If anyone thought I looked strange in the pair of scrubs I was wearing, they didn’t let on.
At this time of day, the lounge wasn’t yet open, so there was no hostess at the stand, not even any servers setting up for the evening. I went behind the bar and poured myself a glass of sparkling water and then took it to one of the large leather couches that faced the skyline.
I heard Flynn’s soft footsteps approach and then he was sitting next to me, his arm brushing mine.
“Why?” I asked, clutching the glass of sparkling water.
He didn’t even pretend not to know what I was talking about. “Because if Sasha died, there would’ve been another upheaval with the Russians. I couldn’t allow that.”
“For the SINS, you mean.”
Sasha and the Russians funneled legitimate money to our cause for a free Scotland. If Sasha was no longer in charge that alliance might’ve changed. I hadn’t even considered it.
“Aye, for the SINS,” Flynn said softly. “But also for you. This would’ve broken you. Losing a friend, being the one to help him end his life.”
“You’re not mad that I didn’t confide in you?”
Flynn’s arm snaked around me and pulled me into his side. I burrowed into him, breathing him in, wondering what I did to deserve such a man who understood me, even before I understood myself.
“Are you mad that I interfered?” Flynn asked.
“Point taken, love.” I leaned back and smiled at him. “So you let me pay the head of the Chinese mafia ten thousand dollars for a diuretic?”
“Fifteen,” Flynn said with a grin. “I gave Li Chan five grand to go through with the con.”
Chapter 51
“We’re never going to find a manager,” Flynn muttered, tossing the last applicant’s resume into the garbage.
“Who would have thought that good help was so hard to come by,” I teased.
“I don’t have time for this. How much money do you think it would take to get Lacey back here for a few weeks?”
I smirked. “More money than we have.”
“She’s that happy with the surfer?” Flynn asked.
“Way to be subtle,” I said with a laugh. “Tell Brad to call her himself.”
“She won’t return his calls.”
“She doesn’t return my calls half the time,” I quipped. “She’s having fun. Let her.”
He ran a hand across his face and then looked around
the newly reconstructed club. It was ready for reopening, but we didn’t have management in place to ensure everything went smoothly. We couldn’t worry about that too—not while we were dealing with all this other stuff.
“Why don’t we promote from within?” I asked. “How about Katherine?”
“Katherine? Katherine who’s afraid of her own shadow?” Flynn asked in dubiousness.
“She’s not afraid of her own shadow.”
“You’re right. She’s just afraid of me.”
“That is true,” I agreed. “Look, we don’t have anyone else lined up and she’s part of the SINS family. What do we have to lose?”
He sighed. “You make a good point. All right. Let’s give her a shot.”
“If this works out, Glenna is going to kill me,” I muttered, pulling out my new phone so I could call Katherine. “Katherine might never go back to Dornoch.”
Flynn shook his head. “I can’t wait to go back to Dornoch. And to our distillery that is a cocaine front.”
“Just for a year,” I said. “Then Sanchez will become a distant memory.”
He raised an eyebrow in disbelief and shook his head. I snorted in humor while dialing Katherine.
A man answered, causing me to falter. Katherine didn’t have a boyfriend. Did she?
“Hi,” I greeted. “Is Katherine available? This is Barrett.”
“Barrett,” the man repeated slowly. “No, Katherine isn’t available at the moment. She’s… indisposed.”
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. “Andrew?”
“I hear you’ve been looking for me.”
“What have you done with Katherine? Where is she?” I demanded.
“I haven’t done anything to her.” He paused. “Yet.”
Anger, volatile, hot, dangerous. I shoved it away and forced myself to sound cool and unaffected when I asked, “What is it you really want, Andrew?”
“How about a trade?” he suggested. “You for her.”