“I’m glad you didn’t hop that plane without saying goodbye,” he told her, once they shared the intimate patio.
County could barely make eye contact. His massive form completely blocked her view of anything going on inside the house. “I um, was just telling Mick that I was going to have to say goodbye earlier than I expected.”
Fernando made no comment. He simply watched her closely, his translucent brows seemed as though they were searing the fabric of her shirt and caressing every curve beneath.
“I told her not to be surprised if she looked up and found me gone,” she rambled on, focusing on the designer logo on his hunter green tee.
“Sounds important.”
She nodded.
“Back in Chicago?” he asked.
“No.”
Fernando tensed, his body seeming to swell to twice its size. “Will you tell me where?”
“Fernando don’t do this,” she shifted her weight from one foot to the other.
“So is it really business or are you just running from me?”
“It’s not that,” she was surprised by the strength in her voice. “I have questions that need answers and to find them I have to take this trip.”
Her words stoked curiosity within his striking eyes.
“Just don’t ask me anymore questions,” she knew he was about to do just that.
Fernando bowed his head, taking a few moments to trail the back of his hand across his hair roughened jaw. “If I can’t ask you questions then it’s up to you to find a way to keep me quiet.”
County rolled her eyes and fought the urge to smile. “How?”
“Dance with me.”
A deep shiver raced through her. His simple request was about as innocent as a request to sit on his lap! Still, she nodded and accepted the hand he extended.
Lord, please don’t let what I discover on that ship put an even deeper rift between us, she prayed, breathing deep as he stepped close. No man had ever affected her mind and body the way Fernando had. It would’ve been easy to resist his power over her body had her mind not been so intrigued by him as well.
They remained on the patio, alone and unnoticed amidst towering plants, vines and bushes. The music wafted in the air as though it were playing just for them. Fernando kept his intense gaze focused on Contessa’s lovely honey-toned face. He judged her every reaction to his touch.
Every part of her body tingled. Especially that part of her that he’d taken such complete and unparalleled possession of. His steely arms wound tightly about her waist and sealed her against him.
Contessa scarcely wanted to rest her hands against his chest. The chiseled definition of his muscular torso produced a moan that ached to drift from her throat and mingle with the seductive music surrounding them. Weak, needy and not the least bit ashamed of it, she rested her forehead upon his chest.
Fernando lowered his hands from her back to envelope the full firmness of her bottom. There he squeezed, petted and caressed while nuzzling her neck and inhaling the airiness of her perfume.
County tugged her lip between her teeth, feeling the still subtle yet noticeable extent of his male length against her belly. She chanted a prayer that the song end soon, never realizing Fernando heard the barely audible pleas. County’s moan left her throat when his lips and tongue nibbled the flesh at her neck.
“Stop,” she asked, her breasts heaving fiercely against him as his fingers massaged beneath her shirt at the small of her back.
“May I ask my question, then?”
“No,” she refused, feeling his tongue invade her mouth a half second later. Her hands curved into fists that pounded his chest in a futile and purely phony show of resistance.
They lost themselves in the seclusion of the patio. Fernando allowed his hands and mouth free reign across her body. County arched her breasts into his palms and thrust her tongue desperately against his when his thumbs barely brushed the nipples rigid and begging for more attention.
“Mmm,” she moaned. Any thoughts of resisting where distant memories and a surge of power rushed her when she heard him utter a similarly helpless moan.
Fernando effortlessly carried her to an even more private area of the patio. Keeping her trapped against the brick wall, his big hands splayed across her thighs in a possessive fashion. Torturing her without mercy, his fingers rubbed her sex through the crotch of her jeans. County broke the kiss to rain tiny, wet pecks along his whiskered jaw and neck. Her blatant desire aroused him so, that the need to take her then and there overruled any other coherent thought.
The charged moment, however, thundered to a halt at the sound that caught their ears and widened their eyes.
“What was that?” they asked in unison.
~~~
“Quay, please don’t do this,” Ty whispered, frantic as she grasped her husband’s arm. “Sweetie, not here,” she gripped the collar of his jersey which threatened to tear under the pressure of his resistance.
“Let me go, Tyke,” Quay’s black gaze fixed on Marcus Ramsey.
“Honey please-”
“Ty!”
Tykira released her hold on his shirt and looked around for a sign that anyone heard the commotion and was coming to Marcus’ rescue. Miraculously, no one seemed to have paid attention to the crash of the small table that carried the large cut glass punchbowl or matching glasses. Ty spotted Fernando and Contessa coming in from the patio and hurried over to them.
“What happened?” County asked.
“Marc said something to Quay and he went crazy.” Ty clasped both hands to the front of her turquoise halter blouse. “Fernando please stop this,” she cried.
“Shh,” he soothed, taking her hands and given them a gentle squeeze. “It’s alright. Besides, don’t you think Quay’s entitled?”
Twin expressions of disbelief emerged on Contessa’s and Tykira’s faces.
“Fernando!” They cried simultaneously.
~~~
Ty moved on, desperate to find someone to stop Quay who, by then, was muttering something to Marc that was no doubt life threatening. Meanwhile, County continued to study Fernando.
“He’s your father,” she reminded him gently.
“And he deserves whatever he’s got coming from Quay.”
“How can you say that? You act like it was Marc who killed Sera.”
Fernando stood with one arm folded across his chest, one hand cupped beneath his arm while the other stroked his beard. “He’s done enough to my brothers, my mother, me…”
“Will you tell me?” She curved her hand over his forearm as she witnessed the glimpse of uncertainty in his gaze. “You think I’d use it against you?” she guessed.
Fernando turned the tables and clutched Contessa’s upper arms in his massive grip. “I’m about this close-” he tugged her forward “-to losing you and if you think I’m gonna tell you anything-” he stopped when she blinked in surprise.
“There’s more, isn’t there? More secrets?”
“A man like me has plenty of secrets. Many that are better just left buried.”
“And this is why we’re at a standstill, don’t you see?”
“And there are some things I never want you to have to deal with. Now if you can’t accept that, County…”
County’s lips parted and she stepped away from Fernando. She watched him as though he were a stranger. Suddenly, the sound of more heated voices overshadowed all other conversations in the room.
~~~
“You and your brother never could control your tempers!” Marc raged, straightening his tie while eyeing the twins with unmasked disgust. “Especially you, Quay!” he pointed a finger at his younger nephew. “You don’t waste a minute to show your ass the first chance you get!”
“And you believe I care what you think of me?” Quay bellowed, his hands spread as he shrugged. “Hell, you harbored a murderer and have somehow managed to weasel out of payin’ for it! But I guess that’s small potatoes to you, huh? I guess yo
u just add that to all the other crap you’ve pulled over the years. I bet Aunt Josie could probably give us an earful on what a sorry bastard of a husband you are!”
~~~
“Quest, please stop this before it goes too far,” Ty begged, clutching the front of the deep purple T-shirt emblazoned with the Greek letters of his fraternity.
Glancing at his watch, Quest shrugged. “Well, I promised him at least fifteen minutes to go at Marc before I stepped in.”
“Quest!” Tykira and Mick cried in unison.
~~~
“A sorry husband?” Marc threw back at Quay, pure wickedness fueling the smile on his face. “Hell son, your only experience with women is seeing how many you can screw and dump in a week,” he cast a leering look toward Tykira. “She’s quite a piece of eye candy, but once you've had your fill, you’ll dump her too-wife or not.”
“Son of a bitch!” Quay hissed, blind rage blocking any sense of restraint he might’ve had. “Because of you,” he breathed, gripping Marc’s jacket lapels so tightly they ripped. “You and your jackass brother, we went through hell.”
Marc simply lifted a brow. “I see and is that how you justify treating that beautiful girl like a slut you banged and threw away?”
Quay roared something vile and indecipherable as he lit into Marc. His fist crashed squarely into his uncle’s cheek and repeated nonstop. Contessa begged Fernando to step in, while Mick and Ty pleaded with Quest. Josephine tried to push Yohan to do something. Even Damon and Westin were reluctant to intervene on their brother’s behalf. Quay followed Marc to the floor and continued to pound away at his face.
Quest finally decided to get involved. Unfortunately, he found it almost impossible to pull his twin off their uncle. Luckily for Marcus, his eldest son was just arriving for the party. Moses hesitated but a moment when he witnessed the scene, before going to assist Quest. Together, they managed to pull an infuriated Quay off Marc. Quay roared obscenities as his brother and cousin dragged him down one of the corridors leading from the sunroom where the guests had gathered.
“Get the hell off me! Dammit...I’m not done!” Quay punched at Moses’ forearm where it lodged beneath his neck.
Quest nodded for his cousin to let go once they were safely tucked away in his study. Quay made a dash for the door, but his brother held him fast.
“Let it go, let it go,” Quest whispered, his arms locked around Quay’s torso as he spoke the words against his ear. “Come on, that’s it…” he soothed, feeling his twin’s breathing slow. When a few moments had passed, Quest released his hold and caught his own breath. “Thanks, man,” he said to Moses.
A playfully uncertain grin crossed Moses’ handsome blackberry-toned face. “And here I was feeling bad about coming to tell you what I knew- thought I’d be putting a damper on a sweet family gathering,” he added in a sarcastic manner.
“What are you talkin’ about?” Quay asked, as he sat massaging his hands. “What do you know?”
Moses’s playfulness vanished as he fixed his cousins with solemn looks. “Wake Robinson is dead.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“Are you sure?”
“How?”
“When?”
Such were the questions thrown at Moses when he announced Wake’s death. By that time, Quest’s study was filled by Mick, Ty, Yohan, Fernando and Contessa.
“I’m positive,” Moses answered Mick, dropping an arm across her shoulders and pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “After the incident on the train, my team kept an eye out hoping Wake would surface. One of my guys caught up to him just as the accident happened.”
“Accident?” Mick queried.
“Some kind of freak explosion,” Moses explained, taking a seat next to Quay on the sofa. “Wake had the cops on his ass.”
Again, stunned silence filled the room.
“Cops?”
Moses leaned forward, bracing his elbows to his knees while massaging his shaved head. “There was a chase that ended at some warehouse when he rammed into it with his truck,” he leaned back on the sofa. “Next thing the cops knew, the truck had gone up in flames.It destroyed the building, the truck...Wake.”
“Are they sure it was him?” Ty asked.
Moses nodded. “My guy out there made visual contact just before the chase headed out to the freeway. As far as I know, the authorities haven’t uncovered anything more binding- no dentals, no nothing.”
“Why were the cops chasing him?” County asked.
“That’s the crazy part of it,” Moses grimaced. “It was some stupid traffic violation- he ran a red light or something.”
“That is crazy,” Quest said from the spot he occupied behind his desk. “Why would he do something to bring attention to himself like that?”
“Are they sure it was an accident?”
Silence filled the room as everyone turned to Fernando who had voiced the question. Then, at once, they all looked to Moses for answers.
“They honestly don’t know, man,” Moses told his brother and stood. “But my guess is that it was anything but an accident.”
~~~
Michaela had intended for her shower party to be a weekend affair with everyone staying over and making it a two day event. Circumstances made that impossible. Marc left the party without Josephine. In spite of his injuries, no one knew or cared where he’d gone. Damon and Catrina took Josephine home with them for a change of scenery and to give her a breather from her husband. The group was reeling from the news of Wake’s death. Now, they had a new mystery on their hands: had Wake been murdered? If so, by whom, why and why now?
Fernando left with his brothers that night and Contessa was glad. She needed to be focused on the situation at hand. She couldn’t afford to let her emotions be swayed anymore by her feelings.
“Would you please cheer up? I’ll be fine,” County tried to assure Mick who’d been grilling her about taking the trip, for the better part of the morning.
“I just don’t like this,” Mick said skeptically, eyeing the cab that waited for County. “There has to be another way.”
County took Mick by the shoulders. “Listen to me. This is information that I don’t want secondhand. I have to see it for myself.”
“What you’ll see is what I’m afraid of,” Mick grumbled as they hugged. “Are you sure about this plan of attack you and Spivey concocted?”
“Well, I better be, because we don’t have time to change it,” Contessa sighed, taking her overnight case as she and Mick descended the wide front porch steps.
Mick pushed her hands into the side pockets of her tangerine and white sundress. “Are you sure they’ll let you on the boat- it being a gentlemen’s only ship and all?”
“Spivey and I are a powerful couple with lots of money to spend,” County reminded Mick speaking of the ruse they’d devised for their cover, “woman or not, those folks ain’t about to turn down those sorts of high rollers,” she smiled as the cab driver went to place her bags in the trunk.
“Just keep Spivey in your sights at all times,” Mick cautioned, blinking tears from her eyes when she and County hugged again.
County promised to do so and then pressed a kiss to Mick’s cheek. Soon the cab was rolling down the brick drive on its way to the airport.
***
Fernando was having the same think twice before you do this, speech with his brothers. Moses, who seemed to fear nothing, thought it was a good idea for his brother to go and only wished he could tag along. Yohan was just as fearless, but took note of their father’s evil tendencies. Clearly, Yohan preferred his brother staying alive to having him out gathering evidence against their father.
~~~
“My mind’s made up,” Fernando snapped the last two locks on his suitcase. “I gotta do this, Yo,” he told his younger brother and clapped one hand to his shoulder. “That ship is partly in my name which means whatever’s going on out there is my responsibility. Hell, I thought I was done lying to Contessa,” he grim
aced, stroking his beard out of frustration, “but this, I don’t know if I could tell her about this.”
Yohan smiled knowingly. “You love her.”
Fernando’s grin crinkled his eyes at the corner. “Heaven help me, I do. In only a few months’ time I’ve gone and fallen in love with a woman who’s completely unlike any woman I’ve ever met and I’ll do anything to keep her.”
“You know if her House is working on this book, there’s a good chance this’ll come out.” Yohan cautioned, folding heavily muscled arms across the front of the brick red, short-sleeved tee he wore. “Then, you’ll have to explain why you kept another secret.”
“Hell Yo, how am I supposed to tell her something like this? Especially when she already thinks this family’s scum?” Fernando searched his brother’s face for answers he desperately wanted to hear.
“This is Pop’s dirt, not ours,” Yohan corrected, “if you try to hide this and it comes out, even that won’t matter.”
Fernando’s light gaze hardened. “I don’t want to talk about this, Yo.”
Yohan nodded, decided to let the matter rest. “As long as you understand that Contessa Warren isn’t a woman you can just pat on the bottom, give a diamond bracelet to and then send her on her way when she starts asking too many questions.”
Fernando stroked the crisp whiskers shadowing the lower half of his face. “I know,” he closed his eyes. “I think that’s why I want her so damn bad.”
***
Kauai, Hawaii
Cufi Muhammad was a picture of proud success. He’d made a living out of what many would have deemed a scandalous profession, but the arrogant South African decided he was providing a service- a service he was well paid and well envied for.
He nodded toward the arriving passengers, hands in the pockets of the elegant white quarter-length suit coat he wore with matching trousers. Cufi strode the deck of The Wind Rage as though he were the king of a country.
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