Strip Search

by Shayla Black

  "Good. Go call the gas company. They need to shut this off and figure out what happened."

  "There's a phone inside. I'll just--"

  "No, the gas is worse than I thought, and it's unpredictable. Any spark or current, and this whole place could blow. Even my cell phone could set it off. Is there a phone nearby?"

  Lucia shrugged, hands shaking. "I guess ... I've only been here a few weeks."

  "All right. You'd better shout into the club and make sure no one else is in there. Everyone ought to know this place could turn into a fireball at any moment. Maybe someone in there can help you find another phone."

  "Yes." Then Lucia looked back at him and said, "Take care of my sister."

  Mark looked away from Nicki's pale, unresponsive face to gaze at Lucia. Tears now seeped from her dark chocolate eyes and tracked down her smooth cheeks. Her chin trembled as she fought more tears. Clearly, these sister shared a deep bond--a bond he understood, sharing something similar with Kerry.

  Sirens began to wail, coming closer and closer.

  "As if she was my own," he vowed.

  Lucia sent him a shaky nod. "Thank you."

  A few minutes later, she appeared with Zack and Blade in tow, along with a few of the other dancers who had arrived early for their shift.

  "What's going on?" Zack shouted as he jogged next to Mark. "Why is a fire truck pulling into the parking lot?"

  Mark looked up to respond and saw Bocelli standing beside Lucia, as the Vegas heat shimmered off the blacktop.

  "Doc?" Blade said softly to Lucia. "Do you need something? Help?"

  Never had he seen Bocelli be anything other than threatening or sarcastic. Apparently even the thug had a little compassion somewhere for Lucia's pain and worry.

  "Nicki ..." she trailed off, looking back toward her limp sister's form in Mark's lap.

  She sobbed quietly into her hands.

  Bocelli glanced at Nicki and squared his jaw, as if he was angry. Then he wrapped his arms around Lucia.

  Mark had no time to ponder the Italian's reaction before he barked to Zack. "Get over there and see if they have any EMTs."

  "But--"

  "Don't fucking argue. Now!" he growled.

  Petulant, Zack stomped away.

  Then he turned to the other man. "Bocelli, will you take Lucia somewhere so she can call the gas company? We need to shut the flow of gas off to Nicki's place immediately."

  Nodding, and without any smart ass comment or argument, Blade slid an arm around Lucia's waist and led her away. She looked back at Nicki until she was out of sight.

  Bocelli seemed surprisingly gentle for a Mafia heavy.

  Finally, Mark was alone with Nicki. He didn't even want to think that fate might force him to do without her.

  "Baby, can you hear me?"

  Chapter 12

  "Heard anything yet?" Zack asked as he darted into the hospital's stark waiting room just before midnight.

  "No," Lucia whispered, looking up at Nicki's stage manager with damp, red-rimmed eyes. Blade sat next to her in utter silence.

  Sitting in an uncomfortable chair the color of baby vomit across from her, Mark was every bit as distraught as Lucia looked. He rubbed his cold palms together, absently wondering why hospitals were always cold enough to double as meat lockers. Mostly, he wished he could say something to comfort her. Nothing came to mind. No one knew how severe Nicki's gas poisoning was yet.

  No one knew if she'd live.

  What the hell had happened?

  God, he'd seen enough of hospitals the last few days to last him a good decade, at least. He only hoped that the ending to Nicki's stay in this hospital was as happy as Kerry's had been in hers.

  "Damn it," Zack cursed, sliding into a chair next to Mark's. "I got here as fast as I could. The gas company turned off the gas in Nicki's apartment and checked out the rest of the building to make sure it's safe. When I closed the club early for the night, the other dancers had a lot of questions, we had an irate thirtieth birthday party ..."

  "Thanks for coming. You're important to Nicki." Lucia did her best to smile.

  Zack shuffled his feet and looked at the ground. Apparently, he was as uncomfortable with praise as a kid wearing shoes two sizes too small.

  "Did the gas company have any idea what caused the leak?" Mark asked.

  "They suspect a broken pipe at the stove."

  Mark nodded. What else could he say? Those pipes were reportedly easy to break, so it was possible Nicki had accidentally endangered herself. It was also possible the broken pipe was planned. This incident just a few weeks after a light nearly crashed on her head made him wonder ... Still, he couldn't prove anything.

  Either way, the last thing he'd expected when he returned from New York was to see the woman he couldn't get out of his head slumped across her bed, near death. Sitting here, watching Lucia huddle in the seat across from him, struggling to keep herself together, he wondered if this incident was going to extinguish the bright light Nicki shined in all their lives. It was surreal. And terrible.

  Zack fell into the same somber silence as the other men.

  Lucia covered her mouth with her hand, trying to stifle a sob. The anguished sound ripped through the silent room, occupied only by the four of them and some dusty artificial plants.

  Wishing he could do something--damn it, anything--Mark clenched his teeth against the rising frustration and reached out to comfort Lucia. Blade shot him a fuck-off glare and tucked her against his shoulder, murmuring soft assurances in her ear. Apparently, she preferred to receive her comfort from someone she knew, someone who hadn't driven her sister to a chianti-induced crying jag. But Bocelli was no Boy Scout. Clearly, Lucia had no idea he was a Mafia thug who knew murder intimately. Mark made a mental note to warn her if things began to look any cozier between them.

  "It's okay, Doc. Nicki's a fighter. She'll come out," Bocelli whispered.

  Nodding as if she wanted to believe more than she actually did, Lucia sobbed again. Blade rubbed her back, stroked the long auburn tangle of her hair. She clutched his shirt and hung on as if he were a life preserver in a raging sea.

  "How could something like ... like this happen?" Lucia wailed. "How is it possible I-I was right down the hall and never n-noticed anything?"

  Mark shrugged, wishing like hell that he had answers. Nothing made sense. None of it.

  "I-if you hadn't come back." Lucia looked up at him from the tangle of Bocelli's arms. "Hadn't smelled the..." She pressed her lips together, unable to go on.

  "Don't worry about that now," Mark murmured. "Focus on Nicki pulling through. While my sister was in the hospital, Nicki offered to get out her rusty rosary beads and pray. Maybe you should do that for her."

  Lucia smiled through her tears. "Hers would be rusty. She probably hasn't been to confession since eighth grade. She's always teased me that I'm the good sister."

  On that note, she cast a furtive glance at Bocelli, then straightened away from him. Blade gritted his teeth, but he let her go.

  "Did you notice the smell of gas in her apartment when you were there earlier in the day?" Blade asked Zack.

  The stage manager shook his head. "No. I was really only there for a minute to talk through a costume problem and run a new idea past her. She said she'd just come back from the gym and was going to shower." He shrugged. "I left and..."

  Something horrible had happened. Zack didn't have to say it. They all thought it, Mark was sure.

  "Ms. DiStefano?" a white-coated doctor called from across the room. "I'm Dr. Halstar, the resident on duty. About your sister..."

  Mark held his breath. Every second that passed in silence was like a rusty blade to his insides.

  "Yes?" Her voice trembled. She squeezed Blade's arm, as if he alone kept her upright.

  "It was close, but she's going to be fine." His kind smile softened his young face.

  Collectively, they sighed in relief. Mark heard his roaring heart slow, finally stop kicking his ri
bs like a kung fu master on meth.

  "Thank God," Lucia sighed. "Can I see her?"

  "Briefly. She's being moved to a bed where she'll be watched very closely tonight. I expect she'll sleep quite a bit for the next few days, but she should recover quickly and have no lasting effects. Come this way."

  Lucia stepped forward to follow the doctor. Before they disappeared around the corner, Dr. Halstar paused, then looked back at the trio of men remaining in the waiting room.

  "Is one of you Mark?"

  "I am." Full of relief and washed-out adrenaline, his voice scratched like steel wool as he stood.

  The resident smiled. "She's been asking for you. I'd prefer that she only have one visitor at a time, so I'll take her sister first and come back for you."

  Swallowing against a jolt of shock strong enough to light up Girls' Night Out on a swinging Saturday night, Mark nodded. Nicki had asked for him? "Please. Thank you."

  Lucia and the doctor disappeared, then. Twenty minutes ticked by, and Mark found himself pacing. He knew why family got to visit first, but the waiting made him want to pound something. He watched the clock, ticking. Slowly. So damn slowly. Was it broken? Was he in the Twilight Zone, where five minutes suddenly took two years?

  "Could you sit down?" Zack rolled his eyes. "You're making the rest of us nervous."

  Mark zipped a glare at Zack, who was tapping his foot on the yellowed linoleum. Bocelli, on the other hand, lounged in his chair with an arm draped across the one beside him. A smile flirted at one comer of his mouth. Yeah, he looked stressed, all right.

  Before Mark could tell Zack to take a flying leap, Dr. Halstar and Lucia reappeared. She was pale and teary, but wearing a tremulous smile that tugged at his heart.

  The doctor motioned at Mark to follow, and he fell in step beside him.

  "Lucia tells me you saved Nicki's life."

  "I just happened to show up in time." Mark shrugged.

  "Lucky, indeed. She's a pretty girl. Very pretty."

  "She's taken," he growled.

  Mark stopped, stunned by his own assertion. Nicki wasn't his. Somewhere in his head, he knew he couldn't afford to think of her as anything more than a suspect, not while he was investigating her, not when he suspected her of felony behavior. Not when there was any chance he'd be helping to ship her off to prison.

  But tonight, when her life had hung in the balance, when his heart had all but stopped as he carried out of her gas-riddled apartment ... none of that mattered.

  The doctor laughed. "I figured by the way she called for you that you weren't her brother or a gay best friend."

  Doing his best to keep his scowl to himself, Mark followed Dr. Halstar down a series of twisting corridors, through a few double doors, up a story in the elevator.

  Finally, they reached Nicki's room. Mark charged in with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball. Then stopped dead when he saw her lying there, eyes half open, still pale, tubes sticking out of everywhere. The heart monitor beeped in the background. The IV dripped into her right arm. The sight hit him like a barreling semi to his abdomen.

  "I'm alive," she croaked. "So you can stop scowling."

  He nodded, feeling his throat tighten. "For a while, we wondered, baby. You okay?"

  Sinking down into the chair beside her bed, he reached for her hand, then thought better of it.

  "I won't break," she assured him and fitted her hand in his.

  He held on tight. "How do you feel?"

  "Other than wishing for a whole bottle of aspirin to make my head stop hurting? I'm fine."

  He squeezed her fingers in his palm, relishing the warmth and life pulsing under her skin. "What happened?"

  "Don't know. I worked in the office when I got up, then went to the gym."

  She took a deep breath and wheezed. Mark flinched.

  But she went on. "I returned, and Lucia came over for lunch. Then Zack dropped by to talk. I took a shower, laid down. Felt really sleepy."

  Nicki had run out of breath, and Mark couldn't stand to hear her tax herself anymore.

  "Rest," he ordered.

  A tired smile flitted across her face. "Thanks again. My hero."

  Frowning, Mark let go of her hand. He didn't feel like a hero. He felt jumbled and torn. Too weak to resist her, too uncertain about her innocence, too committed to ending the criminal behavior that shattered the life he'd once led in Florida to give up investigating her, Mark had no damn idea what to do next.

  Three long days later, Mark didn't know whether to thank

  God that Nicki was back home safely or kick himself for caring so damned much.

  Oblivious to his dilemma, Nicki sat propped up in her bed with a bottle of flavored water in one hand, a romance novel in the other.

  "Oh," she smiled and brushed an errant strand of inky hair from her face. "Listen to this: 'She raised her slender hips to his every savage thrust, her eyes wide with astonished pleasure as his engorged wand of passion parted her womanly folds relentlessly."' She laughed, and through it continued with, "Desire swirled in her belly as she clasped her long, slender legs around his muscular hips, capturing him deep inside her. Her fingernails raked the strong muscles of his broad back and shoulders. Whimpers of pleasure and frustration escaped her cupid's bow mouth as she climbed ever closer to achieving a woman's pleasure and--"

  "Why are you reading this?" Mark asked, frowning.

  She'd clipped her hair in a haphazard twist that left skeins of the dark silk caressing the back of her neck. Even with a scrubbed face and simple striped cotton pajama pants and a tank top, Mark couldn't escape the fact she was one of the most beautiful women he knew. And one of the most interesting and vivacious. She lit up from the inside, face glowing with equal parts intelligence, moxie, and sex appeal.

  Mark hated how much he wanted her at this moment--at every moment, if he was honest. But it didn't surprise him.

  Nicki shrugged. "Bed rest doesn't provide enough mischief. If the doctors won't let me out of bed tonight and you claim you're too busy fixing my books to be in bed with me, well ... A girl has to get her kicks somewhere."

  Her smile teased. Mark didn't smile back.

  Nicki had to bring up the subject guaranteed to confuse the hell out of him--her books. How could she flash that eye-catching grin if she was involved up to those pretty blue eyes in felony money laundering? It seemed impossible ... but Tiffany had taken him on a similar ride. He knew all too well it was possible.

  Shaking his head, he wished it hadn't occurred to him to check her electronic banking and accounting records while she'd been in the hospital. But he'd hoped--prayed, even--that some spark of activity while she was clearly laid up and unable to see to that "business" would at least hint that she wasn't involved. If she had cut Bocelli loose from the operation, as he suspected, and someone else started moving money in her absence, that would say something about Nicki's lack of involvement, maybe even her innocence.

  Instead, all records had been more silent than a roomful of monks. Money had been transferred in, and none of the accounting records or real estate transactions had been updated--a definite departure from the previous behavior, where frequent updates had been the norm.

  From that, Mark could only conclude that the operation was waiting on Nicki to proceed.

  And she was guilty as hell.

  "Mark?" Nicki folded her purple prose onto her lap and stared at him.

  He forced a smile. "Sorry. I'm tired. I've had a lot on my mind."

  "Between your sister and my terrible accounting records and the gas line accident, you've been hopping. Have you talked to Kerry today? Is she all right?"

  He wondered why it mattered to her. "She's fine. Bed rest is doing her a lot of good. So is laying off the ice cream."

  "I'm glad she and the baby are going be all right. Honestly, when you got that phone call, you turned twenty shades of pale." Nicki grabbed his hand and squeezed. "I'm glad you got to see her."

  Mark extracted his hand and
settled the blankets around her. "What about you? How do you feel?"

  "Much better today. I'm not tired anymore. I have my appetite back. My skull-piercing headache is gone. Must be all this wonderful care I'm getting." She shot him a warm smile, which Mark did his best to ignore.

  "Lucia informed me that taking care of you is my job, especially while she's gone to the airport to pick up her friend Ashley."

  Her smile wobbled for a moment, then righted itself. "They'll have a nice time together. They've been friends since college. Because college for Lucia started at fourteen, it was hard for her to find friends, but Ashley has been one of the best. I think she kept Lucia from drowning in academia and made my brilliant sister remember that she was still a young woman. I'll always be grateful to Ashley for that."

  Mark peered at Nicki, doing his best not to frown. Could a woman care so much about the people in her life, then use others as if they had no meaning or value? With no concrete proof to convict Nicki, no way to absolve her, a slow burn of frustration flared in his gut. Before he said something stupid, something revealing, he rose from the edge of the bed and walked to the window.

  "They'll have fun," he said absently, looking at dusk settling over the tourist-drenched street below.

  "Mark? Is something wrong?"

  The better question was, was anything right? At the moment, he couldn't see it.

  "I had a repairman replace the broken hose to your stove while you slept yesterday," he answered. "The gas leak shouldn't happen again. He said you need to be careful not to move the stove too much, particularly not close to the wall. That's an easy way to break those hoses."

  "I've cleaned behind the stove before without problems. Guess I didn't do well this time, I'll be more careful in the future."

  Sheets rustled, and a moment later Mark felt Nicki at his back. He stiffened as she wrapped her hands around his shoulders and placed a soft kiss on his back. Her lips burned him, even through his shirt, through the armor he fought to trap his desire in.

  "Thank you--again. You came to my rescue once more."

  "I would have done it for anyone in that situation." He shrugged, turning to face her.