“Trust me and do this.”
She moved the seat back as far as it would go and I climbed in behind her. It wasn’t as easy as it sounded, but I managed to do it without making her crash. Patting her left hip, I gripped the wheel and started to push her over to the other seat. She stood up and climbed over to the passenger seat, giving me a spectacular view of her tight ass. Now was not the time to be ogling her, but when in Rome.
I quickly adjusted the seat and pressed down the gas, swerving around anyone that was going too slow.
“It would be really fucking nice if the cops would show up right now.”
“Budget cuts. There aren’t enough police officers to patrol as much as they should.” We were both looking in the rear view mirrors, watching the Challenger gain on us again. I continued heading south out of the city, along the river.
“How are we going to lose them?”
“I’m working on it. The most important thing right now is getting away from civilians.”
“I’m a civilian!”
“Sweetheart, you’re the reason we’re in this mess, so suck it up and hang on.”
The Challenger pulled up alongside me and smashed the back left side of the SUV. Up ahead, there was a bridge crossing the river ahead that didn’t have any traffic on it. Pulling onto the older bridge, the Challenger once again rammed into us, sending us into the guardrail.
“Enough of this shit.”
I lowered the driver’s side window and slammed on the brakes, letting the Challenger pull ahead of us. Once it was in front of me and out of range, I pulled my gun and shot at the tires, unloading the rest of my clip until the tires blew and the Challenger swerved across the bridge, hitting first the left side and then over in front of me. I stomped on the gas, hitting the front end of the Challenger and speeding past it.
The Challenger eventually lost speed and was stopped on the bridge as we sped off and out of sight.
“Holy shit.”
I grinned at her apparent admiration of my skills.
“What the fuck took you so long? You fired like seven shots. I thought you were some badass security guy.”
Okay. That was not what I thought she was going to say.
“I was shooting with my left hand at a moving vehicle while in a moving vehicle and driving said vehicle. Should I let you shoot next time?”
She huffed and crossed her arms over her chest. “Where are we going now?”
“We’re heading back to my office.”
“What? No. I have a story to follow.”
“I need to get a new vehicle. This one looks like it was in a war zone, which it kind of was. If we drive back through the city looking like this, we’ll be dead in six hours.”
“And then we’re heading back to the city.”
“Then we’ll use my resources to see if we can find out more about this case before we head back. Do you have the stuff you need?”
She lifted a messenger bag from the floorboards. “I have everything in here. As long as your bad driving didn’t destroy my laptop.”
I rolled my eyes and prayed for a different case. This woman was going to drive me insane. A half hour later my phone rang.
“Cazzo, what d’ya have?”
“The car belongs to a Juan Cruz. He’s part of the Diablos gang. As far as I can tell, they run heavy with Mexican drug cartels. They’ve become a real problem in the city, but so far there haven’t been any attempts to get them out of the city. Very rarely do any of them get picked up for anything. The cops don’t even get called out to the area of the city where they’re usually seen. There have been a lot of murders in their territory, but they never seem to be investigated.”
“Alright. We’re on our way to you. We’re about thirty minutes out.”
“The reporter’s with you?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you want a report on her also? I should be able to have one by the time you get here.”
“That would probably be a wise decision.”
“See you in thirty.”
I hung up and glanced at Maggie to see her looking at me with a raised eyebrow.
“What?”
“Are you going to tell me what that was about?”
“It was business.”
“Business that involves me.”
“Look, can we wait until we get back to my office and we can lay this all out and go over everything at once?”
She narrowed her eyes at me and crossed her arms over her chest, pushing her breasts up in the process. Much as I tried to pay attention to the road and only the road, her perfect breasts forced me to take a second look. Discretely, of course. I was still a professional.
Sighing, I filled her in briefly on what Cazzo had relayed to me.
“Who’s Cazzo? Is that his last name?”
“No. His name is Sam Galmacci. The guys call him Cazzo.”
“Is that like a call sign?”
I rolled my eyes at her. “That’s the Air Force.”
“Whatever. So how did he get the name Cazzo? What’s it mean?”
I laughed at the memory of Pappy giving him the name. “One of the guys on the other team gave him the name in Italian. It means ‘dick’.”
“And why is that funny?”
“Because even though Cazzo is Italian, he doesn’t speak a word of the language. He was pissed that they wouldn’t tell him what it meant and he refused to look it up. The name stuck and he’s still called Cazzo to this day.”
“Why didn’t someone else tell him? Wouldn’t that have been the nice thing to do?”
I snorted. “Maggie, you obviously haven’t been around men that much if you think we’re going to share something to be nice. If the asshole wants to know what it means, he can look it up in two seconds.”
“Men. I will never understand the way your brains work.”
“That’s probably a good thing, sweetheart.”
“Don’t call me sweetheart. I’m not your sweetheart or any other endearment.”
“Maybe I should call you Gingersnap.”
“I said not to call me anything. You can call me Maggie.”
I continued on as if she wasn’t speaking. “Of course, you don’t really have a ginger color. Maybe ‘Red’ would be better.”
“No.”
“No, you’re right. You’re not really a redhead either.”
“How about you stick with Maggie?”
“I could call you Freckles…”
“I don’t have freckles.”
“Yes, you do. Now that your makeup has worn off a little, I can see those cute freckles poking through.”
“What?” She threw down the visor and looked at herself in the mirror. “Oh my, God! Why didn’t you tell me I looked like this?” She started running her fingers through her hair and wiping the dirt from her face, which only cleaned her makeup off more, revealing that beautiful, creamy skin.
“Actually, you look about the same as you did this morning. Didn’t you take a shower last night?”
“I was busy trying not to be blown up.”
“Maybe I should call you Strawberry. You are a strawberry blonde, after all.”
“Can’t you just let this go?”
“The guys will be naming you if I don’t. Better to let me name you, otherwise you’ll end up with something like ‘Fire Crotch’. I glanced over at her and then down towards her pussy. “How do I know for sure that you’re really a redhead? Maybe you want to give me a sneak peek? See if the curtains match the drapes?”
“Ugh.” She said infuriated. “You are so irritating. My name is Maggie. Not Red. Not Ginger. Not Strawberry or Fire Crotch. Maggie. Get it right or I’ll be giving you my own nickname.”
“It’ll never stick. I already have one. Besides, the guys would never side with a woman over a brother.”
“Then I’ll tell them that I had to save your ass today!”
I shrugged. “When I tell them what a pain in the ass you are, they’ll take
my side.”
“Then I’ll tell them you have a small cock!”
Now she was just grasping at straws. I laughed at her. “Honey, most of the guys have seen my cock at one time or another. Good luck with that one.”
She huffed in annoyance and glared out the side window.
“I think I’ll go with Freckles. It was a toss up between that and Strawberry, but Freckles rolls off the tongue nicer.”
“Whatever.”
She continued to ignore me, so I just kept talking. She had seriously pissed me off earlier and now I was going to return the favor.
“So, Freckles. What made you want to become a reporter?”
She didn’t answer.
“Was it your inquisitive nature?”
No reply.
“Pension for getting into trouble?”
Still nothing.
“Sleeping with the boss?”
“Excuse me? I am not sleeping with my boss! He’s old enough to be my father!”
I shrugged. “Well, you never know nowadays. Look at Hugh Hefner. He was pretty old and wrinkly and the ladies still went after him.”
“He was also rich.”
“Well, judging by how much your boss is paying me, I would guess your boss is pretty well off.”
“The paper is paying you.”
“I’m guessing not. No paper would pay that much to keep that pretty, little head in tact. No, this job is most definitely funded by Mr. Darren Hughes himself.”
She was silent for a minute as she thought that over. “No. He doesn’t have that kind of money. There’s no way he’s funding you protecting me.”
I just shrugged. It mattered very little to me how I was paid as long as I was.
“So, what’s your name?”
“Cap.”
“Cap? As in baseball cap? Bottle cap?”
“As in Captain.”
“Were you a captain of a ship?”
“No, I was a captain in the Marine Corps.”
“Wow. Impressive. What made you get out?”
“Damage to my left eye. I couldn’t pass the vision test to get back in the field.”
“Do you miss it?”
I looked over at her with a stony face. “Every damn day.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Maggie
THE LOOK HE shot me sent chills down my spine. It basically said that he could be out doing important work, but was instead forced to be here babysitting me. Well, I didn’t ask for his protection, so he could just lump it. Maybe if I pissed him off enough, he would leave me alone.
The key would be getting his guys on my side. I had to make them like me and I had a feeling that guys like this would only respond to a strong woman that could put a man in his place. If only I had time to clean up a little first. Then I could make a better impression. Of course, looking like I did said that I had seen action and survived, which I had. Three times now. Okay, so there may be something to needing protection. I wasn’t sure how I would have made it out of that building alive without Sebastian. My getaway car would have gotten me killed in less than five seconds, even if I had managed to get away.
We pulled into an underground garage with an entry code. I discreetly looked over and watched him punch in the code 21573. I locked it away in my memory in case I needed that information later. The garage was filled with vehicles that looked much like the one we were in, except they weren’t riddled with bullet holes and a smashed fender and front bumper.
We got out and walked over to an elevator where another code had to be entered. 65932. Inside the elevator, yet another code had to be entered. 79395. Geez. These people were paranoid.
“Preparing for war?”
“We’re a security company. We wouldn’t be very reputable if you could break into our facility. The codes are changed daily, by the way.”
“Okay. Good to know. I’m glad you’re on top of your game.” Rats. That meant that I was memorizing codes that would be different tomorrow.
“I was telling you so that you wouldn’t have to worry about remembering all three codes. They won’t work if you come back here.”
I scowled at him. “How did you know I was watching?”
“Well, I wasn’t exactly blocking the numbers. If I was worried about you seeing the codes, you wouldn’t have seen them.”
“Well, it looks like you entered the wrong code because the elevator isn’t moving.”
He placed his hand on a glass window on the wall. There were some lines that appeared to be scanning his palm and then a green light surrounded it. The elevator started moving with a jolt and he smirked down at me. Bastard.
When the doors opened, a surly looking man was sitting at the entry desk looking more like a warrior than a secretary. Though, he was looking a little haggard at the moment. He looked skinnier than Sebastian and his face looked like it could use a good shave.
“Cal. This is Maggie. She’s a reporter from Pittsburgh. We’re on protection detail until her story is finished.”
The man gave a jerk of his head and continued to stare off into space.
“He doesn’t look too friendly.”
“He’s…going through something right now.”
There was definitely more to the story, but that wasn’t my concern right now. Looking around, the office was very clean and organized. There were a series of doors that probably held offices and a door at the end of the hall, which was where we were headed. When Sebastian opened the door, I gasped in surprise. There were computer monitors along three of the walls in the room and some kind of large glass screen that was on the fourth wall. There was a ledge along the bottom that held markers and an eraser.
“Welcome to our war room.”
“War room?” I asked as I stared around the room in amazement.
“This is where we strategize.”
“Hey, Cap. I see you made it back in one piece. This must be the little reporter you were sent to protect. I’m Derek, but people call me Irish.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “I’m guessing you’re Irish.”
“Right you are, ma’am. I was unfortunate enough to get some unimaginative brothers when I served. The name stuck and here we are today.”
“So, does everyone call you Irish?”
“No, ma’am. Only half the time.”
“Please stop calling me ma’am. I’m not an old lady.”
“Would you be willing to prove that?”
Flirting. That was the name of the game today. I sauntered up to him and wrapped one arm around his neck while I leaned in close, whispering in his ear. “Anytime, Irish.” I leaned back slightly and lifted my driver’s license in front of his face with my pointer and middle finger.
He looked confused for two point five seconds before pulling back and laughing a huge belly laugh. “Damn. You are one sassy, little lady.”
I did my best curtsy and placed my driver’s license back in my pocket. “It’s Maggie.”
“Shit, Cap. You didn’t tell us you brought a little hellion back with you.”
“Just wait. You haven’t seen anything yet,” Sebastian muttered. “Get Cazzo in here so we can go over what Freckles got herself into.”
“Freckles. I like it.” Irish turned and walked out of the room, returning moments later with six large men ambling to get in the room all at once followed by a kickass woman who looked like she’d rather be anywhere than here.
“Freckles, meet the other members of the team. This is Hunter, Sam, Blake, Mark, John, Julius, Chris, and Lola,” Sebastian said as he pointed to each team member.
“And do you all have nicknames as well?”
“Hunter Papacosta, but they call me Pappy for short.” He extended his hand and gave a firm handshake. He was about six feet with olive toned skin. He either had no hair or shaved his head, but it only made him look sexier, more lethal. He wasn’t overly large, but his muscles strained against his t-shirt and his arms were covered in tattoos that made him look even more lethal. H
is brown eyes seemed almost wary as he looked me over.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” My voice came out almost as a croak and I had to clear my throat.
“I’m Blake Reasenberg, but they call me Burg.”
“Burg? Is that because of your last name or because you’re the size of an iceberg?”
A round of laughs filtered through the room and I found myself blushing slightly. I glanced at Lola, who just rolled her eyes. She probably thought I was flirting when in actuality, I was a little nervous surrounded by all these badasses and words tended to fly out of my mouth unfiltered when I got nervous.
“It’s because of my last name,” Burg said with a charming smile. No doubt, with a name like Blake and a hulking body like his, women flocked to his side for a chance to get one night with him. His ocean blue eyes were disarming enough without his dastardly good looks. He was blonde with a large portion of his face covered in stubble. His shirt also appeared to be either child sized or they didn’t make anything bigger at the big and tall store.
A panty melting man stepped forward, holding out his hand to me. “I’m Sinner.”
“I bet you are,” I said with a grin. This man was by far one of the most gorgeous men I had ever seen. He had jet black hair that was shorn in a military cut. He had the most gorgeous dimples that were barely noticeable through the trimmed beard he was sporting. He was the perfect size all around, not overly muscled, but enough to make me want to run my hands all over his body and feel them ripple under my fingers. His piercing blue eyes held me captive as I gulped and then licked my lips as if I could taste him already.
“Geez, Freckles. Pull yourself together. These are my men, not slabs of beef. We aren’t shopping today.” Sebastian’s irritated voice cut through my lust filled haze, making me flush in embarrassment at his observation of my perusal.
“Freckles. That’s cute. Give me a call if you ever want to trade up from the Cap here.”
His smirk told me that he was trying to get a rise out of Sebastian, so I wisely kept my mouth shut. I had already been embarrassed enough for one day. I managed to keep my libido under control for the rest of the introductions.
John “Ice” Peters was named for his ridiculous resemblance of Val Kilmer in Top Gun. I mean, down to a T. This man was also the epitome of gorgeous. Of course, who was I kidding. They could make a security calendar out of these guys.
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