The Drowned Girls (Angie Pallorino Book 1)

by Loreth Anne White

  He reached the gate, but as he punched in his code, a movement in the shadows came from his left. He jerked around, his hand shooting into position near in his holster. Shock rustled through him as a figure emerged from the wet blackness.

  “Angie?”

  She didn’t say a word. Her coat glistened with rain. She wore a black ball cap, and her skin looked ghost-white against the darkness. Her eyes seemed wrong, too. Bigger, blacker, deeper, as if smudged with eye makeup. Worry sparked through him. On the back of his concern came a sinking feeling that she’d been to the club.

  “What’re you doing here at this hour? You okay?”

  Without replying, she came right up to him, reached up, slid her icy-cold hand around the back of his neck, and threaded her fingers roughly into his hair. She looked up into his eyes—deep into his eyes.

  Maddocks swallowed. “How long have you been waiting out here, Angie?” he whispered.

  In silence, she drew him down to herself, and her cool lips—wet with rain—met his. She leaned up into him, pressing her body against his, and she moved her lips against his in a gentle, exploring, drowning kiss that clean stole his mind. His breaths came faster as he felt her hand going inside his coat, moving down his abs. She cupped him between the legs. A groan built low in his chest as he kissed her back, opening her mouth, wider, tasting her, his tongue twisting with hers. She massaged the growing length of his erection in his pants. But while she was blinding him, stealing his brain as all his blood flooded south into his cock, a small voice of caution in Maddocks said this was wrong. Her need was different. It was not the same hot, raw lust—the sexual aggression—that had fired her previously. He pulled back, breathing hard.

  “Angie?” he whispered. “You haven’t returned my calls. What’s happened?”

  “Are you going to invite me in, James Maddocks?” Her voice was thick, hoarse. Maddocks hesitated and then took her hand in his, unlocked the marina gate, and led her down along the dock, which rocked in the swells. His heart thumped with anticipation, promise. Fear. Conflict …

  We’d like you to formally evaluate Detective Pallorino’s performance over the next few weeks, as she continues to work under you … she’s had performance issues, including an incident that resulted in the recent death of her senior partner. Sergeant Hash Hashowsky was one of our longest-serving, most highly respected, and well-liked detectives. I called him a friend …

  “Want something to drink?” Maddocks said once they’d come down the companionway and entered his yacht.

  She shook her head, slid his coat off his shoulders. Dropping it to the floor, she took both his hands in hers and led him backward into his sleeping cabin. His mouth turned dry. He half expected her to shove him backward onto the bed, rip at his buttons and zipper, strip him wild like that night at the club, straddle him, fuck him hard.

  Instead, she seated him fully clothed on the bed and slowly undressed herself in silence, in front of him, lights on. As if she wanted nothing left to hide, no games left to play. She stood naked in front of him—pale breasts, nipples tight nubs, the hair between the apex of her thighs the same color as the long, dark-red hair spilling damp over her shoulders. A poignancy surrounded her, a vulnerability. A fragility that made Maddocks think of perfect glass—a thing of perfection that if he touched, would break. The beat of his heart boomed in his ears. He felt it in his erection. Tentatively, unsure, he reached forward to place his hands on her hips, but she moved them away. She began to undress him—painfully, exquisitely slowly.

  When they were both naked, she lay down beside him and drew him atop her. Her pale-gray eyes were almost consumed by her dilated black pupils, making them look huge and dark. Haunted. Shock?

  “Angie,” he said again, fighting to concentrate, fighting the wildness crackling under his skin as she tilted her pelvis under him, and her hands guided his erection into her folds. “What … what in the hell happened?”

  Her eyes began to glisten slightly, and she shook her head, as if to say Not now. She opened her thighs, arching her spine, an urgency entering her movements now as she strained for him, her breathing becoming faster, her skin warm.

  His vision swirled as he thrust and entered her hot wetness. She sighed softly as if with relief. Maddocks moved slowly, tentatively at first, rocking into her, and she met each of his thrusts with soft, sure movements of her hips—a pace as old as time, a rhythm that matched the waves upon which his boat rocked. And inside him a blinding pressure began to build. He could feel her growing hotter, hungrier, beginning to move faster. He thrust harder, faster. She wrapped her legs around him, hooking her ankles behind him, taking him tight into her arms, as if she couldn’t get him deep enough, as if she wanted to absorb and consume him wholly.

  Suddenly, she gasped, went rigid. Her nails dug into his skin. She clutched onto him, unbreathing, unmoving. Then she cried out, and he felt her muscle contractions, wave after wave after shattering wave as she arched her head back, mouth open, eyes wide, and he couldn’t hold back. One more hard thrust to the hilt and he came right inside those rolling waves, collapsing onto her.

  For a while afterward they just lay there, entwined in each other, breathing hard, skin slick. Then he felt the wetness of her tears against his neck. His gaze jerked to her face. She was crying, her nose and cheeks pinked.

  “Angie?”

  She shook her head, cupped his jaw. “That was beautiful,” she whispered, drawing his mouth down to hers, kissing him again through the salt of her tears on her lips. “So beautiful. Thank you,” she murmured again, against his mouth. “Thank you.”

  CHAPTER 64

  Angie looked up into those impossibly dark blue eyes that had drawn her so on that first night in the club, and a little faraway voice inside her whispered …

  You could learn to love this man …

  He’d slid out of her, rolled onto his side, and was propping himself up on his elbow as he studied her. He no longer wore the bandage over his nose, but the swelling was still evident. As were the bruises she’d put there. Her heart crunched.

  You really could learn …

  But at the same time, she knew she wasn’t ready. Not yet. She first had to find herself, learn who she was. Those cops might have closed her case all those years ago, but she was determined to see it reopened.

  You allowed yourself to be submissive and vulnerable in his arms, and it gave you pleasure, not fear. It was a gift … you could become a new person …

  “Talk to me, Angie,” he whispered, touching her lip, her scar, tracing the line of it across her mouth. “Tell me where you’ve been—what’s happened.”

  “How’s the case?” she replied instead, suddenly a little nervous of actually voicing it all to him, making it more real. “It’s been killing me to be locked out of it. I’ve seen nothing in the media.”

  “Stalled,” he said, his hand moving to her breast, tracing her nipple, so that it puckered and tingled all over again. She shivered slightly. He drew the blanket up over them both. “And you’re stalling with me. What happened? What changed?”

  She took a deep breath and said finally, “I went to see someone. Sort of unofficially. Dr. Alex Strauss. I was a psych major before I decided to go into law enforcement—Alex was my academic advisor, and he became a friend.”

  She explained to him all that had transpired with Alex and then with her father.

  Maddocks listened, playing gently with her hair, an intensity in his eyes.

  “So, I guess if Miriam Pallorino is not my biological mother,” she said, “then I can’t have inherited her genetic predisposition toward schizophrenia. I suppose that’s something. Alex also offered to try further hypnosis sessions to see if I can remember more.”

  “How does all this make you feel?”

  A wave of emotion surged through her, and she paused a moment to corral it. She turned her head away to look down at Jack-O, who was curled into a ball on his little sheepskin bed on the floor. The sight of the anima
l warmed her. “Determined,” she said softly. “To search for my birth parents. To find out where I came from, who I am, what happened to me, how I got to be the Angel’s Cradle baby. How I seem to know some Polish.” She turned back to face him. “I think … something terrible was done to my birth mother—or to us both—which is why I could have suppressed all recollection of that period of my life.”

  Concern entered his features. And it gave her a sense of foreboding, because she wanted back on the drowned girls case. And Maddocks was the gatekeeper—she needed him to believe she was going to be all right now.

  “Tell me about the case,” she said in an effort to swing things back on course. “What did Leo and Holgersen say about my absence, and about your nose?”

  “We’ll talk in the morning.”

  The foreboding deepened—there was something in his eyes, something he was not telling her. “Why?”

  “Have you seen the time, Angie? We sleep now.”

  “I want to return to work tomorrow, Maddocks—I need to. I’ve been off two full days. Any longer and there will be serious questions.”

  “What about that psych eval?” he said quietly.

  Her stomach tightened. “I’ll make it happen. I’ll make an appointment—I’m going to be okay now.”

  “And the fact you could experience another flashback episode?”

  “I won’t. It’s … it’s like I’ve been under pressure my whole life, like this molten lava has been seething and boiling beneath the cool crust of my consciousness, which has been struggling to keep it in and hidden, and now that crust has been exploded open wide, and all that pressure is being relieved as that lava rushes out.”

  He regarded her for a moment in heavy silence.

  “Maddocks,” she said quietly. “I’m going to be fine. You have to believe me.”

  “We’ll talk more tomorrow.” He kissed her gently and clicked off the light.

  But as Angie finally drifted off to sleep in his arms, naked and warm in the rocking boat, Jack-O snoring, the old propane heater clunking every time the thermostat registered that the cabin had grown too cold, a nursery-rhyme tune whispered into her mind. Then came tinny music. It grew louder and louder …

  Two little kittens … Two little kittens … All children, even the bad ones, are already asleep, only you are not …

  A deep and unspecified fear started to unfurl inside Angie at the sound of the music. With it came a cold, mental blackness. And she wasn’t at all certain she would make it all work out fine.

  CHAPTER 65

  SUNDAY, DECEMBER 17

  Angie entered the galley wearing her clothes from yesterday, her hair tied back into a neat ponytail. She was desperate for a hot shower, but more anxious to talk.

  Maddocks had set the little galley table for two. His back was to her. He was flipping an omelet and had a pot of steaming coffee on the brew. Jack-O was crunching his biscuits in a bowl at his feet.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “Morning. Sleep okay?” He turned, frying pan in hand, went to the table, and lowered his gaze, focusing on the food as he slid portions of omelet onto two plates. Anxiety trickled instantly into Angie—he was avoiding her gaze.

  “Yeah, fine,” she lied. Her night had been tormented with dreams awoken deep in that place Alex had taken her.

  “Grub’s up,” he said, taking a bench on one side of the table. He finally looked up and grinned. “My dad always used to say that. Come, sit. Eat while it’s warm.”

  She remained standing, watching his face. His grin did not reach into his eyes. He wore jeans. Nice shirt. No tie. He was dressed for work, but a little more casual. She realized it was Sunday.

  “Maddocks—”

  “Sit,” he repeated, pouring two mugs of coffee. Then, as if catching himself, he looked up again and said, “You doing okay this morning?”

  “Peachy. You?”

  His hand stilled. His smile sobered.

  “We need to talk,” she said quietly.

  “I know. While we eat.” His glance flicked to his watch, and he reached for his knife and fork.

  Slowly, she seated herself opposite him. “You’re going to work,” she said. “You’re watching the clock. Something’s up with the case—you’re anxious to get in there.” She felt left behind—a gap yawing open. A sickish feeling filled it.

  “Yeah.” He reached for his mug, took a gulp of coffee, then cut into his food and delivered a forkful to his mouth. “Jayden Norton-Wells voluntarily gave a DNA sample late yesterday. Sunni said she’d have the profile for us this morning.”

  She stared. “What?”

  “Eat,” he said, motioning with his chin toward her plate.

  “Why? Am I in a rush, too? Am I coming in with you—Maddocks?”

  Carefully, slowly, he set down his knife and fork. He met her eyes. Lines furrowed into his brow and bracketed his mouth—an inner struggle evident in the tightness of his features.

  “You’re avoiding it. Me. This fucking elephant in the room … and you’re scaring me, because I haven’t seen you like this. I thought you were someone who hit things head-on, said things like they were. We’ve got shit to talk about.”

  “I … I’m sorry, Angie. I …” He inhaled deeply. Wind rocked the boat. “I don’t know how to do this, either,” he said finally. “I haven’t been here before. I … I want to be there for you, and I’m …”

  “Struggling with what to do with me? You’ve taken possession of my weapons. You know stuff about my state of mind that you should tell your superiors. We’ve slept together. Partners. And I’ve been accused of killing partners before, haven’t I? Is that what they said back at the station? What did you tell them about your nose? About me? What did Leo and Holgersen and everyone say when I didn’t show up? They shred me apart like jackals the first opportunity they had?” Her voice was going tight, her eyes burning. The crap thing about this metaphorical lava shit coming out her consciousness cracks was that it was making her feel. It was making her vulnerable. It was making her need his approval. His faith. His belief in her. And yeah, while she’d tasted vulnerability and submission last night, and it was a wonderful and shimmering and fragile thing—she didn’t know if she could do this full-time. She felt herself beginning to close as she looked at him.

  “I hate it,” she said. “I fucking hate needing anything from anyone. I don’t need you—I’m sorry I put you in this position … it’s not fair, I know.” She started to get up. “It’s best if I take myself—”

  His hand, big and warm, clamped over hers. “Angie.”

  Thump thump thump went her heart. She could hear her own blood beating. Could hear the chinking of halyards against masts in the wind outside. Could hear the slap of water against the hull. A sense of time pressed down. Past. Present. Future … uncertain.

  “Just say it, Maddocks,” she said quietly. “Bullet points, if you must—like I made my dad say it all. I can take it. I’d rather take it square, because I can’t stand it any other way—the guessing, the innuendo. The not knowing.”

  His gaze lanced into hers. His features tightened further. Energy simmered off him in waves. He nodded, pushed his plate aside, heaved out a sigh, dragged his hand through his hair.

  “Buziak is on leave pending outcome of the internal investigation.”

  She blinked, then slowly reseated herself. “Go on.”

  “I have no idea what they’ve got on him, but that news came down Friday. It’s why I decided, in part, to go after Norton-Wells for the voluntary sample.”

  “Who’s in his place?”

  Silence.

  “You?” Her world tilted again on its axis. The sense of betrayal was instant. “You’re my boss?”

  “I know how you must feel. I—”

  “No you don’t.”

  “I think I do. I’ve slept with you. I know things about you. I didn’t tell you last night because my concern was about what had happened to you. And you had a lot to process, and I didn
’t want you to—”

  “And now you’re my keeper? Deciding what’s good for me to hear?”

  Loss of control, submission in sex was one thing, but … this. This was something else. She swallowed. Pressure was building in her ears. Claustrophobia circling. Focus. Stay in control. She started to get up, couldn’t sit in this little cubicle, in this little bobble of a yacht … panic was rising.

  “Fitz also asked me to spy on you.”

  It hit her like a sledgehammer. “What?”

  Silence.

  “You’re in fucking bed with Fitz?”

  “Would I have just told you this if I were in bed with him?”

  She glowered at him. The old familiar anger, the spiciness of rage, began to swell inside her, pushing aside her fears, and she welcomed it. “Spy? Because of what happened with Hash?”

  He nodded. “And because he’s a misogynistic little prick with a Napoleon complex.”

  “So now I’ve done this to you, too—sharpened the conflict of interest. Put you in a situation where you’ve been asked to assess my mental fitness for the job, while you already know that I mentally cracked—almost killed you. Did you tell him that?”

  “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know what to think anymore, Maddocks. I’ve put you in this position, and now I’m sitting here at your mercy. Fucking body, heart, soul …” She stopped at the sound of her own words.

  Heart.

  Soul.

  Her eyes burned. She swallowed. He’d gone stone still. His eyes glistened, too.

  It was out there now. Like a vibrating thing in the space between them—this thing they were beginning to feel for each other. The heavy implications. The shimmering possibilities. The challenges.

  A sort of quiet tide of terror rose up inside her, swallowing away any teases of rage, leaving behind something far more complex.

  “I have your back, Angie,” he whispered. “You need to know that.”