The smug coil of gratification made Flick smile, because he’d just betrayed that he wanted her again already.
‘Ok.’
This time when he went for the door, she let him hook her hand into his back pocket and take her down the hall to reception. Today it was unoccupied, but when they moved through to the storefront Flick saw another blonde behind the register. Cody stood on the other side of the counter with a goofy grin plastered on his face, until he saw Rushe at least, because then it quickly vanished.
‘Move.’
This single word from Rushe sent Cody scrambling backwards, and he almost toppled over a display of various butt plugs. The scrawny henchman recovered and ran to the door, literally leaping to the sidewalk.
Flick was surprised that Rushe didn’t speak to the girl. Instead, he took them outside and took hold of Cody’s tee-shirt to shove him down into a seat by the door.
‘Fink’s gonna be over with Barry in twenty minutes, you sit here,’ Rushe said. ‘No one in or out.’
Cody nodded, and Rushe strode away with Flick scampering along in his wake. On the next block, he swung her around into a corner diner. The cracked yellow floor had probably once been white, but the benches facing each other over the blue Formica tables were clean, and the faces seemed indifferent enough.
Rushe unhooked her hand from his pants and took her hip to rotate her around so that he could shunt her into the booth. He began to head for the bench on the opposite side of the table, but she seized his wrist to halt him.
‘Sit next to me,’ Flick said.
‘Why?’
The blank expression and abrupt question curled her lips. ‘I’m not a company contact; you can put your hand up my skirt while we talk. How many of your colleagues have you been able to do that with in the past?’
He slid in beside her. ‘You want me to finger fuck you here?’
‘Degrees of love, my love,’ she said, reminding herself that she still had lessons to teach him too.
Gathering his hand from his thigh and into hers, Rushe watched under the table as Flick held their linked fingers together, there on his knee. His brow came down, and his confusion spurred her on. Stretching her other arm toward him, she curved it around until she found his stubble, and then she scooched in until her thigh pressed to the length of his. She boosted up a little and let their lips meet.
‘You’re too damn frisky to be out in public,’ he grumped, but she clocked the moment he realised what viewing pleasure he got of her breasts from this angle.
‘Where’s your guard?’ she teased, and a low rumble quaked from his chest.
‘You want coffee?’ the waitress, with the tied back curls, asked on pausing at their table.
‘Yeah,’ Rushe said, still eyeing Flick’s cleavage.
‘Anything else?’ the waitress asked.
‘I would like—‘
‘No.’
Rushe cut Flick off, but the waitress didn’t bother to appear surprised or offended, she just walked off.
‘You said we were coming out to breakfast,’ Flick said.
‘We needed distance.’
‘Why?’
‘Away from that place to talk,’ he said. ‘They asked me to take the rap.’
Playtime was over, and she understood that the distance was needed so that they could talk privately. If the Merciers had already put their proposition to him, then it made sense why Rushe hadn’t been all that surprised when she revealed the details of her conversation with Simone.
‘What did you say?’ she asked.
‘I told them to go to hell,’ he said under his brooding brow. ‘I don’t trust any of them, and taking me off the street makes you more vulnerable. I need to be around to watch your tail.’
‘I’m glad you’re coming to realise that.’
Crossing her legs toward him, Flick curled into the warmth that his form offered, and his arm stretched along the back of the booth to tuck her body further into his.
‘You do know that if this was as easy as me going inside to keep you safe...’
‘You’d do anything to keep me safe,’ she said, reiterating to him the faith that she had in him, and his commitment to her, as she would probably always have to.
‘If I’m in there, and you’re out here alone—‘
‘You don’t have to explain the insanity of their scheme. They’ll only keep doing what they’re doing. It won’t prevent us any trouble. Taking you out is their number one goal, because they know that getting rid of you makes the rest of us useless. And putting me in the position of testifying against you means I’d have to oppose you, so I couldn’t do a thing to help liberate you.’
‘They’ll come for you.’
‘I know what they want from me, and they won’t get it,’ Flick said. ‘I’ve started to collate everything we need to prove your innocence. No matter what they throw at us, we won’t have to worry about the legal side. I’m going to make sure of that. Liam’s trying to get the records of the internal investigation regarding Jansen.’
‘It didn’t even occur to you,’ he stated. ‘Not for a second.’
‘What?’ she asked, retracing what she had said.
‘To squeal on me.’
Angling back, she blinked up to meet his eye, but her outrage waned when she saw the slant of his smile. Taking his hand from hers under the table, he coiled his fingers into the ends of her hair until his pressure tilted her head and he compelled their mouths together.
Initiating an isolated kiss was unlike him, but doing so in public was almost unheard of. He broke off the union when the waitress came over to fill two coffee mugs. Rushe scrutinised Flick’s face until the employee left, so she maintained her own interest in his features.
‘My woman,’ he mumbled, lowering his gaze to her cleavage and loosening his fingers from her locks. Spreading his bold digits on her smooth thigh, he let his palm move north under the wisp of her cotton skirt.
Basking in the rediscovery of each other was gratifying, but she had the chance now to seek answers from him while they were alone. ‘You’ve been here in this place before, at the brothel,’ she said, venturing to broach the subject that had been plaguing her.
‘I haven’t fucked Tawny.’ Rushe had read her mind and interpreted the real motive for her statement.
‘Oh thank god,’ she sighed, dispersing her palm on his chest and letting her head fall against him beside it.
‘You could’ve just asked me,’ he said, dropping his mouth to the back of her head.
‘It’s your business. When it’s time to tell me things, you do.’ Turning her head, she kept it rested on his chest under his chin. ‘I trust you.’
‘You’re something else, you know that?’
‘If they got their way, would you still talk dirty to me?’
‘From prison?’
‘Maybe we could have a conjugal visit,’ she said, hooking her calf up over his knee.
‘Dirty girl,’ he grumbled. ‘You ready for more?’
Sliding her hand up, she wound her fingers around his corded neck and let them continue to his jaw so that she could direct his mouth down to hers. The sweep of his tongue tempted her to grope for more, and it wasn’t until he removed her fumbling digits from the buttons of his jeans that she realised she’d subconsciously acted on that thrumming desire.
‘When we’re through with this case I want you to myself for a month,’ she said.
‘Only a month?’ he asked, but she gleaned his teasing.
‘You won’t get a minute of rest.’
‘I’m gonna come with you today,’ he said, toying with her hair again.
‘That makes me happy.’
‘That’s what I’m here for, Kitten.’
‘Will you tell me why you were here before?’
‘About five months before the Jansen job,’ Rushe said. ‘I tracked her down.’
‘Tawny?’
‘Yeah,’ he said, opening his fingers and closing them with
her locks between. ‘I’d been trying to track her down for a while. It wasn’t a job, so I got side-tracked so many times.’
‘If it wasn’t for a job, then it was personal,’ Flick said.
His jaw moved, and Flick knew this was a pivotal moment. Rushe didn’t share easily, and sharing anything personal was even more difficult for him. It didn’t matter that he trusted her, because all of his life he’d relied on no one but himself, so it was his default state to be reserved.
‘Her mom was the woman in the alley, the one I told you about.’
‘Oh,’ Flick exhaled.
As a youngster Rushe had watched a woman be abducted from an alleyway and been powerless to prevent it. He found out later that the woman had been raped and murdered. That single incident was what prompted Rushe to take on cases in defence of women who were unable to stand up to those who wronged them.
‘Does she know?’ Flick asked. ‘Tawny, does she know about—‘
‘No,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t gonna tell her that I let that happen to her mom. She’d never understand.’ That, and Rushe didn’t like talking about it. ‘Tawny was only a few months old when her mom died. She was in foster care. I didn’t even know that Tawny existed ‘til a few years back when I...’
‘When you what?’ she asked, caressing his chest.
‘I’d put it off for years, but… I did some research on Darlene… the woman from the alley. I wanted to know who she was, and that’s when I found out about her daughter.’
Doing research on subjects was part of what Rushe did, because he didn’t take anything at face value. It was possible that he wanted to know about Darlene’s history, or maybe he wanted to find out that she wasn’t as great a person as she appeared to be when she tried to reach out to him. But he’d got more than he bargained for.
‘You came here to help Tawny?’ Flick asked.
‘I came to find out if she needed help, if she was ok.’
‘And she wasn’t?’
‘She’s had it rough,’ Rushe said. ‘But she could do worse than Silver.’
‘You’re defending her pimp?’
‘Silver looks after his girls, he provides a safe working environment.’
‘You offer that environment because you owe him a debt.’
Rushe tilted his head. ‘What else did Simone tell you?’
‘Just that,’ Flick said, ‘and about their intentions of framing you.’
‘Do me a favour, Kitten,’ he said. His fingers glided to the back of her knee and he began to trace circles with barely any pressure. ‘Don’t jump to any conclusions, ok? Don’t forget what we’re about.’
‘Ok.’
His fingers stopped and she lifted her eyes to his. ‘Just like that, you comply,’ he muttered, emanating a subdued awe.
‘I trust you.’
‘You’re something else, Kit. You take it all in your stride.’
‘I am your woman,’ she said, set with her own determination. ‘I will make you proud.’
He took another few seconds to admire her. ‘I’ve gotta talk to Cody before we go to your meeting.’
Between the booth and the brothel, he didn’t let go of her hand. Then after a few stern words with Cody, Rushe took her to a vehicle parked at the back of the building. He demanded the address of their destination. Flick gave it, and then they were on the road.
She hadn’t known that Rushe was coming with her today, and so she hadn’t warned Liam. The two men had only met once, and neither had made the best of impressions, which she couldn’t really understand because they’d actually agreed with each other.
But where Flick went there was always the chance that she’d be residing in Rushe’s shadow. It was her home and the place she was most at ease.
Chapter Thirteen
Liam opened the door with a smile, which dropped to the floor when he clocked the man standing behind Flick with his arm draped the width of her collarbone.
‘Any progress?’ Flick asked, moving forward without offering any explanation for Rushe’s presence. She would never make excuses for attending anywhere with her protector.
‘I found out why we’ve had trouble with the internal investigation records,’ Liam said, closing the door when she and Rushe were inside.
The paperwork spread over the dining table was what drew Rushe’s attention, after he scanned the room to take in all of the features. Switching their positions, he hooked her hand into his back pocket and went over to peruse it from his standing position.
‘Why?’ Flick asked, turning to address a frowning Liam, though she kept hold of Rushe’s pocket. He liked to have her close, especially in unfamiliar surroundings, and while potential threats loitered. Flick knew that Liam was no threat, Rushe knew it intellectually too, but convincing her lover to accept that was a different matter.
‘The records were destroyed, a lot of them anyway,’ Liam said. ‘Internal Affairs turned up evidence of corruption throughout the chain of command. A couple of captains lost their jobs, actually.’
‘I’m surprised that the department managed to keep it quiet,’ Flick said.
‘It was after the first captain lost his job that the second was found destroying evidence of the internal investigation.’
‘Which is how you found out about evidence that no longer exists,’ Rushe murmured, and took a piece of paper from the table to read it. Flick looked past him to see it was the timeline she’d laid out. ‘You wrote this?’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘How did you remember all of these details?’ Rushe asked.
‘It wasn’t an everyday occurrence for me,’ she said. ‘My memory of events is pretty vivid.’ Floating closer, Flick rested her mouth onto his arm. His features relaxed as he read the document again, but from the way his body listed toward hers, the reading was cover for his esteem. ‘I think you’ve got a good memory of it yourself, Lover.’
‘There’s a bedroom in there if you need it,’ Liam sniped.
Rushe whipped around so fast that Flick was almost bowled over. Catching his ribcage to steady herself, she soothed his vicious snarl simultaneously.
‘Is he upsetting you?’ Rushe asked through motionless lips, his eyes burning fury to Liam.
‘No,’ Flick said. ‘He’s right. We’re here to work.’ Rushe continued to glare over her head. ‘I’ll never say anything incriminating about you, but we have to make damn sure none of the other women do, or that there’s any evidence that can be construed to imply any guilt on your part.’
‘First part of that is finding out just what you’re guilty of,’ Liam said.
Flick struggled to comprehend the accusation in Liam’s words, but when she about-faced he was still the only one here. ‘You think we’re guilty of something?’ she asked. ‘We’ve talked about this in detail, several times now. If you believed that we were in the wrong—‘
‘He’s talking about me, Kit.’
Though their bodies still touched and the distance between them was non-existent, the calm understanding that Rushe exuded had converted into something else by the time it reached her. Outrage was what smacked her between the eyes, and she felt in no way calm about it.
‘No, look,’ Liam said. ‘I don’t want to start anything. I just meant—‘
‘I told you not to be derogatory,’ she said, angling herself in front of Rushe. ‘I warned you what would happen if—‘
‘Get your reins,’ Liam said, holding up his hands as he traversed toward them. ‘I apologise, I didn’t mean that in the way that it sounded. What I meant was that if there was the possibility, no matter how minute, that there could maybe be evidence out there that could be used to—‘
‘We shot Shiv,’ Flick said, peeking over her shoulder at Rushe.
‘Both of you?’ Liam asked.
‘At different times,’ Flick said, not taking her focus away from Rushe.
‘He was patched up, and there’s no way to prove who pulled the trigger. All the witnesses are dead.’
‘Except Simone.’
‘She didn’t witness either of us pull a trigger,’ Rushe said, and Flick noted how vague his words were.
‘Proving you weren’t pivotal in the trafficking and that you didn’t violate any of those women, those are the main things.’
‘I’m still trying to trace statements,’ Liam said. ‘The whole thing is a mess. Most of what I have is pretty vague in terms of facts. The women describe their individual abductions and their treatment, but they don’t have a lot of names and dates, just stories of events. But the criminal case has escalated.’
‘Escalated?’ Flick asked. ‘What does that mean?’
‘There’s been plenty of local investigation into Victor’s money lending operation. But the testimony of the abducted women, that’s all been turned over to the feds.’
‘Yeah,’ Rushe grumbled.
‘That’s great,’ Flick said, with a welcome glimmer of hope. ‘If they’re investigating, then they’ll find out the truth.’
‘That’s not the way it works, Kit,’ Rushe said.
‘They don’t seem to care about the internal investigation,’ Liam said.
‘They’re not gonna investigate the internal politics of their subordinate colleagues,’ Rushe said. ‘They’re not gonna care about Jansen or Serendipity, what they care about is where those women were going… But they won’t find that out, not if the cops destroyed everything before the feds got involved. Everyone who knew anything is dead, and the paper trail will have been taken care of. The victims didn’t know anything, and Victor was far removed from the top of the chain, that was the point of using him.’
‘They planned to frame him all along?’ Liam asked.
‘If things went bad, he was a great mark,’ Rushe said. ‘A lowlife in over his head, it would’ve played well.’
‘Which is why painting you as his partner puts you into the hot seat.’
As Flick’s head came up, her throat constricted. ‘Oh god,’ she sighed.
‘What is it?’ Liam asked, hurrying the rest of the distance toward her. Rushe hooked his arm around the front of her shoulders, easing her body back against his.
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