Among the Flames (Kisses and Crimes Book 3)

by Natalie E. Wrye

  I had intended to follow my own advice. Key word: intended.

  I didn’t know how I was going to make sure that Sienna followed it, but I knew I would do whatever it took to keep her safe… Even if that meant scaring her away…

  I took another swallow of the whiskey when I felt his presence at my back, the slightly elevated pace of his even breathing.

  I cleared my throat without turning.

  “’Bout time you showed up,” I commented towards the bar. “The stool beside me was getting a little lonely. But then again, you’re used to being lonely, too, aren’t you, Agent Mondello?”

  “What are you doing here… Salt?” He growled quietly.

  “I’m here… for the same reason you’re here. To have a drink. I’m also here to see that same girl we both love. You know? The one you can’t have, but wish you did?”

  I thought he might punch me again, but Javier was beginning to surprise me. I honestly wanted him to hit me, just so I could feel anything but numb. The liquor certainly wasn’t working. I never knew a numbness like I’d felt the second I let Sienna slip away, but I’d given anything to make it go away. Even if it meant taking a beating just to make sure my heart was still beating.

  I finally rotated towards the former FBI agent, wondering if he could also see the pieces of my soul dying. There was nowhere to hide when the masks you once used with the world were off.

  Javi sat beside me, quiet, and I spun back towards the bar and drinks. I motioned towards the bartender.

  “Here,” I said when he poured me another shot. I slid it towards Javi. “Have one.”

  The brown-eyed bastard threw it back, wincing as it hit the back of his throat. I grinned, picking up my own glass.

  “For an everyday bartender, you’re shit at handling your alcohol.”

  “I run bars. I don’t drink them down.”

  I started to laugh when the news on the TV screen above the bartop stopped me. It was about Audriana Fletcher. More of the political heiress’s items had been found, leaving authorities hopeless that the body of the senator’s beloved daughter would surface. The report was bleak:

  “Officials on the case believe that the bloodied belongings of Audriana Fletcher tell a grim story. Family and friends as well as supporters from Washington showed up in droves at a prayer-filled, candelight vigil for Senator Robert Fletcher’s only daughter Wednesday night. Among them? The Vice President of the United States, actor Johnny Tango, and Governor of New York Shelley Price. Price led the small prayer at the vigil, providing a heartfelt account of her time with the youngest Fletcher and the Fletcher family. In light of recent evidence, a memorial is said to be schedule for Audriana in the upcoming weeks.”

  The report made my heart thump harder, but not as hard as the one directly after—an account of the crash from last weekend with more shocking details to be revealed. I listened in.

  Authorities are still on the lookout of the black SUV said to be involved in the triple-fatality crash that took the lives of three native New York men early Sunday morning. Police have finally been able to identify the victims, reporting among them… Gafanelli mob affiliates Marco Morelli, Gino Maloni and Tommy “Buddy” Barontino who were…

  I knocked over my stool, standing to my feet. The glass of tequila went flying, and before it could shatter, I reached for my jacket, grabbing it. I made it to the front door in a flash before Javi caught up to me, snatching my arm from behind. I shrugged out of his grasp, eyes blazing in search of the nearest taxi.

  I grabbed my phone from my pocket, dialing.

  “Hey!” Javi called out, standing on the sidewalk outside the bar beside me. “The hell’s the matter with you? Are you fucking crazy?”

  “Can you get a signal?” I asked, ignoring his question. “My phone is going straight to voicemail when I call her.”

  “Her who?”

  “Fuck.” Voicemail again. “Sienna, dickwad. Sienna.”

  “Sienna’s no longer your concern,” Javi huffed. “I came here to let you know that. And if your phone is going directly to voicemail, I’m fairly sure that she feels the fucking same way, so leave her…”

  “I can’t,” I roared, coming within inches of his face. “This means they’re still following us. Her. They’ve been following us. The SUV. The Escalade. It wasn’t them; it wasn’t my client… And I’ve led them right to Sienna.”

  “Who? What client?”

  I turned my back on Javi. I needed Sienna. I needed to get to Sienna now. The taxis on the street passed me by. I guess picking up a hysterical homeless-looking man on the corner didn’t quite appeal to them. I didn’t care.

  I racked my brain for ways to reach out to her. I’d steal a fucking taxi if I had to. Right now, I was ten calls deep, a million texts messages sent. I pulled out my last trick card, logging into my DateMe app.

  My heart seized, stopping immediately when it saw the last message sent through the app. A message… that wasn’t from me.

  Under my name, my profile. Begging. Pleading.

  In five words, it had turned my entire life around. In five words, it had put my strong-willed Sienna Santiago on the path to the greatest danger she would ever face.

  It was another sign of deadly fate. Five words.

  I’m sorry. 1150 88th Street.

  ***

  I couldn’t convince Javi to stay away.

  We finally caught that taxi… twenty minutes later. I could have strangled every driver that stranded us, could have cut off the windpipe of every motorist that had watched us and kept going, but I knew it wouldn’t make a difference.

  It wouldn’t change the fact that Sienna was all alone, that Grimm and Jessica were too far away in Washington to help… and that all of us might ultimately die.

  In fact, the probabilities were against us. Yet, none of it seemed to matter.

  Javi and I crowded our way into the first thing smoking to get to 88th street. We’d made the taxi driver practically file down the wheels with how fast he peeled off the curbs at our orders.

  If my client didn’t kill us, the drive might certainly have.

  I threw a couple of hundreds at the cabbie for his troubles and he damned near ignored it, he was so happy to be away from us.

  Javi and I hit the curb with new purpose, and I was suddenly aware that we were completely unarmed, headed to face the worst type of enemy. Powerful and ruthless.

  But I didn’t give two fucks how well-connected my client was, how influential. Tonight, I was a whole new level of ruthless, feeling merciless and brutal. I’d break every bone of the fucker who led Sienna here and I didn’t need a mask to do it, didn’t need to pretend or become some imposter to exact my revenge.

  The front door to the building was open. Small and swanky, the bottom floor was quiet and unmanned. No door man greeted us at the entrance. In fact, the apartment building seemed to be so empty that the sound of our footsteps echoed, making the tiny space appear wide and endless.

  It was quiet. Eerily quiet.

  I listened hard, my ears straining to hear for any sound of Sienna. Concentrating, my entire mind focused, I felt as if I honed in hard enough I could probably smell her. Such was the bond I felt to her, so thorough that I swore I could almost hear her breathing in the building.

  I noticed that it was only five floors.

  I would knock down every door if I had to. My head on a swivel, my eyes scanning over the ugly blue carpet on the lobby floor, I sought the first exit to the stairs, approaching the abandoned front desk when the soft sound of soles reached my reddened ears.

  Javi turned… just as I saw her.

  And it was just as if a day hadn’t passed between us…

  Everything about her was the same, except that smell. She was as wide-eyed as she was back then, just as beautiful. If it wasn’t for the change in scent, I’d think she was sent back from Hell, climbed up from the seven circles to torture me again, to make up for ten years of long-lost time.

  I sai
d her name.

  “Morgan…”

  She smiled. “Hello again, Giovanni.”

  “Still fucking choir boys? Or have you moved onto bigger game?”

  She walked towards me on high heels that were like skyscrapers. Blonde and busty, she was every bit of my teenaged fantasy come to life, except my reality was so much better. Sienna Santiago blew this bubble gum bitch out of the water. I stepped even closer, my teeth tightened.

  “Where is she?”

  Morgan’s returning smirk was pink and wide. “Follow me…”

  She started up the carpeted stairs, and I began to trail behind her. Until Javi raised his hand, placing it on my shoulder. His dark eyes slanted.

  “You know this chick?”

  “Know her?” I snorted, shaking my head. “More than most… I work for her.”

  His mouth fell slightly ajar. “This blue-eyed psychopath?”

  “Yeah…” I continue walking behind the unhinged Miss Daniels. “This was my first job for her, technically… and after tonight, whatever happens, if I live or die, it’ll be my last…”

  We scaled the steps slowly, and I fought the urge to wrap my fingers around the crazy bombshell’s throat. It wasn’t her… but the person behind her, the real client, that I couldn’t risk crossing. At least, not yet.

  We reached the final floor. Opening the door second on the right, we entered to the pulse of my hammering heart and solid steps. And there she was.

  The new center of my world.

  Sitting silently at a small wooden table in the condo’s dining room. I had to stop Javi from rushing to her side.

  “Be patient.”

  Because Miss Daniels wasn’t alone.

  There were stern-faced men on the perimeter of the room. Clad in black suits, their eyes were narrowed at us, their trigger fingers ready to retrieve the pistols I knew were tucked away. They’d shoot as soon as look at us. I knew it. I looked at Sienna, staring at her serious face.

  “Are you okay?”

  She nodded slowly. “Yes.”

  She seemed frozen to her seat. I assumed because she had been threatened to, and the thought infuriated me. I looked over at the woman who was holding her, wanting to throw her across the room. I practically seethed.

  “This is how you do business, Morgan?”

  “It’s how we do business when the people we pay don’t behave…”

  “Behave?” I scoffed out loud. “Am I a dog now?”

  “You always were. A disobedient one…” She tilted her head. I could feel my own skin go pale. I glanced from the face of Javi to Sienna and back. I was right. My client had figured it out, slipped in there when I hadn’t completed the deal… and saw her. I kept my eyes on Morgan, shocked when Sienna suddenly spoke up.

  “You’re fucking crazy, aren’t you?”

  “Couldn’t be more,” Morgan responded.

  I threw my words at Morgan. “It must run in the family. One fucked-up Fletcher after another after another…”

  “And yet you fucked this fucked-up Fletcher, didn’t you?” She winked wryly. “There are perks to being Senator Robert Fletcher’s niece, Giovanni. You benefitted from a few.”

  “Benefitted? Is that what you call it?” I sniffed. “I wasn’t benefitting, Morgan. I was indebted. Big fucking difference.”

  “The difference being…” she responded. “That your recklessness killed my Godmother’s informant. A very special one. You know just as well as I do how my father’s church was a popular hub, a place for sinners to come and repent.”

  I lowered my voice. “Just didn’t know that would entail murderers, launderers, thieves and lying potentials.”

  She shrugged, raising her voice to sound sickly sweet. “A sinner is a sinner.”

  “Some more than others…”

  My chest tightened with anger. I was growing tired of playing this game.

  “You can’t threaten me with this shit, Morgan. The trade is off. I can’t bargain with the FBI and a dead girl. Audriana Fletcher is gone…”

  Morgan tilted her head towards me. She knew more than she was saying… and she played my bluff, calling my poker face for what it really was. She laughed softly into the air, twirling a dainty finger at me.

  “Cut the bullshit, Gio. I know your secret.” She looked at Sienna. “She’s very lovely, isn’t she? She has his eyes. I wonder if she has his mean streak.”

  Sienna’s eyes slanted at Morgan, and the blonde woman’s pink lips parted in a grin. “Guess that answers that. But you are right, Gio. The deal is off. I think my Godmother has much more use for your pretty brunette than you do.”

  Sienna stood there gaping for several seconds before her surprise turned into a scowl. Her face scrunched as she looked over at me. I couldn’t find the words to tell her. Unfortunately, Morgan seemed to have all the wrong ones.

  She slinked in closer to Sienna, and I had to stop myself from throwing her across the room. Sienna shuddered as Morgan lightly slid her fingers along her arm.

  They both glanced up at me.

  “Oh, he hasn’t told you, has he? Of your part in his little trade? See, he was supposed to make a deal for you, girl.” She grinned wickedly. “But I won’t let him now. We’re family. My father is the brother of your father.” Morgan placed her hands on her hips.

  “Your dad is Robert Fletcher, and if Audriana really is dead, then you’re now his only daughter.”

  Body and Soul

  SIENNA

  At the demented blonde’s revelation, the room exploded.

  Stupidly, Javi rushed towards me, and I ran. A shot rang out as he threw himself in my direction, and I ducked, looking up to find Giovanni wrangling with the one of the gunman on the other side of the large room, his face flushed, his grunts loud as he attempted to throw the man to the ground while other two jumped on him.

  The sound reverberated, and the slam of skin against skin, knuckle against nose, produced a concerto of crunching noises, sick and sadistic as bone met brawn and everything in-between.

  And Javi had been shot…

  A bright red spot burgeoned below his wrist, spreading as I scrambled to wrap it with a nearby kitchen towel, my eyes seemed glued to Giovanni, who was struggling to maintain ground. I had to help him. But I couldn’t let Javi’s wound worsen.

  Caught between a rock and a bleeding friend, I didn’t know where to go to or who to go to. My heart was torn into two different directions, and I realized that despite his lies, despite the fact that the blondie “Uni-bomber” had let the “secret child” out of the bag—me, I didn’t have the time to think about it.

  We were all going to die.

  If Javi bled out and the suited men got the best of Giovanni. I looked around and found that the fair-haired sociopath was conveniently missing, fled the scene as soon as the shots sounded.

  Time moved in slow motion as I felt the weight of the world on my shoulders.

  I took my finger, running it along the edges of Javi’s pained face when he shocked me, reaching upwards to slap the digit down. He leaned down over me, slumping against the kitchen table, looking taller than he ever was, as he spoke into my face, his breath sputtering.

  “Help him,” Javi whispered. “He needs you more than me…”

  I looked into Javi’s hurting eyes, seeing the double meaning lying there. Seven seconds later, I kissed his forehead, smoothing his hair as I am sat him down. I tried to rush to Gio’s losing side, picking up a chair to swing it when the front door to the apartment slammed behind me.

  A bullet whizzed by my ear. Then three.

  A scream escaped my throat as suddenly Giovanni’s tall, sculpted body slammed into me, knocking me to the ground, rolling on top of me. The sound of our bodies hitting the floor was an explosion in and of itself, and as the additional booms overhead rocked the very foundation, I realized that I felt nothing.

  Nothing but Gio.

  I had assumed I was dead. Maybe we both were…

  The limp, motio
nless bodies that now lay beside us let me know that perhaps we were and had died. The suited men were splayed out beside us, lifeless. I didn’t move and neither did Gio. I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping that the outbursts were over, wishing that despite my fear that I was already done for, that the next blasts weren’t going to be for me… and the man in my arms.

  I could barely believe it when he lifted his body off of mine, running a hand along my face. His touch let me know that I was still alive.

  Rolling sideways, his green eyes bore into my brown ones, as he lifted himself to his feet, taking me with him. Scared and shaking, I fell into his arms, enfolding myself in them. Javi, wincing, wobbled towards us, glancing at the mysteriously deceased guys on the ground.

  My gaze flickered to his face and as I watched him, dragging towards Gio and me, I noticed the man behind him—dark and bearded. He looked like a handsome menace, all hazel eyes and leather. He stood there, smoking gun in hand. When his golden eyes swept across me, I couldn’t help but meet them they were so hypnotic. I wanted to look away, but couldn’t. Even wrapped in Gio’s warmth and care.

  I shrank, trying to appear smaller in Gio’s enveloping arms. I pressed my face into his chest, and Gio kissed the top of it, rubbing his fingers along my back.

  “Don’t be scared, Sienna…” he whispered. “I brought you a present. I sent him a text before I got here. He arrived here two weeks ago.” He looked at the man. “My package.”

  “Sienna, Javi… I want you to meet a good friend of mine. A good friend of Penelope Castalano’s. Fresh in from Paris.” He motioned towards Hazel Eyes.

  “I think you’ve heard of him. Donovan Bishop. Your international felon. Fugitive extraordinaire.” He smiled. “We have a lot to learn from him…”

  ***

  SIENNA

  The view was extraordinary. Thailand was extraordinary.

  It took three days for Giovanni and I to recover from the Morgan Daniels melee. It took Javi even longer. Angie was a mess, and before the week was over, the cops had caught Morgan Daniels, the Senator’s nutbag of a niece.