“Going on eighteen years now.”
Damn. That was a long time. “When you were in the military, right?”
“82nd Airborne Division.”
Her fingers stroked the coarse hair of his forearm as she held it close to her breast. “What happened? Who do you see when you close your eyes?”
The gaping silences that preceded each answer were a blaring indication that this had always been a taboo subject in the past.
“A young boy. He was killed by Haitian police because I didn’t have the orders to fire. I watched the whole beating through my sites. They mutilated his body in front of his father, then killed him, too.”
The skip in her heartbeat told her to breathe. “That’s… terrible.”
“We were there to stop that shit; military and police brutality against their own people. But the rules of engagement changed once we got there.”
“Why?”
He shrugged. “The whole operation was a bunch of political posturing. Flowery words and no action.”
“But you didn’t kill that boy and his father. You were following orders.”
“Like I said, your head doesn’t know that. A lot of guys came out of that operation with a guilt complex.”
“Is that why it was so easy for you to kill Angelo?”
He rolled a little, faced the ceiling. “I’d have gutted a thousand ghosts with my bare hands in order to save DJ.”
The powerful statement rocked her to her very core. Swallowing back the emotion, she said, “So, it really was your first time killing a man.”
“As long as my kids’ parents don’t find out what I did, I’m okay with it.”
Crystal thought about how she’d nearly been his victim, coldcocked at his feet after he’d managed to catch her off guard. “You nearly killed me, too,” she pointed out. “And here we are the next night, freshly fucked and spooning beneath the sheets.”
His head lifted behind her. “As long as we keep things in perspective, right?”
Right. It was just sex, after all. “I was only pointing out the irony, Mac. Don’t worry, I fully expect the cold shoulder in the morning.” His answering silence made her uncomfortable, so she changed the subject. “As far as Angelo is concerned, he’ll probably go down as a John Doe killed by falling debris. No one will know you were even there.”
“Unless someone blabs.” His fingers nudged her ribs.
Crystal smiled slightly. “Is that why you love the daycare so much? Because it rights some kind of wrong in your head?”
With a heavy sigh, Mac lifted his arm to rub at tired eyes. Crystal took the opportunity to flip over, revel in the comfort of his hard, furry chest beneath her cheek.
“I’ve seen a lot of ugliness in my lifetime,” he said thoughtfully, resettling his arm around her. “Men can be cruel, ruthless, and immoral. They’re dirty, smelly, hard on the eyes. Women are soft and kind and beautiful. The gentler sex that keeps us grounded. And kids… they’re our innocents. A mixture of both. I want to shield them from the ugliness, but the truth is… they shield it from me.”
Crystal swallowed hard, fought to keep her voice steady. “You can’t lose that, Mac.”
“No. I can’t.”
His tone made her want to cry. For the first time, she realized how he must have felt when he opened the van doors and found her gone. The betrayal. The uncertainty that would keep him from his kids. Knowing he’d been exposed to a formidable group of people that would use those kids as a means to an end.
Mac’s end.
His eyes flew open. A real noise had penetrated his dreams, he was sure of it. Dawning light shone through the curtains giving him an estimate of time.
Wait a minute. Hadn’t he fallen asleep with a woman in his arms?
Another knock on the front door answered the question as to what woke him. But where the hell was Crystal?
Her absence was foremost on Mac’s mind when he left the couch-bed and looked through the peephole. An impatient Brazilian waited with coffee. He groaned, put his forehead to the door.
“Are you going to stand there, or open up?”
How the hell did she know?
“Come on, Mac, you stomp around like a giant, open the door.” The subtle beauty of their neighbor’s accent was killed by sheer volume. Luciana was an attractive woman, yet everything about her was an exaggeration, from the shaggy mocha hair to the nine-hundred-number mentality.
Praying that Crystal remain out of sight, he turned the knob. The aroma of wet leaves from an early morning storm hit him before the smell of 100% aravaca beans.
“Luciana,” he greeted, squinting from the light over the walkway. “It’s a little early.”
Which wouldn’t stop her when she wanted something. Since Mac had moved in, the woman preferred his services to that of the building’s super, and she always bribed him with gas station coffee. She’d offered more, but he was pretty sure the suspension cuffs in her room weren’t for hanging wet laundry.
The cleavage above Luciana’s low-cut blouse jumped with a gasp. “Your face!”
A brief moment of panic hit, and Mac brought a hand up to feel what kind of hideous malformation he’d woken up with. When the absence of facial hair became apparent, his shoulders relaxed. “Oh, yeah. That.”
“Your beautiful mustache, it’s gone!” Bracelets rattled as she shoved one of the paper cups into his hand. “What happened?”
He wasn’t about to explain that, so he held up the coffee. “Did you need something?”
The woman blinked away her shellshock. “Uh… yeah, I was wondering if you could… look at my garbage disposal, it’s, uh… making a funny noise.”
He handed the coffee back. “Not this morning. You’ll need to call the super.”
She took in his bare chest with open appreciation and ignored the coffee. “Did I get you out of bed?”
Impatience made him snap. “I had a late night.”
Luciana’s dark eyes narrowed beneath pencil-thin eyebrows. “I heard a lot of commotion going on up here last night,” she said, attempting to peer over his shoulder.
Alas, her true motive behind the visit became apparent. Mac drew the coffee back in and edged the door closed a little more. “Sorry if we kept you up, but it’s not a good time.”
Her jeweled sandal wedged in the door before it could close. “I thought you said you and Mel were just friends.”
Oh, boy. “That’s right.”
“There was hanky-panky going on, I could hear you two.”
“It’s none of your—”
“I told you, if you ever need to party, you could come to me.”
“Goodbye, Luciana.”
But she still wouldn’t get her damned foot out of the door. Instead she leaned close and whispered, “You’ll regret sleeping with your roommate, Mac, I’m telling you. Tonight. I’ll be home, you just come down. I’ll take real good—”
The woman’s hushed chatter came to an abrupt halt when a pair of small hands wrapped around his middle from behind. While dread hardened his expression, Luciana took a few steps back and gaped as a scantily clad Crystal placed herself under his arm.
“Don’t worry, Red Light, I have him covered.”
Crystal’s bold reference to hookers put Luciana’s back up. The woman tapped pink nails against her hip in distaste. “I dint’ know you were into boys, Boo.”
Mac opened his mouth to reply, but Crystal beat him to it with deadpan calm. “That’s cute, coming from the one who had to pay for tits.”
She whipped the T-shirt over her head just as she left the doorway, giving Luciana a brief glimpse of her feminine assets. The patch on her shoulder also stood out, but Mac wasn’t looking at that as she sauntered to his bed and sprawled over it like the main dish on a buffet table.
“Oh, I get it,” Luciana purred behind him. “She has a boo-boo and needed you to kiss it for her.”
“I got it in a knife fight,” Crystal replied then quirked her eyebrows.
>
All expression melted from the neighbor’s face. “Yeah, right.” With a huff, Luciana snatched the coffee from his grasp, whirled and clacked down the stairs, back to her own apartment.
Crystal tsked as Mac kicked the door closed. “No goodbye?”
He dug his palms into tired eyes. “Not cool, Crystal.”
“She’s gone, isn’t she?”
“I was handling it.”
She blew air through her lips and rolled onto her stomach. “It looked like she was handling you.”
It was tough to ignore how sexy her ass looked in the skimpy silk panties she’d taken from Mel’s drawer, so he scowled and made his way to the bathroom. “No different than what you pulled last night.”
The only difference was, he’d wanted Crystal. Badly.
“So, we’re back to the cold shoulder already?”
Mac aborted his first attempt to shut the door to answer her with a pointed finger. “Stunts like that are the reason I don’t trust you.”
“What did I do?” Said with faux innocence.
“We’re supposed to be laying low, remember?”
When he finally shut the door, her voice came through it. “You should have thought about that last night before you made me scream.”
Oh, hell, how was he supposed to pee now? “Don’t count on it happening again,” he barked, frustrated with himself for reacting to her words. Now that he’d had her, he wanted more. But to go down that road would invite the kind of trouble he couldn’t afford.
“I’m really hurt by that,” she answered with a pout in her voice. “I thought we had a moment with the sharing and all.”
“I shared that to help you deal. Don’t make me regret it.”
“But, we cuddled!”
Her playful mood only pissed him off more. When he emerged from the bathroom, he said, “Get your clothes on, we’re going to the house.”
She lingered behind to scope out what he’d left. “You put the seat down. That’s so awesome.”
“Clothes, Crystal.”
While she changed in Mel’s bedroom, Mac threw on a pair of jeans and a blue denim shirt. Just as he folded up the couch, she came into the matchbox living room with her black uniform in hand.
“These are bloody and useless now. Can I borrow something?”
While her in-your-face approach to nudity continued to wreak havoc in his pants, Mac kept his voice bland. “Borrow what you want, just put something on.”
“I don’t think your roommate would like me poking through her things.”
With a heavy sigh, he grumbled as he passed her. “She wouldn’t like me doing it, either.”
But, for the sake of sanity, he’d do it. Mel’s room was crammed with furniture since they’d had to stuff the crib next to the bed. With barely enough room to move, let alone see, he pulled the first thing he touched from the bottom drawer.
“Yoga pants?” Crystal observed with distaste as he tackled the top drawer next. “How ‘bout a pair of jeans?”
Melanie’s voice filled the doorway. “How ‘bout someone tells me why you’re going through my underwear.”
Startled, Mac swore and curled his hands as if they’d been caught in the till.
“Better yet,” Mel continued with a perplexed frown, “why is she naked in the first place?”
Completely unfazed, Crystal gave a half-turn and pointed out her bandage. “I got a boo-boo and ruined my outfit.”
Rolling her eyes, Melanie pushed off the doorframe. “God, you remind me of your sist—” She froze halfway through the room as her wide gaze scoured Mac’s face. “What the hell did you do?”
Mac squeezed out from around the bed, grumbled, “It was just a mustache, Mel.”
“But it was DJ’s mustache!”
Crystal chewed on a nail. “So, make Derek grow one.”
Irritation flashed across Mel’s face before she turned to dig through her drawers. “Please, Mac, tell me you didn’t sleep with her.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose.
“Only after a loud round of tub sex,” Crystal replied with a grin and caught the shirt and pants that were thrown at her. “We even woke the neighbors.”
“Cute,” Melanie said dryly as she brushed by. “We’ll be in the kitchen. Join us after you’ve put your fun bags away.”
Crystal had just slipped the form-fitting T-shirt over her head when the argument began in the next room. Mel and Mac were whispering so she wouldn’t hear. How adorable was that? She turned to leave… and was taken to the floor before the next thought entered her head.
When her vision cleared, Derek was on top of her, hovering nose to nose. She coughed, moved her aching shoulder. “God damn, Bennett, yesterday you were stumbling around like a hippo.”
Sweat began to glisten from his brow. “Didn’t you hear?” he said through clenched teeth. “I got some sleep.”
And he was still in obvious pain. Either that or he was about to kill her. Crystal managed a cool smile, though her accelerated heart rate told a different story. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. No matter how much you want to believe it, you aren’t Superman.”
Finally, his brown eyes began to dull and he slipped off her to sprawl beside the bed. They lay on the carpet side-by-side as he recovered.
“Rafferty’s gone because I checked out for two fucking hours,” he rasped. “And now I can’t even kill you.”
Crystal rolled onto her side and tucked her hands beneath her cheek as she watched him. “Not because you can’t,” she observed quietly. Even injured, Derek possessed mad skills, which meant he didn’t really want to kill her. “If it’s any consolation, you look better.”
It was only a partial lie. Though the circles under his eyes were gone, worry still darkened his rugged visage.
“As soon as Rafferty gets some rest,” his eyes met hers, “he’ll be coming back for us.”
“He doesn’t know you’re alive. Besides, he was pretty fucked up, so I doubt he’ll be a threat.”
“That’s what Austin said. But we both know if he gets a hold of our drug, he’ll be on his feet sooner rather than later.”
Crystal was pretty confident that wouldn’t happen… unless there was another stash of Nexifen they weren’t aware of. She propped herself up on an elbow. “I guess this means you don’t think I was the one who freed him.”
He returned his attention to the ceiling. “The ropes were cut with a dull blade and River’s wound was far from clean.”
Definitely not the work of a ghost. “Maybe it was Lana. She did work for him.”
Derek mulled over the possibility, then concluded, “No. He victimized her on a regular basis.”
While her pulse slowed to a comfortable rate, Crystal listened as the apartment filled with more people and the argument in the kitchen became more heated. “You brought the entourage.”
“We’re safer together.”
She listened some more. “They’re fighting over us.”
They need to hash this out their way, Mac, she heard Melanie whisper. They’re different. They come from a society we can’t begin to understand, so you’ll just have to let her hold her own.
“Your fiancé learns pretty quick, doesn’t she?” Crystal sat up. “I like her, Bennett. I just hope you get a chance to add a wedding ring to that sparkly diamond on her finger.”
Derek rolled to a stand, teetered for a moment. As he stood in Melanie’s traditionally furnished bedroom, dressed in his civilian clothing, Crystal marveled at how… normal he appeared. She glanced down at her own borrowed clothes.
“Yeah, I know,” Derek murmured, pointing out her makeup-free appearance. “It’s gonna take some getting used to.”
But, despite what they looked like on the outside, they would always be different. Even if they found a way to flush Nexifen from their system without dying, they’d always have their background as IGP enforcers to shadow their future.
It was weird. She’d always considered Derek someone to
be admired and feared from afar…especially on the training grounds. Now, their unique set of problems brought them together, whether they liked it or not.
A deep sense of foreboding settled around them as Derek lowered himself to the bed. “It’s not going well for us, Crystal,” he rasped. “I’m at a loss, here. I don’t want to fight with you or attempt to control you with threats. We both know you’re not geared that way.” His matter-of-fact approach reflected his dire outlook more than the words ever could. “I’m tired of being the asshole. I want to know I can count on you as a partner. A friend. Someone with as much to lose as me.”
She sat down heavily beside him and together they stared blankly at the closed door. Beyond it was everything Derek had to lose… and the one thing she wanted to keep for herself.
“Trust is a hard thing to earn with you,” she murmured. “I get it. But last night I found myself in a bad position. Plans had to change.” Or Mac wouldn’t have made it out alive. “I’m gonna need a little room to improvise without you going ape-shit on me.”
And, despite what he thought, they did share the same goal: to reclaim the dreams they once thought were unattainable.
“I think I can do that,” he said with a slight nod. “This shit with Rafferty is shutting us all down. Austin’s closing the salvage yard for the day, Mel wants to close the daycare and none of us can so much as tie our shoes without a spotter. If he’s back at Lesico, no telling how many ghosts he’ll send, and I can’t fight them all off on my own.”
The weight of his words added to the growing weight in her soul. What was it Mac said?
It was either them or you, Crystal.
“You won’t have to,” she said absently.
Derek stared at her for a while. “I believe you, but even together our odds are bleak.”
Crystal peered at him through her lashes. “I mean you won’t have to fight them at all.”
As it sunk in, Derek leaned away from her. “Did something happen at Lesico that I’m not aware of?”
Her heart rate began to pick up again. Unable to hold his gaze, she looked away. “I didn’t find anything out about our basement chemist. Lana’s been missing since the explosion.”
Crystal Mac: A prologue novella to Captive Series Book 3 HELL'S HILLTOP Page 7