Of course it hadn’t been. His life couldn’t be that easy.
He accepted the bag with a muttered thanks, then forced his gaze to meet Falcone’s. “It’s been a long day,” he said stiffly. “If there’s nothing else, I’d like to get home.”
“By all means, go on. I’ll see you again soon. We’ll talk.”
He had to swallow hard on the queasiness that assaulted his stomach. “Talk?”
Jimmy’s smile was broad and warm and didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Sure, about my plans for you. You don’t think I’d keep Meghan’s son working as a mere driver forever, do you? It’s hardly a job for family. Prove yourself at this, and we’ll find something else for you. Something better, something that makes use of your best talents.”
Reid’s responding smile was sickly and sure as hell didn’t reach his eyes. “Yeah, we’ll talk.” And when that day came, damn Meghan and Sinclair to hell, he was getting out. He was going home and begging Cassie’s and Jamey’s forgiveness, and he was never doing anything like this again, not for anyone.
One of the men gave him a ride back to the Quarter. He would have taken him all the way to Serenity, but instead Reid asked to be let out at Jackson Square. He had to make arrangements to pass whatever was inside the box to Sinclair. The sooner he did that, the sooner they could examine the contents and—please God—the sooner Reid could quit this damn charade.
It took the agent twenty minutes to get to the meeting place they had agreed to on the phone, a crowded bar on Bourbon Street. Sinclair removed the contents from the shoe box, then gave the bag and box back to Reid for appearance’s sake. He asked a few pointless questions—“How are you doing? Do you have any problems?”—then left less than ten minutes after he’d come.
Did he have any problems? Reid thought grimly as he walked home. More than he could count. More than he could handle.
It was a quarter to eight when he walked into the bar. Old Thomas and Virgil were seated at a table near the door, and Eldin drank alone in the corner. Karen and Shawntae sat at a table near the bar, drinking sodas and doting over the baby in Karen’s arms, and Jamey was behind the bar, drawing a beer for a man whose name Reid had forgotten.
He touched Karen on the shoulder as he passed, but he didn’t speak, didn’t look at her. He didn’t take his gaze from Jamey, who looked as formidable and unforgiving as he ever had. “Give me five minutes, then you can go home.”
“Take all the time you want. I’d hate to impose on your busy schedule.”
The sarcasm in his voice made Reid stiffen and stirred to life the queasiness in his stomach that hadn’t settled until long after he’d left Falcone’s. “I had to work late. I’m sorry.”
“Is that supposed to make everything all right? You don’t come in, you don’t call, you just blow off everything else because your crooked boss asks you to, and ‘I’m sorry’ is supposed to make up for it?”
Behind him a chair scraped as Karen stood up. “Jamey—”
Reid ignored her. “What do you want me to say? What do you want me to do?”
“For starters, you can quit.”
“Jamey.”
He ignored her, too. “You can quit Falcone’s job, or you can quit this one. It’s your choice.”
Reid stared at him. He’d been expecting this, hadn’t he? Of course...yeah...not really. Deep inside he had hoped, had let himself believe, that his father trusted him enough to let him keep this small part of his life intact. It wasn’t much. It wasn’t Sunday family dinners or halfway friendly conversations, but as long as Jamey let him keep this job, as long as he trusted Reid with his business, there was reason to hope.
Now it didn’t look as if there was.
Karen came closer, cradling Sean in her arms. “Reid, if it’s money, maybe Jamey can give you—”
“It’s not the money.” He looked at the baby, as comfortable and contented as any child could ever be. Someday Sean would understand. He would grow up with parents who would do anything in the world for him, and he would be willing to return the favor, to risk his future to protect theirs. Not that Reid’s situation was even remotely similar. Meghan wouldn’t lift a finger to help him if he was in trouble, but he had to try to save her from prison, where she rightly belonged.
Just as Cassie had told him last week, he was a fool.
He turned back to his father. “I can’t quit.” It was meant to be a simple statement, but it came out more like a plea. He wanted to plead, to beg for trust, love and forgiveness. He wanted...damn it, too much.
Jamey’s expression turned as hard as stone. “I’ll leave your final check on the bar in the morning. You can leave your key when you pick it up.”
Not only was he losing his job, but the apartment, too. The thing he had feared since the day he’d moved in had finally happened: Jamey was kicking him out. Feeling raw and achy inside, Reid took the few steps necessary to circle the bar and come to a stop in front of his father. “Don’t do this,” he said, embarrassed that all he could manage was a thick whisper that quavered unsteadily. “Please...”
After staring him down for a long, still moment, Jamey did the one thing he’d always done from the very beginning, the one thing Reid could always count on. He turned his back and walked away.
With the radio tuned to her favorite station, Cassie was perched on top of a ladder in the hall when she became aware of the slow, heavy treads on the stairs. For just an instant, her pulse quickened at the thought of seeing Reid. In the next instant, she felt a surge of panic that tried to send her running to the bathroom for cover. She wasn’t up to seeing him, knowing that she couldn’t touch him, kiss him or change his mind. She certainly wasn’t up to being tantalized by what she couldn’t have, not as long as he continued down his dangerous road.
She focused narrowly on the crown molding she was painting, taking no care to protect the ceiling or walls. They would be painted next, deep salmon for the walls and bright white for everything else. She had started with her door, propped open now for the paint to dry, and worked her away around to the bathroom and halfway back up the opposite side of the hall. It was a big job, but it gave her something to do and gave the living quarters a badly needed lift, even if it did nothing to lift her spirits.
When he reached the top of the stairs, Reid looked as if his spirits had dropped about as far as they could possibly go. She couldn’t remember ever seeing a more exquisite expression of sorrow, and it made her ache. Balancing the brush on the can, she climbed down the ladder, wiped her hands on a towel and slowly approached him as he fitted the key into his door. “Reid?”
He stopped but didn’t look at her.
“What’s wrong?”
He rested his forehead on the door for a moment, then faced her with a reckless smile that would have been much more effective if it hadn’t been so unsteady. “Nothing’s wrong. Everything is exactly the way it used to be. Jamey’s pissed, he doesn’t trust me and he doesn’t want me around.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I have until tomorrow to find a place to live. He wants me out of here.”
She brushed his hand away from the key, turned it, then swung the door open. “Are you surprised?” she asked quietly as she reached inside to flip on the overhead bulb. She wasn’t, although she did feel a tremendous regret. Anyone could see that Jamey was worried sick about his son, but he had a hard time expressing it without anger and guilt. He had long blamed his failures as a father for Reid’s problems. Now there was disappointment, too, because Reid had done so well for so long before jumping back into trouble with both feet.
“Yeah,” he admitted bitterly, “I’m surprised. I thought he really did—”
When he didn’t go on, she finished for him. “You thought he really did care, and he thought you really were a better man than this. You were both disappointed.” She walked into the apartment, laid out in exactly the same plan as her own, but so dreary and ugly. What a stark contrast between the places wh
ere he spent his days and this place where he spent his nights. Where he would spend one more night. “Jamey loves you, Reid. We all do. We’re all disappointed.”
“What did you say?” He stood in the doorway, staring at her as if she’d suddenly started speaking a foreign language. Maybe she had. Maybe he truly didn’t understand the concept of love. When you’d lived your entire life without it, maybe at some point it became impossible to learn, recognize or appreciate.
Feeling chilly in spite of the muggy warmth in the apartment, she hugged her arms to her chest. “I said your father loves you. Karen loves you. I...” She had to swallow hard. All her life she’d dreamed about meeting the perfect man and, in the most impossibly perfect and romantic setting, admitting her love for him. Reid was far from perfect, and so was the setting, but she had to say the words anyway. It was time—maybe past time. “I love you.”
In those silly, naive dreams, her declaration of love had always been met with equal measures of joy and passion. Reid looked unbearably sad. “You don’t even trust me.”
“I do. I have from the beginning. I trusted you enough to make love with you when I’d never done it with any other man.”
“Do you trust me enough to do it again right now? Or does the idea of getting intimate with someone who works for Jimmy Falcone. turn your stomach?” He didn’t wait for her answer, but came to her, taking hold of her arms, pulling her up close against him. The elegant suit could do nothing to disguise the strength of his body or the power of his arousal. It could do nothing to convince her that with him, naked and as intimate as two people could be, wasn’t exactly where she wanted to be.
He slid his arms around her and kissed her temple, her cheek, her jaw, before finally taking her mouth. Controlled and ignored for more than a week, her need was fierce, painful, threatening. All the sorrow, heartache and fear of the past week were forgotten, lost in hunger and desire and the desperate need to believe just once more in him, in herself, in them.
He buried his hands in her hair as his mouth pressed harder, greedier. After a moment, he slid his palms over her breasts, down to her hips, around to her bottom. He lifted her to him, so close, so tight, and rubbed against her with teasing, tormenting slowness, as if he couldn’t wait to slide inside her, as if their clothing weren’t an impossible barrier, as if he needed her right here, right now. She didn’t protest, didn’t try to retreat, because she needed him, too. She needed him desperately, in ways she’d never known, in ways only he could satisfy. She needed him—
“Reid, please don’t—Oh. I’m sorry.”
Karen sounded embarrassed. Reid, who stepped back so suddenly that Cassie thought she might crumple without his support, looked it. His face was flushed, and his eyes were shadowed with shame and that heartbreaking pain. He turned away to the window, Cassie stayed where she was in the center of the room and Karen hovered uncertainly in the doorway.
“I...I’m sorry,” Karen murmured. “I didn’t realize... I didn’t mean to...”
“It’s all right.” Reid’s voice was so flat and dull that Cassie never would have recognized it sight unseen. “She wasn’t planning to let it go any further than that. Having sex with a reformed punk is one thing, but doing it with someone still in the business is different, isn’t it, Cassie?”
It did make a difference, but she would have done it anyway. If Karen hadn’t interrupted, she would have willingly, eagerly, gone into the bedroom with Reid and spent the entire rest of the night making mad, passionate love.
For the last time.
Finally finding the strength to move, she crossed the room to him, laid one hand on his shoulder, whispering a farewell. “If you ever change your mind, you know where to find me.”
His body tensed, and he raised his hand to cover hers. To hold hers, she hoped. To remove it from his shoulder, he proved.
With a tight, teary smile for Karen, Cassie left the apartment and went into her own. She left the door propped open, shut off the lights and curled up in the corner of the couch. She couldn’t see across the hall, but she could hear. Karen sounded as unhappy as Cassie felt. Reid sounded even more so. If this job of his—this job he liked, where he earned good money and could do what he wanted—was so damn wonderful, why was it making him so miserable?
The money wasn’t the draw. He had worked too hard to earn his father’s respect, much too hard to build a relationship with him, to throw it all away for money. Besides, if the money were so important, he would have been out of the apartment and away from Serenity a week ago. If it were worth sacrificing his family and her, he would be out spending some of it, buying himself a better life, enjoying the rewards of working for a man like Falcone.
She didn’t believe he’d simply given up, that trying to go straight had become too hard. He’d made such progress. People had begun to accept him. Besides, he was tough and stubborn. His entire life had been hard. He wouldn’t give up anything he really wanted just because it didn’t come easily.
That left blackmail. Threats. An offer, as the old gangster movie had put it, that he couldn’t refuse. He had done a number of jobs for Falcone in the past, and no doubt the bastard had documented every one of them. Maybe he was now using that information to force Reid to do his bidding. After all, with Ryan Morgan dead, Falcone needed someone bright and reasonable to take over down here, and Vinnie Marino missed on both counts.
Across the hall, Karen’s voice was pleading. “He’s so worried about you, Reid.”
“Firing me and kicking me out of here... Yeah, I can see he’s really worried.”
“He gave you a choice.”
“He gave me no choice. I can’t quit that job.”
“Why not? Why is it so damn important to you?”
Cassie held her breath, hoping that he would confide in Karen. After all, she had been a major force in his decision to get away from the Morgans and Falcone in the first place. She had offered him respect and friendship from the start, without criticism, without reservation, and he loved her for it.
After a long silence, Reid finally answered, defeat heavy in his voice. “It just is. Why isn’t that enough for you?”
“Dealing with a man as dangerous as Jimmy Falcone requires a better explanation than that.”
“I don’t have a better explanation to give you.”
Karen’s voice began trembling. “I know you, Reid. I know you hate what’s happening between you and Jamey, between you and Cassie. I just don’t understand why you’re letting it happen. Why are you doing this to the people who love you?”
There was another long silence, then, “I’ll be out of here tomorrow. You won’t have to worry anymore. I won’t be your problem anymore.”
Cassie felt the first tear slip down her cheek, tickling along the way. She wiped it dry before it reached her mouth. She had cried more tears for Reid than for every other male in her life combined. Considering the hurt she felt right now, there were many more tears still to come.
The passage from March into April was barely noticeable. The daytime temperatures climbed a few degrees higher, the nighttime lows didn’t drop quite as low and the number of tourists in the Quarter just about doubled. Otherwise, everything remained the same in Reid’s life: intolerable.
He had found an apartment in the building next door to Kathy’s House and just far enough down from O‘Shea’s that he could see the side windows that marked Cassie’s bedroom. He could have moved anywhere in the city, Meghan had chided, and she had laughed when he’d replied that he didn’t want to live anywhere in the city. He wanted to stay on Serenity. It was where he belonged, even if no one else shared his opinion. He was just a masochist at heart, she had decided, and he was beginning to agree with her, because it hurt like hell every time he passed O’Shea’s and the women’s center, every time he saw Cassie, Jamey or Karen, every time he looked at the places he was shut out of. It hurt—and it made him bitter.
They talked about loving him, but not one of them had the slighte
st bit of trust to offer. Maybe he didn’t deserve their trust. But even he, with his vast inexperience, knew that love without trust wasn’t much. It was a start—more than he’d ever had before—but it wasn’t enough.
It was Wednesday morning, the beginning of his third week on Falcone’s payroll. Outside it was unusually humid with the threat of a storm darkening the sky. Inside it was pretty damn uncomfortable, too. After using a damp bath towel to blot the sweat that dotted his face, he ran a comb through his hair, then picked up the starched and pressed shirt hanging on the doorknob. He missed going to work at the garage, missed the jeans and T-shirts and the familiar comfort of dealing with engines, which he understood far better than people. He missed the bar, too, with its familiar routines and regular customers.
Most of all, he missed Cassie.
If you ever change your mind, you know where to find me. Her words last week had given him hope...for a minute or two. He believed she’d meant them at that moment, but who knew about this week, next week or next month? By the time this charade was finally over, who knew if she would still give a damn about him? He certainly didn’t.
The sound of a horn on the street below drew his glance to the window. Jimmy was still providing taxi service, which made Reid’s life both easier and harder. It would take some effort to make it to the estate every morning on his own, but at the same time, the presence of the car and driver on Serenity twice every day seemed like rubbing salt into a wound. It made it impossible for anyone to forget that he was working for Jimmy.
The driver this morning was Vince Cortese. Vince was from Serenity Street, and he’d known Jamey, Meghan and Nick Carlucci growing up. He’d worked for Falcone since he was a kid and was, according to Meghan, one of his most trusted employees. He was one of the very few, Reid had learned, who was allowed to call both the boss and the boss’s mistress by their first names. No standing on formality for Vince. Then again, he was the only one of Jimmy’s employees who had gotten shot protecting his boss and had gone to prison for him once, too. Reid couldn’t even begin to imagine what kind of business association could buy that kind of loyalty.
The Taming Of Reid Donovan Page 22