Beautifully Brutal (Southern Boy Mafia #1)

by Nicole Edwards

  Worked for her.

  “Nothin’ to tell. I know him.”

  “Intimately?”

  Courtney lowered herself into the chair opposite RT, watching while he unscrewed the lid from the bottle and poured the clear liquid.

  “Yes,” she finally said. “I know him intimately. But it’s been over for a long time.”

  “How long?” he asked, raising his gaze to meet hers.

  “Not long enough,” she muttered.

  When he pushed one of the shot glasses toward her, Courtney drew it closer.

  Lifting the glass, she watched RT. Neither of them looked away as they both downed their shots. As the vodka left a tingling burn down her throat, Courtney put the glass back on the table, easing it closer to RT for a refill.

  He obliged and they repeated the process.

  “How’d you end up meeting him?”

  “An op.” Courtney nodded toward the bottle, signaling for him to refill the glass. “If you remember, two years ago, Max’s uncle had a stroke, which left him incapable of fulfilling his duty within the organization. The Adorite family came together to show their support when Max took over as underboss. That move advanced him to the second most powerful position within the family.” She’d originally been sent to the Adorites to get intel when the power exchange had occurred, and had she acted as the professional she prided herself on being, none of this would’ve ever happened.

  “A sanctioned SBM op?”

  Courtney nodded, downing the next shot RT had poured her, once again returning the shot glass for another as the heat from the liquor seared her all the way down to the pit of her stomach. She welcomed the distraction. The last thing she needed was to spend any more time thinking about Max.

  “Who assigned it? My father? Or yours?”

  “Mine,” she told him.

  “Who was the client?” he inquired, his face reflecting none of the interest she heard in his tone.

  Courtney shrugged. “That’s more your job than mine. Asking who and why is not in my job description. I simply did as I was instructed, hoping to get all the facts I could and relay them to Casper.”

  Casper Kogan, Courtney’s father, had been keeping tabs on the Southern Boy Mafia for an undisclosed client when the news had come in regarding the change within the mafia family’s hierarchy. Duty to the client, as well as curiosity, she suspected, had driven Casper to assign Courtney to go in and see what details she could get. Purely informational and, according to her father, completely off the radar.

  “Why you?” he asked, staring back at her.

  Courtney glared at him. For all intents and purposes, RT was her boss. He was the next in line to take over Sniper 1 Security alongside her brother Hunter and had been playing the part for the last year. That didn’t mean she would tolerate the condescension in his tone. “Why not me?”

  “I didn’t mean it like that,” RT said, defending his obvious misstatement. “However, had it been my decision, I wouldn’t have sent someone quite so…”

  Courtney’s eyebrows lifted, daring him to finish that statement.

  “Tempting. That’s what I was gonna say, Courtney. Don’t get all up in arms. No one is sayin’ you’re not good at your job. You’re an exceptional security consultant, bodyguard, whatever you wanna call yourself. I just think it would’ve made more sense to send in Hunter or even Clay.”

  “They didn’t have the required … skills to get the job done,” Courtney informed him, tilting her head to the side.

  “Or Casper didn’t want me findin’ out,” RT mumbled, pulling her empty shot glass back over to his side of the table.

  Courtney lifted her eyebrows in question.

  RT shook his head as though clearing his thoughts. “So you went in, attempted to breach the walls of his organization, and the two of you started what? Dating?”

  Courtney wasn’t even relatively close to being comfortable with the direction this conversation was heading—at least not where her personal life was concerned—so she changed the subject. “You tell me what’s goin’ on between you and Z first. Then I’ll be happy to tell you my deepest, darkest secrets.”

  RT’s gaze bored into her, his crystal-blue eyes flickering as she’d seen on more than one occasion when Z’s name was mentioned. She knew that he didn’t want to talk about Z or the feelings he’d evidently developed for the guy over the years.

  “Nothin’ to tell.”

  Exactly.

  Courtney smiled. “Then we’re even,” she stated, nodding her head toward the shot glasses. “Let’s drink.”

  For the next few minutes, neither of them said anything, both downing one shot after another until RT set the bottle aside and leaned forward. His expression turned serious.

  Ryan Trexler was like a brother to her. The Trexlers, like family. Since Casper Kogan and Bryce Trexler had created Sniper 1 Security some thirty-odd years ago, their lives had become entwined. And when Casper and Bryce had started their own families, those families had become interlaced. Since Courtney had grown up around the entire Trexler family, RT’s sister Marissa being her best friend, Courtney expected RT—the oldest of the Trexler children—to care about what happened to her, about how she felt, but she really wasn’t in a talkative mood.

  She’d prefer to take the alcohol to her bedroom, down enough shots to block out all thought, and then crawl beneath the blankets. It wasn’t an indulgence she gave herself over to often, but tonight of all nights, Courtney felt she deserved the mental break.

  “You okay with what went down tonight?”

  Courtney knew he was referring to Max killing the ATF agent. Truth was, she wasn’t sure how she felt about that. “If you’re askin’ whether or not I’ll lose sleep over it, the answer’s no.”

  Her concern was more about her mental state and the fact that she’d felt a strange detachment to the situation, likely due to the things she’d seen during the year she’d spent with Max. Throughout the ordeal in his office tonight, Courtney had been more worried about keeping Max safe, making sure the tables didn’t turn on him. The fact that Duchein was going to die at Max’s hand—because she’d known that was what it was coming down to—had been the least of her concerns. Caring about what happened to Max only pissed her the fuck off. Max was a big boy; he could take care of himself.

  He’d informed her of that on more than one occasion.

  But more importantly, Courtney was going to have to give some serious thought to her own intentions. Had Max not killed that asshole, Courtney couldn’t say that she wouldn’t have. And she wasn’t sure exactly what her motivation would’ve been. Trace and RT had had the situation under control at all times. Even when Duchein had grabbed her, she’d known they wouldn’t allow him to take her. Sure, Duchein was a threat, and he’d needed to be eliminated, but they had enough dirt on him to put him in prison. He didn’t have to die.

  But he had.

  Before RT could say anything else, Courtney’s cell phone chimed.

  She was up and walking across the kitchen before she realized she’d moved. A wave of dizziness swept over her, letting her know she was a little on the tipsy side. How many shots had she had? Three? Four? Seven?

  Squinting down at the screen, Courtney frowned when she saw who it was.

  Punching the talk button, she put the phone to her ear. “What do you want?”

  “Let me through the gate.”

  “No.”

  “Courtney.”

  God, she hated the way he said her name. It was so … sexual.

  “Let me through.”

  Sighing, Courtney hung up the phone and then hit the icon for the program to allow her to see who was at the main gate of the family compound. Sure enough, it was Max. More accurately, it was Max’s phantom-black Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat idling at the gate, waiting for her to grant him entry.

  “Damn it.”

  “What’s wrong?” RT questioned.

  Hitting the button to allow Max through the securit
y gate, Courtney resigned herself to having to deal with him. She hadn’t been naïve enough to believe he would just leave her alone. It was never that simple for her.

  “Nothing,” she lied. “Max is here.”

  RT’s golden eyebrows lifted as he pushed to his feet. “Courtney, you need to stay away from—”

  Courtney put her hand up, effectively halting RT’s brotherly advice. “Don’t. Don’t tell me what I need to do. I’m twenty-six years old. I know what’s good for me, and I know how to make my own decisions.”

  “I just—”

  “I know,” Courtney stated, lowering her voice. “I know you care about me. But I know what I’m doin’.”

  RT simply watched her, and she wondered whether he was assessing her state of mind.

  A car door closed outside, interrupting their stare down.

  “I guess that’s my cue to go.”

  Courtney wanted to tell him to stay, to be there as a buffer between her and Max, but she didn’t.

  She blamed the liquor.

  But as she’d told him, she was a big girl, and she certainly knew how to take care of herself.

  “Are you good to drive?” she questioned.

  RT smirked. “I live on the property. It’s a one-minute drive.”

  “I know, but still. I—”

  “You sure you’ll be okay?” he interrupted as he moved closer, his tone full of concern.

  Watching him carefully, Courtney remembered that Max would be knocking on her door any second. No, she didn’t think she’d be okay, but it wasn’t as though she could tell RT that. He would think she meant physically, and that was the farthest thing from her mind. In that sense, she was probably safer with Max than anyone else. But emotionally… That was an entirely different story.

  “I’ll be fine.” She prayed she’d be fine. Prayed like hell she’d be able to resist Max. And, unfortunately, her weakness for him had nothing—absolutely nothing—to do with the liquor.

  RT’s hand was on the doorknob when the knock sounded. Sucking in a deep breath, she nodded to RT when he shot her a dubious look over his shoulder. He pulled open the door, and Courtney didn’t budge from where she stood a few feet away. Her eyes instantly drifted to Max, gliding over him from head to toe.

  God, he looked so fucking good.

  He’d changed out of the tux and into faded jeans and a black polo. Despite the black leather jacket he had on, Courtney could still see every hard angle of his body, from his sculpted chest to his muscular thighs.

  Why? Why the hell did she do this to herself?

  “Good night,” RT said, nodding at Max as he stepped outside.

  The two men shared a look, and Courtney could practically hear the threats they were silently sending one another. RT was warning Max, and Max was assuring him that she was fine, all without either of them saying a word.

  Men.

  Max walked in, his eyes on RT until the door closed, leaving the two of them alone in her living room. And then he turned that penetrating stare back on her.

  That was when Courtney realized her shitty night had just gotten worse, and no amount of liquor was going to help.

  Didn’t mean she wasn’t going to give it the good ol’ college try.

  Chapter Seven

  A gangster does have a heart.

  Who would’ve thought?

  When the door to Courtney’s house opened, Max immediately took in the scene before him. RT was standing there, still wearing the tux he’d donned at the party, his blond hair mussed as though he’d been…

  Fuck no. Max wouldn’t go there.

  Likely RT had been running a frustrated hand through his hair for most of the night. That was one of RT’s tells. Something Max had noticed about him from the first time they’d met.

  So, upon seeing RT’s disheveled state, Max had tamped down his initial anger. He reminded himself that, one, RT was climbing the ladder within the ranks of Sniper 1 Security and had every right to ensure Courtney got home safely, and two, the guy was gay and nothing would’ve happened between him and Courtney.

  Nothing.

  Granted, the acceptance wasn’t easy, especially when Max’s gaze strayed past RT, landing on the woman responsible for messing with Max’s head for longer than he cared to admit. She was so fucking beautiful, standing there with her hand cocked on her hip, her shoes off, her short dress showcasing her incredible legs, her creamy shoulders bare…

  No, not fucking easy to resort to the calm he typically managed to cloak himself in. Then again, she was probably one of the only people who could so easily push his buttons.

  “Why are you here?” she questioned when they were alone, turning and heading toward the kitchen with a heavy sigh. He smiled when she paused, reaching for her gun and carrying it with her.

  Max watched her walk away, noticed the slight sway of her magnificent ass. His hands itched to touch her, to hold her, to draw her beneath him while he claimed her with his own body. A torrent of memories flooded his mind, memories of those days when she’d been his.

  He forced them away, refusing to stray from his reason for being there.

  A quick glance around the room told Max that not much had changed over the last year. Courtney still had the black-and-white pictures of Marilyn Monroe decorating her living room, along with the giant television, mounted on the wall over the fireplace—which, oddly enough, had never been used to warm the house and was actually lined with tiers of candles, a decoration Max didn’t quite understand. On his left, there was the same black suede sofa that they’d rolled around on during that one night she’d brought him back there, and yes, there on the bar that separated the living room from the kitchen was the crystal bowl that held Courtney’s guilty pleasure—M&Ms.

  Not much had changed, not much at all.

  As she approached the table, placing her gun within reach, he noticed the bottle of vodka.

  Great.

  Just what he didn’t need tonight.

  Courtney was a wildcat without liquor, but when she was inebriated, she tended to get incredibly feisty. And not necessarily in a good way.

  “I wanted to check on you,” he told her honestly.

  He’d spent the rest of the evening thinking about little else other than her. After what had happened with Duchein—after Max had killed the bastard—he’d had the overwhelming urge to go to her, to see how she was doing, to make sure she was processing what had happened, dealing with it rather than shoving it aside as she’d been known to do. He knew firsthand that watching someone die wasn’t easy, especially for someone like Courtney, someone with a conscience.

  Courtney spun around, her gaze slamming into his.

  “Check on me? Why the hell would you wanna do that?”

  Because it was an excuse to see her. But that wasn’t what Max told her. “I wanted to make sure you were all right.”

  Courtney huffed as she returned to pouring the vodka into a glass, adding 7-Up from a can sitting on the table. Max’s gaze instantly strayed to the extra glass, and his frustration rose again.

  She tossed him a glare over her shoulder. “Oh, you’re referrin’ to when you blew some guy’s brains out in the middle of your office? Don’t you have a dead body to clean up or somethin’?”

  He didn’t say a word. His rule was that he’d never own up to anything. He didn’t feel safe anywhere that wasn’t home, never knew when someone was trying to trap him. And of all people, Max wasn’t delusional enough to believe Courtney wouldn’t turn on him with the right motivation. Ultimately, she was one of the good guys. And that was why they never had been able to find a middle ground. It was more difficult than it appeared considering they were at opposite ends of the spectrum—middle ground was just too far away for either of them.

  Not to mention, arguing with Courtney was moot. Max knew from experience that she would never let up, which was why he’d given up long ago.

  “Oh, right. You have people for that,” she continued, turning to face him
again before taking a sip from her glass. “I’d offer you a drink, but then you might think you can stay.”

  “I’m gonna stay,” he informed her.

  Courtney’s eyes narrowed on him, and Max’s body instinctively reacted, hardening instantaneously.

  “You’re not gonna stay,” she retorted, her tone clipped. “Not today, not tomorrow. Not ever.”

  Max shrugged out of his leather jacket, folding it across the arm of the sofa as he moved closer.

  “I’m serious, Max,” Courtney said, her eyes widening as she backed up until her ass hit the table. “You’re not stayin’. RT’ll be watchin’ my house until you leave. It’s not an option.”

  Max continued to stalk her slowly until he was standing only a few inches away from her. Unable to resist, he cupped her face in his hands, enjoying the silky smoothness of her skin against his palms.

  Damn, how he’d missed her. It’d been damn near a full year since the last time he’d touched her, since the last time he’d made love to her. Although touching her now … it was as though not a minute had passed since that fateful day.

  “I’m stayin’,” he said softly.

  Courtney shook her head, opened her mouth, but then snapped it closed. She wanted to argue; it was evident in the lines that creased her forehead.

  Leaning forward, Max tested the waters, allowing his lips to brush hers lightly. Even that was nearly more than he could handle. It’d been too damn long since he’d touched her, tasted her, loved her. And fuck if he didn’t want to do it all again. Right here. Right fucking now.

  “Max, please,” Courtney pleaded quietly. “Please don’t do this.”

  “Do what?” he questioned roughly, pulling back and allowing his eyes to slide over her beautiful face, down the slender column of her neck, where he noticed the rapid thump of her pulse.

  “We’re through,” she stated, her tone holding a hint of conviction.

  “So you’ve said.” In fact, Courtney had told him they were over many times during the year they’d been together. And for the year that followed, right up until this very moment, Max had thought about her every single day, about the way she’d ended things so abruptly the last time. Didn’t matter that he’d called her bluff and that had technically been the reason they’d gone their separate ways.