With a hard glitter in his eyes, A.J. softly drawled, “Hear what?”
Zach turned his head sideways toward A.J. “The only reason I’m tellin’ ya any of this is ’cause ya clinic is involved.”
A.J. lifted his brows. “Exactly what do you mean my clinic is involved?”
Zach palmed his glass. “It was interesting that the nurse ya told me about and the woman the car belonged to had the same name. Thought it might have been a coincidence, at first. Trusted my gut, though, and followed up on the lead. Discovered that my Carmen Jenkins and your Carmen Jenkins are one and the same. So, I decided to dig a little mo’. Took a peek at her finances while I was at it, too.” He tossed the rest of his drink down and sighed again. “She’s loaded.”
K-Mart sat on the barstool next to Zach. “Perhaps she comes from a wealthy family.” He shrugged. “That could explain her money, right?”
Zach snorted at K-Mart. “Ain’t nothin’ in Jenkins’s background to suggest her having that kinda dough.” He pointed to his three brother-in-laws. “All of them can justify their bank rolls ’cause they legit. But one and one ain’t coming up to two with Jenkins.”
A.J. stood behind the bar and leaned forward, bracing his weight on his elbows. “Zach, you never answered me. How’s my clinic involved?”
Zach pushed his empty shot glass to the side. “Remembering me tellin’ ya that Jenkins said her car was stolen two days before the accident?”
A.J. nodded.
“Well, my antennae went up when I found out she didn’t make a report to the police or her insurance company. And it’s real strange how the same car was ticketed for a moving violation on the afternoon of the accident. So there’s no way it could’ve been stolen before the crash like she said.”
Alcee placed his whiskey next to Zach’s empty shot glass. “How did you find out that this Jenkins woman was lying?”
“Father-in-law,” Zach replied, “some of the toughest cases I’ve ever cracked happened because I trusted my gut. I went back and checked my notes ’cause I remembered somethin’ Valerie told me.”
“And?” Marcel said.
“After talkin’ to brother-in-law the other night, took a chance and checked out parking and moving violations,” Zach answered. “Bingo. A red Lamborghini belonging to one Carmen Jenkins got a moving violation the same afternoon as the accident.”
“Hold up, Zach,” Ray said, growing testy. “Who was driving the car when it was ticketed?”
Zach took another sip of his drink and sighed with satisfaction. “Jenkins.”
“My clinic,” A.J. said again.
“Trust me, brother-in-law. Jenkins, Scooter, and ya clinic are all stirring together in the same pot.”
A.J.’s jaw tightened and the muscles along his neck corded. “How?”
Zach shook his head. “Let me worry ’bout that. The only thing I want ya to do is keep Baby Girl away from the clinic for awhile.”
“Why?” A.J. asked, although the task wouldn’t be hard. Since the day Bébé and CeCe came to live with them, Vic hadn’t worked at the clinic. His eyes narrowed. “Is Honey in some sort of danger?”
Zach sighed. “I don’t believe so, but I don’t wanna take any chances. These hood rats I’m dealin’ with don’t play.”
A.J. sighed softly; he knew Zach wasn’t telling him everything. “Zach—”
“Brother-in-law, leave it be.”
“I don’t believe none of this,” Ray snarled, pacing in a circle. “Come on, Zach, let me go get Alex and we’ll find this Scooter and tag his ass. Betcha when we finish with him, he’ll come running to ya.”
“Boy,” Zach said, loosening his tie and slipping the top button of his shirt free. “Go sit ya lanky behind down somewhere. Ain’t got time to hunt down the bad guys and worry about locking up kinfolk, too.”
“So, what if someone could help you find Scooter?” A.J. asked. He casually added, “Like me?”
“What!” Zach stared at A.J. for a moment and shook his head. “Naw, naw. Ya talkin’ crazy, brother-in-law.”
A.J. smiled mirthlessly. “No, I’m not.”
“Whatever crazy scheme that’s running through ya mind, forget about it,” Zach shot back. He shook his head again. “I’ll find Scooter.”
A.J. responded to Zach’s request with an apathetic shrug, his mind already in motion to figure out a way to find the man responsible for a chain of events that had placed his wife in harm’s way, supplied drugs to Valerie that ultimately caused her death, and was now threatening the dream that had taken him so long to turn into reality. “So, you’re sitting here telling me that if the roles were reversed and Moni was involved, you wouldn’t do whatever was necessary to get to the bottom of things?”
“Hell, naw,” Zach yelled. “All of y’all know I’d walk to the moon and back for Moni.” Slowly, he dragged his hand down his face, releasing a hard breath. “My gut is tellin’ me that Jenkins and Grice are mixed up in some shady shit. I wanna lock their asses away as bad as you do.”
“Well, with everything you’ve learned so far, why can’t you?” Marcel asked.
“Ain’t got enough on either one of them to make a charge stick,” Zach blurted out.
A.J.’s eyes were flat. “So let me get this straight.” He bent his fingers back as he made his points. “There’s a nurse who worked at my clinic, who almost allowed a patient to die, not to mention had a run-in with my wife, and who is obviously involved in some type of drug trafficking with Scooter who, by the way, beat Valerie to the point she had to be hospitalized. Scooter’s on the loose and Valerie’s dead from drugs that one of your officers slipped to her, and there’s nothing the police can do anything about it. Is that what you’re telling me, Zach?”
Zach turned to face A.J. “Brother-in-law, let the system bring em to justice.”
“Why can’t you arrest Jenkins and Scooter when you find him?” A.J.’s tone was as rigid as a steel beam.
Zach sighed loudly. “’Cause I know how the system works. If I arrest Grice and Jenkins without enough evidence against them, they’ll lay down a fat retainer to some big-shot lawyer, along with their sob stories, and I can’t get within ten feet of ’em.”
Marcel cleared his throat. “Zach, perhaps if you put the word on the street that the D.A. is willing to offer a plea-bargain to Scooter, he’d come out of hiding.”
“Hell to the no,” Ray shouted. “We ain’t got time to be plotting and planning, and waiting on the D.A. to decide jack.” He lifted his brows at Marcel. “You wasn’t talkin’ about no plea bargain when Mazzei nutted up and said the wrong thing to Little Bit,” he added, referring to his nickname for Marcel’s wife. “Now was ya?”
A.J. glanced at Marcel, remembering how he’d lunged like a madman at his wife’s ex-boyfriend after he’d threatened her with physical violence in front of him. A cynical smile touched his lips because what he had in mind to find Scooter would put his older brother’s actions to shame.
K-Mart stood next to Ray and nudged him in the side. “What did Marcel do?”
Ray snorted. “If Little Bit hadn’t stopped him, mon frère was gonna beat his ass to death.”
Zach snatched the cell phone clipped at his waist and answered on the second ring. “Tate.” He nodded as he listened, then disconnected the call and stood. “That was my wife, and I’m going home to her.” He headed for the door, but suddenly whirled around at the graveyard silence in the room. “You,” he said, staring dead at A.J. “go home to ya wife and babies.” Glancing around at the other men, he issued a stern warning. “And if any of y’all get involved with this mess, I’ll lock up every single last one of ya. Ya hear me?”
Marcel escorted Zach to the front door. When he returned to the family room, he locked his gaze with A.J.’s. “Go find him, petit frère.”
A.J. nodded, then glanced over at K-Mart. “Remember the game of execution we tried out in medical school?”
“We?” K-Mart’s eyes bulged as he walked backward
, colliding with the pool table. “That was your crazy idea. I only came along to watch because I didn’t think you’d have the nerve to do it.” He paused. “Doc, you’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking—” He swallowed, and in a strangled voice mumbled, “Are you?”
For reasons he might never get the answer to, his woman, his family, everything he’d worked hard to bring to the community he loved had innocently become tangled in a web of corruption. A.J. offered a smile that would have run chills down the spine of the most hardened criminal.
“B-but, doc, we could lose our medical license if anyone finds out,” K-Mart stuttered.
“I know,” A.J. softly acknowledged.
“Doc…” K-Mart blew out a hard breath.
“Let me ask you this.” A.J. walked up to K-Mart and braced his feet apart. “If Chandler was in the middle of all of this would you do anything differently?”
“Same way as before, right?” K-Mart asked without hesitation.
A.J. nodded. “Oui.”
* * *
Later that night, A.J. sat on the side of the bed with his head down and didn’t realize Vic had entered from the bathroom until she touched his shoulders, her fingertips gently kneading the tightness in his muscles.
“Baptiste?” she whispered, kneeling behind him. “Baby, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing, mon amour,” he lied, focusing straight ahead in an effort to collect his thoughts.
“Something’s wrong. I can feel it. Come on now.”
Slowly, he scooted around to his left in order to curve his arm around her waist, and his gaze locked with hers. The only thing he could think about was how he’d fought for months to win her love and rid her of the pain she’d suffered because of a man’s betrayal. His heart said to tell her the thoughts that had dominated his mind most of the evening, but his instincts overruled them. What he needed to do to protect her and their family, he had to do alone. He drew in a breath, let half of it out, and gently pulled her closer to him.
With his hands cupped around her face, he gently moved his thumbs along her cheeks and realized he’d always loved this woman. He loved her strength, her spirit, and her courage. He silently vowed to love, honor, and cherish her until his dying day.
He stood, drawing her with him, and gradually peeled off her robe, which landed at her feet. His kiss was unhurried with a tenderness that had him reeling, and he barely heard his name tumble softly from her lips. He watched her eyes drift close as his hands glided along her arms before traveling languidly across her lush breasts, down the curves of her full hips. Her rising body heat set off his blazing desire.
“Tell me what you want, Honey,” he whispered huskily with his lips pressed in the crook of her neck.
She inched her hand between them and gently rubbed his throbbing sex. “This.”
He sucked in a deep breath to ward off an ache that had never felt so good. “Where do you want it?”
“Anywhere you put it.”
It only took a second for him to slip out of his pajama bottoms and place Vic with her back against the mattress. “Here?” he asked in a whisper, pressing his rigid flesh against her thigh. His tongue traced her lips in unhurried strokes that promised to send them both into a world of heated sensations.
She pulled the band from his ponytail, buried her fingers in his hair and whispered, “No.”
When his fingers probed at her center and slipped inside her warmth, a deep ache racked his body. “Right here?”
She nodded and lifted her hips in welcome invitation. “Right there.”
Eyes connected again, hearts merged, as man and woman moved together in slow, perfect sync as lovers countless times before them had. Yet he was certain no one had ever loved as deeply, completely, and passionately as they were doing—as they always would.
Blocking out the uncertainty of what he might discover, he concentrated instead on what he’d already found. Halting, he looked down at her, grateful for the opportunity to witness what every man should—the beauty of the woman he loved in the throes of passion with lips parted and eyes half-closed with desire.
“Je t’aime,” he hoarsely whispered and started his rhythm again. He increased his pace—harder, faster, and deeper than before, wanting a glorious victory with her right at his side. When he felt her body shudder beneath him, he threw back his head to thrust one last time, surrendering to a climax so powerful, his tears mingled with hers.
He’d done nothing in life so far and probably never would to deserve the love of Victoria Louise Bennett Baptiste. Resting his cheek on hers, his eyes slid closed, and all the love any man could ever imagine for one woman penetrated into her sweat-drenched skin.
So much uncertainty was before him, but one thing was for sure. When a man loved a woman, he’d risk his own life in order to save hers.
* * *
It was a little past nine when Vic finally got the girls settled in for the night. After turning on the baby monitor and easing the door to Brianna and Chloe’s nursery closed, she headed straight for Baptiste’s office.
In her heart she’d known for weeks that he was keeping something from her. The sudden late night meetings and the abrupt ending to phone calls whenever she entered the room had made her even more determined tonight to find out exactly what was going on. If there was one thing she knew about her husband, he documented everything, and she wasn’t leaving his office until she discovered what he’d been hiding from her. Seated at Baptiste’s desk, she opened the bottom drawer where he kept his diary.
“Oh, my God,” Vic whispered over and over, carefully reading every entry he’d made for the last six weeks. “How could you do this?”
Slamming the diary shut, she picked up the phone. Listening to the second ring, she mumbled, “Baptiste, whenever I see you again…I’m gonna kill you.”
Chapter 17
“Scooter,” A.J. drawled quietly, straddled across his chair backward inside his office at the health clinic. “I’m glad you finally let me meet the rest of the members on your team.”
The day after his bachelor party, A.J. hit the streets and found Tony “Scooter” Grice himself. It hadn’t been an easy task, though, gaining Scooter’s trust under the alias of Andre Rousselle, his paternal grandfather’s name. The worry of Carmen Jenkins and Lesea Goldberg discovering his identity didn’t trouble him, either. Neither had a clue as to what he looked like. He’d checked the logs Vic kept for the nurses on her staff and both Jenkins and Goldberg had only worked at the clinic twice before being fired. And on each occasion, he’d been away at a conference. Only Chanta, the clinic’s receptionist, knew of his relationship with Vic.
He’d gained Scooter’s trust by pretending to have met Valerie months earlier as a distributor for the drugs she ran for one of the most sophisticated drug operations in Oakland. With each passing day, he’d learned a great deal of information and drawn one step closer to finding out the truth as to why his clinic had been selected as a site for the distribution of illegal drugs.
“Know what, playa, you right.” A wry smile turned Scooter’s lips upward as he nodded to Carmen Jenkins and Lesea Goldberg, who stood next to him. “And the people on your side you said could help us move our merchandise, they all squared away, right?”
A.J. nodded. “As a matter of fact they’re in the other room.” He stood and jerked his head at the door. “Let’s go across the hall and meet them.”
A few moments later, A.J. Scooter, Carmen and Lesea entered. Marcel, Ray, Alex and K-Mart greeted them.
“Have a seat, Scooter.” A.J. nodded at a chair positioned next to a table with a file folder in the center.
Scooter stood in front of the chair, his eyes darting in five different directions once he noticed the set-up in the room. “What the hell kinda shit is this?”
Alex clamped his hand hard on Scooter’s shoulder and pushed down. “Sit.”
With both palms flat against the table, A.J. leaned forward. “The kind,” he hissed softly
, “that’s guaranteed to make you tell me what I need to know.”
Carmen glanced around the room. “W-Who are these people?”
A.J. relaxed and straightened his body, flashing a crafty grin. “My execution team.” He walked around the room and introduced everyone, starting at his left. “This is the gentleman who’ll argue on your behalf.” He nodded at Marcel. He walked down to Ray and tilted his head toward him. “Good to see you, Your Honor.” Turning around to face Scooter, he winked. “I’m sure you’ve spent a lot of time before judges, right?” He glanced behind him at Alex. “You’ve already been introduced to Bailiff Robinson.” He had only one mission now: find out how Carmen Jenkins and Lesea Goldberg were connected to Scooter and why they’d selected his clinic for their drug operation. Shutting out everything, he moved to a chair in the corner and propped his feet atop a small desk.
Scooter turned in his seat and looked over at a smiling K-Mart who sat on top of a hospital gurney with an IV stand attached. “W-Who’s he?”
“Oh,” A.J. replied, snapping his fingers. “He’s the one in charge of executions on my team, but I don’t believe you want to meet him.” He laced his hands behind his head. “There’s only one thing I want to know. Who killed Valerie?”
“Killed?” Scooter snorted. “You got it mixed up, player. Val overdosed.”
A.J. shook his head. “That’s not what I heard. The word on the streets is that Valerie’s death from an overdose was actually murder, and you’re the murderer.”
Sweat beaded across Scooter’s forehead. “I-I ain’t heard nothing like that. I don’t know whatcha talkin’ about.”
“Oh, hell naw, mon frère,” Ray shouted out. “Friend’s trying to play us here.” He glanced at K-Mart. “G’on head and shoot him up!”
K-Mart lifted a syringe and slowly pushed it in until a tiny stream of liquid was released.
“Don’t you say another word, Scooter,” Carmen shouted.
A.J. cleared his throat. “Scooter, I’m waiting.”
“I ain’t tellin’ you shit,” Scooter nervously chuckled, pointing a finger to his chest. “I got rights, and the only person I talk to is my attorney.”
When a Man Loves a Woman (Indigo) Page 18