Committed

by Sidney Bristol

  “I want to know one fucking thing, you pig. Who killed my wife? Who killed Valentina?” He could smell the booze on the other man, and cheap cologne. He removed the rag.

  “I don’t know. Aw, fuck.” He groaned in pain, the adrenaline no doubt wearing off enough that the gut wound finally registered. Next he would become dizzy and disoriented. Emilio wanted him to talk before he got to that stage.

  “Yes you do. There are reports.”

  “I don’t know. It wasn’t one of ours. It was a DEA agent, a black man. I don’t know who he is.”

  There was only one black DEA agent who wanted to ass-fuck Emilio. He’d seen him before. The idiot thought he could touch Emilio? Well, Emilio was going to make that man regret his choices, his profession, and that he’d ever thought about messing with Emilio.

  “That’s all I wanted to hear,” he told the officer, and stabbed him in the throat.

  The other man scrabbled for a hold on Emilio’s knee, his voice gurgling something incoherent, but it didn’t matter.

  Emilio sat back on his heels and watched the life fade from the quiet man’s eyes, listened to the final hiss of breath through his teeth, before Santa Muerte took his soul to hell.

  He rose and wiped the blood off the knife.

  It was time to pay the special agent a visit. He’d taken away one of Emilio’s prize possessions, so now he would have to repay the favor. Like for like, and he had a good idea where to find his new prey.

  Emilio watched the alley, crawling with officers, CSI, but no DEA. Not yet, at least. He sipped his coffee and turned the dial, scanning the frequencies. It hadn’t taken him that long to find a car with a police radio. Chances were that he didn’t have long before the owner reported it missing, but he’d dump it long before they started looking for it.

  “… seven officers …”

  He reversed the dial, focusing in on the words.

  “… in the hospital.”

  “Copy that. Detectives en route.”

  He sighed and glanced at the clock.

  Three fucking hours and they were just now beginning to connect the dots? Pitiful. No wonder he’d been five steps ahead of the game the last few years. These assholes couldn’t find their own dicks with both hands.

  “Patrol, DEA will arrive in five.”

  “Why the hell are they involved?”

  Finally.

  He ignored the radio chatter and leaned forward in the seat.

  Not even five minutes later a sleek, dark-colored SUV pulled up and two men he recognized on sight got out.

  One was the black man he’d seen on his tail at the apartment block. The other was one of Aarón Valdez’s right-hand men. Except now he was wearing a DEA jacket and a badge around his neck.

  What the fuck?

  Chapter Fifteen

  Damien stared at the face of yet another dead officer. There wasn’t any physical evidence to make the connection so far, but he knew in his gut this was Emilio Molina’s work. It was too much of a coincidence that an officer working support for Huck Finn would turn up dead due to knife wounds.

  Emilio favored knives, usually some sort of pocketknife or switchblade. They’d found victims of both over the years, all of whom had similar cuts. Jabs to the abdomen, stabbed through the throat, and a slash on the face or hands on top of other wounds. Sometimes the objective seemed to be pain. Other times it had to be something else.

  This had to be something else. The officer hadn’t suffered as much as some of Emilio’s victims. There’d been a purpose here. But what?

  “Everyone else on his team is in the hospital. Someone tried to roofie the whole group.” Matías stopped next to Damien and they both studied the body.

  The lead detective on the scene sidled up to them, giving Damien the evil eye. “He’s right. A dozen men in the hospital getting checked out. Seems a Hispanic guy they called ‘the Spaniard’ bought them several rounds of beer while taking them to town on the pool tables. Everyone else was smart, and took a cab home. Officer North here was going for the L.”

  Damien blew out a breath. He wanted to punch something. Another officer’s life ended by the lowest scum of the Earth, who he just couldn’t seem to stop.

  He turned to meet the detective’s hard gaze. “I’m not trying to run your case, detective—”

  “Then leave.”

  “We’re about to. First, my condolences. Officer North was a brave man. Second, if there’s any video of the suspect, cross-reference anything you get with one Emilio Molina.”

  “The man you let get away?” The detective leaned toward Damien, hands on his hips. All around them the officers and CSI paused to watch.

  “Yes, he got away from us, and that will forever weigh on my soul. But we’re going to stop him. If there’s anything I or the DEA can do to help—”

  “You can start by getting the fuck off my crime scene.” His gaze screamed, Try me! The man wanted a fight, something he could do in the face of death.

  Damien nodded. The anger wasn’t directed at him, no matter how much some people resented working across agencies. No, the anger was for the burning injustice of another officer struck down. It was personal for those on this scene, more so for them because they’d worked with the young man. Probably saw him daily at the office, passed him in the halls. Damien only recognized Officer North because he’d ridden in the same van and holed up in the same culvert with him, weeks ago.

  “We’re on our way out,” Damien said and glanced over his shoulder at Matías.

  Together they turned and left the alley, not a soul daring to glance their way, while the detective bored holes in Damien’s back with his stare.

  Another officer’s death hung around his neck.

  “I hate these scenes,” Matías said, once they were in the truck.

  “Yeah. They ain’t no fun.” Damien started the engine and eased out onto the street.

  “Where to now?” Matías asked.

  “The office, I guess.”

  “You know we look obsessed, don’t you?”

  “Yeah.” Damien was well aware of it. “Say, did you find anything else on the morgue murder?”

  “There wasn’t a lot. A heel print’s the best thing we’ve got.”

  “Did they take a picture?”

  “Yeah.”

  “See if you can get a copy. Emilio only wears a certain brand of leather shoes. They have a fleur-de-lis pattern pressed in the heel.”

  Matías snorted. “Do you sleep with Emilio’s case file?”

  It was Damien’s turn to chuckle. He hadn’t exactly been sleeping lately. Between Emilio and Poppy, he’d turned into an insomniac. He glanced at his phone, trying not to be exasperated when there was still no reply to his text. She had said she would be busy helping students with research projects.

  “What’s that face for?” Matías leaned against the passenger door and studied Damien. “You’ve got a girl. A new girl.”

  Heat crawled up the back of Damien’s neck. He wanted to have Poppy. In as many ways as he could imagine.

  “I don’t have her yet. It’s just a thing right now,” he replied.

  “Because any woman you have a thing with makes you grin like that? Bullshit. Does she know …?”

  There were many ways Damien could interpret the way Matías’s voice trailed off.

  Does she know he was law enforcement?

  Does she know he liked his steak medium rare?

  Does she know he liked the cheap seats at baseball games?

  But those weren’t the questions Matías was asking.

  Damien had met Matías working an operation in New York. His former director had known about Damien’s lifestyle choices. Because of him, Damien had been handpicked to run support for an undercover operation that involved putting Matías and himself in a BDSM club. The whole operation lasted barely more than thirty hours, but it was enough for each man to recognize the other for what they were.

  True dominants.

  T
hey’d never spoken the truth out loud, but there it was.

  “She does,” Damien said. The muscles in his chest constricted, and for a moment it was hard to breathe. Thinking of Poppy cut through the darkness and gave him something else to think about. “She knows everything.”

  “Cool, man. Someday I’m going to give up this undercover shit and have a normal life.” Matías stared out at the lake as they drove down North Shore Drive.

  Damien glanced at his partner in crime. He’d done undercover in small busts, usually for no longer than a day, maybe two. It was one of the hardest things he’d ever done. He cleared his throat. “I don’t know how you do it.”

  Matías didn’t glance at him, but he also didn’t pretend he had no idea what Damien was talking about. “It’s like putting the real you into a room and locking the door. You just hope that door never comes open when you’re in the field. If it does, you’re fucked.” Matías shook his head and didn’t say another word.

  There were downsides to every job. Sometimes it felt as if their job had pitfalls miles deep. But Damien had found his sunshine. Now all he had to do was figure out how to keep it.

  Damien stepped out of the men’s locker room and scanned the crowd in the club for Poppy. She hadn’t given him any instructions for tonight, and truth be told, he was a little apprehensive about the whole thing.

  The crowd was thick tonight, people moving to the beat of the music. There was a chemistry to the night he hadn’t felt the first time. It beckoned him to play, to twine his will with another’s. But he couldn’t seem to enjoy it. His stomach was in knots, his palms slightly sweaty.

  He hadn’t bottomed in a scene since his mentor had moved away years ago. It had been part of his training, learning how to be a good dominant to his partner.

  Though he identified as a dominant, it didn’t mean he never bottomed. He regularly had new toys tested on him before ever using them on a partner. Occasionally a friend with an odd skill set, fire-cupping or pressure points or something else, he’d bottom for them. But he’d never before bottomed for someone he was romantically interested in. Could he be attracted to someone and still bend his knee to her? It worked for relationships where the woman was the dominant, but that wasn’t his dynamic.

  He rubbed his fingers together to ground himself in the here and now. He’d allowed himself to think of Rapunzel, the woman who screamed submissive to him, while ignoring Poppy, the woman who told him she was a switch. He wasn’t sure when he’d begun to think of those two identities separately, but he had.

  Last night, his interest in Poppy had crossed from a passing lust into something else. He’d suspected it, but now he knew. There was more potential there. A lot more. How much, he didn’t know, but he wanted to find out.

  He was willing to give switching roles with her a try, but he was holding his judgment until later.

  “Look who it is,” a female voice said behind him.

  He turned and met the gaze of the raven-haired woman who’d busted his balls. “Kyle, right?” He extended his hand toward her and she shook it.

  “Yeah. I hear you and Poppy are playing tonight.”

  “We are.”

  “Sounds like you haven’t hurt her.”

  “I wouldn’t hurt her.”

  “I know.” She tilted her head to the side. “But if you do—”

  “You’ll cut my balls off and feed them to me?” He cracked a smile, amused by the overprotective urges Poppy seemed to stir up in those closest to her.

  “Hey, just so we’re clear.” She held up her hands and smiled.

  “Crystal. Have you seen her?”

  “Poppy?”

  “Yeah.”

  “She’s getting ready. You should join us for pancakes again. It’s kind of our thing.”

  “I could do pancakes.” Was this a sign of acceptance?

  “Great. I got a date. Check you guys later.” Kyle sashayed toward a mountain of a man with a shaved head, and tattoos covering almost every bit of exposed flesh. The kink scene accepted all, even Damien.

  He strolled up and down the dungeon, trying to enjoy the atmosphere, watching someone use a cheese grater creatively, and even a plain flogging, but he kept catching himself glancing over his shoulder. Where was she? What would she do to him? Was she leaving him hanging intentionally? He’d done it to her as a mind-fuck. Was she turning the tables on him?

  They’d agreed to adhere to the rules they’d laid down so far, but even knowing the boundaries, there was a lot of space to play with in between.

  “There you are.” Poppy wrapped her hands around his arm and leaned against his side, perching her chin on his shoulder and smiling up at him. Her green eyes twinkled under a fringe of bangs.

  For a moment everything seemed to stop, fade into the background. Her face glowed, her hair shone like a halo, and the way she stared at him, he could have hung the stars. He cupped her cheek with his free hand and kissed her, because he had to. He turned toward her, gathering her against him.

  She placed her hands against his chest and firmly pushed him back. One side of her mouth kicked up mischievously. He straightened, but didn’t give her space. She’d worn a black halter-top dress with a loose skirt, and black, strappy heels. It was understated, but somehow it only made her seem to glow more.

  Poppy’s gaze narrowed and she slid her hands up his chest and around his neck. “Are you in charge, or am I?”

  “You are.” It felt as if the words were dragged out of him.

  “Come on.” She took his hand and tugged him into following her through the dungeon to a space with a fairly normal setup. There was a cross, a table, some places against the walls to bind people to, as well as a hanging hard point. A pink leopard-print bag sat on a small side table. She turned to face him. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  No, he didn’t. But he did. He resisted telling her to get this over with, and instead shrugged. “I’m not used to it.”

  She slid her hands under the hem of his shirt, flattening them against his stomach. “We can stop whenever you like. If you aren’t having fun, if I do anything you don’t like, all you have to do is tell me to stop. Remember, the bottom holds the true power here.”

  He lifted his arms and she pulled the shirt up and off him, their gazes never separating. This was important to her, and for that one reason, he would bend. He didn’t have to like it. She took the shirt and turned away from him, folding it carefully and laying it next to her bag.

  “Should I take my jeans off, too?” He kept his back to the audience. This show wasn’t for them, just her.

  “Do you want to take them off?” Poppy turned toward him, something in her hands.

  “Not particularly.”

  She shrugged. “Then don’t. Wrists.”

  He extended his arms and she wrapped fleece-lined cuffs around his wrists. They were sturdy, but clearly made for someone with smaller arms. She snapped the D-rings together and led him to the hanging hard point. It was an industrial hook hanging on a chain. The hook went into the snap, and she pulled the chain up by a pulley until his arms were extended above his head, but not uncomfortably so.

  Poppy closed the distance between them and smoothed her hands over his shoulders and down his chest. Her smile curled, becoming more sensual as she mapped his abdomen with her fingers, exploring all of him. He welcomed her touch, enjoying the feel of her small, soft hands on him.

  She circled him, her hands never leaving his skin, neither of them saying a word. The music throbbed, pulsing a deep, sensual beat. Her hands coasted over his back and shoulders, even tracing a few scars that had never quite faded. Her lips brushed over the one on his upper back, a knife wound. She trailed kisses over the puckered flesh near the bottom of his ribcage, where he’d been bitten by a dog.

  They began to sway, her hips against him, guiding him. The chains clanked together as he moved, creating a counter rhythm, a song all their own. Poppy circled him again, until finally coming to face him on
ce more.

  He leaned forward and she took a step back. He followed her until the chain stretched taut, his arms straining in the cuffs. It was just close enough that he could duck his head and barely touch her lips with his.

  “Last chance to negotiate,” she whispered, her mouth teasing his.

  “Bring it on, sweetness.” Damien had never bent to another’s will well, but he could learn to accept this. Couldn’t he?

  She wrinkled her nose. “You look like I’m about to give you an enema.”

  He jolted and she laughed.

  “I’m not going to do that, silly.” She wrapped her arms around him, hugging him tight and rising up until she could brush her nose against his. “This is about having fun. Enjoying each other. I’m not a domme. I don’t want your submission. I just want to play with you. And just maybe I can turn you on.”

  “You don’t need to do this to turn me on.” He dipped his head and brushed his lips over hers, doing his best to distract her. She allowed it, sinking into the kiss with a moan.

  Poppy stepped back, panting for breath, her lips glossy and pink. “Fine. Maybe I can turn myself on.”

  She pulled on some sort of black glove from her bag and picked up a violet wand. He chuckled and flexed his hands. He had no one to blame for this but himself.

  The violet wand was an electrical toy that tickled with a low-level charge akin to static electricity when it was dragged across a person. At higher levels, it could be downright uncomfortable.

  “Remember when you asked me about using this?” Poppy turned the dial on the end of the wand. It had a black plastic handle and a glass electrode slotted into the end. The electrode was a six-inch tube of glass, with a flat, almost mushroom-shaped head. As she turned the dial, the wand began to hum.

  “I do.”

  “I thought you would.” Her lips hitched up on one side.

  Poppy strolled toward him, wiggling the fingers of her black glove. He couldn’t tell what was special about it, but he was about to find out.

  She brought the electrode to the top of his sternum, but didn’t touch him. The electricity lit up the glass, a brilliant purple, and jumped to his skin. He sucked in a breath as she drew it down all the way to his jeans before lifting it off. It was an odd sensation. He shifted his feet, tried and failed to roll his shoulders. The scent of ozone wafted up to him as the wand continued to buzz.