by Bethany-Kris
Sargon sighed. “I take what I want—I don’t know how to do things differently than how I have always done them.”
A lump formed in Cozen’s throat at his suggestion. She somehow forced it down.
“And you wanted me,” she stated.
“There is no past tense. I learned that last night.” He came closer to her as he said, “He’s going to continue to pursue you, Cozen.”
“Let him.”
Sargon gaze darkened. “Let him?”
“It’s what I need.”
“And what else do you need, woman?”
Cozen smiled. “I’m not here to hurt him.”
Only take from him …
Sargon stiffened, and then murmured, “He will only wait so long before whatever game you’re playing with him becomes boring, or worse, he figures it out.”
“I will take that risk.”
Cozen leaned over, and pulled an item from its hidden place. She had kept it there all night … maybe she should have been the one to make sure it got back to its owner, but the possibility that she would have to wait to see Jett again meant she couldn’t take that risk.
Besides, she had someone here who could likely return it without Jett noticing. Sargon watched Cozen with a keen eye as she brought her hand up high. She opened her palm, and resting there was a ring.
One Sargon seemed to recognize if the raising of his brow was any indication. Cozen might have laughed at the look on his face if she didn’t think he would get offended.
She held Jett’s ring from his index finger a little higher—a large gold band protected a rather large ruby. She turned the ring over, and examined it for any sign it was the Astor ring, but unfortunately found nothing. No cursive A or nothing to say this ruby had come from another ring and was placed in a new setting.
That’s why she had taken it in the first place because she had the opportunity, and it wasn’t unusual for people to repurpose their jewels into new pieces.
It wasn’t the right ring, though.
Shame.
This whole thing could have been done before it even got started.
No job was ever that easy.
“Would you mind returning this for me?” Cozen asked.
“Where did you get that?” Sargon asked. “Did he take it off or something?”
Cozen arched a brow. “Or something.”
Just the way Sargon’s gaze widened a bit, Cozen knew he then understood where she had gotten the ring from. He remembered, then. She smiled at the way the realization flitted over Sargon’s handsome features.
On the street before Jett left. His hand on her face. Hers covering his.
“You took it? Just like that with me standing right there to watch?”
“Will you return it?” she asked, instead of answering him. “Jett will probably want it back, and I would hate if he thought he lost it. Just slip it anywhere he might find it. I think it’s only fair after our little … time together.”
Sargon’s throat bobbed, and his jaw tightened. “Blackmail?”
“I wouldn’t call it that.”
“I would, woman.”
“So be it,” Cozen returned.
Sargon still took the stolen ring.
Cozen smiled. “Thank you.”
He answered that by moving across her floor, yanking open her apartment door, stepping out, and slamming it behind him as he left. He didn’t even say goodbye.
Cozen didn’t blame him.
She waited just long enough to watch the sun fill the sky before she finally moved away from the window to find her phone. Turning the device on, she hit the number three key, and held it. It automatically dialed, and she put the phone to her ear.
The ring echoed.
Once, then twice.
Someone picked up on the third ring.
“Mathieu here,” the man said. “What can I do for you?”
“Put me through to Pearl Astor, please.”
The butler—Cozen only knew that because the man barked it at her when she called the last time—sighed. “Mrs. Astor is currently sleeping.”
“Wake her up. Tell her it’s the thief, and I have good news.”
“She does not want to be—”
“Wake her up.”
“Fine,” the man snapped.
She heard muttering, and the phone clacked as it was dropped on something hard. It took a few minutes, and she heard a click on the line before Pearl Astor’s voice filled the receiver.
“Cozen, you better have a good reason for waking me up, child,” Pearl said with a gravelly tone.
“You sound unwell.”
“I am fine.” Pearl’s voice—despite being low—was still sharp enough to cut glass. Cozen got the point; personal shit was not on the table, apparently. “Why did you call?”
“Contact was made. I am in. The job is in play. It won’t be long now before I’m closer.”
Pearl was quiet for a long while before she asked in a whisper, “How long until the end?”
“That, I can’t say.”
“Then do not call me again until you have an answer.”
Pearl hung up the phone.
Cozen downed the rest of her wine.
What else could she do?
Sargon was not the kind of man who might find himself pining over a woman—especially not if said woman was entirely off-limits to him in a big way. And really, he would not consider his current position to be pining.
More like obsessing.
Which was far worse.
He barely blinked, and two weeks had passed him by. Two weeks since he had Cozen Taylor alone, and gotten a taste of her. One taste was not nearly enough to satisfy him, and now he found himself like this.
Watching her.
Checking on her.
Wanting to be around her.
Because he was fucked like that.
He blamed her.
To be fair, Jett wanted this. The man all but demanded someone keep an eye on Cozen occasionally, and was quick to tell Sargon to do the job because she was not put off by him.
Fuck.
That woman was so far from being put off when it came to Sargon, really. He put that into the what-Jett-didn’t-know-wouldn’t-kill-him category. For now, anyway. Although who was he to say. It very well might kill the man at the end of the day.
Cozen was playing games.
Sargon just didn’t know what.
He knew for a fact Jett had not been around the restaurant to ask for Cozen on her off hours. Actually, it had been a good week since Jett had even gone to eat at The Kingdom at all. Jett didn’t like the idea of Cozen being … left alone.
His boss had shit coming up—the Italian deal. Jett was trying to get things nailed down for that, and left Sargon to be the babysitter.
So to speak …
He should be annoyed.
Irritated, at the very least.
Who wanted to watch someone for hours and hours, sometimes?
Sargon, apparently.
Sure enough, at exactly three minutes past seven in the evening, Cozen came out of the restaurant. She covered up her all black attire with a long tweed coat she left opened at the middle. She had let her hair down loose and free today. Her face was nearly free of all makeup but for a red lipstick that contrasted brightly against her black clothes.
The messenger bag she always carried was thrown over her shoulder. For a brief second, Cozen stood on the stoop of the restaurant, and glanced around at her surroundings. Her gaze traveled but didn’t linger on any particular thing, and so he figured she was still unaware of his presence.
She actually didn’t live very far away from the restaurant. Four blocks or so. Although frankly, Sargon wasn’t quite sure if he would call her apartment a place that she actually lived in. He hadn’t been so caught up in her pussy that he didn’t take a second to look around.
There was barely anything there.
No pictures.
No knickknacks.
A few piec
es of furniture.
Not much else. Nothing to say she had any attachment to the place. She could easily up and leave, and not feel as though she had left something important behind.
Cozen took the steps of the restaurant two at a time, and then started down the sidewalk. Something else Sargon noticed about her after watching her for two weeks—she didn’t like cabs, and she walked everywhere. Even in those goddamn silver heels.
She could run in them, too.
He figured that took some kind of skill.
Sargon readied to pull the car—a vehicle he had been given by Jett to use—from the spot keeping him shadowed, but the ringing of his cell phone stopped him. He cussed under his breath, kept one eye on Cozen as she headed further into the crowd of people coming her way, and snatched his phone up from the seat.
Goddamn.
He was going to lose her.
“What?” Sargon barked into the phone.
“Is that anyway to greet your boss?” Jett asked.
Sargon glanced up at the roof of the car, taking his gaze away from Cozen’s swaying—and disappearing—backside. She looked good walking in heels, too. A natural sway to her body that could memorize a man.
Fuck.
That’s exactly what Sargon was.
So fucked.
“I’m currently a little busy here,” Sargon said.
Fuck the risk of a fine.
He pulled the car out of the shaded parking spot, and onto the road. A little too fast, probably, considering his tires squealed a bit on the wet pavement. He even flipped the bird at the guy in the shitty white Toyota behind him when the asshole honked at him for cutting him off.
He probably shouldn’t have done that, either.
Sargon was not supposed to draw attention to himself—Jett’s orders. Or rather, Cozen was not supposed to notice he was following her.
Jett didn’t want his possible toy to run off, or some nonsense like that.
“She’s off now, isn’t she?” Jett asked.
Sargon checked the clock. “For about four minutes now, yeah.”
“Then, she’s fine.”
“She walks home.” Sargon thought he might have caught sight of Cozen’s wavy, russet-brown hair as he slowed his car behind a cab. He couldn’t be sure, though. “In the middle of Manhattan, Jett. She doesn’t even take a cab.”
“Mmm, I know. I would send a car for her, but—”
“Wouldn’t want her to know you’re spying on her, huh?”
Jett chuckled. “Well, something like that.”
“What did you need?”
Because Sargon really was kind of busy. Honestly, he just didn’t like to obsess over Cozen while having Jett in the same vicinity. Even talking on the phone was a little too close for comfort as far as Sargon was concerned.
Did his voice change when he talked about her? Was it obvious his dick was tied in a knot over her?
He did not think Jett would appreciate Sargon’s interest in Cozen, never mind the fact he had slept with the woman. Disrespect was one thing, but this was an all-out betrayal. Not to mention, if Jett did find out, he was liable to come back on Cozen for it, too.
Sargon wasn’t willing to risk something like that simply because he didn’t have more self-control, and slipped up. Yeah, a slip up. That was a good way to describe what the two of them had done together. He had fucked her for hours, tasted her pussy, and left his marks all over her body before he left the next morning.
Sargon did like to leave a mark of possession. Cozen’s body was a blank canvas, and he couldn’t help himself but mark it up.
Not a blank canvas anymore.
It made his dick hard to think about it.
Jesus Christ.
He was going to get himself killed.
Sargon felt foolish.
Absolutely fucking foolish.
“It’s been, what, three weeks?” Jett asked. “Time to hand over whatever you have for me, I think.”
Sargon was almost grateful for the man’s interruption into his thoughts. “Three weeks for what, Jett?”
“Since I gave you the contacts to find information on Cozen. What is up with you, Sargon? You’re usually quicker on the ball than this.”
Shit.
“Yeah, three weeks.”
“Bring me what you found, and brief me.”
Without another word, Jett hung up the phone. Sargon was left staring blankly out the windshield as his car became gridlocked in Manhattan traffic. He wasn’t going anywhere for a while, it seemed.
Jett was going to have to wait until traffic thinned out a bit. Not that the man would be pleased with the excuse—even if it wasn’t technically a lie.
Nothing fucking new.
This was why he hated the city. He much preferred the beach.
Sargon peered in to the crowd again as his hands tightened around the leather-wrapped steering wheel. So tight, in fact, that his knuckles turned white from the pressure. Stress was eating at him all the time now.
He had lost Cozen. She was nowhere to be seen in the crowd.
Not that it mattered, now.
The boss calls.
Sargon stepped out of the car at a little past ten. The dark, inky sky hovered high above his head, and for a moment, he took the time to count the stars he could see. It was one of the things he missed the most.
Stars, that was.
In the city, the stars were not as visible. All the bright lights and pollution made a haze of sorts that kept them clouded from view. Whenever he did get the chance to appreciate the sky and stars, he took a minute or two to do just that.
“Took you long enough.”
Sargon closed his eyes, and sucked in a deep breath. Counting back from five to settle the sudden jolt of irritation he felt at being interrupted, it only helped a minuscule amount. He opened his eyes again to find one of Jett’s other bodyguards approaching him.
“He knew where I was,” Sargon said. “I can’t help that he sends me into Manhattan, and then calls me back during rush hour. I am not fucking Houdini. I’m not magic, and I don’t work miracles just because someone demands I do.”
So the counting thing probably didn’t work.
Jean didn’t look like he cared, either. “Whatever. Boss is inside waiting for you. In the dining room, I guess.”
Sargon didn’t bother to reply to the man. Things were still a bit tense for him with Jett’s men, although the less time Sargon spent with them, the nicer they seemed to be. Not that he blamed them, really.
He wasn’t particularly open to them, either.
Tucking the folder under his arm, Sargon headed for the entrance of the Griffin mansion. The estate rested on a few acres of land that was heavily guarded, but also allowed Jett privacy. Not that it really mattered.
Jett spent as much time away from his home as he did inside of it. The guy had penthouses and luxury apartments scattered all over the city. He wasn’t overly fond of hotels—would use one if he absolutely had to—so he preferred to keep his options open.
A man opened the large French doors to allow Sargon in before he could even reach for the handle. He passed the black-dressed man a nod, and headed in the direction of the dining room on the bottom floor of the three-wing monster.
Jett rarely allowed his men beyond certain areas in his home, and if he did let them go further, it was with supervision. Sargon had seen most of the bottom floor plan, and the back of the house where a large in-ground pool rested around a white marble setting.
The whole mansion dripped in wealth. From the gold plated decals on the trim around the doorways, to the overly large chandeliers hanging from the cathedral-style ceilings. Jett did not make any effort to hide his riches inside his home.
Every which way someone turned, there was something more expensive to look at. A person could get lost simply going from one thing to the next.
It took Sargon a couple of minutes to get to the dining room. The voices filtering out from the space made him s
low in his walk a bit. He wasn’t one to eavesdrop, but Jett’s relationship—or sometimes, lack thereof—with his two sons was a source of interest for Sargon.
The man had two grown sons.
Silas—twenty-eight.
And the youngest at twenty-five, Dash.
Apparently born to Jett’s now-dead wife, Anabelle. Sargon didn’t know much about the dead woman, and it wasn’t a topic that was open for discussion. Jett didn’t allow people to talk about her, not even his own sons.
“You should do the deal with the—”
“Both,” Dash interjected. “Dad should do it with both of them.”
“That’s called signing your own death warrant,” Silas returned.
Sargon rolled his eyes upward, and stepped into the entrance. If all they were discussing was business, he had no interest in spying. Jett’s business dealings with various crime organizations held little interest to him.
The moment Sargon stepped into the entryway, all eyes in the room turned on him. He found Jett’s sons—younger mirrors of their father in appearance—to be slightly more tolerable than the men he was forced to work with.
“Finally,” Jett grumbled as he slammed his laptop shut. “Go find something to do, Silas, and take Dash with you. I will be around later.”
Silas passed Sargon a look, and then glanced at his father’s closed laptop. “But—”
“I am doing both deals. End of discussion.”
A deep scowl etched into Silas’ face before he nodded once. “Fine.”
Dash looked all too smug as he patted his father on the back, and then made a beeline for the doorway. “You’re making the right choice, Dad.”
Silas followed behind. “A choice that’s going to either kill him, or ruin this operation, sure.”
“Don’t think I didn’t hear that!”
The two men passed Sargon by in the entryway, and gave him a polite nod. Their three-piece suits were cut and tailored perfectly for their tall heights, and wide shoulders. He knew some people found the Griffin sons to be a bit … intimidating.
Sargon wasn’t one of those people.
Barely anyone intimidated him.
Sure, the Griffin sons were arrogant, far too rich for their own good, and a little difficult to deal with, but that all came with the territory of their lives. It was partly how they were raised, and more so, what their lifestyles demanded from them.