“True. He was a little creepy… He couldn’t know I was working the case, right?”
“Not likely, why?”
“I don’t know. It’s a pretty big coincidence, don’t you think? Him finding us up here?”
“I’m guessing it was the other way around. He recognized you and made up some cockamamie bullshit to get your attention.”
“You’re probably right.”
I check Jeremy’s profile on social media. “He works for Google. That much is true.” I hold out my phone’s screen. “See?”
“I guess it wouldn’t hurt to investigate.”
“Just to be sure. I’m going to send his name to my dad and the FBI.”
“And say what? Some guy in Vermont thinks his cubemate is the serial killer because he takes a lot of sick days?”
“Exactly. I don’t want to take any chances, just in case.”
“It’s your reputation, sugar, but if you feel that strongly, go ahead.”
We spend the afternoon having hot sex, stop for dinner, and make love until dawn. The next day, while Lucky and Suds chat in the front seat of his SUV, I spread out in the back and sleep most of the way home.
Back in front of my apartment, I give the Australian a hug. “I’m sorry I took you away from your family. Thank you so much and say hi to Callie.”
After waving goodbye, Suds and I carefully traverse the black ice, walk up the three steps, and enter my building.
At his kitchen table, Joey glances up from his computer. “Sammy. Better call your dad. I think he put out an Amber Alert.”
“You’re kidding, right?” I glance up at my fiancé who pinches his nose with his eyes closed while Joey grins obviously enjoying my discomfort.
“Nope. He said something about your boyfriend here bein’ a person of interest. Two birds with one stone, is how he phrased it.” My cousin glares at Suds like he’s some kind of lowlife which confuses me.
While not the best of pals, I thought the two men had reached a truce.
“Oh for fuck’s sake.” I slam Joey’s door shut and on the stairs, call my father. “Dad? Are you kidding me? An Amber Alert?”
“Where the hell you been, young lady?” His tone sounds like I’m twelve years old.
“Just because I don’t tell you, it doesn’t give you the right to-”
“Is the bodyguard with youz?” The phone distorts because of he’s yelling so loud.
My inner Brooklyn bitch surfaces and my accent thickens. “Yeah, whaddaboudit?”
“Google Tiera Diamond. I’ll wait.”
“Bye, Dad. Say hi to Mom.” I hang up, do as he says, and stop cold.
What the fuck? I glance up at Suds and read, “Star of Sundance Film Festival devastated. Dumped by bodyguard lover.”
Mouth wide, I show my partner the posting. The image shows him with his arm around Tiera, his eyes full of passion.
That look is supposed to be for me.
He grabs my phone. “Fuck. These were taken last year. I swear, there is nothing going on between me and her.”
“Wait. You two were a thing?” My stupid chest constricts and my eyes water.
“Yeah. Ages ago. But it didn’t mean nothing. Why’re you getting so upset?”
He cannot possibly be so clueless. “And still, you took a cabin in the woods? Only you two?”
“No. Her personal assistant was there. C’mon now. I haven’t even thought of another woman since we hooked up.” After he places my phone in my hand, I scroll through a dozen more photos while walking up the rest of the steps.
At the top landing, I gasp at Suds and Tiera locking lips during the awards ceremony. “Wow.”
“Wow? And what, exactly, is that supposed to mean?” Sebastian has the audacity to sound offended.
Before I can answer, my cousin opens his door, and shouts from below. “Strunz!”
“Shut it, Joey.” Suds and I respond in unison.
In the past, we would’ve laughed our asses off but now it makes the tears I’ve been holding in flow freely.
My stomach heaves, I run into the bathroom, drop to my knees, and hurl. As I wipe my mouth, Chloe jumps out of her litter and bumps her head against mine.
While I sit on the tiles, the aftershocks of puking racking my body, Joey shouts out in the kitchen. “Sam? You want I should call Vinny?”
Suds responds, angrier than I’ve ever heard. “Y’all gonna condemn me without even giving me a fair trial?”
As I stand and exit the bathroom, Mia storms out of her room with her laptop, harrumphs, and clunks it down on the kitchen table. “Read up, lover-boy.”
Chapter 19
Suds
I plum forgot how public Tiera and I had been last year but it shouldn’t matter.
Why the fuck am I on trial? “This here is all in the past.”
“What about this?” Mia opens to a Facebook page with a video dated yesterday.
In it, Tiera gives one of her most compelling performances. Crying, she says I cheated on her, how much she loves me, and how she’ll take me back, no matter what.
My stomach churns, wishing I had never touched the conniving, attention-seeking bitch.
Samantha closes the bathroom door when I step across the living room to see if she’s okay. “You should go before Vinny’s henchmen get here… or my dad arrests you on some trumped-up charge. We can talk later.”
Those tears rolling down her cheeks and her flat tone sound more like goodbye forever. Hell, she doesn’t even want to hear my side of the story. Perhaps she does want that job with the FBI, after all.
Know what? I’m done. I’m a goddamned idiot.
“Well, fuck it!” I storm down the stairs.
At the bottom, Joey has to have the last word. “Don’t let the door kick you in the ass.”
When I get to my car, I bang my palms on the steering wheel until the pain in my hands drowns out the one in my chest.
Then, I call Slate. “Got work? Preferably in Alaska or Siberia.”
“What happened now?” His irritation, coupled with what I just went through, grates on my nerves.
“Tiera. That’s what.” Too angry to drive, I sit in the cold car and stare out at the row houses.
“I told you not to take the job.”
Fuck. He’s on her side, too? “It was good money and I’ve given Sam no reason to doubt me.”
“Your ex is tweeting something quite different.”
“Old news, pal. All those photos were from last year, some doctored up pretty good. She’s dying for publicity.” I turn the key, glance in the rearview, and ease into traffic. With any luck at all, I can be back in Bushwick in less than an hour.
The phone shifts to Bluetooth and Slate’s voice comes out of my car’s speakers. “Did Sam know you and Tiera were a thing?”
“What difference should it make?”
“Fuck. You got a lot to learn about women… Well, if you’re serious about getting out of town, I got a job for a couple weeks in London… Want that?”
“I’ll take it. When does it start?”
“Next week. I’ll send you the deets.”
After he hangs up, my thoughts drift to places I never let them go and I recall how my therapist said the feelings come in a package. You don’t get to pick and choose which ones to keep and throw away the rest.
Samantha opened a Pandora’s Box and no matter how hard I try, I can’t find my comfort zone, the place where I don’t give a shit about anything.
I swallow past the lump in my throat. The pain of losing her is almost unbearable, especially because I didn’t do anything wrong. Right there is the problem with our relationship.
Trust. We ain’t got none.
Driving on autopilot, I go back in time to when I was about ten or eleven.
“Trust? You want to talk about trust?” My mother screeches at my father while I watch them unseen, at my bedroom door.
My dad sighs heavily. “What more do you want from me?”
“I want you home.”
“Quit? Is that it?” Still in his fatigues, he glares at my mother.
“I thought I could do it, I really did, but it’s too much.” Tears well in her eyes but I got no sympathy.
I know her friend is more than that. I heard the whispers at school. My mom has been cheating on my father while he’s been fighting for our country. There’s not much lower a woman can sink.
I blink back the waterworks because real men don’t cry.
Dad sees me hiding and says to my mom. “I think we should talk outside.”
“No. You should go. I don’t want you here no more. There’s someone else.”
“Fuck.” He turns with his hand on the doorknob and I run out to give him a hug.
“Take me with you, please.”
He squats so we’re eye to eye. “You’re old enough to know I can’t son. My boots will be off the ground before long and you’ll need lookin’ after. I’ll Skype as soon as I can.”
He frowns up at my mother. “I need to go.”
After the car disappears at the bottom of our street, I turn to the woman who ruined everything. “I hate you!”
After that, things were never the same. All because my mom betrayed my dad’s trust, something I would never do.
I am a fucking honorable man and being accused of something I didn’t do means shit ain’t right.
Chapter 20
Sam
I text Suds but he doesn’t answer and when I call, it goes straight to voice mail. He had no right to storm off… Well, except for the promise of a broken leg or possible kidnapping charges from my dad.
Did we break up?
After settling my stomach with a slice of cold pizza, I call Lucky. “Have you seen Suds?”
“No, luv, I thought he was with you.”
Dazed, I plop down at the kitchen table. “If you see him, will you tell him to get back to me?”
“Copy that. He’s probably in Bushwick. If not, you might try Patten’s office. Sometimes he sleeps on a couch there.”
Seeing how Joey’s the one who scared him off, I grab his car keys on the way out and give him a dirty look. His old Impala burns as least a half quart of oil and white smoke spews out of the tailpipe as I back out of the driveway. Thirty minutes later, I double park by a hydrant near his apartment until a woman walks into the building. Slipping in behind her, I pound on his door but no one answers.
An older gentleman peeks out. “He’s not there so stop with the noise already.” He quickly ducks back when I glare.
Fighting back tears, I drive into Manhattan, circle the block for a while, then finally find a place to park near Fifty Third. From there I walk to the coffee shop on the bottom floor of Patten’s high rise.
“Has Suds been in?” I open my cellphone and show his image to the barista.
“Nope. I would’ve remembered.” She flashes a toothy smile. “Out of all of them, he is the sexiest by far. I wouldn’t mind having my body guarded by him.”
“Thanks.” Picturing him with her, I nod curtly, and ask for him at the front desk.
“Sorry, Sam. He hasn’t been in.” The guard gives me a sympathetic look.
Awesome. I sit in the café, drink my extra-large caramel latte, and I send about a hundred texts.
Pick up
Don’t be mad
You’re being childish
Fine
This is my last text.
I mean it.
You won’t get another.
C’mon, Suds
I’m going to stakeout Jeremy Townsend. Don’t say I didn’t warn U.
A few sips later, my phone blings.
Suds: U will not
Me: I think he might be our killer.
Suds: Where are U?
Me: Patten’s coffee bar
Suds: Stay right there. I’m coming
Finally. Smiling to myself, I sip my latte and wait.
Chapter 21
Suds
Every damn time I see her, my heart does an extra thump, but today, my chest tightens, making it hard to breathe. She thinks she’s got me wrapped around her little finger…
And well, she does, and that’s not good.
She ran off like I was guilty of cheating but my cock is a one-woman kind of guy. He barely twitches unless she’s near, then he’s straining against my jeans like a junkyard dog on a leash.
Fuck.
Inside the coffee shop, she sits with her back to the wall like I taught her. When she notices my car, she stands, and waves over the barista. She must say something funny because they both smile as Sam buttons up her coat and dashes outside.
It’s only been a couple hours since our first fight but it seems like days. I feel like a bit of a jerk for having left, but under the circumstances, it seemed like the smart thing to do. What if good ol’ Vinny sent some goons to teach me a lesson? Leaning across the front seat, I open the door.
“Ready?” She jumps in with a great big smile and I’m struck dumb.
I came prepared for we-need-to-talk and had researched a shitload of fine comebacks.
Now that the universe has realigned itself, I let out a deep sigh. “Where to?”
She places her cell phone on speaker and it directs me into Alphabet City on the lower part of Manhattan where a one bedroom could run close to four grand.
Then, opening a paper bag, she hands me a coffee and a glazed donut. Our fingers touch, our eyes meet, and all I want to do is take her to bed. If it means staying up all night, I can wait.
We sit in silence until it gets nigh unto unbearable. “Well, ain’t you gonna give me hell?”
“What for?” Blond brows raise and her lashes blink twice as she eyes me over her coffee cup lid.
I reach over and wipe a crumb off her mouth, lingering near her creamy lips. “Tiera, for one.”
“Did you cheat?”
“Fuck, no.”
Her shoulders shrug as if the simple action could somehow fill the chasm between us. “Sorry about my Uncle Vinny. I texted him. There’ll be no goon squad or broken bones.”
“Good to hear. And the Amber Alert?”
“My dad rescinded it. You probably won’t get arrested for kidnapping but no guarantees.” When she smirks, some string inside my heart twangs like a country music song.
Hell, I thought she’d be spitting tacks. For certain, any other woman would’ve been.
“To be clear, you’re not pissed off at me?” I catch her gaze to make sure she’s not lying.
“I was, but only for the silent treatment. How about you? You mad at me?” She studies my face and hones in on my eyes so I try to make her understand.
“I wasn’t angry… more, I don’t know… disappointed. I want you to trust me.”
“Goes both ways, tough guy.” She cocks her head with her brows raised and I understand. My trust issues are a whole lot different but it’s probably not a good time to bring it up.
I know she’s got something on her mind when she says nothing for about an hour so I wait it out.
Finally, she blurts, “How the hell did you ever think sleeping with Tierra was a good idea?”
“Been askin’ myself that a lot lately.” Mid-bite in glazed donut, I mutter more to myself and not wanting to argue, I change the subject. “Are you gonna tell me why we’re here? I thought we agreed Townsend is nothin’ more than a paranoid geek.”
“I don’t know. I got a prickly feeling something is not adding up.” She keeps a straight face but I know she’s messing with me. Lucky must’ve told her about my strange premonitions.
I give her a wink. “Huh. I get those, too.”
“Really?” She tilts her head and I nod.
“Why do you think I flew back east?”
“It’s weird. Right? Me and you.” When her small hand rests on my thigh, I cover it with mine, happy she figured out a way to save face and we can move on. However, there’s still one more thing I need to know.
Shif
ting in my seat, I clear my throat. “I heard the FBI wants you back.”
“Yeah. They asked again. It would be nice to have my own space again… I forgot how invasive my family can be.”
Shit. That wasn’t the answer I was hoping for. Maybe, deep inside, she believes Tiera’s lies but I got all night to convince her otherwise.
“How are things at the hair salon?”
“Well, I thought I had a client, Mrs. Nardo. Her husband has been cheating on her for years and she finally decided to do something about it so I sent her a copy of our contract.”
“Sounds promising.”
“I know but her husband saw the email and promised never to look at another woman again. She believed him.”
“That’s amore, sugar.”
“I know, I know, but he’s a real louse.”
“Agreed. No man should ever cheat on his wife or his girl, for that matter.”
“I assume we’re talking about Tierra?”
“If you want to.”
“Well, I suppose, you might try to convince me she isn’t your type…”
By the time I finish telling Sam about the spider incident and follow it up with a few others, Sam is crossing her legs from laughing so hard. Then, we hold hands, pretty much back to the way it was before our fight. I wish like hell I’d waited a day or two before agreeing to that job in London.
Chapter 22
Sam
After spending the whole night watching Townsend’s apartment, I’m a zombie washing hair. I finish my shift then crash until dinner, ready for more surveillance. Still persona non grata with my family, Suds sleeps in Bushwick.
When he honks out front, I fly down the stairs, and get out the door before Joey has a chance to throw a parting shot.
“Hi Sugar. Ready?” My tough guy kisses my cheek smelling of spicy soap and something sexy, I can’t put my finger on.
Back in Manhattan, as we settle down with our coffees in the dark interior of the car, he sighs. “I’m sorry but I need to go to London next week.”
My chest constricts. ““You took a job overseas? I thought we were good.”
Suds and Sam For Hire Page 8