“What’s going on?”
I asked Chuck the question when he was close enough that I could talk to him without having to shout over the roar of the sprinkler system.
“The cops upstairs were poking around in the ceiling looking for the supposed stash. One of them accidentally hit the valve for the fire prevention system. They can’t figure out how to turn it off. It looks like our little rodent problem might have messed up some of our plumbing. Nasty little fuckers.”
“Shut all the water down in the building before everything gets flooded.”
Chuck shook his head as we reached the metal fire door and pushed through. “Can’t. Fire systems run on a different source, so that even if something happens to the main water supply in the building, they still operate. We’ll have to call out a professional to shut it down and we need the plumber to get his ass back in here.”
I shook my dripping hair out of my eyes and glared at Titus, who was huffing along behind me, his gear making the climb out of the basement slightly more taxing for him than it was for me and Chuck.
“You and your boys cost me another day’s worth of business, cop.”
He whipped his soggy hat off of his head and blinked the onslaught of water out of his eyes.
“You can afford it, and I bet those private rooms you somehow managed to get around the antisolicitation laws are probably due for a good old-fashioned scrub-down.”
His quip made Chuck laugh, but once we got to the main floor and hustled everyone outside, the laughter died in his throat. As the water continued to gush, the sight of half the police force and all of my staff shivering and cold shut down any humor he found in the situation.
I took my sodden suit jacket off and grimaced as rivers of water poured off of it and onto the ground around my feet.
“Expect a dry-cleaning bill.” I muttered the words out of the corner of my mouth to Titus. “And good luck trying to get laid tonight. Your girl is going to be pissed that you kept the raid from her, but she’s gonna be really pissed when she finds out you shut me down for no reason.” I wiggled my eyebrows at him. “Like you said . . . she likes me.”
I thought the big detective was going to lunge at me, but Chuck stepped between us and put a hand on the man’s Kevlar-covered chest.
“Enough. There were no drugs, but you succeeded in ruining the boss’s day, so let’s all consider that a win and head to our separate corners of the city, shall we?”
Titus pointed a finger at me. “One of these days you’re gonna give me a reason I can’t ignore to lock you up, Gates.”
I shrugged my shoulders and then cringed as the motion sent icy water right down the collar of my shirt and along my spine. “Probably.” I mean I was already doing a shit ton of stuff that would mean a jail sentence if he knew about it, but I never had any intention of serving time. My entire life before the Point had been a long, horrific prison sentence, so I’d already done time as far as I was concerned.
I looked at Chuck. “Since we’re dead in the water—literally—I have something else I need to take care of tonight.” I made a face as water squished out of my shoes as I walked toward my new car.
The gold tooth flashed at me. “Do I even want to know?”
I smiled back at him. “I’m going Squirrel hunting.”
His chuckle followed me as I sloshed my way to my SUV. I needed answers. I needed information and I needed a change of clothes. I was going to get my hands on all three and track down whoever this Tyler was and find out why exactly someone so young had it in for me. I wasn’t an easy enemy to have and I couldn’t figure out why the kid had decided to take on someone like me his first time out of the gate.
Chapter 15
Keelyn
I was really starting to hate the words “I have something to take care of.” Whenever Nassir told me that, it meant he was dropping out of contact and was up to his neck in trouble. It was testing all my self-control not to bombard him with questions about what was on his agenda for the night as he changed into a very un-Nassir-looking outfit of black jeans, a black knit sweater, and heavy-looking black boots. There wasn’t a logo or label to be seen, and when he twisted up his long hair into a perfectly coiled man-bun at the back of his head, I knew something was up. He never did anything with his hair, and once it was tied up and out of the way, all I wanted to do was pull it down and mess it up. He kissed me on his way out and told me not to wait up, which made me want to kick him. I believed he would keep me in the loop if it was something I needed to know, something that affected me or the club, but sending him off to do God knew what with God knew who was hard when we were so newly settled into sharing this life together.
I appreciated the fact that he wanted me to be able to claim ignorance about some of the more unsavory parts of his business, but I hated not knowing what exactly he was into and what the chances were of him making it back home in one piece. All that uncertainty and fear was why I had held him off for so long in the first place. The anxiety of what I was going to do if something really did happen to him while he was off doing whatever he did made my skin feel like it was a size too small for my entire body and I couldn’t seem to stay still.
It sucked that the club was flooded because it left me with nothing to do and too much time on my hands. I started to wonder about the girls that had moved from the strip club to the new club. I wondered whether, if someone had offered them a way out, a way all the way out, they’d have taken it. So few people in this city, women especially, were ever offered an opportunity to experience life beyond the hard streets and crumbling economy that kept the Point what it was, and even though Nassir had his own type of escape route in place for the women he protected, he wasn’t offering them anything outside of the city limits. Even after he’d cleaned up Spanky’s and turned it into the Empire, it still amounted to little more than putting lipstick on a pig. There should be a way out for those who wanted it, and I started to wonder if the way I could help my community was by setting free those women that never really had a shot at surviving it.
I shouldn’t have been surprised to see the gorgeous housekeeper making her way through Nassir’s home, since I was stuck in for the night. She had been making herself scarce ever since our showdown the night Nassir got hurt. I assumed she was trying to be discreet and lay low so that I didn’t tell Nassir to get rid of her. But as I watched her stroll through the house like she owned it, I started to wonder if I had been wrong. The other woman was entirely too comfortable in the space I had claimed as my own, and it rankled.
I moved to the top of the stairs and called down to her. “What are you doing here?”
She looked up at me without so much as a flinch or jolt of surprise. Her dark eyes took in my stance and the very obvious spill of belongings that I had left scattered all over behind me, things I hadn’t found a spot for yet.
Something that was a bastardized version of a smile twisted her perfectly painted mouth. I hated that she was so stunning and just as mysterious as Nassir was. I didn’t want her to be a better match for him than me. I didn’t want anyone to understand my devil and why he existed the way I did.
“Working.”
I felt my eyebrows shoot up at her snotty tone, but I cocked my head to the side and asked her, “If Nassir hadn’t brought you here, if he had offered you a way out of the life and the city, would you have taken it?” I knew the woman had feelings for my devil but I was curious if that was all that kept her here. After all, those same kind of feelings were what brought me back.
She rolled her dark eyes and huffed at me. “You know nothing about me or my life. You have no idea what it’s like to come from the kind of place where Nassir and I are from. You know nothing of suffering and sacrifice. Here is so much better than there, so why would I go?” Her dark eyes tried to sear me with her obvious contempt and loathing. “I belong here, with him, but you . . . when he speaks to you in Arabic or Hebrew, can you even tell the difference? Would you even know if he told you h
e loved you in his native language? He deserves someone that knows what it’s like to make it through hell and survive. He shouldn’t ever be ashamed of who he is or how he got what he has. He should be proud he lived, that he was better than all the rest.”
I walked down a few steps, dragging my fingers along the railing. I returned her twisted smile with one of my own as I got closer. She crossed her arms over her chest and continued to glare up at me.
“You think he survived hell?” I gave a bitter laugh. “He’s the devil. He never left the inferno, he just jumped from one fire into the next. Does the Point have IEDs going off or RPGs taking out buildings? No, but it does have people fighting every single day for power and control. The Point is full of innocent people suffering, of men and women willing to sacrifice their lives for an unseen force that owns them. Where you’re from, everything comes down to religion and belief; here addiction and greed control the masses. Nassir never stopped fighting. He just found another kind of battle. Now he’s the general, not a foot soldier.” I took another step down. “And the fact that he understands he won’t ever be able to make up for all the things he did before getting to the Point is what keeps him human. His regret is what keeps him from going back to being nothing more than a weapon waiting to be aimed and used without thought as to who he might be pointed at. He cares about things here even if others don’t see it. He has a cause here, his own kind of code, which might never make him a good man but does make him a better one than he was before. The Point gave Nassir his own kind of honor.”
I finished walking down the stairs until I was just one above her and I could see the fury that my words had ignited inside of her. She was shaking just a little bit, and her cheeks were bright red.
I lifted an eyebrow at her and gave her a real smile, even though it was sharp and had a lot of teeth in it. “And I don’t need to understand the words he says when he tells me every single day with his mouth, with his hands, with his cock, and the way he can’t get enough of me tells me exactly how he feels about me. Not to mention he waited years for me to be ready for him. Not for sex, because he could have taken that anytime he wanted if he pushed; he waited for me to be strong enough and smart enough to stand at his side. I don’t need a translator to understand that.”
I knew it was going to annoy her. I was the only one Nassir had ever let all the way inside. I was the one he had been holding out for while he took Bayla to bed and then discarded her and everyone else as soon as I was ready for him. I didn’t know her story but she had given me enough clues to let me know it was just as ugly as Nassir’s, so of course she didn’t want a Prince Charming. She wanted my prince of darkness. That he preferred me was a slap in her face especially since on paper, she was a better pick for him. She was arguably the better choice, but I was the one he had always wanted. I was the one he fought for.
I was anticipating her move before she made it. When you work with a bunch of cutthroat girls all out for the most money and the most attention from the customers, a throwdown every now and then is par for the course.
I caught her hand as it swung toward my face and grasped her thin wrist. I used the leverage I had to pull her closer to me and bent down so that I was right in her pretty face. She was flushed and breathing hard in her fury and her eyes were pits of hatred. If looks could kill, they would need more than one grave for me because she was murdering me over and over again with her gaze.
“I don’t know where you’re from or where you’ve been, but I’m from the Point, and I assure you that means I know how to fight for what I want. I’m anything but easy, honey. Don’t let the high heels and the short skirts fool you.”
She pulled her hand free and took a stumbling step back from me. I think the fact that I was ready to go toe-to-toe with her for the man we both wanted surprised her.
“He deserves more.” To her it was that simple. Even though Nassir wasn’t necessarily a good man, even though he had killed, had caused destruction and mayhem from the moment he came into the world, he deserved more because he had saved her and offered her a shot at a better life. To her I wasn’t enough and I never would be.
“You shouldn’t be here anyways. It’s well past regular housekeeping hours and anything Nassir needs after dark I take care of.” It was the last nail in the coffin to remind her that she was here to take care of the house and I was here to take care of the devil.
She flipped her fall of ebony hair over her shoulder and smirked at me. “He called me and told me to come pick up one of his suits. He said something happened at the club and it needs to go to the cleaners.”
“And you couldn’t wait until tomorrow to come get it? You had to come all the way up here tonight?” Her devotion and adoration was starting to seem a little more intense than that of a woman who was grateful to the man that had thrown her a lifeline. It made my already tight skin tense up even more and the hair on the back of my neck stand on end.
“When he asks me for something, I do it. I don’t make him wait.” The implication was crystal clear. I had made Nassir wait for years and years and in her eyes that was simply unacceptable. I didn’t feel the need to tell her both of us needed that wait time for me to grow up. That I needed space to be able to understand that being with him wasn’t a choice I could make with my brain. It was a decision my heart was going to be responsible for making, and until now my heart hadn’t been in a place where it was strong enough to hold him.
I gave a little sniff and turned to head back up the stairs, calling to her over my shoulder, “Wait down there and I’ll get it for you.”
I was an idiot. I knew better than to turn my back on an enemy and this young woman was possibly the most dedicated enemy I had ever had in my life. I knew she hated me, hated that I had usurped her place and her role in this palatial mountain home. What I didn’t know was that she must’ve had a death wish on top of it because when I felt her hands at my back, twisting in the fabric of my shirt, I knew she was going to pull me backward, which meant I was going to land right on top of her and neither one of us was going to bounce.
She screeched some kind of war cry into my ear as we both went pinwheeling through the air. I saw the ceiling sail by over my head as I started to go backward and I tried to make a desperate grab for the railing, but she was just too strong in her need to punish me for taking what she considered her own. I couldn’t get a grip and I knew it was going to be hard landing when my feet kicked out in front of me and we both fell through the air.
I shouted in surprise and was cut short as we both hit the ground and I landed on top of the smaller woman. She didn’t offer much of a cushion as both my elbows hit the hard wooden floor and the back of my head cracked solidly into her face. I heard her scream in pain and I rolled to the side so I could heft myself up to my hands and knees. I shook my head to try to clear the fuzz but her anger seemed to give her superhuman strength, because as she rolled in my direction she lifted her leg and slammed her foot into my ribs. The blow took me by surprise, and since I was already winded, it knocked me to the side, which had my head thudding heavily into the wall.
I was seeing stars and struggling to catch my breath. When I blinked so I could look at her I noticed she was staggering to her feet and that her face was covered in blood. Her nose looked a little bit askew but that didn’t seem to be slowing her down at all. Her eyes were wild and she was focused on me.
I moved so that my back was against the wall and used the solid surface to lever myself into an upright position. Both of my arms burned all the way to my fingertips and I had a headache that was thundering and banging against my skull so hard it was almost impossible to find my balance. The other woman wiped her face with the back of her hand and I cringed when I saw blood smear from one side to the other. She looked crazed and ferocious.
“I will not stand by and let you ruin him.” Her words were slurred and suddenly her accent got thicker. “I’ve had him. I’ve touched him in ways you and your ignorance will never understan
d. I came first.” There was vehemence in her words that went beyond that of a lover scorned. Nassir, regardless of his intentions, had had an impact on this woman. This was more than a simple infatuation and it was going to blow up. Partly because there was no way I could resist slipping in one last snide comment.
“You may have come first, but I come last, and I keep coming last over and over again because we both know he can’t keep his hands off of me. He’s been reaching for me from the beginning, and now he won’t let go. You he had no problem tossing away.” Sure, I just called her trash, but she had called me worse. I figured it was a fair trade-off. Hanging out with a bunch of foulmouthed strippers meant I knew just how to come up with a dig guaranteed to hit where it hurt most.
I shook my head again and braced myself as she launched herself at me. She went right for my face and caught my hair in one of her hands. Someone needed to tell this chick that fighting like a girl wasn’t going to get her anywhere. Hair pulling and face scratching were amateur hour, though my scalp did start to burn as handfuls of my hair got yanked in a bunch of different directions.
It was a dirty move, but I took the heel of my palm and crammed it right into her already swollen and deformed nose. That sucker was sure as hell broken if the way she screamed was any indication. She was so loud I thought my eardrums were going to burst. While she was bent over clutching her face I pushed off the wall and walked over to her. It was my turn to grab a handful of hair so I could jerk her head up and have her looking at me through pain-filled eyes that were wet with a sheen of defeat and tears, but I could see that the battle was far from over on her end.
“He was ruined long before I got my hands on him. But he lets me see that there is more to him. He wants to be better than he was before and you can’t stand that because it means you don’t deserve him. You see him pushing himself to be a man that’s too good for you because he’s not a total monster . . . he’s just a man with a little bit of the devil inside of him.” It was more than a little bit but that was splitting hairs and I was done arguing with her about what was mine.
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