The Cait Lennox Box Set

by Roderick Donald

  It was finally over. One thug dead, one knocking on death’s door, one severely injured, two out cold and one who escaped to tell the tale.

  And Tariq, who a total wreck, a distant vestige of what was once a human being.

  O’Donnell was the first to move. He looked over at Cait, down at Tariq, then back to Cait again and gave a cheeky smile, his lips curling up at the edges like the Joker.

  “Cait, I owe you one,” said O’Donnell, a feeling of absolute relief overcoming him. The pain of his injuries faded as he was overcome by the sanctity of the moment.

  Raising her head, a myriad of thoughts cascading through her mind, eyes dancing with emotion, Cait stepped around the blob that was once Tariq and walked over to O’Donnell. Taking both his hands in hers, she looked up at her partner tenderly and smiled. The first real smile that had crossed her lips since before the explosion that had maimed Dec.

  A smile of relief, a smile of happiness, and smile of closure.

  Cait tenderly cupped O’Donnell’s bruised face in her two hands and drew him toward her. Closing her eyes, she found the softness of his lips and pressed hard, locking on to him, her willing mouth open, her darting tongue searching for his, intertwining, seeking out the softness of his palate. She moved her right hand around the back of his head, dragging her fingers through his scalp, grabbing a handful of hair and pulling him forcefully into her embrace.

  O’Donnell responded with an ardor and passion he hadn’t felt for so long that he found it difficult to supress his full emotions and feelings.

  Once again, he was out of his depth, astounded at the amazing woman in front of him.

  The enigma.

  “I better call Primo Capitano Constanzo,” whispered O’Donnell into Cait’s ear when he finally came up for air. “The Carabinieri need to know about this.”

  O’Donnell stepped out of the shower, his towel heavy with water, impatiently smacking his tingling body with the damp cloth, drying himself urgently.

  He had been cut, stabbed and bruised, stitched up and repaired, and gained another scar to mark his body as indelibly as an inked tattoo. Another permanent reminder of a campaign fought and survived. A mark that delineated a moment in time when he had put his body on the line yet again.

  But this time it was different. O’Donnell wasn’t detached. Instead, he was intimately involved. He had broken the rules and crossed over from field operative to concerned individual.

  And Cait was in the next room waiting for him. She had accompanied Ice to the hospital when he needed stitching up and a few jabs of antibiotics, and they were currently back at his apartment. Cait had already refreshed with a shower, washing off the grime, splattered blood and accumulated happenings of the day that were clinging to her aura like shit to a blanket.

  She was currently curled up on the couch, wrapped up like a mummy in one of O’Donnell’s oversize towels. Totally knackered after a day that had seen her go through the whole gamut of emotions, Cait was idly checking out her numerous bruises and abrasions that she had somehow collected like booby prizes at a sideshow.

  How did I get that one? Cait wondered, looking at a large red weal on her exposed bare thigh that was already starting to turn purple in the center.

  O’Donnell walked out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist, drying his hair with another.

  Cait took in his buff body and pectorals that were so defined he almost needed a bra, her eyes drawn to his rippling six pack. They could be used as a washboard, she stupidly thought, laughing inwardly at the possibility. A large ugly scar wrapped around the left side of his midriff, another on his upper shoulder and a third on his upper left arm. He had obviously seen action that had left its mark on more than one occasion.

  “How’s the leg?” Cait inquired, genuinely concerned for O’Donnell’s welfare. His injured leg had looked like it had a zipper across it under the bandaging. Twenty-six stitches cut an ugly path across his upper thigh.

  “I’ll survive. Had worse.”

  “Yeah, I can see some of the scars. That one on your side—what happened there?” asked Cait, interested in his past.

  Silence.

  “Seems like we’ve been tarred by the same brush,” said Cait, moving her towel aside to display her own scar where the Gatekeeper had left his mark.

  He registered the revelation, but showed no outward response.

  O’Donnell was a secretive man, with a such hidden side to him that Cait knew lurked behind his outward persona, that she just had to know more. If truth be known, they both had dark secrets that would very occasionally peel off like an onionskin, exposing the next layer below.

  O’Donnell’s heart skipped a beat as painful memories of the young boy’s death in Afghanistan ran sharply through his head like a cluster bomb exploding.

  “I was shot,” said O’Donnell, trying to fob off the conversation. The memories of killing the boy with a wayward bullet from his own weapon still loomed raw in his thoughts.

  Cait picked up on his pain and changed the topic.

  “Hey Tony, sit down and chill, okay. You got anything to drink?” After everything they had been through today, Cait would have walked over broken glass for a shot.

  “Yeah, sure. Bourbon, vodka, wine?”

  “Bourbon and ice. You got any soda?” said Cait. It was her standard wind-down tipple, and today they had earned it.

  “Now you’re talking my language.”

  “Yeah. The old bourbon analgesic will do it every time,” joked Cait, looking up at O’Donnell with a warm, inviting glance.

  O’Donnell poured two double shots . . . nah, make it a triple . . . with a dash of soda. Perfect.

  Putting the drinks in front of Cait, he sat down on the couch next to her with a loud sigh, placing his injured leg on a pillow that he threw on the table as he sat down.

  “What a day,” said Ice, exhaling loudly as he slumped into the softness of the couch, every muscle in his body aching.

  “Yeah. But we got that bastard Tariq,” said Cait in an equally weary and relieved voice. “You’ll never hear from him again. I made sure of it.”

  “Cait, you’re the most amazing woman I’ve ever met,” said O’Donnell, speaking from the heart, words that he never thought he would be able to say after his wife died eight years ago.

  “I honestly don’t understand it, I don’t know how you do what you do, but you’ve just blown my mind. You’ve defied all logic. And you saved the day.”

  Ice paused to center his emotions, looking at Cait with a rapturous glance. She had indelibly left her mark on his psyche. He felt bound to her by an emotional thread that he couldn’t quite fathom, but nonetheless could feel drawing him into her with a pull that was undeniable.

  Cait looked into O’Donnell’s eyes, absorbing his aura. It’s so fractured and open, she noticed, fighting to come to grips with what had just transpired. Like a mother hen looking after one of her brood, she deftly moved across the leather couch, sliding up next to him.

  Reaching up with her left hand, Cait sensuously placed her palm on his right cheek, gluing it to him with an emotional bind that was electric. O’Donnell felt a tingle that penetrated deep within his very self, penetrating to his core, a warming, vibrant rush that was verging on the ecstatic.

  He smiled. He actually felt positive, comfortable within himself for a change as he relaxed into the moment.

  A wide, beaming, joyful grin opened up O’Donnell’s face to reveal a suppressed long-forgotten happiness and contentment that had been hidden behind a machismo façade for so long that he had ceased to remember the thrill of living in the moment with someone he cared for.

  A privilege that for a soldier of fortune was an uncommon—almost unnatural—experience.

  Ice was totally captivated, under the spell of a beautiful temptress. And he wanted her. Badly. And now. But it went against all his training: never get involved; stay removed, remain impartial.

  Cait felt the worship of O’Don
nell’s eyes upon her. She raised her free hand to his other cheek and urgently dragged him into her, devouring him, pressing her lips hard against his, her tongue searching, darting. O’Donnell responded with an ardor that surprised even him, lost in a moment of passion, carried away by the urgency of his desire, his arms wrapping Cait up in a tight, sensual embrace, dragging her willing body into him in a passionate clasp.

  Cait’s towel fell away, exposing her glowing naked flesh. She desperately wanted him inside her. To feel the power of his manhood carrying her to another place, another plateau.

  Moving her hands down over Ice’s rippling stomach, reveling in the delights of every muscle as she rolled over them, Cait thrust her hands between Ice’s legs and gripped his erect manhood in a firm hold, feeling the very life force of her partner’s energy pulsate with an urgent desire.

  Ice reciprocated in a passionate frenzy, thrusting his probing fingers deep into Cait’s moist folds, stimulating her very being, causing a spark to rush through her wanting body as if she had just plugged herself in to a power source.

  With the patience of a saint, Ice unraveled himself from their passionate embrace and ever so slowly worked his way down Cait’s accepting lithe body, kissing, licking, sucking, tracing circles with his tongue over her breasts, across the downy, soft skin of her stomach, and sensuously onward toward the enticing musky aroma of her womanhood.

  Cait’s yearning body received the soft caresses with willing acceptance and anticipation. In a building crescendo, Cait reached down and grabbed O’Donnell by the hair and uttered her first words since the coupling began: “Oh my God, now! I want you now . . . inside me.”

  With an urgent longing Ice climbed up Cait’s keen body and thrust his manhood deep inside her . . . once . . . twice . . . three . . . four times, then stopped, raising himself up and resting on his arms as he looked down at his accepting lover.

  “You are the best thing that’s come into my life for a long, long time, Cait Lennox. Thank you.”

  Cait wrapped her legs around Ice’s back, locking her ankles and flexing herself, and looked up at him.

  “Thank you, Tony. Thank you for everything.”

  With that Ice started thrusting again, and again, and again, until they reached a climax in unison together.

  Then the passion and frenzy were over.

  For the moment.

  They lay there quietly, seemingly for hours, reveling in the warm glow of each other’s company. They had been through too much together. There was no need for speech. Their silence said it all.

  As they rested together in that magic afterglow, soaking up each other’s contentment, Cait’s unpleasant memories of recent events were gradually pushed aside by a soft breeze of newness and anticipation that blew enticingly through her mind, cleansing her soul and reinvigorating her very self.

  Cait was feeling good. Really good. She had extracted revenge for Dec’s injuries, found a new lover—just maybe—and was able to finally get closure for Dec; to slam the door shut on a part of her life that had been waiting in the wings, gnawing away at her.

  NEWS

  Suspected Mafia Link to Missing Refugee Money

  The International Chronicle, Tuesday August 29

  Sandi Duncan

  Breaking news has just reinforced a long-held suspicion by the EU antifraud regulator, the OLEF, that the Sicilian mafia have been involved in the planned and systematic rorting of refugee aid money.

  Marco Rizzo, nephew of suspected mafia boss Giovanni Rizzo and person in charge of the Cara di Mineo refugee camp, has been arrested and charged by the Carabinieri for misuse and embezzlement of funds for his personal gain.

  Rizzo’s arrest appears to be just the tip of the iceberg. If he is convicted, there is a long list of potential individuals and officials linked to him who also may face prosecution for misappropriation of aid monies and receiving bribes.

  Marco Rizzo’s arrest is significant, because it is the first time that the OLEF has been able to successfully bring charges of corruption and misuse of aid money in front of the courts.

  Due to Rizzo’s family connections, suspicion has been directed at the Cosa Nostra regarding their involvement in this blatant rip off of aid money. However, any direct link between the Cosa Nostra and fraudulent activity has yet to be established.

  The world will be watching the outcome of Marco Rizzo’s trial. If found guilty of theft and bribery, he could face jail time of up to ten years and it could significantly curtail the Cosa Nostra’s cash flow from its purportedly illegal activities.

  “Looks like the Don’s managed to slip through the net one more time,” said Paul.

  He was having a debrief with O’Donnell before he left Sicily to return to Australia, and the two of them were discussing the outcome of the arrest of the Don’s nephew Marco and the effect on the operations of the Cosa Nostra. Dec was on the mend at long last. After nearly a month in the hospital, although still totally blind, he now was well enough to return home with Cait and his parents to continue his recovery and rehabilitation back in Melbourne, so Paul felt comfortable to finally leave Sicily.

  “That man’s as slippery as Al Capone,” said O’Donnell, verbalizing his thoughts more than replying directly to Paul’s comment.

  “He keeps being implicated with the Cosa Nostra’s illegal activities, but he always manages to get off. He must have half of Sicily on his payroll.”

  O’Donnell finished the remnants of his coffee, drifting off, pausing to ponder the future. His future, actually. Pleasant thoughts of Cait had been dominating his everyday existence since their recent union—her taste, her smell, her touch, her very being. She was everywhere, her memory his constant companion. He found himself constantly searching for an excuse to see her again. For the past week it had been daily contact.

  What an amazing woman. She really is unique. Ice was totally smitten. Thunderstruck.

  So innocent and good natured, yet a killer at the same time. An assassin in disguise. And her supernatural powers! I’m still trying to figure those out . . .

  Snapping back to reality, O’Donnell picked up where he left off.

  “I wonder how his nephew likes it.”

  “Eh?” replied Paul.

  “You know, Marco, ending up in the nick, being made the fall guy,” replied O’Donnell.

  “Word is he’ll go down, the missing millions will never be recovered, but give it six months or so, and it’ll be business as usual again.”

  “Not if I can help it,” Paul said with steely determination. “I’ve got friends in high places.”

  “I intend to make sure there’s a defined audit trail put in place from now onward. No more just dishing funds out. Certainly not for the aid moneys that Care the World oversees.”

  Paul paused, lost in a train of thought that was already planning ways to ensure how the Cosa Nostra’s cash cow would be curtailed. This mission had changed him. And for the better. His determination to fix the wrongs of the world—to the best of his abilities—were now paramount, an all-consuming passion and conviction that was verging on the fanatical. His transformation from high-flying international banker at the big end of town only three years ago, wheeling and dealing with the movers and shakers of the world—the politicians, powerful heads of state, captains of industry, the megawealthy—to social warrior was now almost complete.

  The events surrounding the car bombing were the last piece in the puzzle and had sealed Paul’s fate. He was a child of the seventies again, with a social conscience and acting as a champion of the underdog and the oppressed.

  “Paul, the refugees’ aid money is always going to be easy pickings for the criminal gangs,” O’Donnell said matter-of-factly.

  “For them it’s the way of the future—it’s easy money, clean, there in an almost endless supply and has minimal risk attached to it. It’s the perfect white-collar crime. What you’ve said is all very altruistic, but without a concentrated world effort, it simply won’t work. Th
e bastards will crop up again somewhere else. Just like the drug trade.”

  “I’m not that easily put off, Tony. They’ll pay. And get caught and put away like Rizzo and his cohorts.”

  O’Donnell gave a knowing grin.

  “Mark my words. Rizzo will be out walking the streets inside of eighteen months. Remember, he’s a member of the Family. He lives by different rules than you and me. He’s ruled by omertà—he’ll shut up, do his time, and as a reward the Don will find a way to have his nephew freed, and he’ll move up the mafioso ladder. A few other heads will roll, but Rizzo’s will stay firmly attached to his shoulders.”

  O’Donnell shrugged.

  “That’s the way it is in Sicily. Always has been. The law and the politicians are just puppets of the mafioso. The Cosa Nostra own the island. All we can do is nibble around at the edges and make a nuisance of ourselves.”

  “And the likes of the Don will continue to remain squeaky clean,” mused Paul.

  “But regardless, I still intend to remain a thorn in their side. I won’t make it easy for them.”

  SIX WEEKS LATER

  BREAKING NEWS

  The Killing Ground

  Mass graves discovered in idyllic rural retreat

  The Australian Tribune, Friday October 2

  Robert Macillicuddy

  Following on from a tip off by an anonymous source, Queensland police have just unearthed the mass graves of five adolescent children buried in an idyllic retreat located in a secluded valley in the hinterland, thirty-five kilometers south of Cairns.

  Their shockingly mutilated bodies were discovered yesterday buried in the secluded grounds of a private rural property purported to be owned by a secretive religious sect known as the Brethren of the True Believers.