2. Maybe
Chapter 2
Maybe
COLE
“ F uck.”
“What?” Marco asked distractedly, a Twizzler hanging from between his lips like a cigar as he rapidly smashed the buttons on the controller.
Though I had penthouses and offices in all four of Maximo Black’s properties, my main computer setup was in Moonlight—which was also where I stayed most of the time. My spaces in Star, Nebula, and Sunrise held the bare minimum.
As in a bed and a couple of changes of clothes.
End of list.
Like in our boss’ offices, multiple monitors hung from the wall across my desk. Unlike his, half my screens were attached to multiple video game consoles, giving Marco a nearly life-size view of the football game he was getting his ass kicked in. The rest showed what had me pissed off.
Also unlike his, mine were used for programming with a side of hacking rather than stalking.
“There are no SafeCams near Mila’s apartment.” I clicked the keys to access the ones closest to the address Ash had given for his woman.
Not that she knew she was his woman yet.
After getting attacked by a couple of assholes that wouldn’t be walking the earth much longer, Mila had grudgingly agreed to stay with Ash at his house while she recovered. Before he made the moves to turn that into a long-term arrangement, he needed to find the fuckers who attacked her.
That was where I was supposed to come in.
The three of us had our roles working for Maximo. Not as resort employees, but as his personal team. His goons , as Juliet called us.
Ash was his second, handling everything from his schedule and driving to a little torture and bodyguard duty.
Marco used to handle that last one, but he’d switched to covering Juliet when she was out of the house or penthouse.
Freddy wasn’t involved enough to be classified as a goon, though he was still a trusted part of Maximo’s inner circle. He knew about the shit that went down in The Basement or warehouses. But rather than getting blood on them, he put his hands to better use cooking.
My territory was anything tech-related—both legal and illegal—while also occasionally getting involved in the torture portion of the job.
I’d been able to track Mila’s bitch mother when we’d thought the attack was tied to her, but she’d been as useless as expected. It seemed like the thing was random, which made hunting those fuckers down harder.
Ash wanted me to upgrade the security in her building and apartment in case she wasn’t into him and what he offered, but I was a stubborn bastard. Especially when it came to the shit hand Mila had been dealt.
Leaning back in my chair, I weaved my fingers together behind my head and ran through my options. My gaze moved across the map that stretched across the monitor, going from Mila’s apartment to the marked SafeCams. Even if I magically knew which direction her attackers came— if they came, since I was working on Ash’s hunch—there were too many variables.
Such a shitty area for her to live in.
I sat forward and dragged my cursor over before standing. I grabbed one of my laptops and rounded the desk.
“We going?” Marco asked.
“You don’t have to, but I want to swing by Mila’s apartment building. Someone has to have a doorbell cam.” I tapped the map that was still displayed on the wall. “Or maybe one of these businesses has security cameras that actually work.”
He raised a brow at the flimsiness of that lead to track, but he turned off the console and stood.
“You were just looking for an excuse to quit ’cause you were getting your ass kicked,” I pointed out.
“That, too.”
We took the elevator down to the garage before climbing into my company car.
When I was with Maximo, he spent the time cursing whoever had him pissed off, questioning me if there were new software updates or tech I wanted to implement, or on the phone with whoever.
Ash talked sports or tech.
Freddy ranted about employees, customers, or recipes that weren’t coming together or raved when they did.
But Marco was never talkative, which worked because neither was I. With the music low, we didn’t feel the need to fill the car with conversation for the sake of it. It wasn’t awkward.
It was the opposite.
We were nearing our destination when he surprisingly broke the silence. “Ash has it bad already.”
“Yup.”
“What’s she like?”
I thought about the bruised-up woman I’d met at Ash’s when I’d gone over to bring her clothes and meet with him. “Guarded. A little like Juliet. Been through hell but still sweet, you know?”
“Think she’s into him?”
His line of questioning might’ve sounded like gossip, but it wasn’t. Because for a stoic bastard, he was protective as hell.
When Maximo had forcibly… rescued Juliet, Marco had been slow to come around to her. Not just because he’d worried she would go to the cops about the whole father-murdered-in-front-of-her thing. But because he thought she would hurt Maximo.
His interest in Mila came from the same place.
I didn’t even have to remember the way Ash and her had been positioned at his kitchen counter when I’d gotten there or how she’d watched him when his back was turned. My answer was immediate. “Yes. She’s trying to hide it. He’s trying to take it slow. But he’ll make it happen.”
“Another one falls,” he muttered.
“Think it’ll be you next?”
He gave me a blank look before changing the subject. “We’re almost there. Got a plan?”
“Walk around, see what pops. Check out her apartment so I can plan upgrades if we strike out.”
“Got it.”
I parked at the curb in front of a building that was worse than the shitty I already expected. The whole place was one big code violation, ready to come down at a rat’s fart.
And there was no doubt there were rats and fuck knew what else.
We climbed out and approached the door. Not only didn’t it have locks that required a key or to be buzzed in, the damn thing didn’t even close properly. We entered the dingy entryway to see half the mailboxes had been forced open, some hanging on their hinges.
No security desk. No working elevator. No precautions.
Hell, the locks on the cheap doors could easily be popped with a screwdriver and zero skill.
“There’s not a damn thing I can do to make this place safe for her beyond torching it to the ground,” I said as we slammed back out the exit.
The fact she’s been living here…
Fuck.
Dressed in quality suits, Marco and I stood out in the neighborhood. A couple of dealers and working girls perked up as we walked past—likely wondering if we were rich bros looking to party or detectives investigating—but they played it safe and kept their distance.
A good chunk of housing units we checked out were abandoned, and the ones that weren’t should’ve been. I was about to suggest we turn to check what kind of shit show the rear of the building was when I spotted a security camera mounted on a pole on the far end of a small parking lot. “Bingo.”
When we neared the liquor store, I saw that it wasn’t just one camera. It was half a dozen—and that was just what I could see. I pointed out the one aimed toward Mila’s building before we went inside.
The clerk behind the plexiglass barrier barely glanced up from his phone, but the subtle shift of his body said he’d seen us. And that I’d put money on there being a silent alarm button nearby.
Marco stayed at my back, scanning the small, shitty liquor store as I moved to the counter.
“What you see is what we have,” the clerk said, still staring at his phone. “You want some fancy-ass shit, you’re at the wrong place.”
“What we want is to see your security footage.”
He snorted. “And I want a flock of showgirls. Can you make that happen?”
Would you even know what to do with one of them?
I pulled a few hundreds from my wallet and set it on the counter near the opening.
He shook his head. “Three hundred bucks isn’t gonna go far if I get fired. And that’s exactly what my boss will do if I hand over that footage.”
“You’ll also be out of a job if we call the cops and tell them what you’re actually doing out of this place.”
I pulled the threat out of my ass since I had no clue what they were doing, but I knew it was more than selling the cheap booze that filled the store. That wouldn’t bring in enough to pay rent. It also wouldn’t warrant the kind of camera coverage they had outside.
“Lemme call my boss,” he murmured, backing toward the door that likely led to an office.
Marco’s body went tense, and he casually rearranged his positioning. I didn’t have to turn to know his hand rested on the gun hidden beneath his coat.
The clerk didn’t go into the room as he made his call. We wouldn’t be stupid enough to wait around for him to return with a shotgun that would blow through the plexiglass and us. His voice was too quiet for us to hear until he asked, “What do you want it for?”
“Woman was attacked.”
“That happens.”
His easy acceptance of that fact burned in my gut.
“When?” he asked.
I gave the date and a wide time range I wanted to check out.
He hung up. “Boss says he’ll be here in five. Heads-up, that means an hour or two at least.”
“World’s best boss,” Marco muttered under his breath.
We settled in to wait, but it actually was only five minutes before a haggard man came through the back door. His sharp gaze was on us as he approached. “Heard there was an attack. Shame.” He handed over a flash drive. “This has the footage you want. I trust the rest will stay between us.”
“The rest of what?” I wasn’t playing clueless to go along with his words. I was fucking clueless. But he didn’t need to know that my bluff was just that.
“Good luck, and I hope you find the prick.”
I raised my chin as we backed out of the store. Their expressions were equally guarded, the boss’ gaze darting like he expected to be raided at any second.
Returning to my car, I was shocked as shit to see it hadn’t been stripped to the frame in the short time we were away. Once we were inside, Marco finally spoke. “You had no idea what they do.”
“Not a single one.”
I backtracked through the city to Moonlight and parked next to Marco’s SUV in the garage. He climbed out but leaned down into the open door. “Want to crash at my place? I bet that greasy taco truck is still parked down the road.”
Like when he’d asked about Mila, his question wasn’t as surface level as it seemed. The piece of shit mom, the abandonment, the shit neighborhood… He knew how it could affect me.
And he wasn’t wrong.
I grabbed the flash drive and held it up between my index and middle finger. “I wanna start sorting through this, so I’m gonna stay here tonight.”
Or, more likely, get sucked in till I eventually crash on the couch in my office.
The knowing look he gave was like he’d read my thoughts. He thumped the top of the car. “Text if you change your mind. It’s a big house. I won’t hear you come in, and I don’t want to come down to your naked ass passed out on my coffee table. Again .” His voice lowered to mutter, “I liked that table.”
Then he closed the door, leaving me alone.
Not a place I liked to be.
Before Maximo and Juliet got married, I would crash in his pool house, which was bigger than most people’s homes. It was quiet enough on the large patch of secluded land, but I knew others were nearby in the house. It also made sense when I worked there so often. But things were different. I wasn’t needed on goon duty to keep Juliet from fleeing, and Maximo didn’t spend every night working late.
Ash’s big place was good for the same reason. It was peaceful up on the mountain, but he had his hands full with Mila.
Marco’s house was as large as Ash’s, but he didn’t like seclusion like the other two. He lived in a busy development near a lively commercial area. I rarely stayed there since the noise traveled more than what I preferred.
Except when I was wasted and took that rideshare to pass out on his coffee table—something he would never let me live down.
Unlike them, I hadn’t invested my insane income in real estate. Maximo had given his goons their own penthouses in each of his resorts, so it seemed like a waste of money and a commute to own property elsewhere. I didn’t want the privacy they did. I used to have an apartment, but even that was rarely used, so I let the lease go.
Ignoring the pit of loneliness surrounded by a layer of self-loathing in my gut, I grabbed my laptop and was about to go inside when my phone dinged.
Freddy: Drinks.
Freddy: Location Pin Drop
I ran my palm down my face.
Me: I’m working.
Freddy: What else is new? You’re always working. When’s the last time we went out for drinks?
When I ended up passed out on Marco’s table.
I didn’t get the chance to answer when a bunch of emoji and GIFs came through.
He knew that shit annoyed the hell out of me.
Me: Have you already started drinking?
A GIF of the word maybe pinged.
Me: You gonna need a ride?
The same GIF.
I dropped the flash drive into the center console and started the engine.