7. Chapter 7
seven
Mark
I f I didn’t know Bee as well as I did, I wouldn’t know just how heartbroken she was over everything. I never wanted to see her in pain, but at least I knew I wasn’t imagining anything when I remembered our night together.
Bee fell just as hard for me and didn’t want to be apart; it just wasn’t in the cards for us. She was a sweet, wonderful girl who prioritized her blood ties. That alone wasn’t a bad thing. I was a bit of an asshole police inspector who wouldn’t be able to start fresh with Bee because those blood ties were with the mafia syndicate I was actively trying to imprison.
Some things were impossible to overcome.
At least we were never officially together, so she never officially dumped me, so the fates wouldn’t see fit to officially put her in the ground, as was my woeful curse.
My first ever girlfriend, a high school sweetheart, was my everything. I was two years older, a freshman in college, and came home to take her out for her seventeenth birthday. She dumped me instead because she realized how much fun she’d been having by not having a boyfriend around, and our night out with friends together just cemented that in place.
I stormed off, pissed, and Danielle went missing that very night. She was presumed dead after being taken by presumed traffickers, and presumably it was my fault for leaving her alone two feet away from the entrance to the club where her brother and friends were waiting inside for her.
I left her alone, wasn’t there to protect her, and she died. Just like how Sierra felt suffocated and refused to see me when she was in the hospital, on her literal deathbed. Like how Natalie didn’t think we were on the same page and dumped me right before the accident took her away, too.
But since Bee and I were never officially a thing, that meant she didn’t dump me, right?
Every cloud had a silver lining.
I took a moment after her uber drove away to get my shit together, then called Blake for a ride into work—Lucas Blake, whose half-sister I dated before she was taken and killed. It was no wonder we hadn’t been on semi-friendly terms in over a decade.
I regretted the decision to call him as soon as I climbed into his passenger seat.
“Figure out how to find your girl?” This was exactly what I didn’t want to talk about. I glared at the table between us and didn’t answer. “Is that a no?”
“It’s a yes, but I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” I tried.
“Ah. Okay. I’ll change the subject. How are you going to win her back?”
“I’m not going to. I thought I’d try something new and think of other people’s needs over my own.”
“Interesting prospect. How long do you think that will last?”
“Oh, at least until the end of the day,” I smirked. “Can I buy you a coffee as a thank you for the ride?”
“You’re going to have to stop this caring stuff or the shock will give me a heart attack. I don’t want to crash the new car.”
“She’s a pretty sweet ride.”
She actually wasn’t. She was just your standard issue SUV, unobtrusive, the windows not even heavily tinted. Lucas had his pick after the fame that came with bringing down a mafia enforcer, and he chose a boring, safe vehicle. He didn’t even spring for a decent sound system because it would have been “a waste of funds.”
Some things never changed. Even if Lucas had a badass rule-breaking girlfriend, he was still a by-the-book man. Poor guy.
“And you’re a very gracious liar.”
I laughed before his next words sobered me up.
“Seriously. What’s the problem? You seemed pretty set about getting back with your girl the last time we spoke.”
I debated changing the subject or telling him everything.
We were never really close friends historically, even if we hung out together. We lived next door to each other growing up and played occasionally as kids, but by the time the two-year age difference wasn’t that big a deal anymore, I was chasing tail over his sister, so we didn’t keep the friendship going.
We ended up working the Morelli investigation together by pure coincidence; he was working with our precinct in running a now-deceased CI (another reason I didn’t want to put Bee in that situation), and as a homicide inspector it was my job to solve the CI’s murder. Cause of death was a bullet to the head. The person who pulled the trigger was out of the picture, but the men pulling the strings—Carlo and Angelo Morelli—were still running free.
After putting the murderer behind bars together, things snowballed. He stayed at the precinct, and I stayed on the case when we developed an official task force.
Now Lucas and I were on good enough terms, especially when a couple months back I ignored that he had the hots for a person of interest in our case—true team-building behavior.
Despite the giant elephant in the room of his dead sister as our initial point of contention, enough time passed that we were familiar—friendly, but not friends. Grabbing a celebratory drink together last night was only the first step in the Actual Friends direction, but we weren't there yet.
I couldn’t tell him I was in love with Carlo Morelli’s only child, that I spent the night with her before knowing her identity, and then sought her out even after I learned the truth.
“I found her, talked to her. I misread the situation and she’s not who I thought she was. End of story.” It was nothing but the truth.
“That’s a shame. I think you need to get laid, my friend.” Friend. I wished. “ That should get her out of your system.”
“Got it covered, my man. I know a masseuse with magic hands and a regular opening in her schedule. Bet I could talk her into a happy ending.” The last sentence was a complete lie; I had a weekly massage appointment, sure, but Olga definitely wasn’t my type, even if she was phenomenal at getting stubborn knots out from between my shoulder blades.
“I think I’m done with this conversation.” Good.
“Your loss, man. I tell you: magic hands. Perfect way to unwind.”
“You do you, Mark.” He shook his head, a rueful smile on his face.
“And you do Athena. I get it.” He chuckled, but didn’t respond as we pulled into the parking area of the station.
We spent a few hours working, Lucas in the conference room he’d commandeered for the last several weeks, and me at my desk. Lucas was scouring the same paperwork he’d already reviewed seven thousand times before, but it was amazing what new information revealed itself each time. Details that didn’t seem important before could suddenly become relevant every time we came across new information.
I was reviewing the video feed from the surveillance unit stationed near Carlo Morelli’s office down in the Financial District. We recently got a new feed up and running again after our last van was compromised, this time with real audio. We had a uniform on the task force that sped through the footage, searching for any movement or unusual sounds, then sent the files to me so I could analyze it.
After working separately all day, Lucas and I had a standing meeting during the last hour of the day to compare notes. It was boring work, searching for a needle in a haystack, but we’d find something eventually. Bad guys always revealed themselves, we just had to be on the lookout.
Our current project was trying to find Theo Gates, the dirty cop who worked for the Morelli family. He’d given one criminal a warning so he could escape, had stolen items from our evidence locker to get another one of Morelli’s goons off, and then disappeared. I was confident I could turn him if we found him; he was under my wing when he was a rookie before I was promoted up to Inspector.
I felt guilty that I didn’t know he was the mole in the department, but we hadn’t worked together for a couple years. Time had a way of changing people in unexpected ways.
“Hey,” Lucas said, waving a hand in front of my screen to grab my attention. I looked over at him. “It’s late, so let’s break for lunch. Come on, my treat.”
Glancing at the clock in the bottom corner of my computer screen, I saw it’d been over four hours since I sat down. No wonder my back ached. I nodded and followed him outside and down the block to the sandwich shop most of the precinct used for their meal breaks.
When we were sitting with our food, he spoke again.
“I’m going to give you a chance to come clean.”
Oh shit, what did he know? “About what?”
“You’re not really letting go of that girl, right? That wouldn’t make sense for you.”
Sure, now he wanted to buddy up and start paying attention.
“Let’s be honest here. You’ve had shit luck in the love department.”
“What would you know about that? One girl over a decade ago.”
Three girls, but I didn’t really talk to him for eleven years since everything went wrong with the one girl he knew about.
He didn’t know the details about Sierra in my senior year of college, three years after Dani died. She was sweet, kind, pretty. We wanted the same things—in theory—and I stuck by her when she got cancer. But when we found out the cancer was terminal, Sierra dumped me.
I heard her mom sued the hospital a while back because the elevator broke down when she was stuck on it. She went code blue and was trapped with no one to revive her. It looked like her words that she’d rather die alone, no one around her, than be suffocated by me when she was already struggling to breathe came true in the end. Ouch, that one still stung.
After Sierra, I didn’t try seriously dating anyone again until Natalie just last year.
We hit it off, and I worked hard to be the boyfriend she deserved, even if it didn’t seem right. Looking back, I was trying to turn something casual into a long-term relationship. Natalie was smarter than me, knew things weren’t going anywhere, so she took me out to brunch, dumped me, and then died a grisly death being dragged under a bus for half a city block. My stomach rebelled at the thought of my sandwich when I could still see the red streaking the pavement when I closed my eyes.
I hadn’t tried to date anyone since. Not until I met Bee.
“I know about the others, too. Our moms have always been gossips.”
“So?” I rolled my eyes at Mark. “Gossip is just gossip.”
“Well, you think you’re cursed, right? A girl dumps you and then she dies? You wouldn’t just let this girl dump you and move on. You’d keep an eye on her.”
“To be fair she didn’t dump me, she rejected me. There’s a difference. I don’t think a piano will fall out of the sky and land on her for that.”
He snorted. “Or she'll fall in a manhole?”
“Probably not, but if she does, it’ll be my fault. Penance for my bad life choices.”
Despite my words, I was still irrationally worried. That’s part of why I gave her my card. Even if she wasn’t directly involved in her father’s business, he was still a dangerous man. I didn’t like that she was peripherally involved in anything.
“Bad life choices? What did you do wrong?” He was smiling, making jokes.
It wasn’t a joke.
My girlfriend dumped me, and I was pissed enough to leave a seventeen-year-old girl alone in the street where she was kidnapped and murdered. I didn’t make sure she got back to the group safely because of wounded pride, and now she was dead and gone.
So I was being punished.
“I’m a dick, obviously. The universe decided I should be alone, but I think the fates are being too thorough, eliminating all the loose ends so no one can change their mind afterward.”
I said it with a smirk and a twinkle in my eye. I told jokes, tried to make other people laugh. That’s what I did, who I was. I never expected to experience happiness for myself, but I wanted the people around me to laugh and enjoy life. I wouldn’t ever have closure—they never found little Dani’s body—but I could bring closure to other families who lost a loved one when I solved a case.
I wanted to make other people’s lives better, because I couldn’t imagine mine ever being bearable. It made sense that Bee wouldn’t try to make anything work with me. I didn’t deserve a second chance.
Lucas laughed with me, unaware of my inner turmoil.
“True. Maybe if you try being nicer to people the fates will be nicer to you,” he joked.
“Yeah, but then I’d have to be nice. I tried it for five minutes this morning and felt like I needed to take a shower. Not worth it.” I tore off a big bite of my sandwich, chewing with my mouth open.
He rolled his eyes, but he was still grinning.
“Speaking of asshole comments,” I added, hoping to get a rise out of him. “I saw Athena’s newest Instagram post. She looks like she’s trolling for dick she’s dressed so hot. You should put a ring on it because that girl can do so much better than you.”
He grinned again, ignoring the implication his girlfriend had wandering eyes. We both knew better. “Don’t I know it. I’ve got the ring, you know.”
I choked on my next bite. “Really?”
“Really. Still trying to figure out when to give it to her, but I’ve had the ring since…Well, since the beginning.”
“Wow.” This was bro talk. Closed off, rule-following, stick-up-his-ass Lucas Blake was being chill and confiding in me, an asshole. It was a springtime miracle.
“I know. What do you think?”
“I think she’ll say no,” I lied with a laugh. Those two were perfect together from the very first time she kicked his ass.
“Maybe. How do you think I should ask?”
“I say lock her up and withhold sex—no, not sex. Never that. Withhold food and water until she says yes.”
“Stockholm Syndrome technique. Got it. Any other notes?”
“She listens to all those dirty BookTok books, right?”
“How do you know that?”
“Instagram, dude. You should try it some time.”
“I have an Instagram. A myspace page, too.”
“Okay, Grandpa,” I teased. “It doesn’t count if you never actually use it.”
“How do you know I don’t use it?”
“Myspace hasn’t been a thing for over a decade.”
He rolled his eyes. “What’s your point about the books?”
“Do a deep dive into what she’s reading and try to reenact some of the cutesy shit.”
He blinked hard at me. “Is that a real suggestion? Not an asshole sarcastic remark?”
“Do you have to act so shocked?” He was opening up, trying to treat me like a real friend, so I was trying to give him real advice.
“Okay, okay,” he said, raising his hands in surrender. “I’ll think about it. See if there’s a romantic moment or if it’s all just word porn. What little I’ve overheard is mostly just sex.”
“Search BookTok shit. Girls go crazy for that.”
“She does like BookTok, but I still don’t know what it is.”
I laughed. Poor guy really didn’t understand shit about social media. I dragged my chair around the table closer to him, opening TikTok on my phone. “Okay, here’s a quick tutorial on BookTok. Ready?”
“Ready,” he confirmed. The serious expression on his face was hilarious. Dude was so in love with his girl he was willing to delve into the bowels of TikTok, but I couldn’t laugh at that level of devotion. “Um, Mark?”
I glanced down at my phone, looking at the notification that Lucas saw pop up on my screen.
Incoming Call: Bianca Rose Morelli
“You wanna tell me why you have a mafia princess calling your personal cell phone?”