17. Chapter 17
seventeen
Mark
I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t that. I’d said it before and I’ll say it again: even erectile disfunction would be better than that.
I saw a flash of Natalie’s back as the bus smashed into her side. Of the crime scene photos of the last CI who was taken out by the Morellis. We'd needed to scour the grass to find all the body parts. That would not be my girl.
I bolted upright, Bee’s hands the only thing keeping me in the bed when all I wanted to do was take my girl and go on the run.
Just talking about this shit was dangerous. This bedroom had already been bugged once. What if we missed a second device?
“Over my dead fucking body will you wear a wire.” It was harsh, but so was my visceral reaction.
She smiled gently at me, hands rubbing up and down my arm like she was calming a toddler in the middle of a temper tantrum. “It’ll be fine. I’m the perfect person to do it. My dad already asked me if I wanted in on the business a couple days ago.”
That was a surprise to me. What did she say back to him?
“I bought more time, but now I can just go to family dinner tonight and ask to speak to him privately. He’ll tell me everything, I’m sure of it.”
“No. You’re not going to put yourself in danger like that. Not when I finally have you here. In my arms.” I couldn’t breathe. I felt like I was having a panic attack, and holding Bee close was the only thing that mattered. I wrapped her up in my arms, pressing her body as tightly against me as I could.
“It’s going to be fine. Blood is important to my father. He’d never physically hurt me. I promise.”
I trusted Bee implicitly, but I didn’t trust Carlo Morelli. She had never seen what he was capable of. She didn’t know the worst sides of him. Going in to try to implicate him in crimes was a whole other level than just wanting to lead separate lives.
Maybe she was right before, that the worst her family could do was disown her if she wanted to date a cop. But wearing a wire was different. The mafia didn’t treat treason lightly.
I couldn’t support myself anymore, so I let my body collapse on top of her. If she had trouble breathing she didn’t say anything, just wrapped her arms and legs around me tighter.
“I can’t lose you again,” I told her. Henry Cavill, always with his excellent timing, obviously felt the same as he reached for her warmth, just inches away from home. “I need you.”
“You have me,” she said, and I could feel tears on my chest. She was crying. I made her cry.
“I need you,” I repeated, Henry echoing my thoughts as he strained toward Bee’s entrance.
“You can have me,” she said again, sliding an arm between us to guide me home, no barrier between us. “All of me.”
“I need you,” I said again. She nodded her head, unspeaking, just held on tight to me while I let all my fears and frustrations out with her.
“You can’t leave me.”
“I love you.”
“I can’t live without you.”
“We’re supposed to be together.”
Until I felt my climax coming closer, closer, and—
I groaned loudly, the feeling of coming inside my girl too much to contain, the terror and despair too much to withhold.
“I don’t want you to die,” I told her, not yet able to release my grip on her.
“Nothing bad is going to happen to me. My father is a lot of things, but he’s not capable of hurting me.”
“I want to believe that. But what if you’re wrong?” I asked, finally disentangling our bodies. I needed to look in her eyes, so I sat up, pulling Bee up onto my lap so I could still hold her in my arms.
“I’m not.” Her confidence was reassuring, but there was still a harsh pit in my stomach. What if? “I’ve told you before. The worst that could happen is I’ll get disowned. My credit card will get cut off. But you’ll never be safe until this is done. I can live without just about anything, but not without you.”
Well, when she put it that way.
“And I can’t live without you, but I have an…unpleasant history of women dying on me.” I tried to state it like a joke, but my tone didn’t quite hit the mark.
“How many does it take to qualify as an unpleasant history?”
“Only one for most people. I’ve had three.” I saw an image of Sierra in the hospital bed as she told me to leave her alone to die in peace. “I’m scared—no, terrified—that you’ll be number four.”
“That won’t happen,” she said, squeezing me hard. “I promise.”
“You can’t promise me something you can’t guarantee.”
“Sure I can. Fact: no one suspects I’d turn rat on the family. Fact: no one knows about the two of us. Fact: my father would never lay hands on me. This will be just like any other family dinner, except I’ll come home to you after.”
“Hey, it’s not fair to use logic to soothe my illogical fears,” I teased. There , that sounded more like my usual carefree voice. I could pull it together.
“No such thing as fair in love and war. And this is both.” She cleared her throat. “He’s done bad things. Evil things to people I care about. He’s not going to get away with it.”
“You have someone else you want to protect, too,” I realized. “Who?”
“My younger cousin. On my mom’s side. He’s done some…off things to her. I just found out the other day.”
Hell. I couldn’t argue with that. Fucker needed to go down. “Okay, I surrender. I get why you’re so invested in this, honey. But why does it have to be tonight?”
“It’s the perfect opportunity. Everyone is supposed to be over at the house tonight anyway for dinner. Relaxed environment, plenty of imported wine. If I don’t do it tonight I have no reason to see him again for another week, and I don’t want to leave Frannie in this situation any longer than I have to.”
If she only wanted to protect me I could say no and not feel an ounce of guilt. Her safety was too important.
But it wasn’t just about me.
“How old is Frannie?”
“She’s eighteen! He talked to her mom and on her birthday he got her a Porche and cornered her. She didn’t say he raped her, but she said she was scared and…and she thinks she has to keep doing it and putting up with him until she leaves for college in the fall.”
I almost asked why Frannie didn’t report him if she was assaulted, but that was a stupid question. Bee was probably right in her assumption. We had to help Frannie before something more happened to her.
“Fine. We’ll do it tonight. But I’m parking a surveillance van right on the block so I can help you if you need me.”
“That will be too obvious.”
“It’s a deal breaker,” I told her firmly. She had to give me some sense of control in this fucked up situation. “I need to be there for you.”
“Okay,” she said softly, hand on my shoulder to roll me over so she could get up, but I pulled her onto my lap instead. “I need to go home to get a change of clothes for dinner tonight.”
“What, you don’t want to wear yesterday’s wrinkled clothes?” I asked.
“Nah, not this time. One does not simply walk into family dinner at the Morelli house without dressing up a little.”
I hesitated over letting her out of my sight so long, but she was right; we didn’t want to raise suspicions. We needed to come up with a compromise.
“I get what you’re saying, but I think we need to figure something else out. We don’t know if your home is safe right now, and I can’t risk you getting hurt when I won’t be close enough to help.”
She paused, considering my words. Please work with me here, Bee.
“I can have some clothes delivered. I’ll get Sam or Steve to bring me something to wear.”
“Who are Sam and Steve?” I asked, wondering who these two men were who she’d trust with her location.
“My neighbors. They own the bookshop next door to me. We have a really friendly relationship and they have a key to get into my shop and apartment. They could bring me an outfit.”
I trusted Bee’s judgement. If she trusted those men, then so would I now that her eyes were open. But…
“Does your father know how much you trust them? Would he have bugged them to spy on you?”
“I don’t think so,” she said, but her eyes were full of doubt.
A loud knock on the door brought us out of the debate. Bee held her breath and I held Bee for the half a second it took for Lucas to identify himself through the door.
“It’s Blake!” he called. “Let me in.”
I looked over at Bee in all her naked glory, disappointed that it was time to put on some damn clothes instead of just talking about it. I sighed, meeting her smile with a what can you do? kind of shrug. She climbed off my lap, patting me on the shoulder before hunting down her clothes again.
I pulled my boxers on, looking for my jeans before Lucas knocked again. “You’re supposed to be here, so if you don’t answer the door in one minute I’ll break it down to make sure everything is okay!” he warned.
Well damn. Guess I would just answer the door naked. I closed the bedroom door behind me to give Bee some privacy and swaggered over to the front door, purposely waiting to adjust my junk in my boxers until I had the door open for Lucas.
He rolled his eyes in disgust at me as he shouldered his way in.
“Hey, that’s what happens when you don’t call first. You wanna wait in the living room for fifteen minutes while I finish up with my girl?” I smirked.
I heard Bee’s light giggle from the bedroom as the door opened. She was back in the boxers she'd slept in and a fresh shirt, hair mussed, a wide smile on her face. Sexy. Beautiful. Perfect.
“Well then,” Lucas said, clearing his throat. I gave him a couple seconds to process, and then he moved on, just like I knew he would. He owed me one. “The crime scene is secure, but we’re not going to get anything more from it. Just like I thought. Have you two managed to do any work since I saw you last?”
The sarcasm was heavy in his words, but little did he know.
“Yes, actually.” I darted a glance at Bee, confirming she still wanted to do it. She nodded. Damn it. “If Theo Gates was willing to do a drive-by on us, I doubt we’d be able to flip him.”
“That sounds like the opposite of progress.”
“Hey, it’s my job to be a little shit, not yours.” He laughed. “Bianca is going in. She’ll wear a wire and get the evidence we need. We’re doing it tonight, so we need to get shit set up ASAP.”
Lucas stared hard at Bee. She stared back, spine straight and chin up, the picture of confidence.
“Going undercover isn’t easy, you know.”
“I know,” she said. He shook his head.
“You don’t know. You have to be a good actor, sure, but that’s not all. If you’re doing this out of anger for your father it won’t work. Hotheads lose their shit, and if you lose it and ruin this chance we’ll be farther back than we are now. I need to make sure any Daddy issues you’re harboring aren’t going to interfere with the mission at hand.”
“That’s a bit harsh,” I interrupted, but Bee held a hand up to me.
“It’s okay,” she said. “He’s making a fair point. Trust me, I know what’s at stake. I know why these men need to go to prison. I think—I know —I’m the only one who can infiltrate properly, get what you need. I can do this.”
That was my girl. Caring, confident, sexy. I was in awe and more than a little in love.
Lucas stared for another couple seconds and then nodded. A miracle! Mr. Control Freak was letting someone else call the shots. I never thought I’d see the day.
“Call Athena up,” I told him. “Have her bring something nice for Bee to wear. Tonight is family dinner at the Morellis, and Bee isn’t going to go home to change.”
“Too risky,” he agreed, pulling out his phone and dialing. “Babe? Can you do us a favor? Yes, it’s for the case. Can you pick up an outfit for Mark’s girlfriend?”
“Fiancée,” I corrected, meeting Bee’s warm grin across the room. Lucas rolled his eyes again.
“Yes, I promise it’s for the case,” he was saying into the phone. “Hm. Yeah, hold on just a second.” He took the phone away from his ear for a second to snap a picture of Bee. “There. Sent. Yeah. Okay, I’ll text you the address. See you soon. I love you, too.”
“Awww, is little Lukie in love?” I teased, fully aware that I was a hypocrite as I pulled Bee onto my lap on the couch.
“Yes. Now shut up. Fill me in on all the details you’ve worked out.”