Chapter Nine
CHAPTER NINE
Lincoln/ Seven Years Ago
T he usual wing Wednesday tradition that the guys I work with at the deputy’s office turns into a farewell celebration at The Barrel.
“All I’m saying is that hell has to be frozen over,” Stiles, the eldest deputy muses, nudging me with his shoulder, “for this one to be sober right now.”
Jefferson laughs. “He’s got goals that go beyond getting laid tonight.”
Stiles’s eyes flash at Jefferson, the new deputy who the guys like to rift on. Me included. “You telling me you’re not trying to get laid, Jeffy Boy?”
I grin at Stiles, coming to Jefferson’s defense before everyone turns on him. “When was the last time you got any?”
Another one of our friends adds, “And your hand doesn’t count.”
Snorting, I finish the rest of my water. “Take it easy on him, fellas. Stiles can’t help it if all the single women at the station are hesitant over his divorce history. Nobody wants to be unlucky number three.”
They all laugh, smacking Stiles’s back in sympathy and talking about who they think the hottest officers are that they work with. I tune them out, studying the bikers roughhousing by the pool table, who are three sheets to the wind and still likely to ride their bikes home later. I’m ninety percent positive the guy with the scar across his face is one I’ve arrested for drunk driving before, but I remind myself it’s not my problem tonight.
Unfortunately, the focus turns to me, breaking me out of my thoughts. “What about you, Hawk?” Stiles questions, sipping his umpteenth beer of the night. “You haven’t exactly been on the prowl. If you don’t have any luck getting some, then we’re all screwed, pretty boy.”
Shelly, the bartender who served me the night I’d taken Georgia home, snorts. I give her one look, a cautious sidelong glance, that has her quieting and going to serve a group of men at the other end of the bar.
“Like Jefferson said, my focus needs to be on preparing for the academy,” I answer them, pushing the empty glass away. “Not women.”
I haven’t been able to stop thinking about Georgia since the morning she left though, and it’s annoying as hell. I’m the one who usually does the Irish goodbye, so the role reversal makes her a permanent fixture in the back of my mind.
Shelly clears her throat when she walks back over, a glint in her eyes still. “Another water, Officer?”
Humming, I look at my watch. “One more, and then I should get going.”
The guys all protest. “Come on, dude. It’s your big night. None of our schedules will line up again by the time your ass is gone. You’re going to call it early before the party really starts?”
Typically, I’m the last to leave, and it’s not normally willingly. I put up a fight every time a bar closes down or somebody tells me to go home. It was a big source of contention in my last relationship, where things would get heated whenever she’d try to get me out at a reasonable time. I’ll admit, she put up with more than most people would in the six months we were together. I couldn’t blame her for ending things when she did. I needed to grow up, and she needed somebody more stable. That wasn’t me at the time.
I tip the woman who passes me and grab a water before downing at least half of it. “I’d stay but—”
My words are cut short when I see a familiar brunette walk through the door wearing painted-on jeans that sit low on her lean hips and a low-cut top that exposes the curve of her pushed-up breasts.
Damn. She’s prettier than I remember her being last week, if that’s even possible.
“Shit.” Someone beside me whistles. Stiles, I think. “I don’t know who that is, but with legs like that, I think I want to know her.”
Jefferson looks between Georgia and me, an inquisitive brow raised and a smirk curling his lips when he sees how hyper-focused I am on the girl stopping a few feet inside the doors and skeptically staring at the bikers who are drunkenly catcalling her. “I think someone else is thinking the same thing,” he muses, hiding his smile behind his beer glass.
I stand, drumming my hands against the bar top. “I’ll be right back, boys.”
“Whoa.” McAdams halts me, grabbing my arm before I can step forward. “You know who that is, right?”
I don’t answer because I don’t owe him shit. I like McAdams, but he’s a gossip. The more you tell him, the more the rest of the station knows by next shift.
He leans forward, letting go of my arm when he sees the way I glare at his hold. “That’s Georgia Del Rossi.” When I have no reaction, he sighs. “There are rumors that her family’s construction business has ties with…” His brows go up, waiting for me to catch on.
Del Rossi.
Christ, that’s why she sounded familiar.
Didn’t her credit card have Nikolas Del Rossi’s name on it the night we met? I remember hearing mumblings about The Del Rossi Group, a local construction business serving downstate New York and Jersey, being loosely associated with some heavy hitters in New York City. Last I knew, there were a few insiders spilling names within the five mafia families, and Del Rossi wasn’t one of them. Since their informant never brought him up, they focused on more important people.
My voice is low enough to stay between us while the others talk about work shit. “Are you really telling me that girl is connected with a family associated with organized crime?”
He holds up his hands. “It’s what I’ve heard. Nikolas Del Rossi’s former business partner was making waves with some of the bosses in the city while still dabbling with deals down in Atlanta, where their first business was. Guess there were some conflicts of interest between families that got in the way when his contact in New York heard about who he was working with in the South. They didn’t like him outsourcing his business. I don’t know all the details. Ask Beauregard. They’ve been trying to find a way to get Del Rossi since they have his former partner talking to cut himself a deal. From what I gather, they’ve been doing surveillance on him for a couple years to find evidence.”
Beauregard is an investigator who works undercover with a lot of informants. If McAdams heard it from him, it’s the truth. And if they’ve been surveilling them, there’s a good chance Beauregard knows about my personal experience with Nikolas’s daughter.
“I don’t know, man,” I murmur, eyes going to where Georgia shifts on her heels and searches the bar for an empty spot.
She seems too innocent for the kind of lifestyle that comes with ties like that. She proved she’s innocent in more ways than one the first time we met. Somebody with a family like that could be as soft as her and certainly not as tempting.
Probably against my better judgment, I pat his shoulder. “I’ll take my chances.”
The guys all hoot and holler as I approach Georgia, where she’s stopped, looking around at all the bikers lining the room with tense posture as a couple of them make crude comments and gestures with their hands.
She freezes when she turns to lock eyes on me, hand clenching her purse strap when I slide a hand into my pocket in front of her.
I ignore the idiots I call my friends who are making a scene. “I was hoping to see you again.”
Her throat bobs with a thick swallow, and I can’t help but wonder if that’s nervousness in her eyes. Did she want to see me too? Or is that hopeful thinking?
“I wanted to apologize for the other night,” I go on when she doesn’t reply. “I had no idea you were a…” Her cheeks turn pink, so I don’t finish the sentence. “I can usually read people better.”
When she lifts her gaze, I’m pierced with a set of narrow golden-amber eyes. “And what read do you have on me now?”
“You’re upset,” I state matter-of-factly, scoping out her dilated pupils. Internally, I grin. “But you’re also turned on. I bet you’re thinking about that night right now. Tell me, Georgia. What was your favorite position?”
Georgia straightens, the heels on her feet making her almost come up to my six-foot-one height. “We’re in public.”
“Are you embarrassed?”
She doesn’t answer, but she does turn red.
She is .
Huh.
“Your family seems well-known around here,” I offer to gauge her reaction. Her shoulders go back as the grip on her purse tightens. Interesting. “And from what you said, your father has connections with people far above my pay grade.”
I think back to our conversation about the captain. That does little to prove her father knows anybody other than a few people of authority in the State Police. He’s a businessman who probably mingles to build a lot of connections in the community. Doesn’t mean that extends to the mob or anybody else, like McAdams claims.
She crosses her arms, pushing her cleavage up. “Your point?”
I lift my shoulders casually, keeping my eyes above her chest no matter how tempting the mounds are. I remember how perfectly they fit in my hands—how delicious they tasted when I sucked on the pretty pink nubs that had her panting. “My point is that I didn’t know anything about you when we met, and the only thing I know about you now is how you taste and what you sound like when you’re coming.”
A subtle breath escapes her.
“And maybe I want to know more,” I conclude.
Georgia switches her weight from one foot to another, doing another scope of the bar and frowning at the people around us. She sticks out here, and she’s uncomfortable. So why did she come back? I’d like to think it had something to do with me, but I don’t let that go to my ego.
Eventually, her tongue slowly drags across her bottom lip, painted a softer tone than the red they were the first time we met. She’s not here to gain anybody’s attention, not like last time. “The only thing you need to know about the Del Rossis is that their reputation means everything to them. I’ve learned that the hard way recently.”
Her tone changes as her eyes skate around the room, going to the bar where I’m sure my friends are all staring at us.
“Did something happen?” I ask quietly, cop-mode activated as I study her for something I didn’t see before.
An empty smile curls her lips. “You could say that. My father kicked me out.”
I blink, thinking I must have misheard her. “I don’t understand. They kicked you out for what, exactly?”
“For that night,” she murmurs, rubbing her arm. “Apparently, it didn’t take a genius to figure out what happened when I got home.”
I didn’t even know she lived at home. Not that I’m judging. If I hadn’t found my apartment, I would still be too. “You’re an adult. You can do whatever you want.”
When our eyes meet, I see the dulled light in hers as if someone drained them. “Not when you’ve been promised to somebody else. I ruined my father’s plans for me by… tainting myself. His words, not mine.”
It means I’m free, she’d said that night. I didn’t get it then, but I do now. “Promised to someone else. As in…You were engaged?” I ask skeptically, a heavy feeling weighing down my gut. I’m no saint, but I’ve never intentionally gone after taken women.
“Not by choice,” she replies.
I blink.
Blink again.
Is she really suggesting she had an arranged marriage set up by her father? Who does that in this day and age? “And now you’re not.”
“And now,” she responds, adjusting the purse over her shoulder and taking a deep breath. “I am homeless since my friend’s family told me I couldn’t keep staying with them, jobless because I have no experience other than knowing how to dress pretty and smile for the camera, with no connections of my own. I’m an outcast. But, yes, Officer . I’m no longer engaged since that’s all you seem to care about.”
“It’s Lincoln,” I tell her.
“You’re an officer, are you not?”
“I’m a lot of things, sweetheart,” I say easily, getting her cheeks to pinken over the pet name. “And a monster isn’t one of them. In fact, I have a proposition for you. Consider it before deciding.”
Wariness scrunches her nose. “What proposition could you possibly have to offer me?”
“A place to stay, for one.”
Her eyes widen.
“I’ll be gone five days a week for the next few months,” I explain. The timing really couldn’t have worked out better. The academy requires I stay on campus Monday through Friday, but we can go home on weekends. “You’ll have an apartment to yourself for the most part. I’ll be back on the weekends. My place is hardly what you’re used to, I’m sure, but it’s something.”
All she does is stare at me, clearly speechless over the offer.
“Like I said. Think on it.”
A nagging feeling pulls on my gut, one that tells me I probably shouldn’t be doing this. But I’m the reason she’s in this position. The military shaped me into the type of person who offers help to someone in need. The apartment isn’t much, but it’s better than nothing.
Eventually, she swallows. “Why?”
“Because I feel a little guilty,” I admit, lifting a shoulder dismissively. “But also because I’ve always had a thing for saving damsels in distress. I guess it’s a hero complex.”
“And what would you get out of it?”
“A chance to feel like I’m doing right by somebody, I suppose.”
She looks skeptical, not that I blame her. Most guys would probably expect a lot more. If nothing else, sex. But if giving her somewhere safe to go helps her get onto her feet, then I’ll do it. If nothing else, it makes me feel better.
Because there’s no way McAdams can be right. Most families connected to the mafia are close. They wouldn’t kick out one of their own, especially if they know something they shouldn’t. It doesn’t add up.
“Let me give you my number, and you can let me know what you decide,” I say, pulling out a card for work that has my cell listed.
It takes her a minute to accept it, glancing down at the paper. “Lincoln Danforth.”
“The one and only.”
When she looks up at me, I wink.
She tucks it away in her purse. “I’ll think about it.”
Her feigned confidence is back, and suddenly, I respect her a lot more. Because it’s obvious she’s gone through hell, and she’s still standing. Still fighting. All for a future for herself.
“You do that, Peaches.”
The nickname makes her eyebrows furrow.
“I’ll never forget how sweet you tasted,” I say, making her gape at the implication. I hope she remembers what it felt like to have my face buried in her pussy, what it was like to look down as I made her writhe until she shattered apart around me. “I’ll hear from you soon.”
“And if you don’t?” she asks as I back away from her and toward my friends.
I grin. “I will.”