Chapter 35
35
DAX
I… I was stunned. Bewildered. Proud. A little scared because I never knew anyone with that kind of laser sharp drive.
“You went into the FBI to put your father in prison,” I said, making sure I had the facts straight.
She nodded. Her cheeks were splotchy, and her eyes were red rimmed from crying, but she was as beautiful as ever. Perhaps more so now.
“I found my mother at the bottom of the stairs the morning after she took me and tried to run away from him. We got caught and he killed her because of it.”
Fuck. FUCK.
A sigh slipped from her like a leaky balloon. “Like I said, I was five. I knew he was bad then, but someone that age only understands so much. I learned quickly.”
The last sounded ominous.
“He hurt you,” I said, repeating the words I fucked from her.
She nodded again. “He did. He hit me, but the servants caught him doing it. Then he switched to words. I think the words were worse than the bruises.”
I kissed her. Couldn’t help it. Who said words were worse than fists ?
“By the time I was eight, I understood the world I lived in. My father wasn’t in the mafia, but he worked with them. Shipped for them.”
Genovese Trucking was the biggest domestic shipping business in the country. Their semis were on every highway in the country. It had to be close to a billion-dollar company, especially if it was propped up with mafia money. Or had been.
Now, with the CEO in prison, the company still ran, but probably legally now.
“In that world, a wife didn’t leave,” she continued. “A wife didn’t take their child away. It showed poorly on the man. If he couldn’t handle his home life, the mafia figured he couldn’t handle their business.”
She huffed, which I thought was a laugh, but none of this shit was funny.
She was quiet for a moment, then said, “A wife couldn’t leave, but she could die. ”
That was fucking true. I knew more than I wanted about the mafia.
“Your goal was to get a job at the FBI for, what? Justice?”
She nodded her head against my chest. “Definitely. It’s all I wanted. I went to college for criminal justice. For a while, I wanted to join the police force, but learned there was no chance they could take him down. Only the FBI could use the evidence I’d collected all those years I was stuck in that house.”
All those years? As a kid, she saved up proof of his illegal activities?
“So you joined.”
“Yes.”
“And you got justice.”
With a nod, she said, “Yes. He’s never getting out.”
I gave her a gentle squeeze. She was on my lap, letting me take care of her. Comfort her. Listen. Believe. “Good. That’s really fucking good, sweetheart.” Nitro was going to find out what prison he was in, and I’d make him dead.
Her black and white stance on the law made sense now. Her trust issues. Dead mother at the age of five. Cruel and sadistic father. A partner who tried to frame her.
“You’re not worthless like your father told you,” I told her. She didn’t believe the lies her father spewed, so why would she believe me? She needed actions. Validations. Proof.
She stirred. “Dax.”
I held her tight. “You’re not. You know it or you wouldn’t have done what you did. You showed him. ”
A chuckle escaped. “Yeah, I did. I’m the infamous FBI agent who took down her own father. I’m the cold one. The ruthless agent who doesn’t feel. The one who follows the letter of the law.”
“Because if you didn’t, your father might have remained free.”
“Yeah.”
She’d had to live with the fucker for what… thirteen years after he killed his wife? I couldn’t imagine having to live for one night with the drunk who killed my mom.
“And now you’re being framed by your partner for your black and white approach to the law.”
She sighed. “Not anymore.”
“Oh?”
“I blackmailed my boss. He’s gonna frame my partner instead.”
I couldn’t help but laugh because if it were anyone else, I wouldn’t believe a word of this. With Fiona, it was like all the pieces of the puzzle finally fit into place.
“What do you have over your boss?”
“He’s cheating on his wife with a man he calls Daddy.”
I wasn’t expecting that, but it was pretty good stuff when it came to blackmail. “You do realize, sweetheart, that you’re not as black and white as you think.”
She went taut in my arms. “Oh?”
My hand stroked down her back again. “You just said it. You’re blackmailing your boss and you… diverted him so your partner would take the fall instead of you.”
“I would have been fired! My career ruined. I’m on a paid leave of absence until things settle. Or permanently. Who knows?”
“You bent the law to protect yourself. I wouldn’t call blackmail legal.”
She squirmed in my lap, making my dick, which was still untucked from my jeans, get hard again. “You’re getting justice, just like you did with your dad.”
“How do you know so much about justice?”
I shrugged. Took a breath, let it out. If she was sharing, I needed to as well. “My mother was killed by a drunk driver. The law didn’t give him jail time.”
“Misdemeanor manslaughter?” she asked. She knew her stuff.
I nodded. “Yeah. He walked. My father got justice though.”
“Do I… do I want to ask?”
“Probably not.”
“Is he in prison, too?”
“The drunk driver? No, he’s dead. My father? No. Worse. He’s in Florida.”
“The drunk driver killed your mother. He deserved–”
“What happened to your black and white, sweetheart?” I tapped her nose. “You going into the pickle shop with your diversion? You bent the rules. In fact, you broke them. You stole drugs from a drug dealer.”
I glanced at the package that had dropped to the floor.
“You could be arrested for possession.”
She waved that off. “I’m an FBI agent.”
“On leave,” I reminded. “Those guys in that shop aren’t Boy Scouts. They’re not going to help you cross the street, sweetheart. They’re going to run you over. Then back up and run you over again.”
“I have to see this through.” Of course, she did.
I pointed to the drug package. “Take it to the Coal Springs police and let them deal with it.”
“The police?” She popped to her feet, pulled up her panties, then her pants with a little wriggling. “I’m sure the two people who make up the entire department are qualified and all for monitoring a parade, stopping traffic for a herd of elk or catching jaywalkers, but this is a big drug ring.”
I wanted to tell her we could simply drive down the alley and toss the plastic bag filled with Fentanyl at the back door of the pickle place, but they had her photo. Knew she was a snoop.
Plus, I didn’t want anyone besides the drug guys to find a bag filled with pills, especially kids.
I had no fucking clue what to do here. Fiona had opened up to me, fucking finally. Yet I was fucking stuck. Her actions put me in a fuck-all situation.
While I was telling Fiona to let me help her bring down the pickle people, I was now working for them. To fix a problem: her.
The woman on my lap.
The woman I’d fallen for.
The woman who’d stolen their fucking drugs.
When they found out some were missing and she was the culprit, it wasn’t going to be a fix job. It was going to be a hit.
We had to take down the pickle people. There was no other option to keep her alive.
As a fixer, I could’ve kept Fiona in bed–literally tied to the headboard–to keep her away from the pickle store and her nose out of their business. That was all the client wanted. To be left alone without anyone snooping around. Non-stop sex was a great fix.
Except, everything changed when she went rogue and took their drugs. Now it wasn’t some random woman looking too closely at a pickle shop. She knew what they were doing and had proof of it. She wasn’t going to let this drop. Neither were the pickle people.
I needed help. There was only one person to call, and he was going to be pissed as hell.