Chapter 10 #3
Wow. I needed to shut the fuck up forever.
He chuckled, all of him relaxed. “I’m a big guy.”
That was undeniable and I had many, many, many…thoughts about it. More than I’d ever wanted to admit. “There’s a dirty joke in there somewhere.”
“Tell me,” he requested, his voice not even a hint suggestive.
“You can figure it out.” I rubbed his temples harder and tried to focus on breathing to calm myself down. But Alex slowly dropped his head back, his dark eyes staring up at me. He was beautiful even upside down.
“Is the joke that you think I’m big…all over?”
Oh God. Oh God, oh God, oh God. My mind was on fire.
“Size doesn't really matter, Alex. Skill does,” I deflected, unable to truly concentrate on what I was doing.
Involuntarily, my gaze travelled down his chest, over his stomach, and onto his crotch. His large, tattooed hands rested there, and my imagination blazed. His fingers wrapping around his…his… Was it actually big? Was he? Big all over?
“Mmm,” he hummed, his eyes locked on mine. “That’s something you say to make the small guys feel better.”
I chuckled loudly, my fingertips in sensory heaven. “How would you know? Someone said that to you before?” I leaned over him, letting my hair fall all over.
And that’s when something clicked into place inside me. It all moved a mile a minute—my heart, my breath, my brain.
We were inches apart. I stared down into his eyes and he didn’t blink, holding my attention.
“What kind of criminal are you?” I asked, barely able to pronounce the words. “If you’re sitting here all coconutty…with your captive.”
He held the pause and searched my gaze. “One who’s bending all the rules…for his captive.”
I let out a shaky breath, the weight of our situation descending on me. “What’s happening, Alex?” I let the truth slip out. Quietly. Scared. And inching closer toward some invisible but very real line.
He blinked up at me, no hint of a smile on his upside-down face.
“I don’t know, Preziosa.”
It didn’t sound so bad. The way he whispered it—it no longer annoyed me. His arm lifted, and then his fingers were sliding into my hair, rubbing the coconut oil in. My eyes squeezed shut, as if the darkness would protect me from the heat of his skin. The danger in his eyes.
But my body did its own thing. I moved closer, letting him guide me until my lips registered the heat of his. Somehow, inexplicably, accidentally, purely by chance, but so on purpose…we were an inch apart.
“Why are you here?” I pleaded, taking in a lungful of his scent.
His chest rose and fell with every one of his breaths, his fingers tangled in my hair, the same way mine were in his.
“I can’t…” he whispered and I could almost taste him. Taste the mistake, his darkness, and my demise. “I can’t stay away. I can’t sleep. I can’t eat…without you. I can’t.”
Sebastian Moretti held another press conference this evening—
The voice emanating from the TV pierced me right through the heart.
My head jerked up like I’d been electrocuted and that’s when I saw him—my father, wearing his signature navy suit and red tie, standing at the podium of the press-conference room, familiar faces of the detectives I’d worked with right behind him.
—appeared resolute as he addressed the ongoing silence surrounding his daughter’s disappearance. He doubled down on his warning, stating that those responsible weren’t dealing with a grieving father, but with the full weight of the federal justice system.
I ripped my fingers out of Alex’s hair and almost tumbled off the couch in my rush to approach the TV. This was the first time I’d seen my father since it happened. I hadn’t turned the news on, but of course, he was out there, looking for me, threatening anyone who would listen.
Moretti warned that any individual or organization withholding information would be treated as complicit, adding that federal resources were being fully mobilized to ensure the safe return of Jade Moretti, a federal employee. She was last seen in Miami.
The news switched to another story, but not in my mind. My eyes burned with the image of him standing there so composed. Like this was regular business, not a press conference about the disappearance of his daughter. Federal employee.
Alex’s large body loomed behind me and I turned to him, such sudden and deep regret washing over me.
No, I didn’t really know him, and yes, he did kidnap me. Yes, he was absolutely a criminal and I hadn’t figured out which kind yet, and at the same time, Alex gave me something my father never did. Protection, respect, and care.
“Alex?” The almost-taste of his lips and the smell of his skin still lingered inside me. “You don’t have to tell me what you do, but…do you sell drugs, women, or children?”
Alex was stoic, looking down at me with his eyebrows furrowed, not in the least bit shaken by what we’d seen on the news.
“No,” he said simply and that was enough.
That was enough.
I looked into his beautiful brown eyes and asked a very important question.
“Do you still have some zip ties?”
What kind of criminal are you?