CHAPTER 16 #2
“Put me on one of his boats and taught me all there was to know about waters between Vancouver and Washington. Started out scrubbing decks and then climbed the ladder from there.”
Finn smiled, almost fondly. “He was in his late fifties, no wife, no kids. He’d grown up in foster care and built a life out of nothing.
I never had anyone to look up to, and he never had anyone to leave his legacy to.
He taught me everything. Numbers. Documents.
How to read a buyer. How to read a room.
How to read a person. He gave me books to read and made me finish my GED.
He paid for me to take community college classes in art history just because I was interested. He treated me like I was his.”
Finn’s voice went rough on that last sentence and without thought, I slipped my hand in his because he was talking about Jim in the past tense and I knew it was a loss that hurt deep.
He cleared his throat. “He had a heart attack in his kitchen and I’m the one who found him. I tried to do CPR, but he’d been there too long.”
“Finn.”
His gaze came to mine and he squeezed my hand. “He left everything to me, The Quartermaster being the one thing that could assure that I continue in his footsteps. I built my own crew. Brought Connie on, found Marcus… there are others, of course.”
“So you smuggle art,” I said, almost reverently rolling it on my tongue. But a thought struck me. “Why? You have the gallery now.”
Finn’s smile was without light. “I do it because I’m good at it,” he said quietly.
“I do it because the money is incalculable. I do it because I came from nothing and now I have everything. It’s such a shallow desire, but it’s the truth.
And I’m sorry if it makes me a bad person, but there isn’t one part of that money I regret making. ”
I leaned over, put my head on his shoulder. “You’re a good man, Finn. Not a bad person at all.”
I could feel the relief flow from his body into mine. He twisted his neck, kissed the side of my head.
“I built a good life… something Jim and my mother would have been proud of. I had Marcus and I had Connie and I had a gallery I loved that was paying for itself.” He looked at me then, his expression once again tortured.
“And then I pulled a woman out of the water and now I don’t have a graceful way to stop thinking about her. ”
I bit the inside of my cheek, a flood of warmth sweeping through me as my heart expanded to what felt like double its normal size.
“I’m worried, Josie,” he said, his eyes hard and unyielding.
“I just drew the deepest line I’ve ever made with a person I thoroughly trusted and I don’t know if it’s going to hold.
If it doesn’t hold, I want you to know exactly who I am before any of it lands on me.
I don’t want you finding out from a federal indictment what your boyfriend does for a living.
I’d rather you find out from me, in your living room, along with the knowledge that I’ve got some pretty deep feelings going on here. ”
“Oh, wow,” I breathed out. Yes, it was all fucked up and there was danger and Finn was a bona fide criminal, but I just didn’t care.
At that moment, this man laid his heart bare.
I put my palms to his cheeks. “Thank you for trusting me with all of that. I think you knew you could tell me because it’s obvious that I feel the same way about you. ”
He nodded and I leaned in to give him a small kiss.
When I pulled back, that same hardened expression was on his face. “I want you to leave Seattle.”
“What? No way.”
“You have to leave, Josie. Go somewhere Mikhail can’t find you on a map. Anywhere, just not here.”
“We’ve had this discussion before,” I said in exasperation as my hands fell away.
“Yeah… back when Mikhail was just guessing about you. But if Connie goes to him… he’s going to come in hard.”
“No,” I said stubbornly. “I can’t. I have a job to do, Finn. And I’m a trained operative, you know. I can take care of myself.”
“Jesus, Josie,” he grumbled. “Can you not understand how dangerous this is?”
“I know very well how dangerous it is, Finn. I was on that dock with Mikhail shooting at me. I’m not stupid, you know.”
“I know you’re not,” he heaved out, taking my hand in his. “I’m just not used to caring for someone like this and the thought of something happening to you is too much to bear.”
“I know, and I’m sorry. But I’m not leaving. You’re going to have to find some way to reconcile that. I won’t be the woman who runs and lets other women get loaded into a van because she got scared. I won’t be that person. I’d rather be dead.”
“Don’t say that,” he snarled.
“I’m saying it because it’s true.” I took his hands. “Now, let’s figure out a way to keep me safe, okay?”
He squeezed my hands as he stared at them and eventually nodded.
“Finn.”
His head came up and those beautiful green eyes, framed in long black lashes, stared at me.
“Would you walk away from it? The smuggling… if I asked you to?”
He didn’t answer right away and kept staring at our hands for what felt like a long time.
But eventually, he said, “If you would have asked me that yesterday, I wouldn’t have had an answer.
But tonight I told a woman who’s been at my side for eighteen years that I would end her myself if she touched you.
I made a choice in that alley I didn’t know I was capable of making.
So the honest answer is I don’t know if I can walk away from the rest of it yet.
But I know I’ve found something I want more than I want the rest of it. And that’s new for me.”
I laid my head against his shoulder again. It was a good enough answer for me, and I wasn’t sure I had the right to ask him to give up the only life he’d ever known. “I’m completely falling for you, Finn. Smuggler and all.”
A sound came out of him that wasn’t quite a laugh. He pressed his mouth to the top of my head and left it there for a moment.
Fingers snap in front of my face… once, twice, three times, and I blink out of the memory to find Cole there.
“Looks like someone is into some data,” he says, chuckling.
Luckily, I was focused on my screen as I recollected my conversation with Finn last night. “Yeah… lots and lots of data. Those numbers are hypnotizing.”
“I bet. Got a minute to talk?”
“For you, always.” I close BOB’s overlay because it hasn’t moved in two hours and won’t miss me.
“Let’s head upstairs. Rumor has it Anna brought in snickerdoodles.”
“My hips will thank her,” I mutter and follow him up the staircase to the fourth floor.
The community kitchen is empty and quiet except for the espresso machine running through a self-clean cycle.
Cole bypasses it and heads right to the drip pot that looks freshly made and pours us two cups.
I spy the plate of snickerdoodles and remove the plastic wrap, taking a cookie and biting into it.
I make a mental note to add an extra gym day this week.
“You look like shit,” Cole says as we settle at the table.
“You always know exactly what to say.”
I expect him to laugh, because we’re joking, right? Instead, he says, “I’m worried about you.”
“Why would you be worried about me?”
Cole stares at me as if waiting for me to come to the conclusion about why he’s worried, but when I don’t say anything, he sighs. I watch as he takes a sip of coffee, ignores the cookies and sets the mug down.
“I went to talk about Finn Marlowe,” he says.
A mild pulse of anxiety hits me. “And that’s why you’re worried?”
“I’m not going to beat around the bush. I’m sure you already know I interviewed him yesterday and he admitted you two were seeing each other.”
I nod but keep my mouth shut.
When I don’t say any more, Cole scrapes his hand over his jaw. “Jesus Christ, Josie. This isn’t an interrogation.”
“It sure feels like one.”
“Look… I can put two and two together. Finn’s out on the water in the dead of night with no running lights and fishes you out.
You come to Jameson with information about Voronin from a protected source.
It’s not difficult to figure out it’s Finn, which means he knows Voronin, which means Finn is into some dirty stuff himself. ”
“He’s not,” I exclaim, dropping the cookie to the table. “He’s a good man, Cole. He’s a business owner, which I’m sure you checked out. And you’re only guessing that Finn’s the source.”
“I’m trying to do more than guess right now,” he says bluntly.
“Cole, please don’t ask me questions and I won’t have to lie to you.” I hold his eyes. “I care for him and he’s concerned about me. Those are both true statements and all you need to know.”
“Are you safe?”
“Yes.”
“With him?”
I roll my eyes. “He’d protect me with his life.
In fact, he’d prefer I leave town until…
” I stop, unwilling to put Finn and Voronin in the same sentence together.
I take a beat. “He pulled me out of the water, Cole. He’s the only reason I’m still drawing breath and I’m asking you to trust me on this one. ”
He studies me carefully, then says, “I trust you.”
“Thank you.”
“But I don’t trust the situation. There’s a difference.”
“I know.”
Cole nods and stands up. He taps a finger on the table. “Anything goes sideways—anything at all—you call me. Not Malik. Not Reid. Me.”
“Okay. I promise.”
Cole shakes his head and looks resigned. “I’m not going to pretend I didn’t have this conversation. But I’m not going to make it part of the case either. Not unless I have to.”
I breathe out a sigh of relief as I’ve just realized, in addition to taking down Voronin, an equally important mission is keeping Finn safe.
Cole moves past the table but stops at my chair. “And for what it’s worth… I liked him.”
I can’t help but smile. “Yeah?”
“It was clear to me he cares about you. I think you found a real one.”
He squeezes my shoulder once on his way out.