Chapter 21 Rob
ROB
I walked into Knight’s office, freshly showered for the second time and completely satisfied.
For the most part.
Prying information from Krista was almost worse than getting answers from a baddie. How the hell was I supposed to get close to her if I couldn’t get her to open up to me?
“Uh-oh,” Sinner laughed as he sat in the corner, his feet kicked up on the desk. “He’s got that constipated look.”
That drew everyone’s attention, but it was Derek who chimed in. “Either he really is constipated, or he’s in love.”
“I’m not in love,” I grumbled, taking a seat across from Knight, who shoved Sinner’s feet off his desk.
“Hey, I was comfortable!” he complained.
“Next time you put your feet on the furniture, you won’t have any,” Knight muttered.
“Me? I put my feet on the furniture. Rob had his ass and every other part of his body—”
“Did I fucking ask for your input?” Knight scowled.
“Oh, sure. Yell at me.”
“Fellas, I could be wrong, but it seems that Rob isn’t getting laid at all,” Derek said, eyeing me carefully.
I rolled my eyes. “Can we focus on the job?”
“That’s your first sign,” Derek grinned. “Focus on work so you don’t have to think about how shitty things are in your life.”
“Things aren’t shitty, and I’m getting laid.”
“If you were getting laid, you wouldn’t look like you had a grenade shoved up your ass,” Sinner remarked, but the smile from his lips slipped away. “Wait, you don’t really have a grenade shoved up there, do you? I didn’t take her for the kinky type, but—”
“I do not have a grenade shoved up my ass!” I shouted. “Now, can we get back to the people trying to kill me?”
“How the hell do you walk away from sex looking like this?” Derek asked. “It’s supposed to be pleasurable. You know that, right?”
“Until we find out how they’re tracking us, we don’t have much choice but to stay here.”
“Not happening,” Knight grumbled. “My house isn’t turning into a sex den.”
“We need to talk to Cash and find out what information he has on these guys.”
“Already done,” Knight said, handing over a file.
“The thing is, if the sex was good, he would be happy,” Sinner mused.
“Maybe the sex was good,” Derek said with a shrug. “Maybe it’s something else that happened.”
I looked over the file and frowned. “Mafia? Seriously?”
“The Ratti family is huge into trafficking,” Knight answered. “Whatever you stepped in had something to do with that.”
“What could possibly have fucked up sex?” Sinner asked. “Did you do it right?”
“How do you do it wrong?” Derek snorted.
Sinner’s eyebrows popped up. “It could have been bad.”
“He doesn’t look like he would be bad.”
“Oh, and you know these things? You walk around judging men and their sexual prowess with just a look?” Sinner asked.
I slapped the folder shut and tossed it on the desk. “They confused Krista for someone else, and they think she took something from them. Which means she wasn’t an intended target for trafficking.”
“No, but maybe she saw something…maybe took something,” Knight guessed.
“We can’t all have the name Sinner to prove how good we are in bed,” Derek huffed. “And if he was really bad in bed, she wouldn’t keep sleeping with him.”
“Maybe she doesn’t have many options. Maybe she thought she could teach him something.”
“She’s not a hooker,” Derek said, rolling his eyes.
“She didn’t have anything on her,” I continued, doing my best to push their conversation out of my head.
“How did you get away from them?”
“Stole a vehicle. I ditched my phone on the way,” I said, remembering how I practically gleefully ditched all remnants of myself.
“Did you fuck her on the way back to her house?” Sinner asked. “Maybe that’s where you screwed up.”
I closed my eyes and rubbed my temples, trying to push the chaos from my mind. “They’re gonna keep coming. If it wasn’t something important, they would have stopped after we got away the first time. Whatever they think she has—”
“It’s big,” Knight agreed.
“That’s it!” Sinner said, sitting upright. His eyes dropped to my pants. “Sorry, man. Not everyone can be hung like Parker.”
“Dude, that’s just fucked up,” Derek whispered. “It’s not the size of the ship. It’s the motion of the ocean.”
“Well, maybe he didn’t create big enough waves.”
“Then he never would have made it to England.”
“Technically, you don’t know that he did. Maybe he never crossed the ocean. Maybe he only made it halfway before the boat capsized.”
“And she had to get herself off,” Derek said in almost a pained voice. “Oh, this is bad. There’s no coming back from a capsized boat.”
“I don’t know,” Sinner sighed. “Women seem to understand that if your head’s not in it, that boat is more like a motorboat, running out of fuel and puttering along like it can still make it to shore.”
“Would you two shut the fuck up?” Knight shouted.
They both turned, startled by Knight’s reaction. But it was Sinner who opened his mouth. “What could possibly be more important than helping a fellow brother get to shore?”
“The men who are after him, and making sure he doesn’t end up dead so he can enjoy motor boating again,” Knight snapped.
Derek snorted in amusement. “If there’s no one willing to step into the boat with him, what does it matter?”
“Oh my God!” I shouted, their commentary clawing under my skin like bugs.
“There’s nothing wrong with the sex! It’s fucking amazing, okay?
The problem is that I can’t get her to open up to me.
She won’t fucking talk to me, and I know something’s bothering her.
But she won’t trust me enough to tell me, and if that’s the case, then how the hell is this marriage supposed to work?
“Not to mention that we have men chasing us, trying to kill us. Two idiots who are more concerned about my sex life than keeping us alive. A town that can’t stop talking about us. And the little fact that her brother will kill me when he gets his hands on me!”
I was heaving by the time my rant was done. And all eyes in the room were laser-focused on me. With a sigh, I slumped in the seat and scrubbed my hands over my face in frustration. When I finally looked at them, it was Sinner who dared open his mouth.
“Well…that sucks.” Then he turned to Knight. “So, got any good weapons for when they attack?”
I couldn’t believe it. They just spent the better part of ten minutes trying to figure out what was wrong, and when I finally told them, that was all he had to say?
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I snapped.
“What?”
I shook my head at Sinner. “For everyone else, you have words of wisdom. You shove your nose in their business and annoy the hell out of them. But when I’m in trouble, all you have to say is that sucks?”
“Well…in all fairness, it does.”
“Yeah, but give me something other than that. Tell me what to do!”
“I could be wrong, but I think you need to talk to her.”
“She won’t fucking talk!” I shouted.
His eyes slid to Knight, and an uneasy feeling washed over me. “Well…I mean, there’s another way, but you might not like it.”
The sinking feeling in my gut agreed with him, but I had to know. “Tell me.”
“I mean…” He scratched the back of his neck uneasily. “Knight does have an interrogation room.”
Sure I heard him wrong, I scooted closer to the edge of my seat. “Say again?”
“I mean, he has the room filled with all kinds of torture shit. It’s not the worst way to get information.”
“From a woman I’m married to,” I clarified.
“Well, it seems you suck at talking it out. What else do you want to do?”
I couldn’t believe this. “You’re serious? For everyone else, you have sage words of wisdom, but for me, you suggest I torture the information out of her?”
“No, he’s not serious,” Derek snorted. “Are you?”
“No, I mean, not really. You could just put her in there and scare her a little,” he frowned.
“Un-fucking-believable,” I whispered to myself. “I’m surrounded by men who make a living out of keeping their wives happy, and you come at me with torture chamber?”
Sinner shifted uncomfortably. “I never said it was my best idea.”
“It’s not an idea at all because it’s not going to happen!” I shouted. “Knight could come up with something better, and he’s more fucked up than any of you!”
“I’d stick her in the chair,” he said without hesitation.
My head snapped in his direction. “You’d stick Kate in that chair?”
He shrugged. “There are different forms of torture. Pain doesn’t have to be applied with vise grips and pliers.”
Shoving out of my chair, I headed for the door. “You guys are insane.”
“Are we?” Derek called out. “Or are we just the right amount of crazy?”
I flung the door open and stormed out. With ideas like that, I would never get to the bottom of my problems with Krista.
“Just go up to her,” I muttered to myself. “Just tell her you want to be real with her.”
Nodding, I knocked on the bedroom door, waiting nervously for her to open up. What if she didn’t want to talk to me? What if she slammed the door in my face? All were plausible. All very real possibilities.
And when the door opened, I stood there frozen, unable to think of a single thing to say to her.
“Hey, did you find something out?”
“Uh…” My mouth went dry as I tried my best not to look at her boobs. Or anything else that would tempt me into dragging her into the bedroom and having my way with her. But it was damn difficult.
Her head tilted slightly as she stared at me. “Is everything okay?”
I nodded like an idiot, mouth gaping, eyes wide…Fuck, I needed help.
“Rob?”
“We should fuck.”
She opened the door wide and I stepped through, forgetting what I was really supposed to be doing.
“Any luck with the little woman?” Sinner asked later that day.
“I tried talking to her again,” I mumbled.
“And?”
“And I slept with her instead.”
Derek tossed back his head and laughed. “Man, I knew it!”
“You didn’t know it,” Sinner sneered. “You said he would figure it out.”
“I said he would walk up to that door and lose his nerve. You were the one who was so certain he could handle a woman like Krista.”
“You guys were betting on me?” I asked, a little shocked that it had gone that far.
“No, but we definitely should,” Derek chuckled. “A hundred bucks says you can’t go back there and tell her you want to talk.”
“I can talk to her,” I insisted.
Sinner walked over, slapping a hundred on the table. “I call that he won’t even get the words out before she drags him into the bedroom.”
Derek added two hundred to the pile. “Two hundred says he fumbles over his words before he just mauls her.”
I rolled my eyes. “You guys have no faith in me.”
“Well, you did just sleep with her instead of talking to her,” Derek pointed out.
“Yes, and now that that’s out of the way, I can think clearly.”
“Right,” Sinner chuckled. “Your dick is now trained to salute when she opens the door.”
I pulled out my wallet and slapped down three hundred dollars. “I’m talking to her.”
“Right,” Sinner laughed, gathering the money and shoving it in his pocket. “Meet us back here in an hour and tell us how that worked out.”
Glaring at him, I turned on my heel, determined to see this through. I would talk to her. I would get some fucking answers. This wasn’t just personal anymore. Now, my reputation was on the line, and I would not fail.
I skipped steps as I went upstairs, eager to get to her and figure this shit out. I stormed up to the door and knocked a little harder than necessary. When the door opened, she shot me that seductive grin. “Back for more already?”
“Fuck it,” I muttered, slamming my lips down on hers.
Slapping another hundred down on the table, I glared at the men in front of me. I smelled like sex, my hair was a wild mess, and my cock was nearly broken from the way she rode me. I couldn’t possibly get it up again if my life depended on it.
“I’m ready for her now.”
Sinner snorted. “Sure.”
“I am.”
He snatched the money, grinning like an idiot. “Thanks for the money, but you can’t afford to take another crack at it.”
“Give him a chance to earn back his money.” Derek snatched the stack of bills out of Sinner’s hand. “And that’s my money.”
Sinner grabbed it back. “Replay the footage. He said fuck it. There was no stumbling over any words. He didn’t even try.”
“You guys were watching?”
“How else were we supposed to know for sure who won the bet?” Derek asked. “Don’t worry, we didn’t watch what happened in the bedroom.”
I pulled out my wallet and tossed down another hundred. “Again.”
Sinner’s lips pulled up in a grin. “Sure. I’ll take your money.”
Derek tossed down another hundred. “I bet the door opens before he knocks.”
“I’ll take that bet, and raise you a hundred.”
“For what?”
“She’ll be waiting in red lingerie,” Sinner grinned.
“She doesn’t have any lingerie. She’s on the run!”
“Trust me, it’ll happen,” he said confidently.
It was so not going to happen. I had her this time. I was sure of it.
“How the fuck did you know about the lingerie?” I asked, my lips swollen, my shirt torn, and my neck covered in hickeys.
Sinner counted his winnings and grinned. “I was working with Claire.”
Derek gasped in horror. “You stole my wife?”
“She got a cut of the winnings.”
I gritted my teeth, refusing to lose this time. “Again.”
Sinner took the money. “As easy as pie.”
I slumped in the chair across from them, exhausted and dead on my feet. “I give up. I literally can’t take another orgasm tonight.”
“What the hell did she do to you?” Derek asked, staring at me in concern.
I sighed, tilting my head back against the seat as I stared up at the ceiling. “I’m so fucked.”