Chapter 11
DAKOTA
Returning to work on a Friday after vacation was pure foolishness.
Crawling out of bed after a night in Fabian’s arms was like a low-level form of torture, if there was such a thing.
It had to be because I was definitely feeling it as I pulled up to the palatial home by the lake.
After putting my car in park, I sat there for a few minutes.
The majority of the time my job revolved around death, so there was really no need for me to rush into that house.
There were two stone gray trucks parked in front of me, both with the Apocalypse logo on the driver’s side and back door.
Tor sat in his Escalade right behind me.
The alpha crew was already inside, which meant I had a few seconds to shoot a text off to my husband.
I love you.
I wasn’t waiting for a response, but I did let the phone rest on my thigh as I recalled our last moments together this morning.
“Remember what I said.” He wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling me into him as we stood at my open front door.
I pursed my lips. “That my pussy is the best you ever had?”
He lowered a hand to grip my ass, then grinned. “That’s the damn truth,” he agreed, “but no. The other thing I said.”
Looping my arms around his waist, I sighed and let my gaze drop to his chest.
“Nah, I need you to look at me, love,” he said softly. When I didn’t immediately oblige, he gave me a little shake. “Look at me.”
On a deep inhale, I lifted my eyes until his felt like they were shooting Superman lasers through to my soul.
“You’re not weird or deranged. You are exactly who you were created to be, and I love every inch of you for exactly that purpose. Don’t let that shit from the past weigh on you another second. We’re building a future, together.”
I loved the sound of his voice. Loved his honesty, and most importantly at this moment, how what he’d just said made me feel.
“Thank you.”
He shook his head. “Don’t thank me for loving you. It’s my pleasure. I’ve waited all my life for a woman like you.”
I couldn’t help it, I giggled.
He frowned. “Is professing my love a joke now?”
“Only when it sounds like you’re quoting love song lyrics.”
I watched his frown slip away, to be replaced by a grin and half nod. “Okay, whatever, man. As long as you get what I’m saying.”
“I do,” I said, snuggling into him. “I really do get it now.”
After he gave me one of those long, deep, slow kisses that always wiped my mind clear of anyone but him, I watched him walk to his SUV and pull off. Then I closed the door, leaned against it, and wondered how long I would put off moving in with him.
With that thought standing out from the memory, I picked up my phone and sent another text.
Sorry I sent your movers away yesterday.
You can tell them to come back next weekend.
Give me some time to pack.
Getting out of the car, I pushed the phone into my back pocket and closed the door.
By the time I made it to my trunk, Tor was there.
After opening it, I grabbed one of the protective suits and headed for the house with him on my heels.
Before sneaking off to Daufuskie Island—Fabian’s words, not mine—the security detail he had on me remained a discreet distance away so as not to disturb me or bring attention to the fact that I had security.
My punishment for that seemed to be full-on hovering by Tor and discreet distance by Stan who parked his blacked-out F-150 at the end of the driveway.
Fifteen minutes later, I walked out of the powder room located just off the foyer. My bootie covered shoes were soundless on the beautiful floor. And since it was a marble floor, I took careful steps until I was in the study where the rest of my crew was hard at work.
Moira, who always wore her suit with the hood up, tied tightly at her throat, and hot pink googles, leaned down to start rolling up the Aubusson rug.
The pastel colors in the rug’s design were gorgeous, but much too light for the heavy dark oak furniture and drapes.
Not that it mattered now since the rug was destroyed by the two huge circles of blood.
“Mornin!” Krystal, the site manager, said. “I told Emily to tell you we had this under control. You didn’t need to come back until Monday.”
I waved a hand and stepped over the rolled rug, moving toward the built-in bookshelves on the other side of the room. I loved books and was intrigued by what other people read, or thought was worth saving and storing on a shelf.
“You know I show up for our A-list.” Even though I trusted my alpha team explicitly, if one of our high-end clients ever had a question about the work done on a scene, I wanted to have firsthand knowledge. “Tell me about the call.”
Emily had given me the gist of the call when I’d run out of the bathroom still dripping wet from my shower to answer my incessantly ringing phone.
“Em said it came in at seven-twenty-two. My phone rang at seven-twenty-nine,” she said as I continued looking at the books.
The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit collections were nestled between the Jane Austen collection on one side, Roots and War and Peace on the other.
The only thing this told me about the owner of the house was that they had an eclectic taste in books, that could be emotionally enhanced by a few romance novels.
Not that I needed to know more to do my job.
“Two bodies with gunshot wounds in the study,” Krystal continued.
“No other area of the house required attention. Bodies to have tier one disposal. We arrived at seven-fifty-seven. Zeke and Tally removed the bodies—one male, Black, mid to late fifties, gunshot wound to the head. The other was female, Black, twenty at best.”
That last part was said with notable disgust, and I turned to face her. “You examined the bodies?”
She looked up from her tablet. Krystal was a few years younger than me.
Slim frame, honey locs that hung down to her butt when she didn’t have them twisted into a beehive or tucked tightly under a braid bonnet as she normally did when on a job.
Chocolate brown freckles marched over the bridge of her nose and cheeks, and a jagged scar marred her pretty face.
Her response was a nod before her attention went back to the tablet. “She was shot in the chest and stomach. But there were also marks on her wrists and ankles.” Her finger hovered over the tablet. “Bruises on her inner thighs and face.”
The last words were barely a whisper. I knew better than to go to her or try in any way to comfort her from the memories that haunted her. Instead, I did what I knew would work best for her. “Do a second walk through. I’ll help Moira get the rug out to the truck, then we’ll start the scrub down.”
“I can do my job,” she started, irritation tingeing her voice.
“Your job is to do what I say.” I cared about all my staff, but my alpha crew had a special place in my heart.
Together, we saw and did things that others in our industry would never encounter.
Those secrets bound us together in a way that a word as simple as friendship didn’t cover.
But at the end of the day, Apocalypse was my baby, the fruit of a vision that came to me when I was a sophomore in college.
With every job the name and reputation I’d built brick by brick in the last eight years was on the line.
I was the boss and everyone on my staff knew not to forget it.
With a tight nod, she hooked her tablet on the utility belt at her waist and turned to walk out of the room.
She wouldn’t thank me later for the time to get away from where the bodies once were. To clear her mind and reset. She didn’t have to.
“Ready,” Moira said, pulling my attention away from Krystal’s retreating back.
I turned to see her squatting near her end of the rug, and I moved to the other side.
Before I could squat, a hand was on my shoulder. “I got it,” Tor said.
The man was at least six foot seven and three hundred something pounds.
He was wide and muscled, and if I didn’t know better, I’d say his name should’ve been Thor the Avenger rather than Toronto Haley.
I’d asked his full name as well as Stanley Newsome’s because if these guys were gonna be hanging out with me everywhere I went I wanted to know who they were.
Considering my life in the past year and a half, it was ironic that I generally didn’t tolerate secrets.
“I got it,” he said, then moved to the center of the rug log. “You move back, too.” That was directed at Moira.
“And who are you, sir?” Moira asked. “Whoever you are, your name is not on my paycheck.”
“I’m also not the man that’s gonna stand by and watch two women carry this big ass rug out of the house,” he shot back without waiting for Moira to do as he instructed. Instead, he lifted that rug, tucked it up onto his shoulder, and walked out of the room without another word to either of us.
For a few seconds, there was silence, then I laughed. “I guess he told us.”
Moira rolled her eyes. “Whatever. I don’t like him.”
Yet her gaze had stayed locked on his ass in the black slacks he wore with a black button-down shirt as he left us.
“Luckily for you and your paycheck, you don’t have to,” I told her. “Now, come on let’s get the supplies so we can be out of here in the next twenty minutes.”
Ahmet, the owner of Excelsior Investigations, which was really the fix-it company for celebrities, politicians and whoever was rich enough to pay for their protection, required a report within the hour.
I was never late with reports, and he was never late with payments. It was a perfect business partnership.
Forty-eight minutes later, I was at my desk reading the last paragraph of my report.
My half-finished caramel macchiato was in reaching distance, and one of my favorite R&B playlists came from the computer’s speakers at a low volume.
Beneath my desk, I crossed my ankles, feet free of the work clogs I’d slipped on this morning.
My phone buzzed and I glanced over to where it sat on my desk plugged into the charger.
It was a notification. I would get to it as soon as I finished this report.
Turning my attention back to the screen I read the next sentence.
My phone buzzed again and again, until I glanced over at it once more.
The screen stayed black but with each buzz a white text box appeared.
After hurriedly finishing the last sentence, I hit send and reached for the phone.
Notifications were still coming in, and I quickly pressed my finger to the screen to unlock it.
Ten social media notifications and three texts.
The tiny numbers kept rising as the phone continued buzzing.
Before I could answer any of them, Emily came running into my office, a frown marring her face while she held her phone up for me to see.
“Holy shit! You’re sleeping with Fury Mathias?”