Chapter twenty-eight
Connor’s Apartment, The Level
Connor
My alarm rings loudly, my phone vibrating madly on my bedside table. Samantha groans. She’s undoubtedly as annoyed by the infuriating noise as I am. I’m wrapped around her, my hand securely on her stomach, holding her close as she faces away from me.
“Morning,” I whisper, kissing her shoulder.
“Urgh, what time is it?” She pulls the duvet over her head.
“Six. You start work in an hour and a half. How are you feeling?”
“Sore,” she admits, and I chuckle. “This piercing thing perhaps wasn’t the best idea.”
“Once you’re healed, it will be so damn worth it though.” My lips move to her neck, and I pull her closer against my abs. She pushes her ass onto my already hard dick, then wiggles gently. “Oh, you’re a fucking tease.”
“Always,” she whispers back sexily. “And that’s all you’re getting. I need to get up.”
Dramatically, she pulls the duvet from her face then throws it down the bed, exposing us both.
As she moves to leave, I hold on tighter so we remain connected.
Warm skin touches skin, nothing between us. “Connor, let me get up.”
“No.”
“I won’t ask again…” she warns, and it only makes me flex my fingers on her flesh. In my mind, I’m asserting my dominance, though deep down I know she’s the one in charge.
“And if I don’t comply, what will you do? You’re mine. You’re in my arms. You’re under my complete control.”
I can’t see her face, but I imagine the naughty smile on her lips.
“What could you threaten me with that would make me give this up? My dick between your ass cheeks is exactly how every morning should begin.”
“If you don’t do as you’re told, I’ll withhold sexual favors for a week,” she suggests.
“You would never be able to cope without my sexual favors.”
She giggles. It’s both sweet and sexy. My favorite sound in the whole fucking world. Samantha happy means I’m happy. When I feel like this, all the other complications in my life become completely irrelevant. This woman is the other half of me—of that, I have no doubt.
“I am one hundred percent certain my patience is better than yours,” she tells me. “You couldn’t keep your hands to yourself for an hour, never mind any longer. You, Mr. Chase, have no self-control.”
“You’re probably right,” I agree, keeping her firmly in my arms. “And before you ask, I’m unwilling to test your theory. It would be better to accept I can’t control my hands when it comes to your body.”
The alarm sounds again, this time louder.
It’s a setting I added to my phone after being late to the office multiple times since Samantha entered my life.
My schedule is constantly adapting and changing these days to suit hers.
If the opportunity arises to have time together, I’ll move heaven and earth to make it happen.
With her is the only place I want to be, however she’ll have me.
“Can you not phone in sick?” I ask her, already knowing the answer would be no.
“No,” she says, her jovial mood disappearing. “We have that kidney transplant today. The one with the unwilling donor.”
I attempt to stop the conversation before it begins.
“You’re speculating. There’s no evidence she is unwilling or by any means being coerced.”
Samantha was disappointed when we refused to intervene in the upcoming transplant operation at the hospital.
It was difficult explaining to her that sometimes we have to let situations we don’t like but are aware of play out in order to gain information or, ultimately, evidence.
“I’m right,” she says firmly, moving again.
This time I release her, and she shuffles off the edge of the bed.
“That girl was in Dr. Rivera’s office for all the wrong reasons. I know a frightened person when I see one. She was terrified.”
She turns to face me, standing at the side of my bed stark naked.
Fine-boned hands fall on her hips. “But for her to agree to give part of herself to save a man she doesn’t know makes me wonder what she’s running from or trying to pay off.”
“Still speculation,” I mutter, propping myself up on my elbow.
“But what you suggest would make a decent crime novel. Maybe you should plot it out.”
She picks up a pillow then launches it at me.
When I remove it from my face, all I can see are her pert buttcheeks stalking off in the direction of my en-suite.
“Fucking lawyers,” she shouts over her shoulder. “Stick your speculation up your ass.”
I flop onto my back and lie looking up at the ceiling.
My cock remains solid beneath the duvet.
I will my mind to think of anything but Samantha.
We don’t have the time this morning to get carried away with sex, and there’s a conversation I need to have with her before she leaves.
With the situation she’s walking into today and what she’s lived through the past forty-eight hours, I need to ensure she’s okay, that the crazy turn of events at the abandoned warehouse hasn’t affected her more than she realizes.
Ten minutes later, Samantha reappears with a soft white towel wrapped around her torso, a matching one covering her hair. Long, slender legs cross the room back toward the bed. Her blue eyes flick to me, then to the floor.
“Are you okay?” I ask. She shrugs but doesn’t look at me as she sits down on the bed. “Talk to me; a lot has happened in the past few days.”
“You can say that again…” Her voice trails off, the confident, self-assured woman fading. “We killed a man.” The statement is blunt. Samantha’s directness is a quality I love. She doesn’t sugarcoat information to make it sting less. “Jasper is dead.”
“He won’t be the last man I kill or order to be disposed of,” I tell her, just as frank. “Men have died by mine or my friend’s hands before. But I truly believe every bastard deserved it. What he did to you deserved to be punished. His actions triggered his fate, not your vengeance.”
“You and I both know that’s untrue. My need for revenge poured the concrete into those buckets. I did that knowing full well he would be dumped in the River Thames.”
She pauses, glances at me, then returns to looking at her feet.
Her pearly white teeth sink into soft pink lips. “And I was happy about it.”
“How can I help? What do you want to know?” I ask her. I’ve spent enough time with Samantha to know when she’s holding back. When she’s desperate to ask a question but is unsure how to.
“Who put him into the river? And was he alive?”
I stare at the back of her head, but she doesn’t turn around. Moving beside her, I swing my legs out of the bed so we sit side by side.
“He was alive and awake. He was fully aware of what was happening and how it would end.” I keep my explanation clear and concise. She asked a direct question and deserves honesty in return. “Russ and I put him in together.” Her head snaps around, wide eyes fixing on my face.
“How did Russ manage that with a cast on?”
“Hunter helped me maneuver him to the edge, but Russ and I lowered him in. He saw the pair of us as he sank. We both executed the bastard on your behalf. We delivered his punishment together. Can you be with a man like that? Like us?”
A familiar nervousness bubbles in my stomach.
It appears every time I consider Samantha and my future.
“A man who would kill for me?” she asks.
“Yes. Could you be with a man like that?”
“I don’t think I could live without him. The darkness in you both is mirrored in me. I enjoyed seeing Jasper’s pain, and I want to inflict the same again. I want to make people pay who hurt others.”
I look at this beautiful woman I consider to be mine and wonder how much her life has changed since she met my family. Would this part of her have ever surfaced if it wasn’t for us? And are the hardened lines and thirst for revenge a good thing in her mind?
To me, she’s perfect. These changes only make her even more desirable. With each day, my reliance on her grows, and I’ve never felt more connected to anyone in my life.
***
Samantha
Varley Medical
The elevator doors slide open, and I walk out onto the fourth floor of Varley Medical.
My fingers rise to my lanyard, securely hanging around my neck, in search of comfort.
Today, I would rather be anywhere but here.
The uneasy feeling in my stomach has grown since I left The Level.
With every step I took toward work, the more certain I became that something will go terribly wrong today.
After trying to convince Russell to interfere in the upcoming transplant today and him refusing, I tried to convince Connor that he could somehow delay the process.
Neither of them were willing to step in without more evidence.
Russell wasn’t even willing to contact Dr. Rivera, who thinks the world of him, to ask any questions.
“I don’t want to open conversation with her,” he told me. “The last thing I want is to encourage any sort of communication between us.”
“But—” I challenged, and for once he silenced me with a look.
“No more discussions on the subject. Go to work, keep quiet, and learn what you can. Don’t put yourself in danger, and don’t ask questions that promote dangerous answers.”
His shrewd eyes held mine. When I looked away, he growled for me to return to his stare.
“I trust you, Trouble. But I don’t have faith in anyone else in that hospital. If what we believe is happening there is true, anyone could be involved. Keep your head down and mouth shut. We’ll intervene when necessary.”
“The girl, though, what if she’s innocent?” I continued, desperate for him to see my point of view. “If she’s vulnerable and they are taking advantage of her, I can’t stand by and watch that happen.”
“You must!” He’d lost control a little then, a glimpse of the unhinged man who followed me for months reappearing briefly.
Russell has been so calm since his accident in so many ways; his emotional outburst was a surprise.
He took my hands in his, holding them to his chest.
“You, Trouble, are the most important fucking thing in my life. You have to put your own safety first. As I said, I trust you to be sensible. Prove me wrong, and I’ll lock you up in this penthouse and never let you out without supervision.”
I smile to myself as I relive our conversation.