34. Kioni
Kioni
“Just wait—” Ryker grinds out. “until it’s my fucking turn.
” He ducks under my fist, then pops up blocking my kick just in time.
We are both panting and drenched in sweat.
I needed something to keep my mind occupied, and what’s better than pushing myself to the brink of complete exhaustion?
It’s been days since I’ve touched her and I’m going mad.
She tortures me at night, allowing me to watch but not touch.
It’s better than silence, but I need her more than I’ve needed anything in my life.
Even if I could just hold her while I fall asleep at night, would be a reprieve from the constant ache in my soul.
It’s going to take time to heal from watching her cry…
because of me. I hurt her and in turn ripped my own heart open.
I’m supposed to make her smile, laugh, and happy, not fucking cry.
Ryker is too slow to block my outburst and crashes to the ground.
“Shit!” I unstrap my gloves and toss them onto the ground.
“I’m sorry,” I apologize and kneel next to him, turning his face towards me.
“You’re such a dick,” he groans, blinking his eyes open slowly.
“You’re just jealous because mine are prettier than yours.” I help him up and call it a night. “Let’s go home.”
“Which one?” he teases.
“I need to stay away, or I’m going to break my promise of not touching her before she tells me to.”
“You need to grovel.”
“How can I grovel if I can’t go near her right now?”
“Figure it out.”
“I have to give her space. What’s the point of safe words if you don’t abide by them?”
“Being in the same public space as her gives her the option of coming to you or walking away. You won’t be breaking any rules. You already do it. Just make yourself seen this time.”
I nod. This has already crossed my mind, but I don’t want the sting of rejection to cut deeper than it already has.
Sure, she messages me and forces me to watch her come, but she still hasn’t told me to come back.
There’s a voice in the back of my mind that keeps telling me she won’t come back to green.
That she can’t see herself being with a woman and I’ll have to watch from the shadows again.
Watch her be with someone else that doesn’t love her the way I do.
The way she needs to be loved. I’ll grovel.
I’ll crawl on my hands and knees to her if she wishes.
I’ll do anything as long as it ends with her in my arms.
“You know what you need?” Ryker blurts out when we get into my car.
“Besides the obvious?”
“Ever since we moved here, we haven’t had any after-hours fun. You spend all your free time with little miss sunshine or watching her.”
“Find a fucker that deserves a visit,” I laugh. He’s right, but it’s not just because my focus and time has been spent elsewhere. It’s also because I didn’t want a single obstacle in my way to her, but revenge for a victim will be a great outlet for all my pent-up emotions.
“Already have one in mind. I’ve just been waiting until you had free time.”
Guilt for being a shitty friend piles on top of the rest. “I’m sorry, Ryk.”
He squeezes my shoulder. “You’re in love, Ki. And as annoying as some of this shit has been, I like seeing you happy. We aren’t twenty anymore. It was about time one of us found their person. She will come back. And when she’s yours for good, you won’t have to keep such a watchful eye on her.”
That’s doubtful. I’ll always know where she’s at 24/7.
“Taylor seems fun,” I say, testing the waters, wondering if he will finally tell me what happened in that hotel room and who snuck into his bedroom window the other night. His phone has been blowing up since we met her. Just because he has it on silent doesn’t mean I don’t notice.
He huffs out a laugh, but the corner of his lips turns up. “I’m not sure fun is the correct word for her. Crazy, obnoxious, and infuriating is more like it.”
I wonder if Sam is aware her sister is fucking my best friend?
“Did she give you a hard time after me and Sam went to our room?”
“Ki, I already told you I don’t want to talk about it.” He turns his gaze out the window, and I burst up laughing.
“Damn. That bad, huh?”
He grunts, not looking at me.
I think he needs this tonight as much as I do.
When we get home, we change and get our gear on, disguise his car, change his license plate, and then we go hunting for a pervert.
Ryker had already planned everything. He just needed a night for me to tag along.
Rafe Hadley is a lawyer’s son who assumes that gives him free rein to do whatever he fucking wants.
It’s kind of true. His daddy always finds a way to make all the charges go away.
When I say I trust my partner, I mean I fucking trust him.
I know shit about his plan, but I’m along for the ride anyway.
If he says he has it all planned out, I have no reason to doubt him.
The scum parked his car in the far back parking lot of the strip club, out of sight of cameras and windows.
Getting into his car is easy. Ryker made a copy of the key fob when Rafe was last arrested.
I bring up his cameras and put them on a loop as we approach his driveway and enter his garage. Ryker also knows the man’s code to his door. He really had a lot of free time on his hands lately. He needs a girlfriend.
Cocky motherfucker didn’t even try hiding his safe. It’s in plain sight in his office. Ryker fails to open it the first time, and panic bubbles in my chest. His shoulders rise with a deep inhale as he makes a second attempt. I release the air I was holding onto when it opens.
“Don’t do that to me,” I tell him, holding my chest. We don’t need any alarms going off. Ryker has the lead on this one. I’m just here for moral support.
He reaches inside and freezes. “What would you say if I told you Rafe has offshore accounts under an alias, and I accidentally found all of his information?” Ryker asks in a hushed tone, pulling out a piece of torn paper from the safe.
We stare at each other for several seconds.
“Do we?” I ask.
“I think we do,” he answers and opens Rafe’s laptop while I place the cash from the safe into the leather bag on my shoulder.
“This is a shit ton of money,” he whisper-shouts, transferring everything from Rafe’s accounts into our friend’s.
There will be no red flags or alerts. Giles will make Rafe’s accounts vanish without a single trace.
It will be as if they never existed. He will take his cut before transferring the rest of the money into ours, which also doesn’t exist. A simple act to be a thorn in Rafe’s side turned into completely fucking him. Good.
I keep watch out the window until he shuts the laptop and stands.
“It’s done. Let’s get out of here.” He chuckles under his breath the entire way out of the house.
“You don’t even want to know how much money we just…
obtained,” Ryker laughs when we are backing out of the garage.
“That fucker made it too easy. Who in their right mind would put all of their account information on one piece of paper?”
“The same idiot who just got their fifth rape charge dropped by daddy and is currently high in an STD-riddled strip club known for illegal activity. He got cocky,” I explain what he already knows.
We turn the GPS back on in Rafe’s car and make sure everything is in the right spot before abandoning in where we got it and hightail it back to our vehicle.
I love the dark. It conceals so much. He drives to the charity we used to take our earnings to an hour away to discard the money.
They are a don’t-ask don’t-tell organization.
“So…how much money did we just steal, not counting the cash?” I ask once we are finally on our way home.
His smile is huge when he answers, “Six million dollars.”
Ohhh, shit. “Ryk, fuck.” I run my hands through my hair. “We should give some of the money to his victims somehow,” I suggest, and he agrees instantly.
“I still wouldn’t be opposed to some good old fashion mutilation, though. Or just killing the piece of shit. He’s an addict; we could just lace his coke. It worked before.”
“We got lucky last time because we were on the case. Do I think he deserves death? Yeah. Because we can’t keep him behind bars. But nothing is worth losing Sam.”
“You’re right. I just really hate that the legal system sees dollar signs instead of morals.”
I huff out a laugh. “As we just became multimillionaires because we broke into someone’s house and emptied their hidden accounts.”
“Yeah, but we did it for payback. Karma is a bitch.”
“Yes. Yes, we are.” We both laugh and I realized how much I missed this these past few months.
* * *
I feel lighter after the rush from last night.
My mind needed that short reprieve from all the emotions surrounding Sam.
But the moment I catch sight of her walking out of the spa on her lunch break, it all comes gushing back in again.
My god, she’s fucking beautiful. She spots me leaning against my bike immediately.
I parked a couple of spots down from her car.
Public space where she can come to me. My hands are sweaty and my chest tightens when she stops and looks back and forth between me and her car.
Her hair is half up in a clip, and she’s wearing a beige knit top with a long green floral skirt that has a slit up the side.
Always so pretty. Please walk this way. Her gaze finally settles on me, then walks in my direction.
Oh, thank fuck. I stand up straight and grab the bouquet of sunflowers off the seat and hand them to her when she’s close enough.
“So you do know my favorite flower?” She grins and brings them to her nose.
“Of course I do, pup.” Her gaze snaps to mine when she hears her nickname. “I know I’ve said this a million times, but I miss you.”
“You haven’t found someone else to stalk and use that app on to keep you entertained?”
I clench my jaw. “I only did that because I wanted you that badly. Don’t you see how amazing you are every time you look into a mirror?
You are fucking incredible from the inside out.
I want you, love, nobody else.” Dropping to my knees, I rest my hands on her thighs and look up at her.
“I’ll beg for your forgiveness if I have to.
Tell me what to do. If it’s still time that you need, just tell me there will be an us when you’ve had enough. Tell me I didn’t lose you.”
“Ki,” she breathes and shakes her head. “You didn’t lose me.”
My head drops and my shoulders slump. The weight of the unknown finally lifted, allowing me to take what feels like my first full breath of air in days.
Standing in front of her again, I’m unsure of what to do.
I’m dying to kiss her, hold her, something…
I don’t like being this close to her and not being able to touch her.
She steps forward, wrapping her arms around my middle and resting her head on my shoulder.
A rush of relief zips through me, and I hug her back, squeezing her too tight and kiss her temple, letting my lips linger, soaking in this moment.
You know that feeling at the end of a draining day when you can finally climb into bed to rest?
That’s what she feels like right now. Comfort, safety, warmth, calm… relief from the rest of the world.
A siren whips through the air out of nowhere. I look up to find Ryker pulling in. Damn it.
“We got to go,” Ryker yells out his window, urgency in his voice.
I squeeze her one last time before rushing around her to get into the cruiser. He wouldn’t have interrupted this unless it was an emergency. I send her a message before I grab my vest.
Me: You look beautiful, by the way.
My Queen: Please be safe.
Me: For you…always.