by Lucy Leroux
“Was this taken in Las Vegas?”
He shook his head. “No. I decided that wasn’t special enough for the big two-one. This is the Hotel Monte Carlo.”
Tahlia snatched the picture up, her eyes devouring every detail.
Patrick took the picture. “I will take you there as soon as we’re free to leave,” he murmured, moving his hand to cup her face.
He kissed her deeply, his tongue breaching the seam of her lips.
Time slowed down as a liquid heat poured into her body. Her nipples puckered and peaked under the soft black jersey of her bodice.
Patrick was reaching for the hemline of her dress when someone began to pound on the door.
He swore under his breath, shifting so she was sitting more demurely as his brother-in-law and his partner Ethan came in. Both wore dark expressions. Something had happened.
“This better be good,” Patrick growled, holding her fast when she tried to stand up.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, a sinking feeling in her stomach. A scowling Ethan was nothing new, but Jason was wearing a near-identical expression on his face.
“We have a big fucking problem. The local Florida PD has issued a warrant for your arrest.”
Chapter 21
Tahlia wrapped her arms tightly around her middle. The brief warmth from the cognac and Patrick’s kiss had dissipated. She felt like a block of ice, despite his arms cradling her shoulders.
They were sitting on the sofa in his office across from his brother and the two agents in an impromptu war council.
Her mouth felt like sandpaper. She was still in disbelief at the accusation being made. “This is crazy. My father was dead when I woke up.”
“Are you sure?” Ethan consulted his notes. “You told us you were drugged and weren’t sure how long you’d been unconscious. Is it possible he died while you were in the house?”
“For God’s sake, you know she didn’t do this.” Liam was incensed on her behalf.
Ethan rolled his eyes at him. “Of course I know that. But we have to start preparing a defense here. We need to know every detail those bastards might throw at us.”
Every detail?
Tahlia felt her legs weaken, her mind throwing up the ghastly images from that morning. She’d fought so hard to forget them. She hadn’t told the agents or Patrick the full story.
“This is pretty inflammatory stuff.” Ethan’s nose was wrinkled as he read over the papers in his hand. “They’re saying she stabbed him and stole his money because he wanted her to move back to Florida and I quote, ‘take her rightful place’ in the family.”
Tahlia shuddered at the thought of what Lucas might consider her rightful place to be to be. “I don’t know how long he’d been dead, but I assumed it had been a while. The blood didn’t seem fresh.”
Jason leaned forward in his seat. “What color was it? Was it dry? Did you see a knife lying nearby?”
She forced herself to swallow. Her throat was threatening to close on her. “I didn’t, but…it would have taken more than one.”
“More than one what?”
“Knife.”
Ethan cocked his head at her, his expression softening in sympathy. “Because of the amount of blood?”
She shook her head. “Because of the number of pieces.”
Patrick’s head jerked. “Pieces of what?”
Her hands fluttered to her throat. “Of the body.”
The men stared at her. Liam’s mouth was open. Ethan frowned. “You didn’t mention that before.”
She picked at her nails. “Because you didn’t press me. I didn’t want to talk about it. I didn’t want to think about it.”
Visibly shivering, she pressed closer to Patrick, trying to borrow some of his warmth.
Her hands shook as she gestured to the carpet in the recessed conversation nook. “We have a Persian carpet almost twice this size. His legs and arms were at opposite ends, and his torso was in the middle. His head was roughly over there, looking at me,” she said, pointing to a spot behind Jason’s chair with an unsteady finger.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Liam swore, getting up to pour himself a drink.
“Bring the bottle,” Ethan ordered. Liam, usually abrasive with the other man, didn’t say a word as he poured him and Jason refills.
“Why didn’t you say anything before?” Patrick rubbed her back, his face tight. “Christ, I should have had a therapist come in and talk to you.”
She dismissed that. “I don’t think I could have talked to anyone else about their psycho rituals.”
Jason perked up. “It was ritualistic?”
Tahlia leaned back to stare at the ceiling, attempting to clear her mind enough to recall all those details. “I think so. I mean, I don’t have a clear image anymore. It’s like my brain stopped working after I saw him, but in my memory, I see a design on the carpet underneath him. Not a pentagram, but some other symbol in a circle. But the—the pieces formed a star shape.”
“There is nothing about dismemberment in this damn report.” Ethan waved the papers.
“There’s also no pictures, which is rather damning in a way, isn’t it?” Jason pointed out. “A prominent businessman like him is murdered, supposedly of a simple stab wound, but there’s not a single picture.”
Ethan appeared to mull that over. “What you describe would have taken a lot of time. You were in Boston early that morning. Do you remember how high the sun was after you crawled out the office window?”
“It was high but not overhead. It climbed higher as I left the grounds.”
He made a note on a pad. “So maybe late morning? Good.”
Her brow creased. “Why is it good?”
“Because the time of death on this report says he died in the pre-dawn hours, somewhere closer to three or four AM. I’m assuming it’s accurate, although the cause of death is obviously fake.”
He riffled through the papers again, holding up one of the sheets, and then sniffed. “They don’t know you have an alibi up until dawn,” he said, gesturing with the paper in Patrick’s direction.
Liam narrowed his eyes at them, but he didn’t ask what Ethan meant. Had Patrick not told his brother the story of meeting in the lobby afterward?
His consideration and concern for her reputation was sweet, but Tahlia didn’t care if Liam decided she was loose for going to Patrick’s room that night if it gave her an alibi for murder.
“Assuming they filed a flight plan, that alone should be enough to clear you,” Jason said. “But it doesn’t hurt to have Trick and Juan make statements establishing your whereabouts, in case they pull a fast one and want to alter the time of death so it points the finger at you.”
Ethan nodded in agreement. “In the meantime, we’ll pull whatever strings we can to get the un-doctored police report and any crime-scene photos, assuming they exist. One good shot of the body should be enough to get them to back off. Juries can’t picture a woman dismembering a body for a reason. It’s not easy to take one apart. Most don’t have the strength.”
Tahlia flinched, and Ethan winced. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she mumbled, rubbing her head. It wasn’t sore, but she felt numb from head to toe.
“Just so we’re clear, we’re ignoring this summons for her to turn herself in?” Liam asked.
“Damn straight,” Patrick said, his hold on the back of her neck tightening.
Ethan and Jason stood. “We’ll lay it out for BPD. They still owe us for that mess with Dawson.”
Liam muttered something she couldn’t quite catch, but the agents ignored him.
Tahlia watched them leave with a heavy heart.
“I’m so sorry to have dragged you all into this mess,” she said.
Liam tsked and rose. “Don’t you worry about that. We take care of our own.”
With that, he left, leaving her and Patrick alone.
“He doesn’t really mean that, does he?”
Though gruff, Liam seemed v
ery protective of his brother and sister, and to a lesser extent Peyton. He couldn’t be happy Tahlia was exposing them to such sordid, evil people.
“My brother’s a stubborn butthead about a lot of things, but he never says anything he doesn’t mean.”
There was something in his voice that made her twist to meet his eyes. Patrick’s expression was shuttered, his face all angles and planes.
I was worried about the wrong brother.
“Patrick?” she whispered, unable to keep the concern out of her voice.
His face didn’t soften the way it normally did.
“Come with me.” Rising, he took her hand, pulling her along until they were down the hall inside his suite. He tugged until she followed him into his bedroom.
He closed the door with a snap, stalking her with slow deliberation.
Tahlia could feel the change in the atmosphere. It was electric and intimidating. Suddenly, her lover seemed unfamiliar.
“Are you okay?” A tiny tremor betrayed her anxiety.
He put his hands on the back of her head. She waited, but he didn’t say anything. His jaw flexed, and his hands fisted in her hair, pushing her toward him.
“No one is taking you from me. No one.”
His grip was unforgiving. It made her scalp burn, but she didn’t care. Tahlia pressed against him, silently begging for more.
Patrick’s breath was hard and fast, the dark fire in his eyes new and a little disturbing. She stood there frozen as he stripped her, almost ripping the dress off.
Tahlia was left in her bra and panties. She started to take her heels off, but Patrick gave her a sharp shake of his head. He pushed her on the bed, stripping his shirt and pants off. He was crawling over her before his shorts hit the floor.
She tried to help him remove her underclothes, but he wasn’t having any of it. Excited, and still a little apprehensive, she held her tongue as he pulled the thin strips of black fabric from her body.
The matching dark heels dug into the pristine white coverlet. Tahlia closed her legs, waiting for a sign of what to do as she peeked at Patrick from under her lashes.
For a very long moment, he just watched her.
He kneeled in front of her, his gaze sweeping over her as if he were memorizing the lines of her body. Then he reached for a pillow, stripping the silk pillowcase from it and rolling it into a makeshift rope.
His hands grasped her arms, moving to hold both her wrists together over her head. His hands blurred as he deftly tied and knotted the pillowcase around them.
“Leave them there,” he ordered in a raw voice.
Stomach fluttering, she nodded.
“Good girl,” he murmured, running his hands over her hips.
Tahlia resisted the urge to close her eyes. For a man who spent so much time in an office, his hands were rough and strong. She loved the way they felt sliding over the satiny skin of her thighs and stomach.
Patrick palmed her breast, squeezing her nipples until they stung before lowering his head. He drew each into his mouth, lapping them with his tongue before sucking them hard enough to make her cry out.
Tahlia squirmed, her heels scrabbling for purchase on the bed. Patrick clucked his tongue, pulling her leg up to swat her ass cheek, before pushing it back until her legs were parted wide.
He stared at her pussy, running his fingers over the seam of her lips, parting them to tease and pinch her clit with the same relentless hunger. He hadn’t even put his fingers inside her, but she was so wet, already pulsing under his touch.
Forgetting herself, she reached for him. “Patrick.”
Her channel was clenching desperately. She wanted—no, needed—a deeper penetration.
“I said don’t move them.” He adjusted her hands, positioning them back over her head and holding them fast with one hand. He rested his weight on his forearm, moving the second to grasp to his member.
He pumped his cock a few times, the thick length shining with a bead of precum at the tip. Then he crawled up the bed until he was over her face.
“Open your mouth.”
Her pussy muscles clenched as she obeyed, parting her lips to let him inside. Patrick traced them with his cock before pushing the tip inside.
Tahlia’s closed her eyes, savoring his musk and salty taste. She rolled her tongue over the tip, eliciting a groan from him. Warm and aroused, Tahlia tried to take him in deeper, but he wouldn’t cooperate. He let her suck on the head of his cock, but nothing more.
She was almost disappointed when he backed away. His cock popped out of her mouth with an audible little pop.
Patrick was breathing fast, parting her legs with hard hands. He didn’t say anything as he pressed the tip to the entrance of her channel, waiting a beat for her to stop him. When she didn’t, he flexed, driving into her bare, his satiny hard cock filling her roughly.
He stopped when he was all the way in, closing his eyes as if savoring the feel of her. Without the barrier of the condom everything was more intense, her wet heat sliding and straining against his thick length.
Muscles screaming with tension, Tahlia writhed, silently begging for him to move.
“Please,” she whispered finally when he didn’t.
“Please what?” His voice was little more than a growl.
“Please fuck me.”
Patrick smiled, but it wasn’t warm or comforting. It was too hungry for that. His hand fisted in her hair and he braced himself, withdrawing and plunging back inside.
Tahlia clenched, trying to hold him inside, but she was too wet. He pistoned back and forth, plunging deeper and deeper with each stroke.
Drunk on sensation, she whimpered, her bound arms helpless as he moved harder and faster. “You’re mine, Tahlia. All mine.”
Her heart swelled, her skin catching fire as she took each brutal thrust, absorbing it hungrily and responding in kind. Her hips twisted and writhed, while her upper body rose to abrade her rock-hard nipples on his chest.
Their bodies met and parted greedily, shifting and twisting until they were rolling all over the bed. Trick took hold of her, turning until she was on top of him, her back to his front.
Panting, Tahlia thrust her hips back, her pussy caressing his cock as it worked in and out from underneath now. Patrick held her by her hair, using it to pin her in place as he pounded inside her. Their bodies were slick with sweat when his cock began to jerk, and he climaxed with a shout.
His orgasm triggered hers. Tahlia spasmed around him, taking everything he had to give with a mad desperation that frightened her. It was like hurtling through the air at a thousand miles an hour, but she trusted him enough to surrender, exploding and coming with a keening wail.
They came down slowly. Tahlia clung to Patrick, all thought blotted from her mind.
For that, she was grateful.
Chapter 22
Trick nodded absently as Gene, Caroline Wentworth’s father, continued to make small talk. He knew he should be paying closer attention to what the man was saying, especially as somewhere in all the bragging, there were details pertinent to this quarters profits for the boutique hotels the man owned.
He knew Liam was seriously considering acquiring the smaller chain. The idea was fiscally sound, he supposed, but he didn’t like the strings that came with the arrangement. Gene made it clear on numerous occasions that he was open to a sale, but he wanted to keep the chain ‘in the family’.
He could feel his hackles rising as Liam hugged Caroline. His brother walked her to the valet, something he never did for any of their other business associates.
Once upon a time, Trick would have bet anything his brother would never do anything to jeopardize his precious bachelorhood, not even for the sake of business. Now, he wasn’t so sure.
If he marries the ice queen to guarantee the sale, I will personally kick his ass all over the dojo.
Gene reached out to shake his hand with his sweaty paw, pulling Trick out of his distraction in time to see Tahlia crossing
the lobby floor. She was coming from the direction of the security office, where she had no doubt been visiting Peyton. Those two were inseparable lately.
“Goodbye, Gene,” he said, giving the man a tiny push in the direction of the waiting car. “I’ll be sure to give your suggestions to the concierge service some thought,” he promised, lying through his teeth.
“See that you do! I’m telling you, it’s a must for the high flyers,” Gene said, clapping him on the back with all his might.
Trick suppressed a wince and smiled unconvincingly. I swear he does that because I’m taller than him. Gene was only about five-foot-five, shorter than his Nordic goddess daughter. He’d always been insecure about his height.
Once Gene cleared the doors, Trick hurried after Tahlia. His long legs ate up the marble tiled floors in record time. If they’d waxed them recently, he might have broken something. He nodded to Juan and Andre, the two security guards manning the front entrance. An additional two men were stationed discreetly at the back.
His sister Maggie worried aloud that the obvious uptick in the amount of security would turn off their elite clientele, but it had the opposite effect. The dark-suited men resembled secret service agents with their earpieces. Their guests assumed a high-ranking politician or celebrity was staying at the hotel. It increased the hotel’s bookings.
He blocked the penthouse elevator door with his arm before it closed. Tahlia didn’t even look up.
“Hey, Ace.”
Her blue eyes blinked a few times before focusing on him. “Hi. I thought you were in a meeting until five.”
“It’s six o’clock.”
“Oh. I guess I lost track of time. I’ve been teaching Peyton how to play poker, up until she had to leave for class. She’s pretty good.”
“She would be.” He smirked. “I’d have taught her long ago if she’d asked. But she was always busy with Maggie or school. She’s close to getting her degree in computer science, too. Not that she needs it.”
The pensive tension around her chin relaxed. “Yes, she told me. Although, I’m wondering why she is doing it all at a no-name night school. She’s smart and driven. She’d do well in at Harvard or MIT.”
