Retrieval

by Aly Martinez

  With a gentle tug, he sent chills spreading over my skin as he pulled my head back. Our eyes met. Mine were wide. His were feral.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  I couldn’t talk.

  I couldn’t even think.

  Not with his hard body at my back, his breath on my skin, and his mouth inches away from mine.

  His hand squeezed my waist as it slowly glided up my stomach, stopping just below the round of my breasts. His thumb gently swept the swell before disappearing.

  My lids drooped at the contact, and my head fell back against his shoulder. As I gave him my weight, he shifted his hand from my neck around to my throat.

  “There she is. My sweet Lissy,” he praised softly.

  As much as I needed to keep my distance, I knew it was a futile. I’d never been able to stay away from him.

  And that obviously hadn’t changed.

  He was amazing in bed, and I was positive that hadn’t changed, either.

  I hadn’t been with anyone since our divorce. And, the year before it, I had been pregnant, recovering, or lost in despair. Sex hadn’t been very high on our list of priorities.

  Maybe we could remedy this now. At least physically.

  Trusting him with my body doesn’t mean trusting him with my heart.

  Or so I told myself during my “it’s okay to sleep with your ex-husband” mental pep talk.

  It was a successful one too, because seconds later, I threw in the towel with a silent, Fuck it.

  Arching my back, I pressed my ass against his hips and circled. I heard his groan just as I closed my eyes and set aim on his mouth.

  Only he didn’t meet me halfway.

  He didn’t meet me at all.

  He released me and walked away, saying, “I wish I could say the same about your car. It was a piece of shit when we bought it. It’s worse now. You need something new.”

  I blinked.

  What had just happened?

  Oh, that’s right. I got shut the fuck down by my ex-husband after he’d basically fondled my boobs and pulled my hair.

  Roman Leblanc strikes again.

  “Get out!” I growled. (Yes, growled. Apparently, it was contagious.)

  “Yep,” he replied like I’d asked him to pass the salt. He never looked back as he headed out the door, but he paused just before closing it long enough to call over his shoulder, “After our meeting, I have to hit the office for an hour or so today. I’ll bring back dinner.”

  He would not be bringing dinner back that night because I’d be staying at the dodgy motel two counties over. I didn’t inform him of this information by chasing him down the stairs the way I would have liked. Instead, I took a shower, brushed my teeth, and got dressed, all the while cursing my libido.

  Our attorneys had nothing. Not. One. Fucking. Thing. The cops weren’t allowed to tell us the name of the other couple involved so we could deal with it privately. We had to sit on our hands and wait for the APD to feed us more information as it became available—if it became available.

  I was beyond frustrated by this news, but Elisabeth was notably distraught. My attempts to soothe her only made it worse.

  She was probably pissed at me for having shot her down in the bedroom when she’d all but offered me her naked body on a silver platter. But fuck. I’d had fifteen minutes before Whit and Kaplin arrived. There was no way, the first time I had her in what felt like an eternity—but probably calculated closer to three years—it was going to be in a quickie against the closet wall. Though, after that little grind down with her ass, I’d been tempted.

  After our attorneys gave us a full briefing and left, Elisabeth locked herself away in the second bedroom, stating that she had work to do. She probably did, but the way she’d said it was more like, Get the fuck out of my house.

  I gave her that because I did, in fact, have work to do. And the sooner I got to the office and got it done, the sooner I could get back over to her place and finish what she had started.

  It was a rare day when I didn’t wear a suit to the office. I hated that shit, all stiff and as comfortable as a cardboard straitjacket, but if I wanted people to believe I belonged behind the massive desk in the corner office, I had to look the part.

  After my morning, though, I hadn’t felt like going back to my apartment before heading in for a couple of hours. So, in a pair of jeans that were barely held together by a thread and a T-shirt that wasn’t much better, I exited the elevator at Leblanc Industries.

  “Mr. Leblanc?” my secretary said with surprise.

  Just as fast, a man repeated, “Mr. Leblanc?”

  I stopped as he moved toward me. “Can I help you?”

  He was around my age, well-built, and exuding authority, so it didn’t surprise me in the least when he flipped a badge my way. “Agent Heath Light, DEA. Can we have a word in private?” He tucked a manila folder under his arm in order to extend a hand.

  I often had members of the force in the office; I made bulletproof material for a living. But, with my luck, Simon Wells had sent this guy by to harass me into selling him a load of Rubicon.

  I shook his outstretched hand and said, “Listen, I’m really busy today. Can you make an appointment for next week? I’d be happy to have a sit-down and discuss numbers with—”

  “This is personal, Roman.”

  Personal.

  Roman.

  The fuck?

  I arched an eyebrow as I gave him a slow nod, calling to my secretary, “Hold my calls.”

  I led the way to my office as he silently followed behind me. Once inside, he didn’t get much more talkative. I sat in my chair and fired my computer up as he walked around, inspecting the pictures hanging around the room.

  He pointed to one on the wall and said, “She’s cute.”

  I rocked back in my chair and replied, “She’s my sister.”

  “You still caught up on your ex?” he questioned like the ballsy motherfucker he clearly was.

  I sat up, propped my elbows on my desk, and ignored his question. “What can I help you with today, Agent Light?”

  He tipped his chin in my direction. “Lucked out. Your secretary told me you were out for the day.”

  “I am out for the day,” I corrected. “So, if you could speed this up, I’d be much obliged.”

  He finally moved to the chair in front of my desk and sat. “Good. This way, it’ll be easier to explain away that I was never here.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  He slid a photo from his envelope but kept it facedown. “Roman, I’m here on a very unofficial capacity today. You got me?”

  I narrowed my eyes, my gaze going to the photo I couldn’t make out. “I got you,” I replied skeptically.

  “I also need your word that you’re not gonna go off half-cocked and get yourself killed. That would make my life extremely messy right about now.”

  “Get to the fucking point,” I demanded, quickly losing my patience with the vague bullshit.

  “That your word?”

  I shrugged. “It’s gonna have to be. The only other ones I got for you are: Get the hell out of my office.”

  He stared at me for a minute before his face split in a grin. “I hear you and your woman got some news yesterday.”

  Now, that got my attention.

  I steepled my fingers under my chin. “We did. You got anything in that magic envelope of yours that might be helpful to me?”

  He grinned again and then demanded, “Your word.”

  “Never seen you in my life. I spent the day at home with Elisabeth, reuniting our marriage between the sheets.”

  He chuckled. “Works for me.” Sliding a grainy, black-and-white surveillance picture across the desk, he said, “Walter Noir. Bad guy. And, when I say bad guy, I mean bad. Fucking. Guy. We’ve been keeping tabs on him for the last three years. He’s the big name in drugs in the city right now. His army is strong, but worse than that, they’re tight. Nobody in or out without Noir’s personal approval
. He’s into some deep shit. You owe that man money, he’s got tricks that make the old-school mob look like child’s play. The blood on his hands could forge rivers.”

  I set the photo back on my desk. “And you’re telling me this why?”

  He pulled more pictures from the envelope and then slid the bottom one my way. “That’s his wife Clare.”

  I could only see the side of her face, but that was all I needed in order to make out the wide black-and-blue bruise covering her cheek.

  “Jesus,” I muttered.

  “That was taken outside of her gym eight months ago. It’s the only place he allows her to go. The bastard keeps her on a tight leash.” He passed me another picture. “This one was taken five months ago.”

  In this image, she was looking straight at the camera, tears flowing down her cheeks and dark bruises peeking from the neck of her tank top.

  “This one was three months ago.” Another image of the thin, blond, battered woman.

  He started to slide another my way, but I lifted my hand in the air.

  “Enough. I got it. Get to the part where you give me something helpful.”

  He stood and bent over my desk, slapping a picture down into the center. Then he stabbed his index finger down on the back of a little, blond head in the woman’s arms and changed my entire life with one sentence. “That is the child who may or may not be your daughter.”

  I shot to my feet, the chair rolling from under me and slamming into the shelves that lined the wall behind me. After snatching the picture off the desk, I brought it up to my face for a closer inspection. It was nothing but a head full of white curls, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away.

  “Are you sure?” I asked.

  “Am I sure it’s your kid? No. Do I think it’s a strong possibility based on the asshole who’s involved? Yes.”

  I snatched my desk phone up and lifted it to my ear, but his hand slammed down on the base, hanging it up.

  “What the fuck are you doing?”

  “I’m calling the cops…or shit, my attorney…or, Christ, someone.”

  “I am the cops, Roman. And I assure you there is not one fucking thing we can do to help you here. If we could, I’d be off doing it rather than standing here, risking my job.”

  “Jesus, shit!” I yelled, raking my hand through my hair. “What the hell am I supposed to do here?” I snatched a picture of the bruised woman off the desk and lifted it his way. “He doing that to the kid?”

  He cut his eyes away. “Tessa. Her name’s Tessa, and I don’t know.”

  “Bullshit! You know.”

  “No. I really don’t fucking know. But even if he isn’t. He will. Eventually.”

  “Goddamn it!” I slammed my fist down.

  “You cannot go to the authorities with this.”

  “Then what the fuck do you expect me to do!” I yelled so loud the windows rattled.

  His eyes hollowed into dark, treacherous pits. “I expect you to get her out.”

  “Kidnapping?” I laughed humorlessly. “Fan-fucking-tastic idea.”

  “Not the kid.” He once again stabbed his finger down on my desk. Only, this time, it landed on the woman. “Her.”

  “What?” I asked in disbelief.

  “She’s the key to this entire investigation.”

  “Fuck your investigation,” I shot back.

  “That woman holds all the answers. Legally, she’s the mother of that child. She can submit to DNA testing on herself and the girl. We find out the kid’s not hers, we have ourselves a case no judge could ignore. Court order on Walter Noir plus her testimony on all the bullshit she’s seen over the years. That man’s done.”

  He made it sound so easy. But just the fact that he was standing in my office told me it was the impossible. I had a sneaking suspicion that I was about to become the DEA’s sacrificial lamb.

  “And what if she doesn’t submit to DNA? She might be on a tight leash, but what if she doesn’t want to get away? You’d be throwing me into the line of fire, keeping your hands clean, and getting your case. No fucking thanks.”

  His jaw turned to granite, and his hands flexed at his sides. “You get her away from that man, I have not one single doubt that she will sing like a fucking bird. She’s scared, Leblanc. But, from what we can tell, she is not involved in his shit. She’s just a victim. Best thing that ever happened to her is that lab tech spilling it on the doctor and Noir. She needs an out, and I need you to get off your ass, get creative, and give that to her.”

  “And how exactly do you expect me to do this?” I asked, my voice thick with sarcasm as I walked around the desk and settled on the corner. “Just walk into the lion’s den and take his woman and his child?”

  He crossed his arms over his chest and ignored my question. “The second best thing that happened to her was her embryo being switched with yours.”

  I scoffed and blankly gazed out the window. “Right.”

  “Leblanc, I’ve done my research on you. Prior military. Infantry. Two purple hearts and a boatload of men who respect the fuck out of you. You’re smart. Fucking loaded, yet you live in a shithole apartment in the garage of an even bigger shithole house. You’re charitable but run your business with a heavy hand. You wanted to be a family man, but that wasn’t in the cards. Now, your ex-wife hates you, but you’ve been making some headway there in the last twenty-four hours, yeah?”

  I pushed to my feet and took a step toward him. “You been watching me?”

  He didn’t hesitate to grin as he said, “Since the moment that snitch said your name.”

  “Right.”

  “Right,” he replied, moving back to his chair, grabbing his envelope before riffling through it. “If there was ever a man who could handle this, it’s you. You have the resources. So fucking use them. Get eyes on Clare, find a good time, and then make your approach. Be gentle. She spooks easy. She needs help, Roman. Make her understand that you can give her that.” He pulled one last picture out and set it facedown on my desk. Then he passed the envelope my way. “That’s as much information as I could get on her. Her address. Schedule. Gym location. All of her background. It should be a good start for whoever you hire. And should you need someone you can trust, there’s the name of a protection agency in there as well. It’s run by a man named Leo James. He used to be DEA. He mainly does personal security now, but you give him a call, drop my name, and he’ll take care of you.”

  I nodded though I had no idea what I was agreeing to, but I took the envelope from his hands, knowing I had to do something.

  Heath walked to the door. Then he stopped and looked back at me. “I don’t think I need to remind you about the urgency of this situation, but I’m gonna do it anyway. Do not sit on this, Leblanc. Get on the phone, throw some money at people, and get that woman and your daughter out of there.”

  My body jerked at his definitive use of the term your daughter.

  “Saw pictures of Elisabeth at the police station,” he added, lifting his chin to the photo he’d left facedown on my desk. “It’s obvious.”

  I immediately snatched it up and…

  “Holy shit,” I gasped.

  But there was no way to deny it.

  The oxygen drained from the room and the only thing left was a photo of a child with blond ringlets and a face I’d recognize anywhere. I’d seen it in my dreams nearly every night as we’d struggled through infertility.

  She was Elisabeth’s.

  Absolutely. One hundred percent. Without question.

  By the time I tore my gaze up, Heath was gone.

  I didn’t do as he’d instructed. I didn’t pick the phone up and make any calls.

  Instead, I grabbed my keys and stormed from the office.

  One destination in mind.

  And it wasn’t home.

  I’d cried myself to sleep the night before. That wasn’t anything new. However, this time, I did it in Walt’s arms. I’d had no other choice. He hadn’t let me out of his sight since he’
d stormed into Luke’s office, yanked me into his arms, and hugged me as if he hadn’t seen me in decades rather than minutes. He glared at Luke only for a second before he guided me, with Tessa in my arms, out to a waiting car in the parking lot. The police were swarming, but no one could touch Walter Noir.

  The entire day had been mind-boggling. I’d expected Walt to lose his shit that I’d spoken with the police—even if they had been the ones speaking to me. But the minute we arrived home, he gave me the kind, gentle, and understanding man I’d fallen in love with while we had been dating. I knew now that that man didn’t exist, but as my heart struggled to beat with the newest gaping hole, I’d never been so grateful for the façade.

  The moment he got me behind closed doors, he guided me up to the office, where he produced two sets of DNA results. My name at the top of one, his at the top of the other, Tessa’s on both. I stared at them as he crouched in front of me, holding my hand and explaining that the police had approached him weeks earlier about the possibility of a lab error. He’d refused the DNA test because he’d feared they were using it as a ploy to once and for all get a legally surrendered sample of his DNA.

  For an average man, handing the police department a sample of DNA would be no big deal and the results would end up in a dusty box in the evidence room at the end of an investigation.

  For a man like Walter Noir—a money-laundering, drug-dealing, murdering low life with ties to people so bad that the government didn’t even have them on a radar yet—handing his DNA over was the equivalent of a life sentence. I didn’t know everything Walt was involved in, but I knew enough. I was positive there was a case file the size of a library on him, and the cops were begging for a way to tie him to it all.

  So he told me that he’d had his own DNA tests performed at a private lab to ease his mind, and he hadn’t told me because he hadn’t wanted to upset me.

  As if he’d ever cared if he upset me before.

  Still in a state of shock, I listened to him while tracing my finger over Tessa’s name, but never Noir. And, for the briefest of seconds, I wished that the results read differently. I couldn’t live without Tessa, but if it meant she wasn’t Walt’s, I could die with a whole heart.