Protecting Justice (The Justice Series Book 4)

by Adrienne Giordano

  At that he laughed. Had to. The woman was nuts. And all he had to decide was how to take her. Against the sofa, against the wall, bent over. What?

  Something told him she liked it hard and fast. Like him. On the edge of rough because that’s where things got crazy and hot and made the release a pure shot of insanity.

  Boom and boom and boom.

  That’s what he wanted. That shattering release that would make his mind stop, just blow that bastard to bits and give him a few measly seconds of peace.

  From his thoughts.

  From his guilt.

  That goddamn guilt that never gave up.

  Fallyn wrapped her hand around him and his eyes rolled. Holy God, that felt good. He moved back, away from her and kicked out of his shoes, pants and the boxers.

  Ready.

  “So, what do you think?” he said. “Ready to scream?”

  The measly moonlight shifted, threw shadows across her bare breasts and his heart damn near stopped, just froze right in his chest. He sucked in a breath and held it. So damned beautiful.

  “Jesus, Fallyn.”

  “What?”

  He slapped his hands over the top of his head. What the hell was wrong with him? By now, with any other woman giving him the go sign like she had, he’d be on her, the two of them body slamming each other into mind blowing orgasms.

  Now? He shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said. “You…undo me.”

  She sat back, lifted one leg and rested her arm on her knee. “And that’s a bad thing?”

  “No. But my M.O. is bent.”

  “Thank goodness that’s the only thing bent.”

  Shit. Totally irreverent this woman. He burst out laughing. Standing there in the middle of a strange living room, no lights, a hot woman naked and ready in front of him and he was laughing at jokes.

  I’m losing it.

  He sat down next to her, reached for her and kissed her. Long and slow. Savoring it because all of a sudden, he didn’t want to rush. He wanted every second, every micro-second, drilled into his brain. For the first time, he didn’t want to body slam his way through it.

  With Fallyn, he wanted…different.

  Still kissing him, she eased herself back, lying down and pulling him on top of her, dragging her warm fingers up and down his back, over his ass and he broke the kiss, buried his face in her hair and his mind slowed to…nothing.

  Blank.

  God, that was good. Better than good. Fantastic. Who knew? “Don’t stop.”

  “It feels good?”

  “Hell, yeah.”

  And it did. Slowly, she tickled her fingers over his back, the movement lighting up his nerve endings in a way he’d never experienced and he breathed in, let the silence take over.

  While her magic fingers lulled him, she brought her legs around his waist and he was right there. Right there. All he had to do was ram himself home and rock her world the way he knew he could. Just pound away until they both screamed.

  The way it had always been for him.

  Pound. Pound. Pound.

  Mind shatter.

  Done.

  Not this time.

  He raised his head, looked down at her grinning up at him and kissed her. Softly. A gentle brush of lips as he sunk his weight into her, rested there for a second. Taking it all in. Absorbing the moment. For once.

  Her hands stroked over his back. Up. Down. Up. Down. She pulled back, stared up at him, her green eyes, even in the dark, so focused. “You okay?”

  Okay? Was he? He didn’t know. If okay was this crazy calm feeling, yeah, he was definitely okay.

  “I’m great,” he said. “You ready for me?”

  “You betcha, fella.”

  He slid into her and she arched up, gasping as she locked her legs around him and brought her hands to his cheeks. “Oh, that’s perfect.”

  Perfect.

  Forcing himself to move slowly, to not rush it—no pounding—he moved inside her, stayed there for a long second and buried his face in her hair again.

  She nibbled his earlobe, then kissed it while her hands started another tour of his back. “I love being with you like this.”

  He moved again, rocking his hips—slow, slow, slow—taking his time, enjoying it. Not rushing to the finish line.

  “Fallyn?”

  “Yes?”

  “You undo me and it’s the best goddamn thing ever.”

  “Good. Because I have plans for you, mister.”

  Legs still locked around him, she arched up, urging him on and he lifted his head, stared down at her, kept his gaze glued to her as they moved together and something in his brain whipped at him, but no…he wanted it to last. To take his time.

  “I’ll fuck you blind next time,” he blurted.

  What an idiot.

  “Isn’t that what you’re doing now?”

  “No. I usually like it…” he shook his head.

  “Rough?”

  He kissed her again. “Fast. I like it fast. Not this time. This time, it’s—”

  “Perfect.”

  She ran her hands through his hair, brought his head down, hit him with another of those agonizing soft kisses and his body tensed. Not yet. No.

  Here it comes. Too soon. Damn. He fought it, squeezed his eyes closed. Not yet.

  “It’s okay,” she whispered. “Let go. I’ve got you. I’ll always have you.”

  He opened his eyes, looked down at Fallyn. So beautiful. Perfect and flawed. He wanted her. Her and the explosion that would blow his mind.

  Not yet.

  Damn. He didn’t know what he wanted.

  He breathed in, rocked his hips and…pow. His mind and body exploded, a massive rush and he pumped his hips harder, praying the euphoria would last and last and last.

  “Can’t wait.”

  He threw his head back, pumped one last time, buried himself as deep as he could and let the release wash over him and settle.

  “Tony?”

  God, why was she talking right now? He opened his eyes, blinked and focused and—oh, yeah—she had that zoned out look and he grinned. He’d put that look on her face. “You’re close, aren’t you?” He kissed her. “You gonna come for me, Fallyn?”

  He reached down, used his fingers to finish what the now resting little man couldn’t.

  Rocking her hips hard, she whipped her head sideways. “Don’t stop. Please…”

  She reared up, nearly whacked her head into his and grabbed his shoulders, digging her fingers in as she cried out and collapsed.

  I did that.

  He dipped his head again, ran kisses along her jawline. “You’re beautiful, Fallyn. And you’re mine.”

  * * *

  “Damn, woman,” Tony said, his big frame swinging in through the kitchen doorway. “That smells amazing.”

  Fallyn smiled, scooping a smidgen of spaghetti sauce from the pot, blowing on it softly to cool it before she held out the spoon. “I found pasta and tomato sauce in the pantry. My father would shoot me for making sauce from a jar, but it’s the best I can do.”

  Tony slid over to taste it. Eyes widening, he licked his lips. “Tastes as good as it smells. I bet your dad couldn’t tell the difference.”

  Tony was close, looming over her, touching her back. She liked it.

  Oh, who am I fooling? I love it.

  His touch, his kisses—all of it. She wanted him to keep touching her, keep invading her personal space. The sex was amazing, the best she’d ever had. She could talk to Tony about anything and he totally got her.

  Not many people did.

  In the past twenty-four hours, her phone and Tony’s had been ringing nonstop—updates from Mitch and Caroline, the local police, Special Agent Pain-in-Her-Ass Bronco, Jordan, Carl, her dad, Dani and everyone back at Pasche & Associates—they all wanted to know what had happened with the accident. Still, she’d made time to touch Tony every time he touched her, to kiss him back. Any time she saw that self-incriminating doubt enter his
eyes, even with Grey out of surgery and recovering, he still beat himself up. Maddening. The benefit was any time he grew quiet and moody, she’d brought him out of it with sex.

  It was a tough job, but someone had to do it.

  She’d prostituted herself to keep the man distracted and she didn’t care. They’d christened every surface in the loft, St. Agnes looking on with her stoic face.

  “Eric Pasche can smell jarred sauce from a mile away,” Fallyn said, turning back to the stove. As she stirred, Tony put his arms around her and lowered his lips to her neck. Her concentration fled and the spoon slowed.

  Closing her eyes, she sighed softly, enjoying the feel of his solid body pressing against hers. For once, she didn’t want to lean in like all the women’s magazines told her to do. She had a career and it was great, but right now, she was also strong enough to admit, she wanted a man in her life.

  Instead of leaning in, she leaned back.

  Against Tony’s shoulder.

  This. She sighed.

  This was what she wanted.

  What would it be like to come home to him every night? To cook for him?

  “Luckily,” she said, eyes closed, “I learned enough about cooking while working in dad’s restaurant, that I can fake it with the best of them.”

  Steam rose from the boiling water in the second pot, the mist hovering in the air as the noodles cooked. When was the last time she’d stood over a stove and cooked for someone? She couldn’t remember. Even though she knew how to make a variety of plates most people were impressed with, she usually ordered out. Too many years working at her father’s restaurant had jaded her love of cooking.

  Tony’s hands slid around her hips to her backside where he cupped her ass cheeks. His lips nibbled at her ear. “How long before dinner’s ready?”

  “Not long.” She knew where this was going. Despite what he’d said about preferring fast sex, Tony was not a quick, wham-bam lover. He liked to take his time. The pasta would overcook if she let him have his way. “How much time do you need?”

  “I bet I can make you come before the timer goes off.”

  She turned in his arms. To hell with the pasta. “Let’s test that theory, shall we?”

  He lifted her onto the counter with ease, the spoon in her hand falling to clang against the saucepot. He kissed and licked at the fine layer of perspiration on her collarbone, and she helped him unbutton her shirt. His lips moved down toward her left nipple.

  She’d just unclasped his pants and he was sucking on that nipple through her lace bra when his phone went off.

  Swearing, he fumbled the phone out of his back pocket. She saw him about to turn the whole thing off when he stilled. “It’s Teeg,” he said through gritted teeth. “I better take it.”

  Fallyn nodded, playing with his zipper anyway, slowly lowering it to slip her fingers inside. He sucked in a breath, caught her fingers and drew them away, giving her a warning look. She chuckled under her breath and licked her lips seductively.

  “What?” Tony said by way of greeting to Teeg.

  She couldn’t make out Teeg’s exact words, but Tony’s brows crashed together and she stopped teasing him.

  Tony put the phone on speaker and held it between them. “Say that again, Teeg.”

  The techie’s voice sounded tired. “I unlocked a folder Heather had labeled personal email. Except it wasn’t email. There was only a single jpeg in the file. A screenshot of a coded text.”

  Fallyn buttoned her shirt back up. “Who was it from?”

  “Sending the screenshot to you now,” Teeg said, “along with what I could decode. Doesn’t make sense to me, but it may to you guys. Also, I haven’t found anything credible—or consistent—with death threats. Anything related to her shooting down that bill was mostly one-time bitching. I’ll let you know if I find anything else.”

  Tony’s phone dinged with the incoming jpeg file. He brought it up as Fallyn slid off the countertop and stood next to him.

  They read it at the same time, then exchanged a look. “I knew it,” Fallyn said.

  “You know what it means?” Teeg asked.

  Fallyn scanned the words again.

  D-Day, POTUS runt at MacDill.

  Tony was staring at her, as if he, too, were waiting for her to enlighten him.

  “MacDill,” Fallyn said. “The air force base in Tampa? That’s where Ryan Nicols’ Special Operations team is stationed. MacDill hosts the Special Operations Command and twenty-something other mission partners. They patrol the Atlantic waters.”

  “D-Day,” Tony recited. “Is it saying the day the CanAir flight disappeared, Ryan was at MacDill?”

  “Exactly.” Fallyn leaned her butt against the counter. “Who is the text from, Teeg? There’s only a phone number associated with it and I don’t recognize that number.”

  “It’s a personal cell phone that isn’t used much. A real dinosaur bought seven years ago.” The click of keys filtered through the phone. “I managed to track down the name it’s registered to.”

  Tony shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “And?”

  “Carl Lomax.”

  “Carl?” Fallyn met Tony’s eyes, a strong sense of betrayal sending sharp lightening strikes down her arms. She gripped the edge of the counter. “He was helping Heather look into this?”

  “Looks that way,” Tony said. “Heather must have figured out the Nicols angle and wanted to know where the kid was when the plane went down.”

  “He warned me off, told me not to dig into this.” Fallyn shook her head in disgust. “He acted like I was a bitch for insisting Heather had been killed, and then he lied right to my face when I asked him if he knew Heather was investigating the plane’s disappearance. He told me he didn’t know anything about it.”

  Tony’s fingers tightened on the phone. “Which means it’s possible he lied about not knowing Heather had a heart condition as well.”

  Fallyn’s stomach dropped. What was Tony suggesting?

  Teeg’s voice broke into their personal conversation. “What does Ryan Nicols have to do with the CanAir flight?”

  Grey hadn’t had a chance to tell anyone about Fallyn and Tony’s theory.

  Fallyn felt a new kind of heat rising in her body. The heat of treachery turning her blood to a rolling boil. “The president’s son, a member of a secret Spec Ops group, was at MacDill the day the CanAir flight went missing. I think he shot that plane down on his father’s orders. My sister was putting those links together and Carl knew about it. That rat bastard. He was helping her.”

  “Or he’s the one who shut her down,” Tony said. The timer on the stove went off and Tony met her gaze. “Carl just added himself to our suspect list.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Tony stopped on the walkway leading to Carl’s stately colonial in one of the tonier neighborhoods in the DC area. For a guy who’d worked for the government most of his career, he had obviously cashed in working the private sector.

  He scanned the fresh paint, the scrollwork on the oversized double front doors that had obviously been hand-carved. The doors alone were probably a year’s worth of Tony’s salary.

  “Here’s the deal,” he faced Fallyn.

  “Uh-oh. I don’t like when people tell me what the deal is.”

  “I know. But hear me out on this one. I think you’ll agree.”

  She pursed her lips, clearly prepping to argue before he’d even said anything. Tony had to laugh. Everything about this woman gave him a rush. The contrary attitude, the drive, the willingness to put herself in danger to find the truth, all of it tripped his ‘she’s-special’ trigger.

  He smiled. “What? No snappy comeback?”

  “Oh, I have one. But you asked me to hear you out. Which I will do, considering the multiple, rib-shattering orgasms you gave me in the last twelve hours. Thank you, by the way for those. I want more.”

  Yeah, he might love her.

  “Plenty more of that for you, babe. But first,”�
�he pointed to the fancy front door—“we talk to your buddy Carl. We show him the screenshot of his text to Heather and see what he has to say.”

  “Yes. That’s the plan. We talked about this already.”

  Yep. Sure did. “This is the part that’ll piss you off.”

  “Excellent.”

  “I think you’re too close to this situation to question Carl. It’s too personal and, as good as you are, I don’t think you can distance yourself emotionally. That’ll screw up the interview. Let me talk to him. You listen and see if anything clicks for you.”

  She tilted her head, nibbled her bottom lip and Tony’s mind wandered back to the things she’d recently done to him with those lips and—crap—he was gone. Toast.

  Without giving her a chance to respond—or argue—he started up the walkway. “It’s a good plan,” he said. “You can be the good cop.”

  Fallyn scooted up behind him, tugged on the back of his jacket. “Fine. But—”

  “Ha. I knew that was too easy.”

  “But…if I have a question, I’m jumping in.”

  Tony poked the doorbell and heard the sing-song chime through the thick wood of the doors. “I’d expect nothing less.”

  “Charmer.”

  One of the giant doors swung open and Carl—what? No butler?—greeted them. He wore a perfectly pressed white dress shirt, no tie, black slacks and tasseled shoes. If this was his hanging around the house outfit, the guy needed to lighten up.

  “Come in,” he said waving them through.

  Tony held his hand out to Fallyn then rested it on her lower back as she breezed by him. Somewhere in the last few days she’d stopped flinching every time he touched her. Welcome news since he considered himself an affectionate guy who liked physical contact with the people he cared about. Hugs, pokes, tickles, whatever; he showed his love with his hands.

  “I’m home alone,” Carl said, “but let’s go into the study.”

  The study. Sounded private. A place where they could talk openly. Possibly accuse a man of murder.

  Fallyn led the way, chatting with Carl as they walked down a long hallway beside the curving staircase.

  On an emotional level, this had to be difficult for her. These people were family friends and she’d probably visited their home hundreds of times for parties and holidays and dinners. But Fallyn? She was a beast. Nothing about her relaxed tone or the sassy swing of her hips indicated conflict.