“Oh, my God, it’s her,” Lacy whispered. “That burned corpse. It’s Marlee.”
Chapter Fourteen
“I’m going in,” Jake declared, his hands on his knees and his mind made up. Now that he knew what he was up against, the clock was ticking. Those little girls needed help, and he needed to move before Poindexter knew what hit him. A surprise attack was the only way, but it had to happen fast.
“In where?” Lacy asked, her eyes tearing up at what they all knew now to be true. Rafe had murdered Marlee Presley in the most gruesome fashion. The bastard had to pay.
“Into Poindexter’s downtown office. Let’s stop the bastard once and for all.”
“Sex slaves,” Jamaal hissed. His alcohol daze had faded. “It’s bad the world over, but it’s damned disgusting in Thailand and Cambodia. Parents there sell their little girls just so the rest of the family can survive. Damn it, I want to look at those pictures one more time.”
Jake didn’t need to. All they did was make him angry to the point of losing his self-control. They confirmed why his flesh crawled every time he’d seen Poindexter’s arrogant face on the cover of some magazine or newspaper at the newsstands. The only way this takedown could be sweeter was if Marlee had gotten a shot of Poindexter with one of those girls.
“Guys. Talk to me,” Lacy ordered, her voice quavering. “Tell me what’s going on.”
Jake took a deep breath. “Cambodia’s a stinking poor country. There’s no such thing as children’s rights over there, and it’s not uncommon for families to sell their daughter’s virginity when times get bad. It’s a sickening practice, but it’s been going on for generations. It’s one of those cultural beliefs where older men believe sex with a virgin will increase his virility.”
“The younger the better,” Jamaal growled, his finger tapping the mouse to click from file to file. “Look at this one. She look old enough to be doing something like this?”
Lacy peered closer. A young girl peered over the shoulder of the man named Croyden. Stark desperation showed on her face. “No. Someone’s put a lot of makeup on her, but look at her eyes. She should be at home with a loving mother. She’s just a little girl.”
“I say we go to the police with this, Weylin,” Jamaal declared. “Where’s your phone, Miss Lacy?”
“And do what?” Jake jumped to his feet. “All we’ve got is pictures of everyone but Poindexter in compromising positions. These jokers will be in trouble, but he’ll walk. No, Jamaal. I’m going into his office for that file in his safe. I want the smoking gun that ends this bullshit once and for all.”
“That’s why he’s able to do whatever he wants,” Lacy said thoughtfully. “He’s blackmailing these guys.”
“And some of them are damned powerful,” Jake agreed. “All he has to do is snap his fingers and they make whatever he wants, happen. Zoning variances. Real estate deals. Land swaps.”
“It’s not working so good for him here in Anacostia,” Lacy said.
“You don’t think so?” Jake asked. “Look around. Is there a grocery store within miles that anyone who doesn’t own a car can get to? I’ll be honest. More guys than just Jamaal and me have been getting beat up. I just never put two and two together until now. Think about the increase in arson. Lamont Adams’ place isn’t the only one that’s been torched in the last few months. It all makes sense now.”
Lacy’s eye color changed from forest green to nearly gray. “Marlee said the same thing, but you can’t go looking like you do,” she said quietly.
Jake stuck his fingers into the roots of his thick, messy hair. No, a wild man would tend to stand out in Poindexter’s office. “You’ll help me, won’t you?”
“No,” she answered quickly, shaking her head. “I won’t. I’m not going to help you get killed. Like you said, look around. Where’s Marlee? And where are the rest of my friends from the clinic? I’m scared they aren’t alive anymore, Jake. I’m not going to lose you, too.”
Her voice had grown higher with every word, and he got it. He really did, he just didn’t have it in him to walk away from endangered children. Who else would save them if not him? Still, he couldn’t hurt Lacy, either. Fantine’s sweet words whispered a song of regret to him, of dreams dying and hope along with it. A familiar wave of helplessness surged up within his soul again. There had to be a way to reveal Poindexter’s vile sex trade without destroying the beautiful thing he’d just found with Lacy.
He put it to her and let her decide. “What would you have me do? Tell me and I’ll do it.”
“Not fair,” she murmured, her tears glimmering once more.
“I know.” He fell to one knee in front of her, taking both of her hands in his. “It’s not fair, but what if that was your daughter in one of those shots? You of all people know what it’s like to be betrayed. Hell, Lacy, what if that was you? Should I call the police and stand around and wait for them to do something?”
She blinked, her eyes brimming with emotion, and he felt like an ass badgering her. “Their parents are the reason they’re with those men in the first place,” she said quietly. “You know that. If all you do is send them home, they’ll just get sold again.”
“You’re right,” he agreed, “and your parents are the ones who sold you out. You’re just like those little girls.”
“Not fair,” she whispered once more, and he knew exactly what she was thinking. Between her worry for him and the goodness he knew was inside her, Lacy battled her conscience and her common sense. Hell, he was too. Could he get into the mighty Rafe Poindexter’s office without raising suspicion, then get out with the incontrovertible evidence to bring him down? That remained to be seen. Would he try his damnedest? Could he bring Poindexter to his knees? You bet, but only with a lot of luck behind him, and—if he had Lacy stashed somewhere Poindexter couldn’t reach her.
“Life isn’t fair,” he said softly, her fingers as cold as ice in his hands. He lifted them to his mouth and blew warmth on them, rubbing them to chase the chill away.
“You’re just like me,” she said, so quietly that he leaned in closer to hear her better. “I paint. You do stupid stuff like getting yourself killed.”
He offered her the only argument he had left. “We’re Marines. I guess we were born to do everything the hard way. Go figure.”
She launched herself into his arms, nearly bowling him over. Jake caught her and settled back to the floor with her in his lap. Her tears wet his skin, and he choked. What am I doing? Hurting her to save others? What is wrong with me? He couldn’t even speak. All of his bravado had fled, and once more, he was just a man holding onto the most precious thing in his life. Afraid he’d lose it.
“I’ll help you,” she murmured into the crook of his neck, “but only on one condition. Don’t you dare die.”
Chapter Fifteen
Lacy couldn’t stop shaking. Her hands weren’t all that was cold.
“I trust you,” Jake reminded her, his eyes forward. “Make me look good.”
Well, he’d better trust her. A woman with a pair of scissors in her fingers could be mighty scary, especially one who already painted ghosts for a hobby. Holding a strand of his hair above his head, she held her breath and took the first snip that would turn him from vagrant to civilized. The man had a gorgeous head of hair now that she’d brushed the tangles out and had her fingers sifting through it.
She hated cutting it, but he needed to fit the profile of a businessman, and he refused to wear it in a man bun or a ponytail. He said it made him look like a sissy and no Marine wanted that look.
For now, Jamaal had fallen asleep on the floor alongside the couch. He said he preferred the floor and she understood. She did too sometimes. It connected her to her old life. To her friends in the Corps.
It was past midnight and their plan to infiltrate Poindexter’s office was in place. They’d pooled what little financial resources they had. Jamaal knew where he could pick up a second-hand suit and matching men’s dress shoes for Ja
ke at a local thrift shop in the morning—if someone hadn’t already bought them. He’d pick up three burner phones on his way back. If Jake was as good as he thought, this nightmare could be over by noon tomorrow.
She’d Googled Poindexter’s office address. It ended up being in Foggy Bottom, instead of in the District like Marlee had said. One of the oldest neighborhoods in D.C., its name derived from the industrial haze and fog off the Potomac River to its south. George Washington University took up most of Foggy Bottom’s real estate, but Rafe Poindexter’s recently built office building stood like a beacon of extreme wealth overlooking the river. Facing south, its mirrored glass windows by day were outlined by muted blue lights by night, making it look as if it belonged in Las Vegas instead of the nation’s capital.
He owned the entire fifteen-story building and leased all but the ground floor where his real estate office was located. According to his on-line ad, thirty-three agents worked for him. They were listed along with their pictures. Jake had immediately recognized the two who’d beaten him up. Rocky Rabbit’s real name was Bret Clayton. Ferret Face was Leo Shunck.
The plan was simple. Step one: Lacy would call Rafe first thing in the morning. She’d insist on speaking with him personally, because she had a blackmail offer he couldn’t refuse. Only she had to meet him in person. That ought to get Rafe out of his office in a hurry. His henchmen, too.
Only Lacy and her cohorts wouldn’t be at the meet-me address she was supposed to give him. They’d already be in Foggy Bottom and watching his office from a safe distance. Once Rafe and his thugs cleared out, step two would commence. Jake would enter the building on the pretext of being one of Rafe’s fraternity brothers. The things a person could learn on the Internet.
Jake would pass himself off as Bernie Rothschild, the same college friend who’d trounced Rafe in a previous real estate venture that ended up costing him millions and a lot of pride. Jake’s resemblance to Rothschild was uncanny. He figured he could schmooze his way into Rafe’s office to wait for him, because while Rafe might be proud, he was also greedy. He’d want another chance at his old fraternity brother.
At that point Jake, aka, Bernie, would divulge his plan to publicly declare a merger with his Fortune 500 company, East-Go-Tech, and Rafe’s real estate business that could make Rafe millions.
Crunch time started once Jake was inside Poindexter’s office under the pretext of fraternal camaraderie. If Rafe fell for Lacy’s threat of blackmail, he’d be on his way to Anacostia, a good drive from Foggy Bottom on a good day. Once there, Jake would make the second call as Rothschild, to bring Rafe running back. Another thirty minutes.
That gave Jake an hour to locate the information on the girls from Cambodia, and get his ass out of Dodge before Poindexter made it back to his office. The plan hinged on pride, greed, and on Jake keeping his cool.
Jamaal had said, ’Ain’t nothing hard about it.’
But Lacy thought, ’Sounds impossible to me.’
Pinching another section of Jake’s silky hair in her trembling fingers, she eyed the portion she’d already cut and snipped again to the same length. Jamaal snored like a banshee while section-by-section, Jake’s shaggy hair fell to the floor. With every snip, a very handsome man emerged beneath her hands. By the time she’d taken the electric shaver to his neckline, Lacy was trembling for another reason all together. She’d always been attracted to the neckline of a strong man, but damn. This guy cleaned up nice.
“Wait,” she said, needing to make a minor adjustment to the length over his left ear. “I can do better. Hold still.”
She’d left his hair longer on top. Streaks of mahogany mingled with dark browns fell to his forehead, but it was a hack job at best. Raking her fingers through his hair to make sure all lengths were semi-even, she froze. The tips of her breasts were mere inches from his lips, and his hands were suddenly on her hips as if he needed to hold her in place. Like that helped. Every calloused fingertip of his burned through the thin fabric of her scrub top to her skin. Dark gray eyes peered up at her from beneath the thickest black eyelashes that no man had a right to own, and she knew damned well that her nipples were all but shouting for his attention, the treacherous, swollen little traitors.
“Could I talk you into giving me a shave while you’re at it?” he asked innocently, his palms warming her thighs and other places he hadn’t touched yet.
Uh-huh. Yeah. You can talk me into anything. Liquid heat spiraled to her core. She couldn’t break eye contact, and she was melting at his feet.
“Lacy?” he asked as if she might not have heard. Did he have chapped lips or what? He kept running his tongue over the bottom, licking it like she wanted to lick him.
“Sure,” she answered breathlessly. If one of them didn’t blink pretty soon, she’d combust on the spot, right there. All over him. “But I only have the shaving cream I use, umm, for my legs.”
“Legs. Face. I’m sure it all works the same.”
Heat flamed up her neck at the thought of their faces and legs in close proximity. As quiet as this guy could be, Jake certainly knew how to tweak her libido. Easing away from him before she went up in flames, she set the dangerous scissors in her shaking fingers on the counter and went to retrieve something even more deadly. Her razor.
Determined to get her mind out of the gutter, Lacy marched to her bathroom and shut the door behind her before she flicked the light on. The woman smiling back from her bathroom mirror positively glowed.
Trembling, Lacy gathered her shaving supplies, another towel, and a washcloth for later. She changed the cartridge in her razor. That beard was tough. Stiffening her resolve, she opened the bathroom door.
The sound of her vacuum caught her by surprise. Lacy gulped, paralyzed from the neck down. Jamaal still snored from the floor. The noise of the vacuum didn’t seem to faze him, but it was fazing her. At least the man using it was.
Jake’s shirt now hung over the back of her couch. For a low-life transient, he was built. Pure muscle. Wiry muscle. Lean. Trim. Hard as a rock muscle. His neck and arms were tanned in the way of guys who worked for a living. His broad back was clean. No USMC tattoos marred him, at least not as far as she could see. Lat and traps, holy hell he was packed. Narrow at the waist but thick and solid from there on up. His biceps bunched, stretched, and contracted as he pushed and pulled her cheap little second-hand vacuum. Damn. He made it look like a toy.
To make it better, he was singing, his voice low and nearly overwhelmed by the noise of her vacuum, but not enough that she couldn’t detect the tenderness in his deep baritone. The passion. He closed his eyes and his voice lifted into a heartrending, “Bring him home!”
Lacy’s fingertips reached out to him. She wanted to touch. The guy was to-die-for gorgeous, a bit rough around the edges but one hundred and fifty percent male, and he was in her living room, singing his heart out and working it like a Chippendale stripper. All he needed was the black bowtie around his neck and—
How am I going to shave him now? My hands are shaking. I’ll hurt him.
Jake looked up from his chore and turned the vacuum off. A puzzled smile shifted through his gaze. “Did you say something?”
“Umm, no,” she said, embarrassed unto death because she might’ve blurted that last thought out loud. “You sing?”
His shoulders lifted. “Les Misérables. Sorry. Jean Valjean sings it much better than me. I don’t do it justice.”
She couldn’t stop staring. “It was amazing.”
He shrugged, wrapping the cord around the vacuum’s handle. “Ready?”
Lacy nodded. “Yes, um, take your seat.”
He obeyed instantly and resumed his position at the slaughter, umm, chair. But damn. How did a horny woman, one who could barely keep her hands steady, shave a half-naked man, when she’d rather hang on to those handsome body parts? Right on cue, she fumbled the scissors and they fell. He caught them neatly before they hit the carpet, turned the handles back to her, and it was all she cou
ld do to not meet his gaze. One look would do her in.
“Thanks,” she offered a raspy appreciation and took the scissors without touching his fingers. Or looking into his eyes. “It’s shaggy.” And thick and sexy. “I’ll need to trim the length first.” If my fingers will stop shaking.
He gave her a quick nod of agreement, lifted his chin like an USMC enlistee about to be shaved jarhead style, high and tight. It was all Lacy could do to swallow. He might be sitting there with his hands politely flat to his thighs, but—those thighs. She wanted to be straddling those monsters, not leaning against them.
Once she made the first cut, it was easier to focus on what she was doing and how she had to do it. NOT. This was damned personal work on a gorgeous male, and she was touching his face, nose, and lips, not just the hair on his head. Her fingers refused to stop trembling.
By the time the beard on his sharp rugged chin was shorn to a manageable length, she was drenched and throbbing. Her toes kept curling. How could she continue revealing him, body part by sexy body part, and still give him a proper—and safe—shave?
This handsome face was all hard edges and angles from the jut of his brows over his sexy eyes to his squared-off, delectably clean-shaven jaw. And it was tough not to notice how his nostrils flared. The man seemed to be drawing in steady breaths of—me.
Arousal slammed into her at what he was smelling. Her body’s desire. For him. Shaking her head to clear her mind, she traded the scissors for her razor. Her pink razor. Now the tricky part.
“Don’t you want to apply shaving cream first?” he asked.
Duh! She cringed, stalked to her kitchen sink and ran hot water over the washcloth, sucking in enough air to clear her frazzled mind. “Yes. Sorry. I was—” What? Distracted as hell? Horny as all get out?
“Never mind,” she said brusquely. “Tip your head back.”
His obedience Did. Not. Help! The second he did as she’d ordered, every muscle south of her heaving ribcage clenched. The man was polite, considerate and just plain thoughtful. He’d be so-o-o-o good in bed. Covering his face with the hot wet cloth brought her a short reprieve, but GAH! How was he not affected by the steam rolling between them like waves off the desert? The quicker she finished, the better.
Jake (In the Company of Snipers Book 16) Page 12
