by Amelia Autin
While the other RMM members smashed the expensive movie camera equipment and confiscated whatever exposed film they could find, Jason held one of the digital cameras and sternly addressed the naked men in precise Cantonese. “You’re out of the business as of this minute, understood? If we ever hear so much as a peep you’re even thinking of getting back in, we’ll publish these photos all over Hong Kong. And don’t think we won’t hear—we have eyes and ears everywhere.”
He let his gaze wander over the naked men, lingering on their exposed genitals, and laughed softly. A laugh calculated to belittle and insult. It wasn’t much payback for what these men had been planning to do to the two young women RMM had just rescued, not to mention all the others who’d been forced to participate in making this filth over the years, but it was something.
The producer lost his temper and blasted back, “Who the hell do you think you are? Do you know who I work for? The Eight Tigers will hear of this insult, I swear to you. They will—”
Jason stiffened at the mention of the Eight Tigers. This wasn’t the first time the name had surfaced in an RMM investigation. But it was the first time someone actively involved in the criminal organization had invoked their name, and his voice sharpened. “What about the Eight Tigers?”
The producer trembled, obviously terrified he’d let the name slip. “Nothing. Nothing at all.”
Jason got right in the producer’s face, and in a voice as cold as ice and just as hard, said, “I don’t care if you work for Lucifer himself. You. Are. Out. Of. Business.”
Chapter 10
As always after a rescue, Jason was too wired to sleep. He followed his usual routine of a hot shower—especially hot tonight, as if he needed to eradicate the taint of what had been about to happen before RMM broke in—and a cold bottle of water.
Then, clad in just his boxers, he sought the comforting normalcy of his home office and collapsed into the chair behind his desk. He slumped back, closed his eyes and occasionally sipped from his water bottle as he tried to put tonight out of his mind.
He wasn’t successful. He kept seeing the faces of the two women they’d rescued, especially their eyes. One had looked as if God’s avenging angels had miraculously descended from heaven, saving her from a horrible fate.
But it was the other woman’s eyes that had killed Jason, eyes that betrayed she’d already experienced the worst that could be inflicted on a woman...numerous times. That she had no faith in mankind, and even less in God. And he’d known then and there RMM was too late to save her.
He squeezed his eyes shut tighter, but moisture leaked from the corners. He impatiently dashed it away with a muttered oath, swallowing hard against the sudden constriction in his throat.
“You can’t save them all,” he whispered in the stillness, but the reminder helped only a little.
Weariness invaded his muscles and he craved sleep. But he knew it would be denied him. It would be hours before his exhausted body could conquer the vivid images in his brain, blot them out so he could get the rest he needed.
Desperate to think of something—anything!—that would erase the memory of those bleak eyes from the forefront of his consciousness, he suddenly remembered another set of eyes. Amethyst eyes. Guileless eyes. Innocent eyes. Eyes that had never looked upon the horrors he’d seen.
All at once he needed to hear Alana’s voice. To know there was good in the world. Something clean. Something untouched by the sewers he inhabited as his alter ego. That there was a reason he kept subjecting himself to this mental torture.
Before he could talk himself out of it, he’d picked up his iPhone and pressed the speed-dial button he’d already set up for her. It wasn’t until he heard her sleepy hello that he realized it was almost midnight.
“I’m sorry,” he said quickly. “I shouldn’t have called so late.”
“It’s okay.” He heard her yawn, followed by, “Really, Jason, I don’t mind.” Then, with the unerring perception she seemed to have where he was concerned, she said, “Something bad happened tonight, didn’t it.” A statement, not a question.
“Yes.”
Her voice was soft, soothing and unbelievably comforting. “Tell me.”
He tried to marshal his chaotic thoughts, to weed through them to find the things he could tell her without destroying her innocence. “It was a lightning raid,” he finally confessed. “Six of us went in with explosives and flash-bangs.”
“What’s a flash-bang?”
“A stun grenade. Blindingly bright light, deafeningly loud noise. Hence the nickname flash-bang. But unless you’re careless, nonlethal.”
“Oh, no. Was someone hurt? Killed?”
“No, no, nothing like that.” Just two more women touched by evil. “We’d received a tip about...about a pornographer who had a shoot set up in an old warehouse.” He could hear her sudden intake of breath through the phone, but she didn’t say anything, so he continued. “Two young women, still in their teens. From the little we could get out of them—neither spoke much English—they’d both been trafficked into this.”
“Oh, God.” The distress in her voice was balm to his soul. “I’m so glad you were there to rescue them the way you rescued me.”
He ran a tired hand over his face, wondering if he should admit his failure. Wondering also why it mattered so damn much she not know he’d failed. But then he said, “Not soon enough for one of the women. This wasn’t her first time.”
“Oh, Jason.” There was such empathy in her voice, such caring. Not just for him, but for the woman he couldn’t get out of his mind. “No wonder you can’t sleep.”
“I will...eventually. I just... I just needed to hear your voice.”
“You need more than that, don’t you.” Again, not a question. “I wish I was there with you. I wish I could hold you in my arms and make the world go away. For a little while, at least.”
Make the world go away. That’s exactly what he needed. But he didn’t want to use Alana that way. When he said as much to her, she surprised him. “You don’t know very much about women, do you.” Her third question that wasn’t a question.
Jason’s thoughts winged to the women he’d known in a physically intimate way—including Alana—and tried to suppress a chuckle at her naïveté.
But she must have heard him, because she said, “I’m not talking about sex. I don’t think there’s a man on this planet who knows more about a woman’s body than you do. How to...you know.”
“Right. I’m a sex god.” He could almost see the blush he figured was tinting her cheeks.
“You are, but that’s not what I’m talking about.”
“Then what?”
Her voice softened. “When a woman lo—cares—about a man, she wants to take his pain away, however she can.”
His heartbeat kicked up a notch at what she’d nearly said. Love? Had Alana almost admitted she loved him? Part of Jason thrilled to that idea. But the scene in the warehouse tonight was a vivid reminder of the precarious nature of the world he inhabited. She would never be safe if he let down his guard and let her into his life.
Problem was, he didn’t want to keep her at a distance even though he desperately wanted to keep her safe. And those conflicting emotions threatened everything he’d thought he understood about himself.
Then he forced his mind back to what she was saying.
“Sometimes that means giving him the shelter of her arms. Holding him tight. Letting him know she’s there. Sometimes that means just letting him talk as I’m doing now.” She drew a deep breath and exhaled softly, a gentle sound that did things to him. “And sometimes it means giving him the comfort of her body. Whatever he needs to take away his pain.” There was a tiny pause, then, “That’s how I feel about you, Jason.”
“Alana...lang loi...” He couldn’t find the wor
ds to tell her how moved he was by her admission, but she didn’t seem to need the words.
“I honestly thought you already knew.”
He shook his head, even though she couldn’t see him. “No. I hoped. But I wasn’t sure.”
“What did you think today was all about? Just sex?”
“No! God, no. But...”
She made a little sound that could have meant anything. “Don’t misunderstand, the sex was fantastic. But I wasn’t looking for a lighthearted romp between the sheets, and I don’t think you were, either.”
“I wasn’t.”
“We have something special, Jason. And I for one want the chance to see where this takes us.” He could hear the deep breath she drew, as if she was gathering up her courage to make a momentous declaration, but then she said, “I...care about you.” The slight hesitation made him suspect she’d originally intended to use another word, but had changed her mind at the last minute. Was she unsure?
“No! Don’t say anything,” she commanded when he started to speak. “I didn’t tell you this to try to force your hand. I told you because I believe in honesty between two people who respect and trust one another.”
All unknowing, she’d slipped a knife right between his ribs with that last statement. Because while she’d been honest with him from the get-go, he’d deceived her. Deliberately. And he intended to continue deceiving her. Didn’t he?
But there was one thing he couldn’t lie about. Not now. “I care about you, too.” He more than cared, but if Alana wasn’t ready to admit she loved him, he wasn’t about to put his heart out there, either. Not yet. “I want what you want—the chance to see where we go from here.”
“When? When did you know you...cared?”
Jason couldn’t help but smile because this was one of the things he loved about her. Direct. Forthright. But also a little shy in unexpected ways. “I was intrigued that first night, of course. And the way you looked at me at dinner the following Friday, I knew I was in trouble. Then yesterday, I was so proud of the way you handled yourself during the attempted abduction and the interrogation at the police station, I privately acknowledged I wanted you for my own.”
“You were? You did?”
“I was. I did.”
He could almost hear her brain humming as she digested this. “But...”
“But I was still blind,” he admitted.
“So when did you know for sure?”
“When I apologized on the yacht this morning for what happened yesterday, and you said I didn’t have to.”
“Then? You knew then? Before I told you—” The abrupt way she stopped made it obvious what she meant.
“That I’d be the first? I won’t lie to you—” not about this anyway “—I’ll admit a part of me...a primitive part of me...found that knowledge incredibly appealing. But I’d already gone down for the count by then. It was your eyes,” he said obscurely.
“My eyes?”
“Yes. When you looked at me on the yacht, I realized I’ve never seen eyes so earnest and innocent. Windows into a soul untouched by evil.” He closed his own eyes fleetingly as everything he’d felt in that moment came back to him. “I’ve seen so much evil in my life, Alana,” he confessed in a low voice. “Can you understand why I knew in that instant I needed you to wipe the slate clean for me?”
“I understand.” And the beauty of it was, he believed she did understand. “But I’m far from perfect, you know. I don’t want you to think that I—”
“Not perfect. Just perfection...for me.” Then, being the man he was, he had to know. “When did you...?”
“I was intrigued that first night, too. But I never thought I’d see you again, so I tried not to think about you...too much.”
“But you did.”
“Yes. That next morning, I...”
“You what?”
Her voice was faint and he had to strain to hear. “I realized you were the kind of man I wanted as the father of my children.”
Of all the things he’d imagined she would say, he’d never imagined this. But he suddenly saw Alana in his mind’s eye with a baby in her arms. He knew in his heart she’d be a wonderful mother, just as his own had been.
Hard on the heels of that thought came another, from the primitive side of him—he didn’t want any other man fathering Alana’s children. Which meant her children would have to be his...if he allowed himself to have any, which he’d long ago vowed would never happen.
He shook off that thought, because he wasn’t ready to discuss it with Alana. He would have to eventually, but not right now. “So you were thinking about me three weeks ago,” he said, pretending she’d never mentioned children. “Then what?”
“When I met you again on that Friday, I...I was strongly attracted to you. Again. But it wasn’t until yesterday, when I realized you’re one of the founders of RMM, that I knew you were the man I’d been waiting for.”
Once again Alana had floored him. “I never said that.”
Tender amusement was evident in her voice. “You didn’t have to. But I knew.” Words spoken with such assurance, he didn’t bother trying to deny it.
“And that’s why you fell for me? Because I founded RMM?”
“I told you yesterday, I was waiting for a man as idealistic as I was. And I was holding out for a hero like the ones I dreamed about when I was a teenager. You’re a knight in shining armor, Jason, whether you admit it or not. And you can’t get any more idealistic than RMM. Case in point—the raid tonight.”
“I barely told you anything about it, so how can you say that’s an example of RMM’s idealism?”
“Oh, Jason.” Tenderness was back in her voice. “I’m not as naive as you think I am. I know what goes on in the world. I know that shutting down one pornographer who preys on women is just a drop in the bucket...but it is a drop. Most people just turn a blind eye. But not RMM. Not you. You can’t save everyone, but you save the ones you can.”
Jason’s throat closed and he couldn’t have spoken to save his soul. But Alana wasn’t done. “You saved one woman tonight. That’s one who was spared the evil no woman should ever have to endure. And I heard your pain when you said this wasn’t the first time for the other woman. It’s tearing you apart you couldn’t save her. But what you don’t realize is, you did save her. This time. That’s one less time this abuse was inflicted on her.” There were tears in her voice by the time she finished. “Oh, Jason, don’t you see what a hero you are? How could I not care for a man like you?”
* * *
It was nearly 1:00 a.m. when the phone rang in the penthouse apartment of the High Tiger, waking both his wife and him. He answered it after the fourth ring, and when he heard the name of the man calling, said, “I’ll call you back from my office.”
He curtly told his wife, “Go back to sleep,” and made his way to his office without turning on the hall light.
He flicked on the desk lamp, picked up the phone and stabbed out the number of the man who’d just called him, a number he knew by heart. When the phone was answered by the enforcer in charge of pornography, the High Tiger said, “What is so urgent you must call me at this time of the morning?”
He listened without interruption for several minutes, then said harshly, “So you lost some expensive equipment. So what? Easily replaced from profits. So two women have disappeared. What information can they possibly supply except the names of the men who are already known to this vigilante group? So the producer and director and various other hirelings are wavering on whether they will go back to work tomorrow. This is not the first time we have had to deal with recalcitrant men.
“I am sure you know what needs to be done, so why do you come to me? This is your bailiwick. Deal with the problem.”
Then he slammed the phone down in its cradle and headed
back to bed, mumbling to himself about incompetence.
* * *
Jason’s sudden yawn took him by surprise, and he glanced at the clock. Just over an hour had passed while he’d been talking with Alana, but he was already relaxed enough to know he’d sleep like a baby.
Which meant Alana was spot on when she said he didn’t know much about women. Because just talking with her had taken the load off his shoulders, had let him unwind in this relatively short time the way it normally took him hours. Which meant she was exactly what he needed.
But just because he knew he could finally sleep didn’t mean he was ready to say good-night. For the last ten minutes he hadn’t said much, he’d been content to just listen to Alana’s sweet voice in his ear. Soothing. Calming. So like his sister in certain ways, including that way she had of handling high-strung men.
Not that he considered himself a high-strung man as a general rule. Just in the aftermath of an RMM operation. Success or failure didn’t really make a difference—he was always wound tight afterward.
He’d never sought out a woman after an RMM raid. Had never trusted himself that much because his control was iffy at best in the aftermath, and he prided himself on his control. But he wondered now, would it be different with Alana? Would he still need to be in control 24/7? Or could he relinquish it to her when he couldn’t be sure of being strong on his own?
He didn’t know...but he damn sure wanted to find out.
Another yawn warned him his body was about to shut down, but he still wasn’t ready to end the conversation. He knew he should. She had a job and she needed her sleep. So when she reached the end, he said, “I should let you go, lang loi. I don’t want to say good-night, but—”
“It is late, but I can sleep a little later in the morning, if necessary. Dirk lets me set my own hours, you know. As long as the work gets done, he doesn’t really care. But what about you? Don’t you have to work tomor—I mean, today?”
“Yes, but I’m used to working on very little sleep. I never know when I’ll be called out for something related to RMM. That comes first for me, but I still have a—” company to run, was what he’d almost said. He quickly substituted, “Job. I still have a job.”
