Four Seconds to Lose: A Novel

by K. A. Tucker

  A cool finger suddenly grazes my skin behind my ear, where my tattoo is. “She must have been someone very important to you,” Charlie murmurs, tracing the letters softly.

  I don’t answer, the feel of her skin against mine—despite the reminder of my past—igniting something deep inside. I need her to not be touching me like that right now. The intensity of the day is finally merging with my testosterone, creating a pent-up ball of stress inside. She’s not wearing a bra and that shirt is cut way too low. When she hugged me earlier, I could feel her nipples through the thin fabric. I was so relieved when she pulled away, before she had a chance to feel the response in my jeans. But now she’s basically shoving them in my face, the way she has positioned herself. I wonder if that’s intentional.

  “You have blood on your shirt,” she murmurs suddenly, her finger moving from my neck to tap my shoulder.

  My skin begins to tingle as I turn to indeed see the dark brownish-red stain. “Fuck. That woman must have bled all over me when she was on my back. I’ve got something in my car,” I mutter, starting to rise as the first beads of sweat begin to form. I don’t have many weaknesses. Other people’s blood on me is a distracting weakness. I’ve had plenty of experience with that, but it never bothered me until the night Penny died, when I couldn’t get her blood off my hands, no matter how hard I scrubbed.

  Charlie’s hand pushes down against my collarbone, instantly freezing me.

  “Stay. I’ll get it. You need to sit for a while.” Removing her hand from my body, she holds it out, her brow arched expectantly.

  Normally, I’d dismiss her assertiveness with a gentle shake of my head and smile. Normally, I wouldn’t be in her apartment—ten feet away from her bed—in the first place. But I’m too agitated to focus. Besides, nothing seems to be normal today.

  Charlie’s eyes watch my hand as I slide it into my pocket to pull out my keys. I hope she doesn’t notice the other bulge in my pants. “Black Navigator. Golf bag on the backseat.”

  I’m on my feet and yanking the soiled shirt off without a second’s consideration, tossing it on the ground. It’s garbage now. I won’t even bother to wash it. Adjusting myself as my eyes roam the space, I wonder where she hid that gun. Or more important, why she has it in the first place. Protection, likely. She’s a single woman in Miami and she lives here. I’d bet good money that the serial number is scratched off and she doesn’t have a license to carry. But she seemed to know how to use it, as steady as her hands were.

  Atheist or not, I need to say a small prayer that her neighbors didn’t mention Charlie having a gun when the cops showed up. I doubt that even Storm’s fiancé, Detective Dan Ryder, would have enough pull to bury that legal issue.

  My eyes land on the rumpled bed again, on the silky white sheets that Charlie sleeps in. Without thinking, I stroll over to it, picking up the edge and sliding the material through my fingers. These are expensive. People who live in the Miami ghetto don’t spend money on expensive bedding unless it’s a luxury they’ve become accustomed to, a luxury they don’t think twice about. And yet, this is not a place that someone accustomed to luxury would allow herself to be buried in. I mean . . . she knows that it’s infested. The counter is lined with Tupperware containers and there’s a fucking can of Raid next to her toaster, for Christ’s sake. And to top the contradiction off nicely, a pair of fancy heels—identical to Vicki’s—lie next to her bed. I’m a betting man and I’m betting that these aren’t knockoffs. And if Vicki’s wearing them, then they’re by one of those high-end designers.

  Maybe Charlie’s a thief.

  Perfect. I’ve hired an underage thief.

  I pull my phone out of my pocket to check the screen for any missed calls from my private eye. Nothing. I let the phone drop back into my jeans and instinctively move to adjust myself again, silently cursing my dick for not focusing on the more pressing matter at hand.

  The crunching sound of a piece of mirror glass missed in the cleanup is the only thing that warns me of Charlie’s presence. I turn to find her standing in the doorway, her eyes wide with panic as she stares at me, standing over her bed with one hand on her sheets and my other one on myself. I let go of both, but it’s not soon enough.

  In seconds, the panic on her face smooths over. “What are you doing?” Her gaze shifts between my face and her bed. And my upper body, which is now bare.

  And my groin.

  For the first time in I don’t know how long, I feel heat burn my ears. “Nothing weird.” I think I may have just topped Rick Cassidy in terms of sleaze. Bravo, Cain. “Maybe a little weird,” I correct, having nothing better to say to offset the awkwardness.

  She slowly walks over to me, stealing furtive glances at my chest. I’m used to catching women’s eyes on my body. I put several hours in at the gym each morning, so I know I’m in damn good shape—even better shape than when I was eighteen and fighting. But having Charlie’s gaze on me makes my nerve endings spark like electric circuits gone haywire. It makes me unable to think straight.

  She ducks her head, but I catch the adorable smile curling her lips when she looks up again, and my shoulders sag with relief that I haven’t completely freaked her out. Holding up the black shirt that I had tucked into a bag for the rare morning of golf, she asks, “Is this good?”

  “Perfect. Thanks.” Our fingertips graze when she hands it to me, stirring my blood more. I watch as she turns to walk to the kitchen, her perfect round ass swaying in those little shorts. I need to get out of here before I explode in my pants.

  She bends over to pull a small bottle of bleach from under the sink. Forcing my eyes away, I slide my arms through the sleeves and yank the shirt over my head.

  Charlie lets out a shriek and jumps back from the sink area, tossing a small cleaning brush away, together with the bleach.

  “They like dark, damp spots,” I say softly, putting two-and-two together.

  She nods and bites her bottom lip, a mixture of disgust and anger marring her beautiful face as she allows her body to shudder once. I grit my teeth against the tiny smile that threatens. Not because her situation is amusing, but because she finally reacted the way I’d expect her to. Because I finally see an expression on her face that seems unguarded and uncontrolled.

  Persuasive Cain is gone. “You’re not staying in this apartment, Charlie. Not for one more night.” I slide my phone out of my pocket. “Pack your things. Now.” I can’t help the severity in my tone; it tends to escape in situations where I have to take control.

  Charlie turns to regard me with a hard glare. I wonder how she’ll react to my more unpleasant side. I don’t give her a chance to argue. “This is nonnegotiable. If you want to work for me, you’re not living next door to a bunch of crackheads. I don’t want you anywhere near that shit.” I hit “call” on my phone, adding, “I know of a good place.”

  Turning my back to her, I wait. Maybe she’ll launch something at my head. It wouldn’t be the first time . . .

  The familiar, gruff voice answers on the third ring. “Tanner here.”

  chapter ten

  ■ ■ ■

  CHARLIE

  “You drive a brand-new Sorento and you live in the slums?” Ginger’s pretty face twists up in bewilderment from my passenger side. She climbed in the second I pulled into the apartment complex parking lot, behind Cain. Her hair is styled poker-straight and smooth today, reaching all the way to her chin in multicolored stripes.

  “I inherited it.” The lie slides off my tongue so easily. It’s the same lie I gave to Cain when he helped load my belongings into the back. I could tell by the blank stare that he might not buy it, but he didn’t call me out.

  Thank God Sam didn’t send me here with another Volvo—this whole charade would be that much harder to sell. Then again, I imagine a Volvo wouldn’t have lasted one night in the other apartment’s building’s parking lot. The truth is I al
most sold my SUV to bank the money. But that could get back to Sam through Jimmy, and it would raise questions. I figure I can get about twenty grand on its sale the second I’m ready to leave.

  My eyes roll over the white-stucco apartment building in front of us. Despite the bars on the bottom-floor windows, it looks nice enough and well maintained. Nothing fancy, but hopefully not a place where I have to worry about getting shot, standing in the middle of my studio.

  I think I did a pretty good job of hiding my emotions from Cain today. But, considering I carry a constant feeling of threat on my shoulders nowadays, I don’t think this was as shocking for me as it would be for someone else. Either way, I didn’t want to appear vulnerable in front of my new boss, so I did my best to focus on making light of the situation while I iced the bump on his head.

  “So, you live here?”

  “A bunch of us do. Me, Mercy, Hannah, China.”

  “China?” I repeat, tossing a sidelong glance at Ginger. “The China?” The viper who almost made me cry last night?

  She snorts. “Yeah, the one and only. Bad news is she’s a bitch. Good news is she’s fine if you get on her good side.” That’s Ginger. She’s blunt and snarky, but she always tries to keep things positive.

  “Does Cain live here, too?”

  “Cain?” Ginger snorts. “No way. He lives somewhere downtown. But he owns the building. Bought it two years ago.”

  “He owns this building,” I repeat, my tone flat. “And four of his strip club employees live here.”

  “Five, now,” Ginger corrects with a grin.

  “You’re kidding me, right?” I’ll be stripping for him and living under his “roof”? If I don’t get fired for providing false references, that is. What the hell? In my haste to get away from my domineering drug-dealing stepfather, have I allowed myself to be acquired by a pimp?

  Ginger seems oblivious. “I know it’s a little strange. Cain is a little strange. But you’ll be my neighbor now!” She lets out an excited squeal. “We can have coffees in the mornings with Mercy and go to the gym together. You can be my guinea pig for test recipes.” Ginger is taking culinary classes but refuses to eat anything she makes, for fear of turning into a portly chef, she says. “We can drive to work together, too! I hear you’ll be working with me every night.” With a raised brow, she adds, “That’s a lot of Ginger time for you. I hope you realize how lucky you are.”

  Oh, man. Laying low is hard to do when you have people watching your every move . . . Shit . . . I can’t have anyone seeing me heading to a drop, in disguise. That’s how questions begin. I can’t have people asking questions.

  None of them can ever know what I’m into.

  I should have kept my roach-infested apartment, but Cain made it clear that wasn’t an option. He walked me to the superintendent and, after watching them have a heated conversation about bullet holes and appalling conditions, followed by threats about having the place condemned—I don’t know if Cain can make that happen, but he sure as hell sounded convincing—I handed in my keys and the landlord handed me back my security deposit.

  I watch as Cain’s lean body slides out of his driver’s seat, with his phone to his ear. I don’t know whether to be thankful or angry with the way things played out today.

  Or worried.

  Sure, the fact that I might get a night’s sleep without having to leave the lights on is more than enticing. But . . . why is he doing all this? I now have a job and what I assume will be a better place to live. What will he want in return? Everyone wants something.

  Sam sure does.

  And Cain is doing it all despite not knowing anything about me. Except that I have a gun, which he didn’t even say a word about.

  “He sure likes to get involved with his employees’ lives,” I say out loud.

  Ginger’s gaze locks on her boss. Now, our boss. “Yeah, he tends to.” She pauses. “But not in a bad way. He’s a good guy,” she assures me. “A little different, sometimes. Reclusive. Charming, occasionally. And he can be moody, but who wouldn’t, with all the shit he deals with.”

  I have to agree with her. I caught rare glimpses of a joking, playful Cain earlier today, with his soft chuckles. They were few and far between but when he loosened up, I couldn’t deny there was a magnetic pull. Most of the time, though, he seems stressed—his back rigid, his keen eyes boring into me as if scouring for answers.

  I watch him now as he begins to pace, one hand deftly adjusting the collar of his new shirt while he talks. By the deep wrinkles in his forehead, he doesn’t look impressed with the conversation. Maybe it’s my background check.

  Not good.

  When I came back from grabbing that shirt from his ­Navigator—a spotless, well-maintained vehicle that smelled fresh and clean, like him—I found him standing next to my bed and I immediately panicked. I thought he had discovered the wigs I’d hidden. But then I was distracted by the fact that my sheets were in his hand. The 1200-thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets that I had to buy because cheap sheets make my skin itch and keep me up half the night, paranoid that bugs are scurrying all over me.

  And he was shirtless.

  And his other hand was on his groin.

  That was a super-awkward moment.

  Awkward because I didn’t know what he was doing, and awkward because I instantly wanted him to offer me the same ultimatum that Rick had. At that very moment, I would have submitted.

  “And he’s intense,” Ginger says, cutting into my thoughts. She pauses. “And principled. Cain marches to a different beat. I mean, I’ve heard the kinds of things that some of these girls try on him, and he never takes the bait.”

  “Never?” I feel my face tightening with doubt as I gaze out at the tall, dark form again, still on the phone. “Bullshit.” I don’t believe it. It doesn’t matter, because he can do whatever—or whoever—he wants.

  “No . . .” Ginger’s soft chuckle fills my truck. “Ben jokes that Cain must have a malformed, Hobbit-sized penis, because there’s no way any man can own a strip club and have the pick of the litter—Ben’s words, not mine—and not take advantage.”

  “That’d be unfortunate,” I mumble. The very idea of Cain with a malformed, Hobbit-sized penis leaves my insides heavy with disappointment. I feel Ginger’s curious green eyes on me as I ask, “Has anyone ever seen him with a woman?”

  “Nope. Well, maybe Nate, but good luck getting any dirt out of him. That guy is like Cain’s own private Chinese wall.”

  I could see Cain preferring a sophisticated, suit-wearing woman with a pinched nose and a snotty attitude, who only ever has sex in a bed with the lights off. Who he would never bring around to a strip club. But, then, why would he own one in the first place? And why would she be okay with him owning it? Unless she doesn’t know that he owns a club.

  And may or may not be a pimp.

  All these conflicting thoughts swirl around my head, none of them fitting the man I see before me. Unless . . . An even more disheartening thought pops into my head. “Do you think Cain’s gay?”

  Ginger’s derisive snort and confident head shake tells me she doesn’t think so, and a sigh of relief escapes me before I can help myself. “He may not ever touch the girls, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t caught him adjusting himself when one of them walks by and accidently,” she uses air quotes, “brushes her ass into his groin.” She pauses. “He doesn’t fire them for it, though some of them deserve to be tossed out. I’ve actually never seen him fire a dancer, not once. Oh,” she scowls. “I lied. There was one. But that girl was dealing drugs out of Penny’s. Cain has a huge issue with drugs. I think it’s one of the reasons he hates Rick Cassidy so much. We don’t know if Rick’s the one supplying the girls with drugs or if he’s got some slimeball dealer working with him, but all the girls that go in to Sin City seem to come out addicts.”

  Heat crawls up my neck
and ears and I feel a light sheen form on my forehead.

  Ginger continues, though, unaware of my rising discomfort. “There was this girl—Mindy—who worked at Penny’s a few years back. She was super nice, and she worked hard. But then she started dating this local pot dealer. Complete douchebag. Cain wouldn’t even let him in the parking lot to pick her up. Sure as hell wasn’t allowed inside Penny’s. For weeks, Cain and Nate were driving Mindy home at night because she didn’t have her license and Cain didn’t like the idea of her riding the bus at that hour.”

  There’s a long pause, during which Ginger says nothing while studying her green fingernail polish, and I finally have to prod her. “So what happened?”

  I get a dismissive flip of her hand. “Oh, Cain finally got through to her and she dumped the guy. It was around the same time that he ended up busted by the cops.” She grins. “All those dirtbags tend to get what’s coming to them when Cain is involved.” Ginger’s perfectly shaped eyebrows pull together. “My point is, don’t worry. Short of breaking the law, your job is safe.”

  Oh, Ginger . . . if you only knew. Would Cain spend weeks trying to talk me out of my crooked life? Doubtful. Would he fire my ass in a second? Likely. Would he go as far as to make sure that I end up behind bars, where I belong?

  Being around someone like Cain is sounding more dangerous to my future by the second.

  “Anyways, Penny’s is his life. He practically lives there. He makes a point of not watching the dancers perform and he doesn’t sleep with the staff. He stays in his office when the club is open. He’s a quiet, private guy who doesn’t say a lot, but you can tell he has a lot to say.” Her little nose scrunches up. “You know what I mean?”

  I nod slowly. “Yeah, I know.” I could tell by the way his eyes stayed glued to my face that those wheels were constantly turning. Even now, as Cain seems to be engrossed in conversation, his hand continues rubbing his neck, over that tattoo. “Who’s Penny?”