Gray Wolf Security: Back Home

by Glenna Sinclair

  Tommy made an appearance an hour or so after I arrived, but he didn’t look twice at me. It hurt a little, but I knew what he was doing. He didn’t want anyone to suspect a connection between us. I didn’t either.

  But it turns out someone did.

  I was coming back down the hall after walking a client to a room at the end of the same hall where Peach had her room. She was standing in the doorway as I made my way back to the desk. It wasn’t unusual for the girls to stand in their doorways when they didn’t have clients. Every once in a while, a few kind words and a little flirting could earn them a new client.

  “Hey, hostess lady!”

  “What can I do for you, Peach?”

  She grabbed my arm and pulled me into her room, slamming the door behind me. “You need to keep your paws off of Malcolm!”

  I spun around just in time to see her come at me, her bathrobe falling open as she did. I ducked to one side, pinning my arms to my sides to avoid the instinct to hit her. One thing I’d learned working here this week was that damage to the merchandise meant damage to the bottom line. I didn’t want to give Sam any more reason to come after me than I already had.

  “I think you’re misunderstanding something.”

  “And I think you’re a fucking bitch thinking you can come in here and just steal him out from under me. Malcolm is mine and everyone here knows it!”

  “Fine,” I said, waving my hands in the air. “If that’s what you want, I’m good with it. I don’t need a guy like that in my life.”

  “Malcolm’s a rare gem in this place.” Her face was red with passion, her eyes more alive than I think I’d ever seen them. “Stay away from him or I’ll have lots of stories to tell Todd when he gets here at the end of the week.”

  I tilted my head, reminding myself to tread carefully. “Todd?”

  “Todd Michaels. The boss.”

  “I know who he is. But I thought he didn’t come around often.”

  “He’s been down in Mexico, arguing with the Mexican authorities over his brother’s estate. But he’s on his way home now.”

  “How do you know that?”

  She smiled brightly. “I know Todd. I worked for him at The Red Door.”

  “You were a stripper?”

  I hadn’t meant for that to slip out, but she didn’t seem to catch my gaff.

  “I thought I’d try it for a while, but this pays more. And Todd takes better care of us than some other pimps I’ve worked for.”

  She seemed to be bragging, almost like girlfriends do with each other. But then she suddenly turned red in the face again, coming toward me with her fists at her sides.

  “You’ll stay away from him?”

  I almost didn’t realize who she was talking about. When I caught on, I nodded quickly. “Of course. I’ll leave Malcolm alone.”

  “Good. Because I plan on making him a very happy man.”

  “I’m sure you are.”

  I slipped out the door, sending up a quick prayer, hoping Audra and Shaw got all that on tape.

  Chapter 14

  Thomas

  Sam came into the office, his laptop open in his hands. He never seemed to leave that thing, just like the bottle of whiskey he was always slipping out of his inside jacket pocket like we didn’t all know it was there.

  “We’ve got to get this place in shape,” he announced.

  “Isn’t it already?”

  “The boss is coming tomorrow afternoon. He wants to see the books. The real books.”

  Real books? As far as I knew, that was all we had.

  “That prick, Amell, pay up last night?”

  I shook my head. “He promised payment tonight.”

  “Hell,” Sam muttered under his breath. “We’ve let these A-listers get away with too much.”

  I didn’t respond. I hadn’t realized just how many city officials, state politicians, and B-movie actors were on our client list until I did a little internet search the other day out of curiosity. Amell was a state senator with aspirations to run for governor, yet he never seemed to have his wallet on him. He was awfully trusting since one call to the local papers would ruin his career.

  “I’ve got the books here. Most of the clients are paid up.”

  “That’s good. Todd’s going to want all the cash we’ve got on hand. He’s also going to want to have some one-on-one time with that new girl, Kari.”

  The hairs on the back of neck stood up. “Why?”

  “He likes to talk to the employees, check out their stories. Man’s paranoid about some undercover cop infiltrating the organization, you know? Ever since his brother got picked up a couple of months ago because of some bitch working undercover at our nightclub, he’s been super paranoid.”

  I didn’t like it. I didn’t want any of these guys near Kari, but to have her alone with this Michaels fellow where he might be able to figure out she’s private security? It wouldn’t be good. I wasn’t sure I could let it happen.

  “I think Kari might have the night off tomorrow.”

  “Yeah? Who authorized that?”

  “She needed some personal time, something about her kid. I told her it was alright.”

  “I wish you’d clear that stuff with me, Malcolm. I am the boss here, right? You’re just the damn manager.”

  I inclined my head, trying to look subservient even though my fists were clutched at my side. It was getting more and more difficult to be alone with this asshole without putting my hand through his damn skull. I wasn’t sure how much longer I could do this.

  “How long will Michaels be around? I haven’t even met him yet.”

  “I don’t know. He does things on his own schedule.”

  “Okay.”

  “Make sure you get Amell to pay up.”

  Sam walked out of the office, that computer still open in his hands. I could see a video playing, or it might have been a live stream. It was Strawberry’s room upstairs. She was a dark beauty with breasts that only a surgeon could have perfected. She was with an older white guy, giving him the blow job of his life. Sam was watching so hard that he nearly walked into the door frame. Probably the best he’d ever experienced, too.

  I waited a beat, then went to the door and called to Kari. She came immediately, smoothing her hands over the back of her short skirt. I found myself wondering where she’d gotten all these short skirts and if she might consider keeping one or two when this whole thing was over.

  A man could hope, right?

  “Sam okayed your day off tomorrow.”

  Kari looked at me, a question so clear in her eyes that I could read it like the print on a book: What the hell are you talking about? But she didn’t object.

  “Thanks, Malcolm.”

  “Your kid…I hope he’s okay.”

  “I’m sure he will be.”

  She turned to go, but I couldn’t let her just walk away. I knew I should, knew that my feelings for her had to stay on the back burner until this thing was over. But whenever I looked at her…I couldn’t help myself.

  I grabbed her wrist before she opened the door and pulled her into the corner there between the edge of the door and the far wall. The camera couldn’t reach into this corner the way it was set on the desk. Even Sam hadn’t thought to pay the extra money for the kinds of cameras he could remotely refocus.

  She didn’t fight me, nor did she say anything. She tilted her head to look up at me, her gloss covered lips slightly parted. I loved her eyes, the deep green that was like the clear waters of the ocean, the dark lashes that fringed them. I loved her nose, the slender line that ended in a cute little ball. And I loved her full lips, loved them naked, loved them covered in this gooey gloss. Most of all, I loved the taste of her, the taste of her tongue, of the day warm in her mouth, of the thing that was unique to Kari.

  I dreamt of her kisses.

  I kissed her, moving slowly, gently, the way my sister had told me to be. Always be gentle with a woman and she will love you forever. Always put her
needs in front of your own. Always make her your priority.

  I tried. I worked hard at doing those things before Kari. With Kari, it was easy. I didn’t have to think about it anymore. I wanted to be gentle, wanted to put her first. Until this. Until this monster walked into my life and made it too easy to finish what he’d started ten years ago.

  I still wanted to put her first. But making that choice…

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered softly near her ear.

  She shook her head. She looked up at me, her eyes filled with emotion, none of it anger or fear. I was more grateful for that than I could ever express. I kissed her again, harder this time. She responded, her body pressing up against mine, her hands slipping around my back. I hadn’t realized how afraid I was that she would never want anything to do with me again until this moment, until I could feel her submitting to me the way she used to do.

  My gratefulness made me eager.

  I slid my hand over her ass, down the back of her thigh and drew it up against me, held her tight so that I was touching places that were normally hidden in the course of a normal day. She groaned, her lips falling down over my chin and along the angles of my throat. She nibbled at that place just above my collar, her tongue taking a little swipe underneath the cotton of my t-shirt.

  I groaned, twisting my fingers in her hair to pull her mouth back where I could taste it again. I kissed her roughly, needing to bury as much of myself inside of her as I could get. She tugged at my shirt, pulled it up so that she could run her hands over my abdomen. My muscles quivered where she touched me, celebrating the return of the one touch they’d craved so deeply these last few weeks.

  I wanted her. I wanted her in a proper bed where I could take my time and do things to her that we hadn’t yet done. I wanted to taste her, every inch of her. I wanted to be inside every orifice, wanted to feel everything, wanted to watch her writhe in pleasure beneath my body. And I wanted to do it over and over again until we both lost our minds.

  But this wasn’t the place for this.

  I broke our kiss and rested my chin on her head, trying to catch my breath as I tugged her as close to me as I could get her. She felt good there, felt like she was an extension of the body God had given to me. I wanted to hold her there forever.

  “I know.”

  I looked down at her, caught off guard by those words uttered in her breathless voice.

  “Know what?”

  She touched my bottom lip. “I want to help.”

  I studied her face, suddenly aware that she meant Sam. She wanted to help me take him down. I shook my head, but she pressed a finger to my lips to keep me from speaking. Then she reached up on her tip toes and kissed me once more before slipping out of my arms and out of the room.

  I watched her go, wondering what the hell I’d just gotten her into.

  I had never intended to do this with a partner. I knew the consequences if things didn’t go as planned. I was willing to suffer them, but I didn’t want to be responsible for someone getting caught up in the ordeal. Especially not Kari.

  What the hell had I just done?

  Chapter 15

  Kari

  “He’s coming tomorrow.”

  “You don’t know that,” Shaw said, accepting the cup of tea I was holding out to her. “He could have wanted you out of there for some other reason.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Audra was staring into the depths of her own tea cup, curled up on the same part of the couch where Xander had sat that morning. She slowly looked up as though she was afraid of disturbing the steam coming from her cup.

  “She’s probably right. I bet he’s coming tomorrow.”

  Shaw studied the both of us. “Just like that?”

  I shrugged as I settled down on the couch beside Audra. “That girl, Peach, told me that he’d been in Mexico working out his brother’s estate. That could be true, right? You were there when he died, weren’t you?”

  A ghost crossed Shaw’s face, but she nodded. “I was. And it makes sense. But can we really believe something a prostitute and a rogue FBI agent told us?”

  “We trust what criminals say all the time.”

  Shaw sighed, clearly agreeing with that.

  “I’ll go in and talk to Joss in the morning, see how she wants to handle it.”

  “Tommy gave me the night off. Should I go in anyway?”

  Audra shook her head. “That’ll just make them suspicious.”

  The three of us sat back, sipping our hot tea at three in the morning. We’d gotten into this crazy schedule and found it difficult to settle down before dawn. It was nice to know that we were all in the same boat together.

  “How is Joss, anyway?” Shaw finally broke the silence to ask. “I heard she moved her family to the Gray Wolf compound last week.”

  “Ash was shot at. For some reason, that translated into trouble for the Matthews family.” Audra lifted a shoulder in a subtle shrug. “I guess this Mahoney guy is after her husband for some reason and she thinks the shooting on Ash and his wife was a warning for her and her family. She's scared to death.”

  “I heard she was attacked by some guy with a knife.”

  My eyes widened as I regarded Shaw. “Seriously?”

  She nodded. “Jules told Tony and he told me. She was walking through a parking garage at some hotel and fights off one guy. Then this other guy just walks up and stabs her.”

  “Shit!” I shook my head. “That’s rough!”

  “That’s what happens when you get on the bad side of someone like Jack Mahoney.” Audra sipped her tea. “Ask Xander’s mother. She was kidnapped and held hostage by some of his people for a little over a year.”

  “That sucks.”

  Audra nodded. “It did, actually.”

  We all fell quiet as we considered the people we were up against here. I already knew about Jack Mahoney before I came to work for Gray Wolf. But being in the trenches with his people made it more real, more concrete, than it might have seemed before.

  Sam Wilson had killed a woman who was close to Tommy. He could do that same to me without much provocation. That was a reality that scared the shit out of me.

  “You know about Joss, right?” Audra suddenly asked.

  I glanced at her. “I know she’s made a reputation for herself over the years. She took out some other mob boss while protecting a client.”

  “Yeah, but before that... do you know about her first family?”

  Shaw and I exchanged a glance. “No. I didn’t even know she had a first family.”

  “I did some research on her. She was married to this guy right after she left the Army, a teacher in Illinois. They had a baby boy and she was a stay-at-home mom. One night, her husband and baby go on a nighttime run to the grocery store and they’re hit by a drunk driver. The husband dies while waiting for emergency services to arrive. The baby dies some time later in the hospital.”

  “Wow. That’s rough.”

  I chewed on my bottom lip. “What happened to the other driver?”

  Audra tilted her head. “He was tried and convicted. While in prison, he was beaten so severely that he ended up in wheelchair. He committed suicide sometime after that.”

  “Good,” Shaw said. “That’s karma.”

  “An accident is one thing, but getting behind the wheel after drinking? That’s just asking for trouble.”

  I agreed. “Amazing how Joss managed to pull it together.”

  “Yeah. I don’t know if I could have,” Audra admitted. “If someone so callously killed Xander like that, I wouldn’t just sit back and watch the justice system punish him. I’d have to take a little justice into my own hands.”

  “Same here,” Shaw said, nodding emphatically. “I’d kill for Malik. He’s already proven he’d do it for me.”

  I thought about my childhood, the families I’d lived for. I once thought I might feel that way about Daniel, but until now, he was the only one who elicited passionate feelings like that i
nside of me. But Daniel turned out to be a selfish asshole, rushing off to Europe to be with some woman he met over the internet. Who does that sort of thing? I never thought I’d trust someone that much again, that I’d care that much again. But maybe I did.

  I was, after all, willing to go up against a killer like Sam Wilson for Tommy. Wasn’t that the same thing?

  After Shaw and Audra left a few hours later, I was too restless to go to bed. I wasn’t supposed to have it, but my personal cellphone was tucked into a pocket of the overnight bag I’d brought when I began this case. I pulled it out and powered it on, pleased to see the small icon that was Tommy’s face. He’d sent me text messages multiple times over the past week, the majority right after our first encounter at the motel, but at least one a day since.

  I read them slowly, a tear coming to my eye as I imagined his voice in my ear saying these words:

  I never wanted to hurt you. I’m so sorry.

  I need to hear your voice. I think about you every second of every day.

  My first thought every morning is you. I reach for you across the bed, imagining your scent on the air. I miss you.

  When this is over, we’ll go away, talk it all out. Remember what this thing between us was before this darkness fell over us.

  It went on and on, message after message, each as heartfelt as the first. I physically ached as I thought of all the nights we sat on the small step outside my apartment, just two friends talking over a bottle of beer. And then the night I invited him inside, telling him I wasn’t interested in a relationship. I only wanted to have fun.

  I think he saw through me even as the words were slipping from my lips.

  He was still that man, the one who came over with a huge grin on his handsome face the day I moved in and selflessly offered to help. Without him, I never would have gotten my new refrigerator through the narrow door.