by Nana Malone
“Oh, she’s scared all right. I wish I knew of what though.”
“Don’t be an asshole, Caleb. Tell me where she is.”
“No can do. But I will tell you she’s safe.”
“Caleb, let’s not forget why you even have her in the first place.”
“Because you needed a favor, and you’ve officially run out of friends in this country.”
“Fuck you. You’re helping me because I can get you the answers you’re looking for. To give you those answers, I need an unharmed girl.”
“I know the information you claim to have. One question, how’d you come about it?”
She sighed as if talking to someone very small or someone very slow. “I already told you. Cabrillo thinks I’m working with him. I’ll give you the name of the leak as soon as I have what I need. Now stop fucking around.”
Caleb’s skin crawled. He didn’t want his suspicions to be right, but at the end of the day, he knew Sabine. She was lethal and conniving. They might have been partners, but he’d put nothing past her.
“I’ll call you when I’m ready to share, Sabine.” He hung up. He’d have to move up his plan if he wanted to keep the girl safe.
***
Micha’s whole body ached. From the top of her head to the ends of her pedicured toes she was in pain. Every step of those twelve miles that morning wore on her. Her body could normally handle it, but she’d been so aware of her running partner she’d been unable to relax. And running twelve miles like someone had charged her whole body with electrodes was torture. Not to mention, she’d barely slept last night, given their extracurricular activities.
All day, he worked at a desk with perfect sight lines to her office. Every time she’d looked up from her machine, there he was in all his buffed-out glory. God, that man was sexy. Strictly from an objective stand point, he oozed sex appeal. And he wasn’t even her type. Okay, no, he was. Good-looking enough to turn heads, certainly smart. But she’d been overly dismissive of him before. Yeah, sure, she wanted to know what he was like in the sack. Because Lord knew that man could dance, but he’d always come across to her as sweet. Kind. Normal. The way he’d insisted on taking her to dinner. Refusing to sleep with her. The kind of things guys who like relationships do. Too bad she wasn’t into relationships. Hell, in the last two years she’d barely been into sex. Sure, she’d had some, but not as much as she was sure people assumed.
She talked a good game, but at the core, she was as vulnerable as any other woman. She needed a connection with someone to have sex, and she’d been too enthralled with Caleb to really get into any guy. She’d figured she’d get over it eventually, but she’d figured wrong. And now she’d gone and slept with him. It was so colossally stupid. And hot. Not to mention irrational, thrilling, and moronic. Now she’d never get him out of her system.
But she was a healthy woman; eventually she’d cave and sleep with someone even if she wasn’t that into them. Or you could sleep with Caleb again.
Her head throbbed as she dragged her attention back to her monitor, and she rubbed her temples. She was so focused on the article in front of her that she didn’t even notice him come in.
“Hey, sorry to interrupt, but can you come with me for a minute?”
The hairs on her arms stood at attention. “Shit, what’s the matter now?”
“Nothing. Sorry to alarm you. I need you for five minutes, to look at something for me. I promise it won’t take long.”
Eyeing him dubiously, she followed him out of her office, but he didn’t take her to his temporary desk, instead lead her to the back stairwell. “Caleb, where the hell are we going?”
“You’ll see. Follow me for a second.”
Five flights of stairs later, he led her out onto the roof. The building had popped for a barbeque area and some seating, so when it was nice, many of the tenants would come up to get a taste of sunshine without having to go to the street level.. “I’ve seen the roof, it’s not that exciting.”
Caleb led her closer to the edge, and she dug in her heels as much as she could in the spiky Louboutins. “Caleb, just an FYI, you’re failing at your job if you actually throw me off the roof. It’ll wreck your reputation.”
His lips twisted into a smirk. “If I wanted you dead, I wouldn’t leave behind a body.”
She studied him. To her he was a protector, but to someone who crossed him or hurt an innocent, he would do real damage.
He slid behind her with his hands on her waist. “Now, close your eyes.”
“Caleb, what in the world—”
“Just close them, all right? For me.”
Feeling more than a little foolish, she complied, letting her eyelids flutter shut. Carefully, he maneuvered her a little to the left.
“You can open them now.”
When she cracked her eyes open, she noticed a stream of large bubbles coming from the roof across the way. Unable to help herself, she giggled as some of the smaller ones splashed against her arms. “What is this?”
“Rodrigo noticed they were having some crazy photo shoot the next building over and they’re using a bubble machine.” He shrugged. “You looked stressed, so I figured I’d bring you up here for a little breather. Let you have some fun for a minute.”
Micha tipped her head back to look at him. He’d done this for her. Simply to see her happy. He was right; he did see her. It scared the shit out of her, but it was the truth. And as much as she might fight it, she felt good with him. Spine tingling good. But if she let him close he’d have the power to hurt her. And she was not going through that shit again. She’d barely survived the last time. The key was to not get too emotionally attached. For a little while she could enjoy being with him and not get sucked in too deep. That way she wouldn’t get hurt. Or worse, hurt him.
Giving herself permission to enjoy, she relaxed into his hold.
***
Several hours after her interview, Micha gave Caleb a beaming smile as she exited the courthouse.
“Everything good?” he asked as he helped her down the last step.
“Yeah, fine. I have what I need for the piece. It’s not as sexy as the entertainment stuff, but a local judge with an autistic daughter commenting on recent policy is news worthy.”
He walked her to the car, always on alert, checking for shadows. Her car was still in the shop, getting a new coat of paint, so they took his BMW. He opened the door for her, and she slid in. Once they pulled away from the curb he said, “I’m going to be tied-up tonight. I need to check on another case. So I’ll have someone else on you. Can you do me a favor and not go anywhere?”
A quip sat on the tip of her tongue, but she recognized the strain in his face with the tight lines around his mouth and thought to behave herself. “Yeah fine, I can stay put.”
“Thanks. The cameras have been set up in your office, and all the employees have been cleared, so I’m going to post someone in the lobby for now, okay?”
“Uhm, yeah. What about the apartment?” Did this mean he wouldn’t be staying with her anymore? She fought the urge to slap herself. Who the hell was she? The body snatchers could not have her body. She wasn’t this weak-willed creature that depended on anyone. She was a Bennett for the love of God. And Bennetts showed no fear.
“It’s been wired. So I’ll have a guy outside, and for the next couple of days, I’ll post someone outside your door too, but there’s no need for me to stay with you.”
“Oh. Right.” No nookie bedtime pill for her then.
Her iPhone buzzed. The screen indicated a text message. She clicked the message icon to open it. Her breath caught, and she immediately wished she hadn’t opened the text. A video started of her, on her couch. Riding Caleb. Clutching onto him for dear life. He gazed up at her with lust and focused determination and something else she couldn’t identify. As she rode him, he clutched her ass firmly and pumped into her. Her breasts hung in his face, and he took a nipple between his lips and sucked. Just seeing the video was enough
to simultaneously horrify and arouse her.
“Caleb.”
His voice deepened and his brows snapped down over his eyes as he darted her a glance and blared his horn at a taxi drifting into their lane. “What?”
She held up the video, and he immediately pulled over to the right, cutting off a bicyclist and a town car. “Where the fuck did you get that?”
“I d-don’t know. Someone sent it to me. How are they able to see into my apartment? Who did this?”
Caleb stared, his eyes growing stormy. “Micha. The fucking blinds were open last night. I-I’m sorry.”
“No, Caleb. Don’t give me that shit. We live on the third floor. The only unit that has this vantage point into mine is yours. Where the fuck did someone get this? How did they tape us?”
“Shit. Shit. Shit. There’s the unit to the right of mine. From the right angle, they could see into your living room.”
Her heart thundered in her ears. Who the fuck would do this? The violation burned like fire in her throat.
Her phone buzzed again, and she snatched it from him. This time it was a text. Give me what I want, or the video goes viral.
“What does it say, Micha?”
She showed him her phone, and he cursed. “Look, we’ll find who’s doing this. I swear to you. This is not getting out. It’ll be fine. I’ll make of it. Shit. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking last night.”
Micha snatched her phone, grabbed a bobby pin from her hair, took out the SIM chip, and handed it to him. “I assume you need this to find whoever is doing this. This asshole doesn’t know me at all. They think threatening me will make me back off. All it does is piss me off.”
They sat in tense silence until Caleb spoke again. “We need to talk about Jax.”
“Simon? What about him?” Micha stiffened her back. She didn’t want to get into the Simon thing. That part of her life was long-buried.
“Well someone obviously doesn’t want you to talk to him. I still have feelers out on the wife. It could be about him specifically or it could be about the job. What’s your best guess?”
Micha shrugged. “Honestly, I don’t know. With the flowers and things, I thought it had more to do with me than with him. About me getting promoted or getting the media spotlight. But even if there was jealousy, I can’t see any of my coworkers going this far.”
“And if it’s not about you?”
“Then it doesn’t make much sense to me. Before yesterday, I hadn’t seen or spoken to him since that day in New York. Zero contact. There’s no connection there.”
“When you guys broke up, that was it, the end of communications?”
“He was called as a witness in the trial against wifey, but that was it. I was in the room, but we didn’t speak directly.” She tried not to think of how he’d looked at her beseechingly from the witness stand. His eyes grave and apologetic. Guilty.
Micha shook it off. “This can’t be about me and him personally, because there is no me and him, except for this interview.”
Caleb wove between cars as he took the 163 north toward their apartment building. “This also could have to do solely with him. A fan of his going after you because they see you as a potential threat.”
Great. All the myriad ways someone could try and kill her. She shivered. “This is fucking fantastic. You know I could go for a little less crazy in my life.”
Caleb cleared his throat. “There is another possibility. Given the video we just saw, this could be a jealous ex of yours.”
Micha snorted. “Yeah, first I’d have to have exes, make that exes who gave a shit enough to care and who had the inside scoop on my life.”
“You can’t underestimate the delusions of a stalker.”
“Considering that I haven’t been with anyone serious since the whole shit show went down, I doubt it.” Oh fuck. Those words should never have slipped out of her mouth. “I mean no one I would deem serious.”
“Micha, its common knowledge that you don’t keep guys around for too long. And that any guys you actually date are few and far between.”
Heat suffused her face. God, was she really having this conversation with Caleb? “I don’t think any of that is important in this situation. I don’t think this has to do with my personal life.”
He slanted her a gaze. “Micha, someone sent you a video of us. They made it personal. People only do things like that for blackmail and for personal reasons because they feel slighted. I can’t ignore the fact that it could be someone from your past.”
Of all the conversations she didn’t want to have with him. “Look. I barely date as you call it. Not usually past the third or fourth date. Not since Simon.”
He frowned. “You’re really letting that asshole control your relationships like that?”
“It has nothing to do with Simon. I’ve been completely focused on my career. I don’t really have time to date.”
“And what about sex? You’re a beautiful woman.” His gaze once again slid over her body like a caress. “A beautiful woman with a clearly healthy sex drive. I can’t believe you’ve shut yourself away since then.”
Now would be a fantastic time for the ground to swallow me whole. “I—” This was too mortifying. “I, like I said, I’m too busy to worry about it.”
He pulled up in front of their building and parked on the street. “Bullshit.”
Micha scowled at him. “Fine. There have been one or two guys that...” Her voice trailed off, and she cleared her throat. “I call them from time to time when I need to.”
His brows snapped down over his eyes. “I’ll need their names.”
That sounded like a growl. “Is that really necessary? It’s not like I talk to either of them frequently. They have no reason to—”
“Names, Micha. I’m not screwing around.”
Oh, geez. He looked pissed. His big hands gripped the steering wheel so tight his knuckles were white. Well, fine. It wasn’t exactly a picnic telling him that she had no love life to speak of. “Fine.”
“How long ago?”
Not understanding his question, she asked, “How long ago what?”
“Since you saw one of them?”
Oh, and the hits kept coming. The way she figured it, she couldn’t have a more awkward conversation. “It’s been a year.”
His eyes rounded. “You haven’t had sex in a year?”
She flushed. “That’s right. What’s the big deal?” She sniffed and looked out the window. She was not going to sit there and look at him while he dissected her personal life.
“But you’re always so...hot. I just assumed.”
“Well, you’d be wrong. Most people would. My personal life is…” A fucked up nonexistent waste land. “…limited.”
Caleb exhaled. “Micha…I…look I’ll fix this. It’ll be okay. I wish you’d told me.”
“You wish I’d told you what, Caleb? It wouldn’t have changed anything. What happened last night was… Well, yeah, you know what it was. My lack of a sex life has no bearing.”
“I certainly wouldn’t have waited so long.”
“Come again?”
“I’ve been giving you time to get used to the idea of me, to come around to my way of thinking and go out with me. I figured you were getting over some long term thing and needed time.”
She did not need to hear this. “Caleb.”
“I would have been inside you sooner. I would have said the hell with waiting. Thought you needed time or something.”
And because the idea of him thrusting inside her made her body wet and pliable, she ducked her head. “I still wouldn’t have wanted a relationship.”
“Maybe, but I could have stopped torturing both of us.”
Chapter 16
Caleb stared at the report of Trisha Jax on his laptop. The news didn’t exactly fill him with the warm fuzzies. Apparently Little Miss Psychopath had been released after being transferred to a low security psychiatric facility. Doctors there had felt her recovery to be
substantial and that she was no threat to herself or others. According to the report, she died. Jumped off a bridge six months after her release. They’d trolled the water, but had never found a body. That couldn’t be good. Though the likelihood that she’d survived the fall was slim, it was still a possibility.
Why hadn’t anyone called Micha?
He didn’t want to be the one to have to give Micha the bad news that that crazy woman was on the loose, but right now they had to consider all possibilities.
He’d done the requisite check on all the men Micha had any involvement with and any wives or girlfriends they had. It was like she said: She kept things friendly, but never really went past a few dates. And as for those assholes she sexed up, well they were clean too. As much as that chapped his ass. He hated knowing that she’d gone to others to sate her need. She hadn’t come to him. Even though they’d been sniffing around each other for nearly two years.
He kept telling himself that it was none of his business, but his cock kept remembering where he’d been and how good it had felt. So, yeah, it kind of was his business.
He scrubbed both hands over his face. Tom and one of his other guys both checked in via text. The first message was to say that Micha had been dropped off at the apartment, and the other, that she was safely inside and the place had been looked over.
He’d wanted to do it himself, but he’d been busy chasing down information on this missing girl. Though, she wasn’t really missing. She’d taken all the cash he’d slipped her and checked into a motel. From the address his guy had given him, it was little more than a hovel, but it was dry and off the street, so he could live with that for now. He was still waiting on the report back of who she’d called or seen. If she didn’t make any moves for another day or two, he’d have her brought in under his protection. She’d seemed to trust him. His guy at the FBI had sent him an email saying they had no information on her prints. She wasn’t in any database. And from the photo he’d sent, they had no photo recognition on her. He stared at her picture. “Where did you come from? And what are you hiding from?”
