ROMANCE: MENAGE ROMANCE: Tapped and Taken by Two (Pregnancy Sports MMA UFC Fighter Romance) (Alpha Male Romance)

by Maxi MacNair

She had to talk to James.

  8

  When James heard Randi’s voice on the other end of the line, his heart sank. He knew something was up, and probably due to his guilty conscience, suspected she knew. She was a detective. Probably a good one. What did he expect?

  She said the four most terrifying words a woman can say: “We need to talk.”

  He drove to her apartment, which he suddenly realized he needed to ask her for directions to. He’d never been there before.

  No doorman there. She buzzed him up, and the elevator was down, so he took the stairs. Six floors. It felt good to prolong the confrontation.

  When she opened the door he found her wearing a long sweater and leggings with bare feet. Her toenails sparkled with red glittery polish. She’d tied her hair back in a sloppy bun, and blonde tendrils escaped around her heart-shaped face.

  And she was pissed.

  She admitted him into her home, and as he studied the room, he fell in love with her even harder. It looked like her, smelled like her. He didn’t try to hug her or kiss her as he came inside. He had a seat on an overstuffed chair.

  “What do you do for a job?” She didn’t sit, and she placed her hands on her hips, sexy as hell. He wasn’t sure how much she knew.

  “Accounting stuff. Boring.” It wasn’t a lie. He did a great deal of accounting, and except for a few minutes of adrenal rush, the job was all logistics.

  “Don’t lie to me. What’s your name?”

  Which one?

  “I did change my name a few years back. I told you about the dishonorable—”

  “Who’s Tomas Ocampo?”

  The bedrock on which James built his entire world wobbled. Did she know it all? He spent so long groping for the right thing to say, she went on. “You lied to me—”

  “I didn’t lie.”

  “Sins of omission Right? Well I’m a detective. I can’t plead the same. I could lose my job. I could go to jail!” She held up her left hand that held the necklace with the pearl on it he had given her. “This is purchased with stolen money. Everything you have is purchased with stolen money. Tell me I’m wrong. Just please tell me I’m wrong!”

  The last few words came out more emotional than Randi was used to. She was not used to feeling much of anything since Devon died.

  Ice at the pit of his stomach. A maelstrom of conflicting emotions. He’d found prison to be comfortingly uncomplicated. But…

  “I can’t let you do that.”

  She stiffened. “What do you mean?”

  “It means unless you’ve got backup posted, I’ll be out of here before anyone can get to me. And you’ll never see me again. I know you don’t want that.”

  Something passed over her blue eyes and he knew he was right. She did still love him.

  She swallowed, opened her mouth. Closed it again. She crossed her arms over perfect breasts, swollen in preparation to nourish their baby. The tight sweater emphasized the roundness in her belly. “You’d better do it, then. I’m calling my partner.”

  “I’ll stop.”

  “I don’t believe you. I don’t even know what name to call you.”

  He wanted to tell her Damien, but Damien was long dead. “James. I’m just James. I want to stop. What else do I do? When I got out I tried to play it straight. But I’ve got a record. The military dishonorably discharged me. There’s no coming back from that. I’ve got nothing.”

  “So you take from others?”

  He repeated his refrain, the phrase he used to justify everything he did. “It’s all insured. The banks feel a pinch, but none of the people do.”

  All the warmth drained from her eyes. “The Brinks driver? The guy at First National?”

  “I never meant for any of that to happen. I never meant to bring any other lives into this. I’m trying to find a way out. I just want to be with you.”

  “Get out of my house, James. I mean it. I’d better never see you again. Or hear from you again. And don’t even think about trying any bullshit like sending me money.”

  “I’ll change, I swear.”

  “Don’t even think that this is any other situation than what it is. We are not some couple having a fight. I am a detective and you are a criminal.” She picked up her cell phone from her table. She held it like a weapon. “I’m calling my partner right now.”

  “Locker 2215 at the downtown bus terminal. 2215. If you leave a note in there someone will pick it up and get it to me.”

  “But then we can just follow who picks it up to find you.”

  “He has no idea what is going on. Only paid to check and pass it on, and then there are too many links in the chain for you to track. They won’t find me that way. If I get a note, I know it will be from you. If it’s a trap, you need to set it.”

  She dialed her phone.

  He didn’t wait around to hear what she said. On the way out, he caught sight of the picture on her mantle. Her husband, the man who’d killed himself. His blonde hair and blue eyes struck James, he could have been her brother. In the picture he wore his uniform, and didn’t smile at the camera. James wondered if he’d made her laugh.

  Didn’t matter now. Like everything so far, it wasn’t his choice. He just reacted to the choices he was given. At least, that was how he said to deal with the guilt and pain he had encountered so far in his life. He rushed out into the hall, down the stairs. His lungs burned, but not from the exercise. She was gone. She was really, really gone, and if he didn’t make himself gone too, he’d be in jail. He wanted to whip the Mercedes out of the parking spot and tear out of the garage, he drove slowly, scanning for blue lights.

  So this was what a broken heart felt like. James had felt a lot of pain in his life, but this was something new.

  * * *

  Randi set her phone down without dialing. She couldn’t do it. She could, of course. She had to. Just not right now.

  She told herself to ignore the gaping chasm she’d gouged inside herself. She caught sight of Devon’s picture on her mantle. Inexplicable rage tore through her. “This is all your fault!” she screamed at the framed photo. “You did this to us!” She picked it up, meaning to smash it. Then she set it down, and used the back of her hand to sweep a glass cardinal off the mantle instead. Shattering it against the wall. It landed on the floor in shards of delicate red. She threw a pewter candlestick next. It didn’t break, but the long white candle inside did.

  She didn’t want to lose her job.

  She didn’t want to lose James.

  She didn’t want a criminal on the streets, taking money that didn’t belong to him. The Ocampos had gotten enough. They would be fine without his help. If he was a good man, he wouldn’t drive a Mercedes. Wouldn’t live in a penthouse overlooking the city. He’d be humble.

  But she thought about his childhood. Thought about all her stuff, her compulsive shopping.

  The sight of the glass cardinal on her floor, dashed and broken sent her into hysterics. She was sorry she’d done it. She wished she could take it back. She wished she could drink away the pain. Not with a baby, though. No easy answers now that she had her little passenger. Tonight she wouldn’t sleep, she knew it. So she bundled up, and with nowhere else to go, she took the train to James’ apartment. She didn’t expect him to be there. The doorman admitted her, and she used her key to let herself in. In truth, she told herself that if he was there and hadn’t run away yet, she would kiss him and tell him they would figure something out. There had to be a way out of this situation. A way that she could live with herself and him at the same time.

  The place felt abandoned, all the life removed from it. She didn’t turn the lights on, but went to the huge windows and looked down over the glittering lights of the city. Even at this late hour, the city bustled below her. She knew she should be hunting for evidence or…something. She could still see his desktop computer, several monitors, and a laptop sitting on his desk. Those had to contain everything she needed to turn him in.

  Would they
send her to jail? Jame, or Vince or whoever he was, didn’t deserve to go to jail, he was just defending someone who was helpless. But he did go to jail because the law was the law, and intention doesn’t keep people out of jail. Aiding and abetting a criminal. It wouldn’t be a long term, her service record was exemplary, but it would ruin her. Would she have her baby in prison? Maybe Chris would take care of it until she got out. And then what? Police work was all she’d ever wanted to do. All she’d ever cared about. Private detective work, maybe, but it didn’t pay well and was dangerous. She could get into bail bonds…

  Her future looked bleak.

  And without James, did it even matter?

  She told herself to buck up, buttercup. She’d lost Devon, the love of her life, and survived. James was a speedbump in the road of life.

  Except she knew he wasn’t.

  She left his apartment and went home, the first twinges of a plan starting to form in her mind.

  * * *

  She went to work the next morning.

  “Randi, you look like garbage. Are you alright?” Chris was on her in a flash, instantly aware something was wrong. That’s what good partners are for. “Is it what I said last night? I didn’t mean to upset you. I worry about you, is all. I’m sorry.”

  Randi put on her best sick face. It wasn’t hard after her sleepless night. “I haven’t been feeling well. Doctor wants me on bed rest for a week or two.”

  Chris brought a hand to her mouth. “Rand, I’m so sorry. Is there anything I can do?”

  Randi shook her head, no. “It’s going to be fine. I mean, the doctor thinks it’ll be fine. Honestly. If I stay off my feet, nothing to harm my little guy.”

  “Oh so it’s a boy then?”

  “Maybe, I don’t know, just a feeling I guess.”

  Chris looked like she was trying to decide to pursue matters or not.

  “Look, I searched James Moore myself last night,” Randi said, knowing she would need to go into this. “I asked him about it and I didn’t like the answers so he’s out of the picture now okay.”

  She couldn’t stand lying to her friend and partner.

  She wrapped up a few things, then went to her supervisor, Luke Hill. She didn’t like lying to him, either, but she couldn’t be here until she put things right with James. Being inside her beloved precinct, knowing she could put a felon away didn’t sit right with her. What if there was another bank heist. How could she investigate it knowing who was probably behind it. So she told Luke Hill the doctor required two weeks leave. Randi already had the note if he needed it at that point.

  Luke and Chris saw her off with worried expressions.

  She went home, and began to pack. Over the next three days, she moved all her possessions into James’ penthouse apartment. She designated his office as a nursery, and worked to blend their two styles together. On the fourth night, she took the train to the downtown bus terminal and placed a single slip of paper into locker 2215.

  9

  James’ phone buzzed and he almost didn’t answer it. The light pollution from Miami’s skyline blocked nearly all the stars in the sky, but he could still make out a few of them as he lay on his back on the dark beach. He listened to the ocean, and wished something had gone differently in his life.

  He couldn’t put his finger on what, though. How far back could he take his regret? To beating Vince? To joining the army? He wanted very badly to forget Randi. Forget his unborn child (the idea made his stomach knot) and head to one of the clubs on the beach. He could hear the music thumping behind him, and he was dressed for it…but he couldn’t bring himself to go inside.

  So he picked up his phone.

  “There was something in the locker today.”

  James sat up on the beach, suddenly aware of nothing but the voice on the other end of the phone.

  When he went to speak, his throat was dry. He swallowed. “What?”

  “A note.”

  James wanted Nate to go on, but the man on the other end was silent. “Well, what does it say?”

  He steeled himself. What could it say other than she’d found where he was in Miami and was on his trail? No, that didn’t makes sense. Every muscle in his body clenched as he waited for Nate to go on.

  “Two words. Come home.”

  Everything relaxed at once. She wanted him to come home. She wanted him back.

  He tried to tell himself it was a trap. The moment he stepped off the plane at JFK they’d arrest him. He couldn’t stop himself though. The life he saw himself living was no life he wanted. Even if going back meant prison he would risk it. He had to.

  He called Jetblue right there from the beach, and booked the earliest flight out the next morning. Instead of going to the club, he walked along the shoreline, back to his room, where he packed his suitcase. He didn’t sleep. Jail might be the outcome of this flight. She was a detective, after all, and he’d spent a month basically rubbing her nose in the fact she couldn’t catch him. She owed him nothing, but maybe that baby that they shared was the key to all of it. Maybe that was really all that mattered in any of this.

  A winter storm in New York delayed his flight. He waited at his gate with business travelers and families returning from vacation. He couldn’t focus to read, or watch anything on his phone. Sometimes he paced, mostly he stared out the window at the bright blue sky and the waiting airplane.

  Finally they boarded. Sat on the tarmac for far longer than they should have. The woman next to him looked like a grandmother. “Are you nervous about flying?” she finally asked.

  “I’m going home to see my girl.”

  The grandmother beamed.

  “We had a fight,” he said. “But she wants me home.”

  He hoped it was true. He was supposed to get into New York at 11am. Instead, it was after 10pm by the time he stepped off the jet way into JFK airport. He let his eyes search for the cops, but it all seemed business as usual.

  Come home. He’d go back to his penthouse first. He could call her from there. After his day, he needed a hot shower before he saw her, anyway. Flying always seemed like spending five hours stuck in a tube.

  The Mercedes was where he left it in long term parking. The fact that the police hadn’t taken it was the second sign that Randi actually wanted to see him. The engine purred to life, and he headed into the city on storm-slick roads. It had only been two weeks since he’d been gone, yet everything felt different as he nosed the car into his designated parking spot.

  The doorman didn’t seem surprised to see him, and the elevator guy kept smiling at him. James almost asked if the cops had been here, but didn’t. She said to come home. Now he was home. Everything else was in her hands.

  The doors opened on his penthouse, and the smell hit him like a tidal wave. Feminine. Lived in. Nothing like the sterile coldness his apartment usually radiated. Someone had cooked dinner here. He moved down the hall to discover a different home than the one he’d left. He gaped at what Randi had done, the blending of her colorful, cozy décor with his stark, monochromatic apartment. Her paintings on the walls, the bright afghan draped over his grey leather sofa.

  He peeked in the kitchen, saw her magnets on his fridge. Her bright dishes next to his plain white set.

  She’d moved in. Her make up in his bathroom. A hairdryer in the closet. Bright colored towels on top of his grey ones. Blonde hairs in the drain in the shower. It was still moist in the bathroom. The thought of her in here, naked, sent shivers of arousal down his spine.

  He peeked in the second bedroom first, the one was once his office. She’d moved all of his things to one side, and decked the room out in yellow. A crib. A dresser, a big cozy rocking chair. His baby’s room. The door clicked quietly closed as he moved on to the bedroom.

  She’d left the door open and the blinds up, and the cityscape glittered out the big window.

  A rectangle of warm light from the hall fell onto the bed, where she lay curled among the sheets. He could see one bare shoulder pok
ing out, a bare foot and strong calf. He would have gone to her, ravaged her, but it didn’t seem right.

  So he said her name. “Randi?”

  She stirred, but didn’t wake up. He said it louder.

  Her beautiful blue eyes fluttered open, and for a moment he braced himself. This was the bait in the trap, and the SWAT team would come rushing in.

  Instead, as she awoke, her face broke into a smile. “You came.”

  “Of course I came. I got your note.”

  She sat up, holding the sheet against her chest. Her hair was still damp from the shower and he could smell her shampoo.

  “I missed you,” she said.

  He found he couldn’t speak. She let the sheet drop. Dual spears of love and lust propelled him across the room to her, and he lowered himself on the edge of the bed.

  Randi wrapped her arms around him, letting the sheet fall to her waist. The silky material of his shirt pressed against her nipples, and made them hard. It didn’t take him long to notice. He lowered his head and took one into his mouth. At first, he was so gentle she almost couldn’t feel his lips and tongue.

  “They’re not sore anymore,” she whispered.

  He lapped at her nipple with long even strokes of his tongue, reached up and took hold of the other. He teased the hard nub with his fingertips as he licked and sucked the other. She moaned and arched against him. He wore too many clothes. She pushed him back as she unbuttoned his shirt, revealing his lightly haired, muscular chest. As she ran her hands over his skin, she wondered how she thought she could ever live without him.

  He pushed her down on her back on the bed, and tugged her legs apart. He lowered his mouth to her most special place and drove her to fits of passion. He made her come first with his mouth, then with his hand. God, she was so wet and so ready for him. She’d missed him so, not only with her pussy but with her mind and her heart. She’d never threw away the necklace like she threatened, still had it around her neck.

  He kissed her as he slid inside her. He rested his weight on his elbows to keep it off her stomach and they thrusted together. Without coming apart he lifted her and rolled underneath her. They laughed together as they strove to move in unison, to reposition themselves without him sliding out of her.