by Cari Quinn
“Jesus, woman.” I activated my traffic app and looked for the back way into the area. Would she take a cab in? A car? I prayed that she’d be smart enough to use one our drivers, but if she was trying to sneak off, I doubted it.
I held down my call button. “Call Lucy.”
“Calling Lucy.”
“Yo. What’s up, sexy?”
“I need you to pull Faith’s credit cards. Her PayPal, find out if she’s got an Uber.”
“Uh oh. Did you lose your charge, Q?”
“Just do it, Lu.”
“Touchy.” I heard her fingers flying over her keys. I just hoped that crazy keyboard of hers actually pulled up info I could use.
“She has an Uber. She called for one, but turned the dude away.”
“Destination?”
“Maggie’s. Downtown.”
I sighed. “Yeah. Place shut down unexpectedly.”
“I just got a card hit though. Looks like she used it for a cab. Please hold.” Her fingers clacked again, then she whistled. “Your girl has expensive taste.”
“What did she do?”
“Bottle of wine. Three of them actually.”
“Great. Sin City—”
Lucy interrupted. “Mage? Yep. Looks like a cool place. Oh, man. Halsey’s there tonight. I’m officially jealous.”
“Dammit,” I muttered. That was definitely the name of one of the bands I saw on her iPod. I punched it and swung past the underpass and skipped over two streets. “Thanks Lucy. I owe you.”
“That was an easy one. You saved me a call anyway. I got an SOS call from Devon on those packages Keys gets monthly. They squicked her roommate out a bit. Enough that when I press her from some details she painted a much different picture than what you mentioned in your report.”
“Dammit.”
“Q instincts on point again.”
My gut clenched. “I prefer not to be right.”
“According to Dev Keys always downplays them. On a hunch, I made a call to Ripper Records HQ and had them pull her fan mail. Those little boxes plain boxes with no return address? Yeah, way too many are littered in her archives, and all from different post offices in New York City.”
“They keep them?” I was surprised.
“Yeah, they crate them up for the fan club crew to go through. But there’s been a backlog yada yada—so it’s just been stockpiling. I’m having them sent to me.”
“Aidan doesn’t pay you enough.”
“Tell him that.”
“I will.” Lucy was more than just a hacker. She was our best defense when it came to research and finding needles in stacks of needles. “Let me know what you find.”
“Oh, there’s more.”
I downshifted and swallowed a curse.
“She got one today.”
That explained the call with Devon tonight. Why the hell hadn’t she talked to him about it? And why would she go out on her own with that kind of knowledge?
“Is she sure it’s the same sender? Faith usually gets one at the end of the month.”
“I scanned in the labels from both boxes. Generic as hell, but I’d put my money on the same printer. Nothing we could go to the cops with of course, but enough to put my Spidey sense on alert.”
Mine too.
“But the box was a little bigger this time. Devon took pictures. I gotta say, I’m creeped out. I’m sending them to your phone.”
“Give me the high points and I’ll look at them when I lock Faith down.”
“That sounds like a fun night.”
“Lu.”
“All right, all right. Don’t get your cargos in a bunch.” Her fingers clacked on the keys some more. “So, they have a setlist every night, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, this box has one from every show. There’s notes scribbled on them critiquing the show.”
“Like a tour diary?”
“Creepier.”
Not only did this person read the tiniest interview, but now he or she thought they could make notes? “Can’t they get that on the internet or fan boards?”
“Yeah, but the thing is these aren’t just pictures printed out from someone’s Instagram account. These are the actual ones from each show. They have rips on them and footprints from being taped on the floor.”
My blood chilled. “How many?”
“Every one this tour.”
My fingers ached from the force of my grip on the wheel. “Since I’ve been with her?”
“No. Since the new album. Even the small shows.”
“Son of a bitch.” I took an alley pass through and ended up a block away from the bar. “I’m almost at the club. Send me everything you have. Faith and I are going to have a conversation.”
“Will do. Don’t be too hard on her, Q. You can get used to a lot of strange when you’re a rock star. Fans can equal crazy, but for the most part they’re harmless.”
“Doesn’t sound very harmless.”
“No.” She sighed. “I’ll send you what I have, and check back in when I get through the rest of her mail.”
“Thanks, Lucy.”
“Lucy out.”
I downshifted as the building with a neon purple sign came into view. I curbed it up onto the sidewalk and threw it in park. I got out and locked the car.
There was a bouncer at the door. He pointed at the car. “Not happenin’ man.”
I flashed him and a fifty. “Think we could possibly do this the easy way tonight?”
He glanced at my holster and stood up taller. “Cop?”
I shook my head. “Security.”
He flashed me a .45 in his belt holster. “We’re not going to have a problem are we?”
“Nope. Just need to pick up my client.”
“Taking a troublemaker out of my club?”
I sighed as I heard laughter pumping out the door. “Probably your favorite customer.”
He pulled at his bottom lip. “Aww, you not takin’ Blondie are you?”
My heart sank. I held my hand to my shoulder. “Yay high, light eyes, head to toe purple?”
“Yeah, yeah.” His white teeth flashed from wide lips. “She hired out one of the bouncers to sit with her. Said she probably would have some company. You company?”
“I’m the company.”
He took the fifty. “Welcome.”
I rolled my eyes. “Thanks.”
The bar was small and unique. The walls were papered with comics and overlapping graffiti, the stage was intimate and smoky. Moody blue lights strobed in time to the watery, oriental flavor of the music. A petite girl with blue and pale blonde hair hung off a microphone stand, swaying to the music.
Beside her was the woman I knew better than anyone past or present. She’d tied her T-shirt up under her breasts and a light sheen of sweat beaded up on her midriff. A flash of gold glittered at her waist and her fingers. She leaned into the other girl, their shoulders touching, as she gripped a microphone stand as well.
She knew all the lyrics to the song. The same song I’d heard running on a loop for the last three days. The sultry voice of Halsey mixed with Faith’s surprisingly husky voice.
It was a dreamy, dark song full of pain and echoes of a manic episode. Her eyes were closed as she wailed with the young girl beside her. The younger artist had stars in her eyes.
For Faith.
Because this woman drew people in like she was their own private reserve of candy. The girl wound her arms around Faith’s waist and they sung into the same mic.
When the song ended, Faith hugged her back and they both hopped around in a circle. “Thanks for letting me sing.”
“Anytime. Faith Keystone, people!”
The small room clapped and called for more, but Faith shook her head and jumped off the stage. She shook hands and hugged strangers.
My blood heated with every exchange. I moved to make sure I would be in her line of sight. When she got to the edge of the crowd she finally saw me.
> “Hello, Warden.”
“Dammit, Faith.”
She pressed her finger against my lips and shoved me into the crush of people dancing beyond the tables around the stage.
I braceleted her wrist, and pulled her hand away from my mouth. “This isn’t happening.”
“It’s already done. I needed this.” She twisted her fingers into my shirt and swayed against me. “I made sure I was safe.”
I lowered my mouth to her ear. “You weren’t with me, so you weren’t safe.”
“You’ll hurt Ray Ray’s feelings.” She twisted in my arms, her ass swaying back and forth across my thighs and zipper. She waved at a truly huge guy with obsidian skin. He waved back at her, his ivory teeth glowing out of the dark.
I turned her back around and bit back a groan as she slid her knee between my legs. She crouched low, her short nails grazing my thighs, then over my growing erection and finally over my belly. She walked around me as the song grew more heated.
The song spoke of a man coming for the woman. That he’d never let her go. I tried to push out the lyrics, to ignore the beat that echoed a long slow fuck, and most of all I didn’t want her to think this was okay.
I gripped her hips, my fingers digging into her ass until she was flush with me. “I need you safe.”
“I am safe. You came for me. I knew you would.”
I moved one hand up to the back of her sweaty hair, and gripped a handful. “Anyone could have followed you. That ex-football jock could knock some heads if the room got rowdy, but that’s not the kind of trouble you need to watch out for.”
“I’m dying in that hotel room. I need this. I need to go out and to soak up music and people.”
“Ask me,” I growled.
“What would the answer have been?”
“Fuck, no.”
“Exactly. I made an executive decision.”
“You made a selfish decision.”
She flinched. “That’s right. I’ve been holed up for over a month. I can’t stay in a box, Quinn. I just can’t.”
“So you slip away? What if something happened to you?” I shook her. “If someone took you from—”Me. If someone took her from me I’d raze a city block to get her. “Goddammit, not on my watch.”
Her eyes flashed. “I was smart. I was safe.”
“No one will keep you safe like I do.” I dragged her against me. My grip softened in her hair until I simply cupped the back of her head. Until my heart stopped raging and my pulse eased back into a regular rhythm.
All that shit Lucy told me was burning my damn brain. I had no proof it was the same person that tried to take her before. I just had a gut feeling and enough fear to choke off any
She looped her arms around my waist, her fingers slipped under my shirt to get to skin. I lifted her up onto her toes and crushed her mouth with mine. I needed her taste, her warmth, her peach drenched skin.
I hustled her out of the bar, into the cool September air. The bouncer waved at us. “Sorry to see you go, Blondie. You’re just what the Mage needs. You come back anytime.”
“Thanks, Walter.”
“Your man, eh, he’s a bit intense for us. But maybe we make an exception for our little Keys.”
She grinned. “Hear that?”
I clamped my hand along the back of her neck and urged her along. “I hear it.”
The bouncer gave me a once over. “You okay with this guy?”
“I’m her security.”
“Is that what the kids are calling it these days?”
Faith gave him a cheeky grin. “He doesn’t like when I break the rules.”
“Thank you, Walter,” I said with gritted teeth. I led her to the car and opened the passenger side door. When she swung her legs in I reached in and pulled the belt across her chest.
“I can do that you know.”
I slid my hand across her naked midsection, my thumb brushed the line of her bra. The fact that she was making light of this fueled my anger all over again. “I’m going to need you to shut up right now so I don’t yell at you any further.”
She cupped my jaw. “And here I thought we were going to fuck it out.”
“Oh, you can count on that.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “What if I’m not in the mood for make up sex?”
“Who says we’re making up?”
30
Keys
He slammed the door, and I winced. I’d known that this little venture was going to bite me on the butt. It had been worth it though. The songs, the music, the atmosphere—those were the things that got me through the grueling parts of touring.
And my body was buzzing with the anger coming off Quinn in waves. He only wanted to keep my safe. I also knew he would find me. Though the car up on the curb, and a little wildly parked worried me a little.
I’d seen Quinn angry before, but this was a bit different. When he got in and slammed the car into gear, I held on. I was getting used to the BMW. It rode way low to the ground and cornered like we were on an invisible track that only he seemed to know. I always felt safe and a little out of control at the same time.
I drew in a slow breath. When he got like this my system went haywire. He was definitely one of the most intense and dominant men I’d ever been with. Okay, he was the most intense. No one was like Quinn.
From the bone jarring sex, to the liquid gray dawn when his defenses were down, I thought I’d seen all of the different sides of him. I was fairly sure I was mistaken.
I reached for his hand on the shifter, but he shook me off. “You really don’t want to touch me right now.”
“Because you’re angry with me?”
Jaw click thingie in progress. Yeah, mad didn’t cover it. His jaw was so tight that I could actually see his vein pulsing in his temple. I shifted restlessly in my seat. I was way too keyed up, and the caveman tactics should have simmered me down.
Not so much.
Two shots of adrenaline and I couldn’t settle. One at our show, and the other on that tiny stage. I didn’t get behind the mic very often. I was happy in the back on my keyboards, but Halsey’s lyrics had been buzzing under my skin all week.
I should have asked Quinn to take me to the little hole in the wall. I just couldn’t take the chance that he’d have said no. It was better to beg forgiveness than ask for permission.
I was pretty sure Indie was going to stamp that on my wardrobe trunk. I was always disappearing on her. The lure to explore was always there, add in the shine of live music and I couldn’t resist.
I’d tried to, but there hadn’t been a single incident. I was so tired of putting my life on hold.
I looked out the window as Chicago passed me by. We took the Quinn route home. Back streets, side alleys, on and off the highways, but this time he seemed to be taking longer than usual. We skipped past our exit and turned off into a residential area. I frowned as he pulled up to a brownstone.
“Where are we?”
“My place.”
“What?” I scrambled out of the car after him. Well, that made sense why he knew the streets so well, but then again he always seemed to have an innate sense of direction that I so didn’t have.
He glanced down the block and held his arm out. “Inside.” He dug out his phone and typed furiously. He shoved his phone back in his pocket and went to a keypad at the door. The door buzzed and opened. He held open the door for me, and I rushed through.
The hallway smelled of beeswax and lemons. I followed him up the stairs, my fingers trailing over the silky, polished banister. When we got to the top, he twisted a rosette in the upper right corner of the old door and the fleur de lis came off. He took a key out of it and replaced the small wooden piece.
“Did you tell people where we are?”
“Yeah, I contacted the security team.”
I took in the room. Tall windows were unadorned, leaving shadows and moonlight to make a grid pattern over the hardwood floors. He walked through the dining room and final
ly turned on a light in the kitchen.
The house felt empty. Everything was pristine, and the lemon and beeswax scent carried into the living space. He came back into the room with a bottle of wine and two glasses.
“So, we’re going from hate fuck to romance?”
“No.”
“Just no?”
“We need to have a talk.”
I crossed my arms, cupping my elbows against the chill. “Why did we need to come here?” My heels clicked on the hardwood as I paced in front of the fireplace.
“I needed a secure place to take you.”
“And the hotel isn’t?”
He reached under the shade of a lamp and snapped it on. “It’s fine. I just can’t have eyes and ears on us right now.”
I swallowed. “Because you’re going to kill me and bury the body in the basement?”
“Tempting.”
“Funny.”
He poured half a glass and downed it in two gulps. I was pretty sure the only time I’d ever seen him drink had been at our going away dinner with Devon. He filled the glass this time, then mine, and stalked up and down the long room.
I reached for my glass and took a sip. It was much bolder than what I was used to. Good, just a lot richer. I sat down on the couch and waited him out.
Patience wasn’t exactly my strong suit, but I had a feeling keeping my mouth shut was definitely a good game plan. He didn’t talk, just kept pacing. “Okay, you’re officially freaking me out.”
He finished the second glass and put it down. “Tell me Miss Keystone, what do you think we’re doing?”
My eyebrows shot up. Miss Keystone? “We’re working together—sort of.” What the hell were we to each other? I ached for his touch, reached for him in the night, in the morning, even now with the anger lighting him up like a storm in the desert, I wanted to touch him. I wanted the burn coming off him in waves.
“Right. I think my role may have gotten lost in this relationship. You seem to think that my rules are subject to interpretation.”
My heart stalled. “I’ve been following them.”
