by Lily Harlem
“Let me go first,” Roper said.
“No, I don’t know what he’ll do if he sees you.”
“And I don’t know what he’ll do if he sees you. You’re not exactly expected.”
“I know, but he won’t hurt me.”
“Maybe not on purpose. But we don’t know what state he’s in. Living here can’t do a man any good, especially when he’s lost everything.”
“Roper, let me do this.”
He held his hands out and took a step back. “Fair enough…it’s on your head, though, baby.”
“I know. It’s okay.” She pulled in a deep breath, then walked across the hallway toward the kitchen. The floor was littered with broken china: her mother’s prize vases. A picture on the wall had been slashed with a knife. The place was freezing cold, and mildew had taken over one wall entirely, peppering it with black dots.
“Pops,” she called. “You in here? It’s me, Beth.”
Nothing.
When she pushed open the kitchen door, the smell of smoke hit her, as did a thin layer of warmth. “You in here, Pops? I’ve come to see you. I’ve got news.”
There was a noise. The clearing of a throat.
“Pops,” she said, putting her head around the door.
Sitting at the once-grand kitchen table was her father. He looked like a tramp with a heavy gray beard and his hair down to his shoulders in rats’ tails. A far cry from the sharp-suited man he’d once been.
“Pops.” She rushed to him. As she did so, she noticed his hands, set on the table, were bandaged. Between them sat a glass and a bottle of whiskey along with a revolver.
“Bethany?” he said, his eyes narrowed. “Is that you?”
“Yes. Oh God, are you okay? What’s happened?”
He looked up at her. “It is you.”
“Yes, it’s me.” She hugged him, trying to ignore the fact he was in desperate need of a bath and clean clothes. “It’s me. I’ve seen Mom, too, and she’s okay.”
“Is she here?” He didn’t hug her back, instead keeping his hands on the table.
“No, but she will be soon.”
“Really?” His eyes misted.
“Yes. It’ll all be over soon. I promise. We’ll get the house fixed up, get your business back.”
“No, impossible. I fucked up, Beth, big time. I’m a rat, and no one will do business with me again.”
“They will. We have the Hermanus brothers on our side now, and Bowman is getting off, all charges dropped, hopefully. Eastman will have no reason to come after you then.”
It was as if he hadn’t heard anything past the word Hermanus. His nose wrinkled. “Hermanus brothers? What the hell are you talking about?”
The door opened, squeaking some more. Roper stepped into the kitchen kicking a plank of wood away as he did so. “She’s talking about me, Brent Rammada.”
“What…” Her father reached for the gun, fumbling with his bandaged hands. They were misshapen, his fingers…
Beth clapped her hand over her mouth. His fingers! Some were missing.
“I’d put that down if I were you, sir,” Roper said, walking toward Brent who continued to scrabble with the gun, trying to get a grip on it.
“Get away from me.” He pointed the business end in Roper’s direction. “Get away from my daughter. Get out of my house.”
Roper stepped to the left, then the right.
Brent struggled to keep the gun trained on him.
Beth reached out and wrapped her hand around the barrel, pointing it to the floor. “Pops, don’t aim that thing at Roper. He’s our best chance at being together again as a family.”
As Brent released the gun, a sob gurgled up from his throat. “You’re fucking him, aren’t you?”
“Pops.” Beth frowned, hating the pain in her father’s eyes. “Please.”
“Of all the men in the world, a goddamn Hermanus. Do you know what his great-grandfather did to your great-uncle?” Her father screwed up his face, fury making him ugly.
“No, Pops, I don’t and that’s ancient history. It’s time to make amends, bury the past and look forward.” She stroked his matted hair in an attempt to soothe him. “Come on…think about it. Me and Roper, together we can end this and get Mom back here.”
“She’s right,” Roper said, pulling out a chair and sitting opposite Brent. “We can make that happen. If you can accept that Beth and I are together, then the Hermanus family will help you rebuild.”
“I don’t need your help, boy.”
“But you do,” Beth said, sliding the gun across the table to Roper. “You do need our help.” She sat next to him. “Did you hear what I said? Bowman is going to be a free man. Eastman will have no beef with you anymore. You can rebuild.”
“I’m beyond that.” He looked at his hands.
“No, you’re not, and besides, you have Mom to think of and my cousins. They rely on you for a livelihood.”
“But what good am I now?” He held up his bandaged hands. It was clear that three fingers were missing on his right hand and two on his left.
Nausea swept through her. “Who did this to you?”
“Eastman…he’s been here five times, and each time, he’s taken a finger. I couldn’t defend myself against eight of them. They just hold me down and hack.”
The finger. The one she’d delivered for Roper back in New York. Was it one of her father’s? Had they been traded in the underworld to use as warnings?
Beth rushed to the sink. The beer she’d drank in the bar rushed up. She switched on the tap and swilled it away.
“You okay, baby?” Roper asked.
She nodded. “Yeah, just give me a minute.”
“Sir,” Roper said, his tone deadly serious, “I’m sorry for what’s happened and Eastman will pay for this all in good time. It’s way beyond the beating you deserved for the crime.”
“And who is going to make him pay?”
“I am.”
Beth rinsed her mouth out, then leaned against the counter catching her breath.
“You’d do that?” Brent asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Why?”
“Because vengeance would make you happy and in turn make Beth happy. Beth being happy is damn high on my list of priorities right now.”
“Right now? What about when another bit of skirt takes your fancy?”
“Ain’t gonna happen. That’s not how I roll.”
Brent paused. “She’s too young for you, Hermanus.”
“That’s for us to decide.”
Brent pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes and dropped his head. “What a fucking mess.”
“Yeah, it is. But we can clean it up.” Roper paused. “If you’ll let us help you.”
“Please, Pops, say yes,” Beth said. “What choice do you have?”
“I guess that sums it up, sweetness—I have no choice.” Brent glanced from Beth to Roper. “Go ahead, son, and do what you can. I got nothing else to lose.”
“You won’t regret this,” Roper said, standing and pocketing both guns. “Rammadas and Hermanuses working together could do great things in this city. Make enough cash for us to retire on.”
“Yeah, well, for God’s sake, let me retire in the sun. This place is fucking freezing.”
“It is.” Roper pulled out his cell. “I’m calling you a cab. You can’t stay here.”
“But where will he go?” Beth asked, walking over to her father and resting her hand on his shoulder. He was thin, like her.
“Out of town for a while. I’ve got a buddy with a motel a couple of miles south. He can get cleaned up, rested, fed, while I brief my guys and we make a start on getting this place habitable again.”
“Did you hear that, Pops?” Beth said, stooping so she could look him in the eye. “Roper’s gonna get you somewhere warm. You’ll get fed and cleaned up.”
“And then you’ll come for me, Beth?”
“Yes, and Mom. I’ll call her. Eastman wo
n’t be a problem for us ever again.”
“I hope that’s true, sweetness. I really do.”
The cab arrived within ten minutes. Roper gave the address of his buddy’s motel to the driver, then stepped away, making another call.
“I’ll see you soon,” Beth said, as she helped her father into the car.
He nodded, then swallowed noisily. “Never thought I’d be happy to see a Hermanus.”
“Me neither, but he’s a good guy, one of the best.”
Brent raised his eyebrows. “He treat you good?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “He really does.”
“Well, that better continue, otherwise he’ll have me to deal with.” He scowled in Roper’s direction.
“I’ll be sure to let him know that.” She pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I’ll be over tomorrow to see how you’re doing.”
She shut the cab door, and the driver pulled into traffic.
Roper slipped his phone away. “You okay?” He pulled her close.
“Yeah, I guess. It was just shocking seeing him like that…and his hands…” She pulled in a big lungful of cold air. “That can’t be fixed.”
“No, but he’ll be met at the motel. I’ve organized for a nurse to help him clean up, check his wounds, make sure he eats and stuff.”
“Thank you.” She pressed her hand to his cheek. “You didn’t have to do any of that stuff for an old enemy.”
“I didn’t do it for him, Beth. I did it for you.” He swept his lips over hers. “Besides, maybe the enemy thing really will fade into history.”
“I hope so.”
“It won’t happen overnight. My crew are a feisty bunch with the fucking memories of elephants, but when it comes together, when we start making big bucks working as a team and not as rivals, they’ll come around.”
She shivered.
“Come on. You’re cold, so let’s get somewhere warm, preferably with a bed.” He grinned and his eyes sparkled. “It’s been too long since I last fucked you.”
She wasn’t going to complain about that plan. Being close to Roper, having him inside her had become one of her favorite things to do. But there was still one thing playing on her mind. “That finger. In Brooklyn, that I delivered to Kuso.”
“What about it?”
“Was it my father’s?”
Roper pressed his lips together.
“You know something.” It wasn’t a question. “I know you do, Roper.”
“I don’t know if it was your father’s.” He frowned. “But it did come from Chicago.”
“Why did you want a finger?”
“Like I said before, it’s our calling card. It’s what the assholes we deal with respond to.”
“So it could’ve been his?”
“Yeah, it could’ve been. You want me to ask Conner, find out some more?”
“No.” She shook her head. “That won’t be necessary. What’s done is done.”
Chapter Fourteen
Roper drove them back to Callahans’ and parked up outside. But instead of going into the bar, he unlocked an inconspicuous door set back in a narrow passageway.
“What’s this?” Beth asked.
“It’s my Chicago home.”
“As opposed to your New York home?”
“Yeah, something like that.” He pushed open the door. “In you go, baby.”
Beth stepped in and was greeted by a long flight of stairs covered in a faded green carpet.
“Go on up.”
As he set about securing the door with what sounded like several locks and chains, Beth made her way up. She wondered if this place would be as impersonal as his apartment in New York or if it would hold more things that told her about the man she’d well and truly hooked up with.
At the top of the stairs was a single door.
Roper was behind her. “It’s just us here,” he said. “Only I have a key to this place.”
“Oh, okay.”
“But I’ll get you one if you’d like.” He pressed a quick kiss to her head.
“Er, yeah, sure.” She stepped in, and he flicked on the light. “Wow,” she said. This place was very different from Roper’s New York abode. It was sleek and modern with a white carpet, flat screen TV and long, low black leather sofa. On the wall, a huge piece of modern art was spotlit by a single chrome light.
“This do you?” Roper asked.
“Yeah, it’s really cool.”
“Not for long.” He picked up a remote and aimed it at a gas fireplace. The flames sprang to life.
“Roper, I…never imagined.” She was lost for words.
“What, that I had taste?” He chuckled. “I’m with you, aren’t I?”
She smiled at that. “Well, yes, but interior design?”
“Don’t be too impressed.” He winked. “I paid someone to do it. I got sick of living like I was poor when I had plenty in the bank, so I treated myself to a bachelor pad.” He shrugged off his jacket. “Except I ain’t a bachelor no more.”
“I guess not.”
He removed his boots.
Beth did the same.
“You wanna see the rest?”
“Yeah, sure.”
He showed her the kitchen, which was decked out in dark wood with a huge marble island in the center. It was minimalist, as she’d expected, but a spice rack and a pile of letters on the counter made it lived in, made it Roper’s.
“Bedroom,” he said, pushing open another door.
“Impressive.”
A huge bed, again black leather, stood between dark cabinets. There was little else in the room, but a door was slightly ajar that appeared to lead into a dressing room.
“I guess it could do with a woman’s touch,” Roper said. “A bit stark.”
“No. I like it.”
He smiled. “I hope you like the bathroom.”
He stepped across the hallway and opened another door.
Beth peered around him.
The bathroom was made from white marble and had a huge shower cubicle, bigger than the one she’d had in her old house, and she’d always thought that was ridiculously large.
There was a toilet, bidet and double sink and one wall was entirely mirrored.
Roper stepped in and jacked on the shower faucet. “You gonna join me?”
“In the shower?”
“Yeah, in the shower.” He peeled off his sweater, flashing his dark underarm hair.
Beth glanced at the huge cubicle already swirling with steam. How quickly life had turned around. She’d gone from being filthy and starving and homeless in New York to being back in Chicago in a sumptuous apartment with a drop-dead gorgeous, powerful man who was as into her as she was him.
A sudden rush of gratitude to whatever twist of fate had brought them together consumed her. If Roper hadn’t been kind-hearted enough to stop that night to offer a homeless girl food, then she’d still be there…or maybe not…maybe she’d just be another Jane Doe being given a pauper’s funeral.
Roper was naked now, and as he stepped into the shower, Beth quickly stripped off her clothes.
She moved in next to him, hugging him from behind and pressing her breasts against his back. The water soaked through her hair and washed over her face as she touched her cheek to his shoulder.
“You have any idea what having you naked and wet in here makes me wanna do to you?” he asked reaching behind himself and cupping her ass.
“I can hardly dare imagine.” Her cheek had bunched against his skin as she’d spoken.
He chuckled. “You’re getting to know me well.”
“I guess.” She released him and urged him to turn and face her.
His eyes brimmed with desire; his erect cock prodded her belly.
“Gives me ideas, too, you know?” she said.
“Oh, yeah?” He twitched his eyebrows.
“Yeah.” She smiled, then kissed his neck, his chest, his nipples, each one in turn, then headed lower as she sank to her knees, mak
ing sure her body pressed against his as she went.
She flicked her tongue into his navel, then swept her lips over the heavenly trail of hair that led to his cock.
“Baby,” he murmured, sliding his fingers into her hair. “Fuck, you make me so hard.”
She glanced up at him and took hold of his shaft. Without breaking eye contact, she opened her mouth and took him deep.
He gritted his teeth and the tendons in his neck strained. “Fuck.”
She bobbed up, then back down, circling his shaft as it slipped from her mouth. He was so thick against her tongue.
Quickly, she set up a fast rhythm. It seemed to be the way he liked it. With her free hand, she cupped his balls and rolled them gently.
He hissed in a breath and tugged at her hair.
A quiver went through her body. This was so much better than the last time she’d given him head. Then it had felt like paying a debt, but now it was all about bringing the man she loved pleasure.
Loved?
Yes, she loved him. There was no denying that. It had happened, and it had happened quickly. But she’d fallen, hook, line and sinker.
That new knowledge spurred her on and she upped the pace, took him deeper, hugged his cock with her tongue.
“Ah, fuck, you’re gonna get it,” he said, thrusting his pelvis to meet her mouth. “Right about…now.”
He flooded her throat, thick semen rushing from him.
She swallowed it down, holding his balls carefully as they packed up into his body.
He was shaking, trembling, but so was she.
He pulled out, then pushed back in, so deep.
She held her breath. Controlled her gag.
Another shot of cum burst from him.
His groan was loud and abandoned as it echoed around the cubicle.
Suddenly, he dragged her upward by scooping her beneath her underarms.
She gasped and found her footing.
“I don’t know where the fuck you learned to give head, but fuck, you’re good.”
“Naturally talented.”
“Yeah, I reckon.” He kissed her, slow and deep, his tongue tangling with hers.
When he came up for air, he said, “You’re gonna have to give me a few minutes recovery time after that, baby.”
“I can wait.”
“It’ll be worth it.” He reached for a bottle of moss-colored shower gel and filled his palms. “I’ll soap you up if you promise to stay dirty for me in your mind.”
