by Gabi Moore
The look on his face softened.
“Nora, I’m sorry. I don’t mean any of that. It’s just… I didn’t expect for things to pan out this way, to go this far. I was an idiot, it was never meant to be more than an ego boost, a dare. But I never expected to …feel things for you.”
“Bullshit,” I spat.
“It’s true,” he whispered. “You’re falling for me too. Admit it.”
I looked up to see him standing and walking slowly towards me. Would I kiss him? Would I cry and say sorry and beg him to hold me?
“Dean?”
“Yes?”
“Are you still doing whatever I tell you to do?” I said, avoiding his eyes.
Silence.
“Of course. We had an agreement, didn’t we?” he said, his voice kind again. I stood up, straightened my hair and glowered at him.
“Then leave. And don’t come back.”
Chapter 15
Myth: Everyone is a little bit kinky. All of us have a little darkness in us, a little shame, a little secret desire that would mortify us to show the world
Reality: Actually, this one is one hundred percent true…
Kitchen scissors are probably not the best implement to use when cutting a designer sequinned couture frock into tiny pieces, but it would have to do the trick.
On my hands and knees, I worked with big, hulking chomps of the scissors and butchered that slinky number into smaller and smaller pieces. First I chopped the train off, then cut the whole thing into strips and then, still not satisfied, cut those strips even further into smaller scraps. I briefly tried to calculate how much each scrap was worth, but got bored and kept cutting until it no longer resembled anything but a pile of sparkly red innards.
I tossed the scissors aside, gathered the bundle in my arms and tossed it in the trash. I daubed on some fresh face powder, cracked my neck and got to work on the next task for the day. The landline phone flashed to indicate a message, but I ignored it. If that asshole wanted to apologize, he’d have to make about a million times more effort than that.
I sat down and used the other line to work through my client contact list. I began with Ralph, who nearly went into raptures to learn that his dog cage was once again vacant, and moved my way down the list till I had booked up a full schedule for the next two weeks. Provided there were no cancellations, it was easily almost $60 000 of income. I didn’t usually work that hard, but I was rearing to get back into things and forget about my recent little foray into trying to be a normal person.
Two hours had passed by the time I was finished. Finally, it was time for the last and most important task of the day.
I opened my bottom drawer and pulled out a plain manila envelope and stuffed it in my handbag. The time had come to finish what I started. I no longer cared how much that rat reporter offered me this time. I no longer cared about whether my reputation came into it.
Maybe Jeff was right and I was nothing but a whore. Maybe Dean was right and I was nothing but a big bluffing baby. Whatever the case, I still had my trump card, and this time when I played it, I would be getting two servings of revenge for the price of one. I forgave myself for making the error of dropping my guard, but I didn’t forgive them for having seen me so vulnerable.
I slipped on my heels, got in the car and headed into town. On the way, I pulled over at a gas station, filled up and then went inside to pay. It was one of those delightfully cheesy old California diners with everything done in mid-century turquoise and a little Cadillac in the logo. Not quite the backdrop for a femme fatale’s final devastating move, but it would do. I picked up a chocolate bar and a bottle of Evian and went to the high schooler behind the counter to pay. Her eyes were glued to the TV.
“So what do you think happened?” she said and gestured to the screen. I turned to look. It was the news. Some pulpy murder story or something. I plonked my items on the counter.
“Crazy people being crazy, huh? What’s new,” I said and pulled out my wallet.
“Yeah, I don’t know. This one seems like a pretty big deal. They say Portal’s stock price has already halved in just two hours,” she said, and turned the volume up.
Portal?
I spun around to look at the screen again.
“An unnamed source has confirmed that the leaked pictures are indeed of Jeff Cane but as of yet there is no indication whether these pictures are connected to last night’s murder…”
My wallet fell from my hands.
“Police have cordoned off the Portal founder’s multi-million dollar Californian home and investigations are now underway. Cane has declined to comment on what is proving to be a case that’s more bizarre by the hour. Details on this breaking story are still unclear but chief of Police Barry O’Neil has stated that the shocking homicide of Elizabeth Cane is a top priority for their department. ABC7’s Jenna Watson reports.”
Could this be real? The image on the screen was unbelievable: on one side, a censored, candid shot of a plush bedroom splattered with blood, and beside it, a humiliating picture of Jeff Cane – the same as the one I held in my handbag at that very moment.
I swallowed hard.
“Huh, this city is fucked, let me tell you. All kinds of stuff going on behind the scenes, you know. Just goes to show. You wanna know my theory? I think they were both, like, kinky swinger types, wife swapping and that kind of thing, and someone gets jealous, things get out of hand, then boom, some jilted lover kills the wife and leaks the pics for revenge on the husband,” the girl behind the counter said, then gave me a knowing wink and waited to see what I thought of her sleuthing skills.
I felt the blood drain from my face.
I quickly paid and stumbled out of the diner, the sounds of the news story still in my head.
A murder.
He had killed her.
Her twisted, begging face was burned into my mind and all I could think about was the fact that she had come to me for help. And now he had actually killed her.
Fuck. Oh fuck.
Dizzy, I collapsed into my car seat and tried to think. Who the fuck had leaked those photos? Who else even had them? I hadn’t given anything to the reporter. Not only was my little revenge plot rapidly crumbling before my eyes, something more sinister was taking shape in its place. This was bigger than I knew. Somebody else had wanted to hurt Jeff Cane, and worse, somebody had killed his wife. I wanted to throw up.
I raced back home, locked the door, and holed myself up in the library. I needed to think, and fast. On a whim I noticed the flashing red light on the landline phone and pressed the button. Though I was still angry as hell with him, the thought of hearing Dean’s voice now was a strange comfort.
“Nora Smith, this is detective Brady of the California PD. I’m calling with regards to the Cane investigation. Call me back as soon as you can. You’ll need to come down to the station and answer a few questions.”
You’ll find BOOK 2 & 3 in the “Mind Games” trilogy in the table of contents!
(… along with a special deal on my “Bad Boys After Dark” boxed set, containing over half a MILLION words of panty-melting bad boys!)
Never Look Back
Blurb
When they kidnapped her, something dark inside me came bubbling to the surface.
I knew I wasn’t afraid anymore. I wasn’t going to ignore my past any longer.
This time, I would fight…
Chapter 1 - Leo
It was the kind of diner that morphed into a sleazy bar the longer it stayed open. The kind where, somehow, as 7pm rolls by, the waffles and burgers give way to beers and shots, the lights dim and some kids start playing around with the old juke box that has a handwritten “NO BRIAN ADAMS” sign taped to it.
In the past, places like this had always felt like home to me. But these days, I just felt like an expat returning from a long trip away and realizing that I no longer understood the local customs as well as I thought I did.
I took a sip of my beer and tr
ied hard not to pay any mind to the pair of girls in the corner, who’d been trying to catch my eye for the last twenty minutes. They were hot, in a kind of non-threatening way. Couldn’t have been older than twenty-two or twenty-three. In the past, I would have noticed the coy giggles, the cheap Girl’s Night Out heels and tight dresses, and I would have thanked my stars and bounced over there in a heartbeat, ready with more drinks and all my best bullshit anecdotes lined up for the evening.
But now, looking at them, I just felt …tired. Besides, now there was Sophia. Sweet, kind, sane Sophia.
I checked my watch.
Flicking my eyes to the door and scanning the street outside through the windows, I wondered whether this was some elaborate joke. Did I really live in a lame action movie where the hero gets a mysterious message, summoning him to his local greasy spoon for a shady business proposal?
I took another sip.
Not likely.
I checked my watch again, downed the last foamy mouthful of beer and stood up to leave. The girls pricked their ears. I made eye contact with the prettier one, and she froze and held my gaze across the room as I fished out some cash and slammed it on the counter.
Look, I’m not vain. I don’t give a shit, actually. But I do know how to play the field.
I know that girls will talk for eons about how they want a guy who’s kind, and treats them right, and is emotionally available and loves children and all that other crap. But take it from a traditionally hot guy out in the real world: what they really want is a rock-hard chest. A square jaw. A guy who looks at them in a way that makes them feel that sex is just an inevitability. A guy who doesn’t ask. Just claims.
For old time’s sake, I toyed with the idea of traipsing over there and seeing how long it would take for them to both be begging hard for it, to be competing with each other to out-slut one another.
I thought about it, but as a conventionally hot guy who knows exactly how to play the field …let’s just say that I’ve realized that it’s not a game I want to play anymore. I gave them a flirty smile – call it charity – and turned on my heel to leave.
“Leo Bianchi?”
I spun to see a man holding out his hand to me. I looked him up and down. A greasy, balding guy in a baggy suit with a watch that clattered on his hairy wrist and a shirt that looked like it was meant to be whiter.
“You’re late,” I said, and shook his hand.
When he laughed, he threw back his head, then he slapped me hard on the shoulder.
“Yeah, kid, he said you’d be plucky!” The man eased the bulk of his middle-aged form onto one of the bar stools. “Come on, sit down. Bianchi? My mother knew some Bianchis. You know Maria and Ed? Down in Boston?”
I could hear the girls behind me pick up their conversation again. I shook my head and gingerly took a seat beside him.
“No? Pity,” he said with a kind of fatherly disappointment, then ordered a beer and took a good few minutes to adjust his gut, smooth down his slacks and pass his dark eyes over me a few times.
“You look tense, kid. Relax,” he chuckled.
“What’s this about?”
He took a long sip of his beer, sucked his top lip and then frowned at me. “So, you starting up a nice little business for yourself, huh? Imports?”
My face prickled. The longer I stared at his greasy, rubbery face the more certain I was that either he had made some terrible mistake in asking me out here. Or worse, that he hadn’t.
“Yeah, so?” I said.
I had finally generated enough momentum to launch an import operation, bringing in Fairtrade coffee beans and other produce from Costa Rica for boutique coffee merchants all along the west coast. Funny thing, though, the company had only been officially registered for a few weeks, and basically nobody knew about it yet. Except Sophia, maybe.
“Well, we’re always looking for uh, you know, enterprising personalities…” he said, staring straight ahead.
“We?”
“Let’s call it a business offer. We get a brand spanking new channel to push our product, you get to offset those nasty import duties…”
I leaned back in my seat.
“You got the wrong guy,” I said, plainly.
He frowned at me again.
“Oh you’re the right guy, buddy. Little Leo? Came up with Lucille and her kids back in Bay Ridge?”
I broke out into a cold sweat.
“Who are you? How do you know me?”
“I don’t know you pal, but Uncle Vito does, and he told me you’d be interested.”
My heart nearly stopped.
“Haven’t heard that name in a long time,” I said quietly. “Thanks, but no thanks,” I managed to say, and got up to leave. The fat man extended a hand and pulled me back down with surprising strength.
“What? You’re leaving? I haven’t even finished my beer. No manners, I swear,” he grumbled under his breath. “And you haven’t even heard Vito’s offer yet.” He took another long swig, irritatingly confident that he had caught my attention.
Vito Roselli was an evil man.
A notorious man.
I had seen his hard, scarred face in grainy photos in the papers. On the news. Vito was the guy that everyone knew was crooked, but could do nothing about. He was the big bad wolf in a fairytale I wished didn’t exist; a world I was no longer a part of. For Vito, there was no right and wrong. No good and evil. There was only power. Those who had it, those who didn’t. End of story. And just hearing his name had my hackles up and my fists clenched.
“I’m not interested in any ‘offer’, sorry. I barely knew the guy, and that was a long, long time ago. I’ve moved on now. Things are looking good for me…”
“Aw, isn’t that nice?” he laughed.
I glared at him.
“And how did you get to where you are now, anyway, huh?” he asked, gesturing to me with his beer glass.
“I worked hard, I busted my--”
“Uncle Vito helped you,” he said, cutting me off.
“Bullshit.”
“You took his help quickly enough once before, that’s what he says anyway.”
“That’s ridiculous, I was a kid…”
“You were eleven. Sounds old enough to me.”
I stood up, face hot.
“I had no choice. I had to do what I could to survive.” I wanted to hit him. I hadn’t hit a man in more than a decade, but I could sure make an exception for this asshole. He was chuckling now under his breath, shaking his head.
“And what about all those little girls, huh? What about their survival? They were just kids too, you know,” he said mysteriously, and stared blankly ahead of him again.
I felt dizzy. I sat down again.
The diner around me had emptied out. I felt like the blood in my veins had turned thin and was emptying out, too. I suddenly felt unsure of my ability to stand upright.
“Those …those are not just rumors?” I stuttered. Once I had spoken I realized how badly I didn’t really want him to answer. Again, he threw back his head and broke out into mocking laughter that made his immense gut wobble.
“Hey, pal, don’t give me that look. I’m not saying anything. I’m just saying, you’re being stupid if you think you’re innocent somehow. You know what my grandma always says? She says to be human is to be guilty. Smart woman. We all got blood on our hands, pal. Every one of us. Including you.”
“What are you getting at?”
His beer glass was drained, and he watched with boredom as the wet foam slid back down the empty sides again.
“I’m not getting at anything buddy. I’m just saying don’t play like you’re some good little citizen now or something.” He stood up, threw some coins onto the counter, burped quietly, then cast a weary gaze back out onto the street. “Uncle Vito will be in touch. My advice? Don’t be such a rude fucker when you talk to him.”
“I’m not talking to anyone,” I said.
He gave me a joking salute and smiled wryly
at me.
“Oh, and by the way, happy birthday,” he said, and turned to leave.
“How do y—“, but he was already halfway out the exit. The bell on the door tinkled as it swung open and shut, and in an instant I was alone in the diner. I checked my watch. It had taken me more than two decades to run away from my past. And now, in the course of five minutes, it had all caught up with me.
Chapter 2 - Sophia
And what a happy birthday it was. The fact that we both shared the same birthday was only one of the things that made me think that my life with Leo was …fated somehow.
Leo was the only other person I had ever met with completely heterochromic eyes. And while I was blue in the left, brown in the right, he was brown in the left, blue in the right. We were similarly quiet, soulful people. We both loved cats. We shared the same favorite things and had the same pet peeves. We had only known each other for a year or so. But when that year was so cram-packed full of signs and omens, did it matter?
The stars were aligning for me. We were both turning thirty, my massage school was finally picking up steam and his business was finally taking shape. Once I lined up one part of myself with the corresponding part of Leo, it was like all the other pieces could more easily fall into place. I had spent the first six months of our relationship looking over my shoulder, wondering what freakish cosmic error had gifted me such a perfect guy, and the other six months in dumb awe at how lucky I was to get that gift.
It was really all coming together for me.
Finally.
I had a cute condo, a job I adored, two precious kitties and a smoking hot boyfriend who doted on me. And I was going to show him tonight just how thankful I was to have in my life…
