by Julie Leto
First came DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS…now comes DIRTY LITTLE LIES, the next action-packed, super-sexy thriller from New York Times bestseller, Julie Leto!
DIRTY LITTLE LITTLE LIES
JULIE LETO
Praise for Dirty Little Lies…
“A must read for anyone enjoying a little female butt-kicking with a little flare.”
C.J. Yasay
Bookstove
“Leto's style is fast, breezy and loaded with tension. She's created a complex plot that's executed with precision. Her characters have no middle ground and are worth a second look.”
Donna M. Brown
RT Bookreviews
“Compelling drama, engaging and vibrant characters, along with a spicy Latin flavor all combine together to make Julie Leto's latest story a must-have for fans of truly well written romantic suspense.”
Sonya
Fallen Angel Reviews
Main Menu
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Afterword
Dear Reader
About the Author
Contact Information
Other Works by Julie Leto
Dirty Little Secrets (Excerpt)
Copyright Information
Table of Contents
Dedication
To Helen Breitweiser, agent extraordinaire.
Dear Reader,
I hope you enjoyed this Marisela Morales Adventure. The first two books in the series, Dirty Little Secrets and Dirty Little Lies, were originally released by Pocket Books, but the series was cut short and the third book, Talk Dirty to Me, was never published. I’m considering writing this book and releasing it on my own…if reader response to the digital re-release of the first two books proves there is enough interest for me to keep going. I love Marisela, Frankie and the gang and would LOVE to explore more of their down and dirty world, so please, if you’d like to see the third book, send me an email to http://www.julieleto.com/ or contact me on Facebook or @JulieLeto on Twitter.
Happy Reading!
Prologue
“DON’T STOP, MARISELA. God, don’t stop.”
Ian Blake forced his eyes open, pushing aside the languid fog coursing through his brain. No matter how heavy his muscles, no matter how dry and parched his throat, he fought to focus on this fantasy come true.
Marisela in his bed.
As she moved atop him, he swallowed deeply, the mingled tastes of bourbon and woman lingering on his palate. The rows of richly scented candles behind her created a halo against her luxurious black hair. Her skin, so naturally brown, glistened with the sheen of sweat, tempering the friction that sparked between their naked bodies. Her thighs tight on his waist, she pumped them closer and closer to orgasm, a forbidden end to a mating that never should have begun.
“Eres tonto, tu no saber quién soy yo.”
Tonto? Fool? He couldn’t disagree. He’d lost his mind. He’d drunk too much. He’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time with a woman so wrong, she should have come with a warning label.
She leaned forward and captured his mouth just as his groin tightened and pulsed. He groaned and surrendered. To the lust. To the insatiable need. To Marisela, the woman who’d made it her mission in life to drive him insane.
Once he was spent and fell instantly to sleep, Yizenia Santiago climbed off her lover and sighed appreciatively while working out the kink in her back. He was handsome, this hombre. Maybe even more dashing than his father, a man she’d known so long ago. And even high on too much whisky americana, he’d been sinfully proficient in bed, even if he’d called her by some other woman’s name.
As she slipped into the living room and prepared to close the pocket doors behind her, Yizenia stopped and looked at Ian Blake’s lithe but well-muscled body draped across the sheets in glorious male splendor. She hadn’t happened upon him in that Back Bay bar by accident. But the state of his sobriety had come as a surprise—one that she’d immediately exploited for both of their pleasure.
In the burgeoning morning light, Yizenia dropped the window blinds, closing out the view of the impressive pond glistening outside her window. She hadn’t expected such beauty in the middle of a big city like Boston, but then, the last time she’d come here, she hadn’t stayed long enough to see the sights. She vowed to explore this Jamaica Plain area, where the vast influx of Hispanic residents would allow her to blend in and go unnoticed.
That is, until she wanted to be noticed.
She quickly brewed and poured her morning cafécortado, then reached for the newspaper sent to her months ago; she wanted the article close at hand when she contacted her client. She stretched, working out another of the knots in her lower back, then punched the prearranged number into her phone.
Despite the early hour, the client answered on the first ring.
“Señora Santiago?”
Yizenia sneered. The voice on the other end was mechanically disguised. A sign this client didn’t trust her. Did her reputation mean nothing?
“The altered voice device offends me, señor,” she said.
“I apologize, Ms. Santiago, but I cannot be too careful. Until our arrangement is settled, such precautions protect us both.”
Yizenia tapped her red-tipped nails on the table beside the phone, noticing yet again how wrinkled her skin was becoming. She reached for the bottle of French lotion she’d purchased on her last holiday, and worked the emollient into her hands as she spoke.
“You will reveal yourself to me before I commit to your cause,” she insisted.
“Of course.”
The answer came quickly. Without hesitation. She supposed that her potential client could be ruined if anyone found out they’d engaged the services of an assassin. Or, as Yizenia preferred to think of herself, a minister of justice.
“Bien,” she agreed. For the time being, she had the upper hand in this negotiation.
“Did you receive the information I sent?”
Yizenia eased into the chair beside the phone, the dossier nearby. “Sí, but I will need to know more before I decide whether or not these men deserve my attention.”
As the client offered to send her any information she required, Yizenia glanced at a photograph she’d unpacked a few days ago, frowning at how the watercolor hues had faded, how the smiles of her mother and father and younger sister seemed so…forced. Far away. Dead, even though the image had been created nearly a year before they’d been slaughtered by Franco’s secret police.
“According to what I have read, Rebecca Manning received no justice from your courts,” she said finally.
“I thought we would agree on that point.” Even with the mechanical camouflage, she could hear the smile in the client’s voice. The relief. “I’ve lived with this injustice for too long. Now, to watch these men receive accolades and monetary rewards when a beautiful young woman I dearly loved died at their hands…it turns my stomach. I cannot live with this any longer. I’ll pay any price.”
Yizenia listened keenly. The desperation she heard seemed genuine. She should know. She had once attempted to live with the knowledge that the monsters who murdered her family had gone unpunished. When living had become unbearable, she’d decided to take justice into her own hands and mete out the retribution her country’s regime had denied her. Her tragedy had turned her life in a new powerful direction. For nearly forty years she’d traveled the world, killing on behalf of the victimized, risking her life to ensure that God had His chance to punish the unforgivable acts of the arrogant and the cruel.
But now, she was tired. Old, really, though she could still push her slender body and keen mind when she needed to do so. When the price was high enough. When the retribution was swift and sweet.
And this particular case brought an ad
ded incentive, one her potential client need know nothing about. She glanced at the pocket doors leading to the bedroom and was satisfied by the sound of snoring.
“My price will be exorbitante,” she assured.
“Name it.”
She did. With no hesitation, the client agreed to her terms.
“We must meet,” she demanded. “I insist on shaking the hand of the person courageous enough to engage me.”
Yizenia smiled as the voice described several sites in Boston where they could rendezvous unnoticed. She had fond memories of this quaint American city. Contacts born here. Rivals she’d acquired. And now, the possibility of finding someone to pass the torch to, someone to carry on her mission to right the wrongs of the world.
She committed the meeting place and time to memory. “Then I say hasta luego,” she concluded. “You will have your justice soon, I assure you.”
And ultimately, so would she.
One
“SILK SUITS YOU.”
Marisela Morales tried not to jump at the sound of Max’s voice, but his sudden, unexpected presence was the final stomp on her last nerve. It was bad enough being dragged to some society soiree where she stood out like, well, like a Cuban American ex-gang chick amid a mansion full of blue-blooded Boston big shots. But she didn’t appreciate Max, Ian Blake’s right-hand man, reminding her that no matter how honed her instincts were, he could trump her. Every time.
“Would…you…stop…doing that,” she insisted through clenched teeth.
“Doing what? Complimenting you?”
She leveled her gaze into Max’s steely gray glare. She knew he was laughing at her. Gloating. She dropped the subject. Max was a mystery she had no interest in solving tonight.
“Where’s the boss?” she asked.
“Mr. Blake will be along shortly.”
“He can take his time,” she said with a sneer.
Max frowned. “Time to let go of the past, Marisela.”
Marisela’s jaw dropped open.
Max’s expression froze and not surprisingly, he didn’t say a word. Max was nothing if not loyal. But on Marisela’s last mission, Ian Blake had used the life of one of his agents as a bargaining chip against her. And not just any agent, either. Some nights, she still could feel the slick gloss of Frankie’s blood on her hands. And Max expected her to just up and forgive Ian for calling her bluff? Not likely.
“He nearly let Frankie die.”
“But he didn’t die, did he?”
She glanced aside and blew out a frustrated breath. No, Frankie hadn’t died. He’d recovered. Not that she knew how he was doing since he hadn’t bothered to contact her in three months.
“Mr. Blake asked me to bring you this,” Max explained, handing her a flute of pale gold champagne.
“Fancy hooch isn’t going to erase what he did, Max.”
“No, but it might erase that god-awful look on your face.”
“What god-awful look?”
“The one that makes me wonder if you didn’t step in a pile of dog shit on the way up the red carpet?”
Marisela took a long sip of the sparkling wine, rolling her eyes at Max’s earthy assessment. Okay, so she didn’t want to be here, in blustery Boston, at some highfalutin shindig fund-raiser, acting as arm candy to Ian Blake, who, so far, hadn’t even bothered to show his face. She wanted to be back in Mexico, where she and Brynn Blake, Titan International’s majority stockholder and Ian’s twin sister, had been finishing up a case involving the kidnapping and rescue of a corporate CEO who should have known better than to venture into some quaint Chihuahua village just to pay for a piece of ass. The retrieval operation had been dangerous and bloody. She was still riding on the high of their success. Marisela had wanted to stick around when the Titan contingent handed the perpetrators over to the authorities, but she’d been recalled to the home office instead.
“So where are these jewels we’re supposed to be protecting, anyway?” Marisela asked. Several women attending tonight’s masked ball were wearing borrowed jewels as if they were actresses at the Oscars rather than the trophy wives of bloated politicians who showed their generosity toward those less fortunate by planning parties. Thanks to the guest list, security for the event was under the jurisdiction of the state police and the Secret Service. But the guy throwing the party had wanted extra attention paid to the jewels, so he’d hired Titan.
“You have half an hour until your shift,” Max informed her. “Finish your champagne. Mingle. Get a feel for the layout of the place. But stay out of trouble.”
She turned to blast him for his parental tone, but not surprisingly, Max had disappeared. She found some measure of comfort in the fact that she caught sight of the back of his head as he eased through the crowd.
He wasn’t a ghost, but he sure as hell acted like one sometimes.
Mingle, he’d said. Get a feel for the layout.
She’d rather get a feel for the dark-skinned, long-haired hombre on the other side of the dance floor, staring at her as if she were the only woman in the room.
He wore a sequined black mask, but with the slim line of a beard tracing the hard edge of his chin, he oozed machismo. His tuxedo emphasized his physique—not too muscled, but by no means slim. She arched a brow, intrigued. With a cool stride, he walked from the foyer and into the ballroom, stopping to raise his champagne toward her in invitation.
Moving in his direction, she downed the rest of her own champagne and deposited the empty flute on a passing waiter’s tray. She did look hot tonight. And she still had a good thirty minutes before Max would miraculously find her and escort her to her post. Might as well find someone…er, something…interesting to do until then.
As she moved, she enjoyed the soft, friction of her silk gown against her skin. One perk of working for Titan was the wardrobe. She’d been hustled from the private airstrip where the Titan plane had landed from Mexico, to an exclusive Newbury Street boutique, where she’d chosen the most expensive gown in the shop. Royal purple and spaghetti strapped, the dress curved deliciously over her body from the plunging neckline to the fitted bodice to the skirt that flared at the hips with just enough Latina swish to hide the LadySmith revolver she had strapped to her inner thigh.
But she doubted she’d need the piece tonight. Anyone who tried to rob this bunch would have to be certifiable. As she wove through the dance floor seeking out the sexy man in black, she noticed security guards posted near every exit. The Secret Service had blocked off access to large portions of the expansive grounds, and even Titan’s operatives had to check in through a special clearance procedure.
But none of that mattered to her when she caught sight of her mystery man talking to the bandleader. A few seconds later, the music segued into a Latin beat. A salsa. Not a boppy, cheerful salsa, but a sensual, sultry one. The music instantly pulsed deep in her belly. A crowd surged around her. Even the gringos couldn’t resist such an undeniable rhythm.
She dosed her eyes. Listened. Son of a bitch. He’d requested “Reina de Reinas.” Queen of queens. She moved the bangle bracelet she wore on her left wrist and glanced at her tattoo, the only physical evidence left of her gang days, except for the scar behind her ear, hidden by her thick, dark hair. The brand at the base of her hand was a small purple crown, tipped with red jewels—the color of rubies, the color of blood. The color las Reinas wore when they wanted their enemies to be very, very afraid.
Her eyes flashed to the man in black. He stood in front of the stage, his face hidden behind a mask she could now see was tied with a bloodred ribbon. He raised a hand toward her, beckoning, inviting, demanding.
With an intrigued smile, she stepped nearer, inviting the music into her blood. The bongos beat a sway into her hips and the horns blared the shimmy into her shoulders. The minute the flesh of her fingers finally slid into his warm palm, he tugged her forward against his chest, rock hard and flowing with pure male power. She’d just danced herself into danger of the most carnal kind.
<
br /> And after one glance into his hazel eyes—flecked with slivers of deep jade green—followed by the tandem swivel of his hips pressed close to hers, she knew.
Danger with a capital F. She smiled cryptically. The cabrón. Did he really think she wouldn’t recognize him?
He grinned, emphasizing the thin, sculpted line of facial hair that traced from his sideburns down his strong chin, then spiked up toward his full lips. The dark streak of a moustache dashed across his upper lip and the wicked triangle below his bottom lip made him look like el diablo himself. To anyone else, his disguise might have been convincing.
But not to the girl who’d given him her virginity.
“So, where have you been all my life?” she asked him in Spanish.
Or more specifically, for the last three months. On their last mission together, Frankie Vega had taken a bullet that had nearly cost him his life. Before she’d left for Mexico, she’d stayed by his side, making sure that he lived long enough to turn her life upside down at least one more time.
He didn’t answer her question, but instead, spun her skillfully beneath his arm, then stepped into the dance with sure and certain fire. Marisela matched him twist for twist, turn for turn, and kicked-up heel to kicked-up heel. Gazes locked, they danced the full breadth of the song until just before the final verse, when he slid his hand to the small of her back, yanked her flush against him, and then spun them off the dance floor into a corner behind the bandstand.
He pressed his palm against the paneled wall and a door slid open. Marisela bet the cops out front didn’t know about this hiding place, though she wasn’t surprised Frankie had found it. He had a talent for finding places he wasn’t supposed to know about. With a slight gesture, he invited her inside. Once they were through a narrow archway, a steep and winding stairwell emerged from the shadows. Marisela freed herself from his bone-melting embrace and placed her palm squarely on the center of his chest.
