Glass Ceilings

by A. m Madden

  Would I do it all over again to get to this point? I honestly didn’t know if I would. With age came clarity. I’d sacrificed a lot for my career. I wanted it more than anything, or so I’d thought. It wasn’t until I got a taste of something else, something more, that I began to have thoughts of regret.

  “Agent Farley?” I glanced up from my computer to see my newest agent, Parks, hovering in the doorway. The guy reminded me of me.

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re needed in room three.”

  “Brief me,” I ordered, refocusing on my computer screen.

  “She’s the last call that Delarro made on his phone. She ain’t talkin’. Claims she knows nothing.”

  My curt nod acknowledged what he said and a wave of my hand dismissed him. My team knew I needed just the facts, and nothing more. I’d rather form my own opinions about characters that needed to be interrogated. Dealing with witnesses was the part of my job that I loved.

  Getting into their heads was my specialty. Being summoned to room three meant something good was coming, although Parks did say she. Females were the most exhausting to crack. When emotions were added to the lies and debauchery, it was enough to try the patience of a saint.

  I glanced at my watch, realizing it was much later than I thought. This was going to be a long night. Releasing a heavy sigh, I grabbed the Delarro folder on the top of the stack, quickly scanning the fact sheets. An anonymous tip sent us to the victim’s apartment where he was found. No forced entry, single bullet wound in his forehead. The name Delarro was why the FBI were involved. He was the son of the acting mob boss out of Chicago under the Politto family.

  My vendetta against the Politto family began in Chicago. I single-handedly took down their illegal drug operation out of the bar I worked at undercover. Since then, every goal I had was to keep chipping away at the fortress they’d built, which spanned from Chicago to New York.

  We’d already infiltrated the Polittos during the Volante case I worked on soon after I landed in New York, and I planned to pick off the remaining three underbosses until they were all either dead or behind bars.

  Although Delarro was pretty low on the chain of importance, causing cracks in the foundation caused the strongest structures to come crumbling down.

  I stood and stretched, grabbed my coffee, the case file, and set out to grill this chick. As I always did, I entered the adjoining surveillance room first to get a good look at the person being questioned. It gave me an advantage to watch their mannerisms while undetected.

  “George,” I acknowledged my friend as he sat scribbling notes in his pad. George Whitney and I had been working side by side for almost two years. A strange friendship formed between us when we were both assigned to a high profile case involving the girlfriend of a famous rock star. It was my first big case in New York. Trey Taylor’s girlfriend, Tara, was kidnapped, and solving it had catapulted me into the limelight. I was promoted over George afterward, but our friendship never wavered…even after I became his boss, and even though he was old enough to be my father.

  “Good luck with this one, Nick.”

  “Georgie-boy, you know how I love a challenge.”

  I walked up to the one-way mirror and almost passed out when all the air gushed from my lungs. Sitting at the worn metal table, with wide eyes and trembling hands, was Angela Cavello.

  I wasn’t sure if it was anger or relief that pumped the blood through my heart with such velocity that it caused it to violently slam against the inside of my chest.

  I was immediately taken back to a time almost two years prior when she broke my heart.

  Chapter 11

  Nick

  OCTOBER 2015

  I remained rooted in shock while staring at her through the one-way mirror. It felt like I was seeing a ghost. The coffee I held in my hand was no longer appealing as bitterness rose in the back of my throat.

  The FBI’s mission is to help protect the public from dangerous threats facing our nation, international and domestic terrorists, cyber villains, mobsters, street gangs, child predators, serial killers, etc., etc. We’re real-life super heroes, sans the capes and ability to fly.

  There is one thing the FBI cannot help to protect…and that’s a broken heart.

  “You okay?” George asked when I still hadn’t moved.

  “Yeah.”

  The door opened and Parks asked from the doorway, “Ready, sir?”

  I walked to where he stood and handed him my cup commanding, “Get rid of this.” He took it and led me out of the room toward the door separating me from where she waited.

  “Her name is Angela Cavello,” he offered with one hand on the doorknob.

  “She’s scared. I’ll handle this alone. Don’t interrupt us until I summon.”

  “Yes, sir.” He opened the door, waiting curiously while I dragged in breath after breath. Once I stepped into the room, he shut it behind me.

  At the sound of it clicking shut, Angela looked up and gasped. Her hand flew to her mouth in shock, as tears immediately welled in her eyes and then rolled down both sides of her cheeks. Through a whisper that sounded more like an exhale, she said, “Nick.”

  I stood across the room, taking her in, ignoring the urge to grab her and wrap her in my arms, ignoring the gut-wrenching desire that engulfed me to crush my lips against hers in a punishing kiss.

  Ignoring my inner turmoil was by far the fucking hardest thing I ever had to do in my entire life. Yes, I was livid with her, but since it felt like I just took a bullet to the chest, it was more than obvious that I hadn’t gotten over her.

  She swallowed and quickly swiped away her tears with both hands. I waited a few minutes before walking to the empty chair that faced her.

  I had no idea what to say, or rather how to avoid saying what I wanted to. Too much time had passed, almost two fucking years of hating her had gone by, and I should’ve been able to handle the situation indifferently. Yet, I knew as sure as I was an agent, it’d be hard for me to play the role I needed to…convincingly at least.

  The tension that rolled off me caused the air in the room to become stifling. Without making eye contact, I dragged the chair out, threw the file on the table, and sat across from her. The metal table that separated us metaphorically became the past twenty-two months—one-dimensional, cold, hard.

  In all fairness, it hadn’t started that way. That New Year’s Day with her was the best day of my life. That’s what our relationship was reduced to, one day of bliss, followed by a few months of angst, followed by nothing…cold, hard, one-dimensional nothing.

  In the grand scheme of my life, it should’ve been an inconsequential event that came and went. It shouldn’t have consumed me as it had since I left Chicago almost two years ago.

  “I was hoping I’d see you here,” she said desperately.

  “You knew where I was?” I asked through clenched teeth. “All this time, you knew where you could find me?”

  “Yes.” I felt sick at her admission. When she continued by adding, “I’m so sorry. I tried to…”

  “Don’t.” I barked with a raised hand. “I no longer care. It doesn’t matter anymore.”

  I lied. It did matter. I wanted to know why she called me that night, hell-bent on ending us before we even began. I wanted to know why the fuck she promised things that she clearly had no intention of following through with. My brain screamed with question after question as she sat across from me completely distraught and broken. The problem was, every question I had had little to do with why she was really there.

  The five or so minutes that stood still since I’d first laid eyes on her began to dull my logic. Only then had it occurred to me why she was really there. The reason she sat across from me was because Ron Delarro was found dead, and she was the last person he called. It wasn’t because she left me and changed her mind. It had nothing to do with me, or us.

  So, instead of voicing any of my thoughts, I asked, “How are you connected to Ron Delarro?” Cl
arity hit. “Ron Delarro is your Ronnie?” She stared but didn’t answer. “This will go a lot smoother and take a lot less time if you cooperate,” I said with pure contempt.

  She cringed at the harshness in my tone, dragged in a shaky breath, and shook her head in disagreement. “He wasn’t mine.”

  “Yes, he was. He was the prick you were running from. And now that prick is dead. Why, Angela?”

  She muttered something I couldn’t hear.

  “Louder please?”

  “I don’t know,” she repeated.

  I aggressively flipped open the file and slammed my hand on the fact sheet, causing her to jump at the sound the table made as it rattled from my assault.

  “This says he called you last…and between that call and today someone put a bullet through his head.”

  Her chest rose and fell as her breathing became even more labored. I sat back in my chair, folded my arms, and waited for her to speak. Usually, silence was a very successful intimidation tactic. I was slowly losing control of myself, and I had to resort to proven methods I often used when reading people.

  But reading her was proving to be difficult, because all I saw was the Angela I desperately wanted to touch in one way or another, or make her laugh to see her eyes crinkle adorably in the corners. The levity I remembered from the one and only night we were together was nowhere to be found. Even with tearstained cheeks, a face free of makeup, and complete and utter terror deep in her eyes, she was still stunning. So many times I’ve had to rely on my memory to envision her face clearly. I didn’t have a picture of her and with time I forgot the small things that captured my attention the first night we met. Having her sitting before me proved that my memory of her beauty fell short.

  She still sported the ponytail she’d favored back then. Her dark chestnut hair was pulled up high, revealing that smooth curve of her neck that I desperately wanted to attach my lips to. I had to stop staring at her gorgeous green eyes in the familiar way I had back then. The only difference in them were the dark circles beneath that dulled their sparkle just enough to tell me that she’d been through hell.

  “In the past week he called me and texted me often with what he was going to do to me. I never answered them. It’s all on my phone, you can check.”

  I sat and tried to scrutinize her behavior, checking for signs that she was lying, basically trying to channel the prick FBI agent I’d become infamous for. With each second that ticked by, that prick routine became harder and harder to perform.

  With the silence stretching between us like a thick toxic cloud, sure enough, after a few very long minutes had passed, she finally spoke. “He found me a week ago.”

  “He found you where?”

  “Here, in New York.”

  “Where were you prior?”

  “I was staying with a friend in Ohio.”

  “For how long?”

  “A year.”

  “Why did you leave Ohio to come here?”

  “To find you.”

  Angela

  JANUARY 2014

  Two days had passed since Nick left Chicago. His phone call early that morning announced he’d arrived safely in New York, and couldn’t wait for me to get there. “I love my place,” he said over the phone with enthusiasm. “It’s small, but it has a great view of the Hudson and Jersey.”

  “I can’t wait to see it. I’m not sure what I’ll be able to afford once there, but I guarantee the Upper West Side will not be in my price range.”

  “Angela, you can stay with me until we find you a place you can afford. There’s no rush.”

  “I know. Thank you,” I said, meaning it. If circumstances had been different, and if we’d known each other longer than we had, I would absolutely consider moving in with him. It was just too soon.

  We chatted on the phone for a very long time. He wanted to know how Jase was after the shit hit the fan with Mugs. I relayed what I knew, which wasn’t much. “They are really mad at you,” I said unintentionally. Once it slipped out, I regretted telling him. The word “mad” was actually an understatement.

  At The Dump, Mugs had been arrested, along with two of his bartenders, and Marcy was brought in for questioning. It was obvious when Nick disappeared that he was involved with their incarceration. Jase and Eve were livid with the circumstances…even more so when the realization hit them that they knew nothing about Nick.

  “I’m not worried about them. They’ll get over it. I’m worried about you.”

  My heart squeezed at the sound of his voice. I could tell over the phone how much he desperately missed me. It equally warmed and saddened me. I missed him, too, more than I ever thought I would.

  “I’m fine,” I said forcing my voice to be positive. “I’ve discovered that I’m a really great actress.”

  “I bet. You even had me convinced you weren’t falling in love with me.”

  His comment stunned me silent. How could he possibly know, when I barely did? “You’re crazy,” I responded flippantly.

  “No, I’m not. You have. Do you want to know how I could tell?”

  “Yes.” My response sounded winded.

  A few seconds of silence passed before he added, “Angela, just thinking about the way your eyes darken right before I take your lips, and the color of your cheeks after I’ve kissed you, and even the way you grip my shirt wanting more once our lips part all tell me how much I affect you. I could easily tell you the signs of how you affect me over this call, but I’d much rather show you once you get here.”

  My insides clenched from his words. I could feel my desire for him in every part of my body. “Nick, I miss you.”

  “I know you do. I miss you, too.” I heard him drag in a breath before he asked, “Is he back yet?” I knew immediately which he Nick was referring to.

  “No.”

  “When is he due back?”

  “The end of the week.”

  “Angela, it’s time to tell me about Ronnie.”

  I considered what I would tell Nick. “We met in college. Nick, he wasn’t always the way he is now. The Ronnie I broke up with was worlds apart from the Ronnie who swept me off my feet. In my so-called fairy tale I had met the prince first, only for him to turn into the frog. It had a lot to do with why I resisted you so much when we met. He was charming, handsome, wealthy, and considerate—making it easy to fall for him. Our time together in Jersey was perfection. He always treated me like a princess, one he held high on a pedestal…until recently. Do you want to know more?” I asked, assuming he didn’t want to hear the details of why I had fallen in love with Ronnie.

  “Yes,” he quickly said.

  “With graduation approaching, and a job offer in Chicago, it was easy for him to convince me to move here with him. I had family here, and I could easily start my career where he would be. So I went. We found an apartment, he started his job, and I started working for Eve until something in my field came along. Life was fantastic.”

  “And then?”

  “And then as time passed, he turned into his father right before my eyes. Possessive, controlling, intimidating…he became a different person. I became consumed with leaving him. Every time I tried, I’d lose my nerve. After he left for Italy two weeks ago, I packed my things and moved into Eve’s place.”

  Nick cleared his throat, but otherwise remained silent. I could only imagine what was running through his mind.

  “Was he ever physically abusive?” Nick asked quietly over the phone. This was killing him.

  The look on Ronnie’s face when I said it was over flashed in my mind, along with the fear I always felt when confronting him.

  “We’ll discuss it when I get home,” he said without so much as a backward glance.

  “Ronnie, it’s over!”

  The tone of my voice captured his attention. He strode over to where I stood, and with a forceful grip on my throat, he shoved me hard against the wall, squeezing my flesh hard enough to hamper my breathing. He held my eyes to his and repeated h
is earlier declaration.

  “It’s not over until I say it’s over.”

  Our eyes locked; the familiar sense of fear caused the hairs on the back of my neck to stand at attention. The way he held me in his grip caused panic to take what little breath I had left. I was fighting for air, scratching at his wrist in an attempt to get him to loosen his hold. And then he did, and he left.

  “Angela?” Nick impatiently asked again when I remained silent.

  “He never laid a hand on me, but he always looked as if he could at any moment. It was the fear of that possibility that terrified me.” I paused, replaying the memory. “The night he left, he finally did. That’s when I packed my bags and left him.”

  “Motherfucker,” Nick mumbled over the phone.

  “I haven’t spoken to him since the day he left. I was going to wait until after he got back to end it, but after he…” I tried to swallow the large lump that lodged in my throat, hating that Ronnie could still make me feel such terror even when he wasn’t near.

  Nick’s heaving breath was the only sound between us. “Baby?”

  “I’m here.”

  “I want you gone before he gets back. This isn’t a request, Angela.”

  “I will be.”

  Chapter 12

  Nick

  OCTOBER 2015

  “You said his last name was Delton,” I said through gritted teeth.

  After she shared Ronnie’s last name I’d scoured the database for information on him. Obviously, nothing came up. “You lied to me.”

  “Of course not. I had no idea who he really was or who he was connected to until right before I left Ohio. Eve’s brother was helping me.”

  “I could have helped you.”

  “I didn’t know that at the time. I had no idea who you really were, Nick. You weren’t exactly forthcoming with details of your life, either.” She took a deep breath, her lips lifting into a sad smile. “We really didn’t know a thing about each other, did we, Nick?” she said out loud, but barely above a whisper.

  She was right, we didn’t.