It’s a much bigger, fancier room than mine, with a gorgeous wide window that allows a panoramic view of the Vegas skyline. It is truly beautiful. It feels kind of like a travesty that a man like Lieutenant Harden gets to sit in this office. It’s too good for him, in my opinion. Of course, I keep that opinion very much to myself. The lieutenant already doesn’t like me much.
I knock on the office door and wait for an answer.
“Come on in,” barks Lieutenant Harden. I push the door open and step inside, giving him a tentative smile. When he sees that it’s me, he gets a smarmy look on his face and leans back in his chair, regarding me with narrowed eyes and a smirk.
“Yes, Lieutenant? You wanted to see me?” I greet him, trying hard not to fidget. Something about the way he looks at me always makes my skin crawl. It’s like he’s not seeing me in my uniform, but… in lingerie, or something. It’s gross.
“Yeah. I did. So, you’re back,” he remarks. I nod.
“Yes, sir. Mission completed,” I comment, a little proudly.
“I wouldn’t be so quick to congratulate myself if I were you,” Harden begins. I can feel my face blushing as my smile fades. “You didn’t follow protocol. And you took your damn time, too. You’re lucky you made it out of there alive. And with your career intact.”
“I beg your pardon, Sir, but—”
“But nothing,” he interrupts, holding up both hands. “You screwed up, Officer Burns. You went about this the wrong way altogether.”
“What exactly did I do wrong?” I ask, starting to feel a little pissed off. The lieutenant sighs heavily.
“Well, you entered the basement of the club without backup. You blew your cover down there almost immediately, without inspecting what was in the crates. You attempted to arrest our target without backup and without handcuffs. And if we think back a little further, I have to admit, it seems like you might have enjoyed your fake identity a little too much, Burns,” he explains, shrugging. My mouth falls open.
“Excuse me?” I ask, breathless.
“Oh, you heard me,” Harden says. He leans forward and lowers his voice. “I thought you would make a good stripper, but I didn’t think you’d warm up to the job so quickly. And, uh, thoroughly,” he adds pointedly.
“What are you talking about?” I press him, trying to remain calm.
“Thank god I sent one of the guys to keep tabs on you at that sleazy strip joint. He saw you go home with the gangster. Like some common whore. You do know what we really mean by ‘getting close to your target,’ right? It doesn’t mean you sleep with him,” he insinuates.
My heart sinks. “I-I didn’t. I didn’t do anything,” I murmur tensely.
“Yes, you did. And whatever it was, you must have done a pretty good job. With that part, at least. Maybe you’d make a better whore than a vice cop. We all got our demons, Burns, but I didn’t expect yours to be big, burly Russian gangsters. I could fire you right here, right now,” he sneers. Then he leans back in his chair, fixing me with a critical eye. “But you know how we can smooth this over, right?”
“How?” I ask desperately. “I’ll do anything.”
Harden grins smugly.
“Oh, I bet you will.”
It dawns on me what he’s hinting at and I take a horrified step back.
“What? No. You’re kidding me. I would never,” I retort, wrinkling my nose in disgust.
“Ha. Don’t act so innocent now, Burns. Compared to whatever you did with that Russian rat, a night with me should be a walk in the park,” he chuckles, steepling his fingers.
I stare at him silently for a moment, then decide it’s time to just leave. I can’t deal with this right now. My brain can’t even compute what he’s saying to me.
“I have paperwork to do,” I tell him. I turn and march out of his office and back to my desk, my heart hammering away. How dare he? How disgusting! I pull up my email and start typing up a message to Harden’s superior, to turn him in for propositioning me at work.
But then I remember that Harden is up for a promotion soon, and with the way this sexist department works, there’s no question about the fact that he will get it. And when he does, he’ll have even more power to make my life miserable.
I delete the email draft.
I need to distract myself. I start poring over the statements and details regarding Misha’s arrest, and it doesn’t take me too long to discover a small discrepancy in the timeline.
“Shit,” I mutter to myself. God, all of my colleagues here are useless. Do I really have to do everything myself? I know that if I don’t get this detail fixed, it will be my ass on the line.
Chaykovsky is my arrest, and I’m the one that has to dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s.
Besides, I need to get the hell out of this office for a while anyway.
I pack up my stuff and tell the secretary I’m heading out for an interview. I climb into my car and take off in the direction of the detention center where I know my “Russian gangster” is being held.
It’s a long drive, long enough to let my mind wander. Which, at the moment, is a dangerous move. I can’t stop thinking about how shitty my boss is. I can’t believe he would do this to me. Not only tear me apart for carrying out my mission and making the arrest the only way I knew how, but to proposition me.
To try and blackmail me into having sex with him.
I never thought I would end up in a situation like this. Ever since I was a little girl, the only thing I ever wanted to do was become a police officer, just like my father. When I was growing up, it was my dad I felt closest to. He and I just clicked, and I was a total daddy’s girl. He was my best friend, the one I confided my secrets in, the one I turned to whenever I was hurt or scared.
My father was a patient, loving, hard-working man who inspires me even to this day, years and years after his tragic death. He worked as a small-town cop in a town outside of Las Vegas, where I grew up. It’s a quiet suburb, where crime is almost unheard of. Not like the city, which is crawling with criminal activity. The vision of my father in his uniform, coming home from work with a tired smile on his face comforts me even now. I used to wait by the front door when it was time for his shift to end, and as soon as his car pulled into the driveway, I would run out to meet him.
He would scoop me up into his arms and swing me around, asking me about my day. He was full of funny and harrowing stories from his job, and even though his career wore him out, he always had energy to play with me and listen to me talk at the end of the day.
“I miss you, Dad,” I mutter to myself as I roll along down the desert highway. “What the hell would you tell me to do in this situation? I wish you could tell me.”
I have tried my hardest to follow in his footsteps, but being a big city cop is worlds away from being a police officer in a small, cozy suburb. Besides, I am a woman, working in vice, with no one to stand up for me. My boss can do whatever he wants and I have no recourse. How can I fight back when there’s no one around to back me up?
I can’t lose this job, though. I want to make my father proud. I can’t disgrace his memory by being fired, or worse: quitting the force. He was the kind of man who never gave up, and I am determined to be just like him.
I just have to figure out a way around this. If that means I have to interview Misha Chaykovsky every day until all the details are right and the case I’m building against him is immaculate, then so be it.
Deep down, a voice at the back of my mind asks if that’s the only reason I want to see him, and a flash of memory of our amazing night together hits me full force. I have to blink it away, taking in several deep breaths to steady myself again.
I’m a professional. Sleeping with him might not have been the best way to get what I wanted, but I couldn’t turn down the opportunity to get close to my target.
When I arrive at the detention center, I’m full of fire and determination. It doesn’t take me long to get through the security measures, chatting with th
e guards and staff as I make my way through. The worst part of the whole ordeal is just walking through the rows of inmates in their cells, men who are starved for female attention. They shout and holler horrible names and threats my way, calling me every curse word under the sun, grabbing their crotches, sexually propositioning me in a more… direct fashion than the insinuation Lieutenant Harden made.
I just keep my head held high and march right through to the secure little room where I will meet with Misha. When I walk in, he’s already sitting there, his feet and wrists chained to the table. He regards me with a totally unreadable expression, his blue eyes cold and hard as a glacier.
In contrast, I can feel my body warming up instantly, responding to the sight of him. He’s like a magnet, drawing me closer. Even in his orange jumpsuit, he’s easily the hottest man I have ever had the fortune — or misfortune — of meeting. It seems like they couldn’t quite find a big enough jumpsuit for him. His muscles bulge and strain underneath the scratchy orange fabric.
“You have fifteen minutes,” the guard informs me. “We’ll stay nearby, don’t worry. If you need anything or if he gives you any trouble, just yell.”
“Got it. Thank you,” I reply. The guard leaves and I take my seat at the table across from Misha, who is still sitting silently. He doesn’t even seem angry, just… cold.
“Good afternoon,” I tell him, clearing my throat awkwardly. I take out my paperwork and spread it across the table, then click open my pen. I look back up at him. “I need to ask you some questions regarding your whereabouts three days ago.”
“Ask away,” he replies flatly.
“On the morning of the 19th, where were you?” I ask.
“Was that the morning after the night we spent together?” Misha responds.
I blush immediately.
“No, that was — that was a different morning.”
Something close to a smile flickers across his face.
“You weren’t even afraid of me that day in the basement. You stood up to me like you were invincible,” he muses aloud. Those icy blue eyes never break away from me for a moment.
“I was doing my job,” I answer quietly. “And… I was afraid.”
He gives me a slow, approving nod. “You hid it well.”
“And you didn’t hurt me, even though you could have,” I add, frowning in confusion.
He shrugs. “You’re a woman. I would never lay a hand on a woman unless she specifically asked me to. I think you remember that.”
I’m getting flustered now, trying to dodge the sparks flying between us, the memories burned into my mind.
“Could you just answer the questions? You said you would.”
“No. I said you could ask. I didn’t say anything about actually answering,” Misha explains coolly. I heave a sigh.
“Please,” I lean forward, lowering my voice. “Look, my boss is giving me a lot of grief and I just need to get these facts straight.”
“So, because your boss is an asshole, you want me to help you incriminate me further?” he asks, smiling. I realize with a jolt how stupid I’m being. Of course he isn’t going to help me.
“No. You’re right. That makes sense. I’m sorry for— ugh, why am I apologizing? You’re the criminal here, not me,” I groan. “If you’re not going to answer my questions, then—”
“You were one hell of an actress,” Misha interrupts. “But just between you and me, you seemed a lot happier as a stripper than you are as a cop.”
I blanched.
“I’m not a stripper. And what I did with you —what we did together — that was wrong. That was stupid. A mistake on my part.”
“Didn’t feel like a mistake to me,” he says, his heavy shoulders lifting into a shrug, the chains rattling against the table.
“Even though it led to your arrest?” I ask, tilting my head to one side.
He smirks. “Let’s not pretend like our night together did anything to solidify your case against me. You could have done just as well without sleeping with me. You didn’t even have to meet me to arrest me in the basement. Didn’t even need to be a stripper for that. Could have just gotten a warrant if you suspected criminal activity in that club.”
“Ah-ah-ah, keep your voice down, please,” I shush him, glancing around nervously.
He chuckles. “Look, Misty, you’re in a jail right now. Do you really think anyone here gives a damn that we spent the night together? Far worse things go on behind bars every day.”
“My name’s not Misty,” I tell him, without thinking. “My name is Nicole Burns.”
“Nicole,” he repeats, nodding slowly. “That suits you much better.”
“So, are you going to answer my questions or not? I have a lot to—” I trail off as my cell phone starts ringing. “Just a second,” I say, getting up and walking away to check my phone.
It’s not a number I recognize. Frowning, I answer. “Officer Burns.”
“Nicole Burns?” asks the curt female voice.
“Yes. That’s me. Can I ask who’s calling?”
“I’m with the San Francisco PD, calling to inform you that your sister, Samantha Burns, has recently been reported missing by her college roommate.”
Nicole
My heart stops for a second. “What? Excuse me?”
“Yes, ma’am. You are Samantha’s next of kin, correct?”
“Yes, I am. What happened? Where did she go?” I demand, starting to feel weak in the knees. This cannot be happening.
“Well, we don’t know yet, ma’am. This is just a call to let you know.”
“It’s Officer. Officer Burns,” I correct her. “Please tell me what you know.”
“What happened?” asks a deep male voice from across the room. In my state of distress I forgot that Misha was even here. I glance over at him to see that he looks genuinely concerned, which doesn’t make sense. He hardly knows me. And what little he does know of me can’t possibly mean he likes me very much. After all, I am the whole reason why he’s being bars right now. But when I glare at him, he sits back down, a solemn expression on his handsome face.
“Ma’am,” she says, undermining my title once more, “there isn’t much information for me to give you at this time. We will call you if we hear anything further. Goodbye.”
“No, no. Don’t go. Please, I need more information! Something. Anything. What do the police think happened? How long has she been missing? Is she hurt?” I ramble, pressing my hand to my chest. I can feel my heart fluttering a million miles a minute.
“Miss— Officer Burns, I wish I had something more to tell you,” the woman sighs in more annoyance than compassion. “I understand how stressful this must be.”
“Stressful? Excuse me, but no, you do not understand what I am feeling right now!” I exclaim, tears starting to burn in my eyes. “You couldn’t possibly understand. Is your sister missing, too?”
There was a moment of silence and I laid my face in my palm, sighing in frustration. “Look, I’m sorry,” I tell her quietly. “I’m just worried, that’s all. I know you’re just doing your job. It’s not your fault.”
“It’s fine. I don’t blame you for getting emotional. I can’t even begin to imagine what’s going through your head right now,” she replies, in a much more sympathetic tone. “But just try not to overthink this too much yet, okay? If I can be frank with you, people go missing all the time, and nine times out of ten, they come back on their own. Now, your sister is a bright young woman, I expect. She’s a student, right?”
“Yes,” I answer, a lump forming in my throat. “She’s studying to be an artist.”
“So that means she has classes to attend, homework to do, papers to write. She has a routine. She has a life here. If she’s gone missing, she’s got a thousand reasons to come home,” the woman explains slowly.
“No, but that’s the thing. She wouldn’t just leave like that,” I protest, shaking my head.
“Who? What is going on?” pipes up Misha. I g
ive him another silencing glare, but he just watches me with those stony blue eyes. I know there’s no chance that I am going to finish this interview. I have to get out of here. My priorities have shifted. I’m not interested in getting the facts straight for my case.
I need to find my sister.
“Sometimes young people can be hard to predict, but it sounds like you and your sister are very close. Hopefully she will reach out soon. Keep in touch and we will update you if there are any new developments in the case. Try to stay calm.”
“Thank you,” I tell her quickly before hanging up and sliding the phone back into my pocket. I look over at Misha, who hasn’t taken his eyes off of me this whole time.
“You’re upset. Something happened. Something personal,” he says grimly.
“Yeah, good guess,” I shoot back, a little more viciously than I meant to. Misha seems totally unperturbed by my sarcastic response, though. He still just looks worried.
About me.
Why?
“This interview is over. I will get back to you and we will finish this... soon. I have to go now,” I tell him hastily. “Guard!”
The same guard as before comes hurrying back. “Is there an issue? Is he giving you any trouble, Officer?” he asks, leaning around to glare at Misha over my shoulder.
“No, no. He’s fine. It’s fine. I just have to leave. Something… something has come up,” I explain, forcing a polite smile to hurry things along. “I’m sorry to have wasted your time. I just need to get out of here.”
“Of course. No problem, Officer Burns,” the guard says, sliding the bars so I can get out. As I stride away from him as fast as I can go without actually running, he calls out after me, “Hey! Tell your lieutenant I said hi!”
“Sure!” I call back, rolling my eyes.
I all but dash down through the rows of inmates, ignoring them as they all shout and whistle and catcall me lewdly from their cells. Right now, I couldn’t care less about them. Any of them. The only thing that matters to me right now is Samantha and making sure she’s okay.
Vegas Boss: A Mafia Hitman Romance Page 6
