Dollars (Dollar #2)

by Pepper Winters

  It didn’t matter that I’d left without a word. It didn’t matter if I never went back for her. Pim wasn’t my equal. She didn’t need to know my whereabouts or me to ask fucking permission.

  But the truce...

  The truce would stand.

  In fact, the time away would only work to my advantage because her tongue would have another few hours of healing before we met again.

  Nodding at my manager, Charlton Tommas, I strode from the helipad and into the huge warehouse where floating dreams were made.

  “What seems to be the problem?”

  Charlton gnawed on his bottom lip, his eyes darting away in panic. All thoughts of Pimlico vanished as he whispered, “There’s been a murder.”

  HE LEFT WITHOUT a word.

  He stayed away for two nights, three days.

  In that time, I had good hours and bad.

  I ate what was delivered, and each meal was slighter easier than the last. Dr. Michaels visited me again to ensure my tongue was healing, and the swelling continued to abate as my body rehabilitated.

  I wrote notes to No One before tossing them out to sea, as if the ocean had become my own personal wishing well for things I could never have.

  No matter the peace I was given or the safety in which I hovered, I still didn’t trust those around me. Even the girl who came to clean my room and dole out fresh towels was kept at a distance. However, if she didn’t like to natter while working—nerves caused by my silence—I would never have known Elder had left and wasn’t just sulking somewhere on his giant ship.

  I’d never heard the helicopter take off (I didn’t even know there was one), and once the maid left that first morning, I’d sat on the balcony, staring at the sky, looking for a speck of the returning craft.

  Thoughts of pillaging Elder’s office for clues on how to end my captivity taunted me. I remembered the password he’d had me type before calling my mother on his phone. I had a way to contact the outside world…I think.

  I desperately wanted to know more about him.

  The second afternoon, when I’d given into the stupid urge to snoop, I’d spent hours stalking the corridors for his work space. But I hadn’t found it thanks to locked doors and no skills at lock picking.

  And even if I had managed to break into his domain and read his emails or understood what he kept hidden, what would that achieve?

  We were in the middle of the ocean.

  Apart from knocking out countless staff and learning how to fire a flare or call the Coast Guard, I wasn’t equipped to go to battle with him.

  I wasn’t lazy or fearful…I liked to think it was smart to bide my time and let Elder grant more snippets of his life. Already, he’d given me clues in the way he acted and the respectful way his staff went about their chores even though he wasn’t here to oversee.

  They worked diligently because he deserved it not because he commanded it.

  A tyrant wouldn’t have such loyalty. And I was willing to give him more time before I made up my mind. Everyone was worthy of that, even men who owned another’s life—especially a man who’d saved another’s life.

  I was aware my thoughts were a walking contradiction.

  By the third evening, when the Phantom had passed inlets and peninsulas and other yachts nowhere near as fine sailed through our wake, the faint whop-whop of flying machinery sounded.

  As the sun set over the sea, a sleek helicopter appeared on the horizon, slowly growing larger the closer it came.

  My heart did a weird pole vault dismount. I couldn’t decide if it was a death roll or a somersault of expectation. Either way, Elder had somehow gotten under my skin without even being here.

  The helicopter hovering over the stern of the ship was deafening even with the constant hum of boat engines. Leaving my spot on the balcony, I padded naked across my bedroom to head upon deck and witness the arrival of the man who called me his.

  I cracked open my door and came eye to eye with a young steward vacuuming the corridor, I looked down at my state of undress. He gaped like a mouth-breathing idiot, and, as much as it amplified my discomfort to wear clothing, I had to start accepting the habit for other’s sake.

  Closing the door, I headed to the wardrobe and selected the oversized black dress I’d worn to dinner. Holding my breath, I slipped it over my head. Fighting the disgust as the soft cotton cocooned me, I pulled out my hair and let it drape down my back, hopefully hiding some of the whip marks and heavy scars left there permanently.

  Now suitable, I left my suite and headed down the corridor to the lift. Once the mirrored elevator arrived, I pressed the top button for the outside deck and waited impatiently, pressing my tongue on the roof of my mouth, activating a tiny sliver of sensation.

  A few levels higher, the lift spat me out on a glass-fronted walkway. I left springy carpet, and my toes kissed polished wood as I left inside for outside.

  The helicopter was still winding down, its rotors barely still.

  Crew dashed around, placing ropes and pulleys, strapping the machine to this mega water city. A few noticed me, one even waved, but no man with hair as black as nightmares and eyes as lethal as snipers appeared.

  I waited to see if the cabin door would open, but squinting in the twilight, I saw only one person remaining: the pilot.

  Elder had arrived and already vanished.

  I didn’t let myself sigh with disappointment. Instead, I sucked in a breath and headed back the way I came. So what, I hadn’t seen him? What did I expect? That I’d welcome him home like some besotted lover? That he would want to see me after my desire to be left alone?

  As the lift opened its maw, welcoming me into its belly, I changed my mind. I didn’t want walls and ceilings to swaddle me anymore. I wanted the wildness of the sea, the snap of the wind, and the freedom of air and sky.

  I WOKE TO the strangest smell.

  Something that reminded me of bad decisions and stupid teenage recklessness.

  Sweet and pungent and wrong.

  My eyes cracked as the caw of seabirds heading to roost echoed across the night sky.

  Night?

  When had it become so dark?

  Unfurling myself from where I’d napped in a wrapped up lifeboat, I stretched. The canvas covering the boat made a perfect hammock; I’d commandeered it after forgoing the lift and staying up on deck. It was only supposed to be for a few minutes, but it seemed tiredness had other ideas.

  I don’t remember falling asleep.

  Chills scattered over my arm, coldness heavy in my blood.

  A noise made my ears twitch as my nose wrinkled against the familiar sweet stench. Holding my breath, I looked over the side of my twilight hideaway.

  There, haloed by deck lights and stars, was Elder. He stood with his elbows on the railing looking out to sea, one ankle cocked over the other. He wore black slacks and a cream shirt with the sleeves tugged to the middle of his forearms.

  He looked powerful and refined, but all of that was a lie judging by the cigarette between his lips and the cloud of smoke dispersing overhead.

  He smokes?

  Why had I never smelt tobacco on him?

  Another whiff of earthy flavour hit my nostrils.

  Because it’s not tobacco.

  Marijuana.

  So he doesn’t drink, but he smokes pot?

  Could there be any bigger contradiction?

  “I know you’re there.” His voice was low but carried weighty on the breeze. “The captain informed me of a woman dressed in black sleeping in his lifeboat.” Turning around, he inhaled more smoke, grey fog slipping erotically through his lips. “I told him I’d check it out. Make sure we had no unwanted stowaways.”

  I sat up, shifting to position myself on my knees.

  My tongue was half the size it was the day he left but still tender as I fought a yawn and stared instead.

  He followed my eyes.

  “You can ask.” His face darkened. “In fact, if you open your mouth and ask m
e what I’m doing with marijuana, I’ll give you the honest to God’s truth. I’ll tell you more than I’ve ever told anyone just by asking that one question.”

  Silence was heavy and potent between us.

  What was his truth? Why hadn’t he told anyone? What secrets could he possibly be harbouring?

  Attraction that I’d ignored webbed tight around us. He breathed hard as if afraid I’d take him up on his offer while part of him begged me to. “Go on. No one knows what I am, what I’ve done. You ask, and you’ll be the first and only.” He pressed the joint against his lips, inhaling deep. “You hold all the power in this situation, Pim. One little word and all my fucking secrets are yours.”

  My lips stretched to form the words, but my tongue sat heavy and unwilling. Shaking my head slightly, I looked away, doing my best to ignore the way the curling smoke from his mouth made me feel.

  I never thought of smoking as sexy.

  I’d grown up in an age where every establishment banned cigarettes and the culture turned it into a nasty, awful habit that was killing, not only them, but also their loved ones.

  I agreed with it being a death stick, but Elder was smoking weed, a plant…he smoked it in such a way he looked like he needed it, not just used it for the sake of using.

  His head cocked, waiting for me to find the balls or overcome the pain to ask.

  I doubted he’d give me an opportunity like this one again. I had the power to skip ahead—to jump the superficial getting-to-know-each-other and steal his biggest confession.

  After all, he owed me. He’d read my notes to No One.

  He knew how I thought and reacted to pressure.

  I had no idea how his mind worked, and now, my curiosity was even worse because weed was a relaxant, a painkiller in the medical world—given to those who needed help to survive.

  Was he in emotional or physical pain?

  And why did I want to know so badly?

  He said no one else knows.

  No One.

  The fact he’d chosen to tempt me with the title of my salvation wasn’t lost on me. Was it a trick or the first honest to God raw reality he’d shown?

  Climbing from the lifeboat, my feet didn’t make a sound as I padded toward him and clutched the railing, my eyes locked on the empty blackness all around us.

  He didn’t say a word, merely dragged deeper on his home-rolled cigarette, encouraging the end to flare red, before exhaling and clouding the moon with vapour.

  We stood like that for moments, wrapped in quietness and for once not caring.

  He never offered me a drag, and I never asked. I doubted Michaels would approve of smoke inhalation when my tongue was healing so well. However, I inhaled whenever Elder exhaled, stealing a little of the sickly sweet—willing it to numb me a little, to steal the questions driving me insane, to grant me a little of the syrupy calm.

  Finally, when the joint had become too small to hold, Elder flicked the butt into the ocean. The small red dot twirled and twirled until it hit the water below. The second it extinguished, he turned to me, his eyes shredding mine.

  “You wouldn’t break your silence to make me talk, yet you’re still here.” He licked his bottom lip. “Why is that?”

  I kept eye contact, not moving.

  “Did you miss me?”

  I gave him a tight smile.

  “I take that as a no.”

  I blinked.

  You’re wrong.

  No, you’re right.

  I had missed him in an odd way. My dreams had featured him, and my days had been fraught with thoughts of the way his fingers manipulated paper as I stroked his origami sailboat. I’d suffered unwanted questions of what it would be like to be touched by fingers that could conjure life from dollar bills.

  My body repelled against the fleeting curiosity even as my heart put on its armour and prepared to do whatever it took to find out.

  I didn’t miss what you represent. But I did miss the fragments of the man behind the monster.

  “Fuck, this is harder than I thought it would be.” His hands curled over the railing. “Look, I’ve had a rough few days. Normally, I wouldn’t smoke, but it’s the only thing that works around you.”

  Around me?

  That admission made my belly clench. No man had ever admitted I’d made them weak just by existing.

  His face tightened, the anger I’d witnessed at dinner returning. “Don’t think you can use that to your advantage, Pim. It only puts you in a precarious position.” Pinching the bridge of his nose, he muttered, “It’s only fair to warn you I won’t be good company tonight. In fact, you should go.”

  Go?

  Why?

  His jaw hardened, seeing my question in the jolt of my shoulders. “I can’t guarantee I’ll keep my promises if you don’t.”

  My heart stopped.

  Promises to keep me safe? Promises not to touch me?

  The moon cast his face in silver sin. His brow shadowed his eyes until all I saw was black matching the black around us.

  “Leave, Pimlico. I wish to be alone.”

  My feet glued to the deck. Why did he want me to go? Because he had a tyrant inside him he couldn’t control? Would he snap and hurt me after he assured me he wouldn’t? If the demons I sensed inside him were closer to the surface tonight, I should run. I should hide.

  But that would only make the future worse. I might have agreed not to worry about what tomorrow would bring, but if I could find out the worst now—so I could stop fearing—then it would be better for my sanity.

  Puffing out my chest, I stood my ground.

  He growled under his breath. “You truly are the most stubborn woman I’ve ever met.”

  Woman. Not slave. Not orphan or pet.

  Woman.

  “Have it your way.” Reaching for his shirt buttons, Elder undid them with dexterous fingers. The moment the cream material flapped around his sides—once again revealing that magical dragon protecting his bare ribs and internal organs—he dropped his hands to his belt.

  He gave me a wicked look. “Fair warning, silent one. I’ve been away for three days. I only went prepared for one. Know what that means?”

  I swallowed as his fingers undid his belt, followed by his zipper.

  The flash of skin was a shock after expecting underwear.

  “I didn’t take spare boxers with me.” Holding his trousers with one hand, he kicked off his shoes and tugged off his socks. “Run now, unless you secretly want to see me like I’ve seen you? Do you want to see what I hide under clothes, see the true beast I am? Is that why you’re more comfortable naked? Because the truth can always be concealed in trousers and suits, and nakedness it can’t?”

  My heart plucked ancient glasses and put them on, ready, despite myself, to gawk. My gaze kept skittering from his face to the waistband he held up.

  “Fine. You won’t run? I won’t make you.” Without a care, he dropped his trousers, stepping out of them like a royal prince.

  My mouth parted at his size. He wasn’t erect, but his cock hung heavy and dangerous, protected by a manicured area of black curls.

  “Strange to be on the other end.” He smirked. “Odd that I’m naked and you’re dressed, and for some reason, I feel like I’m the one with all the power.” He lowered his head. “Perhaps that’s why you like to be naked. Because you enjoy the way people are distracted by you.”

  Striding past me, his scent and the cloying aroma of marijuana trailed after him as he unlocked the railing that revealed the ladder.

  His ass didn’t have an inch of fat, firm and tight, graced with the rest of the dragon’s tail on his left cheek.

  I expected him to turn to face me and climb down the ladder like a rational person from such a height.

  He bared his teeth over his shoulder. “If you have any balls left, girl. Come join me.”

  His arms spread, his legs bunched, he threw himself off the side.

  I rushed over, just in time to see him somersaul
t and dive into the black crystal below.

  FUCK YES.

  The minute the cold slap of water splashed over my head, the tension of the past few days dissolved. The awful memory of hard asphalt and dirt receded as my body once again remembered the beat and rhythm of the sea.

  Letting the depths cradle me, I held my breath until my lungs screeched for oxygen. Not for the first time, I wished I could dive and dive and never come back up. To somehow find a way to exist in the inky blackness and start a new world where no one knew what I’d done and no family disowned me.

  My business on Monaco ought to have been, if not fun, then marginally enjoyable. But that was before I’d arrived to find a boat carver had died thanks to a slash to his neck with a rasp.

  If the murder of one of my staff was retribution for my past, I wouldn’t rest until I’d killed or been killed.

  My manager, Charlton, had been the one to find the corpse. He hadn’t informed the police or anyone but me. He’d done well. And I’d be the one to create another corpse in response to the crime.

  The first day was spent with the dead man’s family, enquiring about grudges and enemies. The second was spent stalking a certain newcomer who was friends with the man’s son. He’d been caught stealing the dead man’s grocery money the week before.

  It was a simple matter after that of giving the young murderer enough rope to hang himself.

  I didn’t know if I was grateful it was a simple greed attack or pissed off that it wasn’t in relation to me. I’d been waiting fucking years for this farce to be over and face them.

  After an interrogation that started off cruel and ended in brutal, I learned that this minor disagreement was the cause of a spineless coward who thought he could take things that didn’t belong to him, including a life. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’d done this before. But now I’d found him and he would never do it again.

  I killed him.

  The same way he killed my master boat builder.

  I ignored the similarities over him taking what he wanted and me taking Pim. I never said I was a saint, but at least I’d cleaned up my business before it became messy.

  Once I’d washed the blood from my hands and ensured my factory ran like clockwork, I boarded my helicopter and came home.