by Violet Duke
“He’ll come, Caine. I know he will.”
Caine cursed and spun around. “Don’t you think I know that?”
She did a double take. “Then what’s the problem? Are you afraid he’ll outsmart us?”
He made a disgusted sound in his throat. “No. Like I told Marco, I’m going to get Max, and Gabe, and Lia on this. I’ll even call Drew to hack David’s info if we need to. But again, that isn’t the issue here, Addison.”
“Then what is?”
“It’s all going to come out after this. Everything about you and the kids. Social services will step in.” He gazed into her eyes, with more turbulent emotions than she could name. “They’ll take the kids from you, Addison.”
Addison crumpled to the ground.
He fell to his knees beside her. “Sweetheart, I’ll do everything in my power to make sure you get them back. I swear to you. I have a good friend in social services who I’ll put you in touch with to be your case worker on this.”
No. No, no, no. She started to have another panic attack. Felt fingers of dread and despair clawing at her from the inside out. “I can’t lose them, Caine. I’ve been taking care of them their whole lives. I know I’m only 20, but those kids are my kids. By the time Tanner was two, I was raising him practically by myself full time. And Kylie…I’ve been her mom from the day she was born. Aside from not having the money to afford a house not on wheels, I’ve taken good care of them. They’re good kids, Caine.”
“I know that, baby. And we’ll all submit statements describing that. You’ll be able to get them back. Maybe not right away. But you will.”
“Can you guarantee that? Can you? Every day, you hear all these stories of kids who can’t get out of the system. Can you guarantee that I’ll be able to get the kids back? Before something bad happens to them?”
His mouth clamped shut.
Addison dropped her face down into her hands. “So that’s the choice I have? Either I risk losing my kids, or risk some psycho cutting me up with a butter knife when I’m not looking.”
“Sweetheart, your case isn’t that bad. Yes, you’re twenty, but you have a steady job, great references. It’s actually not illegal to sleep in your car here so you weren’t breaking any laws.”
“But they’d still take them from me, right?”
“Temporarily. Until your case goes in front of a judge…and your biological mother is contacted.”
“What?!”
“It’s a part of the process. You have to have faith in the system, and trust the process, honey. I do.”
She stared at him for a miserable second. “Do you really have that much faith in the system?”
He gazed back at her and said without hesitation, “I have enough faith in the system and in what I know when it comes to predators like David, to know that the kids are much better off in the system, than at his mercy, Addison.”
A knife sliced straight through her heart. The kids. What if he came after the kids, just to get to her? Or to get back at her?
She stood back up then, and walked over to open the bedroom door...knowing exactly what she’d find on the other side.
Sure enough, there was Tanner, crouched on the ground, hugging Kylie tightly, while she was doing her best to cry as quietly as possible against his shoulder.
David did this to them. Put that fear in their eyes.
“Your sister Lia,” Addison said softly to Caine. “Do you trust her with my kids’ lives?”
“Yes. I can say with absolute certainty that there isn’t a man on the force whose ass she couldn’t kick. Mine included.”
Addison nodded. “Perfect. Can she watch them tonight?”
“You want to try and lure David out tonight?”
“Yes. I’m going to work, just like I said. And we’ll leave the van in the back. After closing, I’ll go to the van and go through my nightly routine like I always do. He’ll come. Then all this will be over.”
“He might be laying low for a while, honey. But I’ll ask Lia to watch the kids every night she can, and I’ll change my schedule and fill in on the nights she can’t.”
“No, he’ll come tonight.”
Caine frowned. “How can you be so sure?”
“Because he’s been watching me, right? Well then we’ll show him the one thing to make sure he comes after me right away.”
“What’s that?”
“You. And me.” She looked up at him. “We’ll kiss, hug, do everything short of public indecency right outside of the diner. Then you’ll make a show of going off to work. After work, we’ll make sure he sees everyone leave, and me all alone. He won’t be able to help himself.”
Caine was silent for a long, tense moment before asking, “You sure you want to antagonize him that much?”
“Yes. Hell yes. Because you’re right. He’s a threat to the kids. And I won’t let him continue to be.” She took Kylie from Tanner’s arms, and dragged his shaken, lanky teenage frame up onto his feet. “Will you help me?”
It was hard. This whole asking for help thing.
But Caine made it seem easy. “Anything you need, sweetheart. Just name it.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE NEXT DAY, Addison went to work without the kids.
It was all part of the plan.
Caine and a few of his buddies walked her through everything over the phone. She was to assume David was watching her at all times. Twice, she was to go outside and have herself a good cry. They needed David to think that social services had taken the kids as a result of his call.
Earlier today, in addition to tricking out the van with all sorts of surveillance equipment, courtesy of Max, her van now came with its very own police officer stashed inside. Though Caine had been adamant about wanting to be the one in the van, they needed him available for their little skit out front. So Marco had stepped up. Addison made sure he had all the things the kids normally did when they stayed in the van so he wouldn’t go stir crazy while he waited in there.
Now for their skit.
On her third crying session outside of the diner, Caine arrived as planned and held her in his arms, cuddled and comforted her in clear view of anyone watching.
While all of that had been rehearsed, the kiss he gave her then sure as heck wasn’t. Jesus, could the man kiss.
Her over-the-top suggestion the night before about doing everything short of public indecency? A very real possibility.
“Stop thinking,” he ordered, teeth nipping at her earlobe. “There should be zero thinking when my lips are on you.”
She shivered. The combination of hot, hungry Caine and alpha intense cop Caine rolled into one was dangerously, addictively sexy.
Mind-erasingly sexy.
She ran her hands up his biceps as he murmured more dirty recommendations of where she should be diverting her thinking energy. When he made one particularly specific suggestion that mirrored her own fantasies about him lately, her breathing hitched and released in a cross between a sigh and a moan. The growl that tore from his chest was positively feral as he yanked her body flush against his.
It happened so naturally, she didn’t even realize she’d circled her arms around his neck just seconds before her legs circled his waist. Strong as he was, he was holding her to him with one arm, while using his spare hand to cup her face tenderly, eyes constantly checking hers to see if she was okay.
Instead of diffusing the fast-rising heat between them, his gentleness just supercharged the kiss. Every nerve ending in her body felt like a recklessly exposed live wire. Every touch of his hands and mouth felt hardwired to parts of her body even she hadn’t explored yet.
And just that quickly, she was soon approaching critical mass.
“Caine,” she gasped, unable to string together the words she needed to explain what she was feeling.
“I know, baby. I’ve got you.”
She felt him pivot and edge her around the pillars to a small alcove near the fire exit, tucked away from any po
ssible viewing eyes.
Her back flattened against the hidden wall as he slid her over to straddle one of his rock hard thighs.
“This isn’t for anyone but us, sweetheart. No one gets to see you come apart but me.”
His lips found the racing pulse at her neck while he rocked her against him in a slow, pulsing rhythm that had her riding closer and closer to the edge.
He speared his fingers through her hair and captured her lips once more. He seared her mouth with a scorching hot kiss as he shifted and fitted himself against her core perfectly.
The moment she felt his hard, thick ridge nudge between her legs, she was lost.
“Come for me, Addison.”
He swallowed her quiet scream as she hurtled into a sensory abyss and simply shattered. Every muscle in her body seized to a halt, and everything she thought she knew about pleasure unraveled with brand new meaning.
His arms locked around her and held her tight as the waves of her orgasm eventually started to ebb away.
“Oh my God, Caine.”
A hard, tortured hiss escaped him as he arched his hips against hers almost involuntarily. “You saying my name like that sounds like pure sex, baby.” He buried his mouth against the curve of her neck and warned roughly, “If you do it again, I won’t be able to control myself.”
Holy hell, Caine losing control was something she really wanted to see.
But given their physical location at the moment, she refrained from testing him like that.
She did, however, tilt her hips up so she could feel him against her fully again.
“Evil woman,” he muttered raggedly. “I’m starting a tab. And you better believe that once we catch this son of a bitch, I’ll be locking you in my bedroom for days on end to collect.”
She leaned in and whispered the first way she wanted to start paying off that tab. And swear to God, Caine almost dropped her on her ass as a lust-filled shock took over his expression. “I’m holding you to that.”
“I can put a down payment tonight if you want.”
This time, he did drop her. But gently. Onto her feet. “If I keep touching you, and you keep talking, we’ll end up in the back of your van before you know it, with me showing you a dozen different ways we can fulfill your fantasy without you ever once being on your knees.”
Her imagination picked up that gauntlet and began running amuck with the erotic possibilities.
“Holy shit, dude,” called out an amused voice from behind them. “Whatever you two are doing back there is fogging up the windows of your squad car on the street. Keep it up and forest animals will start coming out of the mountains.”
Despite her face feeling hotter than a thousand suns, Addison found herself shaking with laughter. “Your brother Gabe, I presume?”
Caine sighed tiredly. “He’s going to be lording this over us at every family function we go to from now on.”
Addison felt her heart somersault. “Us?”
He gave her a hard, non-negotiable look. “Us.” Then his eyes softened around the corners. “Meaning the kids too.”
Every emotion she’d ever known seemed to bottleneck in her throat then, preventing her from being able to answer.
“I’m taking that as an affirmative,” Caine said simply before snagging one final kiss. “C’mon, time to get on with the rest of our plan so I can get you home.”
Family functions. Kids. Home.
All words she never thought she’d hear a man utter to her. And she’d been perfectly okay with that reality. Until now. Until Caine. Now…she wanted things, hoped for things that she only saw and believed possible with him.
“You tell Marco if he so much as comes within one foot of you on that air mattress in the van, I’m castrating him and bronzing his balls as our first Christmas ornament.”
As she followed Caine out of their little hideaway spot, she didn’t even try not to laugh. The more possessive he got, the more vicious his threats against the offending party. And since last night—when Marco made the mistake of joking that they could snuggle under the covers while they waited for David—Caine had come up with a half dozen different household uses for Marco’s testicles.
The Christmas ornament suggestion was without a doubt the sweetest.
The brass door knocker idea, however, was probably the funniest.
And the fact that he kept referencing each gonad art décor piece as something they could enjoy together wasn’t lost on her.
“Don’t make me put my lips on you again,” Caine whispered as he gave her a bone-bruising hug. “You’re dangerous when you think too much.”
“My over-thinking is what made this little mission we’re on tonight possible.”
“I rest my case,” he retorted dryly.
He pressed his lips against her forehead softly, then brushed them against her temple, and finally, after staring into her eyes for a beat, he sealed his lips over hers in a hot, hard kiss that stole all the air out of her lungs. “See you tonight.”
“I’ll be the one under the blankets with Marco,” she confirmed.
“Your tab is getting bigger by the minute, sweetheart.”
She gave a hot, nanosecond long kiss before teasing lightly, “I’m pretty sure that’s my line for you.”
He groaned. “I’ve created a monster.”
She gave him an innocent backward wave as she returned to the diner, while making sure her hips were giving it all they got.
As soon as he left, she checked the clock.
Three more hours.
Just three more hours before they found out if David was crazy enough to come out of hiding because of the way she’d antagonized him tonight.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
TURNS OUT, HE WAS that crazy.
Crazier, even.
Addison had just finished locking the diner door and was about to get started on her usual closing duties when she heard the commotion coming from the backlot.
Seeing as how they’d told the janitorial staff not to come in tonight, she knew it was David.
She went running out back and felt her blood run cold at the sight that greeted her.
A half dozen cops standing silently around the backlot.
Caine nowhere in sight.
And Marco being used as a human shield by David, who was holding the man at knifepoint.
“Addison, get back,” commanded an officer whose face she couldn’t quite make out in the dark.
She evaded his attempts to grab her and ran closer to David and Marco.
She knew exactly what she needed to do.
“David?” Addison infused as much innocent confusion into her voice as she could. “David, what are you doing? Why do you have that knife?”
It sounded like the cheesiest line, normally uttered by the stupidest character in a psycho killer movie. But given the psycho starring in this particular scene, she thought it was the best avenue to take.
“Addison?”
David sounded manic, almost like how her mom used to sound when she was on a bad drug trip, only ten times scarier. “David, what’s going on? Why is the police here? Are you okay?”
His eyes widened over that, and the ugly rage on his face turned…hopeful.
She took another step closer. “Is it because of that silly restraining order they made me fill out the other night?”
The glimmer of hope exploded into a full order of crazy, with an extra helping of delusional.
“I knew they forced you to do that,” exclaimed David. “And that’s why they made your coworkers keep me from seeing you last night, too, right?”
She painted a befuddled look across her features. “You came to see me? Was that before or after they asked me to come in for more questions?”
He exhaled a shaking, heaving breath through his teeth so sharply, it sounded like a high-pitched, emotional cackle.
“David, let that guy go. Doing this is just going to get you arrested. Why are you doing this, anyway?” Anoth
er doe-eyed damsel in distress look, complete with the delicate hand upon her chest. “Wait, how did you all even get in here? It’s a locked lot.”
“I climbed over the wall,” he replied finally. “Because I saw this piece of trash sneak into your van. He was waiting to attack you, Addison.”
She gasped. But it wasn’t acting. She was truly horrified at how much it sounded like he believed his own words. “Is that Marco? He asked me out a few times, but I never thought—” She softened her eyes and tilted her head at David. “You were protecting me?”
“Yes.” He swung a wide arcing look at all the cops watching his every move. “I was protecting her. This cop is the one you should be arresting. Who knows what kinds of unspeakable things he would’ve done to Addison.”
That actually sounded pretty believable. And if not for that sick trembling smile that overtook his lips at one corner, she would’ve thought he was merely delusional, not necessarily dangerous. But then his eyes scanned her body, head to toe, with that same twisted grin ghosting his features and it was all Addison could do not to hurl.
Back to the objective. “Are you mad at me, David? For having to turn you down again?” She beseeched him with sad eyes. “I haven’t been able to date anyone because of the kids.”
He nodded vigorously. “I know. And that’s not your fault, Addie.”
She’d never been a fan of that nickname. Figured he’d be the one to use it.
“I had a responsibility to my brother and sister, you understand that, right?”
“I know. That’s why I took care of it.”
Infusing surprise into her tone, she asked incredulously, “You were the one who called the police? And got social services to take the kids?”
He beamed proudly. “That was me! I did it so we could be together.”
“I wish you had told me. I was so sad, and so confused. I was crying earlier and no one would tell me anything. Caine was the only one who would answer my questions.”
David’s mouth curled into a snarl. “And that’s when he took advantage of you! I saw him kissing you. I knew there had to be a reason!”
