Angels and Outlaws

by Lori Wilde

  “THANK YOU SO MUCH for bailing me out of jail, Marcos.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  They were standing in the kitchen of Cass’s apartment. Marcos had given her a ride home in his Porsche. He’d arrived to post her bail at the same moment the jailer had been escorting her to a phone to call Morgan. She’d been uncomfortable letting Marcos bail her out, considering she didn’t want to encourage his thinking that they could get back together again. But she’d been even less comfortable staying in jail.

  “By the way, how did you know I’d been arrested?” she asked, the thought occurring to her for the first time. She had just been so thankful to leave that cement cell and those lonely black bars behind that she hadn’t asked too many questions.

  Marcos smiled. “I keep tabs on my favorite girl.”

  “Keep tabs?” Cass frowned. What did he mean by that?

  He moved closer to her.

  Unsettled, Cass stepped back.

  “I’ve been keeping a close eye on you.”

  She gulped. “You’ve been spying on me? Stalking me?”

  “No, no.” Marcos shook his head. “I would never do anything to frighten you. I’ve just been watching over you, protecting you. Waiting for you to come to your senses and realize how much you love me.”

  He reached out a hand to stroke her cheek. Cass shrank back against the kitchen cabinets. A knob poked her hard in the spine. He cupped the back of her head in his palm.

  “I forgive you,” he whispered. “Everything is all right now.”

  “Forgive me? For what?”

  Marcos’s too handsome face clouded darkly. “For getting cold feet and running out on me. I know you’re scared of commitment. That’s why I had to make sure that you would need me. So I could prove that I would always be there for you. No matter what. There’s no need to be afraid.”

  “You,” she said as understanding dawned. “You’re the Blueblood Burglar.”

  “Yes,” he said. “But when the police hardly paid any attention, I knew I had to do something more dramatic. I had to force their hand.”

  “So you robbed the auction house. You stole the jewelry from the Zoey Zander collection and you mailed it to me. And then you broke in, ransacked my apartment and planted the Blueblood Burglar loot in my milk carton.”

  “I didn’t break in,” he denied. “I used the key you gave me.”

  “I never gave you a key.” In equal turns she felt both mad and scared.

  “You left it out in plain sight when I came over to pick you up for a date one night while you were in your room getting ready. It was an open invitation to have a copy made.”

  “You’re unbelievable.” Her heart thudded and her mind raced. The man was obviously deranged.

  “It was for your own good, Cassandra. Can’t you see that?” Marcos stroked the underside of her jaw with his thumb.

  She stiffened. “How is getting framed for burglary good for me?”

  “So I could be there for you when you were arrested. I just never figured you’d cheat on me with that cop.” He scowled. “But I can forgive you for that, too. I understand. You’re a sexy woman and you have physical needs. But I’m here to meet them now.”

  “No, no, you’re not.”

  “Yes.” He was smiling again. “Yes I am.”

  He trailed a finger down the hollow of her throat to the top of her cleavage and it was all she could do not to shudder.

  “You got your comeuppance,” he said. “The cop betrayed you. He slept with you and then he arrested you. But I never will betray you, Cass, never. You should have made love to me and none of this would have happened. I hope you’ve learned your lesson.”

  And then she saw the gun.

  The butt of it protruded from the waistband of his tailor-made trousers. At that point, she realized exactly how much trouble she was in.

  A knocked sounded at the door.

  Marcos and Cass both froze.

  “Cass! Are you in there? It’s me, Sam.”

  Her heart leapt. Frantically, she glanced at the door, trying to measure her chance for escape.

  “I need to talk to you, Cass,” Sam called. “It’s very important. If you’re in there, please open the door.”

  Marcos wrapped a hand around her upper arm, dug his fingers into her skin. “Tell the cop to go away. Tell him you never want to see him again. Tell him or I’ll kill him.”

  His eyes flashed wildly and he pulled the gun from his waistband. Cass had no doubt that he meant business.

  “Go away, Sam, I don’t want to talk to you,” she said, raising her voice loud enough so he could hear her through the thickness of the door.

  “Cass, are you all right?”

  Marcos’s fingers bit harder into her flesh. Cass winced. “Answer him,” he hissed in her ear.

  “Yes, no thanks to you. Now go away.”

  “Listen, we really have to talk.”

  Marcos pointed the gun at the door. “Make him go away, Cass. Or I’ll shoot through the door.”

  “He’s a cop, you can’t shoot him. It’d be capital murder.”

  Marcos swung the gun around, pointed it at Cass’s temple. “Fine, I’ll kill you and then I’ll kill myself. One way or the other, we’ll be together forever.”

  “No, Marcos. No killing.” She held her hands up in a defensive gesture. “Calm down. I’ll make him go away.”

  Her mind scrambled for some kind of a coded message. Something to give Sam a clue as to what was really going on. Something Marcos would not recognize.

  Without a better plan, Cass ended up babbling and praying Sam would understand. “Sam Mason, you’ve forced me out on a ledge, knocked me off balance and you betrayed me. I hate you. I never want to see you again. Get away from my door. Get out of my apartment building. Get out of my life.”

  Dear God, she prayed, please don’t let Sam think I really hate him.

  Total silence from the other side of the door.

  Marcos was still brandishing the gun. Aiming it first at the door, his jaw tight, his eyes red-rimmed, breathing heavy. Then the next second, he would swing the weapon around and direct it at her.

  “Okay, Cass,” Sam’s steady voice came at last. She couldn’t read anything into the sound of it. “If that’s what you want. I’m leaving. I’ll leave you alone.”

  She caught her breath.

  They heard the sound of Sam’s footsteps retreating down the hallway.

  Cass exhaled.

  Marcos grabbed her by the hair.

  “Ow, what are you doing?” She swatted at him until he pressed the gun into her side.

  “Be still.”

  “Stop pulling my hair.”

  He shoved her in front of him. “Into your bedroom,” he said. “I’m going to get what’s due me.”

  YOU’VE FORCED ME OUT ON A LEDGE.

  Cass’s words echoed in Sam’s head. They made no sense. They were out of context. He thought of the window ledge at Isaac Vincent’s where he’d first met her. How she’d knocked him off balance and they’d fallen together into the airbag. What was she saying?

  His gut torqued. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong.

  He realized she was sending him a signal. Marcos Rebisi must be in the apartment with her, holding her against her will.

  As a cop, he was bound by the law. Cass had told him to go away. He had no evidence to support his suspicion Marcos was holding her hostage. He had no proof Marcos had done anything illegal. None at all. And yet, Sam just knew that he was in Cass’s apartment and she wasn’t able to speak freely or let him in.

  Something in her voice, something in the way his heart churned told him that Cass was in serious peril. No matter what words she used to chase him away, she did not want him to go.

  But if he stayed and tried to force the issue, tried to make her let him in, Marcos could hurt her. Sam wasn’t willing to take that risk.

  The fire escape. He could get into her bedroom window through the fir
e escape.

  Which meant he’d have to go up on the roof. His head spun.

  It’s time to get over your fear of heights. Cass is depending on you.

  He’d gone out on a ledge for her once before, when he hadn’t even known her. He’d do whatever it took to save her. He would rock the boat, he would violate the law, he would, by God, overcome his fear of heights.

  Whatever it took.

  He scaled the stairs up one more floor and stepped out onto the roof. Purposefully, he stalked to the edge. Sam stood on the brink, forcing himself to look down.

  Hurry, you don’t have much time. You don’t know what’s going on in that apartment or what he’s doing to Cass.

  Galvanized, Sam started down the fire escape.

  He paid no attention to the wad of panic in his stomach and he ignored the shaking of the thin metal beneath his feet. By sheer will of effort, he pushed himself down those stairs until he reached Cass’s bedroom window.

  Cautiously, he bent to peer in.

  What he saw froze his heart.

  Marcos Rebisi was sitting on the edge of Cass’s bed with a gun pointed at her chest, making her do a striptease.

  ONE MINUTE CASS WAS EDGING her bra strap down over her shoulders, praying for divine intervention so she wouldn’t have to have sex with Marcos, and the next minute her bedroom window shattered.

  She screamed and fell to the floor, covering her head with her arms.

  “Drop the gun, Rebisi.”

  Sam? Tentatively, she lowered her hands and raised her head.

  Sam stood in the middle of her bedroom, his gun drawn, glass glistening in his hair, a cut on his cheek bleeding. His eyes were narrowed at Marcos, who was on her bed with both hands raised in the air, his gun resting on her pillow.

  Cass jumped up, grabbed her discarded clothes and clutched them to her nearly naked body.

  Sam strode across the room, confiscated Marcos’s gun and then handcuffed him. He used her phone to call for backup. He made Marcos lie down on the bathroom floor and locked him in. Then he turned to Cass, took her clothes from her and gently began to dress her.

  Teeth chattering with fear and cold from the wind blowing in her fractured bedroom window, she told him everything that had happened. When she’d finished and she was fully clothed again. Sam cupped her chin in his palm and held her gaze.

  “Forgive me, Cass, for not believing you.” Sam threaded the fingers of his right hand through her left, then raised their joined hands to his lips and gently kissed each knuckle.

  “I understand, Sam. You were a cop, doing your job. Just like with your ex-wife.”

  “Except she was guilty and I knew it and you were innocent and in my gut, I knew that too. I don’t trust my instincts enough. I’m too worried about making a stink or breaking the rules.”

  “It’s okay, no harm, no foul.”

  “Are you kidding? If I hadn’t arrested you, then you wouldn’t have ended up in Rebisi’s clutches.”

  “Yes, I would have. He’s pathologically obsessed with me. One way or the other, he would have come after me.”

  “I let you down.”

  “No, you did not. You saved me.”

  “You saved yourself with that out-on-a-ledge clue.”

  She grinned. “I was hoping you’d pick up on that.”

  “You’re amazing,” he whispered.

  “You’re the amazing one. Climbing my fourth-floor fire escape when you’re afraid of heights.”

  “You know,” he said, “I think I’ve conquered that fear.”

  “Hey, I’m just glad you showed up when you did.” She cast an uneasy glance at the locked bathroom door. “A few minutes longer and Marcos would have compromised my virtue.”

  He held her close and she shivered against him. He stroked her head. “It’s okay,” he murmured. “It’s all over now.”

  “I don’t think I can stay here tonight. Not with all that’s happened.”

  “You don’t have to,” he said. “I’m taking you home with me.”

  16

  IT WAS SIX O’CLOCK in the evening when they arrived at Sam’s house in Queens. They’d been at the 39th Precinct for hours, giving their statement, wrapping the case up.

  During interrogation, Marcos had confessed to stealing the jewels from the Zoey Zander collection, but he swore that someone had robbed him while he was in the process of removing them from the auction house and this unknown person had stolen the White Star from him but left the rest of the loot behind.

  His story was flimsy, but Sam did tell Cass about the blood from an anonymous source found on the onyx brooch. The DNA specimen had been filed and the mystery of the missing White Star went unsolved.

  Cass was happy Sam had invited her to his house, but once the front door had closed behind them and she was totally alone with him, she suddenly found that she felt awkward and shy. She rarely felt shy around men and she and Sam had already shared their bodies with each other. There was no reason for a sudden attack of nerves, but there it was.

  She was nervous and scared to death. Of what, she didn’t exactly know.

  Still, she would rather be here with him than anywhere else on earth.

  She liked his house. It was masculine but clean. Leather furniture, sports memorabilia on the walls, lots of electronic gadgets and sensible Berber carpeting that wouldn’t show beer and pizza stains. The place was him. Reliable, comfortable, homey.

  Sam stood there looking as awkward as she felt.

  A long silence filled his cozy living room and then they both spoke at once.

  “Well, this is weird,” Cass said at the same time Sam said, “I’ve got a surprise for you.”

  “A surprise?” It was such the right thing to say. She adored surprises. As long as it was a good surprise. “It is a good surprise, isn’t it?”

  “A good surprise.”

  “What is it?” She squirmed, delighted.

  “Hang on.” He disappeared into another room and then returned with a Doc Martens shoe box.

  Ugh. Had he bought her a pair of Doc Martens? Cass forced a smile. Okay, she’d pretend to like them even if she didn’t. He had after all done something very nice for her.

  Sam handed her the shoe box, his face earnest, hopeful. In that moment, Cass realized exactly how vulnerable he was, going out on a limb by giving her a gift, waiting anxiously for her approval. His openness touched her. By gosh, she would love these frickin’ Doc Martens as she’d never loved another pair of shoes.

  She lifted the lid, peeled back the tissue paper and her heart melted. “My Manolos!”

  He grinned.

  Holding the shoe box in one hand, she threw an arm around his shoulders and hugged him tightly. “How did you find them?”

  “When we got back from the Catskills, I talked to Bunnie and asked her to send her driver after them. They were pretty messed up from the rain so I sent them out to have them refurbished. I just got them back yesterday.”

  Her throat felt scratchy and her heart was so full. “Oh, Sam, that was so sweet of you.”

  “I know how much the shoes meant to you.”

  “This is just…” She had to stop talking or she was going to cry.

  He took the shoe box from her grasp and set it on his coffee table. Sam smiled, stretched out a hand and any lingering doubt or awkwardness between them evaporated.

  No one had ever taken her breath the way that he did. He wasn’t heartbreaker handsome, but to her, he was the most breathtaking man. He kissed her. Gently, sweetly, like it was their first time.

  She stroked his cheek with a fingertip.

  He whispered sweet nothings in her ear and took her hand again. He guided her into his bedroom, dropping kisses on her face along the way. His dear cheek was cut from the broken glass, but someone at the police station had slapped a bandage on it for him.

  They sat together on the edge of his big king-size bed gazing deeply into each other’s eyes. He kissed her again. At first with little
licks and nips, his lips gentle and damp across her eyelids and her cheeks.

  When did he unbutton her blouse? She wondered this as his hands and then his mouth skated over her breasts. Shutting her eyes, she felt the slick silk fabric of her bra drift over her shoulders and heard it hit the ground behind her with a soft sound.

  Her skirt fell to her feet and he moved beside her, his erection hard against her thigh. Nothing felt awkward now. It was all smooth and even as if it were happening in some romantic movie.

  He shrugged out of his clothes.

  More kisses. Deep and sweet and thirsty.

  Cass broke the kiss and nibbled a trail down his chin to his throat to his chest and beyond.

  When her mouth touched his jutting penis, he sucked in his breath. She raised her head and met his gaze. His eyes filled with wonder and fascination and desire as he watched her stroke him. He looked open, vulnerable, unlike the tough pragmatic cop she’d first met. She’d misjudged him and his ability to express emotion.

  The heat of desire in his eyes was so stark, so hungry, it took her breath. He wanted her.

  She could see it in his eyes. Could taste it on his lips. Felt it in his fingertips. He wanted her in a way no other man had ever wanted her.

  And she wanted him more than she had ever wanted another.

  While she was fondling him with her mouth, he lightly reached for her, his fingers skimming over her pelvic bone. She closed her eyes as she felt energy surge up from her feminine core into her breasts and into her throat. She tasted her own passion hot and ripe, mingling with the earthy flavor of him.

  A silky moan escaped his lips. He carefully twisted away from her, breaking her gentle suction on his erection.

  Her eyes flew open and she saw he had shifted onto his side, propping himself on his elbow. He was peering at her and she saw the raw, animal intensity of need in eyes the color of smoke.

  He kissed her, his mouth urgent. His electricity filled her, shocked her. He was more powerful than a charge of white-hot lightning.

  When he lightly grazed her most tender spot, a desperate sweetness suffused her body, full of opulent enchantment. And all the capacity of her desire sprang alive. She reached for him, seizing, eating greedily.