by Paula Cox
That he could keep her safe.
She looked up at him, hands clasped over her chest. “Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yes. Okay. I’ll have a little faith.” She chuckled. “I guess you got me to stop worrying about my performance.”
“You don’t need to worry about your performance or about your life.” He grimaced at the way it came out, but Liana didn’t notice. She had her eyes closed and was smiling peacefully. Cliff left her there to go talk to his men about their duties for the evening.
He wasn’t taking any chances.
***
Liana was already a sweaty mess, and she hadn’t even gone on stage yet. She’d stared at herself in the mirror for what felt like eight years after putting on her slip of a dress, admiring the way it hugged her curves and caught the light. She loved the way it looked, and yet she still kept wondering what Cliff would think of it.
It was a dangerous place to go in her head, but one she’d been going to a lot more over the course of the week.
She still remembered that tense, rainy morning when he’d shot up to her room to check if she was okay. She’d been half asleep at the time, and not exactly all there. But afterward, when she’d had some time to think, she realized it: Cliff had been worried. About her. Not about losing the person who could identify Lando, but about her well-being. If he’d been worried about his asset, he wouldn’t have had such a wild look in his eyes. And he had looked truly wild.
But he’d avoided her after that. He made it look like he wasn’t avoiding her—like he was just working in another part of the house—but she’d had enough sour relationships to see what avoidance looked like.
It bloody hurt.
She shouldn't have cared. After all, he was a complete jerk. He’d basically forced her to live with him, and that had been its own brand of horror. Sure, it might look like she was getting her own private vacation in a beautiful townhouse with a never ending supply of good books and tasty food, but it had its downsides. Loneliness was one. The other was that the one person she wanted to pay attention to her wouldn’t.
So maybe those were the only two reasons, but they were reason enough for Liana to consider that she was above lusting after Cliff and his attention. She deserved better.
But damn, did she want worse.
Despite her earlier freak-out, Liana wasn’t worried about being attacked at her show. She trusted Cliff when he said he would keep her safe. Against her better judgment, too. Her mind told her he was bad news, but delivering that message to her heart and her body was easier said than done. Which would work in her favor to keep her from freaking out on stage, she supposed.
The stage manager, a woman named Barb, tapped Liana on the shoulder. “You’re on, honey.”
Liana nodded, plastered on a smile, and stepped out under the dazzling lights.
She couldn’t see a single face in the crowd as she began to sing, but somehow they were all Cliff. In the corner by the bar, he watched her with an approving smile and a low glass of scotch. In the shadowy middle section, he smiled at her and gave her a thumbs up—which was something he would never do in a million years. But it didn’t matter. She was singing for him, whether she liked it or not. And she liked it. It might very well have been the performance of her career. She hit every note and every beat. Liana was truly in her element.
Before Liana knew what was happening, she was in the midst of her last song. And then it was over.
Liana tried to look past the spotlight to find Cliff, but it was too bright. She couldn’t get a good look at anyone’s face. Though they clapped and cheered for her, none of it mattered unless he was clapping and cheering too. Was he?
Determined to enjoy her moment, Liana bowed and let the rush of the crowd’s applause wash over her. Then she and her accompanying pianist, an old friend of hers named Mark, exited the stage.
Nobody was waiting for her backstage. Liana tried not to be too upset, but it would have been nice if at least Janelle had come back to tell Liana what she thought. But Janelle was probably out there with the rest of them still, either looking for Lando or chatting to Cliff about the properties they’d been looking at.
Her gloom was broken when Mark clapped her on the back. “Girl, you did great,” he said.
“Thanks.” She smiled demurely. “I just hope everyone liked it.”
“From where I was sitting, everyone loved it.” He ribbed her with his elbow. “Especially that tall, dark haired guy. He was watching you like a hawk.”
Liana’s heart jumped. “I couldn’t see anything,” she said. “The lights…”
“Right!” Mark exclaimed. “Of course not.” He smiled. “Sometimes I forget that I’m just the piano player and not the star of the show. Nobody cares if I’m lit up.” He laughed and ribbed her again. He had a habit of doing that.
“Was he about six foot four or so?” she asked. “Wearing a dark suit and a dark tie?”
Mark shrugged. “I don’t know about suit color, but he was tall and into you.”
Liana smiled and thanked him, excusing herself to her dressing room. She hoped the figure Mark saw was Cliff. Not only because that would mean he was watching her, but also because if it wasn’t him, then there was a possibility it could have been Lando.
“Fire!”
The shout from somewhere by the stage caused Liana’s spine to stiffen. She thought perhaps she heard wrong, but then the unholy shriek came again.
“Fire!”
Liana approached the entrance to the stage. The acrid stench of smoke filled her nose, just as she noticed it spilling out toward her. Something on stage was on fire. Either that or the whole club had suddenly lit up while she hadn’t been looking. Maybe if she went out there, she could help…
The backstage door slammed open, hitting the wall and bouncing from the force of the hit. Liana’s attention moved from the billowing smoke to the loud noise. Cliff darted toward her, grabbing her arm and dragging her back away from the stage.
“What are you doing?” he shouted. “You’re supposed to run away from danger, not toward it!”
Liana struggled against him, but he didn’t release her arm until they were out in the alley behind the club. The night air blasted her face, dewy with sweat and warm from the spotlight. She stepped away and straightened, crossing her arms over her chest in defiance.
“I was just going to see if anyone needed help!” she yelled. “And I wasn’t in any danger!”
“You weren’t in any danger yet,” he replied. “But did you not stop to think why there was a fire?”
Liana stilled. She hadn’t thought about it. She hadn’t even spent so much as a second considering the options. It seemed so stupid to her now. Lando had set the fire—who else could have? And he could have been waiting there for her.
Liana decided to change the topic. “Is everyone okay? What caught on fire?”
Cliff ran his hand through his hair, studying her with what anyone else might have interpreted as cool indifference. Liana knew this look, though. He was struggling to keep it together. Either he was about to yell at her some more, or he was going to punch somebody. Since there was nobody there to punch but her—and she knew he would never hurt her—then that meant she was about to get yelled at some more.
Liana sighed. So unfair.
“I’m sorry for not immediately vacating the premises,” she droned. “I should have been more careful.”
Cliff looked, for a moment, truly surprised. “What?”
“Do I have to repeat it?”
He tilted his chin down toward her. “You’re sorry?”
“Fine! I take it back!” Liana threw her hands in the air in frustration. “I didn’t realize you would get so weird about it!”
Cliff approached her, holding her forearms but not getting any closer. “Thank you for your apology. No, nobody’s hurt. My men are taking care of the fire. It started on the stage, but I didn’t get to see where or how.” He took a breath. “We�
��ll go back in as soon as I get word that it’s clear.”
Liana nodded. “Okay.”
“Okay.”
There was a pregnant pause, and then Liana laughed.
Cliff titled his head to the side. “What are you laughing at?”
Her shoulders shuddered with mirth. “I didn’t realize how quiet it would be if we just didn’t fight about everything,” she said. “I’m wondering if we should go back to bickering just to fill the silence.”
Cliff released her arms and stepped back. But, when Liana looked up, he was smiling.
***
CLIFF, STAY AWAY FROM HER.
The message was loud and clear. A bottle of champagne, the same brand as all the others, served as a paperweight, holding down on the floor. But why? That was what Cliff couldn’t figure out. Why had Lando gone from targeting Michael to Liana? It made sense to try to kill her when she was just a witness. It wouldn’t have surprised Cliff at all under those circumstances. But Lando wasn’t trying to kill her, now. He was trying to scare her. He was trying to scare Cliff.
“Do you have any enemies that you could see doing this?” Julian asked, lighting up a cigarette next to him.
Cliff snorted. “The better question is which of my enemies wouldn’t do this.”
Julian hissed through his teeth. “That’s rough, kid.”
“How did you get them to let you out of it, Julian?” Cliff asked. “Everyone just says you did your time, but nobody seems to be able to say how long a man’s time needs to be.”
Julian sucked on the end of his smoke, pulling it deep into his lungs. He shot Cliff a wry smile. “What’s got you thinking about getting out? Surely you’ve seen worse than this.”
“I’ve been thinking about it for a while,” Cliff replied. “You can’t tell me you didn’t suspect.”
Julian chuckled. “Ah, I’ve had my suspicions. Figured it was your own business.” He took another drag and then shrugged. “He’s your dad, kid. Ask him why he let me out.”
“My adopted dad,” Cliff grumbled. “And hardly the most loving parent.”
“Maybe not a loving parent,” Julian conceded. “But he was a loving friend to your real dad. Just talk to him about it. He won’t kill you for asking.”
Cliff’s nose burned from the smell of the smoke, but he couldn’t look away. The message was for him, and it had been received. “But what did you do? That was my question.”
Julian smiled, dropping his smoke to the soggy carpet and stomping it out. “I talked to your father.”
Cliff knew that Julian meant his current father—the Don.
“Can we go home now?”
Cliff turned to see Liana staring up at him hopefully. “Let me check.”
He looked back at Ellis, who was still going over the evening with the other police officers who arrived after the fact. It looked like everything was covered. Just in case, he quickly got out his phone and texted Bautista to see if they’d found anything. He’d had his guys scouring the area, looking for anyone suspicious. A text came back a moment later. Nothing.
“Yeah. Let’s go.” He gathered Liana to his side without even thinking about it. She didn’t resist him. She didn't so much as give him a sideward glance. Liana just ducked under his arm and allowed him to escort her out.
Thinking about how that made him feel was a useful distraction. When he focused on the lust her warm body next to his stirred, he didn’t have to wonder why it had felt so damn good for her to call his house “home.”
The drive back to the house was quiet. Cliff began to wonder if maybe all he and Liana did have to talk about was their various gripes. But the atmosphere wasn’t unpleasant, just quiet. Neither one of them particularly wanted to discuss the evening’s events. Cliff tried not to think about Lando so that he wouldn’t spin into an endless rage tunnel. He wondered if Liana was feeling the same. Lando had effectively ruined her performance. Nobody would be talking about her afterward. It would be all about the fire. And that made him angry too.
Shit. He’d fallen into the rage tunnel.
“You were amazing tonight,” Cliff said. He felt like they both needed him to say it.
She glanced over at him from the passenger’s seat. “Thanks. I think Lando was watching me, though. It makes me feel kind of sick.”
Cliff looked over in alarm. “Did you see him?”
She shook her head. “No. Mark, the pianist, saw someone watching me. He said all he could see was a tall guy with dark hair. That the guy was watching me like a hawk the whole time. That’s what Lando looks like.” She exhaled through her nose. “Everyone was looking for him, and the whole time he was looking at me.”
Cliff’s chest ached. For her. For him. For the fact that he could never tell her it was him watching her with such rapt attention. For so many reasons he could never tell her. Because he failed her tonight. He should have been looking for Lando, but he couldn’t keep his eyes off her. And because he knew any feelings he might have for her—however complicated and foreign they felt—had to be kept under wraps.
She would never want a man like him. A man with scars. A man who she only lusted after when she wasn’t too busy despising him. She would never truly want him.
***
Liana was a mess. Inside. Outside. Every possible angle, she was a mess. She was upset about her performance. She was upset that Lando had been her mysterious admirer. She was upset that it had felt so good for Cliff to put his arm around her, but he’d only done it because he thought she was broken. She could see it in his eyes. He felt pity for her. Maybe she hadn’t been hurt tonight, but she would live in perpetual fear now unless Lando were caught. And the best performance of her career had been ruined.
The fact that even Cliff could feel enough pity to comfort her through this meant that she must have looked truly pathetic. Damn it all to hell.
When they got back to the house, Liana made a beeline straight for the liquor cabinet in Cliff’s study. He soon followed her, rushing to her side when he saw the crystal decanter she had picked up and was about to pour into a glass.
“This is fifty-year-old scotch,” Cliff said, gently prying the bottle from her hand.
Liana glowered at him. “What? Don’t you think I deserve it?”
He rolled his eyes. She loved when he did that. It made him look so human. But she’d be damned before she let him know it.
“You won’t like it,” he insisted. “If you really want some, sure. But otherwise, let me make you something you’ll actually enjoy and not waste.”
Liana was tempted just to pour a big glass and chug it down to spite him, but she kind of wanted him on her side tonight. It wouldn’t have seemed right to fight him. So she gave a small nod and watched as he set the decanter back on its shelf and grabbed out the gin and a couple of things from the mini fridge beside the liquor cabinet. He mostly kept beer in there, but there was always a little mix.
After a few minutes of fussing, Cliff passed Liana a tall glass of gin, Sprite, lime, and a dash of cranberry juice. She sniffed it, pretending to be suspicious. Pretending it wasn’t her favorite drink already.
Then she took a slow, deliberate sip. Cliff seemed to watch her with baited breath. After a moment, she said, “It’s good. Thanks.”
A small smile slid onto his lips, and he put the drink ingredients away, grabbing the scotch from the cabinet and pouring a couple of inches into a glass.
“Do you want to sit?” he asked, gesturing toward the two armchairs in front of the fire. His study was just as stodgy and old-fashioned as Cliff was, but she kept discovering little, hidden bits of fun—like the mini fridge of beer and the stack of comics hidden behind the encyclopedias. She spent most of her time, while he was out of the house, snooping around. There wasn’t a whole lot else to do.
“Yeah,” she said. “Let’s sit. And drink. And chat. Like normal adults.”
He eyed her quizzically. “It doesn’t sound so normal when you say it like that.”
She ignored him, sinking into one of the plush chairs and taking another sip of her drink. The flames of the fire roared merrily. Though it was an electric fireplace, it still gave off a fair bit of heat. She warmed her hands in front of it. They’d been cold since she first smelled smoke.
“How are you feeling?” Cliff asked.
Liana raised one of her eyebrows. “I’m surprised you care.”
He let out an exasperated sigh. “Of course I care, Liana.”
The words hung in the air. Cliff avoided her gaze as soon as he’d said them. He hadn’t meant to say them at all, Liana surmised. But she wasn’t going to let him get away with changing the topic, or whatever else he might think to pull. She was going to see what she could unravel by grabbing onto this small piece of threat and pulling.
