Smith rubbed his nose and glanced at the camera in the corner of the room. "You'll get all the cameras shut off?"
"I will."
"And the tapes, the ones he has in that room. What will you do with them?"
"Any tapes in particular?"
"Maybe."
"You'll have access to them. If they need to disappear, then make them disappear."
"Just that simple?"
"Why complicate it?"
"You could blackmail a lot of people with what you'll find in there."
"I have zero interest in blackmail, Mr. Smith. My goals are much, much higher."
"Do you think you'll be able to attain those goals?"
"With loyal people at my side? Yes." Dixon watched the man as he thought.
Smith finally nodded to himself before he spoke. "Do what you said about the videos and I'll stand with you. No matter what."
Dixon extended his hand. The motion startled Smith. Dixon waited until the big guy extended his hand. "Don't disappoint me, Mr. Smith."
The man smiled. "The name is Smithson Young. Nobody knows that, and I'd like to keep it that way."
"Nice to meet you, Smithson. Your secret is safe with me. Please get my clothing from my apartment. I have cameras to black out." Dixon nodded toward the suit jacket draped over the camera in the corner of the room.
Smith nodded his head and then chuckled, "Yes, sir."
He watched the man leave before he turned to the corner of the room and eyed the burner phones. He could hear Drake in his mind. “Keep your friends close and your enemies off balance and ready to fucking fall.” He wasn't sure what Smithson Young was, friend or foe, but, first things first. The phones had to be charged, and he needed the cameras blacked out. He'd already swept for listening devices. Then he'd take a moment with a new burner phone. He had a few calls to make.
Chapter 11
Watching the big man move through Dixon's apartment and pack his belongings into two large suitcases sent an inner chill through Joy. That and the fact that she was fucking freezing her ass off on his fire escape, tucked into the corner closest to the building trying to avoid detection. Her teeth knocked against each other. The subzero temps cut through her long-sleeved t-shirt and cargo pants. She tucked her hair into her collar trying to keep the wind off the back of her neck. She'd made it back from her latest job about an hour ago and promptly let herself into Dixon's apartment. It was fortuitous that she was in the bedroom when the big man entered the apartment. He'd made it into the bedroom before she could shut the window all the way when she fled to the fire escape. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
She glanced in and groaned. Damn it, her coat. Smith lifted it from the hanger and looked at it before he folded it and placed it in the suitcase with the rest of Dixon's clothes. The down-filled black nylon was obviously too small for a man of Dixon's stature. She watched as he checked every drawer in the bedroom and rechecked the closet. He approached the window, and she pressed against the brick, blending in with the late-night shadows. He spent several long moments looking out the window. She could see his shadow cast by the light in the room behind him. She listened as the man slipped the sash down and slid the lock back into its anchor. The light changed as he moved away from the window. She lowered and made herself small on the grating before peeking in when the man started turning off lights before he exited the apartment.
She waited until a split second after the front room light went off before she slipped her knife into the groove and slid the latch open. She was in the apartment and heading for the front door within five seconds. She listened before disengaging the lock the man had secured. Carefully, she opened the door and slipped out. The man had removed Dixon's belongings. That meant Dixon was unable to come get them himself. She shrank down and watched the man load both suitcases into a large black van. The driver pulled away from the curb as soon as the man had shut the door. She sprinted to her car while pulling her keys from her cargos. Pumping the gas three times, she hit the ignition, threw the machine into drive and pulled out into the street, damn near getting broadsided in the process. She waved at whoever was screaming obscenities at her and floored it. The black van turned right. She let it go and traveled two streets up, thank you very much for fucking one-way streets, and paralleled the van, making sure to keep her car behind another. It took her six miles to realize where the van was going. Oh fuck, this was not good. She floored the gas pedal and shot through an intersection after the light had turned red. The urgency running through her veins didn't make sense, but it was there nonetheless. She parked within a block of Dixon's employer, and she used that term loosely. The bastard was a large viper at the bottom of a disgusting and deadly pit.
She rubbed her arms as she worked her way around to the back of the brownstone. The lights in the house were out except for two on the east side of the building. She pushed back into the shadows of the neighbor's house when the back door opened.
She immediately relaxed. Dixon set a small step stool down and climbed up on it. What was he...well, shit. He sent a blast of spray paint at something. Probably the camera system. That was odd...why didn't he just deactivate it?
He was down the stool and back in the house before she could approach him. She picked her way through the shadows, moved toward the house, and up the stairs to the back door. The lock took thirty seconds to pick because she was fucking freezing, and her hands wouldn't stop shaking. She slipped in and dropped her picks back into her pocket. At the sound of male voices, she pulled up and moved to the side of the hall, making herself as small as possible.
"Your bedroom window was unlocked, and the window was up about six inches." That wasn't Dixon's voice. There was a long pause before she heard the laugh she'd come to look forward to.
"I have a stray that comes around sometimes. I feed it, and pay it some attention, but the damn thing doesn't want a home. Did you check to see if there was a cat on the fire escape before you shut the window?"
"The fire escape was empty. No snow so I couldn't tell if I scared it away." The man chuckled. "I think, perhaps working for you will be much better than working for the other. He would have had me kill the cat."
Dixon walked past the hall where she had crouched behind an antique table. The hall light illuminated his strawberry blonde hair. "Cats have nine lives. I'm sure the one that has been hanging around my apartment found some other sucker to give it what it wants."
"Is there anything else you require, sir?"
Joy’s eyelids popped wide and then she rolled her eyes. Sir? Really? Was this guy for reals?
"No, other than to thank you for your work today. I'm glad you were available to assist me."
"I hope you won't be offended when I say the pleasure was all mine."
She heard a low, menacing rumble of a laugh and the sound of a door opening and closing. Hearing Dixon step away from the hall cleared her to lift away from the wall. She carefully moved toward the hallway and...
The muzzle of an automatic was trained directly at her head. "Why are you here? Answer me quickly. You won’t be the first person to die in this house today."
"What, I can't come visit you in your new digs...sir?" She mimicked the other man's inflection as best she could and then snorted before she attempted to push away the gun. He slammed her into the wall and lodged the muzzle of the weapon against her forehead. Okay, well…she hadn’t expected the hostility. And damn it if the thrill of his anger didn't turn her on. Yeah, the rougher the better, baby. She winced, well, maybe not tonight.
"Why. Are. You. Here?" His jaw clenched as he spoke.
Daaammmnnn, her heart raced, and it wasn't in fear. "Oh, Quick Draw, are you fishing?" She chuckled and leaned into the muzzle of the gun. "Kill me if you want, because I'm ready for that. I'm sure I'm already living on borrowed time. But to answer your question, I'm here because I saw your goon packing your belongings, and fuck me if I wasn't curious." And worried, but there was no way in hell she'd tell him that.
/> His eyes narrowed, but the pressure of the muzzle against her skin did not let up. "What happened to your face?"
Oh. Joy shrugged as well as she could being pinned to the wall. "My latest job decided he didn't want to die." The bastard had almost killed her–the black and blue marks on her body a testament.
His eyes flitted over the bruise under her eye. It was black and red and a long way from turning yellow around the edges, but the blood had started to mottle. Dixon narrowed his eyes. "The bruises are a couple days old."
"Well yeah, it takes two days to get back from Asia even if you fly nonstop.” Which she had, and no, thank you very much, she wasn't going to examine why she pushed it to make it back to the man who had the muzzle of a forty-five automatic pressed against her head.
"When did you go?" he snapped. The weapon still drilled into her.
"The day you had ‘things’ to do. I met my contact at Rockefeller Center. I was in the air by three that afternoon." She waited for him to decide what he was going to do. Something had happened that altered the way he interacted with her and that was...concerning, but not detrimental. Through their time together she'd learned the man that currently held her life at the tips of his fingers was deadly, but he wasn't a cold-blooded killer. That was her forte, and she had no problem recognizing her traits in others. Dixon Simmons would kill if needed, but it wasn't his default setting. She was getting kinda tired of the barrel of the weapon smashed against her forehead. "Why are you in this place? Why did you have him bring your things here?"
"Remember that retainer position?" His finger rode the hammer of his weapon back into place, and he retracted the barrel of the weapon.
"Told you I wouldn't work for that bastard." She'd reached out to people she knew and found out far more than she’d ever wanted to know about the man who called himself Dixon Simmons' father. It had been an act of true self-discipline not to slice the fucker's throat.
"The bastard is dead. I'm in charge now." His forearm across her chest still pinned her to the wall. His eyes traveled down her neck and his brows furrowed before he lifted his arm, tucked a finger in her turtleneck collar, and pulled it down. "Fuck. Tell me whoever did this to you is dead."
"I'm here, aren't I?" What did he think she was? Weak? If she was alive, her last job wasn't. It was just that simple sometimes. Interesting that his father was dead. With an effort not to show it hurt, she rolled her shoulder and pulled away, adjusting her collar. She didn't want sympathy for her mistakes and underestimating that bastard had been a mistake. She'd taken a fucking beating and running around in the freezing temperatures hadn't helped the stiffness that permeated her entire body.
She spun and started walking, although she had no idea where she was going. "How did your...predecessor die?" She wasn't sure if she should let it slip that she knew the man was his father or not. The people she was linked to had been very thorough with Dixon’s background.
"Take the next door to the right." He spoke as he followed her.
She glanced back at him and smirked. "Know what I'm looking for?"
"No clue, but I need a drink. It has been one motherfucker of a day." He waited for her to move and followed her into a luxurious and impressive office.
The roaring fire in the huge marble-detailed fireplace drew her like iron to a super-charged magnet. She extended her hands to the fire while keeping an eye on him in her peripheral vision. "You didn't answer me."
He walked over to her and handed her a tumbler filled with dark amber liquid before taking a seat in one of the large chairs positioned in front of the fire. His shoulders slumped slightly, and he shook his head before taking a long hit off the alcohol in his glass. She turned to watch him.
"Did you know he was my father?" The question was low and quiet.
"My contacts alluded to the fact." She took a drink rather than keep eye contact with him. He was extremely good at reading her, and this was something she didn't want him to see. Knowing his father was more animal than human, well, it felt as if she were betraying the trust they'd been building. Granted, it was a fucked-up trust, but it seemed to work for them.
He lifted his glass and examined the contents, but she knew he wasn't thinking about the alcohol. He glanced up at her. "About that retainer."
"Give me your wallet." She extended her hand.
He narrowed his eyes at her before he lifted out of the chair. He went behind the large desk and pulled his wallet out of the suit jacket slung over the back of the chair. He tossed it to her as he walked back to the bar and refilled his tumbler.
She waited until he sat down again before opening it and pulling a single dollar bill from the hand-tooled leather. She tossed the wallet back to him and pocketed the dollar. "I'm on retainer. You have me until you release me."
He stared at her, his expression impossible to read. "I require exclusivity, in all things."
In all things. Well, one wasn't going to be a problem, she hadn't had sex with anyone but him since the night they'd run into each other at her...job site. Hell, if she was honest, and why not be honest? So far, the new trend was working for her. She hadn't had any desire for sex for months before that. "We've been exclusive since we met." His eyes flicked to hers as if he doubted her. She cocked her head and scrunched her brows together trying to read his expression. "You don't believe me."
"I was at Rockefeller that afternoon. I saw you with him."
She blinked back her confusion and then realized what he'd seen. Oh! "My contact kissed me to slip me my paperwork. We walked. I left him and took a taxi to the airport. I did not fuck him."
Dixon took another long drink of his alcohol before he looked up at her. He made a motion with his finger circling the entire room. "It has been a day."
Huh, so not acknowledging what she said? Okay, she'd take that as acceptance until she found out otherwise.
So, his father died. God, she hoped it was by lead poisoning. By his comments, however the bastard died, it had happened today. That would fit with the blackout job on the camera system. She set her glass down on the mantle and crossed her arms in front of her. "It would seem you've taken care of the video." She glanced around the office. The blacked-out camera in the corner matched the one at the back porch. "I'm assuming audio is not a factor?"
He shook his head. "Swept the house before I played Picasso. Three units in this office, one in the master bedroom, one each in the guest rooms and two in the offices down the hall, a couple on the outside facade. All have been destroyed. We are clear."
"The control room to the cameras?" She would assume he'd be able to stop the recording, pull the plug or whatever the techy people of the world did.
"Secured behind a retinal scanner."
"How you going to get to it?" Sooner or later he'd need to take control of whatever was in that room.
"I'm working on it." He smirked.
"Are you done with what you need to do for the day?" She walked forward until she was standing between his legs. He glanced up at her, and his eyes made a visual track around the bruises on her face. She watched him lower his eyes to the bruises at her neck.
He downed his drink and nodded. "Why, do you have plans?"
"I do." She glanced out the double doors of the office. "Does this place have a bedroom?"
Dixon reached up and grabbed the waistband of her black jeans. "Since when do you need a bedroom?" He sat forward and lifted the bottom of her shirt. She closed her eyes and waited.
A soft pull of air was the only indication he'd seen it. He lifted the shirt farther and spread his warm hand against her stomach. "Holy hell."
She ran her fingers through his hair. "It looks worse than it is."
"It looks like someone beat the shit out of you."
"Yeah, okay, maybe it looks a lot like what it is." She laughed. "I feel like that heavy bag you beat to fuck that day." He pushed her back about a foot and stood up. She tilted her head way back to see him. "Damn, how do I forget how big you are?"
"The same way I forget how tiny you are." He leaned down and placed a kiss on her lips. "Come on."
She grabbed his hand and followed him out the door and to the left. "Where are we going?"
"I need a shower. A long, hot shower and by the looks of you, a few minutes in hot water won't go astray." He headed up the stairs, and she kept pace with him.
A shower actually sounded amazing. "Good, because I only do steamy, hot and recently washed sex." She glanced up at him and saw a small smile pull at the corner of his mouth.
The bedroom they entered wasn't the master, it was too small and not ornate enough based on what she'd seen of the rest of the house, but she could understand why Dixon wouldn't want to have sex on the same bed his father had slept in last night.
He led her through the room and into the bathroom. He pulled his button-down off over his head and flung it to the corner of the bathroom, stripping out of his shoes, socks, slacks, and boxers in no time. His body rippled when he moved. Joy leaned back against the door jamb and watched him. She'd never been much into foreplay. It tended to get in the way of orgasms. But she found herself wanting to climb his big body and use it as her own personal playground. There was very little she wouldn't allow this man to do to her...actually, she trusted him implicitly and if he wanted her blindfolded and tied to a St. Andrew's cross, she'd do it. A twinge from her ribs reminded her healing would be a better option; yet she trusted him, and she knew he wouldn't take it beyond what she wanted.
He moved to the walk-in shower and started the stream of water. He turned his head and gave her a once over and then raised a single eyebrow. Sexy. As. Fuck. She crouched down–carefully–and untied her boots. A hand appeared in front of her when she tried to lift up. She growled at the proffered hand and heard his laugh in response.
Dixon Page 11
