by Measha Stone
Do I sleep here now, or should I go back to my room? He answers for me by pulling back the covers and gesturing for me to get under them. I press myself to the end of the bed, but once he’s climbed in, he grabs me and drags me across the bed into him.
I swallow, unsure of what to say, what to think, how to feel. I’m not angry. I’m not filled with the hate I thought I’d have for him.
“Are you all right?” he asks quietly through the darkness.
“I’m fine. Are you?” I ask.
He chuckles and kisses the back of my head. “Go to sleep, Kasia.”
And unlike what I promised myself I would never do, I obey my husband.
Chapter Fourteen
Dominik
Last night won’t stop replaying in my mind. There’re complications between us, but then last night was easy. Kasia responds so quickly, so naturally to my touch, it’s hard not to get lost in her.
If I didn’t have to be in the city all day, I would have rolled her over this morning and taken her again. But I have things to do, information to gather.
That’s why I’m at the Katfish Klub, our newest investment, in the middle of the day. Jakub gets information better than anyone I know.
“This one?” Jakub waves over a woman from the wall. She hurries toward us in high heels, black stockings, and a shimmering dress.
“Jakub, how is she supposed to carry drinks in that get up?” I ask, waving my hand in her direction. She looks somewhat relieved that one of us is thinking. “Can you even breathe in that?” I ask her.
She looks to Jakub, who gives her a small nod. Permission to speak.
“Not easily, sir. It’s a little restrictive,” she says, running her hands over the leather corset.
“Fine. We’ll try again.” Jakub waves her away and plops down at the bar in the stool beside me. “I hate this place. Why did we buy it?”
“Because once you do what you do best, it will make us three times what the last owner was making.” I remind him. “And it gives us a legitimate business.”
He frowns. “Fine. I’ll keep working on it.” He swivels around in the stool and looks at me. “I suppose you want the information you asked me for.”
“I’m that transparent, am I?”
He deadpans. “To me, you are. I mean, I’d like to think as my older brother, you come into the city for more reasons than just work, but I know you. All you do is work.” He reaches over the bar and pulls out a thick manila folder. “I brought this down when I saw you pull up.” He lays his hand on top of it.
“What is it?” I sigh. My brother has a flair for the dramatic. I usually play into it because he knows things I don’t about people. He listens to the gossip, knows who is doing what. I don’t have to do those things because he does them for me.
“Kasia has been working with a private detective for the last year.” He is also a man who can get straight to the point when needed.
“What?” I reach for the folder, but he swipes it away.
“She’s been paying him a monthly fee, but the guy’s a washed-up asshole. He takes her money but doesn’t do shit.”
“What does she want him to do?” I ask. Private detectives have contacts in the police department. Having men like him poking around families like mine and Kasia’s father isn’t safe. She should know better.
“She wants him to find who was involved in the car accident. Apparently, she doesn’t believe it was just some drunk.” He finally slides the folder over to me. “What’s in here is his contact information, some of the snapshots I got of him, and a few police reports. He has a rap sheet almost as long as mine.” He smirks.
I flip through the folder. “What did you find in her emails?” After finding her in my office and seeing that bogus email account on the screen, I asked Jakub to find the real one. I knew she was hiding something, and I was right.
“Mostly just emails to this DeGrazio asshole. She used it for school, so there was a bunch of stuff to and from her professors.”
“And her texts?” I push. She’s not going to like that I’ve dug so hard into her life, but the means justify it.
“More of the same. A few messages to the detective wondering if he had anything — after he doesn’t answer her emails. A few to a study group. She could have deleted anything important, but I doubt it.”
“Why?” I ask, curious of his opinion.
He shrugs. “She doesn’t exactly live the most exciting life. Her calendar was filled with school shit, tests, paper dates, graduation stuff. Contact list was short; other than Marcin she had maybe half a dozen personal contacts. Everything else was professional shit.”
“Marcin kept her sheltered,” I say, but there’s more to it than that. People are just like things, easily taken away. If she’d surrounded herself with a lot of friends Marcin could use them against her. He could block her from them if she didn’t play his games right.
“How are things with her anyway? I mean, you tie the knot last night but you’re here doing business today?”
“She’ll settle in. It will be fine.” I check the time.
“Have you talked with Dad recently?” he asks, lowering his voice even though we’re the only ones in the room. The girls have all gone off to put on the next uniform option.
“A few days ago. I talked with his attorney this morning, that’s where I just came from. He’s confident he’ll have it all squared away by the end of the month.”
“Next time you go to the lawyer, I want to go with.” He raises his chin. “I should know what’s going on, too.” There’s a hint of defensiveness in his tone, but I don’t argue with him. He’s the second son and has spent more time partying than getting down to business. But I can’t deny he’s starting to come around.
“Of course. I’ll let you know. The whole case is bullshit. They have no tangible evidence. They audited the books and came up with nothing. Not a single receipt was out of balance.” That’s why we pay the number crunchers so fucking well. “It’s all just a campaign to cause trouble. Marcin’s behind it, I know it. He stands to get everything if our family is hit hard. They’ll give him our territories and none of his businesses will roll to us when he dies.” Which is going to be a lot sooner than the fucker thinks, if I can prove he’s behind the witch hunt that sent my father into hiding.
“And this shit with Marcin?” he prods.
“I have almost enough condemning information. Once everything’s cleared here, we can take it to the old men back home.” It’s not much, an overheard conversation. I need the money trail, and as soon as I get that it will be locked.
“You look ready to bolt; you need to be somewhere?” He pushes my shoulder. “I have two more uniforms to show you.”
“You’ll have to pick it yourself. I have just enough time to make a stop before I need to be at the accountant’s office on the south side. He might have the money trail we need to get permission to move forward. Just send me a picture of the one you like.” I slap his shoulder and grab the folder from the bar top. “Thanks for this, Jakub.”
“Yeah.” He waves me off.” Go. I’ll just sit here and put this damn club together.”
I laugh. He grumbles, but building up clubs is his specialty. He flips night clubs the way real estate moguls do houses. But this time, he’s not flipping it, this time we’re keeping it. Legit businesses are needed in our world, and this one will serve us well.
* * *
Erik DeGrazio, private detective, wasn’t hard to find. When he wasn’t at his office, his secretary pointed toward the dive bar across the street. That’s where I found him. Slumped over a half drunken beer, watching the Cubs getting their asses handed to them on the big screen television. His gray shaggy hair hangs over his ears, and his thick plastic-rimmed glasses slide down his nose. He pushes them back up with his pudgy finger.
“So, this is what my wife is paying you good fucking money for,” I say, sliding into the stool beside him at the empty bar. The bartender looks up a
t me but quickly makes the right decision and heads to the other side of the room. There’re a few stragglers watching the game. But they’re either too drunk or too jaded to care what Mr. DeGrazio and I are talking about.
“Who’s your wife?” His words slur.
I shake my head. Washed up ex-cop probably.
“Kasia Garska. She’s a Staszek now, though.”
His eyes widen, fixate on me, then he looks at the door.
“You’re not going anywhere,” I assure him and pat his shoulder. “I just want to know what you’ve found out so far.”
“Who are you?” he asks. Fear makes his lip tremble, or maybe it’s the liquor.
“Dominik Staszek, her husband.”
His lips puff outward when he blows out a breath.
“Fuck.”
“Well, that depends. What information do you have for me?” I ask, pushing his beer away from him.
“Look. I haven’t told her anything. I keep telling her there’s nothing. I keep telling her, but she keeps sending me money and telling me to keep looking.” He puts up both his hands.
“I’m not asking what you told her. I’m asking what you found.” I lean closer to him. “And I don’t have a lot of time, so don’t fuck with me.”
He nods quick and blinks several times. Maybe he’s trying to reset his brain.
“Okay, okay.” He blows out another breath. “The guy driving the car — according to the police report — was high as a fucking kite.”
“And?” I roll my hand in the air when he pauses.
“His brakes were cut.”
My interest piques.
“Go on.”
“The guy, he was a small-time dealer for the Kominskis. Once I found that out, I stopped looking. I didn’t tell her anything. I just let it go. But she won’t.”
“You keep cashing her checks though?” I’d also like to know where her money comes from, but I’ll find that out later. When I question my secretive wife.
“I won’t anymore,” he vows with wide open eyes. I can’t fault the man too much. It was smart to stop looking. Turning over rocks in my world can find a man bitten by something much worse than an angry mosquito. The Kominskis aren’t a family to mess around with. Sticking his nose into that hornets’ nest wouldn’t have ended well for him.
“No. You won’t. If she contacts you again, you call me.” I pull out a business card and shove it into the chest pocket of his Members Only jacket.
“I got it,” he says with a hard nod. “You really married her?”
“Yes, Mr. DeGrazio. I did.” I slap his back and head toward the door. I have more questions for him, but I need him sober. I’ll call on him again when he’s clear headed.
But first, I have an interrogation to get to.
Chapter Fifteen
Kasia
“You have a phone call, dear.” Margaret brings me the handheld while I sit beneath the willow with my kindle. It’s quickly become my favorite spot. Dominik had a new set of cushioned reclining lawn chairs with a table delivered and set up beneath the tree for me.
“Is it Dominik?” I ask as I take the receiver from her. I haven’t seen my husband since last night. When I woke this morning, it was to a chilled spot beside me in his bed.
“No, it’s Tammy,” Margaret says with confidence, like she knows her. Why would Tammy be calling on the house phone, how would she have even gotten the number? We haven’t spoken since we roomed together sophomore year.
“Oh.” I try not to sound surprised, but it’s not like Tammy and I were close friends.
I wait until Margaret’s back in the house before I put the phone to my ear.
“Tammy?”
“Hey, Kasia. One sec.” The phone shuffles.
“Kasia.”
My heart drops.
“Dad?”
“Your father. yes. You remember me, don’t you?” There’s a sharp bite to his tone. “I have to resort to tricking that housekeeper in order to get you on the phone? My own daughter? What has that asshole done?” There’s no concern, only irritation.
“I’m fine. He said you were going out of town.” If he’s with Tammy, he must still be in the city.
“Change of plans,” he says. “What have you found out?”
Does he know of the marriage?
“Dad, last night—”
“I heard. You married him. What have you found out?”
I’m not sure what I expected, or hoped he would say, but to brush it off as so inconsequential stings. I know who he is, I’ve felt his disapproval, but this stings still. No matter what, he’s my father. My only true family.
“Nothing,” I say quietly. Another disappointment. “He found me snooping.”
There’s a long silence.
“You found nothing?” His voice is like a boulder dropping from the mountain tops.
Doesn’t he want to know what Dominik did when he caught me?
“No, Dad. There wasn’t anything in his office, nothing on his computer. He probably doesn’t keep his business here at the house.”
“Then you need to find out what he’s doing some other way. Go with him when he goes into the city. See who he’s talking to.”
I dig my fingernails into my knee.
“Don’t you have...employees that do that sort of thing?” I ask, desperate to get away from this subject.
“I have a daughter that’s sleeping with the man!” I pull the phone slightly away from my ear when he yells. “You should be able to handle this! Be useful, Kasia.”
Be useful. How many times did he bark the same demand at me while I was growing up?
I lean my head back against the cushion of the chair and look up at the leaves blowing in the summer breeze above me. It’s hot today.
“Kasia.”
“I heard you,” I whisper. “He’s not going to tell me anything.” I close my eyes.
“Then make him talk. Make him tell you or show you. You’re a woman, spread those legs of yours and get the information I need.”
My nails go further into my skin, pinching, piercing.
“How did he get you to agree for me to take Diana’s place? What does he have over you? You’ve done something. You’re doing something that is going to get you into trouble. What is it, Dad?”
“Stay out of my business, Kasia and do what you’re told!”
Before I can respond, the phone is taken out of my hand. I open my eyes to find Dominik standing over me with it pushed against his ear.
“Hello?” he says, keeping his eyes fixated on me. His jaw is tight. With one hand in his pocket, he gives the appearance of being causal, but I’m learning him. He’s pissed.
“Don’t call this number again, old man,” he says without waiting for any response from the other side of the call. “You have my direct line; you call that if you need to talk with my wife. I’ll arrange something.” He doesn’t wait for an answer, just clicks the call off.
He looks at me then moves to the empty chair on the other side of the table and sits down. I stare straight ahead, waiting for the punishment to be announced. I spoke to my father when I said I wouldn’t.
“I didn’t know it was him when Margaret gave me the phone,” I say, fixing my attention on the rose garden.
“I know.”
“I couldn’t just hang up on him,” I continue, still not looking at him.
After a long silence he says, “I know.”
Relief floods me. At least he’s being reasonable.
“There are things about your father you don’t know, Kasia,” he speaks in a low volume, but he’s not angry. He’s being straight with me.
“I’m sure there are a lot of things about you that I don’t know, that I don’t want to know.” I recall the night he took me. The woman he had kidnapped in order to make someone pay a debt.
“I’m not a good man. I won’t say I am, but your father...there are things that I won’t do that he has no trouble doing.”
I bl
ink and look past the roses, off into the distance where the brick wall surrounds the estate. Where men walk along the wall while we’re out here, protecting us from the even worse men that are on the other side of it.
“Whatever the problem you have with my father is, it’s your problem. You two can fight like children all you want. Just leave me out of it.” I push out of my chair and start to walk back to the house.
He snatches my hand and yanks me into his lap. My chin is captured by his massive hand and he pulls me to him for a long, deep, passionate kiss that leaves my mind swirling. When he breaks it off, he rubs the tip of his nose over my chin.
“Why can’t I leave you alone?” he whispers, but I don’t think I’m meant to hear it. “I’m going to ask you a question, Kasia, and you have to be honest with me. If you lie, if you bend the truth or try to hide from me, you’ll be very, very sorry.” Any tenderness he may have had a moment ago is gone, replaced with firm demand.
“What do you want now, Dominik?” I ask. Everyone has questions for me, everyone wants answers I don’t have.
Be useful.
“Why do you think the accident wasn’t an accident?” He doesn’t need to be more specific. I know what he’s talking about, and a wave of nausea hits me. He knows.
Of course, he does.
“You don’t want to stuff your fingers in me first? Make me come for you again out here before I answer you?”
“No. You’ll answer me first. I’m not playing games, Kasia.” He grabs hold of my hand, pushing it off my leg and exposing the crescent-shaped cuts in my leg. “While you were talking to your father?” he asks, completely ignoring what I’ve said to him.
“I’m going inside.”
“No.” He holds me in his lap. “You’re going to answer my questions and without all the attitude.”
I blow out a breath.
“Kasia, you’re my wife now. We can make this easy between us or we can make it difficult.” He touches my leg again.
“How is anything between us easy?” The only part of us that actually works without hostility is when he’s making my body crave him. Sex. We’re good at sex.
