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184
"Get your jealousy under control, Gainard," Nik finally responded with mocking amusement. "I promise, I can make you throw the first punch and I can make Mikayla feel damned sorry for me. Is that what you want?"
"When you're gone, and I know you'll be gone," he was told, the other man's tone low, furious, "I promise, I'll pick up the pieces. You might be her first love, but you won't be her last."
"Bet me." Nik only barely managed to disguise the shock at the instinctive words that burst from his lips a second before Mikayla walked back into the foyer. He managed to get her out without growling like an animal or pounding on his chest like a Neanderthal. But just barely.
Possessiveness was suddenly a demon raging through him, pouring into his senses and opening a well of raging lust that he had no idea how to cap. Suddenly he didn't know himself, had no clue how to handle the needs nearly breaking his control or what to do with one fairy-sized little woman. He had a feeling he was simply well and truly fucked.
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Chapter 20
Martin Kefler had a rap sheet that would have made any crime boss father proud, Nik thought that night as he pored over the files Kira and Bailey were busy gathering and sending to him.
The youngest son of a major crime family, Martin had started out with his own stable of prostitutes at the tender age of seventeen. By twenty-one he was into drugs, money laundering, and loan-sharking.
The man was working on building himself a fortune if he could keep his family's greedy little fingers out of his particular pies. The information gathered showed Kefler owed his fellow crime bosses a hefty portion of his earnings, keeping him on the low scale of the power plays that were constantly waged within that particular family.
"Eddie wasn't very smart," Mikayla commented as she read over Nik's shoulder.
"And Martin Kefler looks rather scary."
Nik glanced at the picture of Martin. The long face, heavy goatee, balding in the front of his thick wavy black hair, his large eyes, pale brows, and pale skin. Nik had seen a lot shadier characters, but he could see where Mikayla had problems with this one.
"He's actually considered one of the nicer crime bosses," Nik stated mockingly.
"He at least gives his clients a chance to pay up. Some of the others come after you if you're not paying early rather than on time."
Actually, that was more or less the truth, Nik thought. The reason Kefler was still on the lower tier was his kill ratio. He made the money, not the kills, while the rest of the family had no problems, and actually enjoyed, shedding blood. Not that Martin was considered a good guy; he was simply not as bloodthirsty as the others.
"I know him."
Nik glanced up at her as she moved to the chair beside him, coffee cup in hand. She'd spent the better part of the evening in a back room working on a dress; now that she was back in the room with him, it seemed as if the life had returned. Fucking soft shit, he thought. She was warping his mind.
/> "What the hell do you mean, you know him? You said you didn't know him."
"I didn't know his name." She shrugged. "I know his girlfriend's name, Eloise Lancaster. She orders some of my more daring designs. I like her." Nik blinked back at Mikayla.
"Eloise is the lead singer with the Jezebels, they're playing in a little place in Frederick right now. She told me her boyfriend is there every weekend with her, if you want to know where to find him."
Mikayla said it so matter-of-factly, as though knowing the mistress of a dedicated crime boss was no big deal. Sweet, innocent, a recent virgin, and she acted as though her connection to a crime family was all in a day's work.
"You're not saying anything, Nik," she stated slowly. He wasn't saying anything. God knew he shouldn't have been surprised. Hell, he'd 186
sworn a long time ago that nothing could surprise him. But staring back at Mikayla, he admitted, he was surprised.
Hell, she would have made a perfect contact. She had clients from D.C. and two he knew of from LA. An exclusive, little-known shop that evidently pulled in clients he simply hadn't expected. Clients he hadn't even known she had.
"Where is this club this woman sings at?" he asked Mikayla. She smiled. "Do I get to go with you?"
"No." He wasn't taking her anywhere close to Martin Kefler. Her expression stilled. "Then find it on your own. I'm sure it won't take you long."
"I'm sure it won't," he agreed.
"See if he talks to you." She crossed one knee over the other and watched him knowingly. "According to Eloise, her boyfriend has a lot of people who want to talk to him but few he'll deal with."
"He'll deal with me," Nik promised her.
