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Vienna
Cool fingers caressed the back of my bare shoulder, pulling me from a light restless sleep.
There had just been too many breakthroughs on Dion’s computers. Too much information to process, that I dreamed about running down a motherboard and ducking behind wires as photographs from the files we’d perused raced by me. It was the weirdest dream, fueled by the hours Fletcher and I spent going down various rabbit holes.
“Vienna?” Rick murmured in the softest voice I’d heard him use.
“Hmm.” I was wide awake, never having been one to float between sleep and wakefulness. Although, now I struggled with the fact I didn’t want to leave my warm bed, and the compulsion to jump up and comb through all the many files we didn’t get to look through.
We’d gone through the ones I was most interested in last night, but that had only been about two percent of his data. Fletcher had acted like Christmas came early, still wired when I peeled myself away to go to bed.
That was one thing Daddy had always drilled into me. We were only as good as the health of our minds. And part of that was getting a good night’s sleep. That wasn’t to say we didn’t have all nighters, or random jobs that disrupted our sleep schedule, but for the most part, we got a full eight hours and ate pretty well.
I’d gone to bed after two this morning as it was.
“It’s almost nine and I know you don’t like to sleep the day away. I can come back and get you in a few hours though if you want more sleep?” Rick took such good care of me. It warmed me through in a way I never anticipated. I could get used to this.
“No, I’ll get up now. There’s too much work to be done for me to lay around in bed all day.” I stretched, getting a little blood pumping through my body with the movement. “Did Fletcher ever go to bed?”
I open my eyes just in time to catch Rick’s smirk. “Yes. He crashed not long after you. The last pot of coffee I made for him was decaf and I may have laced it with a small dose of melatonin.”
Startled by that, I erupted into uncontrollable laughter. Why did images of Rick crushing up herbal pills to drug Fletcher seem so hysterical?
“What the hell for?” I asked through another bout of laughter. His devious smirk melted into a warm smile as he stared down at me.
“He was running himself ragged and he needed sleep just as bad as you did. Mistakes happen and important things get missed when you run on empty fumes and determination.” He paused. “Not to mention, I didn’t want him to be running around the house hyped up on caffeine when I was trying to sleep.”
Rick could posture against Fletcher all he wanted, but the sneaky bastard was trying to take care of him in his own way. I’d just keep that to myself for now.
Rolling onto my back, I stared up at Rick. Amusement still fluttered inside of me. He’d already showered, dressed in clean clothes and shaved. Rick looked altogether ready for his day. Pushing up on my elbows, I studied him. “And how long have you been up?”
“Only an hour,” he confessed. “I slept. But I also wanted to get breakfast started early. You told Fletcher last night you wanted to go to the storage place, among other things.”
With Fletcher. I wanted to go to the storage placewithFletcher. Largely, so that I had him right there if there was anything I needed him to work on and because I needed Rick here, following up on more of the details. There was already too much to do.
My mind raced over the lists as I began to put together a plan. I had a target that needed to be dealt with as well. It was mid-week, they were due back from their business trip. If Fletcher and I left by noon, we would have time at the storage place and then I could make the stop at Terrence Bailey’s place.
The smuggler kept his nose just above the rest of the riff raff in the network, but he was every bit the part of it that Dion and Reuben were. Where Dion built bolt hole accounts for moving money and cover identities, as well as digging into possible targets when requested, and Reuben handled everything from straight body disposal to making vehicles disappear. He was an all-purpose garbage man. Bailey was different.
Bailey did transport. We’d even worked for him a few times, handling more delicate items that needed transport and no notice. Daddy and I could move just about anything, except people. We had standards. Bailey did not. A fact that had grown more and more apparent over the last couple of years. He needed to afford his drug habits and expensive lifestyle and the more decadent it grew, the more depraved his business became.
“Vienna?”
Rick’s soft voice jerked me to the present and I blinked. The vibrant blue of his eyes so much brighter with the diffused morning light leaking around the curtains.
“Sorry, I was making a list of things to get done.”
“Can I help?”
“You already have.” I pushed upward and wrapped a hand around his nape. Rick needed no other encouragement, meeting me halfway for a kiss that tasted of peppermint, coffee, and something sweet. “Hmm…” I sighed as I sucked against his lower lip. “I need to shower and get dressed.”
“I’ll bring coffee up so it’s ready when you’re done.”
“You’re spoiling me,” I chastised him.
The pleasure in his smile sent another flash of warmth through me. “Good.”
“Can you nudge Fletcher?”
