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I close the door and slip back into bed before hitting the button on my cell that will connect me to the person that means the world to me. She doesn’t answer, ring after ring, and finally, feeling disheartened, I disconnect after the call goes to voicemail. I send her a message instead, letting her know to text me the minute she can talk.
I pull up the pictures of our family on my phone. Three women are in the image, all with naturally bright blonde hair and blue eyes, a trait that is far more abundant in the countries surrounding the Baltic Sea than anywhere around the globe. The two ladies, although younger, and slightly different in body shape and most definitely different in personality, are almost a mirror reflection of their mother in the background.
The woman that holds a secret she will not divulge, out of loyalty, out of fear, or other. I should not and would not know about it, if I hadn’t been trying to find my sister playing hide-and-seek years ago, discovering by accident a box full of letters along with newspaper clippings and articles about Frederik Bernatelli, the fearless kingpin of the Chicago Mafia and the father who has no need for an illegitimate daughter.
I hear footsteps coming and quickly slide under the covers, twisting as the wounds on my back graze over the mattress, pretending to be asleep as the door opens and then closes again. The magnetism in the room is palpable and breathing evenly is almost impossible, try as I might. I can feel Jay watching me, the heat of his gaze penetrating me through the semi-darkness of the room. I have almost convinced myself that he believes I’m asleep when the depth of his voice lets me know that he’s very much aware that I am not.
“Angel, you’re still awake,” Jay says, walking toward me. I can sense him getting nearer, can smell the sexy muskiness that emanates from him, all male and so intoxicatingly sexual that I bring my legs together under the blanket in an attempt to squelch the heat and moistness building.
I open my eyes as the bed dips with the weight of his body, and Jay sits next to me. “How are you feeling?” he says, reaching to turn on the lamp on the nightstand, which sheds a dim light into the room.
“It could be so much worse. I’m really okay,” I say, not understanding my rapidly beating heart and intense shyness around this man.
“I’m glad to see that you’re on your back, but flip, I need to check for myself,” Jay says, his hazel eyes penetrating mine in the light.
“I’m fine, really,” I say.
He lifts his eyebrows at me. “Flip, I’ll only tell you once,” Jay says.
“Okay, fine,” I huff, sitting up carefully trying not to brush against my wounds again, catching the narrowing of his eyes as I wince, before turning face down onto the mattress.
“You’re still tender,” Jay says gently, the warmth of his breath against my ear as he moves my hair out of his way.
“It’s not too bad. I took some Tylenol when I got up to go to the bathroom,” I say.
“I’m going to lift your shirt up to check and apply a little more cream, Angel. That okay with you?”
I nod, too overcome with the feeling of someone taking care of me to do anything but allow it. Jay pulls the blanket from me as I turn over, and keeps my bottom covered while he begins to slide the thin white cami up my back, his fingers at the sides of my torso keeping it from rubbing against my wounds. He rolls the material all the way up, and I feel the coolness of the air, but my body soon warms as his fingers skim my back, applying the soothing cream to the wounds that start at the nape of my neck and don’t end until they reach the top of my ass cheeks.
“There, this and the Tylenol should help you sleep. No need to put the shirt back on. Just let the cream soak in, Angel. I won’t be far away. If you need something just call my name,” Jay says, standing and heading toward the door.
“Thank you,” I say. My heartbeat is still racing with desire, and my thighs are still clenched with the thought of his body, but it’s clear as he opens and closes the door behind him that it’s all business for him and that he isn’t even thinking of me in that way.
Tears start to run down my face at his second rejection of the night, but I stop them. I am thankful for not only what he has done for me tonight, saving me from the asshole in the club, helping me get to a safe place, taking care of my wounds, but most of all for not turning me over to the monster that is Frederik Bernatelli when he could have done just that.
I am still on my stomach waiting, and it seems like hours have passed since I sent the first text to my sister. This is so unlike her, and although I try to rationalize it, my mind keeps going over the number of things that could have happened to her.
“Marenah where the hell are you?” I whisper.
5
JAY
Sasha agreesto let me put more cream on her back, and my cock lengthens and hardens with desire. I bare her back and apply it gently to her skin, knowing it will soothe her and that she’s already got another dose of Tylenol on board. The heat of her skin under my touch and the way her waist indents and then gently curves out teasing me with what I can’t see under the covers is making my dick throb. When she moans softly under my touch, I know that I have to get some space between this half-naked blonde angel and me. I remind myself that I have a job to do and people to bring out of this shit alive.
It is by sheer will and determination that I lift myself from her bed, distancing myself from the one woman that has ever captivated my desire to protect her in any other fashion than the job. I walk toward the door, needing to get out of this room before my resolve not to tell her how much I want her disappears. This woman takes my fucking breath away, her graceful body lying under the covers, thinking she can make me believe she is asleep, trying to act indifferent to what’s happened to her instead of showing me the fear that lives inside of her. She’ll be surprised when I add that to her list of transgressions, and my dick gets harder just thinking about her lying across my lap when our time is right.
I head back to the guest room down the hall, open my laptop, reviewing all the night’s intel, making sure Chase and Katarina’s flight the next morning is well secured and plans are in place for them, and that Sheldon who’s running point for them has everything that he and the team need.
I pull up the information that Matt has been able to document and upload into our secured repository while undercover. Sasha Koslov, Russian ballerina in the States on a work visa, contacted Frederik Bernatelli several years ago, explaining that she believes he is her father, and asking to meet with him. I continue to stream through the communication trails uploaded to our intel site by Matt as he searched for things that could help vindicate Jenny, Brian’s girlfriend, of a murder charge. I hate like hell that he had to go back undercover into the same mafia that he once used to enforce, but it was the only way.
One documented conversation between Bernatelli and his head man catch my eye, and I read further.
“The documents need to disappear, or they do. If anyone ever finds out what happened years ago, it will be the collision between two of the largest crime families on earth. We don’t need the Russian Mafia crawling up our ass. Deal with it!”
I look down at the incoming message from Cole. Damn it! We are not getting any closer to Matt. The warehouse we were initially told he was being held in ended up being a dead end.
The informant told us that when we hit the warehouse, it would be wired, that we could expect blowback, so we had a plan in place, but when we ran through that door, we found nothing but an empty room. No fucking Matt. The crew that has him has either moved him, or the informant was dirty.
