Dani
The following day, I’d had to make up an excuse for Greg as to why I wasn’t at the bar to meet him.
I really wanted him to trust me, so letting him down like that wasn’t exactly a step forward for our relationship.
Fortunately, he’d accepted the fact that I hadn’t been feeling well and had fallen asleep. The really bad part was that he wanted to come over and see me here at my condo to make sure I was feeling better.
He thinks I’m sick. He probably won’t stay long.
I’d dressed in a pretty, casual, yellow sundress, and then put on some makeup. I left my hair down in a sleek bob that barely touched my shoulders. Somehow, the style seemed to fit my natural redheaded color.
My phone rang, and I hurried to unplug the cell phone on the living room coffee table so I could answer before the caller got my voice mail. “Hello,” I answered. I hadn’t looked at the caller ID, so I was half expecting the call to be from Greg, saying he was going to be late or that he had to cancel his visit.
“Dani?” a panicked female voice asked in a nervous tone.
“Ruby? What’s the matter? What happened?” I asked breathlessly.
I stressed out over my young friend on a daily basis. After a childhood and adolescence of abuse, she’d ended up running away and had landed in Miami at the age of eighteen. She’d been here and homeless for almost four years, a fact I hadn’t learned about until after she was picked up off the street right after we’d met a month or two ago. She had a home in a crappy hotel room now, but everything about the arrangement that had taken her off the streets worried me.
“The guy who rescued me says I owe him. This isn’t what I thought it would be, Dani. They promised me I’d have a job, and that hasn’t happened. Now they’re telling me I owe money for the roof over my head and food. Since I don’t have money to pay them back, they want to do some kind of auction thing for my services.”
My stomach rolled as I thought about just what kind of auction Ruby was going to participate in. “Did they say what kind of auction?”
“T-They didn’t s-say,” she stammered. “But the woman who comes to bring me food asked if I was a virgin, and I admitted that I was. At first, I was thinking some kind of live-in housekeeper or something. But I’m starting to think they want me to sell my body since it’s really all I have to give.”
I breathed in deeply and then blew the air out. I had been pretty certain that whoever had picked her up had expected to somehow profit from helping Ruby. It was a situation ripe for human trafficking. “Did they say when?” I asked, trying not to sound as concerned as I felt.
“N-No. I think they want to put some weight on me first. Dani, I’m so scared. I know I have a place to stay and food to eat now, but I almost wish I was homeless again. I racked up debt with these people, and I have to pay them back.”
God, I desperately wanted to move Ruby to my condo and make sure nobody harmed her ever again. But I had a few reasons why that wasn’t possible at the moment. “Hang in there. I promise I’ll get you out of there before anything happens.”
“I got myself into a bad situation, didn’t I?” she asked.
“Yes. But it’s not your fault. These people aren’t taking women and kids off the streets to help them. I think they’re human traffickers.” I shuddered at the thought of how many other women had been subject to their “kindness.”
“I don’t know what to do. They said if I try to leave without paying my debt, they’ll find me,” she whimpered.
“We’ll take care of it. Stay strong, Ruby. Ask them how much you owe.”
“Whatever it is, I can’t pay it without a job,” she answered flatly.
“I know you don’t know me that well, but can you trust me?” I questioned desperately.
Ruby hesitated for a moment before replying, “It’s hard for me to trust anybody,” she said honestly. “But I’ll try. You’ve already helped me a lot just by being a friend. I’m not as afraid now that I know that somebody knows and cares about me.”
“I’ll get you out,” I promised. “Just keep me updated on what’s happening when you safely can.”
“I will. Thank you.”
It broke my heart to hear her so sad and frightened. But she really had never had anything to be happy about. Her twenty-two years of life had been pretty damn harsh.
We ended our call, but my gut was still tied up in painful knots when I hung up the phone. Really, I’d been a wreck ever since I’d seen Marcus at Greg’s bar. Our encounter had been unsettling, especially when I realized that just seeing him again had reminded me of every wet dream I’d ever had about him.
And I’d had too many to count.
I’d been pretty confused and wounded after Marcus had rescued me, but the mysterious pull that drew me to him was just as present as it had been when he’d risked his ass to pull me out of Syria. Honestly, I’d been drawn to him almost from the beginning of our acquaintance. The difficulty was, I now knew exactly what I was feeling. I was incredibly attracted to Marcus, and I had no idea how to stifle it.
The chemistry had always been there, but I hadn’t been able to acknowledge the desire right after I’d escaped my kidnappers. But I’d had plenty of therapy to help me start to move on from that horrific experience, and I was able to admit that something about Marcus made me completely crazy. He was definitely hot, so wanting to have him pin me up against the wall and satisfy me wasn’t surprising. I guess it was all the other emotions that seemed to get tangled up with my passionate desire to screw him that baffled me.
I admired what he’d been doing with PRO, even though my brother had been injured in one of the missions. Marcus always seemed to have everything under control in a way I’d never seen before. Granted, he’d gotten arrogant and bossy with me, but there was still some kind of nerves of steel that he seemed to carry along with him as easily as other men carried their cell phones. I’d seen him in plenty of hot spots, but he’d never seemed to be aware of the danger of being there. Hell, I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen a wrinkle in his custom suit when he was doing business in all of the war-torn areas of the world where we’d collided.
I’d had to be in the scariest areas of the world for my job, but really, Marcus had never had to be in those places at all. Strangely, he just treated his travels like everyday work obligations, no matter where he happened to be.
“But what is he doing here in Miami?” I mumbled to myself as I sat on the arm of the couch to wait for Greg.
And why is he so concerned about who I’m dating?
Yeah, he said Jett was concerned, but Marcus wasn’t the type of guy to be somewhere he didn’t want to be.
Our entire encounter at Greg’s bar had been baffling. I’d never seen Marcus in anything but work mode except during his dangerous rescue and the short time we’d spent together afterward. Acting like he was personally concerned was disconcerting.
I tried to shrug it off. It didn’t matter if he liked Greg or not. He’d have to deal with the fact that I was dating somebody he didn’t think was a good match for me. Nobody had ever interfered in my love life, and it wasn’t happening now. My relationship with Greg was too important to me.
The doorbell finally rang, and I shook myself out of my negative thoughts to go answer the door.
“Hello, gorgeous,” Greg drawled as I opened the door.
“Hi,” I answered breathlessly.
He kissed me on the cheek and then walked into the living room as I closed the door.
“How are you feeling?” he questioned, making himself at home as he took a seat on the couch.
“Better,” I replied, hoping he didn’t grill me about not showing up at the bar for our date.
Greg was the type of man who was always cautious, always careful. He was attractive and fit, and had a nice, thick head of blond hair that would send most women running after him, even if he wasn’t filthy rich. But there was a veil over his dark eyes that would never quite let anybody in.
My goal was to know him better than any woman ever had, and teach him to trust me. Unfortunately, me not showing at his bar—or so he thought—probably made him nervous. Greg was always watching for any kind of reaction or anything that didn’t fit into his world exactly the way he thought it should. Me being absent last night shouldn’t make him paranoid, but I’d already discovered that with Greg, any odd behavior was suspect.
“I’m glad,” he finally answered, his eyes raking over me like he wanted to see if I was telling the truth.
“Would you like a drink?” I asked politely.
“No, gorgeous. I just came to make sure you were…safe.”
I sat down on the couch next to him. We’d only been on a few dates, and attended a few charity events together. The most intimacy we’d experienced was a kiss at the door. “Maybe I was just tired,” I lied.
“I thought you were sick,” he said, sounding suspicious.
I shook my head. “I was, but maybe I just felt that way because I didn’t get enough sleep.”
He reached out and took my hand, squeezing it tighter than needed to show simple affection. “Then you should get some rest, Dani.”
“I will,” I replied, trying not to notice that my hand was losing circulation from his hold.
“I don’t really like the fact that you stood me up last night. But I’ll get over it,” he said in a warning voice, a tone that told me that I’d better never do it again.
“I’m really sorry,” I answered remorsefully.
“I’m powerful in this city, Dani. A man like me doesn’t have to wait.”
“I know,” I agreed.
Gregory was a force to be reckoned with in Miami. He was extremely rich, and donated money to politicians and law enforcement to keep them indebted to him. He didn’t have the power of a Lawson or a Colter, but his multimillionaire status made him a VIP in all of South Florida.
He stood up, pulling me to my feet because of his grip on my hand. “I’m glad you understand me,” he answered with a smirk.
“Are you leaving already?” I questioned, looking up at him with a tremulous smile.
“I have things to do,” he affirmed. “But I had to check on you.”
“Thank you,” I said.
He pulled me against him and dropped a kiss on my mouth before he answered, “I had to make sure you knew how I felt about not seeing you at my club last night.”
His emotions were pretty crystal-clear, actually. Greg was a control freak, and anything he couldn’t make go his way wasn’t acceptable.
“I won’t let you down again,” I promised.
“That’s good. Very good,” he answered as he finally let go of my hand. “Stay healthy, Dani. I want to see you in my bed as soon as you’re feeling better.”
I wanted to shake my hand to return the circulation to my extremity, but I didn’t.
His announcement about wanting to have sex with me wasn’t a surprise. He’d made it perfectly clear when we’d met that he wanted me.
And I was pretty certain that up until last night, he’d always gotten what he wanted.
I followed him to the door and saw him out, leaning against the wood after I’d flipped the bolt.
“That didn’t go exactly the way I’d hoped,” I whispered to myself as I blew out a breath that I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.
Greg would never be a warm and fuzzy kind of guy. He had an extremely hard edge to him that should make me want to run away from him as quickly as possible. But I didn’t because I really wanted to get close to him.
I straightened and pushed myself off the door, starting to feel as exhausted as I told Greg I’d been the night before.
“How do I get close to him when he never lets his guard down?” I mused aloud as I walked to the kitchen.
Greg hadn’t told me when he wanted to meet again, but I knew there would be more dates, more time spent together, and I’d do everything in my power to try to be his confidant.
I refused to accept that our relationship would go any other way.