Chapter 41
Amber, earlier
Gabe and I walked to Manhattan via the Brooklyn Bridge. After we stepped onto the walkway, he held my hand. My heartbeat escalated from his touch. I looked over at him, and we made eye contact. At the same time, our smiles grew wider.
“Do you have time to go back to my place?” he asked as he raised his eyebrows.
“Absolutely. I have the day off.”
“Perfect.” We reached the sidewalk, and he raised his arm to hail a cab. One stopped by us. “We can get out of this heat and into air conditioning and privacy,” he said before opening the door for me. I got in, and Gabe followed. He gave the driver his address. As we pulled away, he said, “I do have some news to give you.”
“You do?” I asked scooting closer to him, reaching for his hand.
He took mine and gently held it. Looking deep into my eyes, he said, “My transfer to the Brooklyn firehouse has been accepted. I’m going to be working there in the fall. And I’m thinking of finding a place in Brooklyn.” He paused as if waiting for my reaction.
I held eye contact and sighed. “I see.” Right now, it was convenient to get together because we both lived in Manhattan. Even though Brooklyn was close, it would be less convenient.
“I will always be there for you, Amber. You know that, right?”
I nodded. Living farther away from each other wouldn’t be that bad.
“Good”—he gave me a faint smile, but it quickly faded—“because there’s something else. I’ll be working the day tour.” He frowned.
I did the same, probably for the same reason. We were going to be on opposite shifts.
“You know I’ll always be there for you, right?” I said.
His frown turned into a grin right before he kissed me.
∞ ∞ ∞
We entered his apartment. He went inside first, and I followed. Within seconds, he turned on his heels and faced me. I froze, looking deep into his soft, warm gaze. He reached behind me and shut the door with his palm. His eyes changed into a territorial, primal stare. They radiated pure passion as I took my hair down. After locking the door, he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into his embrace. He sank his tongue into my mouth. The wet sensation drew me deeper into him. A wave of warmth flooded over me as his tongue swirled deeper and deeper. I gripped his tight buttocks, wanting us to go further into each other. He cradled the back of my neck as his tongue escaped my mouth and traveled down my neck. I moaned and arched my back. His hands cupped my breasts softly. His thumbs found my hard nipples and rubbed them, making them even harder.
He put his hand down my pants, and his fingers hovered in between my thighs, right on the verge of making contact with my pulsating clit. He crushed his mouth on top of mine. Pulling my tongue deeper into his mouth, I yearned for more. I needed his touch to do more than just linger. I needed his fingers to nudge me there, touch me there, and enter me there. My body screamed for him to stroke me. The deeper his tongue went into my mouth, which was melting into his, the more I craved from him. My hands found his belt and loosened it. His hands joined mine, and he shed his pants and underwear in one swift motion. I licked my lips, stroking his long, hard cock with my hands. Gabe moaned. He unbuttoned my pants and dropped them onto the ground, along with my panties. He grabbed my butt with one hand, and with his other hand, he guided mine away from him. I wrapped my leg up around his behind. Instantly, our bodies made contact in the most intimate sexual way. I inhaled as he thrust only the tip into me. His forehead touched mine. He backed away so he could look at me, and a grin spread across his face. With pleading eyes, I begged for more. He shoved it in deeper. I moaned louder, burying my head in the crook of his neck. His sandalwood scent made my body greedy for even more. Each thrust caused a new wave of pleasure to ripple throughout my body. He would take me to the brink, but wouldn’t give in to my pleas for him to go deeper. Finally, he would bring me to new heights of ecstasy. My hips rose to meet his thrusts.
Our tempo increased as our bodies were on the verge of surrendering to one another. Gabe kissed me again. His huge cock went all the way in, and I throbbed, taking it all. A tingling wave of pleasure rippled throughout my body as we collided for a final time. Gabe gave himself to me—all of him—as I surrounded everything in me to him. As the wave of ecstasy faded, we stood, still intertwined with each other. Gabe guided my leg down. Then he sighed deeply as he fluttered his eyes open.
“I love making love to you.” His heart pounded against my heaving bosom.
“Oh, Gabe, you know just what to do,” I whispered in his ear.
“Ditto.” He released his tight embrace and took my hand. “Let’s go to the bedroom and recover.”
“Sounds perfect.”
He gathered up the pile of clothes and led us there. We fell asleep in each other’s arms, completely exhausted.
When I awoke, the clock on his nightstand showed four in the afternoon. Gabe looked so peaceful as he slept. His naked, chiseled body still glistened from the sweat of our bodies becoming one. I smiled. Every inch of him was mine.
As I watched him resting, I ran my fingers through my hair, pushing it away from my eyes. Groggy from our nap, what I really needed to wake up was a shower—and to be able to freshen up completely, I needed my shower and my beauty products in my own bathroom. I had to go back to my apartment. I didn’t want to leave a note, so I gently nudged him.
“Amber, you’re awake,” he mumbled.
I kissed him. “Now you are too. I’m going to go back to my place and shower.”
“You could shower here.” His eyes were soft, and the gaze that drifted over my entire body suggested that we’d be doing more than just getting clean.
“Yes, but I’d rather change clothes at my place.”
“Is that an invitation?”
I smiled. “If you want it to be, it is.” He ran his fingers down my back. I giggled. “That tickles.”
He gripped my buttocks and pulled me into him. His hard manhood pulsated. He slid his tongue from my earlobe all the way to my chest. He flicked my nipples and tugged gently on them with his teeth. I squealed in delight. I wrapped my leg around him like a pretzel. With a final thrust, he exploded.
“I just can’t get enough of you,” he said, panting.
“Clearly. I’m glad.”
After we recovered, we decided Gabe would meet me at my apartment in an hour or so. I left. With each stride walking home, my sore thighs throbbed, but it was the good kind of pain, the kind that reminded me of what a good time I just had. As I thought about how much Gabe loved making love to me, a giant grin crept over my face. It stayed there all the way home.
I didn’t think that grin would ever fade, but then I walked into my place. When I entered the apartment, my smile diminished, and I pressed my lips into a straight line. Fiona sat at the kitchen table, drinking from a mug. Her hand rested on the table, and there was a packet next to it. It had been torn open. It wasn’t just any packet. It was the kind that I’d seen Adrianna use the night she pushed Marta off the roof.
For a second, I stared at it, not wanting to believe Fiona would turn to drugs. She had been through hell when Cam died, but Fiona was sweet, and I couldn’t imagine she’d look to drugs for the answer to her depression. Fiona never drank. Fiona never partied hard. Fiona didn’t have an addictive personality. There had to be an explanation. And it wouldn’t be that Fiona had been corrupted. Not Fiona. Anyone but her.
“Are you all right?” Fiona asked, interrupting my inner monologue. Her eyes seemed to have trouble focusing on me, as they darted back and forth from me to her mug.
“Where did you get this?” I rushed to her and picked up the packet.
She took a sip. “Daisy.”
I jerked the cup out of her hands and dumped the contents into the sink.
“What the hell?” Fiona said, coming over.
“You don’t want to use that,” I explained.
“Coffee?” She shrugged. “People drink it every day.”
I put my arms on her shoulders and looked her straight in the eyes. “No, it’s drugs. You’ve been using drugs.”
“What? That bum was right?” Her mouth gaped open, and the color drained from her face. “Why would Daisy lie?” Her eyes became glassy as tears welled up in them. “She said the packets were a vitamin supplement.” She shook her head before burying her face into her hands.
I was confused about the bum and mad at Daisy for giving Fiona drugs. How could Daisy lie like that to Fiona? I rubbed Fiona’s back with a slow circular motion. “What bum?”
She took a deep breath and leaned on the counter.
“Let’s go sit on the couch,” I suggested. Fiona did, and I sat next to her.
“I’ve seen this dirty homeless man hanging around my work and our apartment,” she explained. “He seemed harmless until recently. He started talking to me and saying weird things. The last time he acted like he knew I was taking drugs, but I thought he was mentally ill or drugged out himself, so I dismissed his words. I just wanted to finish playing the song.”
I saw her violin and stand with music on it next to her. “Why couldn’t you?”
“My hands were too shaky. I thought more caffeine and vitamins—well, I thought it was vitamins—would help, and it did.” She held her hand up. “See? I can hold it steady now.”
“Oh, Fiona, you’ve been through so much.” I hugged her. “What happens if you stop taking it?”
“Insomnia and anxiety. I’m aggravated easily.” She released our embrace and looked me square in the eyes. “I don’t think I can stop,” she said with a quivering voice. Her lower lip trembled. Tears streamed from her eyes.
I held her hands in mine and maintained eye contact. “I don’t know how or when, but I’m going to make sure you can.”
Doe-eyed, Fiona looked down, shaking her head.
“Look at me, Fiona.”
She tilted her head up and made eye contact as tears cascaded down her face.
“I promise I’m going to help you find a way to stop.” I felt determination radiate from my eyes as I looked at her.
Her face mirrored mine, showing her own determination. She took her hands back and wiped away her tears. She nodded and sighed deeply. I knew she believed me.
We sat on the couch, staring at the floor. Both of us seemed to be letting it sink in that Fiona had become addicted to some drug her so-called friend, Daisy, had given to her under false pretenses. I would try to help Fiona any way possible, even if that meant speaking to my father or his detective contact about the best way to do that.
I had managed to stay away from the corruption of the mob. It always seemed to be one step removed from me. I never felt directly in danger. The closest was when I had to wait to return home due to the assholes that beat up Fiona. But the mob connections to us were screwing with Fiona’s mind by giving her drugs. Damn it, Daisy. I knew where Daisy got her drug supply. It had to be Mercedes.
I would be working with my father, whom I hated, to give the cops vital information about the mob. They were destroying the lives around me—the lives of people who didn’t deserve it. They don’t even care. It’s like they are sociopaths. There was only one way to get them to pay and one way to get them to care. They had to be sentenced to prison with charges that their expensive lawyers couldn’t get them out of. They would have to be cases brought to a judge who didn’t squirm under the pressure of serving justice to them. The judge would have to have a spine tough as steel so he or she would have the balls to put them away for good. It seemed as though all the stars in the universe had to align to pull that off. I knew what I had to do to set them on the right course. I had to talk to my father again to arrange to speak to Detective Delany, even though my father was the last person I wanted to see.
I could go straight to the police department and divulge everything I knew, but since my father had undercover cop experience, he would know the best way for me to help Fiona and still stick around for my friends without putting us in danger. Yeah, that’s not what he wants. He wants me to tell the cops everything then disappear. Too bad. I’m not abandoning my friends. I don’t run away from my problems like he does.
I planned on telling the detective everything. Every detail about the drugs, Mercedes, Cassie, Fiona, and how the mob had beaten Fiona in order to get her father to pay his debt to them. The cops needed to know all of it. Still, if the mob somehow figured out I had given the police vital info to take them down, then both Fiona and I would be in terrible danger. I wrung my hands together. Even if I followed my father’s instructions, the plan could fall apart.
No, Father wouldn’t let that happen. He said he loved me. As much as I hated to go to my father, I knew deep down it was necessary.
∞ ∞ ∞
After waking up to the alarm on my cell, I looked at it and saw the date and time. It was the first Monday of the month. Moaning, I lay there. It was the day I would set Fiona and me on a course where, once started, there would be no going back. After discussing it the night before, both of us agreed it had to be done. Enough was enough. The mob had to pay.
As I stood, my phone buzzed in my hand. Henry had left me a text stating that he had already messaged my father to meet him at the hotel. Henry thought he was going alone, but now he wasn’t.
I texted him back: Fiona and I will meet you there.
I sighed and closed my eyes. For a second, I saw my father in my mind. His tired, long face with eyes full of regret stared at me. Welling with tears, they longed for my forgiveness. They longed for something that I could not give. I opened my eyes, unable to muster any sympathy for a man that had broken my heart many years ago.
My stomach churned, and my gut wound itself into a tight knot, like a miniature bowling ball was lodged in there. It felt like a static, heavy force weighing me down. I slowly sat on the edge of my bed and bent over, my elbows resting on my knees as my hands clasped each other. My feet rested on their toes as if I could spring into action at any moment. Staring at the carpet, I thought about everything the mob had put Fiona through.
That knot in the center of my gut started to feel different. The weight of it shifted until it didn’t feel heavy anymore. It warmed my stomach as my anger toward the mafia grew. These men, who think they’re all-powerful, walk around with a god complex and destroy people’s lives. They need to pay for what they did to Fiona. They need to be stopped before they do more damage. As the fire within me grew to unbearable heat, I stood.
My heart thumped as I anticipated helping the cops to gather vital information that would put those bastards behind bars. To do it right, I would have to see that tired, long face again, the one I’d never forgive. It was going to be agony. I wished I never had to see him again. Nothing he could say would make up for what he did years ago. Instead of ignoring him, I was about to ask for his help. I cringed, and my whole body tightened. But it didn’t last long. My anger toward the mob took over. My fiery hate burned brighter within me. I would do it for Fiona.