Enemy Mine
Stacks of boxes surrounded Dallas as he stood in the middle of his office at the Sykes building. Or, rather, in the middle of the room that was once his office and now belonged to no one.
He glanced at his watch. Just thirty minutes ago, he’d been inside the apartment that he now owned with Jane.
More accurately, he’d been inside Jane inside the apartment.
He smiled, remembering all the ways he’d fucked her over the last week, both in LA and now back here in New York. He wasn’t one hundred percent—not yet—but he damn sure wasn’t complaining. “Practice makes perfect,” Jane had teased when she’d pulled him to the bare hardwood floor only minutes before he’d rushed off to be here.
The floor had been newly polished and damned uncomfortable, but he wished he was there right now, his back against the wood as she rode him. Or Jane on hands and knees as he thrust hard into her.
He pressed his hand against his stiffening cock. Soon.
Right now, he had to take care of business.
He’d hired movers to come by after working hours to get the boxes and the desk—it had been a birthday present and he was damn well keeping it—but apparently they were running late. Which meant he was stuck in this room with nothing to do, playing the role of the disgraced leader. The immoral son of Eli Sykes, the king of the universe. The goddamn Father of the Year.
Fuck.
He dropped down into the chair—not a present, so it would be staying behind—and wished he hadn’t packed away his laptop and personal Wi-Fi router. At least he could have spent the time going over some Deliverance files. As it was, he had no choice but to answer emails on his phone. And considering his and Jane’s current notoriety, half his emails were from celebrity chasers who’d managed to track his account address.
He was just about to start deleting the bullshit when Gin popped her head in, her eyes still red from her crying jag earlier when she’d told him in a hushed whisper that Eli had it all wrong and that she couldn’t be happier for Dallas and Jane.
It had warmed him, but it hadn’t changed anything.
“It’s late, Gin. Why haven’t you left for the night?”
She sniffed. “I’ll go when you do.”
He nodded, moved by her loyalty. “Fair enough.”
“I came in to tell you that Mr. Foster is here,” she said. “He says it’s important.”
“Liam? Send him in.”
She didn’t have to because Liam was already striding past her. He tossed a blue envelope onto Dallas’s desk as Gin left, closing the door behind her.
Dallas reached for the envelope, careful to pick it up by the corners even though he knew it made no difference. “Where’d you get this?” he asked as he opened it.
“In the pile of mail on Gin’s desk. I recognized it, grabbed it. And it’s not why I’m here.”
“No,” Dallas said. “I didn’t think so.” He let the paper slide to the desk then growled low in his throat when he saw the words written there:
She’s a slut.
She’s a whore.
I’ll make you see you deserve so much better.
Without thinking, he grabbed the note and balled it up, then sent it flying across the room where it smashed ineffectually against the window. Liam strode over casually, flattened the paper, and slipped it in his jacket pocket. “Just in case.”
“You’re supposed to be in London,” Dallas said, forcing his mind away from the letter-writing bitch. Away from Jane. Away from all the shit that was going down around them and messing with his head. “It must be bad.”
“It is.”
“Colin.” At Liam’s nod, anger and regret coiled inside Dallas. “Tell me. What have you found?”
“I’ll send everything over to you digitally so that you can review it yourself. But right now, if I had to call it, I’d tell you to put a bullet in the back of the fucker’s head.” Liam ran his palm over his head. “But we need to make sure.”
“You want to interrogate him.”
“Actually, I want Quince to interrogate him.”
Dallas nodded, thinking of his former roommate turned MI6 agent and his exceptional skill at extracting confessions.
“If we grab him and he’s innocent—”
“I know,” Liam said. “I don’t think he’d invite you around for lunch anymore. It’s your call, man,” he said. “We can keep poking around, but I don’t think we’re ever going to be sure until we look the man in the eyes.”
Dallas nodded slowly. “Grab him.”
Liam nodded. “The team’s already in position. We’ll have him within the hour.” Liam started to turn toward the door, then paused. “Do you want in? Not on the snatch, but the interrogation?”
Dallas shook his head. “No. If he really is the one—if I see the truth of that in his eyes—I swear to god I’ll kill him on the spot. And I don’t want him dead that fast. I want answers. I want to know why he did it. Why he put Jane and me through hell. And I damn sure want to know who the Woman is. So you have Quince interrogate, and you call me in after.”
“And then?” Liam asked.
“And then I kill him.”