I WAS DEVELOPING too many enemies, and I couldn’t point to one person who had something to gain by bugging the house, but I was going to find out.
After Nikki had showered—I assumed—and slipped into bed, I crashed on the other side of her, trying to catch my breath. She rolled over, giving me her back.
“Thanks for the great fuck, you can go back to sleeping on the couch,” she said. She looked over her shoulder at me, pretending she wasn’t fucking with me. “I’m serious, Eric. Go sleep downstairs.”
I quickly grabbed her waist and rolled her over, placing my body over hers to trap her between me and the bed. “The hell is this, Nikki?”
“How long are we going to do this?” she asked, badly faking her annoyance. She definitely wasn’t award-winning, and I was prepared to make her become just that.
“Do what?” I asked, curving a brow.
“You pretend, and I pretend.” She shoved at my chest trying to move me as she rolled her eyes. “Preston, Eric. Did you do something to him?”
“Don’t worry about him,” I warned. “As you never should’ve fucking worried about him. I told you he would pay, and he will.”
She shot up, her tits pressing against my chest and making me lose my focus for a moment.
I chose my next words, very carefully. “What if he’s dead, Nikki? Not saying I had anything to do with it. He couldn’t keep his damn hands to himself. Would it matter if he was?” Her shock was real, and so was her reaction. I pulled her up to straddle my lap as I put my hand on her mouth before she could answer. With my eyes inexpressive, I shook my head, telling her the moment wasn’t the best time to react. “Nikki, you’ve underestimated me. Very, very bad mistake. Preston, wherever he may be, told me some pretty interesting things about you before he disappeared.” The shift in her eyes irritated the shit out of me. Another real reaction. I was giving her the benefit of the doubt with the things Preston said, but she had just told on herself.
Tell me I’m fucking dreaming. Because I’m obviously the only award-winning actor of the two of us, I never indicated to her how much her reaction bothered me. “I know everything, baby. I always know everything. Your sad attempt at becoming Estelle failed. Unlike her, I gave you what you so desperately wanted. My cock, right? It’s all you ever want. It’s what you got all dressed up for. Attention from my cock. My birthday fuck. You got it. I fucked you right.”
She pushed off my lap before I had a chance to grab her. After wrapping the bed sheet around her, she closed herself up inside the bathroom.
That…went exactly as planned. Exhaling, I jumped off the bed and tried for the bathroom door. It was locked, and I could’ve sworn I heard the opening of a window.
Okay…that wasn’t what I had planned.
I stepped back from the door, and after a couple of tries, I successfully kicked the door open.
The window opposite the shower was wide open, and a bed sheet was tied to the faucet in the marble bath. The remaining end hung out of the window. Really, Nikki? What the hell?
I raced downstairs because it was a bad time for her to leave the house. I checked the front of the house to make sure she hadn’t found the keys and took off. With one foot inside the house and one foot on the doorstep, I checked the driveway, realizing I didn’t have anything to worry about. I stepped down for only a second, and in that second, something rustled just behind me. When I turned around, the door slammed in my face. The shadow of Nikki’s figure was easy to see through the window; she was watching me.
She went overboard with the theatrics, and it painted her as the guilty party in a very bad way. I played along, because the end result of the dramatic play was all that mattered. “Open the goddamn door, Nikki.” The lights flicked off. The cold was starting to get to me. Bare feet and all, I tracked through the snow to the patio. She locked it, too. I scanned around the area for something to throw through the window.
“Bro?” Standing by the deck, Dom was staring back at me like I took a shit in his pool. I tried to explain, but I couldn’t formulate the words.
He scratched the back of his neck and tried to look everywhere but at me. If the cold didn’t remind me that my cock was swinging to the free world, he did.
“Shit.” I covered my dick with one hand. Even in the cold, it was laughable. I slipped another hand down to cover it. “What are you doing here?”
“You think I wanted to live like a hobo out of my car? You wanted me to watch her, remember? Got your panties all in a twist because I had to take a piss once. I’m using a cup now. I don’t know why I can’t trade off with some of my guys.”
“Because the guys you said were kosher, weren’t,” I hissed.
He shrugged. “Wherever she went, they said it was an okay place. They checked it out. You had no reason to worry.”
I looked askance at him. “What the fuck ever. So tell me why you’re here instead of in your car watching the house like I asked you to?”
“Because you were running around all American Psycho-like without the chainsaw. I figured it would be a good time to tell you I got some news from my men.”
Turning to him with my interest piqued, I asked, “News about Preston?”
He nodded. “He’s got an infection or something. I don’t think he’s going to last.”
I looked back at the patio, weighing my options. If I continued to play it right, the fucker toying with me would come out to play.
“I got clothes back at my hotel,” Dom said.
“I don’t want to look like I’m wading through a flood in your thirty-two longs.”
He pulled off his coat and threw it at me.
I threw it back at him, shaking my head. “Give me your phone.”
He reached in his pocket and tossed it my way.
I caught it and dialed Nikki’s number. Nikki answered, without actually responding. “You got the answer you’ve been whining for. You want to see what happened to Preston? Open the goddamn door before I break it down.”
“W-what did you do to him?”
I hung up on her and tossed the phone back to Dom.
“Bro, you sure you don’t want to leave?” Dom asked. “I got a blanket in my trunk, so you have something between your ass and my seats.”
Ignoring him, I took in a shaky breath, keeping my eyes trained to the patio door. She came back downstairs, shyly looking at me through the patio window while wearing one of my shirts. Her stare questioned me. I answered her with a wink.
She relaxed enough to let me know we were still playing the game, but not enough to let Dom know something was up.
It was smart of her. At that moment, everyone but me and Nikki were suspects.
“You are the fucking man. I don’t know how you do it. No matter what deep shit you get into, you always get the girl. But you still look like you just lost your puppy…” He coughed. “Or your nut sack.”
“Go. Drive to the warehouse, fucker,” I barked at him. “I’ll be there with Nikki in a bit.”