MY FIST CONNECTS WITH THE face of Marco Denati. His head snaps back, and when it flings forward, blood splatters onto my shirt.
He smiles, red coating his gold tooth. Sick bastard. “That all you’ve got, pig?”
I’m the one smiling this time. “You’re that fucking unoriginal, Denati? What are you gonna do? Ask me if I want a fuckin’ donut now?”
“Fuck you, hombre.” He spits bloody snot at my feet. “You’d probably like that, though, wouldn’t you? Seeing as how your cunt’s been missing for two years.”
I fight with everything in me, every single last strand of patience and every moment lost with Livvie not to hit him again. “You keepin’ track of where my dick’s been?”
“Enough!” Rico shouts and separates us.
We’re all currently standing in the middle of an alley behind a building that’s been abandoned for fifteen years. Back in the day, it was a plastics factory, and with the way the economy tanked, it’s sat empty.
This whole block is deserted and a regular area for drug deals and sex trafficking.
Rico steps in front of me and shoots me a look that Marco can’t see, clearly telling me to back the fuck off. I wasn’t supposed to know they were going to be here tonight. “Detective Jamison, if you don’t have anything substantial to charge us with, which I know you don’t since we’re not doing anything illegal, I suggest you turn around and slink your ass back to your vehicle.”
“Or what?”
He steps to me. “Or that pretty little girl of yours—”
I swing and connect with his jaw right before he reciprocates. I charge at him and slam him to the ground, pulling my 9 out and shoving the barrel against his temple. My nostrils flare, and my fingers flex against his throat.
He looks up at me and grips my wrist as his face reddens.
“You ever mention her again…” I trail off, leaving the threat hanging in the air. I know he’s on my side and he’s only saying it to play the part, but I’m walking a line here with my sanity.
He nods and begins to choke. I jump up and advance on Marco, my gun aimed at his head. It’d be so easy to just shoot him. End his pathetic, disgusting, meaningless life. But things are in play. Huge things. Things that shouldn’t have taken this fucking long, but things that if we don’t play them right, a lot of people—mostly young women—will get hurt because his organization runs even deeper than we originally thought.
Denati raises his hands in a mock surrender.
I pull the trigger and laugh when he flinches as the bullet flies by his head. “I can’t fuckin’ wait,” I whisper in a sinister tone before I turn and walk back to my truck. I hop in and peel out, hands shaking and sweat dripping down my back.
By the time I get home, I feel just as gross as I know Marco is. I can’t get in the shower fast enough. Steaming hot water pours down my body, and I scrub until I practically bleed. My forehead crashes with the tile, and I bite back the heartache threatening to crawl out of my throat.
Once I shut the water off and dress, I head downstairs to eat something since I’ve been at it all day. Just as I hit the bottom step, I sense someone in my house. I glance at the panel on the wall and notice it’s blinking red, armed.
“Just me, man.” Rico shouts from the kitchen. He knows the code since he’s had to sneak in before to have meetings with me.
I finish my descent and turn the corner where he’s sitting at the kitchen island drinking a beer and holding a package of frozen peas to his jaw. “Sorry about that.”
“You’re an idiot, Jay. Jesus.” He shakes his head at me. “What are you fucking thinking?”
Not many men make me hang my head in shame, but I am right now. I know I shouldn’t have been there. If I keep showing up where I know Marco is, it’ll give him the idea that he’s got a rat.
“I will get us what we need. Patience.”
“It’s been two years!”
“I know.”
“Two years, Rico.”
He softens his voice. “I know. This has to be done right. You know that. It must be clean.”
“What are you doing here?”
He straightens his back. “This is the last warning you’re getting. You pull shit like that again, and you’ll be off the case permanently.” He’s had to have talked to Cap. No way he’d ever threaten me like that without orders.
Rocks drop in my gut, and instead of saying anything, I nod as I grit my teeth together. I have no other choice. Part of me is scared I’m starting to crack. Slowly the jagged pieces of me are going to break and rip me in two.
“Rules, Jay. There are rules, and if you don’t follow them, it’s only going to prolong this.”
He doesn’t know. Has no idea that I’ve already crossed the line. Money really does fuckin’ talk, and if Rico thinks the only way I’m getting any headway on this godforsaken case is because of following the rules, then he’s way more stupid than I thought. “Fuck the fucking rules!”
“You think I like this?” He stands. “You think I like looking at the man who killed my mother? Honestly think I haven’t thought about cuttin’ through all the fuckin’ red tape and just ending his ass myself?”
“Somebody needs to.”
“You don’t think I know you’re already dirty, Jamison.” I swallow but don’t look away from his deadly stare. “Don’t think the whispers and murmurs in the street aren’t trickling down to Marco. He knows you’re getting desperate.”
My head snaps up. “Fuck yeah, I’m desperate. I’ve been away from my girl for two fucking years because of him!”
“And if you continue down this path, if you keep meeting us at locations and taking your fists to him, he’s going to lose patience and do something stupid. Or disappear and force us to start back over at square one again. Then all those poor girls we’re trying to save and rescue from his fucking ring won’t stand a chance.”
I turn my back to him and punch a hole through the wall. “Fuck!” He’s right. I’ve always been a good cop—by the book—but if I continue writing my own pages, it’s not just Livvie who will suffer. I have more than just her and me to think about.
“I hate him, Jay. Hate,” he snaps. “Fucking despise the cocksucker. But he’s been running this city for over two decades. It’s going to take more than a few years and a couple of hotheads to watch his empire crumble. Have patience. Ty’s doing six away from his girl because of Marco. He’s forced to sit in a fucking cell with the same cocksuckers we fight to get off the streets every day, Jay. If he can have the patience, you can, too. Otherwise, everything we’ve worked for, all the fucking blood we’ve shed and the years we’ve spent tirelessly and quietly dying inside, will be for nothing.”
He tosses his hood over his head and then walks out of my back door. I stop the beeping on the alarm pad then reset it. He’s right. And by him coming here to set my ass straight, I’m risking his cover, too. “Fuck.” I know he’s right. I shouldn’t have been there tonight. I’m starting to lose patience. My ability to be hopeful about ending this shit is looking more and more bleak as the days continue.
My sister moved out over a year ago now. She took her cat and got a little apartment after some extensive research on my part. I had to inspect and have multiple discussions about security with the building owners, security, and maintenance. If I wasn’t happy with any of their answers or protocols, we moved on. That’s kept me occupied because as much as I wanted her to get to the point where she was confident enough to be on her own, I hate not being under the same roof as she is. Letting her actually leave was hard for me.
My sister is gone.
My girlfriend is gone.
I’m fuckin’ lonely.
I lie in my bed and stare at the ceiling. Sleep rarely, if ever, occurs. I can barely jack off anymore. My cock is broken; no memory of Livvie enough to give me the satisfaction I need. Nothing is enough anymore.
When I eventually end up back in the kitchen, I pull out some stale pizza and a couple of beers then head to the sofa. Once I plop my ass down, I turn on the TV and watch the news. I haven’t watched more of the shows Livvie and I needed to catch up on because I’m waiting for her to do that.
Just as I finish my first beer, there’s a knock on the door. I get up and glance at the monitor in the kitchen as I pass it before I shut the alarm off and open the door.
“Can I come in?” Opal smiles at me, but the moment her eyes meet mine, they glass over with fresh tears.
“Of course you can.”
She walks in and goes right to my fridge, grabbing a bottle of wine that she’d capped halfway through last time she was here. I know I shouldn’t let her drink because she’s only eighteen, but after what she’s been through, I’m the last person to begrudge her.
She tosses her keys at me, and I catch them. Something must have happened for her to be here without the baby. We sit next to each other on the couch, and after she takes a couple of swallows, she sets the bottle on the coffee table.
“Wanna talk about it?” I ask.
“Nope.” The ‘p’ pops, and she shakes her head adamantly.
Stubborn like her sister.
I nurse another beer and cram half of the hard ass pizza in my mouth then pull the recliner out on the end of the couch to kick my feet up. The news finishes, and the evening talk shows begin. Canned laughter doesn’t make either of us smile, and when a commercial with a baby and her father comes on, Opal loses the control she was fighting for.
“It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” she whispers.
“I know.”
She throws herself at me, and I catch her too small body. Pounds lost from not eating over the past year and a half evident on her already tiny frame. I rest my chin on the top of her head and wrap my arms around her. She shakes with every breath she takes, and it absolutely kills me. It guts me that Livvie can’t be here to help her through this.
“He’s never coming back.”
“I know.”
“Olivia is never going to know her father.”
Continuing to agree with her isn’t going to help anything. “What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Where is she?” I ask, referring to her daughter.
“With Mom and Dad.”
“Why aren’t you home with them? Something had to have happened.”
She huffs and finally sits up to face me. “Nothing! Nothing happened. But when I put my daughter to sleep at night, I wonder, ya know? How is she going to grow up without her father in her life? Will she blame me that he’s gone like everyone else?”
“It’s not your fault he—”
“Spare me, okay? I know. Deep down, I know it’s not my fault. But that doesn’t change the fact that I still feel responsible. And you can’t say jack shit to me because you feel the same way with Liv.”
I sit up and gently push her off me. “Watch yourself, Opal. I am not in the fuckin’ mood for your shit.”
“My shit?”
“Yeah. Your shit. When you try to bring your shit to me and get in your little digs about Livvie. You don’t know everything. You have no fucking clue what actually happened, what I’ve done to get her back, and you have no fucking clue what’s at risk.”
She shakes her head and stands. “Bullshit.”
“Jesus, Opal. Just stop.”
“I know.”
“Yeah, you think so, huh?” I stand and face her, tapping the side of my head. “Think your eighteen-year-old’s naïve little brain can even possibly imagine the kind of shit I’m dealing with in order to bring her back home?”
Her arms cross, and she cocks a hip. “Well, whatever it is, you’re not doing a very good job.”
My temper is rising, and it’s all I have in me to walk away. “Night, Opal.”
“What? I’m telling the truth? Gotta walk away? Can’t tell me to my face you have no fucking clue what you’re doing?”
And the line is crossed. I turn on my heel and advance on her. So sick of her piss ass attitude. All the stuff I’ve done to help her over the past couple of years and she acts like an ungrateful brat. Her eyes widen, but she doesn’t move.
Not even an inch from her, I lose it. “There is a man out there. A very bad man, Opal, who would…” I stop. I just can’t anymore. “Just go to bed.”
“What would he do?”
“You don’t need me to say it.” I run my hands over my face. “You’re a smart girl. Figure it out.”
“Kill her?”
“No.” I put my hand on my hips and level her stare. “But she’d be so fucked up after he got a hold of her that she’d wish she was dead.”
She gasps, and I don’t hang around to entertain this conversation anymore. Once I get upstairs and ready for bed, I crawl under my covers and stare at the ceiling. Opal’s words, although untrue, sock me in the gut. If she thinks I’m not doing my job, if she really thinks I don’t have a clue what I’m doing, is that what her family thinks, too?
Do they not realize the work I’ve put in? The hours. The sleepless nights lying in a fucking sewer recording conversations to try to piece together solid evidence. The bullets shot at my head as a warning. The months and months of combing through old files, interviewing witnesses who were paid off, trying to get them to give me a name. The hours upon hours of visiting inmates and working on renegotiating sentences in exchange for information.
With a frustrated sigh, I turn to my side. The photo of Livvie I look at when I can’t sleep stares back at me. We were spending the day at Navy Pier and she was looking out into the water. She’d just turned her face to me and I caught her laughing. The light from the sun’s reflection off the lake shone around her and her hair was blowing in the wind.
She’s so damn beautiful. God… I miss her. Her voice. Her touch. Her love. Everything. I miss everything about her. Even when she was being a snot and giving me shit about being overprotective. When she’d take the last slice of pizza. When she’d go for my ticklish spot on my neck when we were out in public. I miss her.
My throat burns, and I clear it and stop my brain from thinking about her. Instead, I focus on the information I gathered today. By the time I glance at the clock, it’s after 2:00 a.m. My eyes finally get tired, and my lids lower… a couple of hours of sleep humoring me.
The groggy and tired part of my brain takes a moment to comprehend. A soft hand trails up and down my arm. For a moment, I absorb Livvie’s touch.
But when she calls my name, it’s not her voice. Before the covers even fall off me, I jump out of bed. Opal gasps as she stands, tripping over her feet.
“What the fuck?” I scream. “What the fuck are you doing?”
“Jay,” she whispers.
“What the fuck, Opal?”
Her face turns red as a tomato, and she bursts out in tears. “I’m sorry!”
“Jesus.” I turn out of the room, slamming my door shut behind me. “Fuck!”
I head straight downstairs for… something. To get away from her. I pace in the kitchen, tugging at my hair.
“Jay.” I’m too busy talking to myself and pissed the hell off that I don’t even hear her come down the stairs.
My neck snaps so fast it sends a jolt of pain down my spine.
“I’m sorry.”
“Why were you in my bed?” I take a breath.
“I was just going to apologize before I left. I wanted to say I was sorry for what I said last night and… I was just waking you up.”
I slow my heart rate. “Shit.”
“I would never. God, did you think I was—”
“I don’t know what I thought. I just knew someone was in my bed who wasn’t Livvie.”
She shakes her head. “I’m so embarrassed that you’d think that. I’m sorry. I’d never do that to Livvie.”
“I know you wouldn’t. Shit.” My face is scruffy when I run my hands over it. “I know that. Christ.”
I nod and walk past her to get away from her. I’m pissed at myself that I’d think that. Pissed that I even for a second thought she was Livvie. So fucking pissed that I can’t control anything right now.
When I get to my room, I immediately rip the sheets off and take them to the laundry room. They don’t fit when I shove them into the washer, so I try harder. I push them and then pull, ripping them out, and pounding them into the ground until my knuckles bleed. Ice flows through me as I continue taking my anger out on a fucking set of sheets and a comforter. By the time I’m done tearing it apart, it looks like someone came in here with a machete.
I charge back into my room to grab her pillow, Livvie’s pillow. The one I haven’t washed since she last slept on it. I dive onto my bed and land with my face on the soft cloud. Inhaling, my heart skips a beat when the faint smell of coconuts warms my veins.
Relief overwhelms me, and I pull the pillow down my chest so I can wrap my arms around it and pretend, even for a second, that I’m holding my girl. My Livvie.