EMILY
I lock up behind Shane, feeling naked beyond my skin beneath the thin blanket. Suddenly experiencing the sense of being exposed and out of control for too many reasons to count, I dart down the hallway and up the stairs. Once there, I dig out a pale pink bra and panty set, put them on, and then cover up with gray sweats and a long-sleeved black T-shirt. And because a drug cartel seems to be hanging around, I opt to slip on socks and tennis shoes before my mind starts racing, my thoughts twisting and twirling in such a whirlwind that I sink down onto the edge of the bed. Thoughts come at me hard and fast, but there are two that demand center stage. Shane just all but promised to shut me out, and I all but begged the man to spank me. He did spank me, and that connects to so many pieces of my past that should have made that traumatic and lost the me I’ve known, yet it did not. But then, it wasn’t about me. It was about Shane and trust, which brings me back to his vow to shut me out.
“But it’s not about trust,” I whisper, thinking about his promises to protect me and quickly dashing my anger. Shane’s had a hellish night. Anger doesn’t help him. My mind goes back to a statement he made. I am not Derek. He’s right. He’s not like this brother, but if this “war” as he calls it forces him to stoop to that level, what will he be on the other side? I have to help him find a way out of this that won’t do that to him, and do it in a way that doesn’t get us all killed.
Which is what? I go back to a certain law professor who used and abused me, and pretty much said the same thing Shane did tonight. Know your enemy better than they know themselves or you. I need to gather every fact I can for Shane and present him with every idea I can to defeat his enemy.
I push off the bed and dart for the door and down the stairs, my destination the office. Once there, I flip on the light and bypass the giant mahogany desk directly in front of me, cutting left to the couch and chairs framed by bookshelves. Claiming the spot on the floor between the couch and the coffee table where my MacBook sits, I power it up and bypass all my research on the new fashion line I’m determined to make happen for Brandon Enterprises. Right now I have one thing on my mind: finding Adrian Martina’s weakness.
I start reading, and it’s kind of eerie how alike he and Shane are in many ways. Both with elite educations. Both with family empires they’re battling to control. Both with brothers, only Adrian’s is dead, and … gulp. At the hand of his father. So add a brutal father to the list of commonalities they share. But the one difference that stands out to me is a sister. Adrian has a sister, and she is the one Derek is involved with. I have no idea why, but she feels important. Teresa Martina has my attention. If only we didn’t have her brother’s.
SHANE
Twenty minutes after I leave Emily in our apartment, Seth guides us past the foliage-covered gate of his traditional-looking home with a steepled top, the exterior impression more family home than bachelor pad to an ex-CIA operative. But then, that’s exactly why an ex-CIA operative would want it. Traveling the driveway, we cut into the back of the house, and there’s a white Porsche, my brother’s favorite color and make, parked outside the garage.
“Nick’s,” Seth says, hitting the electronic pad above his visor to open the garage door. “Needless to say, leaving the FBI and opening his own security business has been a good decision, though I doubt with his man’s disappearance, he’ll agree.”
“Considering Martina made it to my apartment on top of that,” I say dryly. “I’m not sure I can agree either, but at least he has something in common with my brother. Maybe Nick can understand Derek where I can’t.”
He pulls the car into the garage and lowers the door behind us. “Your brother is a narcissist and driven by greed. I understand him just fine.”
I glance over at him. “He called me tonight.”
“He wanted to know about your father’s treatment,” he assumes, popping open his door, “like you did.”
“He did,” I confirm, exiting the car to meet his stare over the roof, a realization hitting me. “But my mother didn’t,” I add as we walk to the entry.
Seth keys in a code on a panel by the door. “Maybe she elected Derek to call you.”
Rejecting any answer that indicates my mother has the heart my father does not, I offer another solution. “Or she told Mike about my father’s treatment and he’s trying to get her answers.”
“In which case,” he assures me, “he’ll find the information we made sure he finds.”
“As long as his people weren’t as fast as ours.”
“Despite tonight’s events,” Seth says as we enter the newly remodeled house to be greeted by pale hardwood steps to match the flooring in the entire lower level, “you have the upper hand with our team.”
“After tonight,” I say, the two of us starting the climb up the wide steps before us, framed by stainless-steel handrails, “that’s a statement I’m going to need Nick to back up with more than words, or we’re replacing him.”
“He will,” he promises, and in a few seconds we reach the top floor and walk directly into a library, with bookshelves lining the walls and several gray leather chairs with ottomans sitting at various locations. In the center of it all is a long wooden table with a half dozen MacBooks on top, and Nick is behind it, talking on his phone, his military-style buzz cut as extreme as the set of his jaw.
He looks up as we step into the room. “I need to call you back,” he tells his caller, ending the connection as he stands, allowing me a view of the Harley-Davidson bloodstained-skull graphic on his black T-shirt, the FBI conservative logo announcing his past nowhere to be found. “I have no excuse to offer you,” he says, pressing his hands on the table as Seth and I stop on the opposite side of it. “But Cody Rodriguez is leading your team now, and he’s not only damn good, this is his world. He was born and raised in Mexico, and he was undercover in a competing cartel at one point.” He slides a folder across the table. “That’s his file.”
I ignore the file and focus on him. “Do we know how this happened?”
“No,” he says. “And that’s as honest as it gets, but I will find out, and people will pay for it.”
“What about your man?” I ask. “Is he still missing?”
“Yes. Ted is still missing, and I’m here now to reassure you that I’m dealing with this, but I need to be somewhere else, helping my team find him.”
My mind goes back to my meeting with Martina and every one of the many conversations I’ve had tonight on strategy. “You won’t find him unless Martina wants you to find him,” I say, reaching into my pocket and removing my cell phone, and the business card Martina gave me. “I’ll handle this,” I add, glancing at the number on the card, playing the game Martina wants me to play but doing it my way.
“Handle it how?” Nick asks.
I punch Martina’s number into my cell and toss the card onto the table. “I’m going to the source of our problems.” The line rings twice.
Martina answers on ring three. “Shane Brandon,” he says, a smile in his voice, his identifying greeting no doubt meant to let me know that he already has my number, though I never gave it to him. “Miss me already?”
“Ted Moore gets returned alive and well or that deal we discussed is no deal at all.”
“I’m always happy to aid a friend. Who exactly is Ted Moore, and who do I need to kill to get him back?”
A threat. And not even a subtle one. “Alive, Adrian.”
“I don’t know Ted, but I own this city and I believe in the return of favors. You’re going to get my drug into a trial and I’m going to get your man back to you.”
Favors. Quid pro quo. I get Sub-Zero into the drug study. He returns Ted. And how I respond to that clear setup, right here and now, will set a precedent for our future interactions. In other words, I have to gamble on Ted’s life and just how much Martina wants this drug study, or risk many others.
“I’m going to look at the information your consortium sends me,” I say, establishing that I still control this relationship. “And I can promise you only one thing during this phone call. If Ted were to die, I would be too distraught and shaken by the death to even consider looking at the information for months. In fact, I might have to take time off for therapy.”
There is a beat of silence, then two, then five, before he laughs. “I’d love to be a fly on the wall in one of your therapy sessions. I’m putting word out on the street that this ‘Ted’ has my protection. I’ll be in touch.” The line goes dead, and I slip my phone back into my pocket.
“Tell me whatever you just did got me Ted back alive,” Nick says.
“If he’s not already dead, then it did.”
“When will we know?”
“He isn’t going to give us Ted back without a wait. That would make it seem like I said jump and he asked how high.”
Nick scrubs his lightly shadowed jaw and presses his fists to the table. “I need a gut instinct here. Is Ted alive?”
“Yes. I believe he is.”
He gives me a several-second hard look and then nods. “Then thank you, man. Because I really don’t want to tell his wife otherwise.”
Seth gives the table a quick knuckle knock. “What did Martina want tonight?”
My cell phone rings, and I remove it from my pocket to find Emily’s number, my jaw setting, and after a ten-second hesitation, I press decline. I can’t talk to her right now, not without risking my decisions being swayed by her moral compass, not Adrian’s, and Adrian’s is the one that could get us all killed. Again I slide my cell back into my pocket to find Seth and Nick staring at me.
“It wasn’t him” I say, and force us back to Martina. “Everything about this night, including Ted’s disappearance, is about Adrian Martina letting us all know he’s in charge. I suggest we sit down, I fill you in on my conversation with him, and then we come up with a way to ensure he’s not right about that.”
There are some grumbles and exchanges about shutting Martina down, but the conclusion is that Seth and Nick are sitting at the table, with me directly across from them, while I fill them in on my conversation with Adrian. When I’m done, Seth narrows his stare at me. “You don’t really think he’s trying to go legitimate, do you?”
“I believe there’s some part of him that believes that’s what he wants,” I reply.
“I’ve studied this man,” Seth says. “And I agree. He believes that’s what he wants, and ironically, he justifies one bad deed after another as a means to that end.”
“And he thinks with his Ivy League education and expensive suits, he’s better than the rest of his family,” Nick adds. “But he’s no better than them, or my man wouldn’t be MIA right now. He’s just a gangster in a suit.”
My e-mail beeps on my phone, and I remove it from my pocket and glance at the screen. “A gangster who just e-mailed me,” I say, tapping the screen to open the e-mail and read it out loud.
Shane:
I’m stepping ahead of my team and sending you the list of our consortium members. Now you have time to vet them and be appropriately impressed. We can help each other. Still looking into your problem. Nothing yet.
Adrian
“I have a good mind to go to that bastard’s restaurant and point a gun at his head until he gives me Ted,” Nick says.
“He’s giving us something to do while we wait on Ted,” Seth comments.
“That’s right,” I say. “It’s part of him controlling us. Everything is about him.” I grab one of the computers sitting on the table. “But be careful where you shine the spotlight,” I add. “Someone might see something you don’t want them to see. If this consortium really is all-powerful and untainted by the Martina clan, we have to make sure they know who he is.”
“It won’t matter,” Nick says. “He owns them, or he wouldn’t be in business with them.”
“He’s right,” Seth says. “Like we made sure we owned our stockholders, he’s made sure he owns them. I’d bet my life on it.”
“Let’s hope that’s true,” I say. “Because powerful people don’t like to be owned, and they will look for an escape.”
“And we’ll be the escape,” Seth adds. “I like it.” He pulls a computer to him. “Let’s give the man what he wants. Let’s look at the list of consortium members.”
“Are you going to reply to that e-mail?” Nick asks.
“I’m not responding to anything else until we get Ted back,” I say.
“He’ll know you read the e-mail,” Seth points out. “He has tech resources.”
“Good,” I say. “Then he knows my lack of reply is a choice.”
Fifteen minutes later, Nick has e-mailed the list of consortium members to his best hacker, while he, Seth, and I dig through it ourselves as well. An hour later, it’s nearly midnight, and Nick is in touch with his field operation but has no word on Ted. For my part, despite the interesting, and yes, impressive list of consortium members I can focus on, I find myself typing out a personality profile on Adrian. His strengths. His weaknesses.
My cell phone rings, and I glance down to find Emily calling again. Inhaling, I decline the call a second time, not sure why I can’t hear her voice right now. That’s not true. I do know. A man could be dead, directly related to Martina being in our apartment tonight. She will hear that in my voice when no one else would. I send her a text: Is everything okay?
Her reply: Are you okay?
Me: I’m with Seth and Nick, doing research. I won’t be home soon.
There is a long pause in which I find myself staring at the screen and waiting for her reply that doesn’t come. Finally, I type: Are you okay?
Her reply: Yes.
Nothing more. And damn it, I need more, when I’m the one who didn’t answer the phone. I set my cell down on the table next to me and turn it over, and when I intend to look at my computer screen again, I find myself replaying something Martina said tonight. You’re protective of her, as I am of my sister. But know this, Shane Brandon. If you are loyal to any agreement we make, now or later, as I assure you I will be in reverse, I will protect her, even kill for her.
I key in a name: Teresa Martina. The woman in my brother’s bed.
TERESA
I jolt awake and sit up, tugging the blanket over my thin pale pink gown, my gaze swinging wildly around my bedroom, sensing I’m not alone. “Teresa.”
At the sound of Derek’s voice, I yelp and then turn toward him, my gaze cutting through the shadows to find him sitting in the leather chair in the corner directly to my right. I recover quickly from the surprise of him being here, but I’m also shocked and pleased that he has actually used the key I gave him weeks ago. Rotating, I let my feet dangle over the side of the bed, and blink into the darkness, slowly having his outline become clear, seeing a glass of whiskey in his hand, his usual tie absent. I glance at the clock and note the two A.M. hour, aware now that he has not been home, but he has not been here either.
Inhaling, I don’t speak. I just sit there and he sits there, with those now familiar waves of torment rolling off him, telling me that he is once again fighting those inner demons of his that both draw me to him and warn me away. He’s headed for trouble with my brother, the kind I’m trying to escape. And while I know this, I can’t seem to turn him away. I can’t. Somehow, despite all of the many flaws he presents, I fell in love with him.
He downs his drink and then throws the glass against the wall. I jump but don’t make a sound. I know he had dinner at his parents’ house earlier, and I know that every demon he battles is clawing and biting him tonight. And I know why he is here and what he needs. He leans forward and rests his elbows on his knees. “My father got into a drug trial in Germany.”
I am on my feet in an instant, crossing to stand in front of him. His hands go to my hips, and he presses his head to my belly. My hands settle on his head, fingers threading through the dark locks. “No one understands what it’s like to be conflicted over your father more than I do,” I say. “I’ve told you what a monster mine is, but yet … I still love him.”
He looks up at me and then sits back, pulling me onto his lap, my legs straddling his hips. “And if your father died? How would you feel?”
“Confused. Hurt. Scared. Relieved for the world and guilty for feeling that as his daughter.” I lean forward and cup his face. “I told you. No one understands what you’re feeling more than I do.” I press my lips to his and he cups my head, claiming that control he so needs and always demands, his tongue pressing into my mouth in a deep, tormented kiss. He hates his father. He loves his father. He hates himself right now, and I know that feeling and it’s a lingering feeling, because you can’t escape yourself or your family. Lord knows, I’ve tried.
“Teresa,” he murmurs softly, and I answer by sitting back and pulling my gown over my head. It’s barely left my skin before he’s dragging me to him, kissing me again, his hands caressing my skin, his fingers reaching up and pulling away the tie binding my long dark hair. He strokes it free, touching me everywhere, like he can’t get enough of me, his caresses tender and yet wild. I lose myself in his demands and needs. In the way he touches me, holds me, demands more of me, and I do so knowing that the only place he lets go, the only person he lets see the vulnerability he shows in these intimate times, is me. And for this reason, I can be vulnerable. I can be wild, and I don’t even care that he is not undressed. I just want him inside me, and somehow we get his pants down enough for me to make that need a reality.
I slide down on him and he molds me closer, and then we are kissing, swaying, and escaping both of our worlds that have somehow become one. And when it’s over, when we’ve collapsed and I’m lying on top of him, my head on his shoulder, neither of us is in a hurry to move. Eventually though, Derek stands and carries me across the room and into the bathroom. He flips on the light and sets me on the tiled navy countertop, pulling out of me and pressing a towel between my legs.
I quickly clean up and I hate that he’s dressed, perhaps ready to leave, but that isn’t what happens at all. I toss the towel in the sink behind me, and when I face forward again, his hands come down on the sink on either side of me. One is bandaged and I don’t ask about it. One thing a Martina woman learns is, just don’t ask. You wait until they tell you, if they ever tell you. But he doesn’t tell me anything. He just stares at me, his eyes murky with shadows, his lashes lowering. My hand goes to his jaw. “You came here for a reason. Talk to me.”
His gaze lifts and finds mine. “I came here for you. Just you.” He inhales and shoves off the counter. “And that will matter more when I get the filth of this day washed away.” He turns away from me, undressing and walking to the shower, turning it on and stepping inside. Staying here with me, which speaks volumes about his state of mind. He needs me and he’s willing to admit it.
I climb off the sink and walk to the shower too, where Derek is now standing under the spray of water, his back to me. I open the door and he doesn’t turn, but I am not dissuaded. I walk to stand in front of him, and in a blink, his hands are on my waist and I’m in the corner, his big body shielding me from the water.
“I used you to get to your brother.”
Stunned, I blanch, but recover quickly. “I knew that the minute you met him,” I say, concern filling me. “Why are you telling me this now?”
“You knew already?”
“Yes.”
“Then why did you let me?”
“Because my brother might be a bastard, but he’s my brother, and this is my family. If you wanted to be close to my brother, you would have found a way. This way I knew what you were doing and why. I was protecting him.”
“Did you tell your brother?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I’d already decided you were an asshole I cared about by the time I knew.”
“I’m not using you now.”
“I know that too.”
“You matter to me, Teresa. I hate that you matter to me, but you do.”
“I’m not sure how to take that.”
“I’m not sure what do with that.”
I study him a moment, looking for an answer I don’t find but need. “There’s still more, isn’t there?”
“My father gave my brother control of the company while he’s in treatment,” he announces, which I know is devastating news for him. “That man,” he continues, “has used his death to taunt Shane and me into a war over a company that should be mine. Every wrong move I made was really my father’s, but I took the fall for him. I took the fall. I deserve the company. I earned that badge, and I can’t let him or Shane take it. So do I want him to die? No. But that hate I feel for him runs deep.”
“Can you change his mind?”
“I know him,” he says. “It’s done.”
“Why would he do that to you?”
“Shane convinced him your brother will take it from us, when my father all but shoved me at you and your brother.”
“At me,” I say, my throat thickening, that admission more than a little bit cutting.
He cups my face. “I regret using you, but had I not, we wouldn’t be here tonight.”
“What does that even mean?”
“I need you. Is that what you want to hear?”
“For me or for my connections?”
“For you, baby. I need you, or I would not be here tonight, talking to you like this. I don’t—”
“I know. I know you care about me, or I promise you I’d be out of this corner and you’d be hunched over.”
His hands settle on my shoulders. “Then I need to tell you something else.”
“And here it comes. The real reason you’re telling me this tonight.”
“One of the reasons,” he amends. “Shane recorded me telling him you were just a fuck. I was talking out my ass. I was—”
“And you said you fucked me to get to my brother.”
“Yes. And I said it like you were a conquest.”
“You’re such an ass. I don’t even know why I’m here with you.” I try to get past him.
His legs lock around mine. “You said you knew.”
“I wanted to be wrong, but suddenly it feels really shitty, like my judgment in men.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Did I mention that you’re an asshole?”
“An asshole who wants you.”
“You mean, who needs me to get to my brother.”
“You know that’s no longer true.”
I don’t know, and I don’t think I’m going to be rational about it when he’s standing in front of me naked, so I don’t try. “If Adrian wants your company, it’s already his.”
“He couldn’t take it, and even if he tried, it would be insanity to connect a drug cartel to a pharmaceutical company.”
“If he wants it, he has a plan, and maybe it’s not even the pharmaceutical branch he really wants. You don’t understand my brother or my family. I love Adrian, but he’s like my father; he’s brutal and greedy, something my younger brother didn’t learn and now he’s dead.”
“Your father killed your brother.”
“After Adrian set him up.”
His brow dips. “If you believe that, why are you here with him?”
“He’s my brother, and beyond that my answer is as complicated as yours is about your father and it’s not what’s important right now. You better hope your brother doesn’t play that tape for my brother.”
“Shane isn’t that brutal.”
“I hope you’re not underestimating him, and you had better not underestimate Adrian. The only way to get Adrian out of your business is to make him think he makes the choice on his own. You have no idea what Adrian is capable of, but I do. He’d kill for me, but everyone else he kills, and there have been many, he kills for himself.”