A Captive Situation (Kings of New York)

I needed to get away from him, just for a short reprieve, but as soon as the bathroom door closed, I lost it.

Tears slipped out, but those tears were from the last week. For the love of Aunt Clara, I’d earned a good cry session.

But it wasn’t just the tears. It was more.

I couldn’t. I just couldn’t.

All those years with Beck. College. My twenties. Most of my thirties. It’d never been like that with Beck. Ever.

How stupid had I been?

My stomach was rioting. Pressing a hand against it, I slid down the wall until I was on the floor, and that’s when the first laugh came out.

Oh. My. God.

I wanted to call a friend and cry and laugh it out with her. That would’ve been Manda, but he took her.

I’d not been processing the loss of that friendship, but right now, in the bathroom, after having fucking explosive sex—she was supposed to be here.

Another laugh gurgled up, and then I couldn’t stop.

Jesus fucking Christ. Fucking Manda.

She was who I should’ve called, but I was also realizing that friendship had been stale too. For too long. We were friends because of why? Out of obligation? Habit? I couldn’t remember the last time I needed to call her and only she could say something to make me feel better. I went to my mom. Clara and Bess. I went to them. They were my best friends. Not Manda.

Shit. When had that stopped?

A whole new set of layers was falling from my view. I was seeing the world differently, day by day.

I missed Manda, but also . . . I didn’t at the same time.

She never liked martini nights either. She and Beck were perfect for each other. Holy shit.

How had I been so clueless about everything?

Why did I stay with him? Why, why, why?

Had I been brainwashed? Was that it? Or just . . . Had I just never been shown differently? I didn’t know what made my heart soar. Now I only wanted to do things that made my heart soar, and fucking Jake was one of those things. Christ. He made everything in me soar. I was on a high right now. Fevered.

My most exciting date with Beck was glow-in-the-dark mini golf, and he wanted to go because he had a fetish about getting a blow job behind the Eiffel Tower.

I was trying not to go and fuck Jake right now because I needed to stay mad at him, chew his ass because he had me drugged to take me away from my family.

There was no comparison. I was fully fucking awake. Life—I wanted it badly. I wanted everything about it.

More laughter poured out.

My sides were hurting, and I gasped, holding on to them, but that made me laugh even harder. I wasn’t a good laugher. I couldn’t breathe, and somehow that made me cough, and then that could lead me to throwing up. Crying was similar, except if I cried too hard, I’d get clogged up and then I couldn’t breathe either. My body didn’t want me swinging either way too much.

“Sawyer?” Jake was on the other side of the door. “Are you crying?”

God. Just that, that question. Beck would’ve been annoyed if he needed to take time out to come and check on me.

Christ. He never had.

That stunned me, because he really never checked on me.

How was I just realizing that?

My family loved me. They rallied around me. It wasn’t that I grew up thinking I wasn’t worthy of love, but I’d stayed. That’s what I grieved the most. That I stayed.

That I accepted something less for myself than I should’ve.

Never again. I was never settling again. I would only accept what made my heart race.

I couldn’t answer Jake. I couldn’t move either. I was wheezing so bad that my nose was starting to get clogged up.

The doorknob started to turn, but stopped. I’d locked it without thinking.

“Babe. Let me in.”

I didn’t move except to lie down, my arms wrapped tight around my sides.

All those years wasted.

Thud!

He pounded on the door. “Sawyer.” His voice went low in a warning. “If you don’t open this door, I will break it down.”

Another peal of laughter streamed out of me.

Bang!

The door cracked off the hinges in the top corner.

I jumped at the violence. If that fell, I’d need to scoot back past the counter so it wouldn’t fall on me, but before it could fall any farther, Jake reached around and hauled it up with another strong heave. It came completely off. He pulled it toward him, letting it fall in the bedroom. Taking its place in the doorway, his hands went to his side, fisting. There was a wildness in his eyes.

Then, all the hard lines on him relaxed. His eyes closed for a second. “You’re laughing.”

“I’m sorry—” I was trying to control myself, but a few hiccups came next.

He looked adorable now that he knew I was fine. His dark hair was tousled a bit on the top. He’d not shaven in a couple days, so he had a good scruff on his face, giving him an even edgier appeal which contrasted almost beautifully against the soft lines around his eyes and mouth. Looking all sleepy again, with that nicely muscled and smooth chest, and his tats. His one arm was a total sleeve of intricate lines.

He reached over to idly scratch at his chest.

It gave me a better view of the tat that took up his entire right side. The set of justice scales had a sword that ran down the middle of the tattoo and his side. A skull was at the top with blood dripping down from the handle. There were other details on it, words and more, but he was moving again.

He padded over to me barefoot. Bending down, his arms plucked me up from the floor. We went back to his bed, where he laid me down and climbed in behind me. He grabbed me again, turning and situating me so I was on his lap, half resting with my head against his chest.

His hand smoothed down my hair and he bent down, his lips grazing over my shoulder.

A warm tingle seared through me.

He asked, his lips grazing over my skin, “What were you laughing about?”

His arms shifted, pulling me closer against him, and he moved up, nuzzling my hair. All of that was giving me the flutters.

“About this actually.” A sigh left me as I began tracing his tattoo on his arm.

“My tat?”

“No.” I hid a grin, lifting my chin to meet his gaze. “This, whatever this is between you and me. What we just did . . .” How could I explain to him that one time with him blew an almost two-decade relationship out of the water? I needed to stop comparing, but I was on this whole awakening journey at the same time. I was healing while I was with him.

Fuck me. I never saw that coming when I hoped Jake would belt out show tunes on the subway.

He tensed underneath me.

“I was with Beck since college—”

A growl vibrated from his chest. “Not enjoying hearing his name.”

My heart leaped, and I looked again at him.

His eyes were fixed on me in a very possessive way.

More flutters skipped through me, making my body vibrate underneath my skin. I said, slowly, “I was with my ex”—his eyes flashed in approval and I kept on, a small smile coming to my face—“for so long and now I’m feeling all sorts of stupidity for being with him. I wasn’t living.”

I wanted to live.

I wanted to live so bad.

“You want to live now?” His eyes grew soft. He brushed some hair back from my forehead, being so tender about it. “Fucking me made you think of your ex? I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

I shook my head slightly, giving him another small grin. “No. It’s like living inside a closet, thinking a flashlight hanging from the ceiling was sunshine. Then you came along. You opened the door. You walked me outside and you showed me the real sun. You gave me real sunshine. It’s like that.” I winced. “Don’t get a big head.”

He began to grin. “So you’re saying that I am like the sun to you—”

I growled before getting serious again.

I wanted to tell him the rest, because I needed to face it. This link with him was the reason we were in this mess. It’d been there from the beginning.

“He didn’t leave me because he’d been cheating on me. He left me because she was pregnant.”

He went still, still holding me.

My head rested against his chest. “The sex with you woke me up. A month earlier, I’d be calling Manda and dishing out the details. She’d rush over. We’d have wine and gossip all about it. I would do that because that’s what I thought I was supposed to do, but I wouldn’t have liked it. It would’ve felt empty to me. It did feel empty with me. Me and her. For so long. She’d tell me what’s going on with her life and though we wouldn’t be solving world peace, we’d be feeling on top of the world. Or that’s what I would feel that we should’ve been feeling. That’s what a good friend does for you. I don’t have that.” This was the hard truth to admit. “I don’t think I ever did.”

His hand went to my thigh, giving it a soft squeeze. “I’m sorry about that.”

“The last week’s put a lot of things into perspective. I’m realizing how empty my life was regarding them. The real thing I gotta grieve is the time I gave them. Both of them. They didn’t deserve it. And that . . . I think that’ll take some time. That is, if we get out of this whole thing alive.”

He tensed all over again underneath me. His hand slid to the inside of my thigh before he turned me around. I went with him until I was straddling him.

Back to business.

His eyes were shadowed, his face hard.

My chin rose, and I told him, “You fucked up.”

His eyes narrowed. “I—”

“You shouldn’t have taken me how you did. You drugged me.”

He let out a ragged breath, some of the fight leaving him. “That was Ashton.”

I leaned closer to him, seething. “I don’t care who it was. I’m yours. That means it happened on your watch.”

His eyes started glittering at me, a new intensity sweeping in there and taking hold.

“I’m going to get you back.”

He tensed all over again.

I smirked down at him, resting my hands on his chest. His very strong and cement-like chest that was suddenly so still under my touch. “Payback is going to come. It won’t be when you expect it, but it will come. Promise you. But until then”—I smiled, but my own breath hitched at seeing that intense look from him—“I told them a story about a family feud that was going on. My family. They bought it.”

“They didn’t buy it.”

“Yes, they did.”

“Your Aunt Clara tried calling 911.”

I started to argue until his words registered. “Wait. What?”noveldrama

“I had a cell jammer turned on so no calls could go through, but it was logged.”

“Aren’t you full of surprises, with your spy toys.”

He snorted, his hands returning to my thighs, starting to mold over them. His eyes lidded, but never moved away from mine. “I worked in organized crime. We were current on a lot of fancy tech. Most departments aren’t. Also, so you know, your cousin’s husband—his family’s connected.”

I frowned. “I don’t know what that means.”

“They’re loaded in a way that my family is also loaded.”

“Oliver’s family is Mafia?”

“They’re connected. They have Mafia ties. He recognized the others with me.”

I sat even farther back, regarding him. “What?” Replaying the conversation that happened in the study when we’d been eavesdropping on who Jake’s friends were, I didn’t remember any hint at that. “Are you sure?”

“He tried calling his father right away. That call was also logged.”

Some dread trickled in. “What did your friends do after we left?”

“They stayed back to finish cleaning up, and after, they laid out a blunt version of what could happen to your family. Including Oliver.”

I swallowed, hard. “What do you mean by that?” I’d gone to the lengths of concocting a whole story. “I wished they would’ve told me to save my breath.”

“They were told the truth.”

Ice speared me. “What? Ho-how did they . . . ? Everything?”

“Everything.” His mouth went flat. “They’re too far in not to know what is going on. There were three shooters. I killed three men in front of them. They needed to be told the ramifications of what would happen if they tried to contact any more family or the police.”

I didn’t want to hear how they took it.

Jake ran a hand down the side of my face, his whole face softening at whatever he saw from me. He told me, “Your family did not react very well.”

My heart sank. There it was. “What exactly was said in the threat to my aunts? You don’t know them. If they think I’m in danger, no one is going to stop them. They’ll call in everyone in our family. I mean it. I’ve got a cousin in Alaska from my dad’s side. They’ll call him in. He’s stationed there with the coast guard. I wouldn’t be surprised if my mom’s not already on a plane heading here because I was supposed to call her today, and that didn’t happen.” I shuddered at the thought of more of my family getting involved.

“She’s not.”

“You don’t know that.” I grabbed his pants in frustration, balling the waistline up. “You don’t know my family. You can’t threaten them to be quiet. They aren’t made that way. My uncle says it’s because we have some Irish in us, but we did a DNA thing and we don’t have any Irish in us. Whatever our ethnicity, one of them down the line was a rebel. Threats don’t quiet us. They just make us go a different route. They’ll go to the police and if the police won’t work, they’ll go to the press. If that doesn’t work, they’ll go to a rival Mafia family. Are you getting my drift here? I had a story concocted.”

“Three men broke into your cousin’s brownstone and tried to kill you. I left three bodies behind. They weren’t going to buy any story other than the truth.”

“They bought it—”

His hands rested over mine. “Your aunt didn’t try to call the cops one time. She tried fourteen times, and eight of those were when you were in the room with her. You weren’t paying attention.”

“What?” I’d been in the room?

“And as for the rest, it’s been handled.”

“You don’t understand—”

“I do. They’re handled. Everything’s handled. This is not the first time for Walden and West.”

“Who?”

He cursed under his breath. “The two guys with me. They took care of it. And before you can ask, your aunt was instructed to have a specific phone call with your mother. She was told you were fine, that everything was fine, but you needed some time to get a phone. Your aunts are going to play tourist and when you could get away to have a private call, you would.”

I shook my head. “That won’t work.”

“It already did.” He tugged on my hands to jerk me against him. “Your aunts are safe. They’re in a secure place, but they are being watched over by some of Ashton’s men.”

More ice lined my insides. Did he realize how crazy this sounded? “They’re being held captive by the Mafia? Is kidnapping the answer for everything in this world? Have you lost your mind?”

His mouth flattened. “They’re going to be entertained the entire time. They’re safe. They’ll be fine. It’ll be like they’re staying with a family friend, except with guards around them for their protection. Your aunts are fine. By the time this is all done and you show up, they’ll have barely noticed you were missing.”

What family did he come from? “You are severely so wrong, and everything is going to blow up in our faces.”

“It doesn’t change anything because while they’re being guarded, we got tonight to do something.”

“What are you talking about?”

“We have to go to a meet. This person will open a communication channel to the person behind our hit.”

“Why didn’t you lead with that this whole time?” I scrambled off him, my heart racing as I looked around for my clothes.

That’s when I noticed where we were.

There were feminine touches all over. Candles. Warm and pastel-colored blankets tossed over a couch, a chair, all to look trendy. Pink. There was a lot of pink. Doilies on the wall.

“Jake.”

“Hmm?”

“Where are we—” I asked right as I saw a picture frame on the dresser in the corner. Moving toward it, hot burning jealousy rolled through me. Jake was in the picture with his arm around a woman, whose head was resting on his shoulder. Both were smiling wide for the camera. It’d been taken in a bar, and Jake’s other hand was holding up a beer.

She was gorgeous. Sleek black hair. Dark brown eyes. Light brown skin. Her mouth was perfect, stretched into a serene smile.

And I remembered her from the police station.

I rounded on him. “Are you serious? You brought us to your girlfriend’s place?”