Time to leave.“Nothing.” I pull my sunglasses back down. “Bad day.”
“The Les I know doesn’t let bad days get to her.”
“The Les youknew,” I emphasize because he doesn’t know me anymore, “is gone. You don’t know me, Zane.”
“I know you pretty good.” He lets his eyes slide over me again. “Damn good.”
“Was that before or after you betrayed me? Don’t pretend we had anything more than what it was.”
“If you want to pretend all we had was sex,” he shrugs, “that’s on you. I know better.”
“Keep lying to yourself. Whatever helps you sleep at night.” I jerk my door back open and slide into the car, getting the hell out of there.
The truth is, what we hadwasmore than sex, even though we broke it off several times within that year. Mostly because I wasn’t ready, too young to give him what he wanted, what he needed. When I found out that he was becoming a cop, I was crushed. That same day, I had decided that I was going to give in and tell my dad about us like he had been wanting me to do, fully committing myself to Zane.
Then I realized he was a lying piece of shit.
Chapter 27
Zane
Istand there and watch the taillights of Alessa’s black Ferrari disappear before I get back in the car with a fuming Jay. I knew dismissing him would piss him off, but I can’t let him stand there and talk to Les like that. He’s been my partner ever since I became a detective two years ago, and he’s the closest thing I have to a friend, as sad as that is.
I fire the car up without saying a word. “You still bend over backward for that bitch, and she doesn’t even give you a second glance.”
Now is when I thoroughly regret getting drunk and spilling the whole tale of Les and me. The truth is, I had no damn business pursuing her at eighteen when I was twenty-eight fucking years old, but damn, I couldn’t help myself. She was drop-dead gorgeous at eighteen and just kept getting better with age.
“Call her a bitch again, and I’ll put a fucking bullet through your brain,” I warn, jerking the car into drive and tearing out of the parking lot.
He scoffs. “Why are you still hung up on her? She’s a criminal; you’rea detective investigating her.”
I grimace at that. It’s true my department is investigating Les and her merry band of men, among others.We have been for as long as I can remember but they’ve never gotten enough to bring themdown. What Jay doesn’t know is all I do is feed them little information to keep suspicions off me and the heat off her. I also couldn’t tell Les any of that because she would shoot me on principle.
“I’m not hung up on her,” I argue.
He pulls the folder from my lap, waving it in the air. “What’s this then?”
“That’s a damn good tip, no matter who it came from.”
I know Les has a soft spot for kids, mostly because she can’t have any, so it didn’t surprise me when she handed me the folder. I found out the hard way about her being unable to have kids. I spilled my heart to her one night and told her I wanted her to tell her dad so we could quit hiding, maybe get married, and have kids.
She shut down immediately, and it took herweeksto tell me Frankie Perez’s men fucked her up so bad she had to have all her reproductive organs removed, rendering her infertile. That was also the downfall of our relationship. We would break up and get back together repeatedly until the fateful night when she found out I was in the police academy. I didn’t care that she couldn’t have kids; I just cared that it hurt her so bad.
She wouldn’t listen to me when I told her I was doing it for us, so I could get her away from all the danger she was always in. She never talked to me again after that night. The first time I spoke to her in the years after was when she took over for her dad. She had an altercation at one of the clubs, and I was the beat cop that showed up to investigate. I waited late in life to pursue law enforcement because I didn’t want to disappoint my dad, but he died thinking I hated him for still following Luca Poletti.
Jay sighs, and I know he looked over the information in that folder. “How do we play this?”
I do work for Les most of the time when she can’t put herself in the middle, but she never hands me anything illegal. I think it’s her way of making sure I don’t become a dirty cop, or I’m just telling myself that. I’m already a dirty cop for not turning over what I know, stuff that could put her and her crew in prison for life.
“We?” I ask. He seemed less inclined to help in front of her.
“You going to sideline me?” he smirks.
“No,” I sigh, “I have an informant down there. I can convince him to sign that he gave the tip.”
I take the exit to head downtown toward the address of the foster home. I park two buildings down, shoving the car in park, just watching the building. Who the hell would put kids in danger like that? I’ll never understand why people become foster parents if they don’t give a shit about the kids besides the check they bring in. My dad may have raised me while working for one of the most lethal crime bosses in the world, but he loved me unconditionally and protected me the same way.
“So, what’s the deal with you and her?”
