“Oisín.” I glared at him.
“Are you going to take him to our special sex club?”
“Oisín.” I said his name roughly, and he laughed, dancing on his toes. He enjoyed frustrating me too much.
“Yeah, my money says it was them. If the Giordanos want to mess with the Five Families, they don’t need cops looking their way while they’re trying to make power moves. They don’t want someprofessorpointing the finger at them.” He whistled. “I’m impressed one man was able to create a clusterfuck of this magnitude.”
I sighed. This was another reason I needed Vail to see reason. He’d gone beyond New York City now, creating even more enemies for himself.
“I might have also heard about a hit put out on your little piece of ass, too,” he said in a singsong tone.
I shot forward and grabbed his shoulders, my fingers digging into his stupid suspenders. “What hit?”
Oisín’s eyes widened and the shock had him speaking quickly. “The Giordanos don’t want him talking, probably because they’ve already got other players in the area besides your dead man, so they put out a contract to take your sweetie pie down. Half a mil. That’s not bad. It’s a good day’s work. Easy pay.”
“Fuck!” I shoved him back and reached for my phone in my pocket. Last I knew, Rowen had promised to take Vail to one of the local beaches. That was an open space, making them an easy target.
I slammed my thumb on Rowen’s name and placed the phone to my ear, waiting. The phone rang for too long, and by the time Rowen answered I was ready to explode.
“Aye?”
“Get him out of there,” I snarled. “There’s a hit on Vail.”
16
VAIL
Fiddlingwith the laces that held together the fly on my borrowed swimming shorts, I closed my eyes and stepped forward until the cool water lapped over my toes. The sand was soft as it shifted under my feet, and I leaned toward the warm breeze blowing in from the ocean. Salt stung my nose. Overhead, seagulls cried and I snapped my eyes open to stare up at them. Ishouldbe somewhere working on my book. Dr. Atmeyer had sent me a lengthy email last night. Apparently he’d negotiated more time for the book with my publisher, but I had to send in ten pages a week from here on out to make sure I stayed on track. It was a terrible way to go about writing, but I’d agreed.
I had no choice if I wanted to keep the contract.
The sun was so nice, though. I tipped my chin up and the warmth bathed my face. Nearby, children laughed and screeched as they splashed in the water. My skin was glittery and smelled like coconuts and sunscreen, thanks to a lotion Rowen had insisted on smearing on me. He’d even gotten my nose. Without him, I probably would have ended up burned because I’d totally forgotten about it.
Smiling, I watched the waves roll in the distance. Yachts were farther out, big ones owned by rich people having fun I’d probably never know about. Smaller boats were closer, and on them I could see coolers that likely held beer. Music blared. One boat was setting off fireworks and a small NYPD patrol boat crept closer to them.
Laughing, I pointed. “Rowen, they’re about to get it.”
He came up beside me and snorted. The red swimming trunks that clung to his thighs high up barely covered anything on him compared to the long ones he’d let me use. Had he given me the board shorts so no one would stare at me the way I wanted to stare at him right now? More fireworks went off—blue, pink, and green stars that were brilliant even in the sunshine—and flashing red lights came to life on the roof of the NYPD boat. I laughed as they whooped a siren I didn’t expect them to have on board. There were “boos” loud enough from the boat with the fireworks that we could hear them from shore.
“Aye, they’re likely three sheets to the wind. That’s going to be a bad hangover.” Rowen hooked his arm around my shoulders and gave me a friendly shake. “Ye enjoying yerself, me angel?”
I nodded. “Yeah. It’s been forever since I went to the beach. I don’t know why. It’s not like it’s that far away. I never had anyone to go with.” I leaned my weight against him, and he pressed a smacking kiss on my cheek, followed by a “blah, sunscreen” that had me chuckling.
Rowen jumped and pulled his phone out of his pocket, which made me think he hadn’t ever planned on swimming. I’d left all my stuff at our towels. He scowled at his phone and paced away muttering “aye?” at someone on the other end. I watched the police board the boat out on the water, and more fireworks went off with shouting and clapping going on. One person jumped overboard to swim toward shore amid shouts, and I shook my head because that was a dangerous move near the boats.
Rowen hurried back over to me with wide eyes, his grayish-blue irises sparkling in the sunlight. But his mouth twisted and his shoulders tensed. I could already tell I wasn’t going to like what he had to say.
He sighed and clutched at my shoulder. “We gotta go.”
“No, we’re having fun, please.” I turned my head enough to kiss his knuckles where he gripped me, then hooked his waist and dragged him closer. “If it’s work, can’t it wait a while longer?” I stared out at the water, and he scowled with a sigh, but he glanced all around us, eying up the beach. He seemed like he was looking for someone.
“There’s a lot of people about.”
“It’s not that crowded,” I mumbled. “We’ve barely been here forty minutes.” I hated to think I was pouting, but I kind of was, and I amped it up in the hope he wouldn’t make us haul all of our stuff back to the car in the heat.
He turned and scanned the beach with his hand over his eyes, then sighed. “Feck it, ye’re right. We’ve been here this long.”
“You mean we’ve hardly been here at all. Come in the water with me.”
