“Excuse the fuck out of you, but what is going on here?” Keaton’s voice proved I was correct.
I was about to tell his ass that this was my business as I turned around with a smirk, but my eyes landed on the woman I’d been looking for. “You,” I whispered, losing my voice for a moment. My sweet everything was standing there beside Keaton.
Keaton continued to glare at me, but I barely noticed. My eyes and thoughts were all focused on the woman beside him as she did her best to stay close to his side. I would be fucking jealous, but the man clearly had no interest in her. Not that I could fathom why. Still, I wouldn’t argue with my good luck.
“We have a problem, Hernandez.” Yes, we did. He had what I wanted, and I refused to lose her, but I knew he wasn’t talking about the straight-laced, light-makeup beauty next to him. Wow, this look was just as sexy.
“No problem at all. Ava was just getting her shit, right?”
Ava gasped and tilted her head at me with a frown. “I thought you said I didn’t have to quit?”
“By the look on Keaton’s face, I’m guessing he says otherwise.”
“Damn right, unless you want our contract terminated,” Keaton threatened me. It was fucking amusing that today I hadtwo people give me shit like I wasn’t a dangerous bastard, but at least I understood him.
I raised my hands, revealing my palms. “Not at all. Go ahead. She’s a good assistant, but sorry, not irreplaceable.” My eyes refused to leave hers.
“I wondered how you got out,” I growled.
“Are you ready to go?”
“Yeah, we should go.”
“Are you coming, Elizabeth?”
“Yes, I’m ready to go.” She turned on her heels and walked as fast as she could right out of my building. Fuck, I enjoyed looking at her backside, but it wasn’t over by a long shot.
“That’s okay.” I nodded and smirked. As they left, a plan formed in my mind.
I let her escape because I knew exactly where to find her now. The little brat thought she could easily flee, and somehow that made my dick so painfully hard. That son of a bitch Keaton had my treasure and didn’t even know it this whole time. She’d come to the New Year’s Eve party looking like a mafia wife, unaware that she could run, but there was no hiding from me, my slick little thing.
I called Vasco. “I need everything you got on James Keaton’s assistant.”
“Will do, boss.”
“And I need it now.”
“No problem.” I ended the call and sat back in my chair, thinking about how good it would feel to have my hands wrapped in her hair as I slid her down onto her knees and punished her for being a bad girl.
It didn’t take him more than an hour to call me back. “Do you want me to drop it off, email it, or just read it off?”
“Meet me at the hotel bar.” He met me there within fifteen minutes and slid the file over.
“Have a drink while I read this.” I opened it, and my heart nearly popped out of my chest.
“How come this didn’t show up on the DMV list?”
“She’s got special clearance. Unless we had her name specifically, we can’t get it. I had to pull a favor just to get the image.” It had almost everything about my mystery woman, including some dirty secrets. Elizabeth was a good girl with a bad family.
I knew her father, and I was the reason he was in prison. The bastard had crossed me and after he dug a hole with the casinos in Atlantic City. The fucker robbed one of Duke’s drivers and shot him. I was about to kill him, but my boss demanded I just be used as an eyewitness and send the fucker to prison, where our people would deal with him. I’d been making his life hell every six months. I might have to ease up to keep my woman happy.
Did my little sneaky thing come after me that night knowing who I was? Or did she run when she realized the truth?
Chapter Nine
Elizabeth
“You.” One word, and my heart thudded against my chest. He stood there in a three-piece suit with the jacket unbuttoned, looking devilishly handsome. Had he been flirting with Ava before we arrived? No, she said she hated her boss and he’d been a real asshole lately. He didn’t take his eyes off me, and I hesitated. The fear that the anger was for me sent me running.
