Dirty Ties (40 page)

Suck it up, Kaci. You knew the risks.

I climbed on the Hayabusa and followed the plan.

Twenty minutes later, I parked the bike beside the Gulfstream private jet and removed the helmet, the shriek of the nearby jet engine ringing my ears. Walking toward the stairs of the aircraft, I stared numbly across the vast parking light and searched the inky horizon for Logan.

I’d maintained the speed limit. Shouldn’t he be here already? My insides coiled into a ball of jittery nerves. What if he’d been shot? Killed?

Collin stepped out of the cabin and sprinted down the stairs. His arms came around me, his lips pressing against the top of my head. “He’ll be here.”

I nodded, my boots rooted to the asphalt, my arms clinging to his dependable strength. “How are you doing with all this?”

He kissed my forehead. “I’m ready for it to be over.”

My anxiety, my emotions, the lingering adrenaline, all of it bubbled up in a sudden outpour of words. “I’m sorry for keeping so many things from you. God, I’m so sorry for not warming to Seth.” I blew out a breath, my fingers curling into his jacket. “I was so jealous of your relationship, but I think… I now realize that maybe Seth came along at the right time.”

He stared down at me, his dark brows pulling together.

“You had Seth, and”—I shrugged—“that forced me to find what I was looking for.” I scanned the dark depth of the parking lot, my fingers shaking and my wound-up heart banging for a sign of Logan.

Collin held me against his chest and attempted to distract my thoughts by detailing his plans for our parents, the company, Seth, and the billions he now had in an offshore bank account. His enthusiasm held me upright, his steadfast love kept me from falling apart as the minutes passed. Too many minutes.

I wasn’t sure how long we stood there, but when a pair of headlights emerged in the distance, I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move.

The car sped toward us, some kind of cheap model hatchback, and stopped beside the Gulfstream.

Logan climbed out, and the air whooshed from my lungs. His body was still gloved in black leather, his helmet gone. His hair stuck up, messy and tousled, and his grin erased the painful distance between us.
He made it.

Collin’s arms fell away as Logan strode toward me with purpose and speed. He didn’t limp, didn’t favor any part of his body.

“You didn’t get hit? No injuries? Bullet wounds? Blood—”

“Kaci.” He laughed. “I’m fine.” He picked me up, an arm under my back, the other beneath my knees, and buried his warm mouth in my neck. “But I kind of left a path of destruction. We need to go.”

Then we were moving, up the stairs and into the cabin, with Collin trailing.

I combed my fingers through his hair. “Benny?”

“Safe.” He set me on a long couch in the eight-passenger jet, knelt at my feet, and buckled my seatbelt. “We’ll hear from her in a couple weeks. She has a few things to wrap up.”

I slipped my hands behind his strong neck and gripped his shoulders. “She’s shutting down the underground racing network, isn’t she?”

He cupped my face, his touch as soft as his eyes. “And disposing a limo and sixteen motorcycles, among other things.”

I leaned my forehead against his. “No more Evader. Your fans will be so disappointed.”

Not that I would ever regret stealing him away and keeping him all to myself. He was mine, and that notion was no longer a fantasy. It was as real as my smile, as powerful as the breaths we shared.

“I’ve found a better race,” he murmured against my lips. “Something more important to fight for.” He kissed me, his tongue caressing the seam of my mouth. “A sexier prize to win.”

He shifted closer, his chest resting against mine and his hips settling between my legs. I loved how his body pulled toward me so easily, the same instinctual way I gravitated toward him, as if this was the way it was meant to be. Nothing between us.

I kissed his bottom lip. “What are you fighting for now, Logan Flynt?”

He trailed kisses over my jaw, down my neck, and pressed his lips against the breast of my leather jacket, directly over my heart. “Your happiness.”

All I wanted was him, just like this, his honesty, his fire, his love. “You already fought for my happiness.” I lowered my face to the top of his head, inhaling his masculine scent, his soft hair tickling my nose. “You earned my forgiveness. Everything I have to give is yours.”

He looked up, and the intensity of his smile and the fierceness in his eyes warmed every molecule in my body. “When I wake tomorrow, I’ll fight for it again. And the day after. And the day after that. Every day, Kaci.” He captured my mouth, hard and determined, and pulled back. “Every day, I’ll fight for you.”

His sincerity vibrated off his skin, glowed in his gaze, and powered every breath in his gorgeous body. “But we need to go.” He kissed me again and stood, his attention on the cockpit. “Be right back.”

I looked down at my seatbelt. Evidently, he didn’t want me to move. My heart squeezed. I still needed to say good-bye to—

Collin stepped out of the cockpit, his blue eyes locked on mine, his lips tilted in a lop-sided grin. He sat beside me and embraced me in a tight hug. “We’re not saying good-bye, hooker.”

I hugged him back, nodding against his neck, fighting like hell to hold back my damned tears.

He leaned back and tugged on the braid draped over my chest. “I’ve arranged everything for your arrival. There’s a change of clothes for both of you.” He jerked his head at the bags on the floor by the door. “Benny took care of the passports, citizenship paperwork, and your new identities.”

“Thank you,” I said, my throat closing up.

He reached inside his suit jacket and removed a folded sleeve of papers. Unfolding them and flipping to the last page, he pointed at the signature line at the bottom. “I had this drawn up yesterday.”

Divorce papers.
I stared at his signature with blurry eyes and sensed Logan approaching from the front of the plane.

Collin handed me a pen. “This is the last of their control. We’re free, sweetheart.”

I accepted the pen and signed. No hesitation, despite the torrent of emotions my heart was battling. “I’m leaving you. Alone.”

He slipped the papers back in his jacket and cupped my face. “I have Seth. And you’re not leaving me. You’re leaving
them
.” He pressed a kiss to my lips and stood. “I’ll see you in one month, and that villa better have decent bedding or I’m staying in a hotel.”

I huffed, a smile yanking on my lips. “Love you, you fussy pain-in-the-ass.”

“Love you too, you crazy bitch.” He stared at me for a moment, his smile so full of love and devotion. God, I was going to miss him.

He turned toward Logan and gave him a one-armed hug. “Take care of her.”

Logan nodded, his eyes burning with intensity, his jaw rigidly locked. “With every breath.”

Then Collin was gone and Logan was buckled in beside me. My head fell against his shoulder, my hands reaching for his, and somewhere between zero- and forty-thousand-feet, I passed out.

I woke to a dim cabin, the whisper of air through the vents, and Logan’s lips on my neck. He unzipped my leather jacket, removed my seatbelt, and helped me out of the rest of my clothes.

There was no staff on board. Only us, and the pilot, and ten hours of downtime. He’d already changed into a t-shirt and a pair of exercise pants. His blond hair hung in dark, wet strands around his ears, and the scent of soap breathed from his skin.

“Did you take a shower?”

He kissed my lips. “Yeah, it’s too small for two people, but I’ll help you with yours.” His golden eyes glimmered in the soft illumination of the ceiling lights.

I glanced at the rear of the cabin. “No bedroom on this one.”

He shook his head, his lips twitching. “There’s eight chairs and a couch to try out.”

I stared into his eyes, fell into them like a dream. Only I wasn’t dreaming. We were on a plane. Flying to Italy. Wealthy beyond imagination. No more Trent. No more murder and revenge.

I kissed him, pressing my lips all over his face, his persistently-arched brow, his whiskered jaw, his sinful lips, and leaned back. “It’s over.”

He dipped his head and spoke against my lips. “No, baby. It’s beginning.”

A breeze drifted in through the sitting room window, warm and salty, filling my lungs with a weightless kind of peace. We’d lived in the beach-front villa for nine months, yet every time I took a breath, it was like inhaling the sea for the first time.

Life was different here. I didn’t own a pair of high heels. Never slept or woke in an empty bed. I didn’t work twelve hour days. Hell, we had enough money that neither of us needed to work again.

But we found something we loved. Pro racing in Italy was a big deal. Some of the most successful world superbikers were born and bred here. We didn’t aspire to compete in the Grand Prix and travel the world. We just wanted normalcy and a passion to keep the mind busy. Racing in the beginner and intermediate classes gave us that.

And the really convenient part? Anonymity. We walked through the security gates wearing our helmets, we raced the circuit, declined the interviews, and left without showing our faces. The perfect job for two people who couldn’t reveal their identities.

Identity was important to Logan, so much so he’d spent several months researching his biological mother. He confirmed Ella Flynt was a reporter who vanished a few months after his birth, but he couldn’t find anything that linked her to a sister or a son. After a long and unproductive investigation, he decided to put his past behind him and accepted that his questions surrounding her death and his adoption to Maura had died with her.

I stood from the wicker couch and searched for the remote control as the yapping voices of news commentators buzzed from the TV. I needed to follow Logan’s lead and put my past behind me, as well. It seemed like all these damned newscasts talked about was Trenchant’s corrupt executives and the missing persons, Trent Anderson and Kaci Baskel.

God, how the media loved this story, constantly debating the intricacies of the scandal and tagging the company leaders as
wicked
and
evil
. The speculation about what happened to Trent and me was rampant and varying, but most believed we were killed off by one of Trent’s criminal partners.

I found the remote under a throw pillow, powered off the TV, and stared at the blank screen.

The trial against Nicola Anderson, and Dalton and Kathleen Baskel began two months after Logan and I landed safely in a rural town in Southern Italy. The jury reached its verdict four months after the opening arguments.

Collin hadn’t messed around, and the pressure from his legal team led to confessions by our parents and seven others within the company. Sentencing would begin next month. Each faced a minimum of life in prison.

Since arriving in Italy, I’d floundered through a flurry of conflicted feelings about how everything played out, but I had no regrets. My parents were alive, locked away, no longer hurting people. I couldn’t visit them, not as a missing person. But I didn’t want to. They were my starting line. Collin, Benny, and Logan were my future.

Collin was finalizing negotiations to sell Trenchant Media to its liberal,
ethical
competitor, Newswide Corp. The conditions of his sell-off was to keep his job on
The Anderson Angle
and to publicly announce his sexual orientation. I was so fucking happy for him.

I tossed the remote on the couch and strolled through the open space of the villa, my bare feet slapping on the tiles. Wide stucco archways separated the rooms, the walls and furniture in various shades of yellow and brown. Two-thousand-square-feet of cozy, and it was ours.

And we finally had the house to ourselves again. Collin, Seth, and Benny came and went frequently. Benny left two days ago after a month-long visit. She was headed to Eastern Europe in her quest to devour every corner of the world.

And now I was on a quest to devour my corner of the world and the man who occupied it. I missed him. Pathetic really, since he’d only been holed up for half a day, and that hole was a garage twenty feet from the back door.

I slipped outside, my toes sifting through the warm sand, the sun a blinding ball of fire above the endless aqua of the Tyrrhenian Sea. The nearest neighbor was a five minute walk along the beach that might as well have been five days. We never saw them or anyone on this remote stretch of golden sand. We were learning the language, but Logan preferred the privacy. His protectiveness of me required it.

I shielded my eyes with one hand and quickened my gait to the garage. The doors stood open, and the whir of a power tool droned from within. Inside, I found him bent over the seat of his new BMW S1000RR, the muscles in his back flexing with the exertion of the drill in his hands.

The whirring silenced, and he straightened, turning to face me. The drill hung from his hand, his other lifting to wipe the sweat from his brow. His workout shorts hung low on his narrow hips, his blond hair flopping in random directions of chaos. And Jesus, the cuts and ridges of his bare chest made my fingers tingle.