One More Night with You (10 page)

Suddenly, Joey left the room. When she came back she was holding a key. “The spare from your badass locksmith.”

“Asking me to stay?”

“It's the practical way to do this. People might wonder why my boyfriend's shacking up in some undisclosed hotel room. There's a guest room and a hall bath. The master bedroom's my sanctuary...but since some creeper did a walk-through today, that's a moot point.”

“I'm not here to invade your privacy. If I can stay out of your way, I will.”

“Fair enough.”

“How do you suggest I earn my keep?”

She grinned impishly. “How about using your handyman skills to build me a shoe museum?”

“A what?”

“Shoe closet. A sanctuary for my footwear. I have a lot.”

“Kind of odd request, but if you want it—”

“No, forget it. I was being silly.”

“I'm going to do it. For real.”

Releasing his gun and emptying his pocket, he set everything on the counter. Phone, untraceable phone, wallet, money clip, cigarettes, key ring—

“Whoa, whoa and whoa. I'm not a hard-ass by any means, but
that's
a no-no in my home.” Joey was pointing to the cigarettes. “You never smoked.”

“What baking does for you, smoking does for me—fills the downtime and eases the stress.”

“Are we at an impasse? Suppose I want to kiss you? I don't want to taste cigarettes.”

“You thinking about kissing me?”

“Um, no.” Joey's rosy cheeks contradicted her words. “Eventually, we
will
kiss again. If we're going forward with this boyfriend-girlfriend ruse, it ought to look authentic.”

Zaf beckoned her to him, turning away from the counter to give her room to get close. Cupping her head, he brought her face to his and kissed her.

The taste of jelly beans flooded his tongue and he smiled against her mouth. “So how was that?”

“Really good. It's been a while since anyone's kissed me the way you do.”

“What about that cop of yours?”

“He's an exceptional kisser and sometimes I miss that about him. But the relationship soured.”

“What'd he do?”

“Fell in love with me.”

Zaf held himself still, searching her eyes. “Then what did
you
do?”

“Unlike you, Zaf,” she said, “I can't tell someone I love them if I don't mean it. It was nice to have somebody, but Parker was ready to move forward and apparently, in some ways I'm stuck where you left me five years ago.”

He took his hand from her hair, lightly gripped the front of her jacket and urged her closer.

I lied
, he almost whispered.
I love you and am paying hell for it.

Slowly, he bent toward her until his head rested against her chest and he could feel her fingers weaving through his hair. “If I had it in me to love anybody, it'd be you, Josephine.”

“No consolation prize necessary.”

“I'm sorry.”

“Don't mention it.” She disentangled herself. “I need to step away from this for a bit, okay? I promised Charlotte a gabfest, so I'm going to see if she's free for a night out.”

“I'm going with you.”

“Girls' night means no men allowed. I need normalcy, Zaf, for a little while.”

“You're skipping out on me knowing your next-door neighbor's in heat?”

“Aggie's not in heat.”

“She eye-fucked me.”

“She eye-fucks everyone. Don't be so sensitive.” She frowned a little. “Are you thinking about getting some of my neighbor's sugar?”

“No, I'm not. Aggie's a beautiful woman. The thing is, you're also a beautiful woman and we have this deal going. I intend to hold up my end of it.”

“Letting you be the man to keep me company through the lonely nights... That's for show, though.”

“It doesn't all have to be.” He would go out tonight, but not for a shallow hookup. Since he didn't intend to give up the room he'd been renting for the past few months, he would collect some items to keep on site in her house.

Living with Joey, loving her, yet not being with her would be a challenge and retribution.

“Go out with your friend, clear your head.”
Then come back to me.

Zaf shut the thought down. He watched her go then hunkered down to strategize an in-person visit with Gian DiGorgio. Trespassing on Joey's property was a personal attack, and Zaf would confront that bastard personally. As he was mapping out a contacts web, she popped into the doorway.

“Meeting Lottie on the Strip,” she said, but he hardly heard her.

The strapless silk dress was body paint with a side zip, and her hair had been teased into some style that could probably best be called after-sex. The leather walking stick and superskinny high heels gave her an edgy, hard rock “look, don't touch” vibe.

“Christ, Joey...”

“What's the matter?” she asked softly. “You look as if you don't want to let me go.”

But he had to. Archangel was his destiny, who he was meant to be, and she didn't deserve the danger that came with him. “Call me if you need me.”

“Oh. Then...” She hesitated, and he wished she wouldn't give him ample time to lose his wits, walk over and kiss the hell out of her. “Good night.”

When she left, stress threatened to fetter him. A few days ago he wouldn't have thought twice about reaching for a cigarette. But he wanted the taste of her kiss.

Settling for a substitute, he unrolled her half-empty packet of jelly beans. Tomorrow he'd replace them. All he had to do was get through tonight.

* * *

“As your maid of honor,” Joey proclaimed, shot glass in hand as the Hyde Bellagio ruckus pulsed in her ears, “my first order of rabble-rousing is to host a wicked bridal shower that will scandalize Tem.”

Across their fountain-view table, Charlotte threw her head back and laughed. The sequins on her tank top shimmered but were hilariously lackluster compared to the vibrant brilliance of the diamond decorating her hand. The woman was wearing 1.5 million dollars of sparkling fire on her finger. “That party's going to get me disowned.”

“Only if done right.”

“I'm glad you decided to be in the wedding,” her friend said after swallowing down the single-malt whiskey. She signaled for another, which their VIP host delivered promptly in a fresh glass with a linen napkin. “Are you having a second?”

“This
is
my second,” Joey said, giggling. Charlotte was on her fourth and had what Joey estimated to be forty grand worth of whiskey in her system. From über-pricey liquor to complimentary bottle service for their table, they were enjoying the Blue experience. Charlotte's parents weren't only elite, they were supremely generous tippers. As such, the city's most glamorous venues adored them. “It'll have to be my last of the night. I drove here, in your father's novelty car.”

“The Ferrari. Martha might feel slighted about that. She wanted to borrow it when he first acquired it, and his answer was a resounding Marshall Blue no.”

“Maybe he didn't want his baby girl to be spoiled.”

Charlotte and Joey both fell silent then laughed at the irony in that. Charlotte's much younger sister had not even a year ago been splashed across tabloids for her hard-partying exploits. Something remarkable had happened to Martha, though. She'd fallen in love. Now she was blazing up the corporate ladder within the Slayers' franchise, adopting a teenager, modeling an adorable baby bump, and—as of two weeks ago in an intimate beach ceremony—married to Joaquin Ryder, a champion prizefighter.

While Charlotte had only tossed around the idea of eloping, Martha and her man had gotten it done.

It was amazing to reflect on how drastically each of the Blue sisters' lives had blossomed this past year. The love bug had kissed them all, and Joey, who was as close as family but still on the outside, watched it unfold. While they could open their hearts to men who loved them, she couldn't take the risk. Clearly, she was immune to the love bug.

Oh, and the man she
did
love once hadn't loved her at all. It was the story of her life and she didn't appreciate it all that much.

“Sure you don't want more whiskey?” Charlotte checked. “You're staring into your empty glass. My driver won't mind dropping you at your place and we'll have the Ferrari sent over.”

A first-class Hummer limo drop-off would be a tad much. Her neighborhood had already been subjected to too many unusual occurrences today.

“No, thanks, though it'd be lovely. Save it for next girls' night.”

“All right. And since this
is
girls' night and our opportunity to catch up on each other's lives—” Charlotte set down her glass and suddenly there was no trace of her liquor buzz “—please tell me what's going on. I'm worried.”

“What's going on, hmm? A lot, actually.” A shift of her eyebrows and Charlotte took the hint to send off the host and server lingering nearby. “Gian DiGorgio, or one of his people, was in my house—uninvited, obviously—while I was at Desert Luck this morning.”

“Gian DiGorgio,” she repeated as the name and the meaning behind it registered. “He broke into your house? Wh-what...”

“I took too close of a look at him last summer. It was my duty to report what I found. The FBI, IRS, the Nevada Gaming Commission—they had to be made aware. I'll never regret that I did the right thing.”

“You started digging because you were concerned about who I was getting mixed up with. Nate and I, our relationship, set this in motion?”

“None of this is your fault. I'm glad it was discovered. DiGorgio and Nate's dad were
fixing football games
, for crying out loud. Ordering bounties, paying off players, the illegal gambling itself? Come on, that's serious.”

“Gian should be in prison. Nate and his brother will never get past what he's done. And to think he's a free man after all of that?”

“He's a free man because he has more money and influence than you or even his godsons realize.”

“So you do the right thing, act with integrity, and you're saddled with the fallout?”

“It happens, Lottie. I've seen this in my world. It's not pleasant, but the screwed-up reality is money defies everything.”

“This is insane.”

“Agreed. I assume I can kiss goodbye the hope of being invited to the Titanium Club in his casino,” she quipped, because if she didn't joke she'd break apart.

“Joey, he's a sociopathic bastard and he won't get away with scaring you. Let me call my folks—”

“Put it down,” Joey interrupted when Charlotte went for her phone. “Don't involve Marshall and Tem. This is the exact brand of drama they want to dodge.”

“But you need someone to protect you.”

“I have someone.” Zaf didn't love her—
had never
loved her—but he was making real efforts to ensure her safety. She was adult enough to accept their circumstances for what they were. “The blind date from the library. He's also my wedding date, FYI.”

“Is this one of your sarcastic jokes?”

“No.”

“In the gallery you said he's the guy who shot you, then you said, ‘Oh, it's complicated' and shooed me out of there. Now he's your date to my wedding?”

“And he's living with me. And I'm crazy attracted to him.”

“And you
must
be joking. This cannot be an actual, serious conversation.”

Joey sighed, but not out of frustration. Charlotte and Aggie and every other friend who'd crept into Joey's life after she'd moved to Las Vegas to begin again as a civilian—they had innocence about them that she envied. They didn't have an intimate relationship with society's underbelly, didn't know what it was to use deception, manipulation and sometimes violence as tools to seek a greater good.

She didn't speak about the horrors she saw or the devastation she experienced. It was why Charlotte—her closest friend—didn't know Joey had loved Zafir Ahmadi before he'd unintentionally shot her in an attempt to rescue her.

“Zaf was in black ops,” Joey began carefully. “He and I hooked up during a case in Mexico seven years ago. We were hot and heavy for two years. I loved him. I began and ended with the man.”

“He
shot
you, Joey.”

“This is difficult to talk about, okay, Lottie? I need you to listen. Please.” Charlotte looked ready to protest, but nodded and Joey continued. “Our unit was working a narcotics bust in Arizona five years ago. We were in a parking garage and it was so friggin' hot, so hard to breathe. Something felt off the entire time, and then it came out that Zaf had a deal going with the suspects. In exchange for some information of personal interest to him, he'd facilitate their drug deal and help them make a smooth escape. To know that the man I loved had turned dirty? It was gut-wrenching.”

Charlotte sat, not blinking, her fist pressed to her heart, her head shaking slowly.

“It was a cover, though. I hadn't been made aware and I panicked. Someone grabbed me, was going to kill me. Zaf was trying to free me, but I didn't trust him. I couldn't trust him.

“He signaled to me that he'd fire his weapon, but when he was on the trigger I started kicking...and I was hit. The bullet went in through my abdomen, did some unpleasant things to my hip, and I've been angry for a long time.”

“You thought he did it deliberately?”

“At first,” she admitted. “It seemed implausible that it was a close-range mistake. He's a phenomenal sharpshooter. And he's a brainiac, though not as bookish as your hot Joe College.”

Charlotte's smile was sad. “Joey, this is heartbreaking.”

“It's not meant to be. It's only the truth. I wanted the rage. I wanted to hate Zaf. But there were investigations and he'd fired for the right reasons. I wouldn't be here now if he hadn't. The trust between us was lost and as a result errors were made.”