Take Me Tonight (20 page)

When she looked up at him, he said, “It makes me sick to talk about that family, that’s why. I hate this subject.”

“Then change it.” She rose to kiss him.

Instantly, his body warmed with a natural response. No chance he could fight this, and he didn’t want to anyway. He ran his hands over the tight muscles of her back, to the bare skin exposed between her top and smooth, fitted workout pants. “Sage,” he whispered, emotion squeezing his throat. “Now you know that you’re too good for me.”

A little moan escaped her throat. “Not true,” she said, nibbling at his jaw.

He closed his eyes on a sigh and she must have taken it as a signal, kissing him again. He felt a shudder run through him as his hands rounded her waist and closed over her breasts, and he instinctively rocked into her.

“Listen to me, Johnny,” she said. “As long as you’re honest, you’re worthy.”

Honest? He was still lying through his teeth. Lucy held the cards, and the cards said, lie. Or at least, be vague and distracting. Charming. Clever. Persuasive. Protective.

“I have more secrets, Sage.” At least he’d told her something. He mentally braced for the demand that he tell her, but she merely rubbed against him, caressing his back and rear, pulling him into her.

“Tell me tomorrow.” She nuzzled his neck. “You know what I love?”

He grazed his fingertips over her collarbone, down the neat little tank top she wore, settling into her delicate cleavage. “I know what I love. This spot.”

“I love it when you call me Sage.”

She loved it because it was honest and real. Like she was.

“Sage,” he whispered as he kissed her throat, dipping lower to taste that sweet crease. “That’s one of my favorite ingredients in the world, you know that?”

“You have good taste.” She took his hand and led him through the French doors to the bedroom. “Have some more in here.”

She pulled him onto the mountain of decorative pillows, turned on the soft bedside lamp, then knelt on the bed as he removed his gun and kicked off his shoes. He ran a hand over his eighteen-hour stubble. “Want me to shave?”

“I want you to watch.” With one finger, she inched up the hem of her cropped tank top, revealing the luscious, round bottoms of her breasts. “I want you to forget everything else right now but me.”

“I can do that.” For now, anyway.

She slowly raised the top. His body jolted when her breasts popped free and her dark, ripe nipples hardened. Sliding off the top, she pulled her ponytail out and shook her hair down over her shoulders in a dead sexy move.

“Tell me something,” she said.

“Anything.” Anything she’d want to hear, at least.

“What do you like best?” She dipped her thumbs into the low band around her hips, pushing it just low enough to reveal the feminine angle of her hip bones and that sweet, tight skin just below her navel.

He managed a wink. “Is this another one of those interviews?”

“This can be anything you want it to be.” She turned to the side, giving him a profile of her rear end. She slowly slid the material over her round curves, bending over as she stripped the cotton down her thighs. Silky blond hair draped over the bedspread. Blood surged south, punching him to a rock-hard erection as he rose to reach for her.

“Tell me what you want, Johnny,” she said again.

Sweat beaded on his neck, and his mouth went bone dry. He wanted this fiery, sexy, understanding woman who offered her body so willingly. “I want…” Something lasting. Something meaningful. With her. But he’d never get that. “To taste Sage.”

He grasped her hips from the back, and dropped a hot, slow, wet kiss on the dip above her rump and the twin to its left, moaning at the smoothness of her skin.

She lifted herself, offering him access between her legs. He licked her there, tasting her moisture, sliding his tongue inside. She tensed, and he felt the bedspread shift as her fingers balled the fabric and her knees widened to let him underneath.

He dropped flat on the bed, turned over, and slid between her legs to fill his mouth with her. Taking her thighs in his hands, he feasted on her hot, delicious, tangy, sweet womanhood.

She rocked with an orgasm, panting his name, shuddering out of control. She fell back on the bed, undressing him with shaky hands. He sped the process, and throbbing with the need to get inside her.

Sage closed her fist over his shaft, lowering her head to reciprocate, but he stopped her and grabbed for the stash of condoms in the nightstand. “No, no. I want you.”

Understanding, she lay back and opened herself to him. He wanted to say something tender. He wanted to touch her lovingly, to kiss her mouth and breasts with delicate feather touches. He wanted to tell her that this was real, and that it mattered, and that he was so damn sorry he’d lied from the beginning.

But he couldn’t even look in her eyes as he sheathed himself.

He’d lied from the beginning and he’d lie to the end, because his loyalty belonged to someone else. Still needing her to the point of insanity, he plunged into her.

She pulled his face to hers for a kiss, but he buried his mouth near her ear, in her hair, letting the pillow muffle his groans.

All he wanted was comfort and release and forgiveness.

Biting his lip so hard he tasted blood, he took two out of three, feeling lucky to get those from a woman who, by all rights, should hate him.

The New England Snow Bunnies were dancing to an old Beatles’ song, doing the H formation with Keisha Kingston in the center spot. Her skin glistened like semisweet chocolate, and, unlike all the other girls in white, she wore black shorts and a one-shouldered tank top. All around the arena, men in masks held AK-47s, aimed at the girls, waiting for the order to fire. At the far end of the arena a woman directed the music with a conductor’s baton, her black hair flowing down to her knees, with a single bloodred streak down the front.

The chorus screamed through the speakers and the girls sang, but they weren’t singing words. They were singing beeps, like an electronic organ.
Be be be be beeeeep be bee bee
.

Keisha was the only one singing the words.

Lucy in the sky with diamonds.
Her lips moved, her black eyes sparkled, her smile melted every heart in the audience.

Lucy in the…

Light and consciousness slammed Sage as she pulled out of the dream, and she saw Johnny, naked and desperately digging for his pants under the bedspread on the floor.

“Is that your phone ringing?” she asked, rubbing her eyes. She hadn’t heard that melody ring before.

He plucked the device from his pants pocket and gave her a look between horror and hope. “I’m going to take this in there.” Leaving no room for argument, he disappeared into the living room, closing the French doors with a click.

He’d locked her in the bedroom?

She snuggled into the pillow and sniffed the warm spot he’d left. Oh, the man was too much. Too sexy, too good, too charming. So his uncle had a rap sheet as long as her arm. So he had a sordid past. Did he really think she’d shun him because his family was involved with the mob?

Everyone had some skeletons in their closet. That could just bring them closer, couldn’t it? She could help him heal, and he…he…She closed her eyes and saw the vivid image of Keisha in her dream.

He could help her get over this, too. Even if she never got the answers she wanted, he could help her accept this death. And possibly the deeper wound her mother had left years ago. For some reason, this man, this fascinating, sweet, funny man, just might be the—

The French doors popped open and Johnny stood there, naked and magnificent. He looked like a Roman centurion, carved from stone with broad shoulders and rippling muscles, his manhood a breath away from erect, lying perfectly against his corded thigh.

She had to restrain herself from throwing over the covers and demanding more. More rough sex. More sweet sex. More slow sex. More great sex.

“Keisha did not have an abortion. In fact, her autopsy showed that she was menstruating at the time of death.”

The announcement drenched her like an icy shower. “What?” She pushed up on one elbow. “How do you know?”

“I have sources.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely.” He tossed the phone onto the dresser. “That’s not all.”

“What?”

“There is no connection between takemetonight.com and either Glenda or Julian Hewitt. The head of the company has never heard of either one, nor have any of the employees. Hewitt was lying to the cops.”

Ice trickled into her veins. “What? How do you know?” She sounded like a pathetic parrot repeating herself. “Was that Cervaris on the phone?”

“No. It was a very trusted source.” At her look, he added, “Trusted and classified.”

“
Classified
? Are you hiding a military background, too?”

He waved a hand. “Whatever you media types call it.”

Now she was a “media type”? A big demotion from the “queen of delight” she’d been last night. “We media types generally call sources that refuse to be named ‘confidential’ or ‘anonymous.’ Whatever you call them, they are the least reliable.” She sat up and brushed hair from her face. “Are you absolutely positive about this? Do you know what it—”

“Yes. I’m positive.”

His tone was harsh, his expression matching. He disappeared into the bathroom, closing the door with a thump that echoed hers when she dropped onto the pillows.

“Sheez,” she whispered, bewildered by the message and the messenger.

Her gaze shifted from the bathroom door to the dresser, where his cell phone lay. A reliable and classified source. Who could that be? Who would be able to find out whether Keisha had an abortion and what was in her autopsy report
and
what kind of business relationship the Hewitts had with Fantasy Adventures?

A worm of apprehension slithered up her spine. She stared at the phone, running through a mental list of possibilities until her brain hit one so hard, it actually hurt.

No.
No
. Was it possible? The question came as a whisper at first, a nudge to her conscious, as distant as the notes of a song that had awakened her.

Lucy in the sky…

Oh, God. Her heart plummeted into her stomach. She tried to swallow, but couldn’t. No. Oh, please,
no
.

She threw the cover back and crossed the room in purposeful strides. She had to destroy the sickening thought that had just taken hold. She’d do whatever was necessary to assure herself that this was impossible. She’d do anything—

And so would her aunt
.

The phone was still warm from his hand. She flipped it open and pressed a menu key.
CALL HISTORY
.

INCOMING CALLS
.
UNKNOWN NUMBER
. She pressed Talk, then held the phone to her ear. One ring. Two.

“Lucy Sharpe’s office.”

Betrayal rose like bile in her throat as she snapped the phone closed and dropped it like it had burned her. All this time, all this
time…

He was her eyes. Her ears. Her watchdog. Her puppet. And Lucy was in the background, sneaking, conniving, manipulating.
Controlling
.

She closed her eyes and gripped the side of the dresser. Behind the bathroom door, she heard running water and the tap of a razor against the sink.

“You know what I think?” he called.

In one move, she scooped up her clothes from the floor. “What?” she replied, forcing calm into the single syllable.

“I think we have to look harder at Glenda. She’s the one who told you about the abortion in the first place.”

She yanked on her top, then pulled the pants on one shaky leg at a time. “Yeah.”
Just stay in there, Johnny
. “Maybe.”

The water shut off. “I have a plan,” he said.

Or Lucy does
. She grabbed her shoes and ran into the living room, slipped her purse and jacket under her arm, and made it to the door just as the digital song sang again.

“I’ll get that!” he hollered gruffly.

But she was halfway down the hall and never heard him answer Lucy’s private ring.

Chapter
Twenty

“I
 have to fire that girl.” Lucy hugged one of the citron-green silk pillows that dotted the Ambassador Suite of the Four Seasons Hotel, staring out the fourth-floor window at the tops of the trees.

Dan snorted. Across the room, he was draped over a matching sofa, long legs sprawled in front of him. “She sure isn’t Raquel Durant. But those are big shoes to fill.”

She pulled her attention from the window to meet a pair of eyes as green as the spring willows surrounding the park outside.

“It doesn’t take a mental giant to realize you don’t call someone working undercover from my line.”

“True, but she was following your orders. You told her to call him immediately with the reports and she must have been sitting at your desk, hung up with you, then dialed him.”

“And Sage figured it all out.” She studied the carved mahogany crown molding. “How could I have underestimated Lydia’s child?”

“I’ve never seen you like this, Lucy,” he said.

No, even he didn’t know about the dark days. She absently brushed a strand of white hair from her cheek, the constant reminder of the cost of loving and losing.

“I wanted so much to protect her. I knew she’d go digging for information and answers, and my gut told me it could be dangerous.” She stood and walked to the window, her high heels making no sound on the luxurious carpet. “But she would never have let me help her.”

“Why didn’t you tell Johnny the truth?”

“I didn’t want him to know this was so personal. I wanted him to treat her like any Bullet Catcher assignment.” She pushed aside the heavy damask drape and studied the pedestrians on the sidewalk below. “He should be here by now.”

“Maybe he took a detour to Beacon Hill,” Dan suggested.

“And flat-out defy my instructions? Not the Johnny Christiano I know.”

“The guy I saw at that basketball game last night…” Dan stood and joined her at the window. “He wasn’t the Johnny Christiano I know, either. And I’ve known him for a lot of years. Since he was a kid on the streets, a wiseguy, and ready to be made.”

But he hadn’t been “made.” Lucy and Dan had stepped in and changed Johnny’s life, and in return, she’d been rewarded with a fiercely devoted Bullet Catcher who’d performed every assignment with signature style and near perfection.

“That wasn’t your run-of-the-mill lust I saw at that basketball game.”

Lucy gave Dan a knowing smile. “I told him to be charming and creative to stay in cover. He was taught by a master of the game.”

Dan acknowledged the compliment just as Johnny rapped lightly on the door. “See that? He got right into this building and you didn’t even see him. He’s good.”

“I didn’t say he wasn’t,” she said, crossing the room to let Johnny in. When she did, she knew instantly that he was in more misery than she was.

He brushed by her, nodded to Dan, and went straight to the long granite bar for coffee. “She didn’t go home.”

Dan and Lucy shared a look. So he had gone to Beacon Hill first.

“What are the other possibilities?” Lucy asked. “A close friend? An office?”

“If I know Sage, she won’t stop just because you’re involved, or I’m not. She is single-minded and determined, and finding out that Julian Hewitt was leaving notes on the posters of the girls who’d done the kidnappings just made her more resolved to get answers. My guess is she’s off investigating. I’d go straight to Glenda Hewitt, and so will she.”

Lucy nodded. “Here’s what we think, Johnny. Glenda and Julian have been hacking into takemetonite.com. That’s how they know when and where these kidnappings take place. Not through any relationship with the site, but they know, and I think I know why.” At his interested look, she explained, “Evidently, they have a daughter who was hit by a drunk driver and has been in a vegetative state for seven years. They need lots of money to keep her alive at a high-end facility. Much more money than they make running an NBA dance team. They’re doing something that’s allowing them to send twenty thousand a month to Land’s End Critical Care. And Julian was wrong when you trapped him in the parking lot. His daughter is still alive.”

Johnny frowned. “So where’s the kickback for the kidnapping?”

“That’s what we haven’t figured out yet. Some of the dancers apparently sign up and have the full kidnapping experience. According to the website, others have canceled, yet they think they’ve been kidnapped. They’ve all been put into the same dark van, but don’t necessarily remember or share anything after that.”

“Whatever they’re doing,” Johnny said, “it sounds like Keisha found out, and they had to get rid of her. Possibly Ashley, too?”

Dan eased onto the sofa. “You know, there are twenty-some damn near flawless women, together all the time. It’s like some kind of bizarre sociology experiment.”

“They’re like a pack of perfect specimens.” Johnny put his coffee cup down, thinking hard. “Vivian said the guy didn’t want her because she was a ‘mutt’—she thought he meant a mixed race.”

Lucy’s cell phone rang and she glanced at it, then looked at Johnny. “It’s my assistant. Shall I kill her for you?”

He met her gaze straight on. “I take full responsibility for being the bigger of two morons. I shouldn’t have left my phone on the dresser and Sage in the room.”

No, he shouldn’t have. Nor should he take all the blame for this. Lucy had to shoulder her share, and she would—as soon as she had this situation in hand. She left to talk to Nancy in another room, and when she returned, Johnny was leaning over the dining table, poring over some of the reports that she’d accumulated on the case. “You didn’t tell me Glenda Hewitt is a patient of Alonzo Garron’s,” he said.

“And guess who Nancy just connected me to on that call?”

“Garron?” Johnny asked.

“The CEO of Massachusetts General, who happens to be a friend of a friend. And Garron’s former boss.”

Johnny looked up from the papers. “What?”

“It seems Dr. Garron didn’t leave his position at the hospital just because he was a whistle-blower for Sage’s insurance-scam story, as he’d like everyone to believe.” Lucy put her elbows on the counter. “Evidently he lost two patients having routine D-and-Cs, and while nothing at all was proven, rumors were rampant. Some patients were reportedly uncomfortable with him. My contact wouldn’t say why, since he’s already breached ethical boundaries to give me this much.”

Johnny’s body tensed as he stood, straightening the papers. “One of the few people Sage would ask for help is Alonzo Garron. She trusts that guy, a lot.”

“Dan and I will pay Glenda Hewitt a visit,” Lucy said. “You go find Garron.”

“I’ll get my jacket and gear,” Dan said. “Back in five minutes.”

When the door closed behind him, Lucy took a deep breath and asked the question that troubled her most: “Why aren’t you tearing into me for keeping you in the dark, Johnny?”

“Because.”

She laughed softly. “Because I’m the boss? Because you are the most dedicated employee in the world? Because you understand my motives? Because
why
?”

His smile was so sweet, it broke her heart. “Because I got to know her, and she’s the most amazing woman I’ve ever met.”

Oh, no. He had it worse than she’d thought. “Then I’m jealous,” she admitted. “Because I’d really like to know her, too.”

“I hate to break it to you, Luce, but that isn’t going to happen in this lifetime. She’s not about to forgive you for what you did, and what happened to her mother. And I doubt she’ll ever forgive me for lying to her.”

Lucy swallowed the hard lump in her throat. She’d long ago become accustomed to the bitterness that rose with the false accusations, and the fact that she was protecting her niece from the real truth about what had happened. Sage had already lost her mother; there was no reason to steal her father from her, as well. “You lied because I asked you to, Johnny.”

“Yeah. You tell her that next time you see her, ’cause I figure I’m pretty much on her permanent shit list.”

She hated that she’d helped put that much hurt in his voice. “I’m sorry. But I couldn’t have trusted her with a better Bullet Catcher.”

“I slept with her,” he said simply. “We were intimate on every imaginable level. I know your policy about bodyguards and principals.”

She appreciated the admission, but it came as no surprise. “I told you to be creative and charming. These were extenuating circumstances. I’m certain that you merely did what needed to be done to protect her and maintain your cover.”

“Then you’d be dead wrong.” He turned to the door just as his cell phone rang. He swiftly read the ID, his shoulders dropping in disappointment. “It’s Detective Cervaris.”

She watched him as he listened, his frown deepening, his body tensing, then he snapped the phone closed. “Ashley McCafferty’s body was just dredged up from the Charles River.”

“Any clues?”

“Her stomach was slashed and all of her female organs were removed.”

Fear shot through Lucy. “Find that doctor, Johnny.”

“I’m on it.”

This must be what Charlie felt like on his endless train ride on Boston’s MBTA
.

Sage fingered the Charlie Ticket she’d used a few dozen times that day. In the hours since she’d left The Eliot Hotel, she’d taken the Green Line four times from Lechmere out to Riverside. She transferred to the Blue Line and meandered up the north shore near Revere.

The realization that Lucy Sharpe had sent Johnny Christiano as some kind of…of watchdog folded her spirit so badly, Sage had her pity party on the T, as it crawled back and forth like an injured snake over the tracks of Boston’s public transportation system.

With her phone turned off, the day grew darker, just like her mood, and she met her only goal for the afternoon: She avoided going home.

Because she had no doubt who’d be sitting on her front step, or even in her living room since he was so damn good at infiltrating things. Like her apartment. Her bedroom. Her body. Her heart.

She turned in her seat, checking the car for the twentieth time to see if he was following her. Then she leaned her head against the cool glass of the train window and inhaled the rancid smell of sweat and oil and humanity and truth that she’d become accustomed to today.

She closed her eyes to ward off the next wave of tears. How in God’s name could she have been so blind? So stupid? So willing not to see the obvious? How could she have ever forgetten the power of Lucy Sharpe?

John Anthony Christiano—or whoever the hell he was—had been no “rescuer” for a fantasy-abduction site. He’d been no male prostitute. He’d been no lover, no partner, no nothing. He was a liar, a con, a spy. A puppet. A gun-carrying, crime-scene-sniffing, bad-guy-fighting professional Bullet Catcher.

There were so many clues—how could she have missed them? She stifled a groan. And the gym rats! God, she’d been played like a complete fool.

But why? His job, she was certain, was to follow Lucy Sharpe’s orders, and he was no doubt richly rewarded. But why did Lucy care what happened to her?

What did it matter to that coldhearted bitch who’d turned on her sister, and her sister’s family, thirteen years ago?

It was nearly five in the afternoon when the train rolled into the elevated stop at Charles Street. Should she chance going home? Yes. Because no lame excuses or pan-fried delicacies or brain-rattling sex would work this time.

And he shouldn’t have the power to keep her from home, from finding out what happened to Keisha. She’d do whatever it took to get those answers, even face that charming smile.

Getting the answers might require another kidnapping, because she didn’t trust any of the information they’d gotten from Lucy. Who knew what her agenda really was? Next time, her fantasy abduction wouldn’t be interrupted by Lucy and her band of merry men. She’d register tonight.

Her stomach rumbled, reminding her of the many hours since she’d eaten. Maybe she should get something to eat, so that when she arrived, he couldn’t tempt her. With food, anyway.

At the bottom of the station steps, she rounded the corner, opening her bag to tuck her Charlie Ticket into its pocket. As she did, a strong hand gripped her elbow from behind. She gasped, then froze. “Is this your idea of showing me how much I need a thug to protect me?”

“No, this is my idea of a pleasant surprise.”

She turned around at the lilted voice. “Alonzo! What are you doing here?”

“You think I am too snobby to take a train?”

Relief fluttered through her. “I’m just glad to see you.”

That made his gray eyes twinkle. “I dropped my daughter off.” He ran a hand over his wet, bald head. “But her train was delayed and I didn’t bring an umbrella.”

He did look like he’d been there awhile. “I don’t have one either, I’m afraid. I didn’t even realize it had started raining.”

He put a friendly, casual arm around her and led her away from the crowd. “And where have you been all day and all night?”

She drew back. “All night?”

“I saw you with your young chef at the arena last night, remember? And don’t forget my business, Sage. I know women. And you…” he touched her chin, raw from a night of friction with Johnny’s beard, “have the appearance of a woman who has been well and thoroughly attended to.”

The intimacy of the comment sent a frisson of discomfort up her spine. “More like well and thoroughly kicked in the gut.”

His eyes darkened to the color of the rainy Boston sky. “Do I have to kill this Johnny character? Or at least pull his résumé from the Ritz?”

Oh, God. She’d had him
interview
for a job. She’d forgotten that.

“Well?” He studied her expression for a moment. “Seriously, Sage, are you all right?”

“I’m fine, but it’s nice to see a friend right now.”

She normally wouldn’t have been so bold as to call him a friend, but at the moment it seemed appropriate. “I’ve got some problems.”

He continued to guide her away from the station to a small commuters’ parking lot. “This sounds like more than man trouble. Why don’t we go somewhere dry and talk?”

“I don’t know. I’m not such good company right now.” How could she explain to him the mess she was in and the answers she needed? But then she remembered that he might have one of those answers—and maybe his information was different from what Johnny got from Lucy. At the thought, she felt emboldened. “Were you ever able to find out that information I needed about my roommate?”