Dirty Money Read online

  In response, I leaned closer so my body was pressed against the length of hers, trapping her. I slid a hand into her pocket and pulled out the wad of cash. Without breaking eye contact, I peeled off fifteen hundred dollar bills and placed them back in her pocket.

  “What are you doing?” She wanted to know.

  “Buying time.” I combined the cash in my pocket with her stack and shoved the entire thing down the front of my underwear.

  “You think I won’t go in there?” Her expression hardened as she slipped past fear to anger. I shrugged. She called my bluff. Instead of simply pulling out the money, though, she slid a finger on either side of my clit and squeezed.

  Fuck if it didn’t feel good too.

  “You like that? Is this what you want? For me to fuck you?” Each question was accompanied by a steady squeeze and release.

  I fought the rush of blood from my head to my groin so I could speak coherently. Squeeze, release.

  “No,” I said with a shake of my head. Squeeze, release. “Babe.” I placed my hand over her heart. “I want this.”

  The anger in her eyes softened. Just a little. “Don’t you know?” She stopped jerking me off and removed her hand from my pants. Her eyes dropped to the floor. “You’ve already got it.”

  “No, I don’t,” I said. “You still don’t trust me. I need you to trust me.”

  “I do.” She cupped her hands behind my head and started tugging at my hair. Damn, I loved when she did that. Still, it didn’t mean much without eye contact.

  “I’m not—” I tried to ignore the gentle tug of her fingers at my neck. It didn’t work so I placed my hands over hers to still the motion. “I’m not letting you leave me.”

  Reese dropped her forehead to my chest. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize,” I whispered into her hair. “Just stop lying to me.”

  She nodded with her face still pressed against me. So I lifted her chin and kissed her. Kissed her like I was dying, probably because I was dying. Slowly, painfully, each day she refused to touch me, look at me, just fucking talk to me. I kissed her with the pain, the anger, the pent up longing to feel her skin against mine.

  Apparently, I wasn’t alone.

  She kissed me back like I was air. Just air. Beneath my lips, she started to breathe the way she hadn’t in days. Actually filling her lungs with oxygen, with me. Under my fingertips, blood rushed to the surface turning her smooth skin into liquid heat.

  We tore at each other’s clothes. Destroying those barriers until it was skin on skin. For the first time in days, I felt warm. Not the oppressive, wet heat of San Felipe, but the warm blood pumping through my veins, the warm moisture flooding between us. The warmth that meant Reese.

  She pushed my hand between her thighs, taking me in with a gasp that sounded like, “Need you.”

  I could only nod.

  “Harder,” she gasped. “Please, harder.” Her eyes locked on mine, the color of shale almost blacked out by her wide pupils. “I want it. I want you.”

  She kissed me again, biting my tongue, sucking on it, making my head spin. I added a third finger and fucked her until her eyes rolled back. My mouth was at her throat, her breasts leaving marks. I wrapped my lips around a nipple and sucked so I could really taste her skin. I loved the way she tasted. All the while, I continued to pump into her harder, faster.

  This was my way of telling her…everything. That I wasn’t leaving and neither was she. Nothing could come between us. Not now. Not ever. I wanted her to feel me everywhere, the way I felt her. Because I was too afraid to say what I wanted to say. So I was going to show her.

  “Oh, yeah, like that.” Reese whimpered. She bit her lip hard enough to draw blood and came. So I took her lip into my mouth and kept fucking her. Her cunt stretched then tightened around me, holding me in.

  “Oh, God. Don’t stop.”

  I didn’t. I never would. She was all I knew. Only her. Only Reese. I braced my palm on the window behind her to hold us up. She clawed at my naked back, sweat slick hands dropping low to grab my ass and pull me into her. I was so deep in her I didn’t think I’d ever find a way back out. Her nails dug into my skin as she came again with a final grasp of my hand and a rush of wetness. Watching her, I came too.

  Chapter Four

  I signaled the bartender and asked for another beer. At least I could order a beer in Spanish. Though I was pretty sure just about everyone could do that. It wasn’t that hard.

  The bartender set another sweating bottle in front of me. It wasn’t even four in the afternoon and I was already on my fifth of the day. That couldn’t be a good sign.

  Really, I couldn’t help it. Reese had gone to pick up Ryan nearly an hour before, and there was still no sign of them. She wasn’t answering her cell phone either. Maybe I had the number wrong on the new phone. For good measure, I dialed the number again. Nothing. So I took a swig of beer.

  Not that I was nervous or anything.

  “Drinking’s a terrible habit.” A heavyset guy in a linen suit informed me as he took the barstool next to me. I didn’t look up. The bartender came to take his order. “I’ll have whatever Vivian’s having.” That got my attention.

  I looked up and had to force myself to breathe, to act natural.

  “It’s been a while. How’s your head?” Last time I’d seen Vito, I’d knocked him out with the butt of a handgun. He was probably pretty happy about that.

  “Not bad. Got a bit of a soft spot.” He accepted a beer from the bartender, though he didn’t drink from it. “Your face is healing nicely. You can barely tell your nose was broken.”

  He’d beaten me until I was unconscious, leaving my nose and my ribs broken. Asshole. I was glad I’d knocked him out.

  “I figure the imperfection gives my face a roguish charm.”

  Vito did his creepy imitation of a smile thing. “You’re funny,” he said.

  “Is there something I can help you with?” I took a pull from my beer. “Let me guess. You want to know where the twins are. No, wait.” I snapped my fingers. “The gold. You want to know where the gold is.”

  “At the moment I am more concerned about you, actually.” Vito finally took a sip of beer then grimaced. “How can you drink this piss?”

  “I’m twenty-one. It’s like water to me.” But I indulged him and ordered two scotches.

  Vito and I waited until we were each given a heavy glass with an inch of deep gold liquid.

  “Much better.” Vito sipped his scotch. “Thank you.”

  “Come on, don’t keep me waiting.” The twins would be back any time. I really didn’t want to hand them over to him. I downed half my scotch.

  “I like you, kid. And I must say you’ve shown a lot of…potential.”

  “Potential for what?” I scoffed.

  “Just potential. We could make good use of you. Especially now that I’m down two men. Tommy was very sick, but he had his uses. I don’t think you are quite as twisted, but who knows? With some training, you could prove indispensable.”

  “Thanks, but I’m cool.” I stood up.

  “Wait.”

  “Why?”

  “You haven’t even listened to me.” Vito half turned on his barstool to look at me.

  “Whatever you’re selling, I don’t want it. Thanks.” I started for the door.

  “We’ll leave you alone if you listen to me.”

  That made me hesitate.

  “Five minutes,” he said. “Give me five minutes. If you don’t want to hear anymore then I’ll disappear.”

  “For real?” I could take five minutes of bullshit to get them off our backs. Not that I believed him. It was too easy. At least I would know his game plan though.

  “For real,” he assured me. The phrase sounded idiotic coming from him.

  “Go.” Pointedly, I checked the time on my phone as I sat back down.

  “The work is lucrative.”

  “And immoral.” Who was I kidding? I didn’t have morals
.

  “See the world.”

  “Cut the bullshit. What do you really want?”

  “You on our side.” He sipped some more scotch.

  “Not happening.”

  “Why not? Reese couldn’t handle it. Well…” He waved his hand like it was nothing. “She thought she couldn’t handle it. But with you, we could get her back. You’d make a great team.”

  I wanted to ask what he meant, but I already knew. My breath suddenly escaped me, evacuated my chest, trying to abandon a dying body. It was like all of his little comments, that argument with Reese I’d witnessed, a thousand of her equivocations all added up for me. And coalesced.

  Abruptly, I was back in that parking garage in Vegas.

  “You’ll come back too,” he’d said, but I didn’t get the meaning at the time.

  Her response was even worse. “I’m never going back.”

  I couldn’t really swallow and my vision wavered. With a trembling hand, I raised my drink to my lips. The burn of the alcohol didn’t help.

  “What the hell are you talking about? What couldn’t Reese handle?” I asked though I didn’t want to hear it.

  “Working for us. You know she got sick of it after only a few months.” Another wave of the hand. “If we had you on our side, though, she would be able to see. Come back to the family.”

  The family.

  “Reese never worked for you,” I managed to choke out.

  Vito stopped, turned, stared at me. “Of course she did.” He was playing this up. “You mean she never told you?” His eyes were too wide, his tone too incredulous.

  “Don’t give me that shit.”

  “I was afraid this might happen.” Somberly, he pulled an envelope from inside his jacket. “See for yourself.”

  I didn’t want to look in the envelope. Not after today. Reese and I were good. I really didn’t want any more surprises. I really didn’t want to know that she was still lying to me.

  “Come on, kid.” Vito glanced at his watch. It had enough ice on it to freeze over Mexico. “You only gave me five minutes. Don’t waste them.”

  So I looked in the envelope. It was filled with photos. Nothing too incriminating really. Reese in a fancy dress surrounded by guys in tuxedos. Reese at a table in a café with a bunch of greasy looking guys. Reese standing on a bridge in a heavy coat talking with a different slimy dude.

  Except for one thing. Vito was in every photo.

  There he was at her shoulder wearing a tuxedo and pretending to smile. Sitting next to her in a café conducting business. Hand in his pocket on a bridge. The last one really got me. The edge of his shoulder holster was visible and his meaty hand was on Reese’s arm. The look on her face was one I knew well. Detached. I fucking hated detached.

  “What the fuck is this?”

  “Training, kid.”

  “You normally take photos of your trainees?” I sneered.

  “Reese was skittish. I thought mementos of our time together might prove helpful.”

  “Photoshop.” It was my last-ditch, please don’t make me believe this, attempt.

  “Cooper,” he crooned. From the stack he extracted one of the bridge photos. “She’s looking directly at me in this one.” He was right.

  Again, I checked the time on my cell phone. Five minutes was up.

  “Thanks, Vito.” I shook his hand, tossed some cash on the bar for the drinks, and headed for the door. What was I supposed to do? Let him know he’d hit his mark? Fuck no.

  “That’s it?” he called from behind me.

  “That’s it,” I said.

  Fuck Reese. She could handle him by herself.

  *

  It took half an hour to walk to the next bar. Mostly because I kept ducking through side streets, into restaurants and out the back door, and once over a fence. Nobody was going to tail me. Not this time.

  The fact that I was bordering on, but not quite drunk didn’t help either.

  Finally, I went into a bar, commandeered the darkest table in the darkest corner, and ordered a bottle of tequila. From where I was sitting, I could watch the front door, the back, the bathroom, everything. For the next five hours, I did just that. Watched, drank, watched, drank. Anything but think. Thinking hurt.

  It was inevitable though.

  That final blow, dealt with such efficiency from Vito, was going to kill me. I just had to wait for it. Wait as the pain seeped through my veins into every limb, organ, and cell so that breathing hurt, thinking hurt, watching hurt, drinking hurt. She was so ingrained that everything meant Reese. Bars, tequila, dark, light, men, women, all reminded me of her.

  I had nothing. Nothing that mattered. I knew I couldn’t trust Ryan anymore, because I couldn’t trust Reese anymore, and who the fuck would pick someone else over his sister? No one. So my best friend was gone, despite my constantly ringing phone. About two hours in, I smashed it with the bottle of tequila. And my, what did I call her, what could I call her? Girlfriend? No, I’d thrown too many of those away. Lover? Sounded like a bad movie. Life? That was it. My life was gone. Over at twenty-one. In a few well played photos. No. Fuck the photos. In a lie that became so big it eventually killed her, killed me.

  So all I had was a couple hundred bucks, a shell that somewhat resembled my body, and a bottle of tequila, or was I on to two bottles?

  My heart wasn’t just broken. Someone had sat astride my body and carefully sliced into my chest so they could take it, steal it when I wasn’t watching. And then she chipped away at it bit by bit. My heart was scattered, pieces abandoned on the roadside from Sacramento International, to neon alleys in Vegas, to this little slice of land on the Sea of Cortez.

  Vito had followed the trail of blood, collecting specimens, so he could deliver that final blow. So he could open up my chest and show me it was vacant. In that space, he tried to shove some cash to stem the flow, but Reese had already tried, and money didn’t beat the same way.

  *

  I was still alone. I’d spoken to exactly two people after entering the cantina. The bartender and a guy who asked me for a light. I didn’t have a light.

  It was late. I knew that much. Without a watch or a cell phone, I wasn’t sure how late, or how early. All I knew was it had been dark outside for a long time. The crowd in the bar had swelled and then started thinning again. The night was waning.

  I knew I would need sleep at some point. That point was very far away, though, so I wasn’t worried. Sleeping meant dreaming. Something I refused to do.

  “You’ve been sitting here a long time, honey.” A girl, no, a woman sat at my table. “Are you waiting for someone?” She had an accent, but not like everyone else here. It was faint and smooth and cool. Very East Coast.

  I tried to respond, opened my mouth, but nothing came out so I just shook my head.

  “This isn’t the best cantina in town. You might want to be waiting for someone,” she suggested. Guess she was concerned for my well-being.

  “I’m…I’ll be fine.”

  “I’m sure you will. I thought you were a boy until I saw those pretty eyes. That’s probably why no one is hassling you.” She extended a manicured hand across the table. “I’m Joan, by the way.” The words rolled off her tongue as if she were tasting them. Each insignificant word suddenly had elevated meaning.

  “Cooper.” I shook her hand remembering at the last moment to actually grip, just like my mom taught me.

  “Why are you sitting here drinking alone, Cooper?”

  I thought about that. “It’s better than not drinking. Alone.” My speech wasn’t even slurred. Now that was something to be proud of.

  “Would you mind company?”

  Slowly, I shook my head. Moving quickly tended to make things spin. Pointedly, I held up my hand and caught the bartender’s attention. He came around the bar, now almost empty, to my table.

  “Something else for you?” His eyes flickered to the half-empty bottle.

  “Another glass.” Still not slurring. “F
or the lady.”

  He smiled and returned moments later with a glass.

  “Gracias.” I poured some tequila into the fresh glass then filled mine again.

  “Thank you.” Joan saluted me with her drink and emptied it in two perfect swallows.

  “Thirsty?” I refilled her glass.

  “Trying to catch up. You’re quite a bit ahead of me.”

  Not something I felt like addressing.

  “You’re American,” I stated. Speaking was hard, but it was also distracting. Distracting was good. “East Coast.” She had the same infuriating intonation Reese had picked up in the last couple years. By the end of summer, it wore off only to return with a vengeance at Christmas. I wished I didn’t find it so sexy.

  Joan smiled and swallowed her second drink. “And so are you, but I’d say California.”

  Not according to the license I had. “Sometimes.” I shrugged.

  She smiled again. It was a nice sort of smile. I poured her another drink.

  *

  Kissing her was easy. Easier than I’d thought it would be. Easier than it should have been. Just like it had been easy for me to say yes when she wanted me to walk her back to her hotel. Just like it had been easy to go into her room.

  I liked the way she talked when she said, “I want you to stay, Cooper.” I liked the way she said my name.

  She tasted like tequila. That was my fault I guess. The way she kissed me was the way a hundred other girls, women, had kissed me. Like she was dying and I was salvation. Except I was the one who was dying.

  But I wasn’t thinking about that. Promise.

  Joan’s fingertips were smooth as she skimmed under my shirt, lifting the cotton from my skin. I wasn’t as kind with hers, tearing it over her head while I kissed her. That’s a difficult trick. Closing my eyes made it harder to keep kissing her. When I closed them, it made all the differences matter more. Her lips weren’t as full. She smelled like Chanel. My mother wore Chanel. Reese didn’t wear perfume. Joan’s skin felt too soft against mine, like she wasn’t real. Parts of her weren’t, actually. Those tits were fake, too perky, not soft enough. Not that it mattered. Except it did.