Текст книги "Tethered Bond"

Автор книги: Emma Hart

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

No. That’s odd and so un-Drake-like. Sheesh—did I get a concussion when I passed out?

Okay. Time to get back to the real world. The one in which people are dying and I have an inch-long gash across my foot.

Oy vey. Reality is overrated. Just like losing your virginity.

I check my foot, but I can’t see a thing through the bandage wrapped around it. I can’t complain. He did promise I wouldn’t go to the hospital, and I’m not. I swing my legs out of bed and gingerly touch my toes to the floor. My foot stings as I lower my heel, and I figure walking is going to hurt for a couple of days.

That’s the last time I wear heels to a crime scene or run around one barefoot.

My eyes catch a scribbled note on the nightstand, and I snatch it up. It’s from Drake, scrawled in his rough capital letters, telling me that he called my mom but, apparently, my injury doesn’t excuse me from family dinner. He promises to swing by and drop me off because I’m not allowed to drive until the wound is no longer open in a couple of days.

I scrunch my face up. Yeah, I’m gonna check that with Alison. I’m not up to being ferried around, and I wouldn’t put it past him to make that crap up just so he can keep an eye on me.

He does get a little overbearing when people start kicking the bucket. God knows what he’s worried about. He should know by now that the chance of anyone murdering me is next to nothing. I’d talk their ear off and shoot them before they could remember what they were doing.

Actually, no. No, I’d just shoot them. Then talk. Because we all need distracting from a gun wound. Unless it’s fatal. Then there’s not much to distract from.

Let’s face it, I think as I tiptoe toward the bathroom. I do have a pretty epic record against murderers. I am two for two on getting the first bullet in in the showdown. Granted it’s the only epic record I have in my mission to save the world, but it’s a record.

I sit on the toilet, my panties around my ankles, and bury my face in my hands.

These cases always make it come back. The helplessness I feel when I’m not on the brink of an answer or surrounded by certain evidence can be overwhelming. It happened before in the other cases, but for the most part, I could block it out. Now, though…

Now, the bodies are coming too fast. The people missing… It’s the same thing as it was in Dallas. First, it was one missing child, then another, then another. Then we were getting referrals from the surrounding areas and their police departments. Disappearances were happening if you didn’t hold their hand tight enough in the supermarket.

And they really were kids. Five, six, seven… Younger… Older…

I close my eyes. If it’s quiet enough, I can still hear it. The gunfire. The yells. The screams. The cries. The rev of the engine as the semi sped away before we could scramble a chase. The deafening echo of silence once the warehouse was empty.

If I feel long enough, I can still taste my own guilt. I can taste the revulsion at myself and the hatred I bathed myself in for so long. The responsibility that weighed on my shoulders. The pity from my colleagues and the silent anger from my superiors. The promises that we’d still get them, that we’d save them. That someone would. That someone had to.

I knew the truth. I knew I’d blown the chance we had. They blamed themselves for putting the rookie in charge of that. It was in my blood, they said. I could do it, they said. They believed in me, and I failed them.

Everyone fucks up. I just did it epically, royally, explosively.

I couldn’t save them. I couldn’t save Lena or Daniel, or Natalie or Vince. I couldn’t save Toni or Melissa or Annabelle.

But then I did save Portia. I saved Alyssa and Madison McDougall. I saved Ellis, for what it’s worth when she gets her inevitable death sentence.

Maybe, if I stop being so damn sorry for myself, I can save someone else.

“Noelle?” Drake appears in the doorway.

I turn my head and meet his gaze, which is swimming with concern.

“Are you all right?”

I take a deep breath and nod. “Yeah. Just thinking.”

“In the bathroom? On the toilet?”

I drop my eyes to my feet. Oh, shit. How long have I been sitting here? My cheeks burn as I mumble a, “Yeah. Guess so.”

He laughs. “How’s your foot?”

“Can I…you know”—I wave at my underwear—“alone?”

He rolls his eyes before backing into his room. I quickly wipe and pull my panties up. Then I hit the flush and hobble into the bedroom, where he’s taking his tie off.

“Aren’t you going back to work?”

His shoulders drop, and he throws the balled-up tie onto the bed. He deftly undoes the top button of his shirt. “I was until your crazy, old grandmother stormed the police station and demanded every Bond or potential Bond be at dinner tonight. Sheriff Bates was too shocked to argue.”

I choke on thin air. “Potential Bond?”

Drake glances at me, his lips quirking. “She married us off weeks ago. She’s insane.”

Eh. It’s hard to argue with such a stellar explanation.

I’m opening my mouth to agree when I feel the searing burn of his gaze on me. His eyes are trawling across my body, from the way the shoulders of the shirt fall halfway down my biceps to the way the buttons start being done up right between my boobs. My skin tingles at the intense, lustful look in his eyes. I self-consciously tug on the bottom of the shirt and tuck my hair behind my ear.

“Ahem,” I cough, tucking my hands up inside the open sleeves.

He doesn’t even meet my eyes. Hell, he doesn’t acknowledge that I even made a sound. He simply continues to look at me as though he’s never seen a woman in a shirt, standing in the middle of his bedroom, before.

“Hello? Drake?”

Nothing.

“Earth to Detective Nash!”

He snaps his eyes to mine, and the heat that blazes in them sets my whole body on fire. He’s in front of me in two steps, and he hooks one finger around the top button of the shirt. His knuckles brush my breast right next to my nipple, and I breathe in deeply as it shoots a bolt of desire through me.

“Earth sucks,” he murmurs in a low, husky voice, curving one of his hands around my butt. His fingers play with the hem of the shirt, gently brushing across my skin in what I’m sure is a deliberate move. “I’d rather be in Heaven, thank you very much, Ms. Bond.”

I curve one eyebrow upward. “Cute. I think I want to vomit.”

He smirks, pulling me right against him. “Can’t blame a man for trying when you look that fucking hot.”

I press my finger against his lips with a smile on my face. “And I’m this hot because I was born and raised in Hell. You’d do well to remember that.”

“Oh yeah. I can see the horns now. Your bedhead doesn’t cover them.”

“Those are called my nipples.”

“Ah. I was under the impression they were called ‘mine.’”

“You’re right. They are. Except they’re mine mine, not yours mine.”

“Nah. You’re mine, so if they’re yours, then they’re mine too.”

“I’m actually my own. I just let you think I’m yours. You make a mean omelet, and for all the skills of my vibrator, they haven’t made ones that lick pussy or cook. Or bring me coffee. If they ever do that, I might have to crush your dreams.”

His eyebrows shoot up. “I believe a vibrator that could do all of that is called a robot.”

I twist my lips to the side. “Will it argue with me and lose its socks under my dresser? Pee on the toilet seat?”

“Probably not. How would they sell that to a woman?”

“Aha! Excellent. Then, when it happens, I’ll trade you in. I could get a good price.” I tap his chest and step back, but he grabs me and spins me onto the bed.

I should be used to the feeling of falling with a two-hundred-pound wall of muscle taking me down, but I’m not, so I scream. A little in pain, actually.

“Foot! Foot!” I squeak, straightening my leg so no part of it is touching the floor.

“Fuck!” Drake immediately jumps up and grasps my ankle in his strong grip.

I clamp my teeth down on my lower lip as he jolts it.

“Are you all right? Did I hurt you?”

I nod then shake my head immediately after.

“You’re such a bad fuckin’ liar, Noelle.”

“I know. I’m okay. It just stings a little. Do I have shoes to wear to dinner or am I going hippie-style?”

He grabs a bag from by the door and hands it to me. “I sent Bek to your place to get you some things for dinner. I told her to pack real clothes, but she said she packed leggings and a long shirt as well as your flats. Whatever flats are.”

I frown and look in the bag. Ripped shorts and a light tank, plus some cute ballerina pumps. I pull the shoes out and show them.

“Flats. See? Flat sole. No heels.”

“Oh. Good. You’re banned from wearing them until your foot is totally healed.” He tears his shirt over his head, throws it in the laundry basket, and gets to work undoing his belt.

I gape at him. “I’m banned? What are you, my father?”

“Honestly, cupcake? You don’t own a single pair that isn’t fucking deadly to a man’s ballsac. I half expect to wake up one day with a stiletto pinning my cock down to the mattress.”

“That would be counterproductive. Don’t worry until they create the robots.”

He takes the tank top from the end of the bed and throws it at me. “Get changed, woman. I refuse to be late to dinner, because I have it on good authority that Nonna is making meatballs.”

I unbutton his shirt and shrug it off. Then I grab my bra from the bag. “Refuse to be late? Ah—of course. You haven’t met Gio yet.”

“Gio? Who’s Gio?”

My lips curve to one side. Oh boy.

“Hot wench!”

I’ve barely stepped through the fucking door and the horrid creature is already squawking at me. I wonder if I can limp my way to the car before anyone figures out who the “hot wench” is.

“What the fuck?” Drake whispers from behind me.

I take a deep breath. Yeah, “what the fuck?” sums it up pretty damn well.

“Hot wench! Hot wench!” Squawk.

“Someone shut that creature up!” Mom yells. “Liliana! Where’s the sheet?”

“You-a no-a cover my-a Gio!” Nonna furiously shoots back, her accent making her words almost unrecognizable. “How-a would-a you– a like it if I-a covered your-a head, huh?”

“I’d love it! Then I wouldn’t have to listen to this—”

“Hot wench!”

“For fuck’s sake, Gio!” Mom snaps. She storms past us, her hair flying in a wavy curtain behind her as he stomps upstairs.

Drake prods me in the back, but I don’t move until the slam of a door is followed by Mom’s stomping back down. She’s wrestling with a pillow—Nonna’s pillow, to be exact—and it looks an awful lot like she’s trying to…

Oh no. Oh no. Oh no oh no oh no.

“Mom. Think about what you’re doin’!” I shuffle after her, leaving Drake to shut the door. “Cazzo, Mother!”

She whirls around, her blue eyes stormy with anger. “Don’t you dare use that language at me.”

Responsible parenting, yes? If, by language, she means the word fuck. She doesn’t. She means Italian.

“Sorry,” I mutter, averting my eyes for a second. “But seriously—Mom. Oh, Jesus. Mom.”

She throws the pillow to the ground and fights to get the pillowcase over the top of Gio’s cage. It’s slightly too small, and as soon as Gio realizes what she’s trying to do, he ceases his endless cries of, “Hot wench!” and violently flaps his wings, flying around in circles in the cage.

And then the daft bird says something that really sets Mom off.

“Bitch wench! Bitch wench!”

Drake snorts but covers it when a cough when Mom shoots him a deadly look.

“That’s it!” Mom somehow manages to raise her voice over the parrot’s.

I guess it’s a skill she gained from having four kids. If you can’t beat them, join them, and then beat them that way.

“Outside with you, you vile cretin!”

“Mom—what the?” Brody asks, stepping into the front room.

“Cazzo! Putana!” Gio thrashes in the cage as Mom grabs the top of it and holds it at arm’s length.

“Oh, fuck me,” my little brother mutters.

Also an accurate description.

Nonna’s gasp is horrified, and the sound of a plate smashing on the floor reverberates through the air. “You put-a him back! Now-a!”

“No! He’s going outside! He’s a horrible creature!”

“Put-a him back!”

“No!”

This is when I notice Dad, sitting in his armchair, watching television like there isn’t a parrot-based war waging around him.

“Dad?” I ask, waving a hand. “Dad? Hello?”

“Dad!” Brody tries.

I walk toward Dad’s still form and prod his shoulder. He jumps, his hand flying to his chest, and that’s when I see the tablet on his lap and the wire coming from it.

“Sorry, Noelle,” he says, smiling apologetically as he pulls the earbuds from his ears. “What’s—they’re still fighting?” He leans around the back of the chair. “Over what?”

“The parrot. What else?”

“At least it’s not pasta this time,” Drake adds, dropping onto the sofa.

“Yeah, but unlike Gio, the pasta can’t argue back,” I remind him, sitting down too.

Oh, yay. Top Gear is on. Looks like I’m playing Juice Jam until dinner.

Or running away.

I look at my feet. Running is questionable with my injury, but if I could hop fast enough… Then again, I could call Bek. What are best friends for if not for being your getaway driver? Her Mercedes is pretty quick. We could get outta town without breaking any speeding laws if she was careful enough.

Yeah. I’m gonna call her.

I pull my phone out and pretend to read a message. “Oh, I need to call Bek. I’ll be right back.”

Drake cuts his eyes to me suspiciously right as I grasp the edge of the cushion. I turn my head toward the front door as it opens and see Devin come in, surprisingly flanked by Amelia.

“Bet Nonna gave her the work visit,” Drake says in a low voice.

She doesn’t look happy—that’s for sure. She looks like she’d rather be anywhere other than here. Yet another reason she fits right on in with the Bond family. All of us, including my parents—Mom every week, Dad every other—want to be anywhere other than family dinner. It just doesn’t work out. Ever.

“Liliana!” Mom shrieks.

We all jump. I guess the fighting became a background noise.

“Put that cage down! Oh no—Liliana!”

Nonna’s dirty cackle backs the flapping of wings.

Oh no.

She didn’t.

A burst of green comes flying into the front room. I bury my face in my hands. Can I ask for a new family for Christmas? I mean, I know that Santa doesn’t exist, but if I wish hard enough, will it be a possibility? Perhaps I was adopted. There’s no way I have this level of crazy flowing through the blood in my veins. It just can’t be possible.

Air comes toward the back of my head in a few short bursts, and a wolf whistle pierces the air.

“It’s behind me, isn’t it?” I whisper, stilling.

“Uh-huh,” Brody responds, thinly veiled laughter in his voice.

I drop my hand and slap my fingers against his thigh. “Fuck you.” My voice shakes.

“Hot wench!” Gio chirps, following it up with another wolf whistle.

“Please get rid of it,” I whisper to anyone willing to help me.

“Are you…scared of the parrot?” Drake asks.

When I turn to see him, he has a shit-eating grin spreading across his face.

“Wait,” he says.

“I swear to God, if you say it, I am going to shoot you in your sleep,” I grind out.

“The nightmares.”

He said it.

“Sleep with one eye open, you bitch.”

Gio whistles again.

“Liliana! Put the bastarding thing back in its cage!” Mom comes barreling into the front room after Nonna.

She’s still cackling. Nonna, that is.

I’m gonna go ahead and say she gets great pleasure out of Mom’s hatred of the bird.

“Nonna,” I say shakily. “Please put it back in its cage.”

She gasps. “Gio is-a not-a an it!”

“Hot wench!”

I get up and walk to the other side of the room. I stand by the bookcase, my arms folded and my eyes narrowed. Gio flies to me. I stalk toward Dad’s chair, and he follows me again. Everywhere I walk, he follows me.

“Nonna! Put him in his cage or I’m leaving!”

She considers this for a moment. “You-a won’t. You have-a a party to-a plan!”

I meet Amelia’s eyes. Hers widen, her cheeks paling.

Oh yeah. She has seriously cold feet. Props to her though. If I were her and Nonna was pulling this shit with me, she’d be… Well, she wouldn’t be alive in this room. That’s for sure.

“Yeah. I haven’t planned a thing. Haven’t even thought about it,” I admit.

Nonna gasps. Good Lord, the woman is gonna pass out from too much oxygen at this rate. “You-a what?”

“I haven’t planned it.”

“Noella!”

“I’m sorry if people dying is inconvenient for you,” I drawl, rolling my eyes.

Drake’s phone rings, and he excuses himself. Why is it always his phone? This isn’t fair. I want mine to ring and let me escape for ten minutes. Hell, I’d call my fucking self.

Why have I never done that?

“Noella! Amelia can’t-a get-a married without a party-a!”

“She can,” Amelia squeaks up.

“No no!” Nonna exclaims, waving her arms around like she’s being electrocuted.

Seriously. I’m waiting for them to come flying out of their sockets and slap me silly for my uselessness.

“She must-a have-a a party!”

Drake reenters the room with a grim look on his face. “Noelle, Brody, can we talk?”

Yes. Hell yes. Let’s go. Let’s go talk on Mars.

I shoot Amelia an apologetic smile then Devin a hard look. Grow a pair, ya damn fool. He looks away, shame coloring his cheeks.

Ever seen a twenty-nine-year-old, olive-skinned man blush?

It. Is. Hilarious.

He takes Amelia’s hand as I follow Brody out to the front yard. The echo of Mom snapping at Nonna to, “Put that goddamn bird in his cage,” is cut off when I kick the front door shut.

Oh, silence. You wonderful thing.

Drake runs his fingers through his hair. He does it every time he’s stressed, I realize. It’s something that happens a lot, which is the reason for the unruly, messy bundle of dark curls that never look tamed.

“Annabelle was raped. The DNA samples of semen Tim pulled were rushed through and compared to the samples removed our two other victims. They match—both sets. She wasn’t killed at the scene but dumped there with her car.”

“How did they get her car there? And why dump her?” Brody asks, leaning against the wall and chewing his thumbnail.

“The blood was old.” Drake pushes his hands into his pockets and pulls his shoulders back. “Tim guesses that she was abducted, injured, then forced to drive to an unknown spot. She was drugged, raped, and the ritual was performed. Blood traces were also found in the trunk along with some hair that Tim’s assuming belong to Annabelle, so the idea is that she was driven and dumped relatively off the beaten track. If her car hadn’t been left so obviously, she may not have been discovered for another day at the very least.”

I frown. If her body was supposed to be hidden, why would the car be so obviously left? Unless…

“What if they were interrupted?”

“Huh?” Brody lifts an eyebrow in question.

“When they were dumping her body. What if they meant to drive away with her car and leave it somewhere inconspicuous so it was at the side of the road, but someone saw them and checked it out? No one in their right mind parks up there in the middle of the night.”

Drake’s attention is fully on me. “So you’re saying…”

“They parked and dumped her body, but someone drove past and looked to see if the driver of the car was okay. It was too risky to drive away in it because the person who saw might remember, so they dumped it.”

“The ideal place to dump a car is a twenty-four-hour supermarket,” he reasons. “But then you’re on surveillance cameras… If the car was seen parked randomly earlier in the evening miles away, then it would raise red flags.”

“So would a car driven into a bunch of trees,” Brody snorts.

“Hey.” I hold my hands up. “I never said they were smart.”

“Murderers rarely are…” Drake muses, looking somewhere over my head at the dark-red tiles of my parents’ roof. His phone rings again in his pocket, and he looks disheartened as he answers it. “Sheriff… Uh-huh… Really? ... Uh…” He looks at me. “Yeah… She won’t do it alone… All right. I’ll tell her.” He hangs up and slides his phone back into his pocket.

“I’m not pretending to be a hooker to attract a murderer,” I say, pointing at him when he grimaces. “I mean it. I can’t take the shoes right now.”

He rolls his eyes. “One cut to the foot and the world is ending.”

“Right. From the guy who panicked like a virgin at an orgy because he thought he hurt me earlier.”

“I was not a virgin at a fuckin’ orgy.”

“All right, but I’m still not doing it. You’re no fisherman, and I’m not bait!”

“Can I tell you what was said before you freak the fuck out?”

“Too late.”

“Fuck me, Noelle. Be quiet!” he finally growls, covering my mouth with his hand.

I lick his palm. Tastes like man sweat. Yuck.

He frowns at his hand before wiping it on his jeans then covering my mouth again. Futile man sweat. Excellent.

“Brook Meyers has been seen at the fair.”

Brody pushes off the wall. “As in the guy we’re looking for?”

“Yep,” Drake confirms with a nod, looking at him. “Problem is, he knows it.”

Oh no.

I shake my head as he pulls his eyes to mine. “Oh,” I mumble against his hand. That was supposed to be no.

Drake nods. “Yes. Sheriff wants you to find him and call us in. You can call your team and pull them in to help you. The second he sees me, he’s gonna run.”

I stare him down. His eyes are hard, but they’re pleading. Really, what does he expect me to say? No? Brook Meyers could give us another step up the ladder that’s becoming this incredibly fucked-up case.

I grab his wrist and tug his hand away from my mouth. “Fine,” I agree. Sharply. I’m not happy about it and I’m going to make sure he knows. “But you take me to my house so I can get shoes that won’t have my foot cut open every time I step on uneven ground, and while I’m there, you can help call my team and explain to them.”

His lips curve up on one side in an amused smirk. “All right, cupcake.”

“And I still really fucking hate that nickname.”

“Why do you think I use it?”

“I hate you.”

He opens the door to his truck and helps me in, a smile twisting his lips. “Only on days that end in Y, right?”

I can’t help but smile back, despite the sliver of annoyance I feel. “Right.”