Page 4 of Facet

I’d dug into her birth certificate and found that it was falsified. Not forged, because it was a legit California birth certificate, but the hospital documents attached to it were fake as fuck. Whoever had set everything up had a lot of money and a lot of really dirty contacts if I couldn’t find a trail past that.

So far, everything I’d found had been a dead end. Then again, it’s hard to get to the truth when you don’t know when someone’s real birthday is, where they were born, or anything about their biological family. Not even Voodoo and Madame Laveaux had had any luck.

We searched missing persons cases over a five-year span of her documented birthdate. The sad thing was, there were a fuck ton of children that went missing and trying to search through all of them from a sixty-month period was time consuming.

We’d even done one of those ancestry DNA tests to see if anything came back. So far, there were only a few distant possible hits that hadn’t panned out to anything helpful.

“Why don’t you just fuck her and get it over with?” Ghost continued.

Anger vibrated through me, and I spun my stool to face him. “Because I can’t.”

“Why the hell not? You don’t have a dick?” His smirk told me he was kidding, but I was half tempted to pull it out and prove him wrong.

“She doesn’t need the likes of me,” I shot back.

He frowned. “What do you mean by that? And do you think any of us motherfuckers deserve the women we’ve been blessed to find? I sure as hell don’t, but guess what? I ain’t lettin’ Laila go until the day I get called home. And even then, I’ll probably still haunt her as I wait.”

I snorted. “You’re actually haunting her now.”

“Semantics.” He shrugged, then set his glass of beer down and stared at me. Hard.

“What are you trying to do, read my mind? Talk to me telepathically like Blade?” I drily asked.

“No. I’m just trying to figure out why you’re so damn scared.”

“I’m not fucking scared. There are things about me you don’t know—no one knows. I’m not a man any woman should fall in love with.”

His gaze narrowed. “What don’t I know? Enlighten me.”

“It’s not worth it,” I mumbled, running my thumb through the condensation on my glass and acting like it was the most interesting thing I’d ever seen. I wasn’t ready to discuss what had happened.

“If it’s so insignificant, then why won’t you make your move with Willow? Anyone with half a brain can see she’s in love with you.”

My teeth ground together. I didn’t want to hear that—it only made it harder to stay away.

I buried those thoughts and forced an easy grin on my face as I returned my attention to Ghost. “Then how didyousee it?”

He punched me in the arm. “Shut the fuck up, you little asshole.”

We both laughed. Then a chill of awareness washed over the surface of my skin.

“Would you like another drink?” Her soft voice was a siren’s song to my dick. Swiveling my head to look at her, I braced myself. But, like usual, it did little good. Everything about her assaulted my senses. My breath seized in my chest, and I had to remind my body to work right.

“I’m good.” That was a lie. Inside, I was wound tight and ready to snap. Being near her did shit to me no one else had ever done. Because of what I was, that terrified me. I couldn’t risk entanglements.

“Ghost?” she asked.

“I’m good, darlin’,” he drawled and gave her a wink that had me wanting to punch him in the damn eye. His low chuckle told me he knew exactly what he was doing.

“Are you still gonna be able to give me a ride back to the clubhouse when I get off?” she asked Ghost. When he had brought her in to work, it had taken supreme willpower not to go ballistic. The sight of her tits against his back and her legs around his hips had me seeing red, but I’d kept that shit locked down tight. It didn’t matter that he had an amazing woman of his own, and he was undeniably faithful to her.

“Actually, I need to get home. Laila messaged me that Dexter got into her makeup and ate it all. She’s fit to be tied, and I need to get straight home. But I’m sure Facet will make sure you get there,” he smugly announced, and my attention darted to him with a sharp glare.

Willow let out an airy laugh that sent a tendril of ownership up my spine. “Poor Laila. I bet she’s questioning your decision to bring that puppy home.”

Laila and Willow had become fast friends and had grown closer after Cookie left. Laila and I had a bond born of the years we worked together in the dark void of cyberspace. She’d had a rough life, but she was pretty badass. I was glad Willow had Laila in her corner.

“I don’t think—” I started but was interrupted by my least favorite prospect.

---