Page 14 of The Mafia Enforcer's Temptation
I’m not sure I like her. But me liking or not liking her is irrelevant. I want to know why she was there, why I think she made and planted the small bombs, and who the fuck taught her to build them like she was from the mean streets of Belfast.
I leave my phone and everything else, including my ID, locked in a compartment in the car. I grab a burner and switch it on, then I find a place to stand and watch her.
Fuck, I wish I smoked. It’d give me something to do while I pretend to play with my phone as I watch her building from the shuddered doorway across the street.
I’ll fucking go in there and pick her lock if she doesn’t come out.
But it’s a Friday night in the city and midnight’s early, especially at this end of Manhattan.
A laughing, chattering group of girls pass me by, probably off to some bar.
She must be out. After all, I doubt she stole those pieces of jewelry to wear. And in a run-down building like hers? No way is she leaving them in an apartment.
I didn’t take them all from her. Just some of them. She’ll want to sell them, and I don’t think a pawn shop’s gonna take those kinds of items. If it were me, and it has been in the past, I’d do a deal in a pub or bar. Somewhere dark but open, and with someone who’ll pay with hard cash.
The air’s a little cool tonight. I let out a sigh and look around, almost missing the building door open. A creaking sound jolts me, and I see the girl step out in a cap, wearing thick-soled sneakers and a loose, summery dress. She has a bucket bag slung over one shoulder.
The light outside her building is out and she moves fast, sticking to the shadows along the buildings.
There are questions festering inside of me, questions that beg for answers. From who she fucking is to why she had that crest and why she kissed me.
Scratch that, I already know that answer. She wanted to create a distraction.
But I want answers to the rest, especially why she stole the crest from Romanov, how she knows him, and why the fuck she went back into the mansion after she snagged it.
She darts through the crowds of people on the street, not looking over her shoulder, but turning toward the shop front and bar windows when she can, probably using them to check her back.
I follow her on the other side of the street, the idea that she’s somehow aware I’m in her vicinity makes my pulse leap.
She turns down a smaller street. I cross over and follow.
The girl speeds up, pulling off the cap and letting her long raven hair flow down her back.
The lights of a cab turning down the street hit her and that leap turns explosive.
The dress material is thin. She’s tall with curves in the right places and long fucking legs. This time, she isn’t wearing the Lycra body suit.
I could, if I wanted, speed up, drag her up against the wall at the side of a building, and this time sample that cunt. I could push my fingers into her and then rub her juices on her lips and make her lick my fingers clean.
Fuck.
She stops and opens a door, bathed in red and blue light for a moment as music pumps before the door closes behind her.
I follow her into the bar.
Dingy and dark and full of the kind of people I don’t trust. Then again, these low-life types are always for hire or willing to shake someone down if you ask. And they keep to themselves.
If I started a fight with the lone guy in the corner of the bar and knifed him, they’d step over him to reach the bar, but nothing more.
The music’s some weird-ass techno country that irritates my fucking ears. I look around. She’s not here.
Up ahead is a sign for the bathroom, and the bartender, a guy whose muscles have muscles, is picking fresh cash up from the bar.
I take a guess and nod. “I’ll have what the lady had.”
He doesn’t say a word. I drop two twenties on the bar and get a bourbon and Coke in return. I wait and he gestures slightly with his head to the back of the place.
I leave a third twenty, take the drink, and go the way he indicated, past the bathrooms to a small room where I spot her.
