Page 5 of Jack of Hearts
Alex’s words sank in. At the thought of seeing him with a date, something that felt a lot like jealously unfurled, and she swallowed hard. This was her first time experiencing such a thing, and she didn’t at all like it.
“Sounds like a good plan,” she lied. “You never answered my question. Will you teach me how to defend myself?”
There was a slight hesitation. “Yes, but some other time. I need to get back to Aces and Eights. I’ll see you tomorrow night. Lock the window behind me.”
Like a thief in the night, he slipped away, and she dutifully turned the lever, locking herself in. Without him, the room suddenly felt empty, and she stood for a moment in the quiet. What did she know of him other than he was Ramon’s friend, he owned a biker bar with his brothers, and he qualified on all counts as a bad boy?
Bad boys were Lauren’s thing. Her roommate was the one with a weakness for the creatures, not Madison. Well, not until this one, anyway. But what truly bad boy climbed a drainpipe to retrieve a child’s ball? The same day he’d hauled Ramon off her, she witnessed Alex pulling over his motorcycle, alongside a little boy who was crying. She’d left her uncle’s house right after Alex, and upon seeing him stopped, she had nosed her car into a parking spot where he wouldn’t notice her.
He had squatted next to the sobbing boy who she guessed to be around four, and after a brief conversation, Alex had peered up. She’d followed his gaze, but hadn’t seen anything. Then he’d patted the child on the shoulder before standing and shimmying up the drainpipe like a freaking monkey. At the roofline, he’d reached up, fumbling around in the gutter, and then, viola, a baseball had appeared in the hand he held out for the boy.
The child broke into a wide smile as he clapped his little hands. It was what Alex did next, though, that had ruined his bad boy image as far as Madison was concerned. He’d slid down the pipe, picked up the boy, walked up to the door of the house, and rang the bell. When a man answered, from where she sat, it appeared Alex had given the guy a stern talking-to. Madison wanted to applaud Alex for stepping in where others wouldn’t have, because who left such a young child alone on the street these days?
That was the day she’d moved him from bad boy status to hero status. So when he’d told her to call him if she ever needed him, she’d suggested her room as a meeting place.
Along with having a roommate who would come running if she screamed, she kept a knife under her pillow, should her cousin decide to make a surprise appearance, which she wouldn’t put past him. She felt pretty well protected.
Alex had balked at first, telling her that she didn’t know him well enough to be making such an invitation, and that had only served as further reason to trust him. South Miami Beach was a small community where, except for the tourists, everyone knew everyone, she’d argued. If they met anywhere else, sooner or later Ramon would hear about it. Since Alex couldn’t deny that, he’d finally given in.
Problem was, what had started as a kind of business relationship between them was evolving into her having naughty thoughts about him. Too bad he didn’t think of her the same way.
CHAPTER TWO
Alex rode back to Aces & Eights sans helmet, something he’d never done before. But he needed the cool night wind on his face and whipping through his hair after being so close to Madison. There had to be somewhere else they could meet, a place that didn’t have both her and a bed in it.
His brain had gone on vacation when he’d agreed to teach her self-defense. That would mean touching her. Just being close to her tonight, he’d felt her heat, inhaled her lemony scent, and wanted nothing more than to put that bed of hers to good use. If he followed through on the promise of showing Madison how to protect herself, he’d definitely have to find a place without a bed anywhere near the premises. Of course, that would still leave the floor, up against the wall, atop a desk if there was one ...
He took the corner hard, scraping the bottom of the foot peg across the asphalt, the grinding noise echoing in the night. Throttling up, he tried to outrun thoughts of a woman with cat-green eyes.
It worked for a few minutes as he raced down the empty street, but then she crept back into his mind. He couldn’t tell her he was FBI for fear that she would slip and say something around Ramon. Nor was he entirely certain that she was clueless about the family business and what Ramon and his father were involved in.
Worse, he was the lead on an operation to take down part of her family. When that came about and she realized he had helped make it happen, she would hate him. That trust in him shining so brightly in her eyes would vanish when her cousin and uncle were hauled away in handcuffs.
Better not to know what he might be missing, so no kissing her. Ever. No doing any of the things he’d fantasized about since he’d first met her. She was a source for information and nothing more. When he returned to the bar, he would tell his brothers about her. Once she wasn’t his personal secret, his fascination with her would diminish. Satisfied he had his priorities straight, Alex eased back on the throttle and turned the bike toward Aces & Eights.
“When you gonna tell us who your informant is?” Nate asked.
Court brought three ice-cold bottles of beer to the table, sliding into the booth next to Alex. “Yeah, you’ve never been so secretive before. What gives, bro?”
Good question. Alex enjoyed the end of the day when, after locking up, he and his brothers would have a beer together before heading home. Sometimes they’d have some laughs over something Spider or some other dude had done, but usually they’d go over their progress on building a case against the Alonzo family. With Ramon MIA, things had stalled a bit.
Although he’d decided to level with them about Madison Parker, a.k.a. Spooky Man, Alex hesitated, that damn need to protect her surfacing again. If his brothers knew about her, they’d push him to use her to the fullest extent. Although he would do that, he wanted to do it his way. Hell if he knew exactly what that way was. There was a black hole in his mind, one he wanted to fill in before he gave his brothers Madison’s name. He also hoped to ascertain her innocence first, if she was innocent.
Being FBI agents, they were naturally suspicious of anyone with connections to the bad guys. Once he knew which side of the line Madison was on, and if it was the right one, he could better argue her case. If it turned out he was wrong about her, then she’d go down with her uncle and cousin. Yeah, he needed to know more about Madison Parker before he turned over her name.
“Ramon will be back tomorrow. He’ll be at the Flamingo Bar around five, and I plan to just happen to go there with a date.”
He’d never been able to pull one over on Nate, who narrowed his eyes. “Spooky Man tell you this?”
It was close, but Alex managed not to squirm as if he were still ten years old and in trouble with his older brother. “Yep. I need a date.”
Court snorted. “Just pick one of the many outta that contact list of yours.”
“And put an innocent woman in Ramon’s sights?” There were a good number of female names stored in his phone, and he tried to think of one who could hold her own against Ramon. There were a few biker groupies in there, and any one of them probably could, but he was still uneasy about bringing any of them into contact with the Alonzo family.
“Taylor Collins.”
Alex gave Nate an appreciative nod. “Good thinking.” Taylor was a fellow FBI agent, and he should have thought of her.
