I spend hours in Nick’s conference room, working to put together a group of interested investors I can use to buy into the Sports Center, and while I have interest, I also have a long list of questions I need to answer for them, and me. By nine o’clock, Derek’s location is revealed and it’s almost comical to discover he’s at Martina’s sister’s house, fucking himself into a jail cell or a grave, whichever comes first. Nick ends up loaning me a car, and I head in that direction, stopping at the private garage of the Four Seasons and parking next to the Bentley. Wasting no time switching cars, I climb inside my vehicle, my senses instantly filled with the sweet scent of Emily that’s permeated the car. The smell softens a part of me I know has become hard, reminding me of everything right about holding her in my arms, that Adrian Martina makes wrong.
My cell phone buzzes with a text message from Nick: We’re a go.
Translation: Ted’s team has entered the BP plant and now I have to wait on the guard to call me to confront Derek. Things are about to get crazy and I dial Emily. “Shane,” she says, answering immediately and sounding anxious. “Where are you?”
Close and yet so far away, I think. “Still problem solving. It’s going to be a few more hours. Midnight or later.”
“Oh. Okay.”
“You don’t sound like it’s okay.”
“I’m worried about you.”
She’s worried about me. Not about the magnitude of the problems she discovered today, but about me. As an adult, I’ve never thought I needed, or wanted, anyone to worry about me, and yet, Emily caring matters. It calms and soothes the many rough spots inside me, which I am not sure I even knew existed.
“Shane?”
I blink and realize I’ve lost myself, and her, inside my own head. “It’s me who’s worried about you.”
“I’m safe in the apartment with a trusty guard protecting me.”
Her voice is strained, her attempt at lightness failing. She’s captive to my hell and her own, and I have to fix it all, starting with Martina, tonight. “A few more hours,” I say softly, when my phone beeps. “I have to take that. I’ll see you soon.”
“Shane, I—”
“Soon, sweetheart.”
I end the call and sure enough, it’s security at the BP plant. “I’ll be there as soon as I can,” I say, ending the call, and putting the Bentley in drive. Only ten minutes later, and a few miles away, I park in front of Teresa Martina’s little white cottage of a house that runs about half a million—hard to afford on a waitress’s pay. I grab the tape recorder from my pocket and turn it on before exiting the vehicle and charge up the walkway, pounding on the door. The curtain moves and then there is silence before Derek steps outside, his shirt hanging out of his pants.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” he demands.
“The FBI is inside the BP facility.”
“Fuck.” He scrubs the stubble on his jaw. “Right now?”
“Right now.”
He inhales and straightens. “They’re not going to find anything.”
“You better be damn sure of that or we’re in a world of hurt right now.”
“I am.”
“What about in Boulder? Because I just put Seth on a plane in that direction, and I need to warn him if there is anything there.”
“It’s clean.”
“You better be fucking sure, Derek.”
“I’m sure, Shane.”
“I’m not exactly confident in a man sticking his dick in Adrian Martina’s sister. You’re really an idiot with a death wish.”
“Or really damn smart, but then, you get the friends in the right places thing, or you wouldn’t be fucking Emily. Fine piece of ass, man. I hate you beat me to her, but I’m up for the challenge of turning her from your cock to mine.”
I want to hurt Derek, and I want to hurt him badly, but this is a test, a way to discover any feelings I have for Emily, which works in my favor in ways Derek can’t begin to understand. Not yet but he will. My lips quirk. “You can try,” I say, intentionally goading him for a reaction, “but I’ve always been better than you at everything, and you can’t stand it. I, on the other hand, quite enjoy it. I’m going to BP to ensure we don’t all end up in jail.”
His anger is instant, darkening his features, and crackling in the air around us, but I don’t stay to enjoy it. I turn and start walking, his stare following me, a hot beam that feels downright violent, my spine stiff as I wait for an attack that doesn’t come. I climb inside my car, and he’s no longer on the doorstep. I start the engine, and pull around the corner but still able to see the house, to wait for what I am certain will follow. And sure enough, five minutes later, my brother’s Porsche pulls out of the garage, turning toward downtown.
I follow, and in all of ten minutes, we’re at Martina’s restaurant. I park a block down and watch my brother enter, but I don’t alert Nick’s people I know are following me. They’re here. They’re watching, but we all know they can’t go inside with me. This one is on me. I grab the tape recorder that’s still running and turn it off, and not about to risk Adrian finding it, I leave it in the car. Stepping out of the Bentley, remnants of the snow crunching under my feet, I leave my coat behind. I start walking, the cold air welcome, its biting viciousness reminding me that I am alive and plan to stay that way. Emily’s voice plays in my head: Just come home safely, Shane. I shove it aside, facing the truth. You don’t win in a courtroom by fearing a loss. You enter the room confident, even arrogant, about the preparations you’ve made up to that point. And that’s the person I have to be right now. That’s the person I am.