Adored: A Masters and Mercenaries Novella (1001 Dark Nights) (19 page)

When he thought about it, the house he’d bought when he moved to Dallas didn’t fit Laurel. He’d given the realtor a set of parameters and when he’d found one that met his needs, he’d purchased it. Good neighborhood. Close to work. No big yard upkeep.

Laurel would have liked a yard. He didn’t have anywhere to sit in the back and when she’d brought it up, he’d told her no because it would be hot soon and no one sat outside in the Texas heat. He’d told her it was silly to spend good money on outdoor furniture they wouldn’t use for more than a few months of the year.

And she’d simply sighed and gone in to cook dinner.

Why had he done that? Why was it bothering him now?

Because she’s going to leave you. Because she’s going to find someone who’ll move heaven and earth to get her a damn patio set so she can sit outside and have her coffee even if it’s only a couple of days out of the year. Because she’ll find someone who can make her happy.

“Are you sure this wasn’t random, Mas…Lieutenant Brighton?” Lisa winced. “Sorry, Sir.”

Derek put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine though I notice he’s just Mitch to you. No formalities for him?”

She blushed. “He’s family. You put a baby up in my sister, you’re family. I don’t call my brother by a title either. Ever. It’s not going to happen no matter who spanks me.”

Liam chuckled, but Mitch was thinking it was nice that she didn’t even think to follow club rules with him. Because he was family.

“And I think the note left in her bedroom is solid proof that this wasn’t random.” Derek pointed to the door in the back. “If you’re careful, I’ll let you come back and see it. Try not to touch anything. Mitch, I’ll need your prints, too.”

But he wouldn’t. “I’ve never been here before. Lisa brought her a bag for the first week and when we decided she would stay with me, she came after work and picked up the stuff she wanted. I was stuck on a call about a liability claim against a company I represent.”

“You’ve never been here?” Derek asked, stopping in the doorway. “She’s lived here for three years.”

He’d never been to her apartment because he’d known what would happen if he came here. It had happened anyway. He’d pushed her away back then and now he had to wonder if he wasn’t doing the same thing now. He was crazy about her, but he still kept his distance. He still placed that very significant mileage between them.

Did he want it? Did it make him feel safe because she couldn’t quite touch his essential self?

He followed Derek. “No. I brought her to my place when I could. She worked for me. Our relationship was kept to the office until recently.”

“But she’s pregnant. At least that’s what I heard.”

“Yes, our son or daughter was conceived on my desk.” He nodded as he realized certain truths. “I probably should keep that desk. It’s kind of historical.”

His child—maybe his only kid—had been conceived on that desk. Would it be his only? How much better would his life had been if he’d had brothers or sisters to depend on? What if he hadn’t been alone in the world?

How could he get her pregnant again and quickly, so she would need him even more?

God, he was such a shit.

Liam was chuckling. “It’s good to keep that handy. Avery and I have a couch very much like that, brother.”

Derek laughed and entered the bedroom.

He heard Lisa gasp and felt her move closer to him.

When he saw the far wall, he pretty much wanted to kill someone.

Someone had spray-painted the wall over her bed.

Bradford’s whore

Oh, someone was going to die.

Lisa gasped and then he heard a low growl from behind him.

“Son of a bitch.” Will stepped into the room, his eyes wide and an angry look on his face. “Tell me you’re taking care of this, Mitch.”

“I’m doing everything I can. I’ve got O’Donnell on the case.” He hesitated mentioning the bodyguard. As sweet as Lisa was, she would absolutely go straight to her sister and tell her everything, and then he would have one very stubborn Laurel to deal with. He tried her phone again. She should be back from lunch by now.

It went straight to voice mail.

“Maybe it’s time we thought about getting her out of the line of fire,” Will said. “She can come and stay with me and Bridget.”

“No.” He wasn’t giving her up. “I told you, she’s safe at the house. My place is far more secure than your building. I’ve got the rest of it handled. There’s a reason he’s going after soft targets like this place.”

Will stared at him as though he could see through him. He finally nodded. “All right, but the minute he gets anywhere close, she needs to be out of this.”

“The contract is finalized next week. A few more days and it’s all over. He’ll have to find another target for his irrational rage.”

“Will, we’ve got an eye on all of this,” Li explained. “And Derek is taking another look, too.”

Will nodded and seemed to calm a bit. “I tried Laurel, but I can’t get hold of her. I’m going to run over to her office.”

Derek smiled and asked Lisa to join him so he could take her statement, leaving him alone with Will and Li.

Li leaned in, making sure Lisa couldn’t hear them. “Mitch put a bodyguard on Laurel a couple of weeks back.”

Will let out a long breath, obviously relieved. “Thank god. Does she know about the apartment?”

Mitch dialed her again and it went to voice mail. “No. I think you’re right. I think we should go and talk to her. Let me check in and make sure she’s all right.” He punched in a number and a Cajun accent came over the line.

“This is Guidry.”

“Do you have eyes on Laurel?”

“That’s my job. Though you should know that keeping my eyes on that pretty
chère
ain’t no job at all.”

Maybe she needed a new bodyguard. He had to hope all of Tag’s new employees weren’t such flirty asshats. “So she’s back at work?”

“Nah, she’s taking an extra long lunch today. Must have something to do with her male friend. You said this was a protection job. You didn’t tell me she was cheating on you. Do you want pictures or something?”

His blood seemed to chill. “What are you talking about?”

The line went quiet for a moment. “So this wasn’t about the fact that she’s getting cozy with someone else?”

His blood started to thump through his system. This was a place he’d been in before. It wasn’t the first time he’d stood there like an idiot while some professional investigator gave him the rundown of all the ways the woman he was committed to had given her body to someone else. A vision of Laurel in bed with some nameless man assaulted him. The man would be younger, kinder, more giving, he was sure. The new man would be all the things Laurel needed. All the things Laurel had given up when she’d gotten pregnant by Mitch. “Where is she?”

Guidry’s voice came over the line. “No, slow down. I was joking around. I was surprised that she was spending so much time with someone I haven’t seen before. She usually follows a routine. She eats lunch at her desk or in the break room. Maybe this is completely innocent.”

But she hadn’t mentioned that she was having lunch with a man. She’d texted him, as they’d agreed, to let him know her phone wasn’t working, but now he had to wonder. Was it truly not working or did she merely want to be alone with someone? She hadn’t mentioned any male friends. Laurel loved to talk about work. He knew the names of everyone there. She was friendly with some of the male workers. Maybe that was all it was.

“Is it one of her coworkers? I know she’s friends with a Jeremy.” That was all. Jeremy was young and good looking, but Laurel told him they were only friends. He forced himself to calm down. He was being an irrational freak. He trusted Laurel.

“No, I’ve documented all the coworkers. This is a new guy.”

“Where is she?” He would go and see for himself. Maybe she was interviewing a client. She took her work seriously and she was a compassionate woman. It didn’t mean she was cheating on him.

“She’s at the deli next to work. It’s not like she’s in a motel.”

“How long has she been there?”

“An hour and fifteen minutes. Look, Bradford, I really was joking. I was ribbing you. She’s been eating and talking.” There was another pause over the line. “That’s all.”

That little pause made him think. There was something else. Something Guidry wasn’t telling him. “What else? Damn it, Guidry. You work for me. I’m the one paying the bills, and I want to know what else she’s done with him.”

A long sigh came over the line. “She hugged him for a while and she seems pretty affectionate with him for a man she just met, that’s all. At one point, she held his hand for a little while as they talked. But from what I can tell, she’s an affectionate girl.”

She was affectionate with her family. She wasn’t with anyone else but her lover. No. God, this couldn’t be happening to him again.

Not with Laurel. Please not with Laurel.

He felt a piece of himself go cold. If Laurel was cheating, he had to go cold. If Laurel was sleeping with someone else, he might never warm up again.

“Call me if she leaves and get photos. I want to know who this man is and I want the information soon. I don’t care who you have to get on it. Find out who he is and how long she’s been seeing him.” He hung up.

“What the hell is going on, Mitch?” Will followed him as he started out of the apartment and toward his car.

He didn’t want to have this conversation now. He needed to get there. He needed to see for himself that Laurel was exactly like all the rest. She was looking out for her best prospect, and he’d always known it wouldn’t end up being him.

“It’s between me and your sister.” The last thing he needed was Will coming with him.

“I don’t like the look on your face. You need to calm down.” Will kept following him.

Mitch made it to his car. He wasn’t about to tote her brother around. He was sure Will would make a hundred excuses for her. He had to see it for himself and then he could figure out what to do.

He got in and immediately locked the door, started up the car and backed out. Will stared at him, shaking his head. He immediately got on his phone, very likely trying to warn Laurel that hell was coming her way. Poor Laurel. She’d left her phone behind so he couldn’t interrupt her date, and now that action was going to come back to haunt her.

He drove toward her work like a man possessed.

* * * *

Laurel sniffled as she hung up and passed the phone back to Flynn. “He seemed happy.”

Flynn slid the phone in his pocket. “I’m sure he was. You have no idea how much not having Mitch in his life has haunted my father. I think he made a choice at one point. He decided it was too hard to deal with Mitch’s mother and Dad gave up. He would send money, but not fight her on seeing him. He thought after Mitch turned eighteen they could start over again.”

She could have told him that would never have worked. Mitch was far too stubborn to allow that to happen. Though he didn’t talk about his father, she knew Mitch had to be angry with him. How could he not be?

She’d been angry with her mom. Her mother had battled addiction throughout Laurel’s childhood, but at the time all Laurel had been able to see was the fact that her mother consistently chose drugs over her children. Now she could look back with more mature eyes and see how hard her mother had it. Nothing was ever cut and dried. There were always two sides to a story and rarely was any one person perfectly good or perfectly evil. Most people tried. Her mother had come from an abusive family and despite her struggles, she’d never gone back, never exposed her kids to her fist-wielding father, though Laurel was sure at some points it would have been easier for her to have gone home. She’d come to peace with her mother, and it had been freeing to not have all that rage in her heart. She wasn’t sure how she could go into being a mom without it.

Mitch needed to see his dad. He needed to come to terms with his father before it was too late.

“I’m sure Mitch was stubborn. I’m surprised he took the money your father offered.”

“That was all Margot.”

He’d met Mitch’s ex? “Did you know her?”

Flynn frowned. “Yeah. When I met her I’d recently started college. I was pretty excited to meet Mitch since I’d heard about him all my life. Margot was an interesting woman.”

There was something about the way he said “interesting.” “I know she cheated on him with his business partner.”

Flynn’s eyes wouldn’t quite meet hers. “I would suspect that was just the tip of the iceberg.”

“What happened? Did she hit on you?”

“My father. I walked in once and she was all over Dad. He turned her down, but she was always looking for the best bargain. I remember that’s pretty much exactly what she said. She asked why would she go for the imitation when she could have the real thing. Dad tried to talk to Mitch about it but he wouldn’t hear anything he had to say. There was a huge fight and a few years later, Margot had Mitch’s firm and Mitch pretty much spent everything he had left to pay Dad back. When he started up the second time, he didn’t engage my father at all. I never met his second wife.”

Mitch had a lot of reasons to distrust relationships. From what she’d managed to uncover, his second wife had cheated on him, too. “His mother had a lot of relationships.”

“Oh, yes. From what I understand she went from wealthy man to wealthy man. It didn’t matter if they were married or single. If they could take care of her, she was okay with it. She’s been married five times, but there were many more men. She moved often. I’m sure that had an effect on Mitch.”

He held on to things that didn’t matter because he found them comforting. All those places he’d lived and likely not a one of them had been a home. He couldn’t trust the ground underneath his feet. It was constantly changing.

She could see him as a child. Alone. Confused. Afraid.

That would not happen to her baby. And it wouldn’t happen to Mitch again either. Not if she had any say in it.

The door to the deli opened and she gasped in surprise. Mitch stood there, his face a bright red as he looked over the customers, his eyes finally falling on her. His jaw hardened and a nasty light hit his eyes.