Fool's Gold: A Kisses and Crimes Novel (11 page)

BISHOP

The phone rings, picking up after the third repetition.

“
Reed here.
”

“Jackson…
shit
, you’re up.”

“Christ, Bishop.”

I hear Jackson shift through sheets on the other end of the line.

“God Almighty.
Stop fucking calling me at three in the morning.
I thought you were my little French hottie.”

“The waitress from the little cafe?”

He laughs. “Yup. My little croissant. Her name’s Amelie.
You haven’t lived until you’ve loved a French girl, Bish
. I should know… I’ve fallen for at least three.”

“And by ‘fallen,’ I’m sure you mean ‘fucked’.” I bring the phone closer. “I’ll pass… Right now, I’ve got too many women to think about.”

“
Too many?
Got something you want to tell me, Bishop…?”

I hear Jackson perk up. I take a long inhale off my cigarette.

“Other than the fact that I’m following your advice about Barcelona? Not really. I just need a pit-stop in Paris to see P.”

Jackson snorts.

“See? That’s your problem right there.
One of those ‘p-words’ doesn’t belong…
”

He groans, sighing.

“What do you need with ‘Pain-in-the-ass’ anyhow?”

“Some
saving
of my own ass.”

“That’s what
I’m
here for.”

“Not this time, Jax. I need a reprieve in Paris before going to Barcelona. I need someone to help me check-in my luggage.”

“They’ve got
baggage handlers
for that at the trains and airports.”

“Oh, yeah?” I drop my cigarette, stomping on the half-snuffed spark. “Who the hell helps you when the cargo is
human
, Jax?”

***

DANI

When I daydreamed just a day ago about being tied to Bishop’s bedposts, it wasn’t exactly like this…

It turns out…
this
is what happens when an argument with Bishop goes awry. He imprisons you.

This is the most dysfunctional marriage I have ever fucking heard of. If he wasn’t so goddamned good-looking, I’d swear what we had was some sort of shotgun marriage.

Maybe it was…

He stalks the room like a panther, his outfit blacker than the hair on his head and jaw. He watches me as I struggle in his handcuffs. He tries to make me feel comfortable.

And I try to kick at his fucking balls.

I miss for the third time.

“
This
is how you resolve arguments?” I say, sitting on the huge king mattress in our new Parisian loft. “You tie me to a bed? Cuff me there until I shut up?”

“This wasn’t how I resolved them before,” Bishop answers, taking off his sunglasses. He stares me down with heated eyes. “But this is the way I’ll resolve them now if you can’t stay still.”

“Stay still? I’m not a dog.”

“No, you’re worse. At least a dog
sits
when you tell it to.”

Another foot swings in Bishop’s direction, missing.

“You’ve had your fun,” I spit at him. “Now let me go. You heard what that fat bastard of a cop from the street said.”

“I
will
uncuff you…” Bishop answers. “As soon as you stop trying to run away.”

My voice lowers. My teeth clench. “I didn’t try to run away…”

“No, ‘try’ wouldn’t be the right word. You succeeded.” Bishop stands on the far end of the room, leaning against the wall. “I had to practically drag you back here half an hour ago.”

“I have every right to run,” I say, my voice dripping with disdain. “I’ve just been attacked. And the man who saved me isn’t
exactly
what I wouldn’t call anybody’s
hero
.”

His exhale is loud, his leather jacket rising and falling on his wide shoulders as he sighs.

I regard him closely, wanting to knock his nuts into next week.

I cross my legs under my long, pleated black skirt, and I give him a sharp look that I wish could slice him into two.

“I didn’t escape one psychopath to end up in the hands of another.”

I make my implication crystal clear.

But of course, Bishop doesn’t back down.

He walks a straight line towards me, keeping his stare steady. When he reaches the edge of the bed, he crouches at the knee, placing his forearm on the mattress three feet away.

He glowers at me. Unblinking.

“You don’t trust me, do you?” he asks.

“You’ve very perceptive…” I glance him over. “Smarter than you look.”

He doesn’t bite at the snarky remark. Not the way I want him to.

I want to piss him off. I want to make him feel crazy the way he makes me feel every time he’s around me. Every time he touches me or even looks at me.

But he doesn’t do anything.

In fact… he almost smiles.

“I look dumb to you, Dani?”

“You look…”

Too good to be fucking true.

“Like a criminal and a coward,” I finish.

“Coward?” He laughs low. “You should know better by now… There’s not a goddamned thing cowardly about me, kitten.”

I notice that he doesn’t address the “criminal” part of my statement.

“And the handcuffs are to protect you, Dani,” he comments.

I scoff, not believing a word he says. “Protect me from who?”

“From yourself.” Bishop stands again at last. “And any fucking bastard that would use your amnesia for their own sordid goddamned benefit.”

“Any bastard like
you
?”

I bang my cuffs against the bedpost, and he waves the Frenchman’s wallet in his hand, a token the dirty bastard unwittingly left behind.

“Sit tight.”

As if I had a choice.

I knew it. I knew I should have kneed his nuts into the next dimension when I had a chance. I’ll never break free from him now.

“This doesn’t make any sense,” I say to him, my voice rising. “
This
… is
bullshit
. All of these cryptic messages. Talking without really saying anything. You haven’t answered for
shit!
”

My words turn into a scream.

“Who are you?!”

At that Bishop hangs his head, rubbing the scruff around his lip and chin, before turning back to me with fire in his eyes. He places his hand on the front door knob to the apartment, and immediately I can see the regret in his face.

I want to cry.

“I’m the man who risked
everything
for you, Dani. And that’s all you need to know.”

He opens the door slowly before slamming it behind him.

It shakes the entire suite in its wake… and what little kernel of faith in him I still had left.

BISHOP

They call me “the Crow.”

I never liked that fucking nickname.

It was a tradition at first. To call the man guarding the boss’s back and taking perch on his shoulder “the Crow” to let others know that he would be there.

Ever-present. Ever-watching. Waiting to strike.

The guardian of the crops. The protector of all that the big boss had sown.

What a crock of shit. The name was supposed to end with John Gafanelli.

But of course, it didn’t.

Don, wanting to be so much like his father, picked it right back up. And it was easy.

My features were dark, my hair—raven. When enemies looked at me, they saw a shadow. When Don Gafanelli looked at me, he saw “the Crow.”

And so the Crow is what I had to become.

I was twenty-three years old.

Orphaned… left alone in the world, I hadn’t been able to save my own parents when they’d been violently ripped out of my life.

When I met the man who helped raise me, I found my calling. When I met Don Gafanelli, I’d found a
purpose
.

I knew what I had to do, and when he’d taken me under his wing, it was all so easy. So simple to enter into his world.

I thought that nothing would stand in my way—that nothing
could
stand in my way.

I could cake-walk into the most infamous mafia family in the United States. I was living the dream until I met… her.

She was more petite than I presumed. Blonder.

Her hair flowed to her waist, and she had lips the color of maraschino cherries.

Smart. Wittier than a bitch too. She had cut my ego in half within seconds of meeting her.

She’d infuriated her father. Embarrassed her mother.

But me? She had only peaked my interest. I spent half the night chasing her.

I think a part of me has been chasing her ever since.

And now I’ve caught her. But what do I do with her?

I should have never been at that Sweet Sixteen party. I should have never been allowed into that circle of politicians and CEO’s and magnates and tycoons and mob bosses.

But I was.

And I made the most of it.

I thought I could do that now… but then the worst (or
best
) thing I could have imagined happened…

She forgot me. She forgot herself.

And now I’m responsible for building the memories back. A job I’d never asked for. A job I shouldn’t have been given.

I was born into a life of horrors.

If I could’ve erased it all, I would’ve. I would’ve wiped the slate clean and started over, but with Dani? How can I?

She deserves a clean slate more than anyone, to not be born to a father who dabbled in more double-dealings than the Devil himself.

But who am I to judge? Who am I to make the decision about which pieces should stay and which should go?

I’d do anything to not have to tell her the truth.

My Dani.

So pure, so beautiful, so fucking right. Born into a world of so much fucking wrong.

The amnesia was like a gift and a curse, sent to tempt me into rewriting history.

What if we could start over? What if we could leave it all behind?

But now I know that’s not possible. The crooked cop was just a reminder. We could flee the past, but it would always chase us.

Her father will never let her go… and I was once of the mind that I could…

But things are different.

Being with Dani is like touching ecstasy and being expected to hand it over.

Holding her. Touching her. Fucking her gently with my fingers. These are the things I now live for.

Just to lie down beside her and smell her skin. To talk to her until the night turns into day and still never get enough.

As I walk the street outside of our “new apartment” window, all I can think about is how absolutely
fucked
I am—how I want to spend every day doing the things I’d dreamed about.

Dani. Soft and warm beneath me. Dani. With my name on her lips and her fingertips digging into my skin.

Dani. Squeezing my hardness like a silken glove, taking everything I have to give—giving everything back in return.

I should never have taken her.  I should never have touched her.

I should never have married my own wife.

***

“You can’t be that fucking stupid…”

“Guess I am.”

“I’d never taken you for being suicidal.”

“Sorry to disappoint.”

Penelope slams her third manila folder of the day down onto her desktop. Blue eyes blazing, red hair shining, she crosses the length of her Parisian office in a suit the color of her navy eyes.

She regards me closely, tucking a ginger-colored lock over her ear—a nervous habit she’s had since she was a girl.

Incensed, outraged, she hides her concern for me behind a façade of fury, strutting towards me with a powerful walk, attempting to dissuade me with a lethal tongue.

She insults me from the minute I set foot inside the door.

“The fact that I’m wrong about you isn’t what’s disappointing. The fact that you don’t seem to care
is
.”

She shakes her hands in front of my face.

“I always knew you were a different son-of-a-bitch. Crazy? Yes. A boundary-pusher? Abso-fucking-lutely. But this? This, Bishop?”

Penelope shakes her head sadly, retreating from me.

“This is crossing a line. A line I may not even be able to help you with…”

I step forward, placing my hands into my jean pockets.

“You’ve done it before…” I start.

“Yeah! And it
almost
cost me my job. It
did
cost Jackson his job.”

Penelope turns on me.

“A damned good one, at that.” She sits once more behind her desk. “Hell, I never would have gotten this job if Governor Price didn’t see something in me and want to hire me.”

I cut my eyes at Penelope, scoffing. “Yeah, sure. The
honorable
Governor Price.”

Penelope picks up her pen, tapping it.

“More honorable than
your
bastard of a boss.
And it’s
my
connections through her that have kept your ungrateful ass out of hot water. And I honestly don’t know if I can keep doing it…”

I freeze at hearing her admission, saying nothing.
Damned if she isn’t right.

But Penelope doesn’t wait for my reply. She starts writing.

“I could guess that one day you’d be stupid enough to risk your life… but I never thought I’d see the day where you’d risk Dani’s.”

“P, look…”

“Don’t fucking ‘P’ me right now, Bishop. I’m not in the mood…”

“What?
Everybody
calls you ‘P’.”

“
Noo.
They don’t… Everybody calls me ‘Penny.’ You’re the only person I know who think it’s appropriate to call someone ‘Penis” from the ages of ten to thirteen, and think that shortening it to ‘P’ is some sort of term of endearment.”

She glances sternly up at me.

“Does she even know about you? I mean, after the memory loss?”

I don’t hesitate. “No.”

“Well, tell her... before you both do actually
end up dead.”

“It’s not that fucking simple, Penelope.” Frustrated, I run a hand through my thick head of hair. “Who would believe the
fucked up
truth?”

Exasperated, feeling stifled in her office, I walk over to the window behind Penelope, watching a silent rain fall on the quietly bustling city of Paris.

The canal of the river we overlook is silent as the water beats a beautiful pattern on its surfaces.

I couldn’t have picked a more gorgeous locale to escape to… and yet the majestic scenery feels almost tainted,
poisoned
by the horror I’m almost positive is going to follow.

I’d grown up with horror.
Would I ever escape it?

“Everyone thinks I tried to kill her, Penelope...”

Penelope sighs.

“Not
everyone
, Bishop…” She folds her hands neatly. “Some of us do know the truth.
Dani
knows the truth… even if she’s doesn’t remember it.”

“Shit, all Dani knows right now is that she wants to drop-kick me right in the p…” Penelope grunts loudly in response. “—the pillars and post… Beyond that…” I pause. “She doesn’t seem to know anything else.”

I listen to the wheels in Penelope’s head begin to turn.

“Well…” she commiserates, “you’ve got at least one friend in your corner… even if she is a red-headed, hot-headed bitch like me.”

I can practically hear her smirk.

“I didn’t come all the way out to the Parisian office for beignets, Bishop.” She places a hand on my shoulder from behind.  “I came here to help.”

My eyes follow the shiny cars on the blackened wet streets, seemingly heading towards the dusky Paris horizon. If only Penelope
were
here under better circumstances…

If only Dani and I were, too…

“I appreciate you, P. I do.”

“And do me a favor,” she cuts in. “The next time you need another batch of fake passports...” She hands me one thick manila enveloped file. “Please use another messenger.
Jackson is a pain in the ass
.”

“You two have a lot in common,” I smirk.

“Besides
you
and a mutual disdain for one another…?” She cocks an eyebrow. “I don’t think so.”

I push away from the window, passing Penelope’s desk.

“Thank the Governor for me, P, will ya?”

Penelope scoffs. “Yeah… I’ll send her your
highest
regards…”

I reach for P’s heavy office door.

“And Bishop…” she calls. I turn.

“I’m not the
only
one in your corner here. Dani is, too… whether she knows it or not.”

She sits on the edge of her oak desk.

“I’ve never seen you love anything more than her… Not even me.”

I give P one final look before leaving.

By the time I manage to make it to the street where our Paris loft is located, the dusk has turned into an even dark twilight.

The crooked grey sidewalk bleeds into the cobblestone of the street, and amber-golden streetlights cast a golden hue over every doorway.

Rain, light and warm, leads the way, casting a dampened path to the front door of my new building, and I shake the wetness off of my shoulders, attempting to shake off the stupid fucking dread I feel at having to tell Dani the truth.

The
real
truth.

The truth she deserves.

It’d be so easy if I could get one other inconvenient truth out of the fucking way…

That I’m a liar. That I’m a fraud. And I’m the last person on earth she should ever trust…

I take the key out of my pocket, prepared to open the door to the apartment. I wait one second, then two…

A slip into the keyhole, one twist of the tiny metal, and I’m in.

The second I open the door, I know that something’s terribly wrong.

I try to unlock the door…

I realize it is already unlocked.

A quick survey of the living room turns up empty. After a hasty walk-through, the same turns up for the bedroom.

Im-fucking-possible.

Because that’d mean I’m missing one important thing…

Dani.

The spot where she sat bears the silhouette of her body, the outline of her shape. The handcuffs are gone, and in their place are these little notches.

I see scrapes and scuffs that hadn’t been there, markings highlighting places where her fastened metal handcuffs had been pulled.

Gun out, laser focused, I kick the bathroom door open with a deafening
thwack
, searching behind the shower curtain.

I check the closets. The window.

No trace.

Somebody walked right out with her—right through my fucking front door.

Her purse is gone, her cell phone—vanished. It’s almost as if she were never here, though I can still feel the warmth of her on my bedroom sheets.

Not too far behind the scent of her trail, I make a beeline for the door, my cell phone tracker firmly in hand.