Motown Breakdown (Motown Down #4) (31 page)

Stretching, I check my phone for the time and see it’s pushing ten am. The weather looked mild, which for mid-September meant chilly in the morning. Dressing, I grab my coffee for a refill needing to speak with Shade. With a hot mug, I found him in his office with a man sitting across from him. Backing away so I didn’t interrupt, he catches me and calls me back in. “What do you need?” he asks impatiently.

When he met with clients he preferred I didn’t speak so I stayed quiet hoping he’d just tell me to leave. “Who’s this one going to? She looks familiar but then again they all look the same when their mouths are full.” Why do I feel like I know this guy? Studying him closer, I felt like someone walked over my grave. Why was he familiar to me and not in a good way? “Since when do you let them free range?”

“What the fuck did you just say?” I ask stepping forward, familiarity forgotten.

Grabbing my wrist with surprising force, I felt my bone start to crunch and with my free arm, I balled up my fist connecting with his eye. Still not releasing me, I planned on following up but Shade was around his desk with a knife in the man’s throat. “She belongs to
me
,” he says pointing to the wrist he was crushing.

The man slowly looks down and then let’s go like I electrocuted him. “She’s wearing your brand,” he chokes out, shocked. Why a tattoo of a moon freaked this guy out was beyond me.

“She is,” he says not removing the knife.

“But I thought you were – ”

“Who told you to think at all, Armand?” he asks nicking his throat. Tossing the name around I had to admit it didn’t sound familiar to me. “I’m afraid our business is concluded. See yourself out and make yourself scarce.”

“We aren’t finished,” he tries to say but Shade wasn’t having it.

“Our association ended the moment you marked her.”

With Armand running for the door, I would wonder later why he couldn’t stop staring at me; but for now I was focused on Shade. Still nursing my wrist, I was caught off guard when he turns his anger at me. “You,” he says gripping that knife. “Have too many clothes on, remove them.”

When I didn’t move fast enough, he took the knife and cut them away leaving them in tatters on the floor. Shoving me over to the desk, he kicks my ankles apart and applies pressure to my back letting me know he wanted me on my stomach. I hear his pants unzip, I feel him behind me then I cry out when he fills me without warning. With a hand on my spine, he fucks me with nothing but pure anger. Maybe I should have protested, but I didn’t because it felt too good. How I ever thought him robotic is beyond me and I’ll admit I misjudged him.

Shade uninhibited was worth being face down for. Between his grunts and my uninjured hand playing between my legs, I was close to coming and ready for it. Ripping my hand away, he cages me in allowing me no room to move. Did that stop me from coming? Nope. My release set him off and a minute later, he pulled out leaving it all over my back as evidence.

“I’m finished,” he says walking back to his seat and tucking himself in. While still on my stomach, he meets my eyes and announces, “You’re dismissed.”

You’re dismissed…

This morning I waited impatiently for her to wake up. When she did I was pissed off that she wasn’t an emotional mess. Had she been tweaked out, I wanted to be the one to comfort her and assure her she was in the right. That she was justified and to come to me when she struggled. She wasn’t a wreck, not her. No, she was all smiles and cracking jokes.

Her final joke set me off because when she set her cup down, I was reminded that once again, the woman in my care had been marked. After last nights blood bath, I couldn’t fucking decide if I should keep her or let her go.  I wanted to keep her but I knew keeping her was a disaster waiting to happen. The thought of letting her go did not please me. In fact it had me on edge. Then Armand, thinking he had a right to touch her, almost died because of it.

The bastard had been a client here for twenty years and I promised to kill him if I ever saw him again. This was a problem both business and personal. Before she showed up, shit like Armand pulled wouldn’t have been considered a traitorous act. Armand knew who Luna was, that she was off limits but he didn’t know that about Sun. No one knew about Sun and if I allowed clients inside my office, odds were good this would happen again.

When she rubbed her injured wrist I fucking snapped.

Treating her like a random fuck, I used my God damn blade on her like she was nobody, disposable. That’s the other problem, for me she wasn’t nobody she was fast becoming somebody and I panicked. It didn’t matter that she got off on it. What mattered was, I couldn’t afford to keep her around. The stunt we pulled yesterday was ten ways from fucked up and I knew better than to agree to it. You can’t run a business if you can’t keep your gun in your holster. Sun would want to save everyone, it’s just who she was. That wasn’t her fault, it was mine for thinking I could stand in both worlds. That she could stand beside me. Hell, not even Luna could. Needing a moment to calm myself, I dismissed her. Dialing Luna, she answers just like she was trained to.

“Two calls in two days,” she laughs. “I think someone misses me.”

I wasn’t touching that because it would hurt her feelings if I told her the truth. “Why weren’t you busted up over Marco’s death?” I needed to know why females cried at movies and commercials but not dead bodies.

“Because I was sick of being his whipping pole,” she says losing her humor.

“You never lost your shit when someone died or was mistreated in your presence, yet you hate what I do. Why is that?”

“Just because I didn’t curl into a ball doesn’t mean it didn’t affect me,” she says quietly. “It did. No matter what I did, I couldn’t escape it and what Marco put me through will haunt me for the rest of my life.”

She made sense and her answers appeased me so I moved on. “What’s your first stop?” I ask wondering where her and Crews will travel to.

“The Dominican,” she says happily.

“Take care, Luna.” Hanging up, I blow out a breath and wished I could start the day over. Fuck, it wasn’t even one o’clock yet.

“I’m going for a walk,” she says from the door snapping me from my thoughts. Instantly I forget about starting over and go on red alert.

“No, you’re not,” I tell her leaving no room for argument.

“Actually,” she says sticking a hip out. “I am.”

“I don’t trust you to be out alone,” and once I said it I realized it wasn’t true. It was the thought of her not coming back that had me behaving irrationally. Had me acting like I gave a shit. “You can sit on the porch but no further.”

“It’s like that, is it?” she counters. “My Mac is in the bedroom charging so as you can see, I’m empty handed. I would never leave my computer behind. That overpriced piece of machinery is my most prized possession, it’s also the only thing I actually own. When I say I want to go for a walk, it means I want to go for a walk. If I wanted to leave here, I would come to you and say,
Shade, I want to leave here
. Or better yet, I’d walk out the door.”

“Why a walk?” Trying to figure her out was exhausting.

“For one, I’m bored. Two, you’re being a bitch and three, I’m fucking bored.”

“Do you want to be delegated some chores then? Will that help you feel useful?”

Now she was pissed and of course, I liked it. “Being courteous doesn’t mean anything, good to know. I’m going to Eastern Market, would you like anything?”

“The porch,” I warn her again. “And no further.”

“Put Shade down for nothing from the market, noted.” Turning on her heel, she walks right out the fucking door ignoring my order.

Within seconds my phone rings courtesy of my security team. “No,” I answer. “Do not follow, I’ll retrieve her myself.”

Walking isn’t something I do on
purpose
. There’s a reason I had a fleet of sedans, because walking took forever and made absolutely zero sense. Fortunately, I only lived four blocks from the market and the walk wasn’t taxing for me. Her though, that was another story. Between tripping and weaving, she looked drunk. Funny how she has great coordination when she’s feeling lethal. Letting her browse, I stay back watching her. I get eye balled of course. One look at me and you knew I didn’t belong here but she did, she blended. Just another reminder that our worlds would never mesh. Sun was picking out produce whereas I paid people to shop for me. Reaching for a sweet potato, her elbow bumps the carefully stacked display sending a hundred potatoes to the ground.

Fuck, she was gorgeous
.

And she really should have stayed on the porch.

I should have stayed on the porch.

Apologizing profusely, I hit the ground to clean my mess. The guy didn’t look too upset about it, but people walking by were kicking them now and I owed it to him to retrieve them all. Being clumsy isn’t the worst thing in the world, just inconvenient and often humiliating.

Of course, I’m blaming Shade for this.

You’re dismissed…

Being fucked on a desk without any consideration was one thing, I could handle that. Sex was sex and everyone needed an outlet sometime. I’ve used it to blow off steam taking my own pleasure not worried about my partners. Yes, it was a selfish thing to do but I didn’t do it often. It was clear he needed it so I didn’t object. It was the dismissal after that pissed me off.

“Sorry,” I mumble when I back into someone. Reaching for another fucking sweet potato, a hand is offered to me and I look up. He was here and he looked different. A little amused with a touch of annoyance mixed in. Which basically summarizes how most people feel about me.

“Enough,” he says pulling me up.

“I knocked the display over – ” I start but he links his fingers through mine and nods to the attendant.

“Bought and paid for,” he says moving us away. “You will only get on your knees for me, Sun.”

You’re dismissed…

It’s a shame that I wasn’t strong enough to kick him in the balls right now. He was just so beautiful that the thought of squashing his nuts hurt me. But it was a reminder that he hurt me, with his words. “You’re upset with me,” he says this like he’s confused.

“Go home,” I tell him removing my hand from his. “I want to be alone.” It’s true, I did. Being alone is what I was used to and I wanted to pout without an audience.

“I fucking walked here for you,” he says angrily. “Show me the courtesy of being adult enough to have a conversation.”

“Fuck you,” I growl. “You walked here for me? What four blocks? Should I get on my knees and kiss your Michael Kors loafers now?”

“Watch your mouth,” he warns.

“Watch my ass,” I snap. “While I walk away.”

Pushing him wasn’t smart, I knew that. I also knew he wasn’t used to being as tolerant with people as he was with me. But right then, when he roughly grabbed my arm to bring me to heel, I swear to God, I did not care. “In public,” I smile. “You want to start shit with me in public?”

“We’re leaving,” he says letting me know this wasn’t a request.

“Wrong. You’re leaving. I’m shopping.”

Without even blinking, he grabs me and with no fanfare hoisted me up and over his shoulder with me kicking and screaming. The thing about people is, they generally suck. Big into minding their own and shit. So when he carried me through the crowd screaming every obscenity I could think of (plus a few I made up), no one stopped to help me.