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MJ 6B: Case of the Curse Pt 2

By: madam_noe



I stepped outside and did what I thought I wouldn't do again; I called Finn. 

"Marly," he purred into the phone with the warmth of a hungry tiger to a mouse.

"Finn. It's business. Nothing personal."

"Our mutual business is always personal. But as long as you have an open case I'm involved with, you're not going to let it get personal. That's the only reason I'll tell you this."

"Tell me what?"

"Dana got a package about an hour ago, sent by messenger, no return address. It's your jewels. My guess is Eleanor Bain will come to call on Dana in a few days."

"Can I pick those up?"

"Call Bain. I have them, I paid Dana well for them and her cooperation if Eleanor turns up. I'll meet you at Bain's in two hours."

He hung up then and I was shocked. Recovering quickly I called Bain's secretary and scheduled us, wondering how I'd feel around the incestuous bastard. Supposing Nikolas was right.

Knowing who to trust was always the hardest issue for me.

***

Finn emerged from his Mustang like an avenging angel. He wore a leather jacket, black jeans, boots, and a black t-shirt stretched taut over his muscles. His hair was clubbed back and his countenance was darker than I'd ever seen. The man looked damn good in tailored suits that cost more than my car, but I'd always remember him best out of the old uniform in a tight t-shirt and jeans. He always was, and forever would be, a walking wet dream.

"Marly." Damn it, the way he purred my name always had a disturbingly deep effect.

My response was a curt nod and a taut return. "Finn."

He pulled out a small box and opened it, lifting out a beautifully Gothic ruby necklace. There was something eerily beautiful to the jewels, and I was not a woman given over to pretty baubles. It was a simple long strand of small rubies in burnished settings, but the crown piece was a ruby the size of a baby's fist. It was outlined in scrollwork that would make any maudlin Victorian proud.

"That's it?" I peered closer and saw one ruby missing from a setting next to the main stone. "It's missing a ruby."

"The letter said that's how it came, the setting was added but the next stone would come in place with another Bain. We'll let the elder Bain decide but if so just another day or two and we'll have Eleanor."

"Finn...there are some things about this I don't like. It's too pat."

"It's logical. Not that many of your cases are, but sometimes you catch the breaks." He turned to head in.

I did all the time, actually, just never when he was involved. "Wait!"

"What is it, Marly?"

"I've learned some disturbing things about Bain. Something smells fishy."

"From who? Nikolas Meyers? Are you fucking him?"

"What?"

He growled and stepped close. "Marly, I am spending my own money and I owe Dana a huge favor, and I'm doing all this so you and I can just be Michael and Marly. Yeah, this case smells bad, real bad, but here is a perfect place to jump off the dammed train. I want you off and for once I want to be just two people, a man and a woman. Why can't we ever be that!?"

I narrowed my eyes and stretched to my full height, still five inches short of his. "Because I am a private investigator, you are a retired pornographer and fence, and we were both crooked cops. Because I am a woman who likes her freedom, and you are nothing but a sparkly ball and chain. Because you think you want to ride off into the sunset and live happily ever after and you're too fucking stupid to realize people like us, poor Southside trash do not get to live that life!"

I turned on my heel and marched up the stairs fighting tears. There was a part of me that wanted that dream, the happily ever after movies and books were always telling us happened. Because if I ever had that shot, it was with Finn.

However, he was the one man who had more dead bodies in his wake than I could ever dream.

***

Bain was again in full performance. Austere, cold, and oddly beautiful his black hair was smoothed back, and his black suit was a fashionable undertaker's garb that set off his Gothic study to perfection.

He eyed Finn who pulled off the tall-dark-and-handsome routine with much more natural grace and frowned. Through eyes and handshake they did some kind of macho thing I'd never understand, and as they sat I had no idea who'd won.

We went through greetings, my sanitized report in which I made no mention of Nikolas and ignored Finn's raised eyebrow. And then Finn presented the necklace.

It was the first show of true emotion Bain had delivered. He cradled it like an old lover and stroked it, smiling like the Mona Lisa into the red depths of the ornate jewels. At long last he pulled a loupe and the silver pencil jewelers used to test the veracity of their wares.

Silent moments passed marked by the ticking of an ancient grandfather clock and finally Bain looked up. "It is back, we are almost safe, but without my daughter this curse is quite real, I fear. You say two days and we will find her?"

"Guaranteed," Finn said before I could say anything.

"There is a missing stone. Was that the condition you lost it in?"

Bain moved the necklace like a sinner with a rosary. "A new stone is added with every Bain born. I added this in the hopes that my daughter would soon marry and give us an heir to the line."

"Just the hopes?" I asked and ignored Finn's sharp glance.

Bain pursed his lips and balled the necklace in his fist. "Wait here," he said and jumped from his desk with surprising litheness and strode from the room.

As soon as the door closed I fished into my purse and pulled it out. The little bug was not even a ¼" wide or long, and would be easy to miss, the battery that powered it was another issue.

"Watch the door," I whispered to Finn and ran around to the back of the desk. Feeling around the edge I found the best place and stuck the bug and battery.

"Hurry up, what the fuck do you think you're doing?" His whisper was harsh.

"Done."

"He's coming!" Finn whispered back and I scrambled back to my seat just as the door opened. I stumbled a bit and Finn grabbed my arm, squeezing my bicep like he'd rather be strangling me.

"Miss Jackson, one million dollars will be wired to your account today. Mr. Finnegan a fee for half that can be wired to you upon receipt of my daughter. When she is returned, the rest of your fee, Miss Jackson. You will of course call me as soon as Eleanor agrees to meet Mr. Finnegan's friend."

"Of course. Thank you, I-"

"We do apologize but we need to go and begin making arrangements." Finn cut me off with a harsh squeeze and those curt words.

Bain frowned slightly but nodded. "I admire your dedication. Call me if anything changes, otherwise I expect you to deliver my daughter in two days' time."

We rose and the butler of death escorted us out. The whole time Finn gripped my arm with menace and kept that stiff smile on his face where his upper lip refused to move, making it a beautiful grimace.

Once outside Finn waited for the door to close and whipped around to face me. "What was that!?! Forty-eight hours, that's all. Forty-eight hours and Dana will call us, we'll pick up Eleanor and drop her off, we get our money, and you can retire with me and-"

I slapped him. "Snap out of it! Jesus Christ, do you not remember how cases go when we work together? All mine are smooth, boring, but you come along and there are guns and killers and bodies! Did you ever stop to think that Eleanor Bain is dead? That maybe her father killed her? That maybe the money he's giving us is setting us up? Wouldn't be the first time, Finn. The last time we worked together on a case I ended up facing two murder charges and they could come back to bite me in the ass any time! Get your head out of your ass!"

He sat there stunned as if blood came into his head for the first time in a few weeks. I wrenched free and slammed into my Olds, gunned the engine, and peeled out, leaving him in my wake.

The expression on his face was a beautiful mix of rage, lust, regret, and mostly confusion. It mirrored my own feelings.

***

Damn him for making me want what I can't have! I thought this as I changed the first 6 hour tape that had recorded Bains' study. The best way to get over someone was to get under someone and my mind flashed to Nikolas Meyers for a moment. Boy, that would frost Finn's ass, I thought with a smile.

I put in the new tape and left it attached to the receiver on my bookshelf. I went to the bar and poured myself a whiskey sour and went the leather pull-out couch and sat down, popping the tape into a player.

I grabbed my notebook and lit a cigarette and pressed play. Like most bugs it picked up pointless things. Bain ordering lunch, Bain doing a phone interview for the Trib, Bain meeting with a client who wanted some necklace modeled after one that had disappeared from Prussian Royalty years ago. I went through 3 cigarettes and 2 drinks before I heard something interesting.

He'd called the butler in and was dictating some errands not even a major domo would do, like a visit to a PI who also ran numbers. "Get me everything on Michael Finnegan and Marly Jackson. I know we have her file but find out everything about their connection. And call me Priestess Georgette, tell her three days time at the full moon. And where are we on Meyers?"

"He's being followed but no sign of Miss Bains."

"Make sure you buy a ticket for him, train, and then he disappears but not until Eleanor is back."

"Yes sir."

My bowels chilled and I felt the icy cold drink floating in my stomach. I was right. Bain was setting us up. He was going to kill Nikolas, do God knew what with his daughter, and he was going to take me and Finn down.

I could warn Finn but I trusted him to take care of his own skin. I knew my speech had made him think and he'd look into things. I could always trust Finn to survive but Meyers was in more grave danger. I shut the tape off, grabbed my gun and jacket, and pulled my phone from the charger.

***

Nikolas dwarfed my couch as he sat clutching the G&T I'd made him. He was pale, paler than usual as he listened to the tape.

When it was done he threw the glass and it shattered against the wall, luckily the liquid missed the Tooker print.

"The bastard!"

"Who is Priestess Georgette, Nikolas?"

He wore a black satin shirt above leather pants and even with the eye liner and necklaces managed not to look one bit girly. He smoothed his hair back as I retrieved the broom and dustpan from my closet.

"She's a Satanist, claims she studied under LeVay. She had a church or whatever they call it in the city for a while until it got shut down for prostitution. She's been tucked away writing books and no one has really heard of her otherwise in ten years that I know of."

"Why would Bain want to kill you?" I asked as I swept up the broken glass from the black and white tile floor and mourned yet anther highball glass lost to someone's temper in my office. No one cared about good wood and marble, it seemed, but me.

"Didn't you hear?"

I shook my head and dumped the trash into the basket.

"JuJu died early this morning. She OD'ed, and this was a girl who never took enough to get close. I think Bain is killing everyone who knew what his daughter was mixed up in. I though JuJu's death was what made you call. I'm scared, all right, and now I know for sure this bastard wants me dead."

"Someone should warn the Bobsey Twins."

"He'll pay them off," Nikolas grumbled and stood, beginning to pace. It was a neat trick in my small space. 

"How do you know this?"

"Because he tried with me, or I thought he did. He offered me two million to keep quiet. Got a note this morning, anonymous, asking me to leave town and collect the money from a Swiss account. It came along with the paper announcing her death."

"Did you take it?"

"I called him myself and told him to go fuck himself, right before you called. I was tying up my concerns. I debated, but not over the money, only about his honesty." 

"Why did you refuse?" I grabbed paper towels and finished up with the mess.

He laughed. "I'm worth twelve million already, I have no need of money, and Eleanor was- is my friend. I care more about her safety than my own. Look, I don't know if the curse is real or not, all I know is that family is fucked up and she needs out. I'd give her half my money just to get her out, keep her safe, and I need your help to do it."

"You love her, don't you?" I sat on the corner of my desk and reached for my own drink, watching him carefully.

He pushed his fair hair aside and looked at me with hawk-like intensity. "I love her, yes, but not the way you think. She is a beautiful creature but she has been warped and twisted by that demonic father of hers. She always spoke of secrets and conspiracies, and I never knew what was the truth and what wasn't. I love her and I want her to be happy, but I know we can't be together."

I nodded because I strangely understood. Loving someone you knew was pure and simple bad medicine...I was a goddamn expert at that.

He sat back on the couch with a loud plop. "I'm scared Marly. What if she's already dead? And me...I don't want to die. I want her safe, but I don't think I'm ready to die in the process."

I stood and walked to him, standing between his spread legs. He looked down to his clasped hands and hid between a curtain of hair.

I reached out and lifted his chin so his clear green eyes met mine. "Do as I say and I swear I will keep you safe. We will find Eleanor and I will kill that bastard father of hers. I swear it."

I couldn't say if it was his fragile expression, my need to separate myself from my feelings for Finn, or good old fashioned lust, but I found myself bending down slowly to kiss him, giving him time to get away, only Nikolas didn't.

His lips met mine and his eyes closed before mine did. It began as a soft kiss under my direction and when I realized that, unlike Finn, he wasn't going to lead this dance, I took charge.

Planting myself on his lap I raised my other hand to cup his face and forced his lips open with my tongue. He tasted of gin and good cigarettes, the kind of taste only a fellow smoker enjoyed. Underneath that was something fresh, and despite the fact he was a man who had done dark things he was still young and naïve, and that turned me on.

I slanted my lips against his, feeling his long hair brush my face as at long last he began to respond with calm desperation. His hands clutched my shoulders and I snuggled closer, pressing into his erection.

His body was warm and firm, not hard and sculpted, but the kind of body a woman could sink into like a plush bed. My hand moved to fist in the back of his hair and I yanked his head back, breaking our kiss to slide my mouth down his throat.

I knew his kink and delighted in the shivers as I nipped at his neck, the column and sides, and he moaned in that deep voice, nails digging into me.

"Have you ever been bitten?" He gasped out as I laved the bites with my tongue.

I had; Finn knew I liked it rough and when he was angry, when I had pushed him, he would bite me all over, drawing blood. I'd never been bitten by anyone with sharp dental implants and a taste for blood however, so I simply cooed "no."

"Let me," he gasped again as I bit harder. "I want to taste you, the real you."

Something about that was so much more darkly erotic that anything else he could said so I let go of his hair and ripped open my starched white shirt.

He didn't look at my breasts, decently sized and shown off to perfection in a lacy tan bra I'd worn to boost my confidence and match my panties. No, he gripped my head then and stared at the pulse in my neck.

He bent me back over the floor with surprising strength and kissed my chin, my throat. He bent over me hidden by that hair and I felt a frission of fear course through my body.

Then his teeth pierced and the sharp pain jerked me. Nikolas held me still and lapped at the blood, pressing his hips to mine with the hardest erection I think I'd ever felt. It was always so good when you knew someone's kink and enjoyed it too.

I tugged at his shirt and he raised us again to pull it off, baring a pale broad chest. My blood tickled from his lips and though vampires in the supernatural sense never turned me on, this very human one just did it for me.

He tugged me to him and bit the other side and I reached between our fused bodies and struggled to get at his pants. I gave up and simply stroked his reaction through the leather and he gasped and stopped me. "Please, I can't take much."

I smiled the smile of an older woman used to young men, and pulled back. "Bite my breast," I ordered and he grabbed one, pulled it from the bra and laved the nipple. Electric tingles coursed through me as he licked and suckled, making me wait for it.

I opened his zipper and he was naked beneath. He wasn't overly large or wide, but filled my palm. The second I skinned back his foreskin he bit my breast and the pain was deliciously intense.

I stoked him in time to his lapping tongue and he came, groaning, clutching me with his sharp nails and sucking the tip of my breast hard. I felt so wet, so hot, I wanted to shed my skin and jump into pure pleasure.

He came down with a groan and blushed. "It's been a little while, I'm sorry."

I rolled my eyes. "I seriously doubt you'll get bored in recovery time."

I got up and let him go to the bathroom to clean up. I stripped naked and left the blood trailing in slow rivulets down my skin. I turned the lights down and laid a spare black towel on the couch to keep the blood from the leather.

He came back naked and just as I hoped an erection twitched in thought at the sight of my naked bloody body. I worked out every now and again and got most of my calories from beer and whiskey so kept in decent shape, but I think it was the blood more than anything that peaked his interest.

"Lay down," I ordered softly and pointed to the couch. He did on his back and settled down with calm expectation.

I climbed up and sat on his face, rubbing my wet pussy against his lips. "Lick it," I commanded and he did.

He was decently good but the threatening pass of those sharp canines over sensitive skin was what made me shiver. I bent down and took his cock into my mouth working it with my tongue, lips, and hands, teasing him to full erection.

All the while a buzz or orgasm built slowly and steadily, requiring my concentration to spill over. I left his cock fully hard and gripped his thighs firmly. "Bite me there. Do it now, do it!" I urged and he did.

Flicking my clit with his tongue those teeth sunk in on either side and the pain was the first thing that made me scream, until that cry blended to the shriek of victorious orgasm. I pulsed and contracted, feeling him take the blood from my wounds with every spasm of my body, his lips brushing my clit in time and it seemed to go on forever.

I reached down and pulled the condom from my crumpled pants and ripped the foil packet open, rolling the condom down his pale erection.

I made him sit up against the back cushions and straddled him, watching blood and my own cum train down his cock as he slid in. Once seated we gabbed each other and he licked a closing wound open and then lapped.

I was caged by his arms and could not thrust so I settled for grinding, a much more pleasant sensation for me anyway. Every nerve felt on fire and I felt so alive, dancing with danger, the tangy scent of blood mixing with the spicy aroma of sex. His hands grabbed my hips and helped me grind against him, pulling wounded skin and bringing new sensations coursing through my entire body.

He drank and I ground, and we both made animal sounds of unholy lust. In this position our bodies were fused, force made it feel like he filled me. Sweat covered us and I threw my head back, closed my eyes, and surrendered to the feeling.


MJ 6B: Case of the Curse Pt 2



This orgasm galloped up on me and slammed into my body as if from the outside. I shouted and shuddered, and suddenly he grabbed me, switched his mouth to the other side, and lifted my slightly, slamming his hips into mine.

It changed the angle and drew my orgasm out and soon he joined me, his whole body tensing as he came inside me, grunting against my skin with feverish kisses.

We collapsed panting together and I held onto him, exhausted, dizzy, and replete. If any doubts were beginning to creep into my head comparing this interlude to past times I'd fucked men involved in my cases (I took a love of bad boys to the extreme) I pushed it out, rolled off to sit on the towel, reaching across the small span to my desk for my cigarettes. I lit two and passed him one, inhaling my own deeply.

"So what do we do now?" He asked softly in a rumbling voice tinged with embarrassment. It was oddly endearing, I was far too jaded to get embarrassed about sex. Emotion was a different story but this had been purely physical, animal in intensity. And damn it, I felt hollow and oddly disappointed in myself.

"We get cleaned up, we order some food, and we do some research. Find out if there is any way to press this fence Dana who's waiting for Ellie to show up day after tomorrow. Find out who Bain hired to coordinate all this shit. At the same time we'll track down this Priestess Georgette and see what she can get us. In short we follow any lead we can but you have to stick close to me. Bain can afford good assassins, but two targets together are harder to get than one."

"And you think you're better than they are?"

I had come close to dying more times than I could count but I was still there, still breathing, still shooting. "Yeah," I said and blew out a large smoke ring. "Oh, yeah."

***

We'd spent the night on the computer and phone, eating mediocre Chinese from a new place across the street, and we'd fucked another time before bed, no blood. I had to admit, without the biting and his desperate need for it...I'd had better, and the desolate feeling returned.

I tried hard not to think of how it felt with Finn. Goddamn good in the physical sense, frustrating intellectually, and yet emotionally...not quite right, but not quite wrong.

I was thinking that, and confronting Finn in a bar, the Purple Rose. The Purple Rose had been a VIP club for the underworld run by my ex-boyfriend (How silly that sounded in my head for a woman my age) and I'd lived this scene a thousand times since one fateful night. The players were there: Harwood the owner, looking slick and almost Italian against the bar talking to Alabaster, a pimp and dealer I'd grown up with who had his pinky toe perched on the bottom of every dirty ladder. Stormy sat in a booth, a porn actress who'd been fucking Finn and with each dream I realized more and more how much we'd looked alike. Dream...the word faded like a distant echo.

Finn and I were arguing, gibberish about sex and love and lust when the shots rang out. A man in profile, always profile, shot Stormy and Harwood and they fell to the ground bleeding out faster than even an arterial hit could.

Alabaster hobbled with unseen wounds over to me and Finn as we could only watch the faceless assassin disappear, laughing with a neutral timbre.

"It's not over, Marly. But it will be soon." Alabaster grinned at me with a gold tooth and then melted into a puddle of pure black on the floor.

I woke screaming and felt a large body next to me on the pull out couch. I fucked people in my home/office, but no one slept over, and my brain was foggy with sleep and whiskey.

I was going for my gun when he woke. "Marly!"

The fog cleared. I hated that dream. Finn and I had been accused of the murders and when Finn had skipped town, skipped out on me, I had faced both accusations in a court room. I had not won or lost, but merely ended those trails with hung juries. At any moment I could face trial again. Figures Finn would enter my life again just when everything blew up now that I had an insane jeweler ginning for me.

"What happened?" Nikolas asked. I sat down with a sigh when a faint tapping at my office door sounded.

"Marly?" A faint voice called from the other side of the door. It was Finn.

"Shhh," I said to Nikolas and began handing him his clothes.

"Marly, I heard you scream, open up." Finn said louder now.

"Give me a minute1" I yelled to the door and searched for Nikolas' pants. "Go into the bathroom and turn on the shower," I said to Nikolas. I passed him everything including his boots and locked him in. I sat on the floor behind my desk, hiding, and lit a cigarette, waiting for him to go on.

The unmistakable sound of a kit being used on my lock sounded, so with a groan I stood and found my gun, clearing it as the frosted-glass door swung open.

Finn was smiling, saw the gun, saw my ripped shirt hanging on my shoulders, saw the bites, and sniffed the air like a dog. Then he snarled. I rolled my eyes and braced for the assault.

"Marly," he growled and took a step closer.

I shot the floor. He jumped and cursed in three languages, truly surprised. The bullet lodged in the floor, ruining a marble tile, but you don't plunk down several thousand on a floor without a few spare tiles in the closet.

"Jesus! The cops will come!"

"It's Saturday morning, the cleaning crew ain't even here yet, so no one heard that. I will shoot you if you don't calm down."

His beautiful blue eyes narrowed. "You could never kill me."

I sighed, not awake enough yet to bluff. "Probably not but an extremity shot is very painful and I may hit some nerves by accident and make you limp for life."

He put his hands down and if looks could kill, I'd be dead. "Is that Nikolas Meyers in your shower?"

"It doesn't matter, perhaps I seduced the delivery boy from Huang Gardens."

He crossed his arms and glared harder, which I had deemed impossible. "Knowing you, I wouldn't doubt it."

Was that a veiled slut insult from a man who'd likely fucked every woman between 18-80 in the country? "Why are you here, Finn?"

"I did some checking. Word on the street is Bain has a bounty out on your Meyers, has two men watching Dana, and a tail on you and me, who works for some PI named Richards. That's who Bain hired to look into us and there's a lot of traffic to the files at Cook County that hold your recent court records."

"Glad you caught up. Yes, that's Meyers in my shower, he's staying here so I can keep an eye on him."

"Looks like more than your eyes. I thought I was the only one you liked biting you." His voice dropped to a sensual purr no mortal woman could resist. I'd been feeling superhuman for a few years and just snorted and lowered the gun. 

He was angry but I knew he considered Nikolas an unknown, and I could control Finn with information. He wouldn't do anything rash until he thought he had everything figured out.

I grabbed the tape recorder and pressed play. "Listen to this."

While he heard the conversation I'd recorded I got dressed and relit my cigarette, watching his face darken more and more.

"So you can see we knew everything you did, but not that it was Richards digging up our mutual dirt."

"We're going to have to kill Bain."

I shrugged noncommittally and blew out a puff of smoke. "First we need to find Eleanor and make sure Nikolas is safe."

"Nikolas, is it? And I'm still just Finn to you...Christ I don't even get my full last name, do you even know it?"

That won him my best eye roll. "I know your middle name is Francis, please. This is not about you and me, this is about two innocent, completely fucked-up but innocent people caught up with this crazy bastard. I'm bad, but not as bad as you, Finn! I can't just walk away and let innocent people die."

"So what will you do? You're willing to die for two crazy rich kids trying to run away from home in their mid-twenties?"

"I'm not willing to die for anyone! Not you, not him, not even for my damn principles. I'm willing to live, and I have a helluva lot of mistakes to make up for."

He folded his arms and looked at me as if he could peel away my skin and peer inside. "You mean it. You think I'm abhorrent."

I raised my eyebrow at the word. He had a damn fine mind on him, but like anyone raised in the streets he kept it hidden well. He must truly be irked. "I've lived through your lies, manipulations...I've seen you lure women onto boats to die, and I've seen you shoot people first and ask questions later. Hanging around with you has made me broke, dependent on mobsters, and on trial for murder! How could I think you are anything else!?!"

"And it's left you free, spiffed up your office, and handed you huge million dollar cases. And I have personally saved your delicious ass more times than I can count."

My bones chilled. "Montgomery, Petrov...Bain...it's been you. You're the one who's put me in danger! All these horrible, horrible cases that come along and blow my world up, they're your fault!" I stubbed my cigarette out and crossed my arms. "Get out. Get out of my office, get out of my life, get out Finn!"

He stood and considered, weighing options in his eyes. I was pissed, beyond screaming and name calling, right into the bullet-between-the-eyes kind of rage that won juror sympathy. 

"Do you think this will make you happy? Fuck this kid and then find his girlfriend, watch them ride into the sunset together? Does it make you happy fucking a man who doesn't know you? Does he know you like it rough? Does he know you like a thumb in your ass when you're fucked from behind?"

I stormed over and went to slap him. Finn caught my arm and leaned in so close I could smell his aftershave. "That's it, isn't it? You don't want to get involved with me because I know you, Marly. I know the real you. I know everything about you."

"Not everything. Let go."

"No." He tried to stare me down.

"If you really knew me, you'd know why I was so much happier when you lived two thousand miles away!"

His eye ticked and the staring contest resumed.

Into this Nikolas stepped in the room, wet hair slicked back, leather pants hanging open making him look pale and damn near truly vampiric. He looked from Finn and to me like a slow motion tennis match.

Finn's face took on an impassive façade the was new to me and he simply dropped my hand, turned, and left. It happened so quickly I could only blink. Was he gone to his car for a bigger gun? Was he gone to sulk for a couple of days, a couple of months? Or was he truly gone from my life, backtracking those miles to his home in California?

"What just happened there?" Nikolas asked.

"I need to talk to someone and you have to stay here. Order a pizza if you like but watch the window to see them at the buzzer downstairs. The computer's yours, I don't watch TV, and nothing from the liquor cabinet that's on a mahogany shelf. Got it?"

"Where are you going?"

"To talk to someone and buy us some time." I buttoned the shirt and found my pants, then grabbed my coat and my gun, slipped on my sunglasses, and headed out with grim determination.

When the past is confusing, blaze into the future. It was a lesson I knew all too well.

***

Franklin Richards hadn't been a cop like me before becoming a PI; he'd been a skip tracer, a recovery agent, in other words a bounty hunter. I'm sure there were classy ones out there but they were usually men the size of mountains with tattoos and missing teeth, reading and writing skills minimal.

His office was a store front wedged between an alderman's and a laundermat, and the front windows were papered-over with dissected grocery bags. Inside it was storage lockers, computers, gizmos, a safe, and Richards behind his desk wearing a suit with the ease a monkey would wear a suit of armor.

He looked like Telly Savalas on steroids, if Telly had full sleeve and neck tattoos visible under an open collar and rolled up cuffs. He smiled at me with two teeth missing, one replaced with a gold tooth. My mind flashed to alabaster, an extremely thin black man, and the commonality was unsettling.

"Let's cut the crap, Richards, it's not a social visit. Bain hired you to find out what cops couldn't about the Harwood and Michaels cases, and more about me and Michael Finnegan. Why?"

"Marly, so nice to see you. Hard to find a woman who can handle a man's...piece so well."

I sat down and snorted. Since I'd started dressing a bit better, switching to contact lenses and losing the Doc Martens, my debatable equals had been copping an attitude. Apparently for a woman giving half a shit about your appearance lowered your street cred. "If you mean a forty-four then yeah. So what does he want?"

He steepled meaty fingers and braced his elbows on his cheap scarred desk. "Client confidentiality, Marly."

"You know he wants to kill Michael Finnegan, right? All this is leading up to killing Michael Finnegan, his own daughter, her friend, and pinning it all on me. How much is it worth, all our lives, how much is he paying you?"

"I'm just being paid to find information, that's all."

I snorted. "You've had us tailed. Took me ten minutes to lose mine on my way here."

He smiled and it was eerily blank in the eyes. "Little girl, this is all so much easier with you here. How about an interview?"

"What do you know about Bain? I mean, really know?"

"What's it worth to you?" Richards grumbled.

"My life. How much would that information be worth to you?"

"You can't match Bain. He has millions liquidated and that store of his is worth more, black market or not. You could buy me, Marly, if you could afford me, but you can't."

"Well what do you know about Priestess Georgette?" I asked, shifting my purse to hide unsnapping my holster. I pretended to look through it to cover removing my gun and I frowned as I squelched my conscience. I meant it when I said I'd stay alive.

"Who?" he asked, truly puzzled.

I pulled up the gun and before he could move shot him, two in the chest. He was wearing a vest but it wasn't like the movies; getting shot in a vest was like getting kicked by a horse. You went down and stayed down until your lungs started working again, many seconds later.

As my adrenaline pumped I saw it in slow motion. He fell backward and papers and dust flew. I climbed to my feet, gun still hot, and dropped my purse, swinging around. He was getting his gun loose and I fired, two slugs into his head.

I had to jump away from the blowback, and nothing was in my mind more than keeping my shoes clean and getting the hell out of there. He was missing most of his brain and wouldn't be getting up.

It would look like cold blooded murder but he'd reached for his gun first. Holstered to his desk I knew the movement and that's what made me go for mine. Dead or alive I could take the fall, but dead was so much easier. With Ellie, Nikolas, and Finn still alive I could only guess if Richards had planned to ice me for later, or play for a few days. Neither option had any appeal.

I picked up my purse and got down on the ground to make sure nothing had spilled out. His blood was spreading in a dark pool and I sidestepped it when I came up and looked over his desk.

Richards was smart enough to know that he was setting up murders, and smart enough not to put anything on a computer. I found the files I wanted on his desk and grabbed his cell phone with my gloved hands and pulled out the battery so GPS would not be active.

I ran out the back door and hit a brick wall.

"Marly, it's me!" I looked up and found Nikolas staring at me, slightly in shock.

Sirens were already sounding in the distance, unusually fast for CPD, and I shoved my gun back in the holster.

"Come on, we have to get out of here!"

We ran down the alley to Ashland and when we hit the river I tossed my gun into it. My car was parked near the Green Dolphin, a giant bar, and into its dumpsters I tossed the phone before shoving Nikolas into my car.

"What the hell were you doing there!?!"

"Someone tried to break in and your phone was off, so I checked your last Google search. The maps led me there, what the fuck did you do!?!"

"I killed a man! Okay, I killed Bain's assassin. I just bought us some time!" I jerked the wheel though I didn't know where I was going. I only wanted to get away from west Lincoln Park and get somewhere familiar.

"You got cops on our asses!"

He was hysterical and I debated slapping him, but maneuvering a boat in Chicago traffic made it damn near impossible.

"They won't come looking for us, I know what I am doing!"

"That was murder!"

"That was business!" I glanced at him and he was giving me a repulsed look, one I knew too well. One I'd worn around Finn too many times. Maybe Mr. Finnegan and I were not so different, after all.

"He pulled his gun first. I'm being set up to take the fall in all this and it's better if I'm dead. I decided not to go out quietly, and I am trying to keep you and your girlfriend alive, Nikolas! I am trying to keep me and Finn alive too! You want my protection? Then shut up, help me, or get out of my way!"

He sat back sullen, letting a pregnant pause bloom. I hated those, but I hated useless chatter even more.

My brain was working fast. "Priestess Georgette, memorized her address by any chance?"

"Yes," he ground out. 

"Then lead the way."

***

We found her in Humboldt Park. Sometimes referred to Little Puerto Rico it was not the kind of neighborhood you hung out in after dark. Drugs, guns, prostitution, it all happened here in daylight or night. I'd grown up a little further south but in a similar neighborhood and felt quite at home.

Still, on North Avenue one could see a neighborhood trying. Her address was two floors above a photography studio right off Western Ave. We parked on a side street and I pulled a new gun from my trunk, offering Nikolas one he eschewed.

"We won't need it, she's not like that. I met her a few times at parties, she's chill."

"People keep telling me things like that, and they're always wrong. And they usually end up dead."

He raised a brow and smoothed his fair hair back, tangled from drying in the cool fall wind.

"So you do know her. Interesting you forgot to mention that. You'll do the introductions, I trust?"

He nodded and wouldn't meet my eyes.

"Nikolas, if it gets rough in there...don't interfere."

I slammed the trunk shut before he could answer and we walked silently back to her door. He pushed the buzzer and a soft, deep, feminine voice asked who it was. All he had to do was say his name and the buzzer sounded, making me curious.

He'd said he didn't know her...what was young Nikolas hiding?

We had to climb up what felt like infinite stairs in a narrow hallway, no good for escape I noted, and the top floor door swung open.

The woman waiting was in her late fifties, slim, short, with a white-blonde bob that looked convincingly natural. She wore a black slip, the kind that was right out of the forties and belonged under a dress, and over that a soft white shawl with fringe I could tell was quality. She wore no makeup but false eyelashes and a pentagram on a red satin ribbon around her neck.

"Nikolas...I see you brought muscle."

"I am flattered you remember me," he cooed to her like she was Elizabeth Taylor and he an aspiring gigolo.

We crested the stairs and she offered her hand, he bent far, far down and kissed the back, and rose again turning to me for introductions.

"Marly Jackson," I said without pre-emption and offered my hand for a shake.

She eyes it questioningly. "You are the one in the papers? The woman who killed her lover and her other lover's woman?"

"That's what they say."

I pushed past them both into the loft. Black walls, polished wood floors, an open floor plan much like Nikolas' place only much, much larger. The furniture was black and white leather, clear glass, steel, imbuing no warmth over the shaggy white rugs.




MJ 6B: Case of the Curse Pt 2



Stairs led to a small platform with a bed, and underneath a curtain blocked out a large space.

"Nice digs."

"Nikolas," she cooed shutting the door behind her, "I would love to talk about why you never joined the church, but I sense your friend is impatient. You have come to talk about the Bain family, have you not?"

I perched on the edge of the couch and folded my arms, well aware this left a gap showing my gun.

Nikolas frowned and leaned against the kitchen bar-style counter. "Yes we have. Let me bring you up to speed; Ellie went missing and she took the family curse and jewels with her. Her father hired Miss Jackson here to find her. She contacted me and let me know she was taking off and Kraven was helping her. He turned on her and she killed him at this little cabin-" 

"In Riverwoods, I know it well."

I shifted, letting my jacket fall loose as a bad feeling rose in me. "Do you now?" I remembered the altar, the blood. It was beyond sadistic, even in my world.

"She killed him and the next anyone heard of her she had sent the jewels to a fence Marly knows, and she's due to collect her money tomorrow."

I sighed, feeling he'd missed some big details. "In the meantime Bain hired a PI to follow us, killed JuJu, and has someone gunning for Nikolas here. Then he made an appointment with you, why?"

She crossed the room and bent to a small humidor, the only wood besides the floor in the place, and came back with a long black cigarette holder and Newport on the end. Fake class, faux flash.

She gave me a level look, fighting the way women always did; in their minds. I'd been there, done that, gotten the bullet holes, and stared back. For a moment in time it was wild west on the dusty street, it was two men with rapiers in the courtyard, it was proper folk with pistols at dawn.

Her face crumbled; I'd won, and I smiled. Funny how when women squared off a winner was always obvious, but with men you could ever tell. 

"You have to protect me from him. I will tell you everything if you can protect me."

Shit, I thought. Win one face off and the damsel in distress routine comes out. I hated being the white knight. "I can get you out of town, but only if what you have to say is what I want to hear."

"Drink!" she called, voice wavering on the edge of tears.

Nikolas went around to the liquor stored on the counter and pulled something that looked like sherry into 3 glasses and brought us each one. I took a sip and grimaced when I realized I was correct; I hated sherry.

Georgette drank it like water. Impressive.

"I have known so many secrets. Bain came to me when his daughter was born and told me of the curse. He thought I knew about such things. I told him I could make a dark bargain to rid him of the curse, but it required a sacrifice."

"A human sacrifice?"

She turned her dark, liquid eyes to me sharply. "That is murder! I do not commit murder, it is- it is- it's savagery!"

"No one is accusing you of anything," yeah right, I thought and nearly muttered. "Just calm down and go on."

"A sacrifice like a goat, and money, what Bain held most dear in this life. He bought a cabin in Riverwoods, very private back then, built the altar just as I said, and brought the money, twice as much as I asked. He agreed to burn the sum I instructed and said the rest was for me. I asked where was the goat and he showed me his wife.

"He had already killed her and he said he would kill me if I told, and I believed him. He said it was my fault, after all, I had consulted with the Dark Lord and told him the curse would continue as long as there was a female child."

Nikolas choked on his sherry. "So he wants to kill Ellie? But that makes no sense, he is fanatical about continuing his line."

Georgette nodded. "He called me because one week ago he discovered something. He has another child, grown, from a time before his marriage. A son. Never before has the first child been male, and he decided to end this curse and kill his daughter. I refused, I told him it was madness!

"Bain said he had been practicing the Dark Arts without me, that he had been studying. I...I don't know what he meant but I have seen his little girl and the look in her eyes. I fear he is evil, and his teacher even more so. He said he didn't need me, but if I didn't help he would kill me, and I know he means it."

"What is he expecting you to do?"

"Anoint his line while he kills his daughter and then bless his son. Pray to the Dark Lord to turn the curse into a dark blessing."

"She's pregnant!" Nikolas cried, face devoid of color.

"You don't even know what role that unborn child is to play. Can't you see they are mad? You have to help me!"

"I can't fucking believe this," I said to myself. "You know the only way to prove this is to find the brother, this son who mysteriously showed up."

"I have a phone number. Bain said he might call from it."

I pulled out my phone and thought of who I could trust to keep Georgette safe. I considered shooting her myself when the only name that came to mind was Finn.

He answered on the third ring, very business-like. "I found Georgette. There's a brother, Bain wants to kill Ellie as a sacrifice to turn around this curse and leave everything to his son. They'll kill georgette and I promised her I'd keep her safe. What can you do?"

There was a long pause.

"I can have a car and two drivers there in twenty minutes. Tell her to pack light, but she'll be going out of town."

"Twenty minutes? We're in Humboldt Park."

"I know where. Where are you going?"

"Recon, verify this brother."

"Do nothing without me," Finn growled.

"Your men will be here in twenty, got it." I simply hung up.

Perhaps the less he knew, the better off Finn would be. He was much like a cat in that way. The only question in my mind was: in dealing with him, would good luck rub off, or would I just get the claws?

***

Nikolas insisted on waiting for the men to arrive and not leaving Georgette alone. Intellectually I could understand but in my heart I knew it also meant Finn was driving over from his gorgeous brownstone on LSD. Though it was Saturday night was dawning and it was a warm October. The countdown to Halloween was on and traffic would be a bitch. I prayed for a jam blocking him.

The car was a simple newer-model caprice in black and pulled up. Two men emerged like cartoon goons stuffed into suits. One stood by the car and the other came to the bell.

Packing light for Georgette meant 3 suitcases and she'd changed to an honest to goodness flowing gown and mink stole. We bundled her off with Nikolas' assurances that she would be okay, and Finn was to be trusted.

I'd used the waiting time to borrow her computer and Intellius gave me the name and address of the number. Edward Blake, and he lived in the northern burbs too.

We walked to my car in silence and I pulled out with no sign of Finn behind me. Perhaps the traffic gods had smiled on me.

We hit a drive through of a McDonald's just up the way and got some food in our systems, still not talking. He was nervous and so was I.

Highwood was our destination. It was a small town nestled between chic villages of mansions, but Highwood homes were smaller. Much of the population spoke Spanish and many worked for the nearby big houses.

We found the small house on the wrong side of the tracks nestled between a dry cleaner's and a closed barber shop.

I parked far enough away that we could run to the car but it wouldn't clue anyone like Finn into our exact destination.

When we got out I insisted Nikolas take a gun. "Safety is here, and you guard the trigger like this," I showed him. "Always guard the trigger but if you do have to shoot, aim for the middle of the chest and squeeze, don't yank the trigger. Got it?"

"I think so."

"I'll move first. Keep the gun up, trigger guarded but I'll point left, you right. Keep it under you coat until we're on property and away from the street."

"Got it."

I lead the way. Closer to downtown people were walking but the block we were on was quiet. I slowly opened the plain chain-link gate testing for a squeak and we slipped inside.

We walked to the back and I scanned for signs of a dog and a burglar system. There was a system, and it wasn't activated, meaning he was at home and like most people had it off. I could cut it but Brinks would just call, so instead I cut the phone line hoping he might be one of the few people in the end of the century not to have a cell phone. No dog.

We went to the backdoor and I saw there was a kitchen light on but no movement. Thick curtains closed off the basement but light shone through and there was movement.

I crept up the stairs and tested the kitchen door. It was unlocked. I waved Nikolas up and whispered "When I go in the basement door you go in here, cover the stairwell. If he runs shot at his feet. If nothing, wait for me to call you."

He nodded and took position.

The basement door had 3 deadbolts. I considered my ability to pick all 3 without alerting Edward Blake but there was no way. I found a rock near a window well and walked back down the steps to the basement door and smashed the window open.

There was shouting and a scuffle as I reached and began flipping deadbolts. Something swiped my hand as I got the last I bit my lip, jerking my hand out to find a deep knife slice.

My gun had the silencer on so shot through the door and heard a yelp. I opened it, threw it wide, and stormed in.

I was stunned. It was an average basement from a home built in the 20's and remodeled in the 50's. Awkward remnant counters and cabinets, a washer, dryer, mechanical room, what looked like a bathroom, and hanging on the walls were implements of torture. In the middle was a bondage table, new and shiny, and on it was a very pretty brunette I took to be Eleanor Bain. She was bloodied, brutalized, and there were obvious signs of rape.

I saw red. My first shot had hit Blake in the shoulder. He looked disturbingly like a younger version of his father; tall, slim, darkly handsome features under long black hair. However his face was twisted into rage.

I didn't think, just squeezed the trigger twice. Once to his mid chest and once to his head. He had time to gasp and then he was dead on the floor, had his face blown away and one blue eye staring glassily up.

"Nikolas get down here!"

I'd dealt with enough terrified victims back in my days on the Chicago PD to know the gag was the last to go. I untied her feet from the leather restraints and she tried to kick me, screaming behind the gag.

I heard the sound of retching and Nikolas was doubled over by the body. Fuck, her blood was everywhere, his vomit, I was going to have to torch the place.

"That's Nikolas Meyers, I'm Marly Jackson. I'm a PI and I'm here to help you." She screamed like I'd threatened to sing Pat Boone. If only in real life knocking someone out worked like it did in the movies, I thought, and untied her left hand.

She reached for the gag and I clamped my hands over her screaming mouth ad yelled at Nikolas to get his as over there.

Suddenly he was there, smothering her, weeping, and I untangled myself and made my way around to her right hand.

They were embracing, weeping into the tangle of long hair, and in that moment I knew he truly loved her, and at long last his soul was just as broken as hers. A very human twinge of regret struck me and I averted my eyes, set on finding a blanket for her. 

I found a large bath sheet in the bathroom and brought it. "Cover up, Ellie, it will help a little."

I left them and closed the door. No neighbors or wailing sirens, a good sign.

"Let's move upstairs, get out of this room."

Nikolas mutely nodded and swept Ellie into his arms. She was tall but painfully thin, and he barely struggled with her weight, following me up. I collected his gun from where it dropped at the base of the stairs and stuffed it in my pants.

The kitchen was decorated in poor bachelor chic, nothing matching, everything scarred and screaming salvation army. I found glasses and poured them waters, which Ellie gulped. 

"Here's what is going to happen. No police. Your attacker is dead, our DNA is all over the place, so we're going to torch it. But first, as quickly as possible, Ellie you have to start from the beginning and tell me what happened."

She sat in a chair and Nikolas stood, pressed to her side. She hugged him like he was a life preserver and sniffled. Underneath the swelling, cuts, and yellow and purple bruises she was strikingly beautiful and her eyes wee deeply haunted.

"I had a fight with Nikolas and JuJu invited a new man to our ceremony. I'm a vampire," she said as casually as one admitted being protestant. I swung a chair around and sat on it backwards, nodding.

"We did the ceremony but then this guy Edward said he was my brother. He said he'd poked a hole in the condom and wanted me pregnant. My father believes there is a curse on us and it will continue as long as there is a female child born."

"What exactly is the curse?" I asked. 

She squeezed Nikolas' hand. "The jewel in the center of the necklace was a gift from the estate of Catherine the Great to my family years ago. It came with a curse; we must add to it with every generation, one ruby for each firstborn, never failing, and as long as we possess it our family will have success. But whenever the first child is born and it is female, the women in the family will due a horrible death. If a male is firstborn it ends the curse."

"But your father is only child, isn't he?" I raised a brow.

She shook her head. "I had an aunt, she died when she was a teenager, just when my mother got pregnant. I-I think my f-father k-killed her."

I nodded and exchanged a worried glance with Nikolas. His sanity was shredding but enough was there he returned my look which cabled INSANE FAMILY, SELF-FULFILLINH PROPHECY loud and clear.

"So Edward bragged he could make a male child. He said my father was going to kill me. My father killed my-" she broke then, sobbing. I found paper towels and cursed the DNA flowing everywhere. Two rooms to wipe, this was not going to be easy.

"You have to keep going. I know it's tough, but Ellie, you have to."

"He killed my mother when I was born! He had this cabin and he did things there, bad things. He took me there all the time as a kid and he- he hurt me, said to clear the sin."

"So Edward drops this bomb and?"

"I decided to run. I was angry, broke into the store and took the necklace my father loves so much. When I saw he'd put a new setting in, I knew Edward was telling the truth." She drew in a long breath of air and asked for more water.

I poured it and slammed it down on the table. "Finish the story so we can get the fuck out of dodge."

"Kraven, he's my- was my friend. He said he'd help me fence it and get out of town. B-but when I went to his place I saw a number he'd written, and I knew he was working for my father. So I asked him to come to the cabin with me."

That would have been when Bain called me. Made sense; his daughter had gone missing and the one man she'd turn to for help, and ostensibly a fix, was in her father's pocket. Given the time of Kraven's death, or what I estimated, this was when Bain had brought me in. He'd lost his inside man.

"I just wanted a fix, but Kraven wanted me to do things. I'd told him what my father had done and he wanted to act it out. I lost it, and I- k-k-k..."

Nikolas squeezed her. "We know, you don't have to say it."

"He told me about this fence, so I sent her the necklace."

"She's a friend of a friend. It's okay," I said hastily, warning Nikolas with my eyes not to mention that her father had the necklace once more.

"I got to thinking the curse was real, I was so strung out. I went looking for a fix and JuJu agreed to meet me Friday night. When I showed up she was dead and Edward was there. He- he said he'd met with our father and had an agreement. He brought me here and he...he..."

"We know," Nikolas said again. "You don't have to say any more."

"He took the baby. That and more, oh, god!" she began sobbing again and I stood, gathering things.

"I'm going to find a coat or something for her. Stay with her."

In the front closet I found a trench coat and brought it back. "Put this on. Nikolas, get the car, pull it into the alleyway three houses down from here. I'll be out in ten. If you hear sirens just go without me. Take her here." I pulled my notebook and pen from my suit jacket and jotted an address. "Give him my name. He's a doctor, a good one, and he won't report this. Then get your money and disappear."

He forced her to her feet and bundled her in the coat. "Bain has to die."

"Yes, yes he does." I was sickened. Bain was a psychotic pervert who had killed his own wife, raped his daughter, condoned his own son getting his half-sister pregnant, and then planned to murder her. I generally didn't kill for pleasure but I was willing to make an exception.

"Promise me you'll kill him, please!" Ellie snatched my hand when I went to grab to towel.

"Promise me when this is over you'll go into rehab, and both of you into therapy. Swear it and he's dead."

I was rewarded with two solemn nods and then they left.

I found ammonia and any surface we'd touched in the kitchen I sprayed. I took the towel and glasses down to the basement. I pulled out my gloves, snapped them on, and any bloodied instrument was thrown the table.

I found gas canisters and other flammable canisters. I'd never been good at chemistry but if I accidentally made napalm it would only help.

I soaked the table and then led a trail towards the water heater and furnace. I led another trail to the kitchen and turned the gas oven and stovetop on high.

Another couple of minutes passed until I heard my car rumble past then I lit a match, dropped it to the table, and ran out the back.

I cleared the back fence as the bondage table went up in a whoosh and sprinted for the car. Jumping in I wished I could stay to make sure it all went up, but at least the most damning was burning.

"Where to?"

I gave Nikolas directions to the good doctor, pulled out a pack, passed cigarettes all around, lit one, and pondered how best to commit premeditated murder. 

Finally, Finn would come in handy.

***

Finn gave me one glance and shut whatever wisecrack he'd been ready to make. His home was quite posh and here he dressed better than I was used to. I realized he wore the cheap t-shits and jeans for me. In the midst of all the ugliness I smiled.

"This is in no way shape or form a come on but you look like you need a shower and a strong drink. You know the way, I'll bring you a drink, no hanky-panky."

I nodded and pulled off my guns, holster, and jacket in the hall. I was numb on the outside but it was a thin shell covering rage, disgust, and revulsion. I worried I'd crack and couldn't think of anything but getting the filth off me.

I turned the shower on high and stepped in. Finn parted the curtain but only his hand came through, handing me an ornate highball glass filled with Jamesons. I mumbled thanks and shotgunned it, and stood under the water until it ran out and I was wrinkled.

I emerged to find a fluffy white bathrobe waiting and wrapped it around me, a sinfully soft towel in my hair.

It was late, past midnight. The doctor had taken a while then getting the wounded couple to the airport and making sure we weren't followed. I'd borrowed a car for that, stealing it, hotwiring it, and had returned it to where I had found it.

"We found Ellie. She's safe, and I can't say any more." I announced when I emerged into the living room. Finn had a fire going and knelt beside it.

He glanced up, his shaggy hair loose, and the look was questioning and surprisingly innocent.




MJ 6B: Case of the Curse Pt 2



"Hold me. Don't ask any questions, don't try anything sexual, just hold me, please."

He stood and crossed to me, stopping a few feet away. "Are you sure?"

I nodded. "Hold me please, and if you ever throw this in my face or tell anyone I'll-"

"I won't."

He took my hand and led me to his bedroom. I'd slept in it once, knocked out, and in my morning rage hadn't appreciated the king size bed with satin navy sheets.

He pulled the towel from my wet hair and sat on the bed, pulling me down. He just took off his button down shirt and shoes, leaving his sacks on and guided my in my robe to lay down. I settled into the crook of his shoulder and closed my eyes.

He smelled so damn good, like he always did. It was almost like the old days, when we'd been partners, beat cops. In those days the attraction had been simple and easy. The sex had been furious and hot but there had also been laughter, and once Finn used to hold me just like this.

We'd been so innocent then. I'd never drawn my gun once in the field, I was a rookie. Following in my father's footsteps I'd been alone except for my godfather, a sergeant, until Finn had come along.

I had thought I was falling in love with him until a very petite, very curvy, very beautiful woman walked into the station house and introduced herself as Finn's wife.

I'd transferred to vice to escape him but he had followed so I'd gone into homicide. Running from Finn I'd met Arthur Bowers, and helping Arthur escape a murder charge had cost me my career on the force. My father had died on the job, a detective. I'd just barely made the grade when I'd been forced out.

Luckily I'd been left the PI business from a relative I'd never known and had grown into blackmailing cheating spouses. For a few years it had been peaceful until the fateful day Finn, footloose, fancy free, and totally divorced had waltzed back into my life. 

Since then I had killed. I'd been beaten, shot at, and threatened more times than I could count. I'd stood trial for murder, and almost come full circle recently when Arthur Bowers resurfaced and tried to end my career as a human being.

I had seen so much death and gore and vile sickness I'd reached my breaking point. In the morning I would cross another line. I would walk into a man's home and kill him, not to save my life or another's, but to fulfill a promise of vengeance. I'd still be me but I would become something more.

I snuggled deeper into the crook of his shoulder and that night I pretended none of this had happened. I pretended Finn and I were back in my old apartment, curled up on my pull-out couch, our uniforms draped over the recliner, and our futures stretched long and unwritten before us.

For the first time in years, I fell into a dreamless sleep.

***

I woke to find Finn still sleeping beside me. His pants were on, my robe was still tied though gaping, and my hair had dried to a tangled mess.

I extricated myself and did the necessary, borrowed his toothbrush, and tried to brush my hair.

I was still sleepy and when I came back in he looked so damn good. Sleeping on his back his own black curly hair was poofed out, and he had a decent beard start going. He slept on his back one arm by his head like caught in the middle of a backstroke. He was lean, his muscles sharply defined once by life on the streets now by an expansive home gym. He had tattoos from his days in the Marines as well as remnants of a wild youth.

I sat and brushed hair back from his eyes and he sighed, shifting to nuzzle my hand. I was lost. I had pretended all night, why not let the fantasy continue a little longer?

I dropped the robe and laid beside him naked, pressing my cool flesh into his, sleep-warm and welcoming. I kissed his shoulder and his neck gently, licking as I went.

It was almost easy to call up those playful innocent memories of ignorant days past. I undid his slacks and lowered the zipper, sliding my hand inside. He was half hard and I began to nibble his ear as I stroked him to full hardness.

At long last he woke and turned to face me on his side.

"Marly," he said with a yawn, "are you s-"

"Shh." I pressed my finger to his lips and then kissed him. Funny how he had the same morning breath as anyone yet it never bothered me to kiss him like this.

His arms wrapped around me and his hips thrust to meet my stroking hand. He moaned and I did as well, heady pleasure swirling in my mind.

One arm loosened and his hand sought out my breast, cupping it, teasing the nipple. My toes curled and I closed my eyes and enjoyed the teasing motion with little pants.

He moved me to my back and my hand slipped from his pants. He hastily shrugged them off and then his mouth replaced his hand. He licked and sucked and nibbled until my hands fisted in his hair and my own hips thrust up. I was desperate to be filled, to have him inside me and I was more than ready, but apparently he wasn't.

Finn kissed down my body and shifted until his mouth was at my pussy and then he attacked me. He suckled and licked and electric shocks coursed over my body radiating from his hot mouth.

He added two fingers inside me, spitting on his thumb. That he worked into my anus and then he curled those two fingers to press on my g-spot. He began to massage and I cried out, manic with need. Finn didn't tease long, his mouth returned to suck my clit and it felt like I exploded.

I screamed and twisted the sheets in my fist, humping his face furiously, my brain swimming in the most intense orgasm of recent memory.

I came down panting and he moved to grab a condom from the nightstand. He put it on in record time, likely afraid I would change my mind, and before I could offer him a little pleasure with my own hands and mouth he was between my legs, and thrust in.

Finn was on the larger scale of what I could handle and had the grace and knowledge of an old lover to hold still. No matter how aroused I was he pushed in deep and I had to adjust. That feeling of first entry was always so delicious, and he knew how much I enjoyed it.

He laid on me and our mouths fused into a kiss as he began to thrust. His hips pumped and our bodies slid together, his sweat-slick abdomen rasping my slit with each deep, grinding thrust.

I came again with almost shocking ease and clawed at his back, drawing groans of pain from him.

I was barely done with the immensely glorious pulsing deep inside and he was out, moving. Time for his favorite position; he turned me onto my stomach and drew me to my knees, forcing my face down to the bed with a heavy hand on my back. He slammed in now and hit my cervix. It was brutal pain for a second and again he held still, letting me adjust.

Then he began to fuck me harder than he ever had before. His hands slipped to my hips and he jerked me ass back onto him with every thrust. The brutal pain came with each push and pull but pleasure blended with it and all I could do was moan and beg him for more.

Finn grunted in response and I felt his balls tighten and not slap my pussy so much. He slipped a hand around placed two fingers on either side of my white-hot sensitive clit, letting the motion of our bodies pull the hood back and forth.

I came with a primal scream and he slammed into me again and again, forcing me to brace the headboard as I orgasmed again, and Finn joined me with a hoarse shout. We moved mindlessly together riding the crest until it slowed and we collapsed, exhausted on our sides.

We lay there panting for a moment and I cautiously pushed him to his back and settled alongside, my head on his shoulder. He wrapped an arm around me and the other he pushed his sweat-slick hair from his eyes.

Was content to let it be and lay in silence but he seemed in the mood for pillow talk. "What was this, Marly?"

"I saw and heard some horrible things. I'm going to do something today I swore I'd never do. Last night I just needed comfort and damn me, but Finn, you're the only one who can give me that."

He kissed the top of my head and pulled me closer. "And this morning?"

"I miss this, all right? I miss working nights with you in our uniforms, busting shoplifters and vagrants, and then spending days in my bed. I miss when I loved you and it wasn't complicated, and I just wanted to relive it. do we have to dissect it."

He took a deep breath. "Marly, I love you. You know that. It doesn't have to be complicated."

I pulled away, feeling the need for space. "It always has been. Even in those early days it was a lie. You were married and I was your mistress."

I sat and tuned my back on him. He just rolled to his side and laid a kiss on my lower back, surprisingly gentle.

"We were different then. I was an idiot kid, fresh out of the military. I'd been in the Gulf, I'd seen some bad shit, and I wanted to escape it. I married my high school sweetheart before my first deployment and way before returning from the third I knew it was over. She'd moved out when I joined the force. She had a boyfriend, it was over, but we were two Catholic kids scared of divorce."

"You never told me this."

"I did, you just didn't listen. My ex-wife...she's a bitch. She came to the station that day with divorce papers for me to sign. She only said she was my wife because when she saw you she got jealous. That bitch only had them drawn up because she wanted to get married to somebody else.

"I told you, but you wouldn't listen. You transferred, and then I followed you. I tried to tell you I had papers drawn up myself, I was ending it to be with you. You didn't listen.

"Marly, can't you see? You left me so many times. I never gave up."

I whirled around, pissed off. "You left too! You left me to face two murder charges, you left me alone with that!"

He sat now too. "If I had stayed we would have been tried together and gone down. I left the state because there wasn't enough evidence to convict you alone. I did it for you!"

The fantasy had ended. "Fuck, Finn. I wanted a nice easy morning fuck and some cuddling, you had to ruin it with talking. Fine, I love you, you love me, we bump uglies now and again but you're right. We can't be together or we go to prison!"

"Marly..." he growled then sighed. "Look, obviously whatever happened yesterday has to do with Bain. Let's deal with that, you have my help and support, but I ask one thing. When this is done, you WILL sit down and discuss this like an adult with me."

"Before we strike this bargain let me tell you what I have to do. I have to kill Bain."

I finally turned and looked at him. With his loose hair, scruffy beard shadow, and visible tattoos he looked like the perfect person to help.

"All right. I'll do it if I have your word you will talk to me after."

I nodded, wondering what more there was to say.

***

"You're sure this will work?" I asked Finn later as we drove to Lake Forest in a stolen car. Riding in back was Carlos, a former personal assistant to Finn both in his fencing days and startup porn mogul ones.

I'd worked with Carlos a few times with Finn and he'd even testified at my trail for the murder of Stormy Michaels. Carlos had been the one to pick up Finn and was his alibi, and he had testified on my behalf that I wasn't near the club that night.

Trouble was I had been. The other murder charge I faced, Eddie Harwood, was my then ex-boyfriend and owner of the club where Stormy had been shot. Truthfully we'd pieced it together. Eddie had killed Stormy. Great, neat, except a mysterious man we'd never found had killed Harwood, setting me and Finn up. The only man that knew anything about the unknown gunman was my old childhood pal Alabaster who had hightailed his ass to Europe and off the map.

Carlos was many things. A good sewer, a good business manager, but originally he'd come to Finn as a forger and today he was going to reprise his career.

Finn ended the pregnant pause with a sigh. "You and I both were cops. You know as well as I dump a body in an alley with no wallet and you're scot free, but there's too much here. We've got a dead son, a dead PI, a missing daughter, a dead drug dealer...Marly this is the only way out."

"It's complicated. Too complicated."

"And you and I both know a suicide note in Bain's hand will be pat enough for any local rinky-dink cops to consider it open and shut."

I turned to Carlos. "So the story again is this: Bain discovered his daughter was into heroin and he tracked down the dealer and killed him. Eleanor ran away when she realized a recent sex partner was a previously unknown half brother. When Bain discovered this he killed Edward Blake, his son. When Eleanor didn't come back, he killed himself out of grief and guilt."

"Got it. I'll just need a letter written by him, a couple practice sheets and I can write it. Put his prints on it and we're good, as long as you stage it right."

"No problem there. You ready?" Finn asked me.

I pulled the disposable cell out and called Bain's direct line. He answered sounding a bit rough; perhaps he'd heard the news about his son. "It's Marly Jackson. We found Ellie and we're bringing her in. We'll be there in ten minutes."

"What!?! Of course I- I'll be ready."

I hung up and took a deep breath. "In the end I have to do it."

"Marly, I can do this. My conscience is shredded enough, you don't need to do this."

I glanced out the window. "I made a promise. This man is evil, and he has to die. T's not about us anymore. You should have seen Ellie. Her brother, her fucking brother raped and tortured her. He did this with their father's consent, a man who killed his wife, probably his sister, and raped his own child countless times. I only regret we won't make him suffer."

No one spoke the rest of the way. We were let in the gate and Bain himself ran out and down the steps. When we emerged he stiffened, a stark black figure against the large white house.

"Where is she?"

Finn strode over and jabbed a gun into his side. "She will be along in a minute. Call your man."

Bain looked at Finn at a level gaze and paled. 'Dawkins!" he yelled.

"Have Dawkins dismiss everyone and leave, or I shoot. Got it?"

"How do I know you won't anyway."

I strode up and pulled off my sunglasses. "Trust me, he won't."

Bain eyed me and I gave him my gimlet stare.

"Sir?" the butler asked.

"Ellie is coming here and I need total privacy. Escort the staff off property and then leave. Five minutes Dawkins."

"Sir?"

"She's coming and I need total privacy," Bain drawled the last with a touch of lasciviousness.

The butler nodded and my stomach roiled. "No, Dawkins, you'll stay with us. Get everyone else out."

"But you said-" Bain's protest was cut off by Finn's gun jabbing him in the ribs.

We waited as a woman in a maid uniform and a gardener came out and walked to their cars. When they drove off I brandished my gun and trained it on. "Inside, now."

"Marly" Finn asked me as we forced them into Bain's home office.

I shot Dawkins without pre-emption and everyone froze, staring. I turned to Bain, heart pounding and adrenaline coursing through my system as the man slumped to the ground, a large hole in his chest as he gasped for air.

"He knew the whole time, didn't he, you sick fuck!?!"

"Knew what?"

"Finn? I'm ready."

Finn dropped his own gun and grabbed Bain in a sleeper hold. The thinner man struggled but after several long minutes he fell into unconsciousness. 

"I'm not yet," Carlos said. "Suicides write the note usually at the site when at home. Give me five minutes. What do I say about Dawkins?"

"He was the gay lover of Bain and tried to stop him. When Bain shot him, final nail in the coffin."

Carlos shrugged and sat in the desk chair. Petite, delicate, and darkly Latino he didn't fit as well with the décor as gothic Bain did. "Works for me."

He had on gloves as well and opened drawers, pausing and waving me over silently. I came and saw he was pointing at my bug.

"Oh, that's mine." I blushed. "I forgot about it in the, er, excitement."

I pulled it and tucked it in my suit jacket. Carlos shook his head and selected a few papers, and began writing his own.

Finn scowled at me. "It was still recording, wasn't it?"

I shook my head. "Six hour tapes and I haven't been home in 24 hours, we're safe."

"Christ, Marly."

"I had my mind on other things." We both glanced over at Bain as he moaned. Finn was there in a flash, using a pillow to smother him back into unconsciousness. We didn't want him dead yet.

"Almost done, Carlos?"

"Almost. Okay, got it. Bring him here, he should be holding it."

Finn picked up Bain with a grunt and we all with gloved hands positioned him. The gun I'd brought was stolen, hot, bought for cash on the street. 

Carlos made Bain clutch the note and Finn helped me position the gun. It was tricky getting it to a position where blowback wouldn't land on me instead of the room, but I managed.

I squeezed the trigger and it was like his skull blew off.

I expected to feel dead but horribly, oh so horribly, I felt alive. We all did and glanced at one another nervously hiding smiles like the fucking suck sociopaths I felt we were at that moment.

A noise from the hall jolted us. Before we could move Ellie came barging in screeching, Nikolas' behind her fumbling with the gun I'd given him.

Ellie stopped, saw her father, and began screaming "the curse, the curse," over and over again.

She ran towards her Father but Finn stopped her. At the touch of a strange man she flipped out and began thrashing.

"Nikolas what is going on?"

"She went for a fix, said she was going to the bathroom. I chased her here in a goddamned cab. She's high, out of her mind."

Finn restrained her with both hands and Carlos edged away. He'd seen enough violence and Ellie was vibrating with the threat of it. Her loud screeching had turned to slurred nonsense and then she surprised us by grabbing Finn's gun from his holster.

He'd left the safety off and she swung it wide, jerked the trigger back, and blew off some crown molding. Finn dove for her but she sidestepped and aimed at me. "You did it, you killed him but he killed her and he's dead and you killed him!"

I put my hands up in as non-threatening manner as possible but she was on something that had her pupils blown and her movements jerky and erratic. PCP it looked like, every cop's worst nightmare.

"I'll kill you!" she screamed and a shot rang out.

For a panic-stricken moment I thought she'd done it, but then she slumped to the floor.

Nikolas let out a screech and ran to her before we could stop him. Finn was the only one with a working mind and he crawled to the elder Bain and grabbed the gun.

Nikolas reached for Ellie who squeezed off a shot by his head, fairly unaffected by the shot to her stomach. "Kill me, Nik, kill me," she sobbed.

"I can't!"

Finn stalked back and kicked Nikolas aside. He pumped two bullets into Ellie's brain and when her head was a bloodied mess and she stopped moving he pulled the gun up.

Nikolas let out a whine that w as almost pure animal and collapsed to a sobbing heap.

"Carlos?" I asked after a few seconds of blinking bewilderment.

"On it."

Finn replaced the gun in Bain's hand then came to stand over Nikolas. "It had to be done. She was on fucking angel dust! How could you let that happen?"

"I didn't know! Oh, god!"

I reached into my purse and brought out tweezers. "Get him out of here, Finn. Do it now!"

Finn had to drag him to the front kicking and screaming. The whole scene had taken less than four minutes but my adrenaline was still high and it felt like hours.

The gun I'd given Nikolas was a .22 which meant the slug was still in her but could have moved. I slapped on a second pair of gloves and began to feel inside the wound until I found it. It took several minutes but I got it out with the tweezers. It was important there be only one gun in this scene.




MJ 6B: Case of the Curse Pt 2



"Done," Carlos said just as I slid the bullet from her body.

"Get me some tissues."

He grabbed a few and brought them over. I wrapped the tweezers and bullet and bunched them inside the outer pair of gloves, and wrapped all that in more tissue, stuffing it in my purse.

We stood together staring. "ever done anything like this before?"

He shook his head. "Nope."

"Me neither. I hope to God I never have to again."

"Amen to that."

In our shower-cap covered shoes we padded out to the drive where Finn sat alone in the car. We got in and he pulled off, wasting no time. "Sent Nikolas home in a cab. Called my man in California, Georgette can come home when she likes. It's done."

"Feel any different?" Carlos asked.

I thought about that for miles. "It scares the shit out of me to say this but no, I don't. I feel I did the right thing."

"What about Eleanor Bain?" Finn asked.

"She was begging for death at the end. Think of all she went through...I'm going to have to try not to think of that."

"Carlos we'll dump the car and then drop you off, okay?" Carlos nodded to Finn. "Then Marly, you owe me a conversation."

"Can we wait a few days, Finn?" He gave me a long glance and jerked a nod.

One reprieve, but there was never any rest for the wicked.

***

Again my name came up. Bain had hired me and so the Lake Forest police came to talk to me Monday morning. They left happy with my story of an open-and-shut case of missing jewels returned, but some asshole tipped the press. That it was ruled officially a murder/suicide with Bain the sole triggerman, and that tales of incest, human sacrifice, and black magic had no effect. The press dragged out every detail of the double murder I'd stood trial for and I knew the call from the D.A. would come any day.

By Wednesday I'd unplugged my phone and stopped reading the paper. A knock came that afternoon at my door and a tall shape was beyond the glass.

I smoothed my hair and skirt and opened the door, expecting Finn but instead it was Nikolas.

He wore a suit and his hair was clubbed back. When he smiled, the dental implants seemed to be gone. "Marly."

"Nikolas, what are you doing here?"

"I don't know if you know this, but Ellie left everything to me. With her father and brother dead...I'm managing the estate. Not my idea of fun. I came here to give you the rest of your payment and to say thank you."

He held a suit case and strode in past me with newfound confidence. His eyes looked dim, flat. The eyes of a broken man...maybe.

I shut the door and he set the briefcase on the desk and opened it. Inside was money. In the movies to get a briefcase full of a million dollars you'd need mostly fives and tens. Good luck getting that from a bank.

In hundreds it was smaller, but no less sweeter. "What is this?"

"Bain promised you payment for finding Ellie. You did so much more, you stuck your neck out for me, and in the end you did something you swore you'd never do for a girl who was...insane."

"Thanks for the recap, but I meant how are you executor?"

"Good lawyers. In short it's a little convoluted, but Ellie's will in the end left me executor. We managed to get the coroner to file a canny report that Ellie was shot before Bain killed himself, but died after, making his will and hers valid."

He had been a friend and it made sense, but it still seemed odd. Wills moved in months, not hours, but then again I didn't have much experience with wills of the obscenely rich.

"Marly, I'll be leaving town. I just wanted to...thank you." It sounded bitter on his tongue.

I saw him glance at the couch where we- we'd made a mistake. "That's for the best. It might get dicey, Nikolas. It's best if you don't contact me."

"I have some news for you. I could have had this money delivered, but I wanted to tell you this in person. I've fixed it so we all walk away from this matter. Well, as best I could. I have friends, or at least Georgette has friends in high places. There's some talk. While we were dealing with this that PI you killed did dig up some info."

"I destroyed all his files."

Nikolas motioned to the humidor and I nodded. He pulled out 2 cigarettes, lit one, passed it to me, then lit his own. "Marly, that PI you killed, Richards? He passed something along to an assistant D.A."

"What the fuck was it?"

"He found someone named Bowers."

"But Bowers is dead. He was killed by a drug kingpin in California." Or I'd been told, but no body had ever been found. Oh, goody; a new nightmare.

"This D.A. is a client of Georgette's. She told me that there is some evidence of a murder over ten years ago. They're convening a grand jury soon."

My heart stopped. Bowers had been my partner in homicide back on the force. One drunk night a fellow cop claimed he'd seen Bowers shoot a man outside the club where Bowers' wife Liz worked. Believing in his innocence I'd done what I could, but in the end he'd needed a damn good lawyer, and money walks.

Bowers had a foolproof robbery planned and I'd helped him. We'd brought in two thugs but as soon as we got it I realized we'd been set up. We'd taken coke and cash from a man named Javier, a powerful drug kingpin. Bowers claimed the 2 thugs had double crossed him and so he and Liz had gone underground.

Ten years had done by and not too long ago Bowers had contacted me. He'd found the money but his wife had disappeared. It was a setup: I was sent to kill Liz and the 2 thugs and Bowers wanted the cash and coke to disappear. 

I'd been left a stalking horse and only with Finn's intervention had Javier let me go and then he set off to kill Bowers. That had been the end of that, or so I assumed.

"Fuck," I ground out at last. I was sick and fucking tired of my past coming back to haunt me.

"Marly, it might be time to run."

"Where would I go? My family is dead, everything I know is here."

"What about Michael? I've seen how he looks at you. Leave with him, go far away."

I shook my head. "The past, as I am learning, is inescapable. It doesn't just go away. Everyone in your past is dead. Best you get out while you can."

"You're not," he said, and chills ran up my spine. 

"I have my own problems. I'm not going to blackmail you, Nikolas, not when I pulled the trigger. You could always blackmail me, but if I want to, you might as well take that suitcase with you."

He glanced at it and stubbed his cigarette out. "I think I'll be going now. Marly, don't call me, I won't call you."

I opened the door and let him walk out. I stood there, watching him go down the stairs, listening to people in the lobby murmur as they searched for the other businesses in the small building.

A new tall man appeared and as he passed Nikolas hard gazes were exchanged and almost imperceptible nods. Finn turned and raised an eyebrow at me, then smiled.

I'd actually dressed up. I wore 1 of my 2 skirts, stockings, shapes with a suggestion of a heal, and a form fitting blouse. Yes, I'd dressed for him, and I wasn't going to think about it.

He wore a long cashmere black trench against the chill of the day, beneath it navy slacks and scuffed boots.

"What was that about?" He said as I closed the door.

I poured us drinks and filled him in. Finn and I knocked back the whiskey in one go.

"Well, take of your coat, relax," I said and flopped on the couch.

"I'd probably rather keep it on. I had a surprise underneath but seems wrong now."

I raised a brow and jerked a nod. Sighing, he removed the coat to show a worn cop uniform. His old one. It still fit but was a little tight in the shoulders and arms.

"Normally I'd indulge in a little dress up but I think you can understand cops freak me out these days."

He put the trench back on and joined me. "Don't you think this all seems odd?"

I gave him the most incredulous look I could muster.

"Marly, I know you didn't kill those people and I didn't. But you and I are the most likely suspects. Why does it keep coming back to you? Who hates you?"

"People who hate me? It's a long fucking list, and coincidence. You know what happened with Bowers. According to you Javier isn't behind anything and I'm clear there. We still have no clue who killed Harwood, and why he did it. It's likely we were set up because it was easiest.

"It's just coming up because I've taken too many high profile cases with too many bad people. I've worked for the Russian mob, the most dangerous man in Chicago, and a crazed Satanist. It's bound to catch up."

"Leave with me."

"And go where?"

"I have money, legitimate these days."

"The Swiss aren't as quiet as they used to be. You move any of it and they've got us." Both our eyes slid to the case.

"A million is damn near impossible to smuggle out on a plane, and you and I know it's not enough to start over for two people on the run."

"So what if we didn't have to run?"

I almost snorted with laughter. "To do that Bowers would have to disappear, for real this time. I'd have to go through a retrial but without this new charge I could beat it this time. I have the first installment Bain gave me. This is a bit much, but what was wired to me will cover it."

"If a pathetic bastard like Richards could find Bowers, it can't be hard. Give me some time." He jumped up and pulled out his cell phone. 

Pulling a long slim cigarillo from his pocket he lit and began calling. As he smoked and paced I poured us more drinks, cutting the scotch with soda, and listening to him ask the same questions of people named "Vinnie," "Snake," and "Deuce."

I handed him the glass and sat in my office chair, firing up the computer. I got nothing on Bowers that wasn't from 10 years before in the papers, so I turned to Richards.

"Finn," I said when he ended a call. "You know anyone in the FBI?"

"Yeah, possibly, why?"

"Richards opened his business eight years ago with backing from a retired agent. Guy died in a holdup on the west side five years ago. The FBI might have been how he found Bowers."

"Worth a shot." He called an agent and identified himself as Smith, which made me raise a brow. These questions were different and he hung up and collapsed on the couch.

"We've got half an hour to kill before calls get returned."

"We're skirting around the issue of finding someone and killing him, waiting for a lead in his direction, I'm facing so many charges I'll get a needle in my arm, and you want to fuck!?!"

"So?"

"Oh, fuck it, probably won't get bail, and no conjugal in city jail." I stood and began pulling off my clothes. "Get rid of the cop uniform, it's freaking me out."

"But I brought my handcuffs."

"Not today, Finn."

"I'll take it off on one condition. Call me by name." He stood and the look he gave me wasn't fierce or hard or angry. It was hesitant and expectant.

I kicked off my shoes and sighed. "Michael, strip off your damn uniform, now!"

He smiled and pulled off his clothes with impressive speed.

I was frantic, nervous, and not terribly aroused. Despite what movies and books say, that's the only time a woman wants a quickie: when she thinks she won't get off.

I pushed him back and mounted, keeping myself above his bare cock. Such a man, he was already hard.

"I had a feeling it'd be like this," Finn grumbled and opened his fist. He had a condom and a small vibrator.

"What's this?"

"This is me being a gentleman even when you're no lady." He rolled the condom on and without invitation I sank down. Christ he felt huge and it damn near hurt.

He grabbed me and kissed me. Finn was good enough at it that it helped a little and the last inch slid in. Suddenly he turned the toy on and pressed it to my clit, making me jump.

Finn kissed me harder and one hand pressed the toy, the other moved my hips grinding against him. It wasn't the best, there was too much in my mind, but he was warm and hard and something in my heart told me this could very well be our last time. When that thought hit, something changed. I pulled his hair free and tangled it with my fingers and kissed him back frantically. 

I began to thrust more traditionally and that toy stayed with me. Kissing became difficult so dragged his lips to my breast and threw my head back.

He fought me and bit my neck, hard. The pain was excruciating and blended into deep, electric pleasure. I moved one hand to claw at a bicep and dig my nails in and he bit the swell of a breast.

I lost myself to pure animal lust and all thoughts blew away in the wind. We jerked and clutched and bit as we fucked hard. I grew close and knew he was too and somehow it became a contest who could hold back the longest.

Then one thumb just teased my anus, stroked across it, and I went off. I screamed but it was late in the day in my office and he dropped the toy and slapped a hand over my mouth. Just as I started to come down to gasping pants he surged into me, lifting us from the couch, and came with a restrained grunt.

We didn't go completely slack, just loosened our holds but kept them. I rested my forehead against his. "Finn, don't talk, don't ruin this."

He laughed and kissed me. For a moment, it was perfect, and then the phone rang.

***

I often thought back to that day. Six months had passed since then, and I'd been right. That had been the last time I had been with Finn.

We'd never talked about us, but there had been an unspoken agreement. That call had been his friend at the FBI. Bowers was in Miami, in a safe house, also testifying against the Javier family. Someone had killed the Javier Finn knew and apparently Bowers was a witness. I snorted, he'd likely pulled the trigger himself.

Finn had taken the cash to fly to Miami. He had flown to kill a man he had nothing to do with. He was doing it for me. After that he'd planned to head to Europe to follow a tip Alabaster was in France.

With Bowers dead the charges in that case would drop. With Alabaster I'd beat the murder charges. Finn left his life to do this, and the unspoken agreement was that when it all ended, we'd be together.

I hadn't imagined kids or marriage, I was 35 for Christ's sake. Sitting back in my chair I drained my glass of whiskey and threw it against the wood shelves. The glass shattering felt good and I was almost drunk.

I'd slid back into dark ways. I was drinking to blackouts almost nightly, I'd gone back to comfortable shoes and wrinkled clothes, and limited my diet to martini olive and stale Chinese takeout.

Finn had taken the money and disappeared. There was no trace, even Carlos, his closest confidante had no word and swore, facing my gun, that he hadn't wired any money to Finn or heard from him.

Was he dead? Bowers wasn't. He'd testified for the grand jury and I'd been indicted. Conspiracy, robbery, drug possession charges. Smartly they'd set a speedy trial date so I could go down for this then face capital murder charges.

Bowers was in LA now, testifying against high ranking members of the Javier family. Luis Javier, the youngest brother, proved shrewd and had escaped any charges. In desperation I'd called him for help finding Finn two weeks earlier with no word.

As sick as it was I hoped Finn was dead. I hoped Bowers had shot him, or the marshals watching Bowers' safe house had him in some dank dungeon. I hoped because otherwise it meant he'd betrayed me. It whispered in the dark that he was the sole thread that connected me to Bowers', Stormy, and Harwood.

All along, had that bastard said he'd loved me, and been plotting this? When I'd first left him all those years ago on the force, had it left only with a seed of hate?

I'd tracked down his ex-wife to a cemetery in Arlington Heights to the northwest of the city. No answers there but her death had been suspicious, and it had happened before the divorce was official. Damning indications.

How stupid could I be? I would have seen this six months ago but Nikolas had been a good distraction. I often thought back to the stare, the nod. More and more I thought Nikolas had set it all up from the beginning, a man involved with a very sick family who figured out a way to get their money. Turned out his was in a trust he still didn't have full access to, but now he had the Bain millions to play with.

It was so Machiavellian it just reeked of a Michael Finnegan plot.

Out of clean glasses I pulled from the bottle and lit a cigarette. The phone rang, making me jump. Clients didn't call so much these days, just my lawyer or the press.

"You better not be a fucking reporter," I said by way of greeting.

"Miss Jackson, this is Luis Javier returning your call."

"Shit, I mean, thank you."

"Miss Jackson I hear we have two mutual problems. Is you line secure?"

"As far as I know."

"We shall call these problems A and M then, do you understand me?"

"Yes." I tried to shake the fog of drink off and took a deep pull off the cigarette.

"A has gone missing and I am assured will not be returning, though at large. I'm sure you know this means your problems are not over. Miss Jackson I can help you..take a vacation if you understand."

Get me out of the country, escape the charges. If anyone could do it, it was Javier. I caught myself nodding and slapped my face. "I understand."

"The price for this will be your help disposing of M. I know where to find this M."

My heart stopped. Freedom...for the price of killing Michael Finnegan. This meant he had betrayed me, was alive, was on the run.

"Yes, I'll do it. When can we meet?"

"I'll be there soon. Good day, Miss Jackson."

I hung up and stubbed out the cigarette. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.