Page 102 of Diamond In The Rough

“He’s a businessman, first and foremost. He’s just another corporate drone, flittering from meeting to meeting. He and the cops can be in the same room. It’s fine.”

“He won’t go to prison?” she whispers. “You sure?”

“If he was, then you’d have committed a crime eating dinner at his place last night. Sit tight, Hale. We’ll be there in twenty.”

I pull the phone from my ear and kill our call. It pains me to cut her off. To leave her, standing alone when she specifically reached out to me. But to go to her, I have to deal with other shit. “As fast as you can, Smith.”

He presses his foot to the gas and turns to a less populated street. “Yes, Boss.”

“Who hit the shop?” Felix asks instantly. “And was it a message for you?”

“You think Wilkes is knocking on her door to piss us off?” I hit dial on another number and bring the phone to my ear. “He’d be so brazen as to hit up an art gallery in broad daylight, just so Tiia could call me and bring me across the city?” Then I pause, my call connecting and Stovic’s, ‘Yes, sir?’ rings through my ear. But I focus on Felix, first and foremost. My job is to protect him. My entire existence, built around his safety. “You don’t think he’s drawing us back to Manhattan to pop you, right?”

“You still think she works for him?” He mocks, but hell if he doesn’t pat his breast pocket in search of those cigarettes. “Have we established for sure she’s not Wilkes’ girl? Because this could be a really fucking clever ruse.”

“Sir?” Stovic bites out. “What’s up?”

“I need you and Michaels to beat us to Manhattan,” I order, my stomach somewhere around my asshole and my heart fracturing in my chest. “Colby’s Antiques. I need you to get eyes on the entire block. Send Jasper to Harlem to meet Rico. I want Tiia’s street searched and shut down before we get there. You have twenty minutes.”

“Yes, sir.”

21

TIIA

THE EYES OF SUSPICION NEVER TRULY GO AWAY

Nerves prickle my skin and leave a sickening sludge in the base of my stomach. Police lights swirl outside, though it’s daytime, so the blue and red don’t penetrate nearly as ominously as they would in the dark. Cops wander the street, while others take statements from anyone who witnessed the incident that has everyone in a tizzy.

And yet, I sit on my desk, my feet on a stool, and I bite my nails as I stare at the glass front door.

Five minutes pass from when Micah hung up.

Ten minutes.

My palms slick with sweat.

Fifteen minutes, and I’m not sure I’ll keep my breakfast inside my body.

“This is messing with my business, Ms. Hale.” Jakeline stomps from her office and shoots me a glare. My posture and position atop my desk are hardly elegant. Neither are the bedrock for upscale shopping, or for hoping a customer might consider spending five or six figures.

I nibble on my thumbnail and finger the new pendant in my left hand. I run the pad of my thumb over the emeralds, and when another minute clicks by and still no Malones walk through the door, I tiptoe shakily closer to insanity.

I shouldn’t need him this much.

I shouldn’t want him here like this.

I shouldn’t let his existence and proximity literally affect my well-being.

But that’s who I am now. It’s what I am.

I fell in love on the job, and I’ll be damned if I can undo the damage I’ve caused.

“Tiia?” Micah bursts through the shop door, his broad form taking up the entire doorway and his eyes spearing straight across to mine. Instantly, the breath stuck in my lungs empties. Horrifyingly, my eyes itch with tears I refuse to let free.

But he’s here.

Safe.

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