Page 102 of Sweet as Sin (Bad Habit 1)
“C’mon now, darlin’, you’ll give me a complex if you keep cryin’ while I’m tryin’ to fuck you,” he teased, coaxing my head back with gentle pressure against my temples. I wouldn’t meet his eyes. “No,” he said firmly. “When a fight’s over, it’s over. No hangin’ on to it. No rehashin.’ No dredgin’ it up in the future. Which means you’re gonna quit cryin’ and start enjoyin’ me fuckin’ you right about now.”
He flexed his hips again to drive his point home.
I opened my eyes and stared up at him. With tears still leaking from the corners of my eyes, I whispered, “Have I told you how amazing I think you are? Because I think you’re the most amazing man I’ve met in my entire life. And I love you so much it hurts.”
His face did a funny thing. His eyes got all crinkly at the corners, his lips twisted as if they weren’t sure whether to curve up or down, and a big furrow dug its way between his brows.
His voice came rough. “Right back at you, baby. Right back at you.”
Then he lowered his mouth to mine and gave me everything I’d never knew I needed, and then some.
I loved him. God, how I loved him. And he loved me, too.
Which was ultimately what ruined us.
For eight days, Nico tried to contact Michael. Phone calls, email, texts, even a series of faxes, of all things. He went so far as to have Barney drive up to San Francisco and pound on his door, but Michael wasn’t home. And didn’t come home for the entire twenty-four hours Barney waited on the doorstep for him.
Michael had disappeared.
I wondered if he was hiding somewhere in Nico’s house.
That chilling thought didn’t hold a candle to one other piece of news provided by the police, however. When they tried to review the footage from the security cameras installed all over Nico’s property, they found nothing. The digital file for that day had been erased. As had the backup. Whoever had done that had known exactly how to breach the security company’s firewall without being detected, which meant that not only was he an expert at breaking in to real houses, he was an expert at breaking in to virtual ones.
Which consequently meant that Nico’s tendency to be overprotective exploded into a state of full-blown paranoia.
“I have to go to work!” I insisted for the tenth time, trying to keep the aggravation from my tone. It was eight o’clock Monday morning, and Nico was blocking my exit from the bedroom with his body. Getting past him with physical force would prove impossible, so I was trying to talk my way past.
I wasn’t having much luck.
Glowering down at me, he shook his head. “No way, baby. You’re not leavin’ this house until we know what we’re dealin’ with. I’m not takin’ a chance with your safety.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. My foot tapped a staccato rhythm against the floor. “Nico. Sweetie. I love that you’re worried about me, but I can’t hole up like a scared rabbit because your brother found his way into the house.”
I’d avoided saying the name “Michael” since I’d been given a red ass for speaking it in Nico’s bed. I might be dumb, but I wasn’t stupid. “It’s already been over a week, and I’ve missed way too much work. Besides, it’s not like he’s going to do
anything to hurt me, he’s just a weird peeping—”
“We don’t know that, Kat. We don’t know what his motivation is for anything.” Nico paused. “Or what he might be planning.”
A tingle of fear swept down my spine. “Planning? What’s that supposed to mean?”
Seeing the fear on my face, Nico stepped toward me. He unfolded my arms and wrapped them around his shoulders, pulling me into a hug. “I told you before. Michael doesn’t do anything without a reason. And the fact that he’s not answerin’ my calls or emails means he’s avoidin’ me, which means he’s up to somethin’. I know him, Kat. This is more than just a one-time thing. I didn’t want to scare you by sayin’ anything earlier, but . . . that little midnight visit of his was probably just the beginning. He can hold a grudge like a motherfucker.”
My heart began to race. Michael had looked at me with such anger in the kitchen the day of Avery’s wake. Was I in danger?
Nico guessed my thoughts. He pressed me into the warm solidity of his chest and kissed my temple. “You’re safe as long as you’re with me, baby. So work is gonna have to wait for a few more days until I can find out where my brother is and deal with this shit.”
There was only one problem with that plan: what if Nico never found him?
I pulled away and gazed up into Nico’s face. He looked tense, and I hated seeing him that way. I caressed his cheek, rough with stubble, and stood on my toes to give him a soft kiss on the lips. “Okay. I get that you’re worried about me. And I get that you want to keep me safe. But we can’t live our lives around what someone else might do. So how about this.”
Nico’s brows pulled together. “Ask away, baby, but if it involves you leavin’ this house, the answer’s ‘no.’”
I chose to ignore that. “What if Barney drives me to work?”
A chuckle from Nico. It was a sound without humor. “No.”
Shit. Today I had a really important job, one I couldn’t miss. I had a client I’d worked with for years, an aging film and television actress who was up for a part as the love interest in George Clooney’s new movie. She was scheduled to do a screen test, and was freaked out about the face-lift scars around her ears; they were still healing and were red. One of my specialties was hiding plastic surgery scars. This skill alone had often kept me booked solid for months.
