Because he trusts me.
The weight of that realization struck me suddenly. Alexei seemed to prefer a language of doing rather than saying. Today, by inviting me into his home, he had shown me exactly what I meant to him and how much he trusted me.
For the first time in forever, I truly felt special. I felt as if I mattered. Knowing what it had taken for me to place my trust in Alexei, I imagined it had been similarly as difficult for him. I had to respect that and treat his trust as a gift. I expected him to do the same for me.
I won’t screw this up.
He came out of the bathroom wearing only a pair of swim trunks. They were black and fit his body like a glove. His erection was outlined in the thin fabric, and I wondered why he hadn’t asked me to help him with that. He must have noticed my gaze lingering there because he said, “This can wait until tonight.”
“You’re sure?” I was more than willing to climb into bed with him.
“I’m sure.” He crossed the room and leaned down to kiss me. “It’s not quid pro quo with us, Shay. Sometimes I’m just going to throw you down, push your legs open and eat your pussy because I feel like it. I don’t expect anything in return.”
Reeling from his description, I flushed with heat. “You say the dirtiest things.”
“And you fucking love it,” he remarked with a devilishly sexy grin. After he kissed me one more time, he stepped back. “I’m going down for a swim.”
“It’s raining,” I reminded him and gestured to the window overlooking the lush backyard with the incredible pool, pergola and outdoor kitchen.
“There’s a smaller indoor pool downstairs.” He combed his fingers through my hair. “When you’re done unpacking, come find me. We’ll talk about dinner.”
“All right.”
“The security alarm is on so you’re safe inside the house.”
“And if I need to go out or answer the door?”
“I would prefer that you didn’t do either one of those without me, but the code is 1113.” He glanced away briefly, and I realized there was a significance to that number. It didn’t take me long to work it out. It was a date. A very significant date.
“The first time they sent me to your dealership was last November.”
Alexei nodded stiffly. “It was the thirteenth.”
There was a flutter of something sweet and warm in my chest. “I see.”
“Do you?” He pinned me in place with a searching look. “I had that security system installed two months after you started working at the dealership. Two months of seeing you once a week and I was already infatuated with you.”
“I think maybe I had the same feelings for you after my first night there,” I confessed, not wanting him to feel exposed.
“But we wasted all those months avoiding the obvious,” he said with a shake of his head.
I grasped his hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “You know what they say about the best place to hide things…”
“Right under your nose,” he said, a tender expression crossing his handsome face. He leaned down and kissed the tip of my nose. After stroking my jaw, he backed away and pivoted toward the door.
When he disappeared from the room, I found the strength to push out of the chair and onto my feet. My legs were wobbly as I pulled on my panties and leggings. I tugged my suitcase through the master bathroom to the insane closet where Alexei wanted me to store my things.
Standing there, I was reminded of the stark difference between his lifestyle and mine. My entire mobile home would have fit in his master suite. The closet alone was bigger than my bedroom and Shay’s combined. I ran my fingers along his designer clothing, noticing the way he had everything organized so neatly. His collection of leather belts held my interest. Some of them were beautifully made and I admired the stitching.
Spotting the stack of hangers he had placed on the marble-topped island, I took the hint and started unpacking my things. There wasn’t much in my luggage so it didn’t take long. I found the hamper for my dirty clothes and decided to investigate the rest of the house so I could locate the laundry room.
When I was finished unpacking, I left the master suite and walked around the upper floor of Alexei’s mansion. I opened doors and poked my head inside the many rooms. I was a bit taken aback when I realized only two of the rooms were furnished. I clearly wasn’t lack of money that kept him from finishing the guest rooms on the second floor. There had to be another reason for it—and I had a good feeling I knew what it was.
As I walked downstairs, I began to suspect that Alexei had purchased this grand mansion in River Oaks as a way to prove to everyone else that he had arrived. He was a man who liked to nice things and liked to use luxury items like his watches, his suits and his fleet of vehicles to prove that he was successful and wealthy. That wasn’t my style, but I understood it. I had seen what it was like when the people I grew up with got a taste of money. They immediately went for new cars or shiny rims or expensive clothes.
I suspected Alexei had done the same thing. He wanted to prove he belonged. He wanted to prove that he had left behind his criminal past and was a man of worth and success.
But it had to be lonely in this beautiful house of his. All the marble and hardwood and expensive, luxury furniture in the world couldn’t make up for the coldness of an empty mansion. Without anyone to share this incredible space with, he must have grown disinterested in decorating and furnishing after tackling the first three bedrooms upstairs. The other four had been left to languish, unused and empty.
Downstairs, I finally found the laundry room. There were two washers and two dryers plus a wall of built-in cabinets and an obscene amount of marble countertops. I tried to imagine what size family would need that many machines and that much folding space. Considering the dry cleaning tags I had seen upstairs in Alexei’s closet, I doubted he got much use out of this room at all.
The ringing doorbell startled me. Alexei hadn’t said anything about visitors. Wondering if Stas had come back for some reason, I left the laundry room and made my way to the front of the house. The custom double doors made of wood and iron filigree had glass panels on the upper portion of the doors. I could see the outline of a single man through them and hesitated in the entryway.
I hadn’t located Alexei’s indoor pool yet so I had no idea where he was or if he could even hear the doorbell. I backed away from the door, hoping the man out there hadn’t seen me yet, and winced when the doorbell rang again. After the hell I’d been through in the last three days, I was naturally suspicious and easily spooked.
And then I caught sight of the security system console mounted on the wall around the corner. The small screen showed a live feed from a camera mounted somewhere above the front doors. I recognized the man standing there almost instantly—and my stomach knotted with distress.
What is he doing here?
Inhaling a steadying breath, I punched in the code Alexei had given me and walked to the front door. I turned the deadbolt and door knob locks and opened the door a few inches. Trying to hide my anxiety, I faked a warm smile and hoped to hell Detective Eric Santos couldn’t tell my hands were shaking.
“Hello,” I greeted softly. “Can I help you?”
“Shay?” Eric Santos’s face registered shock. He took a step back and gazed up at the façade of Alexei’s house as if to reassure himself he was in the right place. “What are you doing here?”
“I sort of live here,” I said, still not quite believing it myself. I didn’t add that it was a temporary situation. I didn’t need Eric digging around in my personal life. “Are you here to speak with Alexei?”
Eric nodded. “I came here to speak with him about you actually.”
“Me?” Oh, this wasn’t good.
“Well you’re missing—”
“I’m not missing, Detective. I’m right here.”
He shot me a perturbed look. “I think we need to talk.”
I didn’t want to talk to him. I really
, really didn’t. But I knew that if I acted odd or gave him any reason to suspect something wasn’t right, he was going to make trouble for Alexei.
I stepped aside and waved him into the house. “Come in, please.”
Eric entered, and I shut and locked the door behind him. I walked him into the living area and gestured toward one of the couches there. I took a seat in a chair across from him and tried to look calm and relaxed. I thought about asking him if he wanted something to drink, but I wasn’t familiar enough with the house. If he saw me peeking through cabinets or going down the wrong hall, he would automatically know something was up.
After taking his seat, Eric whipped out a notebook and pen and flipped to the page he wanted. “Your neighbors said they saw a truck at your house on Friday evening. They said three or four men got out of the truck and hassled you. Your landlord and his crew intervened.” He lifted his gaze from his notes. “Does that fit your recollection of the evening?”
“Yes.” I leaned back in the chair, drawing up my legs and crossing them. I tugged my oversized sweatshirt over my knees and reminded myself to be very, very careful with my answers.
“And do you want to tell me who those men were?”
“They were just some guys looking for Ruben.” The lie came so easily. I sort of hated myself for not telling Eric the truth. He had been trying to help Shannon get straight for years. He was a good guy, and he was someone I had trusted—until my loyalty shifted to Alexei.
“And?”
“And they left when I told them he wasn’t there.”
Eric’s expression remained impassive. I couldn’t tell if he believed me or if he was using those super detective powers on me. “We’ve been trying to find your sister and Ruben.”
“Why?”
“Because we think they may have had something to do with the disappearance of this man,” he said and flashed me the screen of his iPhone. “Do you know this guy?”
Expecting to see Lalo’s face, I reluctantly glanced at Eric’s phone. The license photograph wasn’t his. It was some blond guy I had never seen. “No.”
“His name is Edgar Vasquez. He went to school with Ruben. They seem to have kept in touch and the rumor is that they’re working together.”
“Detective Santos, you know that I don’t have anything to do with Ruben or the life he lives. I barely tolerate Shannon’s involvement.”
“Is that why you’ve moved in here?”
“I live here because Alexei asked me to live with him. It has nothing to do with Shannon.” Lies. Lies. Lies.
“How long have you been dating?”
“I don’t think my personal life has anything to do with that man.” I motioned toward his phone. “I’m not going to answer questions about my relationship with Alexei.”
Eric seemed surprised by my reply. Had he expected to push me around that easily? As if trying to push my buttons, he asked, “And those rumors about you and Lalo Contreras?”
My face wrinkled with disgust. It was a reaction I couldn’t hide. “There has never been anything between me and Lalo. Those rumors are all lies.”
“Even the one about you and Lalo going into a back room together at the Arena on Friday night?” His arched eyebrows dared me to lie, and I knew I was caught.
Carefully, I explained, “I went to the Arena on Friday night looking for Shannon. She was supposed to be there with Ruben.” Not wanting to talk about what had happened in that back room, I came up with another lie on the fly. “I ran into Lalo there. I couldn’t hear him over the music and the crowd so he took me to a quiet room in the back. We talked for a few minutes about Shannon and the show and then I left.”
“You just talked?” He didn’t believe me. “You’re sure about that?”
“Yes.” I didn’t know what else to say.
“Because those bruises on your throat and on your face tell me another story, Shay.”
Shit. I had completely forgotten about my busted up face. Alone with Alexei and Stas, there had been no reason to smear on concealer and foundation.
“Those bruises tell me a story I’ve heard from other girls who were unfortunate enough to run into Lalo on a bad night,” Eric said. “They tell me that he tried to get rough with you.” He tilted his head and studied me. “But I think you fought back. I think the story I heard about Lalo getting the shit beat out of him by a pretty little dark-haired doll is true.”
I swallowed nervously. “It was self-defense.”
“I don’t doubt that it was,” Eric assured me. “Lalo is a pig. He got what he deserved.” Sliding his pen into the metallic coils atop his notepad, he admitted, “I saw the footage of you going into the Arena. I also saw you going into the back of the building with him. I didn’t see you come out the front or back exits, but I did see him stumbling out the back with a bloody towel on his head.”
“I went out a window,” I said quietly. “It was the only way out of that room.”
He didn’t have to ask why I hadn’t called the police. “You realize he’s not going to take that embarrassment lightly.”
“I’m not worried about what Lalo or anyone else thinks. Alexei won’t let anything happen to me.”
Eric narrowed his eyes. “I know what Alexei used to be. I know what he still is.”
“And what is that?”
“Take off those designer suits and those expensive watches and he’s nothing but a gangster with money. He’s a criminal who lives in a fancy house. He’s got blood on those tattooed hands, and it doesn’t wash off, Shay.”
“Are you trying to scare me away from him? Because it won’t work.”
“Obviously,” he said with a dark laugh. “You and your sister seem to have a type. I always thought you were the smarter sister. The one with goals. The one who was going places.” He glanced around the beautiful room with its lavish décor and vaulted ceilings. “Looks like I was right about you going places and having goals. I was just wrong about the type of goals you had and what you were willing to do to attain them.”
His barb hit its mark. Like a bullet to the chest, it burned through me, spreading humiliation and embarrassment as I realized what he was insinuating. He thinks I whored myself out for a big house and money.
“When was the last time you saw your sister?”
Still hurting from his cruel remark, I said, “Friday afternoon.”
“And you haven’t talked to her since then?”
“She texted me a few times. She heard about my run-in with Lalo.” It was close enough to the truth. “We haven’t talked since yesterday.”
“You should know that I’m going to pull Shannon’s phone records. If you’re lying—”
“Yesterday was the last time we spoke.”
“May I see your phone?”
“Do you have a warrant?”
Eric shot me a warning look. “I can get one.”
“When you have one, come back and ask me again.”
“You should be careful playing these kinds of games, Shay. You don’t have nearly as much experience as Alexei. You’re bound to get burned.”
I didn’t have a smart reply to that.
“Was Ruben with Shannon the last time you spoke to her?”
“I didn’t hear him, but they never spend much time apart so who knows.”
“And Lalo? The last time you saw him?”
“Friday night,” I lied.
“You haven’t had any contact with him since then?”
“No.” The lie came quickly and without a hint of emotion. I would take that secret to the grave rather than put Alexei and Kylee in danger.
“Tell me about your car.”
His question threw me off but I quickly recovered. “It’s in the shop.” Not exactly a lie.
“The body shop, you mean,” he interjected. “Because your boss told me someone beat your car to hell in the parking lot. He said that some guys in a truck that looked exactly like the one in front of your house took bats and crowbars to the car.
”
It seemed Eric had done quite a bit of snooping before coming here to talk to Alexei. “That’s what he told me, too.”
“And?”
“And nothing,” I said with a careless shrug. “I called Alexei, and he had one of his friends tow it to a shop.”
“And that’s it? No insurance claim? No police report.”
“Alexei took care of it,” I reiterated.
Narrowing his eyes, Eric asked, “Is Alexei going to take care of Lalo?”
And that’s when I realized that Eric didn’t know Lalo was dead.
Treading carefully, I said, “No.”
“I find it hard to believe a man like Alexei is going to let someone like Lalo put his hands on his woman and not doing anything about it.”
You have no idea, I thought grimly. “Believe whatever you want, but I’m telling you the truth.”
“Maybe I’ll ask Alexei about Lalo,” Eric said in a threatening tone.
“Fine.” If Eric thought he could outsmart Alexei when it came to something like this, he was a fool. Eric had said it best. Alexei was a gangster through and through. He was never going to let the police get a step ahead of him. “That’s why you’re here isn’t it?”
“I’m here because I heard a rumor on the streets that Alexei was playing sugar daddy to a cleaning lady. I figured he might know where you and your sister were hiding.”
“I’m not hiding. I’m right here.”
Eric grunted in annoyance. “Where is Alexei?”
“He’s swimming.”
Eric shot me a disbelieving look. “It’s raining.”
“In his other pool,” I corrected. “It’s indoors.”
“Of course it is,” he grumbled and rose to his feet. Stuffing his notepad into his pocket, he said, “Tell your boyfriend I’m going to come see him at the dealership tomorrow.”
Eric should have known that type of intimidation tactic wasn’t going to work on Alexei. “I’ll make sure to let him know to expect you.”