Page 5

5

Andre

I sent over the paperwork to Saint this morning. Now, I just have to wait and see if Stella will actually agree to one year of marriage.

Creed was pissed I offered to back the loan, but I know he’ll still collect on it if the time comes. Not that I blame him. It is a shit-ton of money. As part of the gigantic debt I now owe him, he also put me on babysitting duty for the day to make sure Tristan is making progress on the DA.

“I’ve got a question,” I say to Tristan. We sit in his old black truck in the sanitation department’s parking lot across the street from the courthouse around lunchtime, stalking DA Kirstin Hunt and waiting to see if she’ll make an appearance.

“What?” my cousin asks while chewing on his bottom lip, his tone annoyed. His eyes are solidly fixed on the brick building, on the task at hand — figuring out a way to get the woman to drop our criminal cases.

My normally upbeat but obnoxious cousin is obviously distracted and pissy about something, so I reach out and change the radio station while saying, “Never mind.”

He glances over at me from the passenger seat, and I notice the bags under his brown eyes. “Spit it out. Nothing else to do while we wait for her.”

“It’s nothing. I’m not sure why I was going to even ask you, since you don’t know shit about meeting a woman’s mother.”

It takes him several long moments before he puts it together and flashes his usual grin. “You’re nervous about meeting the wife’s mom? That’s why you wanted to tag along with me today? You think I have any advice?”

I refrain from mentioning Creed wanted me to check on him and move on to my dilemma, so he doesn’t lose his shit.

“Stella’s mom is dying,” I explain. “I don’t want her to hate me or to suggest Stella call off the wedding. The woman is hanging on to the idea by a thread as it is.” I shake my head, recalling her list of conditions.

The fact she thought she had to tell me not to touch her without her explicit permission blows my mind.

What kind of fucking men has she been dating? I want names so I can beat some decency into their asses.

And she thinks it will be a chore to beg or take a great deal of effort for me to pretend to be in love with her which is ridiculous. The woman enthralled me the first time I laid eyes on her.

Fine, that may be more lust than love, but it’s similar enough that when we’re together in front of her mother, I won’t have to act like I want to be there when there’s no place I would rather be, no other woman I would rather have.

“You want to know how to impress Stella’s mom, so the viper bitch won’t back out of the wedding?” Tristan asks.

“Basically,” I reply, wincing at the insult. “Should I…is it too cheesy if I bring her some flowers?”

“Fuck, yes, that’s cheesy as shit,” Tristan chuckles while his fingers drum on the steering wheel to the beat of the classic heavy metal song on the radio. “But you should probably still do it. I mean, just because we think it’s stupid doesn’t mean she won’t appreciate the gift.”

“Yeah, okay. Stella will probably throw them in the trash.”

“Probably, but then that’s on her and you’ve at least put in the effort.”

While I was aware this marriage would not be a cakewalk, I’m starting to think it’s going to be more complicated than I expected.

I knew damn well Stella wanted nothing to do with me, that she wasn’t excited about the prospect of marrying me.

Now it’s obvious the only reason she’s going along with the wedding is not just to get the money or backing her brother desperately needs, but to try to make her dying mother happy.

That’s like a whole new level of pressure on me I wasn’t expecting…

“There she is,” Tristan exclaims, pulling me out of my thoughts. He leans forward in the driver seat to get a better view.

“Are you sure that’s her?” I ask when I spot a woman with blond hair, sleeked back into a bun at the nape of her neck, and wearing a pristine white pantsuit. She strolls down the steps with a matching white leather briefcase in one hand and her phone in the other. The woman’s nose is raised in the air as if she thinks she owns the entire world and looks down upon the rest of us.

If nothing else, I guess we’ve discovered her favorite color, even if it’s the absence of all color and boring as shit, and that she’s haughty as fuck.

“That’s definitely her.” Tristan cranks up the car to follow her. “DA Cunt. She’s going to get into that white SUV waiting at the curb and go to some posh as shit restaurant to eat lunch with a bunch of rich pricks, who laugh at everything she says and practically drool the entire meal, especially when she talks about Monday night football or how both of the New York teams suck. The assholes stand up and shit for her when she goes to go take a piss.”

“How long have you been watching her?” I ask him, since he seems to know her schedule so well.

“Three weeks.”

“Three weeks and you don’t have anything on her, other than she’s a snob who dines with rich assholes and weirdly loves white shit?”

“Not yet, but I will. I assume the rich guys must be campaign donors, even though she won’t be up for reelection for another three years. So why pander to their asses now?”

We follow the SUV to Beekman Street. Tristan parks, and we see the waiting table of douches inside, just as he predicted.

“Bunch of pussies,” he grumbles.

“Is it the same guys every day?”

“Hell no. Different men each time, Monday through Friday. No repeats from the weeks before either.”

“So, she needs lots of donations for reelection. Any chance she sucks dick for big checks?”

Tristan looks at me, his face twisted in disgust. “Do you think she would’ve been elected if there was even a hint of her getting on her knees for campaign contributions?”

“I guess not.”

“No men show up to her apartment, and she doesn’t go to anyone else’s place at night.”

“You’re seriously watching her every second of the day and night? No wonder you look like you haven’t slept in days.”

“I take naps in the car when she’s working. She gets up at five a.m. to go to the gym in her building, then showers and heads to the courthouse at seven. She leaves to take lunch around noon and is back by two. Then she stays and works until around eight every night, except for Fridays, when she leaves at seven to go straight home to bed.”

“How do you know she goes straight to bed?”

“Either she’s asleep or she’s sitting in the dark, since there are no lights on in her apartment from the windows facing the street.”

“Damn. You seem to have her all figured out. What about weekends?”

“On Saturdays, she goes to a nine a.m. spin class within walking distance of her apartment. On Sundays, she has an eight a.m. yoga class with the same deal. Oh, and she orders takeout at work with coworkers for dinner most nights or waits until she gets home. But she doesn’t cook. All her meals are delivered.”

“Any of our restaurants?”

“Yeah, she seems to like Italian.”

“That could be an angle to work. How about security?”

“Nothing but the doorman and cameras in the building and her apartment doorbell cam.”

“So, posing as a delivery guy, someone could possibly grab her if they hide their face…”

“Grab her and do what? Drag her onto the elevator where people will see? Down ten flights of stairs and past the doorman? Unlikely.”

“And she’s not fucking anyone?”

He exhales heavily. “There’s a big ass Vice cop, Bryan Daughtry, she meets with more than any of the others, but only in her office. The door stays closed for at least half an hour whenever the two of them have a meeting, usually once a month.”

“How the hell do you know that?”

“I fucked it out of the receptionist.”

“You fucked the DA’s office receptionist to get information from her on the DA? Jesus, Tristan,” I mutter while scrubbing my palms over my face. “What if she tells the DA?”

“She won’t. And it’s not like she gave up the details easily.” He smirks.

“What the hell did you do to get her to talk?”

“Nothing she didn’t like. That’s for sure,” he replies with a broadening grin. “I did some digging, found out this girl, Natalie, likes going to the BDSM club. So, I got her into one of the private rooms and worked some dom magic on her until she was singing for me, telling me anything I wanted to know. Took hours, but damn, it was worth it when I finally let her gush all over my dick.”

“Jesus,” I mutter again.

“Natalie won’t say anything to DA Cunt. She doesn’t like her very much. If her boss finds out she spilled info on her, she’ll get fired. Which is also why she’s still feeding me intel by phone without me needing to withhold orgasms.”

“Does Creed know what you’ve been doing?”

“No. Does it matter? The boss wants results. I need to figure out some way to blackmail the DA. Creed doesn’t care about how I get it done as long as I figure out a way to convince the bitch to drop the charges.”

“And you haven’t found any dirt to use yet? The clock is ticking. Trials may start soon…”

“You think I fucking forgot that shit?” Tristan snaps. “Creed’s depending on me to figure this out. I know. I’m working on it.”

“Well, you may not have to work on it much longer,” I admit.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, the bigger Zara’s pregnant belly gets, the more real it is to Creed that he’s going to be missing out on his baby’s birth and the first years of their life. He’s getting more desperate by the day. I think he’s ready to take her out.”

“Take out who? DA Cunt?”

“Who else?”

“What the fuck?! Why am I wasting my time stalking her if he’s just going to have a sniper put a bullet in her pretty little head?”

“Because that’s a last resort. He’ll do it, but it could cause a bigger mess. Creed doesn’t want to serve three and a half years, much less a fucking life sentence.”

“That shit will blow back on him,” Tristan says. “You’ve got to help me convince him to back off and let me handle it.”

“Why? So you can serve a life sentence instead?”

“If I have to…”

“You can’t be serious. Creed doesn’t want you to go down for him.”

“Well, it’s not like I’ve got anyone who needs me like he does, and you’re about to have a wife waiting at home when you tie the knot.”

“I’ll kick your ass if you even think about taking the fall on a murder one charge,” I warn him. “Seriously, just figure out another way.”

“I’m trying to, but I’m not a genius like you two!”

“Creed and I aren’t geniuses either,” I tell him with a bark of laughter. “But I’ll think on it too, okay?”

“Yeah, okay,” he agrees but doesn’t sound confident I’ll be much help.

“I’m guessing there’s nothing on the Vice cop either?”

“Not a single complaint in fifteen years of service. He’s a fucking hero and shit,” Tristan grumbles, as if he hates the man’s guts.

“Keep looking. You’ll find something on him or her, eventually.”

That’s all the advice I can offer him for now. I’ve got my hands full as it is with the wedding and trying to figure out how to not only impress my future mother-in-law but also convince her I’m in love with her daughter.

I want the dying woman to see her daughter happy, but I also need that fucking wedding night with Stella.

One night to have her the way I’ve always wanted, to finally get her out of my system so I can focus on the upcoming trials instead of thinking with my dick.

The things I plan to do to that woman…well, I better start making a list, so I leave nothing out in my limited time.

I’m going to fuck Stella so damn good she won’t remember her name, only mine. And I’ll have her screaming it at the top of her lungs until she loses her voice.