Page 28 of Hidden Ties (Made Men #11)

TWENTY-TWO

BAGGED MYSELF A BOYFRIEND

“ Y ou bob , and then you weave , Valerie!” Sal scolded her, taking his hand off the steering wheel to show her what he meant by making a zigzag motion. “I don’t understand how you play video games and don’t know that.”

“I know that,” she muttered under her breath with her arms crossed over her chest.

“Then you certainly should fucking know that you don’t bring a goddamn Harlequin cosplay bat to a gunfight!”

“Why the hell am I getting ridiculed right now? I almost died, and you’re the one who’s been lying to me this whole time!”

“Exactly. You almost died. Thankfully, I saved your ass in time because I had your computer in the first place. So, I’m pretty sure that gives me a pass.”

Valerie went to open her mouth to say something smart but had absolutely nothing to say because, frankly, he was right.

“Still hurt you did that, though, especially after last night.” Her voice revealed just how much he had hurt her; they both knew he’d had plenty of opportunities to tell her.

“Listen.” Sal softened his voice a tad but still held a bit of firmness.

“Real life isn’t anything like video games.

You can’t respawn after you die. I’m only telling you this”—his jaw flexed a bit—“because I care about you, Valerie. So much so that I let a lie by omission get out of hand ’cause I didn’t have the balls to tell you the truth.

Then you did the exact thing I was afraid you’d do by running away. ”

Valerie no longer held her arms so tightly across her chest. Instead, she loosened them, placing her hands in her lap and feeling awful for leaving him like that. Just how she had fears of him leaving her already, he did, too.

“I’m sorry. I sometimes let my temper get a bit out of hand.”

“ A bit ?”

At feeling a sense of rage come up, she had to bite it down not to prove his point.

“Maybe a little more than a bit.” She had to say the words with a clenched jaw after she quickly remembered that he had said he cared about her.

Then, if that wasn’t enough, she had seen another bachelor’s way of life, making her even more certain after today that Sal was the man for her. “I care about you, too.”

Sal took his hand off the wheel to take hers in his and held it firmly.

“I haven’t let myself care about anyone like this ever .

I’m afraid of getting attached to someone only to have them ripped away from me.

It took me three years before I let myself accept the Carusos as my family.

I was too afraid they’d change their minds and throw me back out on the street.

I understand the thoughts in my brain aren’t healthy.

It will take some time before I ever believe you won’t leave me. ”

“I don’t plan on leaving you again.” Her grip held his back tighter in a promise.

While they had talked about his past last night, he hadn’t mentioned those kinds of thoughts and feelings for her yet, also revealing both of them had a fear of abandonment due to their own issues.

She supposed it was only another reason Sal had joined the mafia.

Giving his oath to the family meant he’d have one for life.

“If you don’t want me to, of course.”

“I’ll never be able to control my thoughts on your safety,” he warned, letting her know that he didn’t have plans to let her go, either. “A made man will always worry about his girl’s safety.”

His girl , she replayed the words, looking down at their intertwined hands in disbelief. No one had ever held her hand before, let alone make her their girl. Certain she had just gotten her first boyfriend, she’d be sure to iron out the details later.

Right now, only one thing came to her mind as butterflies fluttered in her stomach. “Are we going back to the house?”

He seemed unsurprised by her sudden change in subject, so he had obviously grown used to her focus level.

“Yes, your stuff is still in my car, and I don’t exactly enjoy driving this shit box,” he reminded her of her little key stint.

“The Casino Hotel is closer, though,” she couldn’t help but mention.

“I thought you might want your computer back.” Sal looked at her in confusion. Maybe not wanting her clothes, he could understand, but not wanting her computer back was practically unbelievable.

“I suppose the car could suffice …” she said, looking at the back seat. While it was rather tiny on the outside, her car was a bit of a clown car with the inside more spacious than you’d think.

Sal took his eye off the road to look over at her.

“Suffice for what?”

“To fuck.”

Valerie ran her hand lovingly over her PC. “I have missed you so much. Come to Mama.”

She loaded up her game; it wasn’t hers, but it would do in a pinch. She had been playing for five minutes when she saw the notification of a name pop up as they were entering the game.

“What’s up, Justice?” she squealed through her headset. “I’ve missed you. Have you missed me?”

“Yeah, I really missed losing to you. My ranking went higher. I have to admit it did dull the pain.”

“If I weren’t so happy to have my computer back right now, I would be hurt,” she said, placing a hand over her heart as if he could possibly see it.

“You going to tell me what happened? I’ve been waiting for you to get online and find out.”

“You still haven’t gotten my message? I sent you one through … well, a now deceased person’s Xbox.”

“Geez, we will have to get back to that.” You could hear the headset practically shaking on his head before he continued. “I don’t own an Xbox anymore, so I never linked my account to my PC to even receive a message from there.”

Of course, he didn’t. Justice had taste. With her hope restored in gamers, she began to catch him up to speed.

“My dude, I got arrested! Can you believe that?”

“I did happen to catch that,” Justice reminded her of that night they had stayed up to play games. “So, what did you get arrested for? Eating too many Twizzlers? Buying too many MoonPies?”

“Bro!” Gunning him down, she raised her arm, doing a fist-pump. “I’ve missed kicking your ass.”

“Valkyrie! What did you get arrested for?”

“For cyber-attacking the Horseshoe. Can you believe that? It’s why I had to try messaging you through someone’s Xbox. They confiscated my electronic devices.” Valerie gave a sarcastic snort into the mic. “If I were to cyber-attack someone, I would—”

“Valkyrie!” Justice yelled. “Get your tanks!”

Concentrating on the game, she waited until she was safe before she started talking again. “Anyway, I got to meet this really hot lawyer. I’m going to make him an avatar in a new game I’m thinking about. Once I go back and put some final finishing touches on Bubblegum Blitz, that is.”

“You can’t use your lawyer as inspiration for an avatar.”

“Why not? Did you not hear me tell you he’s hot?”

Valerie pulled out a bag of Twizzlers that she had hidden from Sal. He only let her have a pack a day, spewing all these scientific facts about red dyes she couldn’t care less about.

Uncaring about her taste in men, he had to put her back on track of their discussion. “When do you have to go to court?”

“If I’m lucky, never. We’re hoping to have the charges dropped soon. Hey! Did I tell you my bail was two million dollars! Isn’t that fucking cool?”

“Yeah, cool.”Justice blasted her to smithereens, trying to keep up with her tangents. “What are you doing about playing on the Internet? Won’t you get in trouble? You should get off.”

“Sal let me have my computer back out of self-preservation and told me that I shouldn’t get into any trouble for it.”

“Salvatore?” he asked, like he was making sure he’d heard her correctly over the missiles she had just sent his way. “As in your next-door neighbor that you have despised with your whole being for the last six months?”

“Funnily enough, it turns out he’s not a cheater …” she admitted with fake laugher that those accusations on her part had been completely false. Valerie couldn’t, however, tell him the full truth about him, either.

“Well, I don’t think he was playing video games with the girls he brought home,” he said in a slightly worried tone.

“Oh no, he was being a total manwhore, but it turns out that he’s sweet, and kind, and really, really, really hot.”

“Wow, he got three really hot s. You only gave your lawyer one,” he quickly noted. “It sounds serious.”

“Hopefully.” Valerie smiled to herself. “I might’ve finally bagged myself a boyfriend. I’ll hold out hope that you’ll finally find a girlfriend soon.”

“Thanks for that,” Justice simply muttered. “So, can we go back to the deceased person’s Xbox?”

“Oh yeah!” She remembered the important detail, trying to think back over their conversation if she had told him yet or not, since she got distracted with all the times she already killed him in the game.

“Did I tell you someone was trying to kill me? Scared the crap out of me. I went to my coworker Lyle’s house to try to get in contact with you.

Unfortunately, he was murdered while I was there.

I barely escaped with my life. Dying and fighting for your life isn’t at all like the games we pla—”

“Did you tell your lawyer?” Justice’s voice cut through her sentence.

“I was going to get Sal to call him in the morni—”

“I would have him text your lawyer tonight, so he can talk to the police,” Again, he cut her off with a sense of urgency.

“Sal’s already talked with the police. I don’t think there’s anything he can do about it tonight, anyway.”

A frustrated sigh came through the mic after he got blown up. “Valkyrie, there has to be a reason you’re being accused of cyber-stalking and why you were almost killed along with your coworker. You had to have seen or heard something you weren’t supposed to know.”

“I didn’t. I only worked at the Horseshoe for a short amount of time.

Even when I broke through their firewalls to prove a point that they needed to install a better system, I didn’t see anything that raised any red flags,” she told him with confidence, having already considered this a million times when she’d been held up in the cell for the long weekend.

“So, why kill Lyle? And try to take me out? If I’m convicted, I’ll be out of their hair, anyway. ”

“Because you know something …” Justice’s voice trailed off. “Or have something …” His voice rose from pulling his mic closer to his face. “Valerie! You have something!”

Valerie had to lower the volume on her headset at his raised voice, and she found it funny when he used her real name. Yes, he knew her real name, but he had never used it before. “What would I even have?”

“How in the fuck do I know?” Justice was practically yelling at her. “Did you ever take anything from work?”

Putting a Twizzlers in her mouth, she had to think for a moment. “Maybe I shouldn’t mention what I took over the Internet.”

“For God’s sake, think, Valkyrie. Hard .”

“Okay!” she yelled back, trying to do so as she mulled it over her candy. But now she was in the mood for something else since he had mentioned the word hard . Valerie wondered when Sal would be back from his office; he had left her safe in his penthouse to take care of a few things.

“Do you still have the stuff you took?”

His words brought her back to what she was supposed to be thinking about. “I didn’t take that much. Let’s see, a monitor, graphics card, a RAM—”

“The RAM, where is it now?” he asked with urgency, knowing that was what stored all a computer’s data.

“I don’t know …” It was hard for Valerie to think now that she had Justice’s avatar in her crosshairs.

“It’s probably gone, actually. Did I mention my house got broken into?

I kept all my unused parts at home in a box in my office.

The only reason they didn’t get a hold of my computer was because Sal took it. ”

“No, that was not mentioned.” Justice’s voice could be heard in a growl.

“It’s not like it matters, anyway. Everything that could hold memory or data, I wiped clean once I brought it home.

Anything I might’ve taken wasn’t worth taking to the scrapyard.

They were older than me—” Valerie broke off, suddenly remembering something while she waited for Justice’s next life to regenerate.

“There was a flash drive I found a while back, though. I had actually forgotten all about it. I bet it’s still in my stash of loose items I keep in the pot of a faux plant.

It came with the desk, so when I got fired, I couldn’t take the plant and forgot I had hidden some stuff in there. ”

“Where exactly did you find the flash drive?” he asked, sensing where this was going.

“On the floor … in someone’s office,” she finally admitted.

“So, you took it,” he corrected her, sighing, “Whose office was it?”

“Um … let me think …” Valerie shot down Justice, who was finally on his last life. She did another fist-bump in the air to celebrate. She was surprisingly on her game, considering she hadn’t been playing lately.

“Valkyrie!” Justice yelled. “Quit playing and think.”

“I think it was my boss’ office. Edmond’s …

” As she said the name, it suddenly clicked with her that those charges were not only never going to be dropped, but they were never going to let her see the inside of a courtroom.

To make it worse, she didn’t even have what they wanted, and she didn’t know how many people were involved for certain, past Gerard, until she got the part back.

“Justice, I have to go. Thanks for the game and the help! I have to go find Sal and get him to take me to the Horseshoe. I think I left it inside the potted plant on my desk. Love ya! Bye!”

“Valkyrie! Don’t go ye—”

She quickly turned off the game. She didn’t have the time to explain it to Justice, whether he sounded nervous for her or not.

She had only one mission: Find Salvatore.