Forsaken (The Protectors 4)

“Mercenaries,” I murmured.

“I’ve got Daisy monitoring the ones we know about, but there could be ones we missed.”

I nodded in understanding as fear settled in my gut.

“Hey,” Ronan said and I realized I’d dropped my eyes at some point. “He’s going to be okay,” Ronan said softly.

I managed a quick nod. “What else?”

“I’m worried about Barretti,” Ronan said.

“Dom?” I asked and quickly shook my head. “No way, I’ve seen him around Eli. He’d lay down his life for him in a heartbeat,” I said adamantly.

Ronan glanced over his shoulder to make sure Eli was still inside the café. “Mav, Cortano helped Barretti get some international security contracts with the government that are worth billions.”

“What do you mean ‘helped’?”

“Cortano has connections with several people who sit on the Committees that award the contracts. Barretti Security Group was doing fine before, but when Cortano put in a good word for them and they got those contracts, their net worth quadrupled. Dominic Barretti and his brothers would lose big if Cortano got the government to pull their contracts.”

“When did this happen?”

“The first contracts were awarded eight years ago, but more have been added and they get renewed every couple of years.”

I shook my head in disbelief. No way could I fathom that the man who’d nearly kicked my ass when he’d thought I’d laid a hand on Eli would betray him like that. “No,” I said again, going with my gut. “No way he’d do Cortano’s dirty work for him.”

Ronan studied me for a moment and then said, “And his brothers? You so sure about them?”

I wanted to say that yes, I was sure, but the reality was that I wasn’t. Eli hadn’t talked much about his surrogate family. And money made men do terrible things to even those they claimed to love the most.

“Surveillance of Eli continues,” I finally said. “For anyone who might be a threat,” I added, acknowledging the ugly truth that the threat might be much closer to home than I would have liked.

“We don’t have the resources to watch all of Barretti’s men, but I’ll bring in a few more guys to watch the ones in Eli’s inner circle. And I’ll have Daisy monitor them for communications with Cortano. Hopefully this really was just Cortano overreacting to the stress of what was happening to his kid, but I think we need to play it safe and assume there’s more going on.”

I nodded even though I felt sick to my stomach. If anyone in Eli’s family turned out to have ties to whoever tried to break into Eli’s apartment the other night, Eli would be heartbroken.

“I take it I should tell Memphis to take you out of the rotation for a while?” Ronan said.

I looked up at him and finally remembered that I’d asked him to have Memphis find me a case that would get me out of Seattle. I saw Eli headed back our way so I merely nodded and tried not to think too much about the look of satisfaction that passed across Ronan’s face. He stood just as Eli reached our table.

Eli sat down and passed me my coffee before taking the hand Ronan extended. “I’ll see you around,” he said to the younger man. “I’m not supposed to tell you this, but Matty is planning to let you win big today at Tic Tac Toe and he made Seth promise not to get too jealous since Seth has yet to manage to beat him.”

Eli and I both laughed at that and to my surprise, Eli held on to Ronan’s outstretched hand as he stood back up. He gave a very startled Ronan a quick hug and I saw Ronan swallow his surprise and hug him back before releasing him. “He’s a lucky kid to have all you guys in his life,” Eli murmured before he sat down again. Ronan smiled, gave Baby a brief pat and then left the patio.

“Everything okay?” Eli asked as his fingers closed over my hand which was resting next to the fresh cup of coffee he’d brought me.

“All good,” I managed to say, though lying to Eli made a sour taste flood my mouth. “I was thinking we should have another lesson today,” I said.

Eli’s eyes sparkled with mirth as he said, “I’m up for that.”

I chuckled when I realized what he was talking about and I leaned down to kiss him. “A self-defense lesson,” I murmured against his mouth.

“Okay,” he said softly as he teased my lips with his. “Do I get something if I knock you on your ass?”

An unexpected surge of lust went through me at his words and I said, “My ass.”

Eli straightened a little. “What?” he asked in all seriousness.

I kept my voice low even though there was no one around to hear us. I put my hand on Eli’s thigh as I said, “You knock me on my ass this morning and tonight after dinner, you can have my ass.”