Counterfeit Love

It said that regardless of how long it had been since she got away, that it was eating at her, that she was far from free of it.

Likely because those bastards were still out there, living, breathing, daring to have the carefree kinds of lives they had deprived her of. And likely countless others.

I wasn't a vigilante. By nature, that wasn't how I operated. I left that to the darker souls. Like Ferryn. Like some other people I'd heard about in Navesink Bank.

I had killed, yes. But because I needed to. Because someone was coming at me. Because they were a threat in ome way or another.

I didn't seek them out.

But if they found me, I could handle it without much remorse.

I had only three to my name.

Why I had volunteered to join in on Chris's mission, sign up to take down a dozen more, yeah, that was a bit of a mystery to me.

I hated traffickers. Who didn't? They were the lowest of the low. When it came to crime, there was a hierarchy.

Those with moral compasses went toward the top right under the white-collar shit. And then a good part of the Cosa Nostra was also up there. Below that came other organizations. Like the gun runners. The loan sharks. The counterfeiters and general forgers. But way, way at the bottom were the trafficker shitheads. No one above them had any respect for them. But we also all accepted that they were like a hydra. You cut off one head, two more appeared.

I wasn't going to take down all traffickers. I would leave that in the very capable hands of Ferryn.

But I could take out the ones who had hurt Chris.

And in doing that for her, I'd get to spend more time with her, would get to know her better, would help her come out of her shell more.

Did that make sense?

No.

Of fucking course not.

It wasn't like me to get so invested. But it also wasn't like me to hem and haw shit to death, to deny myself something that I wanted. I'd always been more the sort to follow my wants, my desires. Even if those desires weren't what I was used to.

Discomfort was how you grew and all that sage advice crap I'd heard a million times.

So, I was into Chris.

And it wasn't just a physical thing. Though, let's face it, there was that. I wanted my hands all over that woman.

But it was more than that.

I liked her as a person.

I wanted to spend time with her.

So that was what I was going to do.

The whole murdering rapists thing, that was just a perk along the way.

"Angel, are those sheets?" I asked a week or so later when she rolled up my driveway, popped open the trunk for me to drop my bag in.

And there they were.

Three sets of off-white sheets. All in their packaging still.

"Hotel rooms are cesspools," she insisted, shifting from foot to foot.

I expected her to pack heavy. Some stereotypes were stereotypes for a reason. Like women over packing for everything.

But I figured it would be shoes and clothes and makeup.

Not sheets.

And I was pretty sure there was a big, fluffy comforter in a purple color in the backseat too.

"We're staying in the presidential suite. I'm pretty sure they clean those sheets. What the hell is this for, doll?" I asked, reaching for a three-pack of canned air that she'd likely picked up on that Costco run I'd mentioned to her. I'd spied the giant bag of lollipops on the front passenger seat. "How dusty do you think your electronics are going to get on this trip?"

"It's for the beds," she insisted, crossing her arms over her chest.

"I'll bite. Why do you need canned air for the beds?"

"To freeze the bed bugs."

I couldn't help it. The absurdity of that mixed with the authoritative, borderline condescending tone she'd used to deliver it made me throw back my head and laugh.

"I've never been bitten by a bed bug. I never plan to."

"They're every bit as awful as they sound," I told her, shaking my head. "And is that Comet? For the bathroom?" I asked, smiling. "And scrubbers. What? No maid's uniform?"

"You'll thank me when you don't get some pernicious kind of foot fungus," she declared, lifting her chin.

"You wanna scrub the room, sweetheart, you clean to your heart's content. But I don't promise not to tease you about it."

"It's fine. I'm used to it. Where's your pillow?"

"The hotel will have pillows. And, if you don't think you have enough, they will actually bring you extras if you ask. Fancy shit."

"But don't you have a preference."

"A pillow preference? No, angel, can't say that I do. I once used a sack of fake cash for a pillow. I will make do with the luxury pillows in our presidential suite."