With This Ring

I smiled at the image she painted. “Why did you change your mind?”

She laughed. “I realized I didn’t give a fuck about cooking. What about you? What was your first big dream?”

I smiled. “I just realized it a few days ago.”

“What?” She laughed.

“Yeah. My first dream was to be in love,” I answered.

She looked at me as if I was speaking Chinese. “What?”

“Yeah, I was fourteen and I wanted to fall totally, and deeply, and absolutely in love with someone. At that time, I had just finished reading my first harlequin about this broken actor who finally found love in the arms of his high school sweetheart. Somewhat cringey now that I think about it, but back then, it made me want to find that one person that would love me beyond anything else.”

She began to cackle. “You’re joking, right? You? Love? You don’t even fucking date.”

“It’s not that I don’t date. I didn’t have the time. I was busy with the idea of setting up a business.”

“You were too busy to date? Yeah, pull the other one.”

“Okay, maybe I wasn’t too busy to date, but I had my dream at the back of my mind. It was either I got the right guy and everything or nothing. I’d never settle for anything less.”

“I think with you though, it’s worse than you not wanting to ‘settle for something less’. I seriously doubt if someone you wanted came along right now that you’d even give him a glance much less agree to him.”

I returned my gaze to hers. “What do you mean?”

“You’re too closed off, Freya. I used to think that you were just being stubborn but now I’m beginning to understand all that Mafia/Bratva stuff must have made you wary. Which is not a bad thing in itself, but sometimes I wish you’d allow yourself to just jump at the opportunities life throws at you, even if it will be a mistake.”

Actually, I did jump and ended up falling down a great big hole.

Chapter Sixty-Three

Maxim

“We got a lead on Freya’s attacker,” Levan said, placing two photos in front of me.

I stared at the two heavily tattooed men.

“Well, first of all brother, you have a pretty extensive hate list.”

“Get to the fucking point,” I prompted.

He chuckled and pointed to the man in the first picture. “Well, this one is part of the MLBOA gang. We had nothing on him at first … until, they got this picture of him last night.” He slapped another photo on my desk.

The man he referred to had his face slightly turned away from sight, and a baseball cap sitting low on his head so it was almost impossible to make out his feature.

“That’s Boris Arakas. Now he’s the Death Angels’ Sergeant at Arms. Ring any bells?”

I thought about it. “Isn’t that the club house we had Detective Clay raid for Sarah Dale’s grandson?”

“Exactly. His brother was killed in the raid and I have it on good authority that he holds you responsible.”

“Hmm.” It was all starting to come together, but something else occurred to me.

“We reasoned, especially with the attacks on Freya instead of you, that this was personal. He wanted you to suffer the same loss and pain he did.”

“Seems like the closest lead we have until something new pops up,” I said thoughtfully.

“The thing is I want to clear this mess up before I leave. The fastest way to do it is to dangle some sort of bait in front of them.”

“Why don’t you leave? You’ve done good work until now, but I can easily handle this on my own.”

“No. I leave when it’s all over,” he insisted stubbornly.

“You keep finding reasons not to. I hope you don’t plan on disappointing Bianca.”

He rose to his feet. “Not on my life or yours. And how the fuck am I supposed to leave with a target on your back?”

I sighed. “After you resolve this one, another will pop up. It’s the curse of our trade.”

“Well you can handle those on your own then, but this, I need wrapped up for my own peace of mind.” His lips twitched with amusement. “Besides, I need to see how you sort things out with Freya.”

I ignored his mention of her and went on. “So what’s the plan?”

He produced a key and tossed it on the desk. “You, are going to move. The new jersey compound is too protected. We need to give them clear access to you.”

I grinned. “When you said bait, I didn’t think you meant me.”

“This is the only way to lure them out.”

I picked up the gold key chain and key and gave it a once over. “Where?”

“Midtown, 172 Madison Avenue. 63rd floor.”

“Okay.”

“Am I ever going to find out why Freya lost her shit on you last week?”

“Get out of here. I have work to do.”