Dangerous Lines (13 page)

“Mr. Moreau, I think she’s more alert.”

At Adam’s words, he smiled and turned. “Good, let’s
get this show on the road. I do have plans later that I’d really hate to be tardy
for.”

Returning to stand before her, Gabriel noticed her
eyes did look more focused. He folded his hands at his back. “Now then, my dear,
who the hell do you work for?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Moreau. She honestly seems
confused by your question,” Adam spoke up.

“She does, doesn’t she?” Moreau muttered. Drawing a
hand over his face, he stared down at the woman, not happy about the situation.
If she didn’t know anything, then she was a liability.
One
that needed to be taken care of.

“Well, if she doesn’t have an answer, then she’s no
use to me. I can’t have my associates feeling nervous about someone they think
they might know from elsewhere. It’s very bad for business to have them so
thrown off balance.” Shaking his head, he put a hand on his waist. “I’m afraid,
my dear, that means that you need to die. Adam, would you happen to have a gun
with you?”

“Of course, Mr. Moreau.”
Adam drew a weapon out of his holster, flipped it around, and handed it
over, butt first.

“Thank you,” Moreau said. He checked the chamber
and then lifted the weapon, pointing it right at Rhonda’s head.

“It’s such a shame. She really is quite lovely in
her own way. Goodbye, my dear.” He pulled the trigger.

Chapter Sixteen

“Is it me, or is this guy like a broken record?”
Shawn’s voice filled Vincent’s ear.

Holding in the derisive snort, Vincent rolled his shoulders.
Tapping out a Morse code message back on their communication gear, he listened
to Shawn’s sigh.

“You got that right, buddy. He definitely is more
than a little redundant. Is this what he was up to down there, I mean, before?”

He sent back a quick yes. At least according to
Rhonda, that’s all
Moreau
had asked, repetitively ad
nauseam. Shifting his weight slightly, he worked out a crick in his neck. He’d
been in place for over three hours, and it was definitely weighing on him. Ro
and Adam had arrived ten minutes after Vincent, and his team got into place.
Moreau had shown up not long after Adam’s phone call, and things had been going
on and on since then.

“Well, there’s nothing to report out front. Bruiser
in the door is attentive and aware, but you knew that. The driver is slouched
in the driver’s seat, looks like he’s sleeping under that hat, but I’m pretty
sure he’s not. The second bodyguard is heading out for another loop of the
building.
Oh,
and there’s a hawk eyeing up a gopher. I
think it’s a gopher. Might just be a really big mouse. It’s really hard to say
at this point. My money’s on the hawk, though.”

Tapping out another message to Shawn to remain focused
he forced himself not to shift to relief a growing ache in his back.

Moreau’s voice had his focus centering fully on the
man once more. He was in Ro’s face, his hand grabbing her hair, yanking her
head around. “Who the hell do you work for?”

Shit, the guy was really starting to lose it.
Come
on, baby, we just need him to threaten your life. Get him to fucking say he’s
going to kill you and this ends.
Hopefully, before Moreau figured she’d
recovered enough from the drugs and started to hit her.
If he
did that...

Fuck, Vincent knew he’d lose it if the guy hit her.

Ro was far from helpless, but it would take her
long seconds, important seconds to break free of the faked restraints.

“I don’t know, Mr. Moreau. She honestly seems
confused by your question,” Adam spoke up.

“She does, doesn’t she?” Moreau muttered. Drawing a
hand over his face, he stared down at Ro. “Well, if she doesn’t have an answer,
then she’s no use to me. I can’t have my associates feeling nervous about
someone they think they might know from elsewhere. It’s very bad for business
to have them so thrown off balance.” Shaking his head, he put a hand on his
waist. “I’m afraid, my dear, that means that you need to die. Adam, would you
happen to have a gun with you?”

“Of course, Mr. Moreau.”
Adam drew a weapon out of his holster, flipped it around, and handed it
over butt first.

“Thank you,” Moreau said. He checked the chamber
and then lifted the weapon, pointing it right at Ro’s head.

Clicking on his throat piece for the communications
system, Vincent gave the ready signal. He got clicks or a soft “ready” in
return.

“It’s such a shame. She really is quite lovely in
her own way. Goodbye, my dear.” He pulled the trigger.

Vincent signaled and everyone converged fast.
Moreau stood there, stunned, as he realized the bullet had been a blank. Rhonda
was up and out of the chair, punching him in the nose with her good arm. Adam
caught the man, and threw him down, flipped him over and took the cuffs she
offered to bind his wrists. “Gabriel Moreau, you’re under arrest,” she said
,
then read him his rights.

Securing the bodyguard with a pair of flex cuffs,
Vincent left him on his belly. With a quick check outside, he saw the other
bodyguard and the driver were both being secured and hauled into the building.

Good enough for him. Jogging over to Rhonda he
scooped her up into his arms and hugged her to him. “You okay?” he asked. He
pressed his nose to her neck and breathed her in.

Her arms wound around his shoulders and head.
“Yeah, I’m good,” she told him. Not that she let go. If anything, she tightened
her hold on him.

Shawn would handle calling the captain and
arranging for Moreau and his men to be hauled off. Right then, right there, all
he cared about was holding onto the woman he loved and never letting go.

Slowly he let her down to her feet. He didn’t let
her go, then again neither did she let go of him. Pressing a kiss to her temple,
Vincent rubbed his lips to her skin. He could still hear the click of the gun
as Moreau had pulled the trigger. He’d known that Adam had switched out the
bullets, but that hadn’t helped his heart as it seized.

“You two okay?” Shawn’s voice was right behind him.

“Yeah, we’re good,” he said. Keeping his arms
around Rhonda, he turned enough so he could survey what was going on.
“Everything kosher?”

Shawn nodded, his eyes moving to the four men
kneeling by the open door. “The captain is on his way down with a few cops, and
the paddy wagon to pick them up. We’re just getting everything organized so he
can take it all with him. Since he’ll need the originals, we’re making copies,
just in case.”

In case the mole was working for Moreau and could
figure a way to fuck the case up and get the man loose. “How long you figure?”
Vincent asked.

After a quick glance at his watch, Shawn shrugged.
“Probably in the next ten, unless they have the pedal to the metal, then they
might make it sooner.
Anyway, just wanted to give you a heads
up to wash some of that off, Ro.
No need to let the captain see you
looking pummeled.”

“Shit!” Jerking out of Vincent’s arms, she spun
around. Adam was there with a couple of wet naps held out, an amused grin on
his
face,
and a little mirror in his other hand.
“Thank you.”

Rolling his eyes, Vincent looked at Shawn. “Think
we have enough to hold him for good?”

“Between the drugs he accepted personally and paid
for, plus pulling the trigger on Ro, yeah. Since we have him and Adam
discussing the previous time too, that lends some weight to Rhonda’s already
submitted statement. All in all, I’m betting that the DA is going to be able to
bury the fucker under a
supermax
prison.”

“Good,” Vincent said. His relief was profound, not
that he would relax until Moreau was permanently behind bars. Oh, he was sure
the man had some damn fine lawyers that would be scrambling to get everything
thrown out of court. Hopefully the C&M crew had done everything just right
to keep that from happening.

Sirens in the distance announced the impending
arrival of the cops. “All right, everyone,” Shawn called out. “All C&M
personnel weapons down on the ground, hands up until we’re identified. No one
fucking gets shot tonight.”

Laughing softly at that, Vincent did his part as
the siren’s got closer. With a look toward Ro, he grinned. Adam dropped the bag
of cash, the bounty, down next to Moreau’s prone body before kneeling and
lacing his hands behind his head. The cash would be handed over to the police,
and would be used to help build a stronger case against the man As the lights
began to stripe the inside of the warehouse, Vincent laced his fingers and put
his hands on his head as he knelt down.

Chapter Seventeen

Sometime around dawn, Rhonda and Vincent stumbled
into his house, both of them absolutely dead on their feet. Rhonda quite
willingly had followed on Vincent’s heels to his bedroom. Once there, they’d
somehow managed to get out of their clothing, at least to a point, before
collapsing on the bed. Tangling their limbs together, they’d passed out cold.

When morning dawned, Ro stretched slowly relieved
that there
wasn’t
more than a couple minor twinges,
her body warm and held tightly by a strong male arm. Smiling, she turned her
head to look at Vincent. He was still out cold, his face relaxed as he slept.

He still looked dangerous, still looked edgy, still
looked like the sweetest man alive. Damn, but she wanted to lick him up. Ro
paused mid-thought. Maybe he’d let her. Smiling at that, she closed her eyes
and listened to his breathing.

Deep, slow and very relaxed, he was truly still
out. At least she thought he was. With a frown, she moved her head back a
little to eye him up. He could be faking it. Why he would do that, she didn’t
know. Unless he was waiting to see what she’d
do.

It wasn’t the first time they’d slept together over
the last few weeks. Of course, they hadn’t been naked those other times, and
she hadn’t exactly been in a position to care if they were or weren’t. Now that
she was mobile, for all intents and purposes, she could definitely appreciate
the fact she had Vincent Bradley in bed, and so very naked.

Licking her lips she smiled, biting her bottom lip
to hold back a chuckle. Oh the things she could do to him. The things she
wanted to do to him, had wanted to do to him for so very long. Now, where to
begin?

She shifted slightly, taking her time so as to not
disturb him. A small frown flickered over his face before he settled back down.
Light sleeper. Something she’d have to remember in the future. Chewing her lip,
she narrowed her eyes.

Rhonda knew she’d have to be sneaky good if she
wanted to get her hands on him. Or, better yet, her mouth.

All right, she could do this. She was only mildly
hampered by the cast on her left hand. She had use of the fingers, but not the
hand itself. She’d work around that issue. After all she did have one good hand
and she could put weight on the other one.

So, how to go about this without waking him up too
soon?

It took her a couple of minutes, but she soon was
grinning. He was used to her wiggling around a little in her sleep. He’d
commented that, in the first few days, he’d woken up every time she’d twitched.
After that though, he’d gotten used to it, and while he registered it, he
didn’t let it wake him.

With a plan in mind, she twitched a little,
shifting a bit, and except for a small frown tugging on his brows, Vincent
didn’t budge. Excellent! He apparently hadn’t been kidding.

Chuckling internally, Rhonda began to work her way
down, slowly, watching his face the entire time. A few more flickers of frowns
that she let smooth out before proceeding further.

Under the blankets, she came face to face, in a
manner of speaking, with what she wanted. With a glance at his face, she slid
her tongue over his cock. He frowned a little deeper, but didn’t wake up. Well,
one part of him did, but not the rest of him.

A feeling of glee washed over her as she licked his
cock again.
It was hardening, straightening out, getting
impressively larger.
Then, because she wanted his full attention, she
took his cock into her mouth and sucked hard.

It definitely got his full attention, and he woke
with a foul curse on his lips that quickly turned to a groan.

Smiling around his cock, Rhonda rubbed the tip of
her tongue under the head, her hand coming up to grip him, holding him steady.
Up and down his cock she worked, taking him a little deeper each time. God, he
tasted good, smelled so
good
. His natural musky male
scent amplified under the blankets.

Her mouth popped off the end as she worked some
saliva left behind down his length. “Good morning,” she said in a cheery tone.

He let out a growl, might have been words,
might
have been a warning.