Bound by Lies: A Dark Mafia Romance Read online

  “Let me take you back to your place,” Mick says.

  I nod and give him quick directions.

  He frowns. “That sounds close.”

  “It’s only four blocks away,” I admit.

  Mick lets out a string of curse words. “The fucker lives four blocks away from you? What the hell, kid?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t know either, Mick. I thought I knew him.” My voice sounds wooden. It sounds like a stranger’s voice. A stranger. Like Caden Thaine is to me. Or Harper Lexington. Or whoever this son-of-a-bitch is. I can’t deny anymore that I don’t know Caden at all.

  I have to blink back hot angry tears. He stalked me. Took pictures of me at my gym, at my work, at my goddamn home. My home. Then he orchestrated his arrival in my life. He made sure that I would trust him. And care for him. Bastard.

  Why would he do this to me? Was I just some kind of sick game to him?

  Jacob Tyrell flashes back into my mind. Is there a connection there?

  Inside, it feels like part of me breaks off from the rest. Caden loves you, it cries. You have to have faith.

  Fool. Look at the evidence. You’ve seen those pictures of you with your very own eyes.

  Remember how he speaks to you, how he looks at you, how it feels when you are with him. You know he would never intentionally hurt you.

  Do I really?

  “I’m going to keep digging into him,” Mick says, pulling me out of my thoughts. “I’ll see what I can find. I can pull some favors with my friends still on the force. In the meantime, you stay the hell away from this guy, okay?”

  I can’t speak. I am staring numbly at the blur of things moving past my passenger window, my mind whirring over all those photos, then to the night we met.

  “I’m no good for you… I never should have approached you.”

  That night he sounded like he was warning me away from him. Why? If he was deliberately trying to insert himself into my life, why would he warn me away? Or was this another manipulative trick of his to make me feel like he wasn’t trying to push his way into my life? To make me feel like it was my choice to bring him into my life.

  This small voice inside keeps screaming that there has to be some other explanation, some other reason… I shut it off. There needs to be no damn room in my heart for doubt about what I saw and about Caden’s devious intentions for me. I’ll get enough attempts at creating doubt from Caden when I confront him.

  “Kid,” Mick’s harsh voice snaps me back to the present. I notice that Mick has pulled up into my driveway. “Did you hear me? Stay the hell away from him.”

  I nod, mutely. Hidden by my side I have my fingers crossed.

  I’m sorry, Mick. I’m not staying away from Caden Thaine. I’m going to follow him like he followed me and find out why the hell he wanted to fuck with what little of my life I have left. Then, if I have to, I’ll put a bullet in him.

  Chapter 17

  That night, I’m sitting in a car outside of Caden’s building. Earlier today, I traded in my white ratty car for this black sedan with tinted windows. I couldn’t take any chances. Caden would recognize the other car. Under the passenger seat I restashed my small bag of clothes and cash. My GPS sits on my new dash and my gun is in the glove box.

  I match the car in head to toe black. It’s my first official stakeout and I’d probably feel like a badass if I wasn’t so God damn twitchy. My fingers tap on the steering wheel. The radio is on, but I can barely hear what is playing as it’s set so low. I can’t sit in silence. I don’t want to turn up the radio so loud that it will block my hearing.

  The street is quiet. Most of the residents are inside having dinner. Just like I should be. My stomach growls. What am I doing here?

  My growing hunger is put aside when I hear a low rumble, then see Caden driving from the building on his bike. My heart skips. As he moves under the driveway light, I catch a glimpse of him. He looks devastating in his dark blue denim, black t-shirt and his brown leather jacket. It sends an ache through my stomach. I grip the steering wheel, trying to focus on how much I hate him instead.

  He pulls out into the street and rides towards me. I duck into my seat and wait until the rumble of his bike moves past me. I slide up, turn on my engine, pull out and start to follow him, my eyes glued to his red back light.

  Caden stays away from the main roads, making it easier to keep up with him but easier to spot me, so I drop further behind him. I don’t want to hang too close to him. What if I lose him in the night?

  It doesn’t matter. If I lose him tonight, I’ll follow him again tomorrow. And the day after that, and the day after that if I damn well have to. Oh, how the tables have turned.

  The buildings start to change from the houses and apartments of a well-lit blocky residential area into warehouses and concrete lots when he enters an industrial part of town. We’re near the docks. What is he doing by the docks? My nerves ratchet up as I notice fewer and fewer people on the street and more and more dark buildings.

  Finally, he pulls into a fenced warehouse area up ahead. I slow down as I approach.

  I hold my breath and grip the wheel as I pass the open gate. Just inside I see Caden parking his bike in a small flat parking area with several cars already parked there. Odd. I wouldn’t think that a place like this would be open this late at night. I catch the outline of boxy structures behind the car park. I don’t have time to notice what they all are before I have passed the gate and my vision is obscured by the wall that fences off this lot. I keep driving along the road. I need to find somewhere safe to stash my car.

  A few driveways down I spot an empty warehouse parking space lit up by a single spotlight. This lot is more open with no gate, just a line of concrete-trimmed garden beds to separate the lot from the street. I pull into this lot and park in the far corner away from the light. From the glove compartment, I take my gun and a small torch and tuck them into my pants.

  I take a deep shaky breath before I get out of my car. Slipping through the shadows, I creep out of this parking space and onto the cracked sidewalk. Here the streetlights are far apart and make sick looking pools of light against the concrete, made rough and cracked from the treads of heavy trucks. I keep against the fencing as I make my way towards the warehouse lot that Caden entered, my neck twisting and my eyes darting around, alert for anyone. I can’t see anyone else walking on this road at this time of night. I can’t decide whether I am happy that I’m alone or not.

  I slow my steps when I start walking along the edge of the lot that Caden disappeared into. I gaze up towards the top of the wall. Shit, it’s high. It must be double, even triple my height. The wall is flush with no obvious handholds. I squint. There looks to be barbed wire strung across the top. There’s no way I could get over that. Which means this entrance that I’m coming up to is likely the only way in or out. I stop just before the entrance, thankful that the gate, which I can see now is a tall black metal sliding gate, has remained open.

  I slide my body up to the edge of the wall and slowly peer around the corner. I can see Caden’s motorbike in the parking area, but I can’t see Caden. I scan the rest of the area. There’s a field of large shipping containers all around the large concreted area, creating a metallic garden around the sparsely lit driveway between them. Rising up from beyond the containers are two large warehouses and the reaching limbs of several cranes.

  I jump when I hear a dog bark in the distance. Please, God, let there be no guard dogs on this property. I eye the entrance yawing open at me, my only way out. Shit. Am I really doing this?

  Yes. I’m really doing this. I have to know who Caden is and what he wants from me. I have to. My heart, maybe my life, depends on it. I slip through the edge of the gate and against the row of bushes that line the parking space. I bolt crouched over between the cars, staying out of the light until I get to the other side, where the field of shipping containers begins. I cringe when my boots crackle on gravel as I press up against the closest container
. I can smell oil and salt on the air.

  I scan the area looking for where Caden might have gone. To my left there are just more rows and rows of containers drowned in shadows. To my right, even more containers. Up ahead at the end of the driveway I spot what looks like an office shed. A dark car is parked at the front. The shed is lit from inside and I can see shadows moving across the windows. Is that where Caden went? If I can just get close enough to see who is inside…

  I glance back at the entrance – God, it seems so far away – and pray I’m not making a huge mistake. I turn back to stare at the depths of this lot. I creep, slowly, placing each step so that the gravel makes as little noise as possible, moving slowly along the rusty metal containers, trying to stay in the dark, my eyes flicking, darting, about me. I am barely breathing as I press up against the closest container to the shed. I peer again around me. I’m okay. I’m okay. No one’s around.

  From here I can see the car parked outside the shed is a black Mercedes. Fancy car. The front of the shed is splattered in places with dirt and mud, probably flicked up by cars’ tires.

  I slide around the corner of the container and duck against the side of the shed. The outside is made of sheets of corrugated metal layered with dust. There are two dirty square windows set in the side, but the view inside is obscured by the closed ribs of cheap blinds. Wait, I can see light peeking out through the bottom of one window. One corner section of the blinds is bent up, out of shape.

  I crouch under the window. I can hear the hum of muffled voices through the thin glass above. Up through the broken blinds I see shadows moving across the ceiling inside. My fingers curl lightly on the sill. I ignore the layer of grime sticking to my fingers as I pull my eyes up to the gap.

  Inside is a chaotic office space, one paper-buried desk and a wall covered in racks of files and more papers. I can see Caden at an angle from where I stand. He seems agitated and he waves his hands about as he talks. I can see his mouth moving, but I can’t hear what he is saying.

  There’s someone else in there with him. Another man. His back is to me. He wears a dark shirt and dark pants over his thin, wiry frame. I spot a gold watch on his left hand as he shakes his hand back at Caden. The owner of the Mercedes, I assume. A lump develops in my throat when I spot the handle of a gun peering out from the back of his pants. Who is this man? And why does Caden look upset?

  A hand grabs my collar and pulls me up roughly, choking me so that my yelp turns into a gasp. “Oi. Whatchu doin’ ‘ere.”

  His voice causes a frenzied rush of fear to rise up through my body. I think I know that voice. It echoes in some of the memories of my past. He spins me around so that I slam against the shed wall, causing it to bang. In my periphery, I spot the gun tucked into his belt at his hip. That doesn’t scare me as much as what I see across his face. The familiarity of his features – hook nose, dark-slit eyes violently framed with thick brows – tickle my insides.

  Shit. I know that face. Do I know that face? Oh God. Is this one of Jacob’s men? I stare at Hooknose, willing my memory to place him.

  No. You’re paranoid. You’re seeing connections to Jacob everywhere. This can’t be one of Jacob’s men. It can’t.

  “I said, whatchu doin’ ‘ere? You mute or sumthin’?” His brows press down, further narrowing his eyes, and I can see the gears working in his mind. “Wait a minute… Do I know you?”

  Oh God. I hear noises from the shed and the door unlocking. Caden and the man he’s with. They heard me bang against the shed. Caden’s going to catch me snooping. I have to get out of here.

  My body reacts of its own volition. I knee Hooknose fast and hard in the crotch, then send a right elbow to his jaw, knocking him to the side. He lets out a pained groan as he hits the ground. “Bitch.”

  I run for the entrance, my heart crashing as loudly as the gravel underneath me. My eyes focus on the dark open gate like it’s the light at the end of my tunnel.

  “What the fuck’s going on?” the other man calls from behind me. I swear I know that voice, too. I don’t look back. Caden can’t see my face.

  “Stop her!” I hear Hooknose yell.

  Their footsteps crunch on the gravel behind me. I curse when I see the gates ahead starting to roll closed. Someone has turned on the automatic gates. I put on a burst of speed and I can feel the spray of gravel flicking up from my heels. I’m not going to make it. The gate is closing too fast. I hear them yelling for me to stop, the sound only causing me to sprint faster.

  Then the first shot is fired. The bullet clips part of a container that I race past and I let out a scream. Oh God. They’re shooting at me.

  I veer right and dart into a dark slip between two shipping containers. I keep running between these rows of containers, not knowing where I’m going, not knowing where this is leading me, just knowing I need to get away from them.

  “There she is.” I turn right. Then left. I’m running deeper into the heart of the compound, but I have no other choice. I swerve in and out of the shipping containers, eyes darting about me to look for some way out of this mess while keeping an eye out for an ambush.

  I can hear them faintly behind me. They’ll have spread out across the lot and are searching the area for me. They know I’m here somewhere. I doubt that they’ll stop looking before they find me. Maybe kill me. I need to get off this lot.

  Shit. I’m coming to the end of this labyrinth of containers. I press up against a container for a second to figure out what I’m doing next, one ear open for the sound of someone approaching. This is the last row of containers. Beyond here are the two large warehouses sitting side by side. I can see them looming up above the container I’m pressed against. Peering around the corner, their matching wide entrances look like grinning toothless mouths. There’s light oozing out of the left warehouse. The right one looks dark inside.

  These two warehouse go all the way to the edge of the portside. I can smell the water from here and feel the moisture against my skin. The water. The only way off this lot now is by the water. There’s a space that runs between these two warehouses to the edge of the docks and into the river. If I can just make it down to the end of the dock without being seen…

  Through the path between the containers, I aim right towards the dark warehouse until it looms directly above me. After checking that no one’s watching, I run out from the containers and press into the shadowed wall of this warehouse. I have to be quick. It’s only a matter of time before they realize I have exited the area of shipping containers. I skirt along to the left corner of the building before I peer around. There, between the two warehouses, the water glints at me, mocking me. God, it’s so far away. This warehouse is huge.

  Movement to my left makes me flinch. Someone steps out of the brightened warehouse across from me, his shadow long and menacing against the light inside the building. I gasp and pull back along the wall until I’m just inside the entrance of the dark warehouse. Peering around, I can see that he has lit up a cigarette; the end of it glows with every inhale. I don’t have time to wait for him to leave.

  Something moves between two of the shipping containers, catching my eye. Shit. It’s one of the men after me. They’re getting closer. I can’t stay out here. I do the only thing I can. I back into the dark warehouse.

  Inside, the warehouse is dim. Only a few of the overhanging lights are on, casting a bare-bones light across the space. It spans from here to the edge of the water, where I can see the moon and the night sky blinking with stars out the open end. Freedom. Between us are rows and rows of large crates, each the size of a small living room.

  If I can just make my way through this dark maze to the open side of the warehouse I can get to the water. If I can get to the water, I have a chance at swimming down the river and pulling myself out at a safe place along the bank, far away from here. If I can just make it to the open end without being caught…

  I creep across the hard concrete floor, weaving through the maze of crates, most of them stil
l nailed shut. I press up along the crates, feeling the rough wood rub against my skin, to peer around corners into the gloom. I ignore the splinters that catch on my shirt. So far, I haven’t seen anyone else in here.

  I kick something without meaning to, making a rustling sound. Shit. I cringe. Did somebody hear that? Please let no one hear that. I hold my breath, trying to listen over the thud of my heart in my ears.

  Nothing. Well, I think there’s nothing.

  I look down to the object I have kicked. It’s a bag. A bag of coffee beans. In the gloom I can just make out the lettering “Colombia” on the bag. I frown. The bag has been ripped open, and there are some wayward beans about the concrete. There’s some sort of residue on the lip of the bag and the floor. My curiosity getting the better of me, I bend down, catching the smell of coffee beans. I press my finger into the powder on the floor and pinch a bit. I hold it up and rub it between my finger and thumb, frowning. What the…

  I dab the tip of my tongue with my finger. Where the powder touches my tongue, it starts to tingle and goes numb. Oh God. I know what this is. I learned about it and its effects in my nursing course. A cold chill settles on me. This is why they’re trying to kill me. Not because Hooknose recognized me, but because they have drugs in this warehouse. Now I’m a witness. And they can’t have witnesses.

  Oh God. Caden led me here. Caden’s a drug dealer.

  It all makes sense. His secrets, his dual identities, the letters postmarked from Colombia, all his money. It’s drug money. The man I love is a criminal. Now because I know, he’ll have to kill me if he finds me. He even warned me once.

  “Okay, Cade. Who are you?”

  “Be careful what you ask me. You may not like the answer.”

  I thought he was joking.

  This is why he never wanted me completely in his life. This is what he was keeping from me. In some twisted way he was trying to protect me by keeping these things from me. His rules about not touching him or being able to see him… he must have gang tattoos on his body or jail tattoos. So when I demanded not to be blindfolded…