Trouble in a Tight Dress (Six Points Security, #1) Read online

  Nina was afraid she was going to say that. During her final interview for the job at Six Points, she’d come clean to Larissa about her family’s dark history. At the time, it felt like the right thing to do, and she was still pretty sure that it was. In the end, the admission had gotten her the job, along with Larissa’s word that the information would remain confidential. “I know, I know. I’ll tell him.”

  “When?”

  “I don’t know. Soon.” Once the thought of telling him didn’t make her feel like she was going to throw up.

  “The longer you wait, the worse it’s going to be. Just rip the Band-Aid off and get it over with.” Larissa gave a smile that was probably meant to be reassuring, but it only twisted Nina’s stomach more. “He won’t be happy about it, but he’ll understand if you explain it all to him.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.”

  Larissa’s smile gave way to a no-nonsense look that she usually reserved for difficult clients...or her brothers when they were getting on her nerves. “Let me put it this way: I know I promised to keep your family issues confidential, but that promise ends when my brother gets involved. I’ll give you until the end of the day to get Austin up to speed. If you haven’t done it by then, I’ll do it for you.” The office phone rang, and she glanced down at the screen. “Speak of the devil. Hold on, let me get this.”

  Nina watched while Larissa answered the phone, the blood pounding in her ears so loudly she could barely hear her friend’s side of the conversation.

  “Yeah, she’s right here...uh-huh...yeah...aw, crap. Sure, no problem. See you in a few.” Larissa placed the phone back in its cradle. “He just spoke with the detective in charge of your case.”

  “And?”

  If Larissa’s expression was any indication, the news wasn’t good. “It’s...well... he’ll tell you when he gets here.”

  That definitely didn’t sound good. On the plus side, at least she didn’t have to wait long. The door swung open and Austin stepped into the office. He must have taken a quick shower before changing back into his street clothes, because his hair was still a little damp.

  For an instant, he seemed as if he didn’t know what to say, but then he blinked a couple times, and his usual cool demeanor slipped into place. He leaned one hip against the desk and folded his arms over his chest. “I just got a call from Detective Lopez; he’s the officer assigned to your case. He and his partner went to the convenience store this morning, hoping to talk to the clerk. When they got there, the place was burned to the ground. Total loss.”

  Her heart slammed against her ribs. “And the clerk?”

  Austin slowly shook his head. “Nowhere to be found. He’s not home and he’s not answering his phone. No one’s seen or heard from him since last night.”

  His eyes met hers, and understanding passed between them. Most likely, the clerk was dead because he could have identified her kidnappers. The guy might have been a jerk, but he didn’t deserve to die. Guilt tore at her insides, tightening her chest, making it difficult to breathe and almost impossible to speak.

  “It’s not your fault,” Austin said, as if reading her thoughts. “You’re not responsible for the actions of others.”

  Sure, that sounded great on paper, but it didn’t do squat to ease her conscience. Her eyes blurred with unshed tears, and she blinked until they cleared away. “I understand that, but it doesn’t change the reality. If I’d kept on walking, that man would still be alive.”

  “You don’t know that for sure.”

  “Of course I do. I might not have done it directly, but that man’s blood is on my hands.” She glanced up at him, and the steely resolve in his gorgeous green eyes came close to doing her in. But it also gave her the strength she needed to finally come clean about her past. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

  The lines between his eyebrows deepened. “Is it something I’ll like?”

  “No. I, uh...” The words caught in her throat, and she coughed to clear it. With each passing second, it was getting more difficult to speak, so she decided to just blurt it out and go from there. “My brother was responsible for my kidnapping.”

  Outrage spread over Austin’s face. “Son of a bitch. Have you called the police to let them know?”

  She shook her head. “There’s no point in telling them. I don’t have any proof, and he’ll just deny it anyway.”

  “But they need to—”

  “Let her finish,” Larissa cut him off. To Nina, she said in a much gentler voice, “Go on.”

  Nina paused to gather her thoughts, her heart pounding so hard it felt like it was going to burst through her chest. She took a deep breath, blew it out slowly, and started at the beginning. “My family is very powerful, well-connected, and above the law. Ever since I was a kid, they’ve had the police in their pocket, as well as some judges and a few politicians. Are you familiar with the term Bratva?”

  “Yeah, it’s the Russian maf—” Austin’s mouth dropped open. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

  At that moment, she regretted telling him the truth, but it was too late to take the words back. Besides, he had a right to know what kind of disaster he’d gotten himself into. “Before he passed away, my father was the head of the Order of Petrov.”

  Austin didn’t utter a word while he processed what she’d just told him. Slowly, outrage spread over his face. His gaze cut left to Larissa, accusation plain in his sharp green eyes. “You knew about this all along, didn’t you?”

  When she gave a curt nod, he threw his hands up in exasperation and let out a creative string of expletives.

  “She wasn’t involved in the business,” Larissa said as he paced the small room like a lion trapped in a cage.

  “It doesn’t matter. She’s a mafia fucking princess. You should have told me the second you found out. Do you have any idea what this could do to the company’s reputation?” He dragged both hands through his hair, making a few strands stick up. “Christ, we’re so fucking screwed. She’s worked on government contracts. If they ever catch wind of this, they’ll never work with us again.”

  Larissa made an exasperated sound. “Oh, for Pete’s sake, settle down. The government’s not going to find out. And even if they did, her work is beyond reproach. It’s not fair to judge her by what her family did. She’s a victim.”

  Anger set his jaw and rolled off him like waves on a stormy sea. “And how do you know? Because she said so?”

  The way they were talking about her, as if she wasn’t even there, started to tick Nina off. She coughed to get their attention. “I am still in the room, you know.”

  Austin spun around, his eyes sharper than daggers when his gaze locked onto hers. “Oh, I’m very much aware that you’re still in the room, princess. Forgive me if I’m a little preoccupied with salvaging a business I built from the ground up.”

  She jerked her chin up. “I’m not going to damage your business.”

  “Sweetheart, just having you on the payroll jeopardizes everything we’ve worked for. Haven’t you ever heard of guilt by association?”

  “Will you get your head out of your ass for ten minutes and listen?” Larissa snapped. Tension building, they glared at each other as though waging some sort of unspoken battle, until she finally spoke again. “The only reason I know is because she told me. And yeah, after I found out, I did a lot of digging and verified everything she said.”

  “Is that supposed to make it better?” His voice sounded low and lethal.

  “No, it’s supposed to convince you that the sky isn’t going to fall. Just listen to what she has to say. If you want her gone after that, it’s your decision. I’ll respect it, but I’ll still think you’re an ass and I probably won’t talk to you for a while.”

  Without another word, Larissa stood and crossed the room. As she passed, she gave Nina’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze. Then she was gone; the door clicked shut behind her, leaving Nina and Austin in the office.

&n
bsp; Nina was the first to break the silence. “If I talk, will you actually listen?”

  He had the nerve to look offended. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  Determined not to show weakness, she tilted her head up to meet his gaze, and the anger in his eyes broke her heart. “It seems like you’ve already made your mind up about me. If that’s the case, there’s no point in explaining. I’ll pack up my desk and leave.”

  Even though they were only six feet apart, it felt as though miles separated them. He stared at her, not blinking, not speaking. A war of emotions played over his rough, chiseled features. With each passing second, time seemed to drag and the tension grew unbearably tight, like a bowstring straining for release. At last, he shook his head, raked a hand through his hair, and sat down on Larissa’s empty chair. “Go ahead, I’m listening.”

  A sliver of hope took root inside her as she organized her thoughts. “My family moved to the United States two years before I was born. They settled in a small town not far from San Francisco. There are four—no, actually, there were four of us kids: two boys and two girls. I’m the third born, and the youngest girl.

  “Growing up, I was told that my father owned a shipping company, but I never had a clear understanding of what he really did. At the time, I didn’t think much about it. But when I was fifteen, a war broke out between my father’s organization and the Belikovs, who wanted to take over my father’s territory. Alexei, my older brother and the one my father was grooming to take over the business, was killed in an ambush while driving home one night.”

  She’d loved Alexei, and the memory of him in an open casket still tore a hole in her heart. Trying not to think about it, she picked at her nails while she stared at a spot on the wall just above Austin’s shoulder.

  “From what I understand, the two families were evenly matched in terms of size and strength, and even though my father wanted revenge, he was a pragmatic man by nature. He decided it was best to broker a peace, and to achieve that he arranged for my older sister, Dasha, to marry the Belikov’s oldest son, Yegor.”

  The muscles along Austin’s jaw flexed. “I take it she didn’t have a say in the matter.”

  Nina shook her head. Her chest tightened as the memories from thirteen years ago played out in her mind. “Women in general don’t have much say in the Bratva. Dasha wasn’t happy about it but she did as she was told. Papa got what he wanted, and he never objected to the way Yegor treated her. Or maybe she just didn’t say anything about it; I don’t know. But I saw the bruises, and I saw the way the light slowly went out of her eyes. Six months into the marriage, she learned she was pregnant, and she told me that she couldn’t bear the thought of having a monster’s child.”

  A sharp, sour taste rose up in her throat, and she swallowed hard to force it back down. In her heart, she knew she couldn’t have stopped Dasha, though a part of her couldn’t help but wonder and it tore her up inside. “Two days later, she took her own life. Slit her wrists in the bathtub.”

  Austin made a sound that was somewhere between shock and outrage. “Shit, I’m sorry.”

  “Nothing for you to be sorry about. It’s not like you had anything to do with it.” She pushed on, ignoring the swell of grief that stung her eyes and blurred her vision. “Anyway, Yegor was furious. He came to our home a few nights after Dasha’s funeral, demanding compensation, as if she was some sort of defective product. I didn’t hear the whole conversation—Mama sent me upstairs to my room—but by the time they were finished, my father had arranged for me to marry Yegor when I turned eighteen.”

  This time, the sound Austin made was pure disgust, and it perfectly matched his expression. “How old were you when this happened?”

  “A few months shy of seventeen. Yegor was twenty-three.”

  “And Yegor was okay with waiting that long?”

  Nina let out a low, bitter laugh. “He wasn’t happy about it, but my father insisted. In the meantime, he allowed Yegor to take me out on dates with a chaperone. Why, I have no idea.” An involuntary shudder went through her at the thought of it. “He treated me well enough, probably because my father wouldn’t let me leave the house without one of his most trusted guards, but every time Yegor touched me or kissed me, it made my skin crawl.”

  Austin didn’t say anything right away, but his pinched eyes and rigid posture told her everything she needed to know. Teeth clenched, he asked in a rough, low voice, “What happened when you married him?”

  “I didn’t.” The words came out harsher than she intended. “After what happened to Dasha, there was no way in hell I was going to marry that asshole. Even back then, I was pretty handy behind a keyboard. I created a new identity, saved and stole as much money as I could, and at the first opportunity, I ran.”

  “Where did you go?”

  “All over the place. For the first year or two, I never stayed in any one location for very long. Mostly, I lived in big cities, because it was easier to blend in. I did odd jobs for extra cash, and after a few months, I moved to the next town. Eventually, I ended up in Orlando. By then, I was getting tired of running. I answered an ad for a roommate by the university, where I wouldn’t have to put my name on a lease.”

  Austin went silent for a few long moments as though he was digesting everything she’d just told him. “What happened to your family after you left?”

  “The war started back up, even worse than before. From what I understand, my father’s organization won, but both sides came out of it bloody. It caught the attention of the FBI, but after six months, they closed their investigation without filing any charges. Two years ago, my father passed away and Ivan took over the business.”

  “And your mother?”

  She shrugged. “I have no idea. Like I said, women don’t have much say in the Bratva, and she never came up in any of the articles. Ivan mentioned her when we talked, so I suppose she’s still alive, but I didn’t ask how she was.”

  Swallowing hard, Nina rubbed at the ache that was building at the base of her skull. She glanced up at Austin, hoping to gauge his reaction, but his face gave nothing away. “So now you know everything. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, but for obvious reasons, it’s not exactly the kind of thing I wanted to share. If you want, I’ll clean out my desk and get out of your hair. All I ask is that you keep what I told you in confidence. Or don’t; it’s up to you. I’ll be long gone before anyone finds out.”

  The last thing she wanted was to leave, but if he thought her presence would be a liability to the company, she wasn’t about to argue. And if he didn’t want her in his life, she’d suck it up and accept that as well. In time, her heart would heal. Hopefully, Larissa would give her a good enough reference for her to land another job.

  Bracing for the worst but hoping for the best, she waited for Austin’s response. His body language made it clear he was angry. He opened his mouth as if to say something, hesitated, and then closed it with a shake of his head. Then he rose from his seat and walked out of the room without a backward glance.

  Chapter Twelve

  A SHORT DRIVE LATER, Austin parked his truck at the one place where he could usually think clearly.

  After pocketing his keys, he gathered everything he needed for the gun range and got out of the truck. He needed time alone to process the bomb that Nina had just dropped on him. In his heart, he’d known she was hiding something. But Russian mafia? What the actual fuck?

  She should have told him, should have trusted him with the information instead of keeping him in the dark until her options had completely run out. The betrayal stung, especially considering the way he felt about her. Even though he’d been reluctant to admit it, from the moment he met her, he’d felt a connection that ran a hell of a lot deeper than simple attraction.

  After paying his fee at the front office, he walked to the outdoor pistol range and pinned up a fresh round of targets. No matter how many times he ran it through his head, he kept circling back to the simple fact she
’d repeatedly lied to him. She could have told him last night after he took her to his place, or this morning after Ryan left.

  Hell, she could have told him at any time during the past year she’d worked for Six Points. But no, she’d chosen to keep him in the dark about her ties to a criminal organization that was probably on the watch list of every law enforcement agency in the country. It posed a serious credibility problem for the company, and if any of their clients found out, they’d be within their rights to terminate their contracts.

  He picked up the gun, the cold steel a familiar comfort, and loaded a fresh magazine. Taking aim, he fired four shots and grimaced at the lousy grouping within the black inner circle. He was also pissed at Larissa. She damn well should have informed him about Nina’s past the instant she uncovered it. At this point, he wasn’t sure who he was more upset with: Nina for lying, his sister for not telling him, or himself for trusting them both.

  Austin sensed Wade’s presence a split second before he spotted him in his periphery, wearing a plain black shirt, jeans, beat-up construction boots, and a black baseball cap with the Six Points logo. A pair of bright orange plugs protected his ears, and yellow-tinted sunglasses covered his eyes. Without a word, he walked up alongside Austin and placed his gun case on the loading table.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked, not bothering to mask the irritation in his voice. “Larissa bribe you into coming out?”

  Wade shook his head, the scars on his face more prominent under the afternoon sun. “I volunteered after she told me what happened.”

  That wasn’t the answer Austin had expected, considering how Wade usually kept to himself. “I’m not in the mood for a lecture.”

  “Good. I wasn’t planning to give one.” Wade unzipped the case that held his weapon. The faint whiff of gun oil scented the air as he took out his Colt M1911 pistol. He inserted a loaded magazine and set two more on the table.

  Fine, whatever. Austin shifted his attention back to the target and stared straight down the sight. He fired on the exhale, his body absorbing the brunt of the recoil, and repeated the action until the magazine clicked empty. Checking the target, he grimaced again at the shitty grouping.