Partners (Fire & Lies - One) (17 page)

“Your mother?
How?”

“She had an
affair with Goldsmith.”

“Shit, is his
dick made of gold too? That guy really gets around. Did your father
know?”

She shook her
head. “Not that I’m aware. But my mother told me the day she was
evicted from our family home.”

DECEMBER,
three years before

“
MUM?”
CHLOE called out, as she walked through the empty rooms of what was
once her family home. With no furniture to absorb the sound, her
steps echoed loudly off the marble floors, giving the house an
eerie quality it never seemed to have before.

“
Mum?” she
called again, walking up the long winding staircase to the second
floor. She listened carefully, heading toward the master bedroom
where she felt sure that she could hear her mother’s sobs.

Pushing open
the door, she found Sienna Donovan sitting on the carpeted steps
that lead down to what was once their sunken bedroom. Chloe looked
around, noting how enormous the room seemed without furniture in
it, then she sat down next to her mother and placed her arm around
her, holding her as she sobbed.

“
This is
all my fault,” Sienna moaned, crying into her daughter’s
neck.

Chloe shushed
her mother, rubbing her hand up and down her slim frame soothingly.
“It wasn’t your fault at all. If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine.
I’m the one who married into that family. The opportunity wouldn’t
have been there if I’d refused.”

“
No. You
don’t understand. It
is
my fault. Michael Goldsmith. He did
this to hurt me.”

“
To hurt
you? Why?”

Sienna lifted
her head, her eyes shining as mascara ran down her face, still
beautiful despite the years. “Because I wouldn’t run away with
him.”

Chloe’s head
pulled back in surprise. “You wouldn’t what?”

“
We had an
affair, Chloe. Back when you were still just a girl. He wanted me
to leave your father. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t take you away from
him and I didn’t want to be the woman who ruined two families. So I
said no.”

“
Did you
know he was going to do this?”

Sienna shook
her head, wiping at her eyes as fresh tears fell. “No. Not until he
sent me those.” She pointed to a bouquet of red roses that Chloe
hadn’t noticed lying, half broken on the floor. It was obvious that
her mother had thrown them.

Standing,
Chloe moved over to the bouquet and picked it up, reading the card
that was attached.
When nothing stands in your
way, there is no excuse. M.

“
He removed
the obstacles,” Chloe stated, understanding why her mother was so
upset.

She’d had her
suspicions that Michael Goldsmith’s interest in her family was more
than economical, and now this proved it. Of course there was an
affair involved. When a person’s life was ruled by money and power,
very rarely did one ever find the happiness of real love. Like all
wealthy men, Michael Goldsmith used his money and power to woo
women and like many a powerful man’s wife, Sienna Donovan had felt
a loneliness so powerful that the attentions of a man like Michael
Goldsmith had caused her to turn her head.

“
I believe
so.”

“
What are
you going to do?”

“
Nothing. I
don’t love him. The affair was… it was a mistake. I was lonely. He
was there…” She shook her head and wiped at her eyes again,
sniffling as she looked at the floor. “And now look what he’s
done.”

“
We have to
tell someone it was him,” Chloe said.

“
I have,
Chloe. I told the police that I was sure Michael was behind it. But
there’s no evidence.”

“
Then we
have to get some. He must have left something somewhere. He can’t
get away with this.”

“
He already
has, Chloe. And if you pursue this, he’ll take everything from you
too.”

“
What is
there for him to take? Everything I care about is already
gone.”

PRESENT,
7 days before the job

I TELL Aiden
everything, finally explaining why we couldn’t be together and why
I left him without a word. “What we had was apocalyptic, Aiden. I
had to leave or it was going to destroy the both of us,” I say to
finish, wiping at my eye before any sort of tear can make it out to
my cheek.

“Isn’t that
exactly what happened anyway?”

I wipe at my
eye again, pressing my lips together as I nod. “We were damned if
we did and damned if we didn’t.”

“I suppose we
were.” He reaches over and cups my face in his hands, pressing his
lips ever so softly to my eyelids. “Come here,” he murmurs, pulling
me toward him as he brings our mouths together. His arms slide
around my body and he rolls, pulling me so my chest lies on
his.

I look down at
him, studying his face and committing it to memory. I don’t know
how long we have this time. But I don’t want to forget a moment of
it.

“I’d do
everything differently if I could do it again,” I whisper.

He reaches up
and pushes my hair back from my face. “I think we both would.”
Bringing my mouth to his, I slide my leg over his body and settle
myself on top of him, whimpering slightly as I feel the throb of
his hard cock as it presses between my thighs.

I slide my
folds up and down his shaft, grinding myself against him as his
hands move down to squeeze my arse and then my hips, his strong
grip, always biting into me, verging on painful. But I love it. I
love the intensity in his need to grip me. I’ll be bruised from his
hands, just like I was the last time. But I love that he marks me.
I’m not sure what that says about me…

With a sudden
growl, he grips me harder and lifts me off his waist, dragging me
up his body as if I’m weightless. My arms reach out and grip the
headboard as his mouth closes over my core and his tongue dives
inside me.

“Holy shit,” I
gasp as his tongue circles my bundle of nerves, swollen and hard
and so close to release.

His arms curl
around my thighs and his hands splay over my belly, pulling at my
flesh as his mouth moves against me and my body spasms, my climax
coming all too quickly. His hands shift to my hips again and he
moves me back down to his waist, plunging himself inside me as he
rocks his hips up in one swift movement.

“Ah!” I gasp,
my body shuddering as warm swirls through me, hardening my nipples
into small tight peaks as his hands slide over them and I push up
through my thighs, bringing myself down to meet each of his
thrusts.

He moves his
hands again and pulls me down toward him, our mouths locking
together as our hips continue to move. I whimper as he moans, and
before long, we’re coming, shuddering, and crying out, whispering
names and quivering like we’ve just been through something
monumental.

We lie there,
catching our breath as his fingertips glide up and down my back,
and I rest my head on his chest, keeping him inside me.

“Are you
really sure you want to go through with it?” he asks after a
while.

I nod. “I’m
sure. I need to find a way.”

He lets out a
sigh of resignation. “Ok then. Well, I know someone who can help
us. But this is going to have to be done my way and under my
orders. Otherwise we’re all going to end up in prison. Do you think
you can do that?”

I sit up,
sliding off him to sit beside him. “You want to do it
with
me
?” I shake my head, feeling like this just got way too
complicated. “No, Aiden. I’m not risking you too. What about your
business? What about the club? You have people who need you. No one
needs me. No one needs Leah. We’re both willing to go down for it
if it doesn’t work out. The answer is no, Aiden. No.”

He slides out
of the bed, his face stern as he stands in front of me, buck naked
with his hands on his hips. “This isn’t an option, Chloe. You can’t
get in there without me, and you certainly can’t get out with what
you want without me. We do it my way, or we don’t do it at all.
Understood?”

I open my
mouth to speak but shut it, having nothing to say. He’s right. I
can’t get into that bank without him. The original plan is going to
have to change. I just hope Leah will go along with it…

“Understood?”
he repeats, and I nod.

“Understood.”

“Good,” he
says, extending his hand to me. “Now, get your arse in the shower.
I’m going to fuck you, clean you then feed you. Then we’re going
into the office. We’ve got shit to plan.”

When I take
his hand, he tugs me toward him, hoisting me up and throwing me
over his shoulder. I squeal in surprise, and then reach down and
slap at his arse, squealing again when he slaps mine much harder,
before he takes me into the bathroom and proceeds to fulfil his
promise.

“NICE OF you
to grace us with your presence today,” Jared says, as he sees me
walk through the door to the office. “Don’t worry. I fucking
covered your shift at Ark and told Marli that you were on another
job. Although you’d know all that if you answered your fucking
phone,” he rants as he stands up from his desk and walks toward
me.

It’s then that
Chloe decides to appear from behind me, offering him a small wave
as she presses her lips together looking a little awkward but
fucking adorable. My eyes drift to my office and I wonder how much
Jared would be able to hear…

“Oh. Hello
again. I guess this explains your absenteeism of late. How are you,
sweetheart? It’s Chloe right?”

He extends his
hand and she takes it. “Yes. It’s Chloe. Nice to see you
again.”

“The
pleasure’s all mine, believe me,” he grins, his eyes travelling
over her curves with admiration.

I clear my
throat loudly and shoot him a look of warning. He lifts his hands
as if surrendering. “You’ve got nothing to worry about from me.
Just looking.” He gives Chloe a wink. “I had a feeling I’d see you
again. You had him all tied up in knots last time.”

“Oh I did, did
I?” she laughs, and I hold my hand up to stop this ridiculous
conversation.

“All right.
Enough. We’re not here to talk shit. We’re here to talk business.
Jared, what if I told you that Chloe here, works for a big bank and
they’re interested in hiring a man with your skills to test the
vulnerability of their systems to hackers–would you be
interested?”

He folds his
arms across his chest and looks down at the both of us. He towers
over me and he makes Chloe look like a kid as she only comes up to
his chest height. “I’d be interested. I can hack most banks with my
eyes closed. But I’d also say that I think you’re full of shit.
Ain’t no way, Chloe Donovan works for a bank.” He turns to her. “I
know who you are. I did some research on you after you got him all
worked up the other day,” he explains.

I laugh. I
can’t help it. The kid sees straight through me. “Well, are you
still interested?”

“Fuck yeah,
man. If you need access, I’m your man. With the shit pay you’re
handing out, I hack those greedy fucks all the time–spread the
wealth a little. I’ve gotta save for my retirement.”

“Wait up a
second,” Chloe says. “Hacking? I thought you did club security and
some recovery operations. But hacking? That’s a whole other ball
game.”

“A game that I
excel at my young lass,” Jared crows, loving it when he gets the
chance to toot his own horn.

“You never met
him, but Jared came to me from Donovan Corp where his skills were
more widely used. Your father wasn’t exactly above board himself,
as you know. So Jared was quite the asset.”

“Believe me, I
know my father wasn’t the perfect citizen. You don’t get that rich
by being a good guy.”

“Why are we
clearing his name again?”

“Because he’s
innocent.”

“Whoa. What?”
Jared says suddenly. “Old man Donovan is innocent? Bullshit. I
looked into those transactions myself. They all came from him.”

“It wasn’t
him. It was Audrey and Goldsmith,” I inform him.

“Audrey? The
red head with the big tits?” he says, holding his hands out to mime
her ample bosom.

“Yes,” Chloe
confirms.

“Shit. What
was her motive for doing that?”

Chloe and I
explain the whole scenario to him, and when we’re done, he has one
word for us. “Fuckers!”

Then he rubs
his hands together. “Ok. Well, if we need to get into that vault
then we need to get into that vault. Just let me pull up the
schematics and we can see what we’re dealing with.”

He moves over
to his laptop and opens it up, his fingers dancing over the keys at
lightning speed.

“Wait. What
you’re doing can’t be traced back here, can it?” Chloe asks,
obviously worried that we’d get busted before we’ve even
started.

“Don’t worry
about it, sweetheart. I do this shit all the time for fun. Just
relax. Leave this to the professionals. Just promise me that you
bring me something pretty from those safety deposit boxes.”

“We’ve got to
get in there and out without detection first,” I say, moving to
where I can see the screen.

“Well, that
part’s on you, boss. I can get you access, but you’ll have to get
in there and out without getting yourself on the most wanted list.
Have you thought that part out yet?”

“Yeah, we
have,” Chloe says. “We’re going to go in as other people.”

“Other
people?”

“Yeah, man,” I
say. “You should see the bang up makeup job she can do–makes you
look completely different.”