Take Me Deeper (21 page)

Of course, he could imagine that Iris looked the same wet and naked as she did naked and under him, where she'd been for a good couple of hours already, so perhaps he wasn't missing anything.

His phone buzzed again.

Dick. Of course he was missing something. Iris wet and naked was completely different from Iris naked and under him, and he wanted to see her. He most especially wanted to run his hands all over her slippery, wet flesh and perhaps lift her up against the white-tiled wall of the shower and make her scream again.

His phone buzzed even more insistently.

Cursing, he reached for it, if only so he could turn the damn thing off. But then he made the mistake of glancing at the screen and noticing that he had a text from Quinn.

Oh, hell. There was a reason he shouldn't be spending quality time with Iris in the shower.

The restaurant tonight. The cartel.

“Fuck,” he muttered softly. How could he have forgotten all about that? He'd never not remembered a mission. Never. Not Relentless Redmond.

Zane scrubbed a hand over his face, trying to get his head back in the game, where it needed to be. Jesus Christ, Iris had pretty much blanked his mind with that sweet little pussy of hers and her even sweeter kisses. Begging him not to stop, his name on her lips as she'd screamed. And her hands holding his face, her eyes dark and soft as fur, telling him she needed him.

His chest constricted, something in him shifting like a broken bone rubbing against another, painful, sharp.

Once Charlie had needed him, but she'd been the only one. His brothers hadn't, too caught up in their own grief, and his goddamn father had found everything he needed at the bottom of a liquor bottle. And when Zane had tried to help him see beyond that, well…

He blinked, trying to shake off the feeling. He didn't have time for that kind of shit. Christ, he
never
had time for that kind of shit. Frowning, he concentrated instead on the text Quinn had sent him. They'd gotten word that the cartel had fallen for the bait and were interested in doing a deal at the Waterwheel in return for Iris. Also, it looked like Rush had managed to get the police on board, which meant all they needed to do now was finalize the details of a take-down strategy.

As he read, his phone vibrated again with another text, this time from Rush. Flicking his thumb over the screen, he opened it and grinned. His brother had sent him the floor plans of the restaurant, gotten from a contact of his. Excellent. Now they could
really
start planning the best way to get these cartel guys into police custody and away from Iris.

Just like the old days, eh?

Yeah, not quite like the old days. They were missing one drunken old fool who insisted on taking charge, even when he was so drunk he couldn't stand upright. But not now. Now Zane was taking part, organizing the mission himself with his brothers as his support and his backup.

Sound familiar? You could be back in the army…

He stilled as the thought struck him, staring down at his phone. It
was
like the army, only instead of his unit, he had his brothers. And he couldn't deny the feeling of rightness that settled in the center of his chest. As if this was the way it was supposed to be.

No. That was stupid. This was a mission—
his
mission—and once he'd completed both it and the six months he'd promised Quinn, he'd be out of here. He'd be done with his family once and for all.

Quickly, he studied the floor plans, then called Quinn to discuss strategy with Rush joining the conversation via text. Ten minutes later they had a plan, which was kind of insane considering how they'd all been at one another's throats a day or so earlier. Then again, it just went to show how easily they worked together when they had a focus, a goal. When they didn't let the past loom over them and color everything they did.

Maybe it could work? Maybe that old family loyalty
is
there after all?

But he didn't want to examine that idea too closely just yet, so he ignored it, finalizing the details and finishing up the call instead. Then he ordered room service for some…hell, was it late lunch? That done, he slid out of bed and stalked into the bathroom, hoping to catch Iris before she'd finished in the shower. Sadly, she'd already gotten out and was in the process of wrapping herself in one of the hotel's fluffy white robes. With her black hair sleek and damp against her shoulders, her skin freshly scrubbed and glowing, her eyes bright, she looked delicious. Delicious enough to unwrap and maybe lift up onto the vanity and…

“Oh, no, I need food first,” she said, holding up her hands as if to ward him off and grinning. “No, scratch that. I need
coffee
first.”

Not used to being read so easily, Zane blinked. “What?”

Iris rolled her eyes. “So innocent. But sorry, honey.” She put a hand on his bare chest and his dick stirred, wanting already. “I have one rule: coffee before cock.”

He laughed, sliding an arm around her waist, bringing her close, the scent of soap and perfumed body wash rising from her warm, damp skin. “Sounds like an excellent rule to break.”

“Oh sure. Because you're such a rule-breaker.” Her palms were warm against his skin as she leaned back and looked up at him, dark eyes hopeful. “Seriously. Coffee?”

He leaned down and kissed her beautiful mouth. “It's coming. In the meantime…want to have another shower?”

She narrowed her gaze. “I suppose. But what's in it for me?”

After a very pleasurable twenty minutes where he showed her exactly what was in it for her, Zane and Iris finally got out of the shower just in time for the room service tray. As he dressed, she sat cross-legged on the bed wrapped in the hotel robe, holding her coffee in one hand and a fork in the other. A slice of chocolate cake was on the tray in front of her and she was attacking it with gusto.

“What's with the suit?” she asked between bites, waving her fork at him. “I mean, why do you wear one? Your brothers don't.”

Tugging up his pants, Zane buttoned them, then reached for his shirt. “I like to be professional. Nothing wrong with that, is there?”

Iris was watching him dress with a certain amount of focus. “You must be the only bounty hunter who wears a suit.”

“Then you haven't met Duchess.” He shrugged into the shirt, doing the buttons up. “And please, we're Fugitive Recovery Agents.”

“Oh sure. Sorry.” She sounded anything but. “Is that like saying hooker instead of sex worker?”

“Something like that.”

Iris put down her fork all of a sudden. “There's something I wanted to ask you.”

Something uncomfortable turned over inside him. He had the feeling he wasn't going to like this. He bent his attention to doing up his cuffs. “What?”

“That thing with Charlie. Were your brothers involved too?”

Her name on Iris's lips sent a jolt through him. He wasn't used to discussing her with anyone, let alone this woman whom he'd only known a few days. It made him remember what he'd told her earlier, everything he'd told her.

He tucked in his shirt, smoothed it down, and adjusted his cuffs with a precise movement. Then he lifted his head and met her gaze. “I'd prefer it if we didn't do any more psychoanalysis today.”

She flushed. “I'm sorry, I didn't mean to. I should be more sensitive.”

Come on. You've already told her everything. Why be a dick about it now?

“It's okay,” he said gruffly. “It's a sore subject. We don't talk about it. My brothers and me, I mean. In fact, we never talk about it.”

“Never?”

“No.” He hesitated. “Our family broke up afterward—not that it wasn't already breaking up before. But Quinn and I went to the military and Rush…Rush went to jail.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh my God. Did he…I mean…was it his bullet that…?” She stopped, obviously hesitant.

But he knew what she was asking. “No, it wasn't Rush. He was out front.”

“Then why did he go to jail?”

“Because he didn't want Dad or Quinn to. So he took the blame.”

“Jesus.” She stared at him, cake forgotten. “Then whose was it?”

“I don't know,” he said, because he didn't and he'd never asked. He didn't want to know whose bullet had killed Charlie. If it had been his father's, he didn't know what he would have done. “It doesn't matter who did it anyway. Rush still went away.”

Iris blinked. “How long?”

“Eight years.”

“Hell,” she breathed. “For something he didn't do?”

He remembered the arguments in the desperate half hour after Charlie had bled out on the floor of her own living room. Arguments he hadn't absorbed, too paralyzed by grief to understand what was going on around him, all his attention on the young girl in his arms. Arguments between Quinn and their father, shouting about something Zane had ignored. But when the police finally arrived, it had been Rush who'd walked out calmly to meet them. Rush who'd taken responsibility for the death of the girl in the house.

Rush who'd gone to jail for something he hadn't done. To protect his father and his brothers.

To protect the family. He had your back, idiot. He always did. Just like Quinn did at Duchess's. It's still there, that loyalty. Whether you believe it or not.

“Yes,” he said, his voice oddly toneless.

“But why?”

“Because Redmonds stick together.” His father's stupid motto, said at least once a day, mostly when he was drunk. Zane had always hated the sound of it, because the old bastard didn't mean it. He only said it when he'd needed someone to go buy him more liquor.

Her forehead creased at the bitter sound of the words. “You don't like that, do you?”

“No, of course I don't fucking like it. No one stuck together, especially after Mom died. Dad just let us all go, like we didn't matter anymore.”

Iris said nothing for a long moment and when she did speak, it was soft. “You said you emptied all his bottles and then he…hurt you.”

He found his hands had clenched, even though he hadn't meant them to. Slowly, he unclenched them. “Yeah,” he said, as if it didn't still hurt all these years later. As if the betrayal of it didn't still feel like a knife in his side when he thought of it. “I was fifteen, watching Quinn disappear for days at a time, while Rush went off the rails every night at the bar across the street. I had to do something. I had to make the prick see what was happening to us.” He let out a breath, trying to ease the taut pull of an old and deep anger. “So I poured out every damn bottle of liquor we had down the sink.”

She didn't say anything, only slid off the bed in a graceful movement and came over to him, taking one of his hands in hers and just holding it, her touch warm.

“I thought he'd be grateful,” Zane went on, the words coming out whether he wanted them to or not. “I thought he'd wake up, finally see what was happening to us. I thought he'd actually fucking be there for us like a father should be. But he didn't. He just punched me in the head, then kicked me in the gut when I fell. And he told me if I ever pulled a stunt like that again, he'd kill me.”

He could still hear the old man's voice in his head, thick and slurred, his face red with fury. Still feel the impact of his father's boot in his stomach. And it wasn't the physical pain that he remembered, but the betrayal. The knowledge that all this Redmonds-stick-together bullshit was just that. Just bullshit. Just a lie.

They didn't stick together. When the shit hit the fan, it was every man for himself.

“He didn't want to stop drinking,” Zane said, because he couldn't seem to shut himself the fuck up. “Nothing was more important to him than escaping his grief. He didn't care that we were hurting too, that we missed her. He didn't give a shit about us. He didn't give a shit about me.”

Another deafening silence.

Jesus, he couldn't believe he'd said that. This had never been about him, had it?

“You couldn't have stopped him,” Iris said softly, after a long moment. “You know that, don't you?”

“Of course I know that.” But the words rang hollow, as if he didn't believe them himself.

Her gaze was steady, as if she knew something he didn't. “When Mom left, I blamed myself for a long time. I thought maybe it was something I'd done or something I'd said. But then, after a while I realized that it couldn't have been me. Because she'd left Jamie too and Jamie was just a baby.” Slowly, she turned his hand over in hers, her small thumb stroking his skin. “Mom made her own decision. And if me being her daughter wasn't enough to make her stay, then nothing I did or didn't do was going to be enough to make her change it.” She stared at him a second. “You did everything you could, Zane. But your father was going to drink no matter what. You couldn't have stopped him. He had to make that decision himself. You couldn't have saved him because he didn't want to be saved.” She bent and kissed his palm, her mouth warm. “Which makes Charlie's death his fault. Not yours. He was the one who went in there drunk. That's on him. Not you.”

He blinked at her, unable for a second to process it.

He didn't want to be saved. That's on him. Not you.

The words resonated inside him, setting up an echo, a kind of vibration that shook him all the way to his bones. Intellectually he'd known it wasn't his fault but somehow, over the years, he'd taken responsibility for it anyway. Just like he'd taken responsibility for the way his family had fallen apart after their mother had died.

As if a fifteen-year-old boy could have cured his father's alcoholism and stopped his two older brothers from going off the rails.

“He should have chosen us,” he heard himself say hoarsely. “He should have let me help him.”