Coming Undone (3 page)

Tough choices.

Her eyes burned. Could have been the shampoo, could have been tears.

This wasn’t her longest con, not by a long shot. By the time she’d been old enough to talk, to fake supermarket slip and falls, and bat her lashes at the men who came to the door looking for their stolen belongings, she’d always had a partner in crime. When she set her eyes on Salim, she’d had her partner by her side.

But her mother’s luck ran out. One too many lies. One too many fake names, fake sob stories, fake everything. One metal baseball bat to the head later, she’d lost a mother, a mentor. The only stable and true thing in her entire existence. And what had her mother lost?

Her ability to speak, to think, to rationalize. She’d become a shell, unable to recognize her own daughter. McKenna had lost control then, the only time she could remember doing so. She’d abandoned the plan, the carefully constructed plan, and spent all her time taking care of her mother.

There would be no justice. The authorities required the truth and McKenna sure as hell couldn’t share that. She didn’t even know her mother’s birth name. She doubted she ever had. The woman who gave birth to her had been at the game long before McKenna was born. In fact, McKenna had been a con, a deliberate pinprick in a condom to ferret hush money from a wealthy married man somewhere in the Deep South.

She was known now as Marilyn Lacey to her caretakers in the nursing home, but she’d been Helena, Marie, Lucy, Diane. Too many names and stories to keep straight.

McKenna dipped her head under the spray of water, eyes screwed shut. She was tired, had been tired of always being on the move for over twenty-five years. She’d been ready to give it up, abandon the groundwork she’d laid with Salim and walk away from it all when her mother got hurt, but reality crashed in quick. The money they’d stashed away disappeared almost overnight under the weight of her mother’s medical bills and McKenna had to make choices.

Before her world fell down around her, she’d worked damn hard to get into Salim’s bed. The plan was to be his woman, gain access to his bank accounts, and bleed him dry at the first opportunity. She’d had no idea what being in Salim’s bed truly meant. What being dependent on him meant.

Until she’d been well and truly caught in the web.

She needed the money he provided her to take care of her mother. If it wasn’t for that, McKenna could tell him to fuck off and go about her merry way…except he had her. Dead to rights. He knew who she really was. Knew that her mother was wanted in over ten states.

If she walked away, the cops would come knocking, and she couldn’t have her mother die in a prison. Locked up somewhere without sunlight. McKenna figured she could take whatever Salim felt like dishing out, but her mother was another story.

One that wasn’t up for debate.

She ended her shower and stepped out after wrapping a towel around her wet body. She used another towel to dry her hair as she walked into the bedroom. Her stomach growled, but she didn’t have the will to eat anything. Instead, she pulled on some underwear and crawled into bed. Her damp hair spread across the pillow and the material was cold under her cheek, but McKenna curled onto her side and pulled the blanket up over her head.

Maybe she could get some sleep before Salim showed up to take even more from her.

****

She couldn’t say for sure what pulled her from the restless sleep, but McKenna came awake on a gasping breath. Night had fallen and her bedroom was cold, cloaked in darkness. Nothing moved, but she felt it on her skin.

A rustle. A presence. She sat up slowly, one hand reaching out gingerly to turn on the lamp on her bedside table.

“I wouldn’t if I were you.”

“Fuck!” Her heart slammed against her ribcage. The voice was familiar and close, too close. She turned the tiny black knob, flooding the room with a warm yellow glow.

He sat on the floor near the doorway, his legs stretched out in front of him, hoodie pulled up. His head was angled in such a way she only saw half of his face. The other remained shadowed.

“Hello again, McKenna.”

That voice was like cut glass, jagged and sharp and lethal how it scraped across her skin. Who was this guy? She pulled her knees up to her chest and crossed her arms as she squinted down at him. “I take it this is a regular thing with you? The breaking and entering?”

“Believe it or not, this is my first time.” His tone held no humor, dry as a fucking desert wasteland.

“Not believing it.” She tried sliding her fingers through her hair, but winced when they got caught in all the tangles. Shit. “I’d like you to remove your carcass off my bedroom floor and leave the same way you came, whoever the fuck you are. Now.”

He didn’t budge, didn’t blink, didn’t give any indication he’d heard her. “You can call me RJ.”

McKenna clutched the red comforter to her chest. “No. See, I don’t want to call you anything.” She snatched her phone from under her pillow. “Who I will call is Salim Najal if you don’t make yourself scarce.” She hit the contacts icon on her phone but didn’t get the chance to see the screen change. He was on her, his bulk covering her body as he pressed her into the bed.

McKenna blinked up at him, at the white scar bisecting his right cheek and brow and the dark patch covering his right eye. His exposed eye was green, a sort of mint color with flecks of amber and gold. He held her down with one hand, not an easy feat when she kicked and lashed out, trying to claw his face.

“Keep calm.” His voice had no inflections, nothing to indicate their current position. “I’m not here to hurt you, McKenna. I’d have already done it while you slept.”

“Yeah?” She lifted her head off the pillow, coming inches from his nose. “So what? Maybe you like your victims to fight back. You strike me as the type.”

He didn’t rise to the bait. Instead he pried the phone from her fingers with infinite slowness and pocketed it in his ragged jeans. Task finished, he moved away from her, got off the bed, and went to stand in the bedroom doorway.

“My job is to make Salim Najal pay for the things he’s done,” he said sternly. “The crimes he’s committed. I need your help to do it.”

“No.” She shook her head. “No, you don’t. Go to the cops. Take that shit up with someone else. Leave me out.” Her hands trembled, and she quickly hid them under the blankets. Her help. No way was she helping anyone to anything.

The man—RJ—regarded her silently. The longer he stared at her, the more pronounced her tremors grew until she had no hope of hiding them.

“Don’t you know better than to get emotionally involved with your trick?” This time disgust dripped from his words and shone from his one visible eye. He clearly didn’t think much of her, and McKenna couldn’t say that she gave a flying fuck. He thought she loved Salim, and that she could work with.

She bared her teeth at him. “Don’t you know better than to show up where you’re not wanted? You’re liable to lose your other eye there, Patches.”

His nostrils flared, the only sign of any facial expression since he’d made himself known. Unshakeable, that one. His sandy-blond hair was cut almost to the scalp, severe, matching the hard angles of his face. She swore his eye glowed in the dark.

“You’re not who you appear to be.” He spoke the words low, as if to himself, and McKenna’s stomach flipped.

“Whatever. Get out.” She waved her hand and a phone rang. Salim’s ringtone.
“That’s Salim, and if I don’t answer, he’ll be coming in.”

“Can’t have that.” He pulled the phone from his pocket. “Let’s keep my presence a secret, hm
m? Otherwise I’ll have to rescind my earlier promise not to hurt you.” He winked and threw the phone at her. “And him.”

McKenna rolled her eyes as she answered Salim. “Hi, baby.”

“The boys will be there in twenty minutes to get you. Don’t be late.”

“I’ll be ready.” She hung up and raised an eyebrow. “I’ve got a hot date so I hope you don’t mind if we cut this
tête-à-tête
short?”

RJ walked over to her, footsteps silent for such a big guy. He stopped next to the bed and looked down at her. His hard features were once again smooth, betraying nothing when he said, “Salim is on my hit list. It’s not someplace you want to be, McKenna. Choose a side. And soon.”

Twisting her fingers in the blanket, McKenna stared up at him. “What is the big deal? Why can’t you take whatever you think Salim did to the cops?” Why involve her, for God’s sake?

“The woman he had before you was the daughter of a friend of mine,” RJ said. “She disappeared after indicating she wanted to end things with Salim. We don’t know if he killed her outright, or if he handed her over to the many shady men he deals with. Either way, there’s been no trace of her for years.”

McKenna swallowed. Jesus. She didn’t want to hear the words, didn’t want to know.

“Salim has diplomatic immunity. That means no matter what he does, who he hurts, all the US can and will do is put him on a plane to his home country.” He shook his head slightly. “That is unacceptable.”

“What do you want then?” she asked. “From me, what do you want from me?” She was scared to hear what he wanted. Something told her she’d have a hard time refusing once he spelled it out.

“I’d like to kill him.” He smiled, a genuine, honest-to-goodness smile that transformed his face into a more lethal façade. “Until I know what happened three years ago, I can’t. I need answers.”

McKenna choked. “I’m supposed to find them?”

“I want you to put some listening devices in his place.” He shrugged. “Obviously I can’t get in to do it.”

What the hell? “Are you trying to get me killed, is that it?” She jerked upright and swung her legs off the bed, pulling the towel tight around her body. RJ moved out of her way smoothly, his gaze never leaving her face.

“Salim trusts you.”

“Salim doesn’t trust anyone but Salim, fool.” Goddamn it. Goddamn it. This was what it boiled down to? Being a pawn to use in someone else’s game of chess?

“Still, you’re on the inside.”

McKenna stared at him. “I can’t even…I can’t deal with this right now.” She padded over to her closet. “Show yourself out. I have to be someplace.” She didn’t look to see if he complied.

“Think about it, McKenna.”

She didn’t like how he said her name. Like it was something sweet, to be savored. She put her head down and chose her clothes. When she finally turned around, he was gone. A white business card sat on her dresser. She walked over and picked it up.

A phone number with no name.

Goddamn it.

Chapter Three

“She’s not who she appears to be.” RJ stroked his chin with a finger as he stared at a photo of McKenna Lacey with her arms around Salim, her face alight with laughter as she stared up at him. They were out at
a black tie event to raise money for God knew what. They looked good together, a very beautiful couple, but that was a façade.

He knew that much.

“What makes you say that?”

RJ looked up at Carter. He’d forgotten his brother sat opposite him on the ratty sofa in the cold warehouse. Carter’s interest was well peaked, one of his eyebrows raised as he gazed expectantly at RJ.

Bringing his attention back to the image of Salim and McKenna, RJ shrugged. “I don’t know. I can’t put my finger on it, but I know that”—he waved at the computer screen—“that is a lie.” There was no way McKenna was in love with Salim.

“What are you talking about?”

He didn’t have to look at Carter to see the confused frown on his face. “Are we looking at the same images? Because from what I see, she is completely in love with dude.”

“That’s it.” RJ jumped to his feet with a snap of his fingers. “It’s what we see, and we see a woman in love with a powerful man. At least that’s what she wants us to see.”

Carter shook his head. “I’m lost, man.”

“She’s pretending.” RJ grinned when Carter gasped. Pretense. Why didn’t that surprise him? “It’s a game, but to what end?”
Was McKenna in on the entire thing with Salim? Had she known the true nature of the man she bedded from the beginning?

“A game?” Carter narrowed his eyes. “How can that be faked?” He nodded to the seemingly happy couple. “And why?”

RJ laughed and clapped his brother on the shoulder. “That’s the question we have to answer.” He bent and peered at McKenna, staring into her eyes crinkled at the corners from her smile. “Once we have the answers, we’ll have her.” He was sure of it because no one went to that much trouble to play masquerade unless they had something to hide.

That much he knew first hand.

“If all this is faked, she must know, and if she does, then we have no leverage,” Carter pointed out. “We can’t scare her into helping.”

“Not with that, but maybe we can scare her with what she’s fighting so desperately to hide.” RJ patted his brother’s shoulder. “Give the old man an update. I’m gonna get some rest.”

Carter nodded and turned back to the computer but called out when RJ was halfway up the stairs to the bedrooms.

“Hey, how do we find out what she’s hiding?”

RJ glanced over his shoulder and winked. “Leave that to me.” He felt Carter’s eyes on him until he escaped into his bedroom and slammed the door shut. They'd found the Williamsburg warehouse for a steal and converted it into a base of operation once RJ realized their plans would take more time that they’d originally planned.